Am I Just Lazy?

July 21, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

I’ve never felt like I’m an inherently lazy person. Quite the contrary, I’ve always thought. Until my bipolar II depression and anxiety got to a tipping point. I had never been on medication before this time, and I finally agreed to start taking it. As my symptoms started to get really bad in 2008, I was still working on a production, performing in a musical at a regional theater. I forced my way through that time, never missing a show or even an entrance, never a beat. But I was crying every day at home (my temporary housing in Philadelphia) and sometimes even crying backstage between cues, trying not to mess up my makeup. I met my husband on that job, and I think his friendship is what ultimately got me through.

Once the show ended, it was back to New York and onto unemployment. Now if you remember correctly, 2008 was not a good time for the economy at large. The worst financial disaster since the Great Depression, to be exact. So while there wasn’t any work for me in the theater, there was a long extension of my unemployment benefits. I considered it a bit of a lucky break to have some time off from working and traveling and get my health in order. I found a psychiatrist who ran a clinic for artists and musicians, and I was able to get medical care despite having no insurance. Even the cheapest poverty-level New York insurance was way outside my budget, so the clinic was a real godsend. And thus I started my decade-long journey with psychiatric medication, a journey I’m still on with my third official psychiatrist. The doctor at that first clinic was incredibly generous with his time and his patience, filling out forms so I could get my prescriptions through Patient Assistance Programs run by the drug companies (each drug company has their own program, so google the name of your drug with the words ”Patient Assistance Program” for more info). He always called me back when I was traveling all over the map and he never let me go without meds.

While I was getting started on medication, I kept getting extension notices from unemployment. This gave me some serious downtime between auditions. I kept up a rigorous practice schedule of singing and I went running every day. I started pursuing an opera career instead of a theater one, and dove into lessons, coachings, and more practice sessions. But things moved slowly with my singing. I ended up working 9-5 temp jobs in NY, and it was hard to find the time and energy to practice. And when Matt started going out of town for work, I started going with him. I’d try to get voice coachings at whatever opera company he was working for, but aside from that and my solo practice sessions, I kind of turned into a lump of weepy despair. I eventually relied on him for money, and I didn’t have the energy to do much. Lots of people dream of working for themselves, or even just having lots of “free time.” But I never seemed to get the hang of it. I’d fill my head with thoughts of dieting or bingeing or rearranging the furniture, but I had no routine and I was constantly changing cities as Matt’s work took him around the country. I was alone much of the time and started to wonder where the day went. I screamed at myself for “not getting anything done.” I couldn’t figure out how to arrange my days and felt at the mercy of my flagging energy, medication side effects, and horrible moods.

And that’s when I started rethinking this whole laziness question. If I wasn’t lazy, wouldn’t I be doing more? Wouldn’t I have a stricter schedule? Wouldn’t I be researching more opportunities, seeking them out? Instead I was doing the bare minimum to keep my foot in my stagnant career, jumping on those opportunities that came my way as a desperate attempt to convince myself that I was trying my best. Because of the state of the economy, finding work was something of a losing battle. But I did some auditions and concerts- with devastating results. I was asked at auditions if I was pregnant (I was not), my voice completely ignored. I subjected myself to the abuse of an opera concert company in NY, purely out of desperation for work. The woman running it was a hot mess, changing rehearsals around on a whim and yelling at ticket-holders in the lobby. I had the encouragement of my voice teacher, I had my practice sessions, and I kept my head down. Even so, you can’t sing Wagner for 8 hours a day and I was at a loss for what to do with my downtime when I was so exhausted. I always felt that I had to ration my energy, saving it up for singing-related endeavors.

Right now, I feel the same way- that I have to ration my energy. I ration my energy for the gym and the cafe, and then I have all this downtime where I can’t seem to move at all. I lie down in the dark bedroom, staring at the wall or just closing my eyes and listening to the panicked screams in my mind. The screams say that I’m lazy and that I’m a failure. They say I should just get my shit together and get over this depression already. They say I’ve wasted ten years looking for a cure and that if there’s no cure, I must not really be sick. Just lazy.

Just a few days ago, I started resisting the urge to lie down in the dark. I’m frantic not knowing what else to do with myself, unable to work, unable to relax. So one night, I went for a walk with Matt. That was hard. I cried, embarrassed by my size, not wanting to be in public. But it was OK. Another night I did some work on the blog. I sat in bed with the air conditioner on and clicked away on my laptop. That was exhausting, but it was OK. Matt picked up a flyer for a meditation center (the last meditation center I’d been to shut down). They have a couple of evening sessions each week, so I’m going to try that instead of ruminating in the dark. Because I keep going over and over things in the past and they never get any better. It never makes things any better in the present, either. And spending all this time ruminating just feeds the thoughts that I’m lazy. So I’m trying to stop the cycle. I’ll just keep trying until I stop lying in the dark.

Trying to Stay On My Diet with a Six Hour Time Change

July 16, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness

Let’s just say right now that this was not exemplary eating behavior. This time-change meant my day was six hours longer than a normal one. Plus I was downing breakfast at 8am in Berlin, which is about five hours earlier than I was normally eating breakfast anyway. I’d like to thank motion sickness for getting me through the tough parts. Really came through for me there. And I’d like to thank my husband for sacrificing his 100-calorie bag of Cheez-Its to the cause. Because I made it: I stayed under 2,000 calories which is my absolute daily limit- coming in at 1,910 for the day, including my nighttime snack with my Latuda.

Let’s go through the exciting play-by-play. 7am: Wake up. 8am: Matt goes to the supermarket across the street from the hotel and scores me a big yogurt and a bag of fresh cherries. I eat these with in-room espressos (yes, with creamer and sugar) for a total of 400 calories. A thoroughly nauseating cab ride to the airport ensued, Matt actually having to yell at the driver in German that we wanted to go to the airport, not the police station. Thank you, Rosetta Stone for that. Once camped out at the not-so-glamorous bus station of an airport that is Berlin-Tegel Airport, I drank a large bottle of Coke Zero. If this day had a sponsor, it would be Coke Zero. Some time passed and I thought I might pass out from sheer exhaustion. I got a soy latte, approximately 90 calories. Not much help for the exhaustion, but it did extend the car-sick feeling all the way to Amsterdam, where we connected flights. There may have been an in-flight Coke Zero there; I blacked out on how many I actually drank, partly to help with the nausea, and partly to stave off hunger. We power-walked, well almost flat out ran, to our gate and settled in for a 7-8 hour flight on Delta. I was confused by the pre-packaged pillows and blankets at 2:30 in the afternoon, but I understood once we hit the 4-hour mark and I tried sleeping on my tray-table. Food-wise, there were about six Coke Zeroes (come on, they’re tiny cups) and a cup of coffee (also tiny) with creamer and sugar (30 calories). But the real excitement was when they handed out a little card with a list of scheduled food service and different menu options. No prices on it- so I searched on the little TV for food prices, but nothing. My heart fluttered- was this food FREE? The last time I ate on a plane, I think I paid about $18 for a box of cheese and crackers, so this was truly shocking. And yes, it was free. It was.

First came a round of drinks (Coke Zero) and the 100-calorie Cheez-Its. I ate Matt’s bag too, so 200 calories there. And then they came around later with warm towels (okay, paper ones, but STILL). The first meal (yes, there were two) had a Caesar salad on the menu, so I got that, but there really wasn’t much lettuce involved, just croutons and a hunk of chicken. I ate the chicken with a packet of salt sprinkled on it, and a pretzel-roll that had the calories stamped on the wrapper. 200 more calories there. I turned down the wilting fruit salad, the cheesecake-cup dessert, the cheese and crackers, the sad lettuce and dressing, the croutons. I had a Coke Zero to make up for it. A little while later I caved and ate a protein “raw bar” Matt had in his jacket (200 calories). I was up to 1,120 calories and it was only 11am in our new time zone. The second meal I had to forego altogether- it was a choice of pizza or a ham and cheese croissant, both colossal in terms of calories, plus they came with a fancy chocolate ice cream bar on a stick. At this point, I was feeling deprived, so I recruited my husband to try and score me an extra pack of Cheez-Its, but the evil flight attendant claimed she didn’t have any more (obvious bullshit to avoid a tidal wave of Cheez-It requests from surrounding passengers). I had a Coke Zero.

After the devastation of turning away free pizza and ice cream, I decided to just go to sleep. That would pass the time and keep me sated. But it didn’t work. I watched two movies on the little TV- Bohemian Rhapsody and Colette. We finally started our descent (Coke Zero) and I focused on the nausea again. We deplaned, went through customs, and waited for our luggage to never appear. We stood in line to tell them it never appeared. And as we were about to board a bus to the train station, I insisted on buying something salty and greasy to help with the nausea (I don’t know why this works for me, but it does). I ate a bag of Lay’s potato chips from the news shop while sitting on the bus: 390 calories there. Up to 1,510. Bus to train, wait for train (bottle of Coke Zero), train to Lyft, Lyft to home. Remove disgusting clothes and shower, settle on painting shorts for attire. Take pills with two more “raw bars” for 400 calories and fall into deep sleep. I did it. 30 hours on 1,910 calories. Wouldn’t advise it. Never want to do it again. But I felt I had to in order to maintain my sense of control over the food issue. I need to stay on my diet for the sake of my mental health right now, so I did it. I did it.

Medication Mixup and Minimalist Memorabilia

June 30, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Minimalism

Okay, so I’ve been having some bad days here in Berlin. Yesterday I broke down crying at the cafe, unable to think of what to write about, or else just unable to motivate, it’s hard to say. I felt like my brain was stuck in a pile of mud. I kept spacing out and feeling like I needed to lie down. Finally, I downed my coffee and we walked home, my husband just as exasperated as I was. Once there, he drew the curtains, turned on the fan, and let me decompress on the bed while he tried to continue working at the kitchen table. I watched 3 and a half hours of YouTube, and the time just flew by. I didn’t feel rested at all afterwards, just like I couldn’t keep up with life.

I’ve been stressed out by everything lately. Waking up, I’m dreading exercise. At the cafe, I’m stressed about the heat- it’s in the 90s today- and in the afternoon, I’m already stressed about the evening routine. Will I be able to concentrate enough to watch movies or TV? Will I eat the right foods for dinner? Will I be able to get through the time between dinner and my bedtime snack? Will I be able to fall asleep before the akathisia from my meds sets in? And then in the morning it all starts over again. My routine starts to close in on me sometimes and I feel like I’m just scraping by. Last night as I was trying to calm down and relax, I thought I’d take my bedtime anti-anxiety medication a bit early. I opened my pill case and looked for the little blue pill. I couldn’t find it. It wasn’t there. All these nights I’ve been struggling to fall asleep, struggling to stay asleep, and it never occurred to me that I might have forgotten that little blue pill.

