Day 236

Not a great day.

Weather much warmer so I wanted to go for a walk but since Eldest and I are going into the city tomorrow and yesterday the short walk I did got me achy I decided not to risk it. So I started off the day a little irritable.

Got more irritable as the day went on because gee, guess who ended up changing the toilet paper in all the bathrooms -and- changing the paper towels? Meanwhile, Spouse was irritable and sarcastic too.

The fact that my vacation is now more than half over was getting to me as tomorrow is all about Eldest's interview and I leave Saturday. There was some usual low-level family drama in the background which wasn't helping either. Had a nice quiet lunch with ice cream afterwards and was reasonably successful at the self care...till Spouse decided to drink tonight. Usually I'm good at remaining completely detached from anyone else's drinking but today it just really got to me. As in "pissed me the hell off" which wouldn't have been at all productive to share -- everyone dances their own dance with that particular demon. Nobody wants to hear any disapproval while the music is still playing, either.

It took me a while to work through all my feelings, starting with admitting I had them in the first place. That of itself was helpful: being able to acknowledge to yourself "hey, I'm really x and y and z right now...and that's okay" does a lot to de-fang whatever the emotions are (angry, hurt and melancholy.) Gave myself some distance too: announced I was going to go downstairs to eat and then have a shower. By the time all that was done (including more ice cream; the sugar seemed to taste particularly good) I had worked through enough of my thoughts (including a fair bit of self-pity) to be able to spend another few hours with Spouse and Eldest before calling it a night.

If I were less tired I think I would be more impressed with myself and my adaptive self-care. First of all I didn't drink and in fact wasn't even tempted. Secondly I acknowledged the emotions I was having. Then I decided not to act on them because reflection and rational thought said nothing good would happen if I did. Finally I figured out something to help ease my feelings which -wasn't- picking a fight, being sarcastic, excusing myself so early in the evening as to cause an issue or getting all weepy: dinner, dessert and a nice long shower. It doesn't seem like all that much written down but it worked. Everything remained amicable.

A year or so ago I would have been drinking also, right on top of the bad emotions. Meaning there was a better than 50% chance we would end up having an ugly verbal conflict which would have to be resolved in the wee small hours of tomorrow morning and would have cast a shadow over the last bit of my trip. Sober is definitely better.