Insomnia, Feeling Broken, and Acceptance

At first, I felt super empowered about coming out to my family, but as time went on, I started to really worry about what Dad would do. My anxiety about this and things with Mom and school and everything have really been taking a toll on me. My insomnia has really kicked up another notch, and I've noticed that I'm stress eating like every night before bed, and it has messed up my digestion.

I tried going to a meditation workshop on Sunday. It was in the gorgeous location, and there were a lot of people there. But, I still had a hard time getting into it. In part because I missed the Saturday stuff, having had to be at a breakfast with my advisor. She had told me to send out an email to tell people to go to this one restaurant - - and then she shows up at a completely different one and made us come over there. Augh!

Anyway, my sister has been great recently. And then, as she was checking in with me, I got a call from Dad. He got my letter.

He sounded a little bit chocked up. He said something along the lines of: It isn't the worst thing in the world. The worst thing in the world is to have to lose your spouse and best friend. She's the person that was there for me to lean on through the hard times in my life, and I can't lean on her now. Now, I have to take care of this little girl that she's become.

Then, he gave me some spiel about how he and Mom tried to be an example for my sister and me (clearly hinting that I'm not following the example when I date women). But, then he was like okay, let's talk about these new phones that I bought and how the weather's been.

I'm kinda in shock. Clearly, Dad's feeling broken. He even said at one point how he sees his life as basically over other than taking care of Mom. Otherwise, he would have really tried to fight with me, I think. I'm feeling a little broken too - I can't relax, can't sleep, can't stop eating so much, getting stuff confused all the time. I even showed up at therapy today at the wrong time.

When I came back later in the day for my appointment, my therapist and I spoke about how I have this pattern of spinning out of control with anxiety and ending up like a hamster on a wheel running around feeling more and more ragged.

And here's where I continue with that pattern: I have a date tonight, which I'm sort of not in the mood for. This weekend is my camping trip, which makes me anxious because I'm not quite sure what to expect and not feeling super comfortable being dependent upon the people I'm going with. I going to go start up on taking anti-anxiety med before bed on nights when I'm super stressed so that hopefully I can start getting some sleep again. I'm going to try to make myself finally workout after a little hiatus. I'm trying to finish my exam and my fellowship application......