I dole out my pills once a week into 3 pill cases: morning, afternoon, and bedtime. The bedtime pills and vitamins are quite a fistful, so it’s easy for me to overlook something like that. I’m very methodical in how I dole them out, opening each bottle and replacing it into the clear plastic zipper pouch in which I keep all the bottles. But putting anti-anxiety medication into the pill case is new (I used to just keep the bottle by the bed). I don’t remember doing it either time I filled the pills since being in Berlin, and I’m not even sure I did it with the original set of pills I left home with. That means that there have been at least two (maybe three) weeks with some days without any anti-anxiety medication, and other days where I only took it in the early hours of the morning to fall back asleep. And so I wonder how many of these “bad days” can be attributed to this little mixup. I’ve been on this medication for years now, taking it at bedtime for at least a year, so this could have really been throwing things out of whack. I’m hopeful that putting it back in will at least help make nighttime less stressful, if not help balance me out throughout the day.

And once again I’m reminded that just when you’re blaming yourself or your circumstances for your misery, it’s a good idea to check your meds. There are all kinds of symptoms of chemical problems that we really think must be behavioral. I was questioning my routine, questioning the timing of every little move I make, blaming my husband for “jinxing” me, and it never occurred to me that there might be a chemical problem.

The last time I had a medication-induced problem was when I was suffering from akathisia at night, after taking my Latuda. Experimentation proved that the horrible climbing-the-walls feeling of akathisia was indeed from the surge of Latuda soon after taking it. Now I take it right before bed (with the 350 calorie snack it requires). Problem solved.

Another example of this has to do with exercise. I still absolutely loathe exercising, despite having been doing it 6 days a week since the start of the year. My endurance seems to be at a standstill. Usually if I’m exercising regularly, I can run for at least a half hour at a stretch, and if I’m on the treadmill, I alternate between a slow speed of 4.3 and a high speed of 5.3. This regime seems so far away right now, despite my religious consistency with walking and running. Currently, I’m only doing 10 minutes of running and 10 minutes of walking on cardio days, and that seems a real struggle. I keep complaining to my husband about it, but I have yet to find a solution. And then the other day, he read an article in The New York Times that talked about Metformin and an experiment that suggested it might interfere with increasing aerobic endurance. I’m on Metformin, as a preventative for diabetes since my weight was so high. Now that I’m down 30 pounds, I might be able to come off of it, and that might solve this exercise problem. We shall see. All I’m saying is, when experiencing any symptoms, it’s worth checking your meds.

There have been random “good days” interspersed with the bad: two days ago we went to the Alte Nationalgalerie (an art museum). I was able to wander through the museum, walk the distance to “Museum Island” from the subway, and have a pleasant coffee in a secluded courtyard cafe on the way home. It’s the kind of day that makes you superstitious- what did I do today and how can I replicate it exactly so I will have another good day?

At the museum gift shop, we bought some souvenirs. Partly due to my minimalist tendencies and partly due to a lack of luggage space, we’ve rarely brought much home from Europe. I have a couple of pieces of jewelry and one dress from Paris, but our only other allowance for souvenirs has been postcards, especially postcards from art museums. They usually have postcards of memorable pieces at the gift shop, and it’s nice to have a picture of something beautiful or meaningful that we saw on our trip. A lot of minimalists shun souvenirs, and for the most part, I do too. But postcards are small, flat, easy to store or display, and inexpensive. My husband looks through the box of them every time he starts a new design for an opera set, and I like to keep a few on binder clips hung on nails in the wall in my office, swapping them out periodically. This time, we bought nine postcards, not for sending, just for us. Buying only postcards on trips is a good rule of thumb if you’re going minimalist but can’t let souvenirs go altogether. Personally, I need help remembering trips since my memory is pretty poor, but I still don’t want to clutter up our house with magnets and keychains and mini Eiffel Towers. Memorabilia and sentimental items are always the hardest to get rid of when you’re decluttering, so it’s best to nip the problem in the bud and just not buy the stuff. Or else keep it to small things, a small number of things, things that are extremely useful, or even better, just photos.

The Donut Hole

June 27, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Food

I’ve been thinking about buying a donut. Major decision, I know. But for me, it is. Donuts were the food I gained a lot of weight eating last year. At the worst of my mental illness last summer, in between crying and screaming at people, between going running and lying down seething, I ate a lot of donuts. Sometimes 9-12 a day? Something like that. And they were giant fried crullers with glaze on them, aptly named a “glazed stick” at our Dunkin Donuts. They probably had 4-600 calories each, as they were larger than the standard glazed stick at 370 calories. Multiply that by 12 and you get at least 4,800 calories a day in donuts alone. But let me explain.

Despite my horrific mental state on little to no medication at that time, I was also trying to “legalize” donuts. This is part of the process of overcoming overeating introduced in Jane R. Hirschmann and Carol Munter’s books Overcoming Overeating and When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies. The idea is to eat certain foods freely until they lose their taboo and therefore, attraction. They become like any other food. The legalizing process usually doesn’t take very long- in my twenties, it took less than a year. I went from compulsively bingeing to eating freely and normally. I was thin and could eat whatever I wanted. I’ve been chasing that state ever since, trying to legalize foods and find more effective ways of dealing with my emotions instead of eating. After a certain amount of time (and weight gain), I would get scared, start counting calories, and go back to dieting. This time, I thought, if I could stick it out long enough, it would work for me again. I committed completely to the process, keeping the freezer full of donuts and eating them for almost every meal, waiting for the inevitable day when their allure had run its course. It never did. I was either eating for comfort from my extreme duress or I was ravenous from Seroquel all the time. I couldn’t even find a sense of fullness, never mind satisfaction. I couldn’t relax around food because I couldn’t ever relax at all. I was in the worst way in terms of my (Bipolar II) depression and rage. My husband and my mom were trading shifts babysitting me, all day, every day, always at the ready to take me to the hospital if it came to that. I was wishing for death, fantasizing about suicide constantly as an escape from my unbearable situation (I should have been in the hospital, but I refused to go). It was the first time in 10 years that I’d been unmedicated. And then I was prescribed Seroquel, and gradually worked my way up in dosage. The Seroquel made me tired and hungry, but it did nothing for my agony. My rages settled down, but so did my ability to exercise. It’s difficult to even think about that time. Apparently, it was no time to legalize donuts. It’s better to do that when you’re mentally healthy and can think clearly and take care of your emotional needs.

Since I started counting calories and dieting again, I haven’t even looked at a donut. I eat cookies every night with my Latuda (you need to eat 350 calories with it), but somehow that’s been just fine. Lately, though, I’ve been feeling awfully deprived. I walk down the street in Berlin, seeing people eating whole “personal” pizzas themselves, thin people eating “kuchen” or cake with their coffee, eating ice cream in public- huge, elaborate sundaes made in the shape of a plate of spaghetti or piled high with waffles and sauces (yes, there is something in Germany called “Spaghetti Eis” with vanilla ice cream “pasta”, red raspberry “tomato sauce”, and white chocolate “parmesan” on top). And I’m not eating any of it. It’s too hard to estimate the number of calories in even a bite of cake, so I just don’t eat it. It’s also really difficult to fit cake into your 1,800 calorie allotment for the day.

And so, the donut. Going to the grocery store here is a real trigger for me. There are all kinds of junk foods we don’t have at home. And the last time I was in Germany, I was bingeing on them. At the bakery counter with my husband the other day, he was buying a loaf of bread for himself. I was eyeing all the things I can’t eat. The cheese danish, the “Schwein Ohr” (“pig’s ear”- kind of like a giant Palmier), and especially, the jelly donuts. Strawberry filled, generously glazed perfection. I brought up the idea of having one as my night time snack with my husband. He saw it as a potential Pandora’s Box, something not worth playing with. I argued, claiming it would be easy to estimate the number of calories, since they were comparable to a Krispy Kreme and the calories in those are listed online. And then he reminded me: I have a history with donuts. And it’s not one I’d like to relive. So the donuts are staying behind the case for now, and perhaps forever. I will not fall down the donut hole again.

What Do Minimalists Wear To Go Swimming?

June 22, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Food, Mental Illness, Capsule Wardrobe

Maybe they just don’t go swimming? Or maybe they go naked or in their underwear? It’s a mystery to me. Personally, I do own swimwear. I guess I’d consider it a tiny seasonal capsule: a two-piece bathing suit, rash guard shorts and top, and neoprene swim shoes. This little ensemble was acquired last year when my husband and I were attempting to take a mini vacation. My parents have a little cottage in Cape Cod, and we’ve twice now attempted to take some time off there. The first time, we had an Ebay mishap and had to drive home (about an hour and a half) in order to ship a package in time. We returned to the cottage, but threw in the towel (so to speak) after another day or two. At the time I was feeling pretty bad, having akathisia and demanding of my husband a constant card game or round of scrabble. I was incapable of relaxing. Our second attempt was a little better. We did actually make it to the beach two or three times- and once we actually swam.

For this much-planned-for-but-barely-achieved swimming, I wore my bathing suit: pretty standard bikini bottoms with a folder waistband and a fitted camisole top with a flowy crochet overlay, all in navy blue. I also wore the swim shoes (there are lots of rocks and crabs at the Cape). On dry land, I wore the black rash guards over the top, both for modesty and for sun protection. The rash guards consist of a stretchy short-sleeve top, bought in way too large a size so it would be loose, and a pair of fitted mid-thigh shorts. I went through a lot when shopping for these items, ordering different sizes, returning them, finally settling on a suit from Amazon in a 2X. The top fits well and doesn’t ride up or anything, but the bottoms are designed for wider hips than mine. This just means the seat bags out a little bit unless I jack them up really high (not a good look for me). I tried and returned a blouson top and shorts set from Walmart which was really cute, but had a serious foam-cup shelf bra inside it, which I suspected would float even when I didn’t. Originally, I was trying to keep it simple and just go with the rash guards as my bathing suit, but I didn’t want a tight top which would roll up when I moved, and the loose top has the same issues with the foam bra top- it floats. In any case, I’m happy to see that the world of swimwear is finally catching on to the idea that not everyone wants to be wearing what looks like underwear at the beach. There are all kinds of swim shorts, skirts, dresses, and different styles of tops out there to choose from, in many different sizes. Plenty of people, plus-sized and straight-sized alike, love the traditional underwear-type looks and that’s all well and good. But for me, it never felt right. I mean, post-childhood, I wouldn’t even wear shorts until a couple years ago.

I’ve tried, over the past several years, to figure out the swimwear conundrum - how do I look like myself and still get to go swimming? I’ve gone through various styles of suit, some traditional, some less so. My last suit was just a stretchy tank and running shorts (with the little underwear inside) bought in haste from a Target in Virginia, where Matt was working, and where our building had a pool and hot tub. This worked well for that trip, but the chlorine pretty much destroyed the fabrics by the time we left. Before that, there was a black deep V-neck one-piece suit from the Gap. I got it on clearance and wore it in our building’s pool in Palm Beach, again where Matt was working. I never felt like it looked very good, at least not how I’d imagined it would, and so at some point it disappeared. Before that, I do recall a vintage-look suit from TJ Maxx in a deep teal. It had ruching throughout, so it masked my rolls of flesh and made me feel less exposed. That one didn’t hold up to the elements for very long, either, so it, too, disappeared. The last time before that that I remember owning a suit was in college when I cut a lavender leotard in half at the waist and wore that to the beach. And then there were my high school years: my freshman year, my family went to Mexico for a week, and I wore one of my bikinis from my early adolescence. I remember feeling like I was spilling out of it since my weight had increased a bit over the years, and I also remember bingeing on candy bars from the hotel gift shop alone in our room while everyone else was at the beach. The bikini was one of a couple suits that I wore when I was 10-12 years old. I’d lost a significant amount of weight since my chubby childhood, starting to diet and count calories when I was 9. Wearing a bikini seemed like a natural benefit to being thin. It never occurred to me that I might not want to show so much skin. So I acted like the people in the Dexatrim and Slim-fast ads on TV- I lost the weight and stripped down to my underwear. Wasn’t that the whole idea?

