Family refugee
Jul. 18th, 2014 03:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
missroseroseSo I'm in Anchorage, staying with my mother. No big deal, I've done this any number of times in the past. My mother is a wonderful person, we get along really well, I like Anchorage and have friends here, it's a beautiful time of year.
It's been...a little more complicated this time around. A good chunk of it is my maternal grandmother being here too. Don't get me wrong, I like her fine, but this is a smallish condo already crowded with my mother's art studio, so with my grandmother taking up the second bedroom that bumps me to sleeping in the living room. I honestly hadn't thought that would be a problem - I've slept on couches and whatnot before - but between my mother being an inveterate morning person, the jet-lag, and the ridiculous Alaskan summer daylight pouring in through the windows at all hours, things are starting to look increasingly like Insomnia all up in my head, if Al Pacino were a thirtysomething wannabe-artist with a history of emotional instability.*
Also (I suspect) in part due to my grandmother's presence, my mother's been going into Full Planning Mode. To her credit, she's been very good about letting me do my own thing, but there are occasional conflicts (no, Mum, right after a power-yoga class when I'm sweaty and smelly and just want a shower and a change of clothes is not a good time for me to go to lunch with you and Grandma in a very public place), and combined with the sleep deprivation and the unaccustomed family dynamics and the lack of any place of my own to retreat to, I've been feeling increasingly emotionally unstable and viewing the approaching planned road trip to Homer (four people in a small car for a full day, and then several days in a shared hotel room) with an increasing amount of dread.
So now I'm at the airport, booked on the last (first-class, because even when I'm an irrationally-angry weepy wreck my mother is wonderful) seat on the overnight flight back.
I'm not sorry I came - I got to hang out with my friend Carl, I got to see both of my grandmothers, and my mother took me to a wonderful birthday dinner, and aside from the sudden hyperemotional moments it's been nice. But I'm trying very hard not to feel like I'm a failure who's disappointing everyone; I know they'd rather I wasn't miserable (no one's good company when they're miserable!). And...I'm trying not to feel apprehensive. Because I'd seen such an improvement in my mood swings with my regular yoga-going, and I had thought maybe I was making some headway in getting stable. True, taking away the yoga and adding in multiple acute stressors probably isn't the best measure of progress. But here, in my sleep-deprived and already-weepy brain, it's hard to ignore the voice that's insisting that there's something permanently wrong with me, and that anything that disrupts my routine is going to send me over the edge again. And for someone who's always prided themselves on both their flexibility and their self-control, that's kind of scary.
Ah well. Homeward, and then I can cry (and sleep!) as much as I like. Brian's even being a dear and getting up early on a Saturday to brave The Kennedy Express Parking Lot With Deluxe Moveable Spaces (painfully-accurate description credit: him) to pick me up and save me the hour on transit. He must love me an awful goddamn lot.
*I realized - just today, three days and two emotional breakdowns into this trip - that I could have totally stayed with my paternal grandmother, who lives literally right down the street from my mother and has a spare bedroom (with blinds!) for this segment of the trip. I felt a little stupid once that hit me, as if I'd been able to have my space and catch up on sleep and interact with my mother and maternal grandmother on a more even keel, things might have been more pleasant all around. I guess that's what "live and learn" means...
It's been...a little more complicated this time around. A good chunk of it is my maternal grandmother being here too. Don't get me wrong, I like her fine, but this is a smallish condo already crowded with my mother's art studio, so with my grandmother taking up the second bedroom that bumps me to sleeping in the living room. I honestly hadn't thought that would be a problem - I've slept on couches and whatnot before - but between my mother being an inveterate morning person, the jet-lag, and the ridiculous Alaskan summer daylight pouring in through the windows at all hours, things are starting to look increasingly like Insomnia all up in my head, if Al Pacino were a thirtysomething wannabe-artist with a history of emotional instability.*
Also (I suspect) in part due to my grandmother's presence, my mother's been going into Full Planning Mode. To her credit, she's been very good about letting me do my own thing, but there are occasional conflicts (no, Mum, right after a power-yoga class when I'm sweaty and smelly and just want a shower and a change of clothes is not a good time for me to go to lunch with you and Grandma in a very public place), and combined with the sleep deprivation and the unaccustomed family dynamics and the lack of any place of my own to retreat to, I've been feeling increasingly emotionally unstable and viewing the approaching planned road trip to Homer (four people in a small car for a full day, and then several days in a shared hotel room) with an increasing amount of dread.
So now I'm at the airport, booked on the last (first-class, because even when I'm an irrationally-angry weepy wreck my mother is wonderful) seat on the overnight flight back.
I'm not sorry I came - I got to hang out with my friend Carl, I got to see both of my grandmothers, and my mother took me to a wonderful birthday dinner, and aside from the sudden hyperemotional moments it's been nice. But I'm trying very hard not to feel like I'm a failure who's disappointing everyone; I know they'd rather I wasn't miserable (no one's good company when they're miserable!). And...I'm trying not to feel apprehensive. Because I'd seen such an improvement in my mood swings with my regular yoga-going, and I had thought maybe I was making some headway in getting stable. True, taking away the yoga and adding in multiple acute stressors probably isn't the best measure of progress. But here, in my sleep-deprived and already-weepy brain, it's hard to ignore the voice that's insisting that there's something permanently wrong with me, and that anything that disrupts my routine is going to send me over the edge again. And for someone who's always prided themselves on both their flexibility and their self-control, that's kind of scary.
Ah well. Homeward, and then I can cry (and sleep!) as much as I like. Brian's even being a dear and getting up early on a Saturday to brave The Kennedy Express Parking Lot With Deluxe Moveable Spaces (painfully-accurate description credit: him) to pick me up and save me the hour on transit. He must love me an awful goddamn lot.
*I realized - just today, three days and two emotional breakdowns into this trip - that I could have totally stayed with my paternal grandmother, who lives literally right down the street from my mother and has a spare bedroom (with blinds!) for this segment of the trip. I felt a little stupid once that hit me, as if I'd been able to have my space and catch up on sleep and interact with my mother and maternal grandmother on a more even keel, things might have been more pleasant all around. I guess that's what "live and learn" means...
