Spent 4 hours on the allotment today, lugging more wood up to the plot, building 3 more raised beds, digging a bed over and sowing some seeds. We’ve done 8 out of 12 beds now – if we get one more done tomorrow morning, we’ll be able to finish all of them next weekend.
I admit I underestimated how much time and effort it would take to get all the wood up to the plot, prepare the ground, make the beds and get them all level and aligned. In my head, it was an afternoon’s work. In reality it will end up having taken about 5 times that. But it’s totally worth it. It looks great, and it’s already clear that the site will be much more manageable as a result.
Sowed more seeds today, in bed #1:
- Limanthes Douglassi
- Nasturtium Salad Mix
- Garlic (can’t remember the type, think it might have been Solent Wight?)
- Dwarf peas: Charmette and Jessy ( a sugar snap)
J fetched the last of the woodchip from the top gate and we made pathways between the new beds.
4 hours flew by, and afterwards we wolfed down a huge plate of food at the nearby cafe.
I started this year feeling anxious, tired and overwhelmed. This was partly because I reduced my dose of anti-anxiety medication at the start of the year. It was also because last year was difficult, work-wise – I was under a lot of pressure and dealing with a lot of uncertainty and ambiguity, which I enjoy but which can get tiring if you carry on too long without any let-up. And it’s been dark and cold and wet – I think I always find the first month of the year the most difficult.
I’ve been on the medication for about 3 years, since my last mental health episode took me out of action for a few weeks. It was, in some ways, my worst episode so far (I’ve had a small handful over the last 3 decades) in that I was unable to leave the house or do anything very much for a while because I was paralysed with anxiety. I don’t say that lightly; I really was completely stuck. I honestly don’t know what I would have done without J taking care of me and an amazing NHS team coming to visit during that time.
So although I’ve been well for ages, I’ve been putting off reducing my dose for fear of a relapse, so reducing the dose was stressful. But it felt like an important thing to do: I can’t / don’t want to stay on them forever, I hadn’t had a panic attack for many months and had been feeling pretty chipper all things considered. Also I hate it that the medication makes me put on weight – I want to get back to my normal weight and shape, and feel fully like my normal self again.
Within a week of taking down the dose, which I did gradually like you’re meant to, I started getting all the all-too-familiar signs. Nightmares with long narrative arcs and vividly memorable characters and stories. An increasing inability to deal with a change of plan or unexpected turn of events without feeling close to meltdown. Pointlessly scrolling down my Twitter feed, searching for something to connect to and somehow unable to stop because I was too knackered to do anything else. Procrastinating really important tasks instead of just the usual minor ones. Too tired to enjoy reading or focus on anything much at all for more than a few minutes. Trouble retaining and recalling information. An intermittent and feeling of being full to brimming over with worry and tears. General exhaustion.
It wasn’t really bad at all compared with my worst full-on episodes – more like a general low-level angst punctuated with minor meltdowns and a few dark nights of the soul. But it was enough for me to be scared of a downhill descent into much worse and more dangerous territory. Once you’ve been really low, you never fully lose the fear of going there again.
I started writing lists of things to do to make myself feel better: start going to yoga again; limit screentime (I was up to an average of around 3 hours a day on my phone, which is never a good sign); cycle both to and from work, having got into the habit of getting the train home; do a kind and calm thing for myself each day; get back on top of the sugar situation. Get up to the allotment – spend time outside, working the earth and feeling a connection to it. Connect with the season and the sky. I know that doing these things makes me feel better, but unfortunately that doesn’t always make it easy for me to keep on doing them in any sort of consistent way. I have to make myself do the things that keep me well. When I fail to keep on top of them, it shows.
So I started doing some of these things about 6 weeks ago, determined to do all I could to halt the decline. It was hard, but also sort of empowering to be reminded that I can intervene and control this if I do it early enough and with enough dogged determination.
I realised today as J & I peacefully lugged wood, dug the soil and sowed seeds that I’m better. I’m fine again. Things stress me out, tire me out and sometimes overwhelm me, but generally speaking the cloud has lifted and I’m ok. I’m ok. I’m ok.
Keeping the Plot 