I’ve promised myself that I won’t do that again. I won’t expose myself simply because I’m thin. I truly believe that part of the impetus for my weight gain has been my subconscious’s attempt to protect me from all that: If I stay fat, then no one gets to look at me in my underwear. But now being fat and exposing your body aren’t mutually exclusive. Plenty of people love the more body-positive movement in swimwear, lingerie, and sexy clothes. But I’ve realized that fat or thin, I just like to be covered. I don’t like to be objectified or on display for everyone to see. Sure, I have bathing suit fantasies of being thin and on some tropical beach somewhere, but in reality, I need to feel clothed in order to feel like a person.

Bikini Berlin

June 18, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Mental Illness

I’ve been feeling like I should be doing more, seeing more of Berlin. I had this idea that coming here would change me, like in that movie Sabrina where she goes to Paris for the summer and gets a haircut and all of a sudden Greg Kinnear is smitten with her (I’m referring to the 90s remake, not the Audrey Hepburn classic). So I asked Matt to look for someplace interesting to window-shop, where we could get a coffee and see some of those famous Berlin hipsters. He found the perfect place: Bikini Berlin, where there are indy pop-up shops and a Japanese tea place. I realized that there surely wouldn’t be any plus size clothing to speak of, and I started having imaginary arguments in my head:

Me: Do you have any plus size clothes?

Hipster: No. If you were a vegan, you wouldn’t be so fat and you’d fit the smaller clothes.

Me: #?&*$!

Or…

Me: Do you have plus size clothes?

Hipster: No. It’s too expensive to make them, and most people are thin anyway.

Me: Actually, most people are plus-sized and you’re missing out on their money, which is much more expensive.

Hipster: (Scoffs)

In reality, I didn’t even ask anyone about plus size clothes because a) we can’t afford hipster clothes and b) we were too intimidated by most stores to even go in. I kept thinking someone would speak to me in German about how they don’t have my size and how I should just get out of the store. And Matt just didn’t even feel cool enough to go into the shoe store at all. We wondered how much business was actually being conducted at this little “mall” since most people seemed just as intimidated as we were and the shops themselves were pretty empty. We did go to the Japanese tea shop and consider buying some incense or some chopsticks that came with a little carrying case, but I somehow didn’t feel qualified to even do that. Everything was so pristine and beautiful, that I just didn’t feel allowed somehow. I wonder if these shop-owners only knew why they weren’t selling things, they might try to make their shops a bit more shopper-friendly.

The journey to Bikini Berlin involved a hike to the subway plus a transfer, and I was exhausted by the time we’d made the return trip. We’d also stopped off for a major purchase at a Home Depot-type store. We bought a small electric fan. Everyone around here seems to just put up with the heat- no AC, no fans anywhere. I feel like making a public service announcement that they don’t need to live this way. At the very least, my fellow heatstroke sufferers, get a fan! It was 17.99 Euros (about $20) for something from China we had to assemble ourselves- pretty expensive in my mind, and very difficult to track down. But boy, was it worth it. I promptly parked myself in front of it on the floor of our apartment and basked in all its electricity-wasting glory. But emotionally, I was spent. Our little outing wasn’t exactly easy for me, plus I’d indulged in sweetened iced coffee, throwing off my calories for the day. This always stresses me out- I don’t know why I do it. We’d planned to head back out for a coffee and some work, but I reassessed and admitted I couldn’t do it. My husband went out for groceries and I collapsed with some YouTube. When he got back, I came clean about how I really wasn’t doing well and was probably headed for a major meltdown. Matt talked me down and we came to the conclusion that maybe I was aiming too high. Maybe the point of me being here was simply for us to be together while he had his business meetings. Maybe just getting through my usual routine from home was enough. I cried about my sense of deprivation with the food and my intense urges to binge. We talked about how keeping the food on track was just as important as taking my pills in terms of my mental health. We made a plan that if things started to get really bad for me, I would just go home. Our last trip to Germany ended early for me, but there was a lot of suffering before I left. Matt told me this time he would not watch me go through that. I’d just go home and back to my normal routine. We watched a terrible TV show and ate a healthy dinner.

I know I’ve talked about this Sabrina-syndrome before, but it keeps popping up. I feel like I’ve hardly seen the city and that it would be a shame to miss out on Berlin. But every time I try to push myself, I regret it. Maybe just coming on this trip was enough of a push. Just functioning in a foreign city is enough of an accomplishment for now. I’m on track with food, with exercise, with my pills, with my writing. The desire to do more makes me absolutely infuriated- I really feel capable of so much more than this- but the reality is, I’m limited. My mental illness is real, and the effects are real. I have to accept it.

The Days You Can't Explain To People

June 17, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

Yesterday was rough. I woke up late, around 1pm. I knew I should get up, have coffee, get ready to go exercise. But I walked into the bathroom and saw the little shelf with all the toiletries on it. Sunblock, face wipes, toothpaste, moisturizer, powder. And something clicked in my brain. No, it said. We can’t do this today. We can’t go through all that. And so I went back to bed. I’m sick today, I told my husband. I can’t do it, I said. He made me coffee- four tiny cups because we only have tiny cups. I took my pills. And I lay back down in bed. A while later I had breakfast. Okay, I got through breakfast, I thought. After some time I said, what do we have to do for exercise today? It was a strength training day, so we’d have to rig something up. He showed me: biceps with this bag of water bottles, squats, and then Superman holds. Then 10 minutes’ walk in the park uphill. I thought about it. It seemed like the makeshift exercises were pointless, and I certainly couldn’t just roll out of bed and do them in the state I was in. I was groggy, weak, depressed. The bed was like a magnet, like it had its own gravitational force. Finally I decided I would do the walking first. It would get me going and then the other exercises would make more sense to me. So I started to talk myself through it: take off my shorts, put on my leggings, put on my socks and shoes, and go out the door. But I kept getting stuck on leggings. Do I wear the ones that were just washed? Or the other ones I’ve already worn? Or the third pair, so they’re all in perfect rotation? I could just leave the third pair out of the rotation, since I can wash the others pretty frequently. This small point had me paralyzed. I could not decide- what was the best thing to do? I told my husband my dilemma and he said, it doesn’t matter, whatever you do will be right. But that’s the problem, I said. That’s why it’s impossible to decide. Finally, around 4pm, I decided to stick to the original plan of rotating all three, and to wear the third pair. I got dressed, didn’t bother with sunblock, and trudged out the door behind Matt. I followed him to the park. I walked up the hill. I walked down the hill. I listened to a Podcast by one of my favorite bloggers where she interviews women my age who are successful, who have children, who lead full lives. And then we did the bicep curls, did the squats, did the Superman holds. I sweated and cursed inwardly and somehow got through. Then I took a very cold shower in our tiny bathroom where the shower curtain sticks to you no matter what you do. And I got dressed. Same pants from yesterday. Fresh T-shirt and underwear. Laptop in my backpack and ready to go. And we walked to the Main Street, headed down a little ways, and stopped at a cafe I like. “Um wie viel Uhr sind Sie geoffnet?” My husband asked. “Neunzehn Uhr,” the woman answered. Open until 7pm. We decided to stay. I typed a blog. I used the ladies’ room. We finished our coffees and continued down the street, looking at shop windows we’d already seen. We went to the toiletries shop (the pharmacy is completely separate here and called an Apotheka). I got some face wash. We went to the “Kilo Shop” where you can buy vintage clothes by the kilo. I half-heartedly poked around, seeing nothing in my size. The jeans only went up to a 38” waist. We left and started walking home. About halfway home, I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. I was horrified. I looked like a mountain. I looked like Jabba the Hut. I felt deeply ashamed. Here I was, walking around, feeling good about the fact that I’d dragged myself out of bed, when suddenly it felt like someone had slapped me down. I was humiliated that I’d been out in the world, exposed. I felt like people had seen me naked while I was obliviously shopping and chatting. We hurried home. I was sobbing already. I felt disappointed and ashamed at how fat I still am. “You’ve lost 30 pounds,” my husband keeps saying. How long are we going to keep saying that? Meanwhile, I’m starving myself and forcing myself to exercise every day. I don’t deserve to still be this fat. Or maybe I do. Maybe this is all punishment for eating too many donuts, for believing my body would balance itself out. I can gain twenty pounds in a week, but to lose that amount takes months of consistency and torture. I started dwelling on my former “career.” How I ultimately failed, and how now I’m too old to do anything. The past doesn’t exist anymore, my husband said to console me. All that matters is now and the future. “Slowly is the fastest way to get to where you want to be,” he quoted. They were the words of the actor Andre De Shields, who won his first Tony Award at the age of 73. Do I have to wait until I’m 73? And where am I going anyway? With days like today still disabling me and holding me back, I don’t see how I’ll get anywhere. And you can’t explain it to people. I can’t explain why I couldn’t get out of bed until 4pm. I can’t explain what it was about looking at the bathroom shelf that shut me down. And I could never explain how hard it was to exercise, how hard it was to shower, to get dressed. To thrust myself out into the world, to expose myself to the public and participate in life. It’s as though a heavy yoke is always at the ready, waiting to rest itself around my neck. And nothing I do can ever make it go away. I can manage to take it off for days at a time, but it’s always there, threatening.

The Epic Trek to Berlin

June 14, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Clothes

Let’s just start by saying that despite having a nearby airport, we started our journey a full 7 hours before even getting on a plane. It was cheaper to fly from Boston, which is over an hour away, but the main issue was that our flights from Providence kept getting changed and then cancelled. So we got a ride from my mom to the commuter rail, then took the “subway” (really a glorified bus called the Silver Line) to the airport with enough time to check our (one) bag and get through security. I was wearing my boots that lace up pretty high, plus a belt, since everyone knows you’re supposed to wear your heaviest items on the plane. This made going through security even more of a hassle than usual, but it was Matt’s backpack that got hand-searched. Dinner was $32 worth of raw vegetables and dressing, plus a string cheese. Oh, and Matt got a little cheese plate thingy. I split my Latuda in half, knowing I wouldn’t be able to sleep on the plane and not wanting to experience any akathisia. Once on the plane, I downed it with 2 Larabars and the rest of my pills. By the time we got to Iceland at what was 2 in the morning for us, I felt delirious. I sent Matt for an iced coffee while I waited with the bags and we were both freaking out at how long the coffee was taking with our plane already boarding and no way to contact each other (our phones stop working once we cross over). And I had 4 bags instead of 3 because the under-the-seat-in-front-of-you space was much smaller than usual on Iceland Air and we had to redistribute stuff from our backpacks into my emergency carry-on bag. It’s this extremely thin but surprisingly strong Urban Outfitters freebie bag that thank god I had stashed in my backpack for just such an emergency. I had expected to use it at the baggage check where you never know what they’re going to weigh- carry-ons and personal items included- and transfer stuff from the possibly overweight suitcase, Matt’s carry-on, or the backpacks. You hear a lot of advice on packing that says to roll your clothes or use packing cubes and all that’s well and good, but the real trick is keeping everything underweight. I could easily fit 65 pounds in a suitcase, but they only allow 50 before the astronomical fees come into play.

