New Normal?

I want so much to be a regular person. One who gets up at 6am, puts on workout clothes, walks 2 miles, comes home, puts on coffee, showers, and starts their day whether that's working at home or going to a standard job.

I was that person for a long time--except for the exercise part *ahem*--and I remember I could only cope with it for a short time. Eventually I get bored, restless, and resentful. Mostly I can last about two years in the same position until I start to lose my mind.

I want things to be different. I want to be a "regular" person. I want to be productive, I want to contribute to society and my community, I want to be liked and valued. Maybe that's my problem. I wasn't for such a long time.

Also, I know how my brain works, and my brain causes me to fuck up, regularly. I have something called Visual and Auditory Processing Disorder.

I cannot follow verbal directions if there are more than two, or at max, three directions. My mother said she noticed this when I was a child and she would tell me, "go to your room, put on your shoes, socks, and meet me back here." She says I would go to my room, put on my socks, forget why I was there, then she'd have to come find me invariably playing with something that had caught my eye.

Oh, the ADHD (at that time--I grew out of the "H" part in my 20s).

Spatially, I have difficulty putting things in space. Also, if my brain is overloaded, I can literally overlook the item I am specifically looking for. Like magic. Things disappear and reappear to me as if they were rabbits in a hat. Like the time I lost my glasses--and they were on top of my head. Or when I needed a spatula, or the remote, or a pair of shoes, or my car keys--and I knew where I had left them, but they weren't there. In reality, I just had not seen them. So when I look for things, I tend to say them out loud, "Keys, looking for my keys," because it helps me focus and if there is someone else around, I can engage their help.

It's really hard sometimes living this way, but then, it's all I've ever know. It still is irritating, though. And part of the reason I love magic (in books, not that fake stuff they do on stage, I hate that); because it feels real to me, even though I know it's not.

My mother says that to compensate for all the bad wiring G*d gave my brain, he made me very smart. Unfortunately, I'm just smart enough to know that I'm not all that smart. And as I age, and take different drugs, my brain slows down just a little bit more.

I'm hard on myself because I've lived with myself a long time, over 40 years, and I know the imaginative and amazing ways I fuck up.

In college, I got out of Algebra, but not before getting help first. I had a tutor make me cry when he said, "I can't help you."; And then my math teacher who was getting her PhD in math at Berkeley say when reviewing my test, "You got this answer right, but I have no idea how you arrived at that answer." Guess what? Me, neither.

I then went to the disabled students office and was tested where they found, low and behold, a learning disorder regarding math. No sh*t, I thought to myself. But I got out of Algebra, fortunately, because I would never have graduated from college if it required me to pass Algebra.

So. My hours are screwed up (I've been up since 1030pm), I've probably got insomnia, my longing for normality is not strong enough to overcome my anxiety of doing things alone (yeah, I slept through the activity I wanted to attend today. Eff.), my ID keeps arguing with my ego, or however that works.

I'm applying for a county job. It looks like something I can do and would enjoy, and I'll be in close proximity to law enforcement, which I love. The mail deadline is June 9. I need to get some printer ink while I'm out today, so I can print out my app on their PDF, it's saved, in multiple places, and ready to go into the mail. So, fingers crossed. Fortunately I have a gift card to an office supply store from turning in used ink cartridges--yee haw. I love it when recycling pays off in a personal way. ;-D I'll also be looking for some letterhead stationary while I'm out to start marketing a small editorial business I have had on the side for a while. I've got a great marketing plan, and I just need to get my name out there.

And I want to stop being scared all the time.