Documenting my journey through the mental health system

The AC is down at work. Everyone is sweltering. Except for a few cold vets who still ask for warm blankets at night.

I don’t mind the heat. It feels nice to me. I have negative associations with the cold, and it reminds me of sterile hospital environments, the psych ward AC chill, and growing up without much heat in the house, in a northern climate known for its winters.

Now it is warming up, rapidly. My move-in back home is approaching, rapidly.

Wednesday they start tearing out the dining room wall to install a new window. I get a new door too. I’m thrilled about that. Not thrilled at what a miserable old woman my mother will be about it. But I refuse to stop. I have more plans besides this.

Like grout repair. I’m hiring a flooring specialist to restore my bathroom floor grout. It’s nice ceramic tile. It’s been fairly easy to get through all these changes but my mother has been kicking and screaming the whole way.

DBT teaches we can only worry about ourselves, essentially. Others and their behavior is their responsibility. Not mine. But soon I have to live with her again. I can’t get her to do what she really needs to do. Something as simple as cleaning up her room. Going out. Seeing a doctor. Anything besides complaining, smoking, drinking, and pretending she works 18 hours a day. It is overwhelming. I know I can’t help her. Maybe I’m supposed to, maybe it’s my job, but I don’t know what to do that I haven’t already done.