By the time we got to Berlin, I couldn’t tell you what was in which bag and that’s not normal for a control freak like me. We succumbed to getting a taxi from the airport to our hotel rather than the subway and a bus and a walk. For some reason, adding a night or two to our month-long stay at an Air BnB was going to cost like $800, so we got a hotel for the first and last nights. Upon arrival, we crashed into sleep for about 4-5 hours. I don’t think I’d gone all night without sleep since college, or since the last time we did this, so I was feeling rough. We got up around 7pm German time (6 hours ahead) and went out to a very nice dinner. I got a Caesar salad with chicken, and the chicken was deep-fried in Panko. There was a lot of creamy dressing, cheese, and croutons involved, too. Since it was my only meal of the day, I let myself go and ate most of it, hoping I’d come in under 2,000 calories. I took my Latuda as soon as we got back to our room and went right back to bed. The next morning we - no joke- went to the fitness center and worked out. I had rearranged our routine so that Thursday was a planned day off, but Friday was on again and by god, we did it. I took a cold shower (Germans aren’t as shameless with their AC as we are in the States) and tried to reassemble our luggage. We’d already thrown all of our travel clothes into a laundry bag to be burned later, so I stuffed that into the magical Urban Outfitters bag, filled in all the nooks and crannies in the suitcase, and gathered all our chargers and devices. All this on no coffee and no food. We checked out, grabbed a taxi to our Air BnB (where they let us in early) and stood on the street with our luggage for about 15 minutes or so. The owner/manager zipped up on his bicycle and let us in where I was openly underwhelmed. Matt commented later that he doubts whether an Air BnB cleaning fee has ever actually been put to use. The place is tiny, but excellently located near the heart of Kreuzberg. It’s coffee shop Mecca, and that was our first stop before the supermarket. We only had a fifty-Euro bill on us at the coffee shop, but the owner said we could just come back to pay when we had change, which of course we did- with a tip for his kindness. Back at the apartment, Matt mopped the floors and cleaned the kitchen while I wiped down every Ikea surface in the place. After a nap and a frantic search for pre-paid cell phones (my old SIM card stopped working), we unpacked our clothes into the one slim wardrobe and this weird red shelf. I just left everything rolled up, so it works like a filing system (see photo). Today we slept until 1pm, went for a run/walk in the park across the street and are currently imbibing our second coffee of the day. Everyone here seems to speak English, but I’m pretty chuffed that we’re not automatically dubbed as Americans and spoken to in English first- the way they do in Paris. Here they speak to us in German first, and considering the diversity here, I think we might even pass as locals. So far, so good.

Mood Update and Painting Clothes

June 11, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Mental Illness, Minimalism, Capsule Wardrobe

I’ve been getting a lot of foot rubs from my husband. This is a sure sign that I’ve been crying a lot in the afternoons. Well, I guess late afternoon and early evening to be specific. And night time doesn’t always get any better. I have a really hard time relaxing- even watching TV feels like work. I was so relieved when the akathisia finally went away, but now things are not so good again. I had talked to my psychiatrist about this a while back, and we discussed behavioral solutions to the mood drop. I really did think it was situational and not medication-related, so I sought out adult education courses and tried to go to the library or ride my bike to the cafe for a second round of writing. None of these options materialized, mostly because I have no motivation when I get home from the first visit to the cafe. Having written and typed a blog, or worked on photos, or done some editing, or all of the above, I just want to relax when I get home between 4 and 5pm. Exercise is usually in the morning/midday when I wake up, and then I shower, eat breakfast, and get dressed. And for me, the exercise, basic self-care, and writing at the cafe amounts to a full day for me. And so what do I do when I’m done for the day? Sometimes I’ve tried to just keep working, and that can help, but I don’t usually have the energy for that. What ends up happening most of the time is I lay down in our bedroom with the curtains drawn, thinking and dozing, and then usually end up wide awake with horribly negative thoughts. Then the crying starts, my husband tries to comfort me, I take a Klonopin, and I might end up getting an intensely painful foot massage (it helps with the emotional pain). This combination of Klonopin and foot rubs will calm me down, but fill me with guilt and remorse for being such a burden, and just such a downer in general. My husband never gets to relax since I can’t relax. And so he’s run ragged taking care of me, picking up my slack (doing chores, etc.), all while trying to get his work done, manage the house, plan business trips, look for future work, and work his “day job” tutoring at a local college. So if there’s something I can do to improve the evenings, I’m eager to find it. My great hope right now is that in Berlin I’ll be able to walk to a cafe twice a day instead of just once. There are so many coffee shops in walking distance that it just doesn’t seem like as big a deal to go out again in the late afternoon. Maybe at that time I could just listen to an audiobook or read books on my computer. But for the time being, I’m just watching YouTube in the dark to get through. There’s something so soothing about watching those incredibly detailed clothing reviews and styling tips. Now mornings- mornings are good in general. I can be silly and laugh hysterically with my husband, and I’m just more game for things.

Today we went to the dump to get rid of a broken air conditioner. Our last tenant left it in a recycling bin while moving out, which thoroughly confused us, but it probably just indicates simple ignorance. Before I owned a home, it never occurred to me that you actually have to pay money to get rid of trash. We do have free (tax-funded) curbside pickup for household garbage here, but for construction projects we’ve hired dumpsters or paid by the pound at the dump. And so we made the 25 minute trek to the state landfill/recycling center and paid $12 to get rid of it. I went along on this little trip to try to ensure that my husband did not throw his back out right before our trip lifting said air conditioner on his own. I think it worked.

But when doing such chores, I’ve learned to wear appropriate clothing. That doesn’t mean leggings for the gym or the jacket you wear to work. Clothes can really get wrecked from cleaning, painting, and any kind of heavy lifting (stains and snags are common). And so I have a small capsule of “painting clothes” reserved especially for such occasions. They’ve already made an appearance in anticipation of painting and cleaning our rental apartment between tenants (we had a new tenant move in on June 1st).

The painting clothes capsule’s 11 items consist of:

1 pair old sneakers

1 pair rubber boots

2 pairs old socks

1 pair skinny jeans

1 pair pajama shorts

2 T-shirts

1 long-sleeved thermal top

1 zip-up hoodie

1 fleece-lined vest

This little assortment of things allows me to paint or deep clean in warm or cold weather, rake leaves, shovel snow (with a coat and hat), move furniture, tile bathrooms, and mow the lawn if need be. Now my husband does take care of most of these things the past couple of years due to my depression, but I hope to be able to chip in more and more like I used to. And I realize a lot of people out there have “people” to do such things, but we’re landlords of a 3-family house and do a lot of home improvements on our own. We gutted our own apartment, insulated our own walls, framed walls, skimcoated walls, tiled two bathrooms and our kitchen backsplash, poured our own shower floor, installed our own kitchen cabinets, installed our own molding, built our own vanity out of a dresser from Craigslist, and have painted just about every inch of the 3-story Victorian, ten-foot walls, ceilings, hallways and all. While these clothing items might not fit into a “real” minimalist’s backpack, they are utterly necessary for me.

How I Gained the First 30 Pounds

June 09, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness

This isn’t your typical story of weight gain. I wasn’t falling off the wagon of a diet and just eating more. I didn’t stop exercising, keeping up with running consistently from 160 pounds to 190 pounds. It all started when I was in Germany last time, about a year and a half ago. At the time, I was taking Adderall- not a common drug for symptoms of bipolar depression- but it was working well for a number of months. At some point around the time of our trip, the Adderall stopped working. No longer was I waking up early to beat the crowd at thrift stores and spending hours on my feet. Exercising got a lot harder, and I just couldn’t motivate to do any Ebay listings, despite the huge stash of photos I had at the ready. Aside from the decline in energy from the Adderall, I was all of a sudden in a foreign country with none of the same foods and with frequent holidays where all of the shops would close for days. And as my diet started to unravel, I decided to deal with it in the best way I knew how: to eat whatever I wanted.

This will sound crazy to most people, but I swear this method has worked miracles for me in the past. At the end of high school all the way through college and into my twenties, I followed an anti-diet program that I still swear by for curing compulsive overeating. Two female psychologists in New York City wrote books on the program in the eighties and nineties, and there are still monthly workshops in one of the authors’ offices. The basic idea, which is difficult to explain in a sentence or two, is that when foods are no longer forbidden, when you stop dieting, when you eat according to your hunger, your body achieves its natural weight. It may sound like a fantasy to eat whatever you want and be thin, but this method gave me just that when I was younger. Dealing with compulsive eating since childhood, I was able to learn the difference between stomach hunger (physical hunger) and mouth hunger (emotional hunger). I learned to take better care of myself emotionally, and slowly my mouth hunger decreased. And then once I was eating mostly from stomach hunger, my weight went down and stabilized. I enjoyed any and every kind of food that popped into my head when I asked myself, ”What am I hungry for?” And I enjoyed a low, stable weight without dieting or intense exercising. The brilliant feminist theory behind these books is absolutely mind-blowing. They are: Overcoming Overeating and When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies by Carol Munter and Jane R. Hirschmann. (Ms. Munter still runs the monthly workshop in NYC, as well as an annual conference.) Both books draw from the classic Fat is a Feminist Issue by Susie Orbach which was first published in the seventies. I am a true believer in this method despite my current circumstances and would defend it regardless. But when I tried to implement it that day in Germany, I did not get what I expected. Initially with this method, you binge. This usually lasts a matter of weeks or months until you’ve rebelled against dieting enough. Then food is no longer taboo, you start to get a handle on the emotional self-care component, and your weight drops down to rest at its natural level.

So I started out bingeing and waited for it to taper off. Having done this before, I knew about all the little psychological traps that can keep the process from happening. I persisted. I surrounded myself with an abundance of food, I listened to my emotional needs, and I fed myself according to my hunger. But this time, it wasn’t working, at least not as quickly as I’d expected. I was going through true agony with my mental illness since the Adderall had stopped working. I sobbed every day, my husband gave me intense foot massages every night, and I found it unbearable to be seen in public. I forced myself to go running in the cold, but aside from that, I was in a downward spiral. A plummet is more like it. I couldn’t go see my doctor, and my mood continued to decline until I decided to go home to the States several weeks early. Throughout this time, I was still trying to “legalize” food and stop dieting. I believed wholly in this method and could not accept that it wasn’t working for me at the time. But my emotional needs were a bottomless pit due to my mental illness. And so no amount of bingeing got it out of my system. I steadily gained weight throughout the month-long trip, the months following at home, and then ultimately when I started taking Seroquel. I’ve often referred to my weight gain from Seroquel here on this blog, but that was only the last 30 pounds. I was already up to 190 when I started on it. And I attribute that weight to my insatiable need for comfort. I could not comfort myself emotionally; I could not talk to myself in a kind or compassionate way. And so I could not remove the need to overeat in the middle of my violent depression. And that’s where those first 30 pounds came from. From trying and failing at a brilliant anti-dieting method, because I could not get a handle on the emotional component. I truly believe that if I were not suffering so deeply and chemically, the food would have worked out fine. But I was a black hole, both emotionally and physically.

