I feel like this month has gone pretty quickly; I feel as though Christmas was like two days ago and in reality it’s been over two weeks…

On the 16th of January, I have my pre trial court date. An agreement has already been reached by the prosecuting attorney and my attorney. Just gotta pay $240.00 for the PDA agreement to ensure I stay out of trouble and the agreement just states with two years of no legal trouble and I finish treatment, then my second DUI will be dropped to a negligent driving and my first will be dropped altogether. No jail time or other fees. That’s a… relief to say the least. I still am anxious because there is a slight possibility that if the judge doesn’t approve of the PDA agreement I go back to jail, but that is unlikely, thank Jesus. As long as I go to court and continue doing the right thing, everything should go as planned. Also, my attorney is going to try to dismiss my ignition interlock device requirement for my vehicle which would be amazing because the damn thing is hella expensive. But at the same time, I’m not holding my breath if I have to keep it in my car for the next indefinite future.

I have my chest CT scan two days after my birthday, so on February 8th to see if I have the cancer or the popcorn lung from vaping for the past, well, seven years. And I don’t smoke those small things either… I have a huge mod that smokes out the room when I puff on my vape because I’m frankly that addicted to nicotine. Low key worried about that because they did find stuff in my lungs on the last CT for my abdomen and they said the base of my lungs had “ground glass matter” and wanted to recheck in three months. I got the pre authorization completed from my insurance and now I wait.

If I can make it three more days, I will have five whole months sober from weed and alcohol on the 17th. I’ll get a six month coin on February 17th which is 11 days after my 26th belly button birthday. Honestly I’m more excited about getting my six month coin than I am about entering in my late twenties lol. There is always a relapse in us addicts and alcoholics but there isn’t always another recovery in us. I feel as though I have been somewhat complacent on my recovery because the past two weeks I missed a lot of my intensive outpatient classes because I had an upper respiratory tract infection. But on Friday, the 19th I meet with my outpatient counselor and I can figure out how much longer I have in intensive outpatient before I graduate to outpatient which is only two hours twice a week versus three hours, three times a week.

I gotta call on Monday to see where my ENT doctor is on my pre authorization as far as my endoscopy and sleep apnea surgery goes. I do have the proper BMI to qualify for the surgery since my BMI is around 35 and it has to be underneath 40 to perform all of the procedures. Before, they told me I had to lose like 25 pounds but with my new insurance through work I don’t need to lose any weight which is ironic because I’m now 179lbs and I think I was 186lbs at my original doctor’s appointment so I’m unintentionally losing weight regardless… which is both good and kind of amusing.

I got my leave approved with my work for surgery so I just gotta pick a date and fill out the proper paperwork so that I get paid by the state for my absence since my personal PTO wouldn’t cover all of the two full weeks that I would need to recover from surgery. I mean, I can go without pay for a little while, I’m just thankful that the state I live in reimburses me 90% of my wages while on family medical leave so I’m not really gonna miss out on a paycheck when I leave work for two weeks for surgery.

My relationship with my boyfriend is wonderful. He was so sick this past week and I had to take him to the hospital on my day off on Thursday and I felt so bad because he has this severe abdominal pain that the doctors couldn’t figure out the cause of. It’s not kidney stones or spleen issues or diverticulitis. But he is also a cancer survivor so the worry now is if his mastocytosis is coming back with a vengeance. So it’s pretty scary to say the least, but I’m here for him in whatever capacity he needs or wants me in. He’s such a hard worker; he went to work today despite the pain and did his job without complaining. I just hope he can get ahold of his primary care doctor on Monday if he can wait that long so he can get some peace of mind and clarity on his health.

Sometimes I forget this is a mental health blog and I gotta sometimes write my emotions and feelings on this very mental health blog. So, with that being said…. My mental health has been in full blown depression for the past two months which makes sense because it’s been about two months since reducing my lithium levels for the sake of the court. I like that I feel way less tired because I reduced my lithium intake from 900 mg a day to 600. But my depression is shitty. Every night I spend with Kyle, I end up on his kitchen floor just over stimulated by the day and the lights and sounds and I get small and sad. Sometimes I want to self harm, but mostly I want to end my life even though things have never been this good because the depression is so overwhelming.

Kyle is pretty good about comforting me. After his hospital day trip, it was snowing super bad so I spent the night at his house. I was laying on his kitchen floor, well originally I was at his kitchen table working on my budget but after his shooting game kept making loud gunshot noises, I somehow ended up laying on the floor because it reminded me of when my “friend” tried to shoot me in self defense because he was a full blown alcoholic turned epileptic and after blacking out and having a seizure he was so disoriented about why I was in his home, he tried to shoot me. I was out the door once the shell went through his screen door but do not stop do not collect $200 when passing go, I was fucking gone.

Ever since then and this was maybe four years ago now I can’t stand gunshot sounds even fake ones or fire works. Plus hospitals and me being a visitor at a hospital reminds me of the time when I was 16 and had to rush my mom to the emergency department because she had overdosed on what was unknown to everyone, hospital staff included but signing a DNR for my mother because I was the only blood relative and we were out of state with my sister and dad being home in WA state and my nana couldn’t drive because she was blind. She also wasn’t very helpful in that situation either because she hadn’t ate and she was diabetic so I called my grandfather on my dad’s side to come to the hospital to bring my nana food because I was my mother’s emergency contact and couldn’t leave the hospital and like I said, nana Is blind and couldn’t drive. My grandpa was pissed because I “inconvenienced” him but eventually he brought food because it was late at night and there was no food available nearby.

So the too long don’t read version of all that was hospitals and gunshot noises are serious triggers for me but I tried to overcome my irrational fear to be a comfort to my boyfriend who was seriously sick and next thing I know, he’s blocking the light of the kitchen skylights and comes sits on the floor with me to hold me. I don’t deserve him….

So essentially I need to go to the doctor soon because this depression shit is gonna kill me and I actually want to be alive for once in my life, so jot that down. I don’t know what more they can do because my Abilify and Prozac are pretty high and as far as court goes, I can’t up my lithium plus the upped lithium levels makes my apathy go crazy. So I literally cannot win. But I keep telling myself that my feelings of depression and anxiety are only temporary. I will feel better… eventually. We shall see…

I think that’s all I have for now. Please pray for me and my boyfriend, Kyle as we both go through our own health, physical and mental, struggles. I care and love you all. Thanks for reading.

Much love,

Dani