How I Sort of Took Charge of My Time

I’ve just put up a new SharePost on HealthCentral, where I write in the Bipolar Disorder topic. Living Well With Bipolar II Disorder: Taking Charge of Your Time talks about a change in my life I’m really proud of.

It started in early November when I was talking with my son Joey via instant messenger. I can’t remember the details of the conversation, but it was probably me moaning about how overloaded and overwhelmed I was feeling. Something in our conversation inspired me that day (Joey’s good at inspiring), and I sat down with Microsoft Excel and created the schedule I wrote about in the SharePost.

I’d lived too long, too often, in a slosh of struggle, anxiety and desperation. Always feeling overwhelmed, always feeling inadequate, always beating myself up. There were some periods where using daily lists really helped. I could go on that way for quite some time, as long as my mood wasn’t too bad and nothing went wrong.

There were, and are, hypomanic periods where I had lots of energy, but I usually expend that energy on physical tasks like housework and gardening, not on work I get paid for. Face it – I don’t often get excited about working on my jobs. But they’re essential. They have to be tended.

Anyway – when I started making a schedule for the month at the beginning of the month, complete with topics for my required writing, the effects were instantaneous and lasting. Wow! Pressure eased. Confidence increased. Work done, on time, without turning into a frantic ghoul clawing at my own spirit. Continue reading

I’m supposed to be hypomanic in January

AmsoniaJanuary is usually the month when my mood starts to soar into hypomania. Garden catalogs are arriving, filled with loveliness I want for my garden. I make lists, spreadsheets, drawings. Where can I use amsonia (at right); which variety is best; which nursery has the best price?

No – not this year. Keep looking, keep looking…

Artemisia Powis CastleOne ‘Powis Castle’ artemisia (at left) will be perfect to separate two rather garish peonies and soften their magenta color. I’ll get that from High Country Gardens. That goes on my “definite” list. So does artemisia ‘Seafoam,’ which will form the base of a floral waterfall. (I can’t afford a real pool with waterfall and fountain, so I’m going to make the image of one with plants.)

Oh how I want those 3 lilies from American Meadows! And that darling little false cypress – chamaecyparis obtusa ‘Chabo Yadori’ for my collection of dwarf conifers.

Old Hosta Garden

I also collect hostas (there’s my old hosta garden at right, from before I moved), and there is one I really want this year, a new dwarf called Fireworks. It’s expensive.

Yes, I love variegated foliage, but I don’t focus on foliage plants only. I want some new daylilies in soft yellow and salmon, I want the blazing red of geums, Maltese Cross and Oriental poppies. I want another fuschia ‘Gartenmeister Bonstedt’ – tried to overwinter last year’s, but Buzz Continue reading