The only other example of this type of failure that I can compare it to would be my failure with meditation. In the throes of my worst symptoms, akathisia particularly, meditation was a nightmare. It only made me more acutely aware of how horrible I felt, and did nothing to help it. Lots of experts prescribe meditation for any and every ailment, from general stress to back pain, but I don’t feel mental illness should always be one of them. At certain times meditation has only increased my symptoms and my suffering. And so I put this anti-dieting method in the same category with meditation: brilliant and life-changing for the average mentally healthy person, but not necessarily good for those with severe mental illness.

Preparing For Germany, Sort Of

May 25, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Clothes

I of course don’t mean “preparing” as in doing German language tapes or scouting out museums and transportation. Instead, I’m just thinking about clothes. Well, clothes and meds. I was able to get 3-month supplies of all my meds- even Klonopin, a controlled substance. I can’t imagine this would fly in most states, so a little advice: if you run into a situation where you need more than a month’s worth of a controlled substance, just ask your doctor to overprescribe for one month. Doctors usually prefer that you have your meds rather than not, so they tend to be amenable to this. Since I’m traveling for just about a month, my 3-month supplies are more than sufficient, so I didn’t have to go this route, though I have in the past. When traveling, I pack all my prescriptions together in a packing cube in my carry-on bag. If anything gets lost, it will not be my meds. My name is on all the prescription bottles in case of inspection, but I’ve flown internationally with quite a pharmacy, controlled substances included, and never been questioned.

My real concern is of course, my wardrobe. Here on the homefront, we had our first really hot day of the season. It was 84 degrees to be exact, and I was absolutely sweltering in my joggers. I scrambled to the closet to change into shorts, and we left for the cafe as per usual. Walking through the front door of the cafe, I suddenly became frantic from concern that my belly (and my underwear) were exposed. They weren’t, but I was quite aware that my shorts were in fact on the verge of falling down. I hadn’t been planning on wearing shorts this early in the season, not even planning to bring them to Germany for the month of June. But this little heat wave suddenly brings to light a bit of a wardrobe crisis. The shorts in question are Old Navy, size XL, elastic-waist, drawstring utility shorts (similar here). I bought them when my Old Navy, size L, elastic-waist, (no-drawstring) utility shorts got too small. This should have been a no-brainer: Find the same or a similar style, buy one size up, and you’re good to go. But the size difference between these two pairs is far more than a L to XL. These XL are at least a size or two bigger than the tag says. You’d think, same store, (almost) the same style, that the sizing might be consistent. But apparently this is not the case. As women, we are used to these sizing discrepancies between brands, between styles, and - no joke- even between colors of the identical item. So this isn’t a huge shock to me. But it does put me in a bit of a pickle. If shorts are in the cards for the upcoming trip, does this mean I have to buy new shorts for this in-between weight? My obvious solution is to thrift when I need something temporarily, but finding the right thing is difficult, and it’s also the principle of the thing. I thought I was prepared for summer at this weight, and now I’m not. So I’ve been obsessively checking the weather both here and in Berlin to try to get a handle on what I’ll need to pack. I’ve been making little lists in my bullet journal, potential packing lists, but the size issue is popping up in other areas, too. My navy blue men’s pants that are such a staple worn with my black leather men’s belt might be on the verge of being too big to cinch in any more. I think in this case I’ve made peace with the fact that if I bring them to Berlin, I’ll probably have to replace them while I’m there. Besides, it will give me a chance to go thrifting in Berlin. But the cashmere sweaters, the puffer jacket I was thinking of bringing- is that just wasted space I should be using for shorts and camis?

At least I have a firm handle on the shoe situation. My decluttering has proved quite helpful in this aspect of decision-making, since there are fewer pairs to choose from. I’ll wear the boots on the plane since they’re the heaviest, then pack the Adidas and New Balance running shoes. The Supergas aren’t great for lots of city walking, so they’ll stay home regardless. There are no fancy occasions to worry about, so no heels will be in tow. As far as other wardrobe areas, gym gear is always complicated, so I’ll definitely have to resort to handwashing my things between workouts. Other than that, it’s just lots of T-shirts and a couple pairs of pants. Oh, and lots of socks. I’m not one to go sockless in sneakers. I’ll keep my eye on temperatures and end up making a lot of decisions last-minute, like I usually do, which tends to lead to overpacking. This time my husband and I are sharing a checked bag, however, so I’ll have to reel it in. At least I’m not lugging parkas and sweaters and snow boots like last time- thank god it’s spring.

Crying at the Psychiatrist, and Bras and Underwear

May 21, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness, Clothes, Minimalism, Capsule Wardrobe

I had my psychiatrist's appointment yesterday and it went unexpectedly downhill. I should have been glad to hear that I lost 5.4 pounds, down from 198 to 192.6. I still cried and felt it wasn't enough. My doctor asked me why I felt like the weight loss wasn't working, and I said that I guess it's because it's so goddamn slow. I told him how I never miss a workout, I never eat above 1800 calories a day, how hard it is, and how seemingly slow the results are. He said that from his perspective, 30 pounds in 7 months was better than most people do. And the fact that I'm doing the exercise and diet (despite how hard they are) sounds positive to him. Then I cried about the afternoons I spend lying in the dark, ruminating on how I've screwed up my life. I cried about how hard it is to take a shower, to brush my teeth. He questioned whether the afternoon mood seems like a time-of-day problem or a circumstantial issue when I'm left alone without a car and without the motivation to do anything. Since Matt and I have tried going to cafes in the afternoon and had a fine time, I told him I don't think it's a time-of-day problem. It's because aside from Matt, my life is garbage. I have nothing to show for 20 years of my life in the arts, and now I'm having to start over at 40 (almost 41) years old. He looked blankly back at me. He seemed genuinely confused as to why I was so upset. We'd just told him how we are going to Berlin for the month of June, partly for Matt's work, and partly just to get out of Dodge. He must have thought I should be happy and looking forward to the trip. He must have thought how I should appreciate the fact that I'm on disability and can leave the country at the drop of a hat. But I don't feel lucky. Everything feels like too little, and that I'm too late to do anything of significance with my life. 41 years old and starting a blog? It's 2019 and everyone else has been doing this for more than a decade. And how will I get anyone to read it anyway? I've shunned social media for so long that I don't know how to even approach getting back into it. My Facebook account hasn't been touched in about 10 years, mostly out of shame. It still has photos from 10 years ago, when I lived in New York and was at my thinnest. I was actively doing plays and auditioning and had friends. So I left my profile frozen in that time. I've had the thought that maybe it's time for me to "come out" on Facebook as fat, and as mentally ill. My husband has told me about friends of ours coming out as gay on Facebook, even an acquaintance who transitioned genders. They are not ashamed of these changes, and yet I'm ashamed of my weight gain and my mental illness. I guess it's a different (though obviously no more difficult) type of stigma around my issues. No one congratulates you or posts "Good for you!" when you announce a hundred pound weight gain. And while there may be an occasional shout-out to a suicide hotline when a celebrity dies from suicide, there's just not the same passion involved when it comes to chronic, treatment-resistant depression. But still, I just might take a stand on my own behalf and challenge my "friends" to accept me as I am.

Now while we're getting personal, here is the current state of my bras and underwear (20 items in all):

8 Bras:

2 Low-impact white (sort of graying) sports bras. I got these in the garment district in NYC. I have no idea of the brand or origin of these, though I've had them for at least 12 years now.

4 Lace-back bralettes by Marilyn Monroe Intimates, one black, one navy, one pale pink, and one rosy pink. I found a 2-pack at Marshalls and stalked down two more packs in my size at a different Marshalls. I did a bit of an illegal switcheroo and re-tagged the garish fluorescent pink ones and returned them. These are super comfortable and look fine even when you can see them under a top. The lace even covers an itchy tag on one of my sweaters.

2 Foam-cup, proper bras, one nude, one black. The brand is Vanity Fair, specifically the “Beauty Back” bra. I rarely wear these lately, but they're good for times when I want to look put together. Because they're a larger size, the band is nice and wide and has 3 hooks instead of the standard 2 you get in smaller sizes.

9 Underwear:

9 pairs of Ellen Tracy microfiber briefs in mauve/beige/black, all bought at Marshalls or TJ Maxx.

3 Other items:

1 Maidenform shapewear bodysuit. This can feel like body armor when you need it- sometimes I just feel too vulnerable having other people see my wobbly fat rolls through my clothes.

1 Cotton Kimono Robe. This was stolen from my husband- his parents got it for him in San Francisco. I adore it, though one sleeve is ripped and needs repair.

1 Lands' End white terry-cloth robe in XL. A classic right out of the shower, or great as an added layer of warmth on cold mornings.

I do have other undergarments in storage, though nothing that fits right now. I still have yet to lose enough weight to downsize in the underwear department. When that time comes, I have some new-in-plastic underwear that I bought online with a bit too much optimism. At one point at my higher weight, I tried to find cotton underwear instead of microfiber or polyester. It was just about impossible to find what I wanted in plus sizes- hence the still-in-plastic Warner “no-muffin-top” cotton underwear waiting for their turn in the wardrobe. I also have 12 pairs of Warner “no-muffin-top” microfiber underwear in a smaller size, and two Beauty Back bras in a smaller size. I'm chomping at the bit to get back into my smaller things. It's just so hard to wait.

Why Do I Write About My Weight When It's None of Your Business?

May 19, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness

I found myself asking this question when I remembered an incident at a party a couple years ago. I had lost a significant amount of weight, partly due to my new-at-the-time medication, Adderall. I was also restricting my calories and running at the time, so the weight loss was pretty dramatic. But at this party, someone I barely know was very excited and enthusiastic about my weight loss. She kept saying, "You did it!" And "How do you feel?" And "You look great!" I mumbled something about it being the result of my medication change and tried to leave it at that. But she kept pushing, repeating herself and goading me for some kind of excited response like, "Thank you!" And "Yes, I feel great that I did it- and you know, the secret is to just never eat cheese!" She just wasn't getting it. I thought my body was none of her business and found her quite presumptuous and rude. I finally muttered, "Thanks," and walked away. I was so uncomfortable and offended by this person's interest in my body- my private, self-contained body- that I had to leave the room. In another room, I fumbled around looking for a beverage, making sure not to drink grapefruit with my meds, when I had another unwelcome encounter. A woman across the room who I don't know very well caught my eye and mouthed, "You look beautiful." I mouthed, "Thanks" and looked away. It was at this point that I knew I had to get out of there. I gave my husband the eye and we left. He was just as horrified as I was by the events of the party. I know comments like that are socially acceptable and people expect you to act grateful for their compliments and congratulations, but you just end up feeling horrible on the receiving end. Even if consciously you enjoy it, on some level, there's a retort at the back of your mind- "What, did I look so bad before?" Or simply "Mind your own business about what's happening to my body." It's just such an invasion of privacy to be called out like that, and it makes me so self-conscious that all I want to do is eat and go back to hiding behind my fat. And if I feel so strongly about this, you may be wondering why on earth I share the details of my weight changes online? Isn't that just inviting some kind of unwelcome response? And my answer is simply- I hope not.

