Or How Will I Spend My Winter?
In January, my daughter, Sam, will be going to New Zealand for over three months. That means I will be home alone.
While I don’t anticipate Marv & Harry showing up, I won’t lie; it’s going to be hard on me to be alone for that long. Due to agoraphobia and PTSD from a car accident, I don’t get out much. Plus, I have to travel anywhere from 30 minutes to over 2 hours to see friends & family, all of whom are busy with their own lives. So, unfortunately, there won’t be too many opportunities for visits. In short, I will be spending most of these upcoming 3+ months devoid of human companionship. I will need something to keep me occupied while Sam is away.
I am not one who consciously chooses a New Year’s resolution; however, I am naturally inclined to start a new year out with a specific goal in mind. I think it’s because I get so focused on the holidays that everything else falls by the wayside during November & December. By the time January rolls around, I’m wanting to get back on track and usually an opportunity for change naturally presents itself.
One year, I KonMaried the house. Another time, I wanted to spend the winter re-reading the Outlander series. Two years ago, I decided to focus on my health and lost a lot of weight. And last year I concentrated on forming some healthy habits and nailing down a skincare routine. As for this time around, it’s too soon to say. But I will definitely need something to focus on to get me through the drudgery of winter.
There are plenty of things I like the idea of doing. The problem is that I don’t know if I’ll want to do them. I most likely have ADHD. Both of my daughters have been diagnosed with it, and in the process of learning about the disorder, so much of my own life started making sense. My issues have been compounded by my brain injury, which has made it nearly impossible to initiate tasks. Problems with focusing and an inability to start things is not conducive to being productive.
I also struggle with post-holiday/seasonal depression. I absolutely love the holidays, which helps buoy me early on when the days grow short. However, on New Year’s Day, the depression comes for me with a vengeance, and the thought of all the dark, cold days ahead fills me with angst. For this reason, I have to have a January goal to anchor me so I don’t get swept away; I refuse to let it beat me. I will come up with a plan—hopefully one or more of the things I talk about today—and I will be okay.
Besides the things I would like to do, there is one thing that I need to do. I’ve always been big & brawny. Well, I used to be, anyway. My strength & stamina suffered as a result of my brain injury. These problems were compounded by muscle loss after losing a large amount of weight. I’m weak now, and I hate it. I feel so vulnerable. I can’t even lift a garbage bag up over my head to toss it in the dumpster. I lost weight to be healthier, but now I feel even more unhealthy than I did when I was fat. I really need to do something about the weakness.
However, I’m not good at sticking to exercise routines. If I’m doing a physical activity that I enjoy, there’s no problem. But exercise routines bore me. And while I enjoy strength training a lot more than cardio workouts, it still does not hold my interest for long. If I can’t do this on my own, I may need to speak to my doctor about doing some physical therapy. I did months of physical therapy after my car accident, and I hated it. But it worked. And I need something that works for this weakness.
Next, there is genealogy, which this blog was intended to be about. After a few years’ hiatus, I got into it hardcore back in September. Day and night, I was researching. The house even got messy because, when I can actually focus on something I like, I do it to the exclusion of everything else. And in typical Jen fashion, when I go hardcore for something that really interests me, I love it. I love it until I suddenly don’t. One day, I can’t get enough; the next day I say, “That’s enough,” and I don’t want to look at it again.
So, that is where I’m at with genealogy right now. Regardless, I just bought an Ancestry DNA test kit that came with a 3-month subscription to World Explorer. I also upgraded my dad’s Y-37 test at FTDNA to the Big Y-700. Hopefully the DNA results will get me revved up for genealogy again. If not, it’s ultimately okay because genealogy will be there waiting for me in the future, and I will find something else to do this winter. In the meantime, I will just need to reevaluate the purpose of this blog.
I started this blog because, at the time, I was compulsively performing genealogical and historical research. I had a lot of thoughts floating around in my head and needed to get them out. Pretty soon thereafter, however, I got bored with it all. But I wanted to keep blogging. For the first time in my life, I actually found myself writing just for fun. I did not ever imagine myself writing just for the sake of writing, itself.
The other day I was reflecting on how much I loved my new morning routine in which I wake up around 5:00 a.m. and start blogging. And not only am I blogging, but I’m losing myself in writing for hours at a time. As I was thinking about this new ritual, it suddenly dawned on me why I suddenly loved to write like this: Ritalin.
Despite the fact that I think I have ADHD, I was actually prescribed Ritalin to help me with task initiation issues that were caused by my brain injury. While the jury is still out on whether it’s helping for that, it has done wonders for my anxiety, so my psychiatrist kept me on it. And it’s apparently helping with attention & focus, too! I’ve been taking it since June, and I just realized this within the last week.
I am hoping that I will continue enjoying this new hobby of mine, but as I previously stated, I will just have to decide what my blog is going to focus on going forward. And that leads me to my next interest. I want to write about a few ancestors who fought in the Civil War. However, in order to do that, I will need their Compiled Military Service Records from NARA. At 30 bucks a pop, I’ve only ordered one set so far, and it will take a long time for them to arrive.
In the meantime, I could be researching the Civil War and the histories of my ancestors’ units. But it remains to be seen if I’ll have the focus and attention span to do that. As I stated earlier, my probable ADHD makes me run hot & cold on my hobbies, so where I’ll be at with my writing in January is impossible to say; however, I am hopeful now that I have the help of a stimulant.
Another thing I’d love to be able to get back into is baking. It was my passion until—by now you can probably guess what I’m going to say—my freaking brain injury killed it for me. Even when I want to bake, my inability to initiate tasks makes it impossible. It amazes me how one split second turned my whole world upside down, and I’m still feeling its effects over four years later. However, I will never give up hoping that things change. Even after all this time, there is still a chance I could see some improvement. If nothing changes that’s okay because I have accepted my circumstances as they are, but it’s never wrong to have hope.
Finally, there is one more thing I’d love to (be able to) concentrate on this winter: cooking. I am a decent cook, meaning I can follow a recipe. But I only like cooking occasionally. Therefore, in our household, the chore of daily cooking falls on Sam. But soon enough Sam will be gone for over three months, and I will have to fend for myself. Last year, while Sam wintered in New Zealand, I relied heavily on convenience foods, but I do not want to do that again.
Whether I want to or not, I need to cook some real food this winter. Instead of looking at it as a dreaded chore, I will try to view it as an opportunity to try new things. This is a more recent approach I’ve been taking with the chores I hate. I am trying to reframe how I view tasks to see them in a more positive light. You aren’t always going to enjoy the things you need to do, but you don’t have to be miserable while doing them. And that attitude makes a world of difference.
Now I just have to come up with some meal plans, which is difficult because I don’t care for meat (probably another reason I struggle with weakness). I also don’t care for tofu. While I like eggs and dairy, you just don’t get anywhere near the amount of protein in them as you get from meat; the same thing goes for iron, and I’m susceptible to anemia as well. For these reasons, I will probably aim for a serving of beef once a week, but what I’ll do with the beef is another story. Wish me luck!
So I’ve identified some areas that I’d like to work on:
- strength training,
- genealogy,
- historical research,
- blogging,
- baking, and
- cooking.
But who knows what I will want to work on when January rolls around. I may even be inspired to work on something completely different than what I’ve written about today. No matter what, I will be occupied by something this winter because, despite my issues, I always manage to rise to the challenges I’m faced with. In fact, instead of merely surviving this winter, I want to thrive. Hopefully Ritalin, determination, and a positive attitude will help make that possible.🤞
