In a funk...

There have been times when I have been happier than I have been lately and I have to admit, when I stop and think about it, that I am in a bit of a funk. I have noticed it especially these last few days, when a nagging little voice keeps telling me that something is not quite as comfortable emotionally as it should be. This nagging little voice is an almost constant companion now and I find it hard to ignore like it tried to do at first. I think I will have to acknowledge its presence and pay attention to what it has to tell me. I do hope that it is not the harbinger of the black dog that is lurking in the background.

 

Maybe writing about what makes me feel down will help me feel better, although exactly what is making me feel down is a mystery to me and would be hard to describe. There isn't anything in particular that is making me feel so, but just a general sort of malaise and a feeling of unease. I feel that I have shifted off center and that I am not in balance and that I am wobbly at the base. My foundations haven't been shaken, it is nothing as serious as that, but I am not solidly walking the middle ground anymore.

 

Walking on firm ground is what I always try to do because it is the safest route for me, what with my easily upset equilibrium. I have drifted off to a very soft shoulder and am in danger of toppling over or simply getting stuck. I want none of that and have to get back to the middle of the road and I aim to get me there through some very logical thinking. I will try to reason my way back to safety by being as objective as I can be.

 

It is very possible that my feeling down now is a reaction to me having been hypomanic before and that I am like a pendulum swinging between two extremes. This is called 'rapid cycling' and something my psychiatrist warned me about the last time I saw him. The thing to do, is to be aware of this tendency and to prevent the extremes from getting out of hand, which I think I am more capable of on the depressive side than I am on the manic side. If you look at it as a purely mechanical process, it is not so complicated and somehow makes sense.

 

I wonder how much I was walking the middle ground before this anyway and have to air my suspicions that I probably wasn't very much. I have been off kilter one way or the other for a while and walking on a tightrope, so there wasn't really very much of a solid base. The trick is to create that now by incorporating a schedule and structure into my life and by not doing anything out of the ordinary, while at the same time not creating such a boring and predictable life that it will drive me nuts with boredom.

 

You see, I thought there was a logical answer, or at least an explanation that I was able to understand and work with. When it comes to psychological solutions, I am a craftswoman and not an artist. I don't need the finesse and the lofty inspiration, but the patience and the basic skills.