I hope that I have better reasons for revealing these private details about myself than just fishing for compliments or encouragement. I imagine that there are like-minded people out there who can relate to what I'm going through and are relieved to hear that they're not alone. To hear that there are other women who are conflicted about weight loss. I may be actively trying to lose weight, but I'm not saying it's noble and I'm not saying it's easy. There's nothing wrong with being the exact weight that you are right now. Being heavy or fat or "overweight" or whatever you want to call it does not indicate any flaw in character. It doesn't even indicate that you eat too much; our genetics dictate so much about our physical appearance that we really can't make those kind of assumptions. And even if someone's weight is the result of overeating or under-exercising or medication side effects or any other reason, there's still nothing wrong with being "overweight." But I talk about my weight loss because it's part of what I'm going through, the same way I talk about my struggles with mental illness. For me, it's also related to my mental illness: one of my motives for losing weight is to avoid exacerbating suicidal thinking and any other symptoms a higher weight triggers in me. I exercise not just for vanity, but because it's been reported to help with the symptoms of many mental illnesses. If it were not for these reasons, I might not even pursue such a goal. But I want to say that there is also nothing wrong with wanting to lose weight either. I don't have to feel guilty that I'm not feminist enough just because I'm losing weight. I'm a feminist, and I believe that my body is my business, and I decide how much or how little I want to eat and exercise. And the results of that are my business, not that of any passers-by who want to chime in. I don't even see it as the business of my husband or my family. No one is allowed to get excited for me when I lose weight, no one is allowed to judge me when I gain weight, and no one is allowed to keep tabs on my behavior or my body. And I hope these opinions come across in this blog. I want to lose weight for my own personal reasons, many of which I choose to share. At the risk of eliciting the wrong kind of attention, I want to share these things so other people might not feel so alone. This is the reason I share what I do with regard to my mental illness, my wardrobe, and my weight. Most weight loss-related messages out there are pretty one-note: Weight loss good, weight gain bad. I want to say more than that, because we are people, not just eating and exercising robots. I want to say that it's OK to do whatever is right for you and not listen to what anyone else has to say about it. And if getting that across means exposing myself to commentary, so be it. It's my choice to write about it, not yours.

I'm Crying About a Sweater

May 17, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Clothes

It's true. I'm actually crying about a sweater. It's the sweater I'm wearing- my purple-grey, short-sleeve cardigan in a cotton-blend knit. It has this great "ladder" weave - I think that's what it's called- that's kind of chunky but not fuzzy or bulky. And the style is great- short rolled sleeves, a rolled shawl collar, dolman-shaped sleeves. But it doesn't hold its shape no matter what I do.

I got it when I was working in an office at Brown University, about 3 years ago. I was actually having a shockingly good reaction to the medication Abilify. 5 days at 5mg, and I was securing said job, soon working full-time and surprising my husband by not having a meltdown every 20 minutes. It was like a magical reprieve- I had no psychological issues, just blissful functioning and optimism about the future. It was at this point that I realized that my illness is clearly chemical. I've often doubted myself, asking whether I'm benefiting from being sick in some way. Was there some subconscious martyrdom or attention-seeking at the root of my disease? This experience on Abilify proved to me that the answer is no. Given the right chemicals in my brain, not only did I have no baggage, I thrived. I was unfazed by small slights, things that would usually send me into a tailspin. I actually started therapy to cope with the reality that I was better. It was such a huge difference that both my husband and I felt it a major life change. And then six weeks in, the Abilify stopped working. Apparently this is a common phenomenon with Abilify- after a few weeks, it just. Stops. Working. I started crying in the bathroom at work and eventually had to quit. I just couldn't get through the day without melting down and sobbing. That was the last job I had- after leaving, I applied for disability. Clearly my illness was preventing me from working (this was the second job of late that I had to leave due to my symptoms), and I was immediately approved. And then I spent two years chasing that Abilify magic. I tried every possible dose, going all the way down to 2mg and all the way up to 30mg, way above the usual dose for depression. And my heart broke every time it didn't work. I was devastated. Medication disappointment was something I'd been through before, but this was different. I'd lived the life i was hoping for, and then had it taken away. I'd had a glimpse into what could have been, and was then thrust back into my typical reality of debilitating bipolar II depression.

So this sweater was something I wore a lot during that blissful time of working full-time. I'd sewed on a button with a little snap behind it so it closed in the front. It was always handy in that air-conditioned office environment, and I loved the purple-grey muted color, the texture, the style. But when I stopped working there, it was shoved to the back of my closet with all my other work clothes. Short-sleeve sweaters are rarely practical for me, except to throw on in summer, maybe in air conditioning. I wore it this way two summers ago, when I was going through TMS- Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. A new and experimental treatment seen as an alternative to ECT (Electroconvulsive Therapy), I endured the pain of the magnet hitting me right on my cranial nerve for 6 weeks. I had a line drawn on my head with a Sharpie so they could try to position the machinery correctly each time, though it didn't solve the problem of it hitting my nerve. I had to go off most of my meds for the duration. On a particularly bad day, I was threatened with hospitalization by the attending doctor. Between sessions, I would shop. Thrifting for Ebay or Thredup resale items became my addiction, my source of dopamine. I wore that sweater in the cold, air-conditioned Salvation Army for hours at a stretch, stopping only for coffee or because they were closing. But the thing about this sweater is that it never looked the way it did in my mind. I had this idea of it as a cool, edgy, chunky knit with a slouchy feel and a shawl collar. In reality, the collar never stayed rolled over and the sleeves constantly unrolled themselves too. The dolman sleeve has never done me any favors (something I'm only now realizing) and from the back it just made me look big and kind of hunched over. I recently stitched the sleeves so they were permanently rolled and stitched the collar permanently into a shawl style. So now it looks like some kind of Frankenstein's monster in order to hold its shape, and it still doesn't fall right. It still doesn't work. It's time to let it go. But I keep questioning myself- I love the color, the texture, the idea behind it... But it doesn't work. Just the way the Abilify ultimately didn't work. Just like the TMS didn't work. Just like Ketamine treatments didn't work and Vraylar didn't work and Adderall didn't work and Seroquel didn't work and Lithium didn't work and Effexor didn't work and Prozac didn't work and Cymbalta didn't work and Viibrid didn't work and Pristiq didn't work and Topomax didn't work and Xanax didn't work and Rexulti didn't work and Medical Marijuana didn't work. Just like that. So I'm sad.

The Best Advice I've Got

May 08, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

When it comes to mental illness, it's difficult to find good help. Psychiatry can be a real guessing game if you don't fall neatly into a classic diagnosis, and even then, it's not easy to find the right treatment. And crisis intervention usually doesn't go beyond that; no one is checking to see that you take your meds once you've left the hospital. So when it comes to finding care, I recommend first finding an advocate (a loyal friend or family member, or even a social worker) to aggressively pursue the best doctors and therapists available to you. Waiting for the right doctor to "accept new patients" can be agonizing, but stay on that waiting list while you get started with someone more accessible. It can be worth the wait long-term. After a few years with my local psychiatrist and little improvement, my husband sought out "the smartest person he could find" in psychiatry in nearby Boston. We now drive over an hour each way to see my current psychiatrist, but for the first time in a decade, I feel I'm truly in good hands.

When going through the initial process of finding help and getting started on treatment, I recommend making your life as easy as possible. If that means eating off of paper plates to avoid doing dishes, so be it. If that means limiting your shower to 60 seconds a day, fine. Get creative when it comes to doing the bare minimum. If you have people to help you, that's always great. But if you're on your own, lowering your expectations for yourself for the time being can be key. Having a mental health crisis is hard enough without worrying about what clothes you're wearing, what foods you're eating, and keeping your apartment spic and span. Hire a cleaner if you can afford it, or just do the bare minimum to get by. Eat the same thing every day and buy your groceries online and have them delivered. Pull out some sensible wardrobe basics and make them your uniform for now. This is not the time to challenge yourself too much. It's about taking your meds, getting to therapy, and taking out the trash when it's full. Do whatever you have to do to get through the day. For me that meant watching YouTube all day, every day, and making a checklist for my meals and hygiene. I exercised when I could, but other than going to my appointments, I rarely left the house.

If you find yourself beyond this stage, like I do right now, where things are slowly but surely improving and you're trying to get your life back, I have different advice. I think this is the time to look for a kernel of interest in something to reconnect you to the outside world. Something extremely small and specific that won't overwhelm you, and something so easy that it doesn't feel productive. For me, that small kernel of something is my wardrobe. Clothes seem frivolous and not as lofty as actual "fashion," so I'm not intimidated by them. It's more of a guilty pleasure. I like deliberating over clothes, clearing them out, carefully replacing them, finding the perfect item. I like having a capsule wardrobe and taking care of my things and arranging my clothes aesthetically. Does any of this make me any money or save the world? No. But getting into this one little thing is helping me get better. My interests have expanded to reading books on style and fashion, listening to audiobooks about sustainability and ethics in the fashion industry, and developing my own personal style in a way that empowers me and gives me confidence. If you don't have a "kernel" to start with, here are some ideas that hopefully spark an idea that's right for you:

Look at interior design magazines. Pick an actor or actress that you like and watch every movie they've ever been in. Experiment with makeup and figure out what you like. Pick a favorite musician and listen to every album they have. Plan a fantasy vacation and look online for all the details of your imagined itinerary. Take up some form of crafting: knitting, jewelry-making, crochet, scrapbooking, origami. Get an adult (or children's) coloring book. Try baking something. Find recipes you'd like to try and put them in a box. Look for the best places to get tacos in your area and try them all out, leaving your reviews on Yelp. Set a small fitness goal and come up with an explicit plan to achieve it. Learn to touch-type. Watch decluttering videos on YouTube. Go to thrift stores and hunt for things to resell on Ebay. Read a whole series of romance novels. Learn to play solitaire. Start doing Sudoku or crossword puzzles. Pick a specific painting you like and look up everything the artist has painted online. Look at vintage clothing on Etsy. Clean out a drawer or cupboard and make it look like something on PInterest. Draw cartoon characters, even if they're terrible. Watch an entire baseball game on TV. Watch hip-hop dance videos on YouTube. Listen to an audiobook of a biography of someone you admire. Get into a serial podcast. Plan out your meals for the week and make an exact grocery list of what you need. Alphabetize your books by author, or organize them by color. Watch a foreign-language movie without subtitles (or with). Make an herb garden for your kitchen. Look up Japanese toilets on Amazon.

The idea here is to do something really easy- so easy that it doesn't make you want to just lie down. If these suggestions are too difficult, scale it back to where it feels feasible. And eventually your interest and curiosity can grow from there.

The New Normal and Art

April 27, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

I'm still adjusting to the new normal. No akathisia. But suddenly it's hard to not just go back to bed. I hate exercise, like more than before. My locked-down morning is all mixed up with photo-taking and wanting to lie down and hating showers. I have a mild obsession with Billie Eilish and hating her but loving her outfits and boyish charm. I'm questioning whether this blogging thing is yet another distraction from what I should really be doing: writing music. I had a particularly prolific period in my twenties writing songs and poems and I've been trying to replicate that era ever since. At this point it all feels like a distraction: theater, opera, massage school, Ebay, and now blogging. But the very idea of working on music is completely paralyzing. I can jot down words on scraps of paper, but even the melodies escape me at this point, never mind the actual production on a computer. And it just seems so hard. Does that mean it's the thing that really matters? Or does it just make me miserable? I love my songs- they're precious to me. But they are truly hard-won. What makes me happy, or at least excited, is thinking about clothes. Organizing them, shopping for them, culling them, and rearranging them. I love the way cashmere feels and the way my boots ground me. I love the drape of a scarf, the look of bright white against color, the smell of retail. But it seems frivolous, like a guilty pleasure. And are things just more pleasurable when they're guilty? Transgressive? Some part of me thinks I just like it because it's easy. And another part thinks it's easy because it's right. So do I do the easy thing that makes me happy? I do need all the happy I can get. Or is that giving up? Do I instead fight through the inertia and do the hard thing that matters? I remember one day in high school when I was in the modern dance studio alone. Facing that empty room terrified me, and that moment dictated my future. I ended up pursuing classical music instead of dance. There were scores and musicians and dresses in the room with you, so it was less scary. Was I just running from myself? Does it matter? Some part of me says it does. It says that it is my destiny to get to the heart of the matter and make something authentic. Some might say that anything you do is authentic, so don't worry about it. I worry. And then this idea of running from myself: is it OK to run from yourself when your self is trying to kill you? Trying to drag you down into the abyss? Or could I somehow go inward and still come out the other side? Are my insides the secret to happiness- true happiness- or are they just a bottomless pit? It's a dangerous question to toy with. Last summer I played with it. I went off my meds. I went into the abyss screaming and crying. I wrote violent poetry and went running a lot, fantasizing about drowning myself in the river. Was I facing myself or just denying my illness? If I'm on medication, can I truly face myself? Or does going off meds just obscure the view? What I'm wondering now is, does that poetry hold up? Is it drivel? Is it "outsider art"- art made by people with no training, no contact with the art world, mental patients included? Is that more authentic than the carefully trained, choreographed productions I took part in as a singer? During that prolific songwriting era in my twenties, I made a lot of what I refer to as "garbage art." Glass lashed to twigs with wire, primitive paintings on brown grocery bags, poems scribbled on bed sheets. I loved these things- they felt authentic. There was no training, no prompting for me to make these things other than my own processing of feelings. My own angst or despair or ecstasy. I don't have them anymore (in the spirit of minimalism), but a few pieces survived my brutal editing. Matt and I photographed them a couple of months ago and I finally let them go. They were breaking down, disintegrating, anyway. It was part of clearing out my drawer full of mementos. There's plenty left, but I was able to digitize all my scores and notes that hold value for me (those scores that weren't ripped up in a fit of rage last summer). I've just about completed my project of decluttering mementos; the only thing left is a box of photographs I need to scan onto my hard drive. But facing the photos, facing myself, my history, my choices, proves too difficult every day. Is this actually a good place to start? In the aim of facing myself and becoming authentic? Or is it still too soon? Am I still too fragile? Do I keep steady, holding down the new normal, or do I venture forward, or maybe inward? Is it safe? It feels a bit like spinning plates: keep up the new normal, and at the same time add something new. Am I too eager? Should I push myself or keep the status quo? How fragile am I?

I Hate Nice Weather, and Sneakers.

April 20, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Mental Illness

I’m afraid I've made a terrible mistake. I've been searching for a pair of white sneakers- you know the ones. The ubiquitous thick-soled all-white "trainers" you see Victoria Beckham wear, and therefore everyone else on Pinterest wear. I picked up a pair of Adidas at TJ Maxx for $34.99 with silver stripes that were surprisingly comfortable. I put them to the treadmill test and they didn't hurt my bunions at all. I did eventually get some soreness on the sides of my feet, possibly because they're just a rather flat, unsupportive type of shoe. In my fervent need to be environmentally responsible and not settle for a low-quality item of clothing that might wear out quickly, I returned the shoes and ordered the official Adidas Superstars in two sizes online. One was too big, the other too small, and both had the strange attribute of pressing down on the top of my toes, as though they were too narrow top-to-bottom. The fit was nothing like the ones I returned to TJ's, making me think that the TJ's version were not actually made by Adidas, but had simply gained the license to the Adidas name on their (shoddier) product. This is quite common at stores like TJ Maxx, Marshalls, Ross, etc. You think you're getting unsold Calvin Klein from a high-end department store, when in fact Calvin Klein has simply sold the use of their name to an anonymous company to make different products with the Calvin Klein name stamped on. I've experienced this phenomenon when buying jeans: the Calvin Kleins from TJ Maxx fit nothing like the identical item from the Calvin Klein website.

In any case, I soldiered on, deciding to try the oft-mentioned Veja-brand, sustainable, ethical sneakers so many bloggers recommend. Rather expensive at $120 a pair, I finally found my size on the website Need Supply. I ordered two sizes to try, a 39 and a 40 (I'm an 8 or 8.5 in women's) and both were an utter failure. Once again, the larger size was too big and the smaller size too tight. I've returned all 4 pairs of shoes now, using up all kinds of fossil fuels, I'm sure. And I find myself utterly regretting returning that first pair from TJ's. They were by far the best fit, the lowest price, and I had them in my hot little hands for 2 weeks before casting them aside. I was sure that getting a more expensive, authentic pair would ensure better longevity if not an ethical/sustainable purchase. But if the shoes don't fit, they don't do me any good. And so I returned to TJ's in search of those shoes I returned. But alas, they were gone, and I'm afraid I've made a terrible mistake. I plan on hitting up a couple of other TJ Maxxes in the area, something I've been known to do in the past. My mom and I are notorious for our "quests" for that 4th pair of curtains from Homegoods or that second pair of black joggers from TJ's. We have been victorious in the past, so there is hope for success here.

In terms of my latest "assignment" from my psychiatrist, there have been several developments. An afternoon class is much harder to find than he made it sound, but maybe when another semester rolls around at RISD I might give it a go. Hitting the library in the afternoon in order to get out of the house is still an option, so on Saturday morning I made a pilgrimage to the Providence Library in downtown Providence. Walking several blocks through pouring rain, I was disappointed to find the library closed. It was State-wide "Library Day" so I never suspected this closing was a possibility, but they were apparently renovating. On State Library Day. So instead I sat at a nearby Starbucks while my husband was at work on a rare morning shift.

We got home around 2 and ate lunch, noticed the weather had cleared up significantly, and decided to embark upon our very first bike ride in the last 2 years. We had an image of an idyllic afternoon coasting down the bike path, ending at a local cafe. Well, we barely made it. We were in pain. Bicycles are deceptively innocuous, but in fact can lead to intense butt pain and burning leg muscles. By the time we completed our return trip, I knew the pain would only get worse over the next day or so. I slept 13 hours that night, and 14 the next. I faithfully kept to my gym/walking schedule, but this whole bike ride thing was a rude awakening to say the least. I thought I was getting into pretty good shape, slowly but surely, but clearly I have a long way to go. For the life of me, I can't explain the bland, contented smiles of my fellow bicyclists. That expression that says, "Isn't this great weather? Let's get outside!" I hate these people. I hate people who want to go eat lunch in the park on nice days, who enjoy street fairs and outdoor concerts and impromptu bike rides. Nothing sends me to bed in a dark room faster than "nice weather." I like rain and being inside and snuggling up in a blanket. Now I do have aspirations of being fit enough to ride my bike as a means of transportation like I did so many years ago. But this leisurely attitude is something I'll just never understand. Is this a symptom of my depression? Perhaps. But I don't see it changing anytime soon.

All these new activities- library, bicycling, classes- have sent my brain into a tailspin. I got in a terrible argument with my husband yesterday and I feel like it was all because of these small changes (or attempts at changes). What little traction I had on my day- exercising, writing at the cafe- was being lost in this new flurry of activity. And so I hit a wall trying to get on the treadmill yesterday. I was dressed and cueing up my YouTube watch list when all of a sudden I heard it as clear as day in my head: No. I can't do it. So I went directly to bed, only stopping to take off my shoes in the process. And for the rest of the day, my brain was on fire. It was screaming at me for not getting enough done and then fighting back with a hard no. I will not move. I will not get up. My husband tried to salvage the day, making suggestions for what we could do instead. I was not having it. I feel like every day I'm trying to salvage my life. And I feel like that's enough.

Today is better. Gym, a few photos, breakfast, cafe. Back to square one at least.

Someone Tried to Take My Boots at Savers

April 13, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Clothes, Mental Illness

I'm feeling pretty chuffed after an incident at Savers the other night. I was there with my mom trying on more men's pants, since wearing the same pair every day has gotten a bit impractical. I tried a bunch of pairs on, and at one point left the dressing room in my socks to put some rejects back on the reject rack. My mom was watching the dressing room to be sure no one took it. But there was a man of somewhat small stature wearing construction-type clothing who walked by just then. According to my mom, he did a double take when he saw my boots lying on the floor of the dressing room and picked one up to inspect it. He seemed very excited to have spotted them, possibly especially because they were his size, but I had to disappoint him and explain that they were the shoes I was wearing. I sensed some mild surprise and maybe even a nod of approval at my choice of footwear. And I felt validated in some way, that wearing practical boots of good quality was something I'd done right. I felt almost admired that as a woman, I'd chosen to belong to the "club" of fellow boot-wearers, and therefore deserved as much respect as a man. My shoes are not frivolous or delicate, so I am not frivolous or delicate. And this sums up my entire attraction to the boots in the first place. I sense some respect from other people when I wear men's construction boots. Just in a small way, but every little bit helps. As I recover from my worst symptoms of bipolar depression and re-enter society, a small thing like that does a lot for my self-esteem.

As far as the pants shopping, I selected two pairs to take home with me. One was $3.99, the other $3.49, and both were 30% off for a grand total of $5.24. The first pair is a beige/khaki colored cotton chino from Old Navy. They're really wide-leg, a rare find these days, and have extra deep side pockets. They're only a waist size 40, not my usual 42, but they're so worn and broken-in that they seem to fit just fine. The edges of the pockets and waist are even a little bit frayed, which gives them the feel of an old favorite right from the start. The second pair are a lightweight grey flannel dress pant with a 40" waist and a 30" inseam which is perfect for bunching up a bit at the ankle over my boots. These seemed brand-new, but after washing and drying them, I've determined that they are a bit too small. I'm afraid I was a little optimistic in trying on size 40 pants, and in this case it went awry. I'll keep them in hopes that they'll fit soon if I continue to lose more weight.

I had my psychiatrist's appointment yesterday and learned that I lost 2 point something pounds, so I'm down to around 198. 2 pounds in a month is difficult to appreciate when I've been so diligent, but I guess I have to take into account the fact that I backed off on my exercise progress this month. I've also moved my food around so that I'm eating 350 calories of cookies and almond milk right before bed, which probably isn't helping things. I have to stick with this routine so my meds work properly without causing akathisia, but I do have notions of delaying my eating in the morning so that I can get back on an intermittent fasting schedule. Maybe intermittent fasting was working after all- I'm just having a hard time waiting to drink my coffee with creamer in the morning. Black coffee is an option, but I'd need some time to get used to it. My husband insists the weight loss has just slowed down because I'm "gaining muscle." I can actually see a distinct tricep emerging from my chubby upper arms, so there may be some truth to that theory as well.

I can say that for the first time since I started dieting and exercising, a full 26 pounds into my weight loss, I can finally see a slight difference in my body when I look in the mirror. I truly think that my mind just couldn't get around seeing myself at a weight higher than this. I couldn't recognize myself in the mirror for so long, and tried to avoid mirrors altogether. But just this week, I feel like I'm starting to recognize myself again, and I don't look absolutely shocking. This unfortunately has not improved my overall mood.

I think that since the profound relief of not having "the bad feeling" (akathisia) at night anymore, things feel like they've returned to normal, which for me is fairly depressed. The depression has seemed even worse lately when I'm alone in the house in the afternoon and can't motivate to start a project. I explained this to my psychiatrist, and he suggested I find a way to get out of the house in the afternoons and have some structure, the way I do in the mornings. (Going to a cafe and doing my exercise in the morning and early afternoon has become something of a routine lately, and I feel best while doing those things.) We talked about me going to the library and reading a book about something I'm interested in trying- like improving my website or taking photos. He also recommended taking a class at an adult education center, or something equally low-key. I had actually applied for community college a while back, but the money and commitment seemed too great at the time (and still does). But there are some great adult learning programs at nearby RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) that I started looking into. I could try something fashion-related that doesn't involve drawing or sewing, two things I'm incredibly bad at. There's also a course on website design "without coding" which sound feasible. Or maybe a basic photography course would be good. The classes are only a few weeks at a time, and if it does give me the structure I'm after, it would be a welcome relief.

My doctor is really good in this way- he focuses on whatever my major complaint is and makes suggestions to resolve it. Now that "the bad feeling" (akathisia) is under control, it feels like a step forward to address these moody afternoons usually spent in bed watching YouTube. He says that if structure and getting out of the house doesn't help my mood, then maybe it's a medication issue we can address. It all feels very sane and methodical- my doctor is incapable of rash judgement- and it gives me a sense of slow and steady progress. I'm genuinely excited to try taking a class. I've always been really good at school and think it could help with my self-esteem as well as my mood. My self image has gotten pretty bad over the years. My inability to get better, combined with my constantly shrinking world, really ate away at any innate sense of worth I once had. But these small things could start to build into something, maybe something new.

Minimalism and Change

April 13, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Minimalism, Mental Illness

As a minimalist myself, I often assume that minimalism has benefits for everyone. I've even used minimalism as a coping mechanism during my most acute times of bipolar depression. I simplified my kitchen to make it easier to cook, I reduced my wardrobe to reduce my stress when getting dressed, and I streamlined my household items to make it easier to clean and get organized. In general, the value of minimalism for people with anxiety or depression goes relatively undisputed. But watching a lot of YouTube videos and reading blogs on the subject has made me notice something interesting. A lot of minimalists just keep reducing their belongings to the point that I wonder what the endgame is. For some, it might be to live out of a backpack, but I do start to wonder what the point of eliminating a handful of items is when it's a noticeable sacrifice. I mean, why get rid of your colander when you use it fairly frequently? This aggressive, almost competitive pursuit of owning less starts to seem more like an obsession than a positive change.

And so I've begun to wonder if minimalism really is good for everyone, especially people going through significant change. As I'm slowly getting better and stabilizing in terms of my own mental illness, I'm experiencing a lot of change in how I see myself and in what my activities are. And if I were to maintain a very strict doctrine of constantly reducing my belongings, there would be no room for new things to come into my life as I change. Minimalism often demands that we become more realistic about who we are and what our lifestyle really is. But for someone who is going through a very dark time in terms of mental health, this type of assessment can be brutal. When I found myself reducing my wardrobe to the things that still fit me (after my weight gain on Seroquel) and that were comfortable for around the house (when I was never leaving the house), I was left with a pretty drab, unfashionable capsule of basics. There was little color, and practicality was what mattered. But as I'm starting to break through a bit into the outside world, I've found a renewed interest in style and in finding my own authentic style. So I bought some new things, some colorful, less practical things. And like a "bad" minimalist, I've expanded my wardrobe a bit. So my question now is, how can we embrace minimalism and embrace change at the same time?

I've heard people talk about the "one in, one out rule," where for every new item you buy, an old item has to go. In terms of clothes (and keeping them out of landfills), I've had good luck with selling those older items on Ebay. And for sentimental items, repurposing is a good option: I had a beautiful blouse from high school that was wholly unflattering, so I sewed a few handkerchiefs from pieces of the fabric. As much of a minimalism enthusiast as I am however, I do feel there are considerations to make when decluttering during a difficult time. One thing to think about is whether going through belongings from the past might prove too difficult and not worth the rewards of clearing things out. What may be cathartic for some, for others can uncover issues they are not ready to deal with. In this way, clutter may actually be protecting you from dredging up regrets and memories that might make you feel worse. Right now I have a box full of photos I've been meaning to digitize for over a year. When I think about it rationally, I want them preserved and out of the way on my hard drive. But I've been blocked when it comes to actually getting started. I believe the reason for this is that going through those photos is a lot like that old game show "This Is Your Life" where you are reunited with people and events from your past. This may be a project better saved for when I'm feeling better about my current life and less prone to comparison and regret.

Another thing to consider when decluttering is whether getting rid of belongings is actually a symptom of suicidal thinking. It has been noted that when people are planning suicide, they might give away precious objects to friends and family. If you have any suspicions that this is your situation, cease and desist decluttering and see a mental health professional immediately. Another clue that this might be your situation is "decluttering" people and activities from your life. Advice from minimalists might suggest decluttering your time and schedule, but for someone battling mental illness, this may in fact be a red flag.

In general, if you are thinking of trying out some decluttering in order to simplify your routines and make daily tasks easier, I'd suggest going slowly and storing things away instead of getting rid of things outright. When I reduced my wardrobe, I stored my clothes that didn't fit in a plastic bin on my top shelf. This leaves me the option of returning to those items if my mindset or my weight shifts, things that are bound to happen as I recover from acute mental illness.

Which brings me to my last point regarding clutter and minimalism: sometimes hanging on to objects can give us hope. I like to call this "aspirational clutter." For me, five pairs of high heels that I don't currently wear (and haven't worn in years) constitute some of my aspirational clutter. I fantasize about the outfits I'll wear them with when I'm better. I imagine wearing them casually to go to a coffee shop, or putting them on for social occasions (which I don't currently attend). While they don't feel right just yet, I like to keep hope alive that sometime soon they will.

Studies have shown that the risk of suicide declines sharply when people call the national suicide hotline: 1-800-273-TALK

There is also a crisis text line: Text HOME to 741741

The lines are staffed by a mix of paid professionals and unpaid volunteers trained in crisis and suicide intervention. The confidential environment, the 24-hour accessibility, a caller's ability to hang up at any time and the person-centered care have helped its success, advocates say.

Power Dressing and Exercise Updates

April 06, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Food, Clothes

I know you're in suspense about which boots I decided on, so I'll get that out of the way first: I went with the brown logger boots. My concerns that they might look too feminine were unfounded, I discovered, when I saw the photo my husband took of me in them. I was wearing them with my men's pants, trying to decide whether to wear them out, and from the photo it became clear to me that they do not look in any way traditionally feminine. The heel is more subtle than I imagined, and so I've finally started wearing them (gasp!) outside. They feel great, comfort-wise, and I feel great in them, more myself. I keep commenting that I just feel normal. I feel like they ground me, the weight of them, and in the way they balance out my body shape a bit. I feel like less of a tomato on a stick. OK, not a great body image to admit to, but it's accurate as to how I've been seeing myself lately. Another thing the boots give me is a subtle sense of power, like they're armor of a sort. And it dawned on me how rarely, as a woman, I shop for clothes that look powerful. I'd say my usual MO would be looking for clothes that a) make me appear thinner or smaller than I am b) look "cute" c) are "flattering" (refer back to a). I think it's good progress for me to abandon these motives and go for something empowering instead. It seems like when traditionally feminine clothing is deemed "powerful," as in a "power suit" or some great high heels, the power comes from sex appeal, especially in reference to men. This ultimately does not seem like real power to me. If objectifying yourself is your only way of feeling powerful, I think there's something wrong there. But maybe there's something more that I'm missing- maybe a power suit feels like armor going into a business meeting, or high heels make you feel taller and in that you feel power. I just personally don't get those things from those clothes- I get them from menswear.

In other news, I am pleased to report relief from "the bad feeling" at night, something that was ruling my entire day for months. "The bad feeling" has been correctly identified as akathisia from the initial surge of medication when I take my Latuda, an atypical antipsychotic. I have had to abandon intermittent fasting altogether, since the solution is to take the Latuda right before bed, and you have to eat 350 calories with it in order for it to work. The idea with taking it so late is that I sleep right through any potential akathisia. The other part of the solution was to lower the dose. I tried 40mg instead of 80mg, but that started affecting my mood. 60mg with dinner was definitely an improvement over 80, but I still started to get that feeling creeping up on me as the evening progressed, hence the late night dosing. It's not perfect, but this late-night snack thing is doing the trick so far.

With all the stress of experimenting with the meds, I've been losing my motivation to exercise. And with all the changes to my eating schedule, I've been having urges to binge, or at least eat outside my caloric limits. So I've had to back off in both departments, become less aggressive in trying to lose weight, and find some patience to go slower. I've allowed myself up to 2,000 calories on some days, though now it's leveled out to about 1,800 including my late-night cookies and milk. In terms of exercise, I've backed off on my intermittent running/walking and just gone back to walking at an incline of 2. On gym days, I'm only lifting weights, eliminating the 10-minute round of 6-incline walking altogether. This has made working out feel way less overwhelming and I feel less in danger of quitting outright. I'm convinced that I need to just keep doing something every day, and if I can just keep it going, motivation will strike again and I can start building my workouts up again. Going to the gym and just doing 3-4 machines feels pretty pointless, but I'm able to do it, and that's what really counts here. I do also have to credit myself for those 4 hours on the treadmill trying out boots (that was in addition to my regular exercise). I was walking really slowly (2.2 speed), but it does add up to something. And I've been leaving the house almost every day, so there's a bit more activity in just doing that. I tend to get ahead of myself, always wishing I could do more, accomplish more. But I need to appreciate how far I've come. I'm reading books instead of just watching YouTube. I'm going to the cafe to read or write. I'm shopping for clothes and making decisions. And I'm still on track with food, meds, and exercise. That'll have to be enough for now.