Sunday, February 15, 2015

Work, Florida and the Stuff In-between.

Hello again!


    Well, it's been a while since my last post, and I assure you I will try to make this flow with my previous two. To recap, in my last post I talked about learning to love myself and my fear of being alone. With this post I will talk about a few things I've done to help myself, but also about my struggle looking forward.


    To begin, after my last blog post I worked for three 12 hour shifts, rendering me pretty much useless for anything but work and/or sleep. (One of the wonderful side effects of working the night shift.) However, work is not a bad thing. I use work to help me focus on something other than the rough situation I am in. I love the hospital I work at, it is absolutely fabulous. They are the best in the state, literally. The hospital does everything in its power to help the patients that come through their doors, and they treat us nurses so well. I have so much support as a new nurse, which helps me feel confident in my job knowing that my employer has my back and believes I have what it takes. In fewer words, work is my normal, my safe haven, minus the stress the job carries with it.
 
  Though, as good as that all is I know I need to look for comfort elsewhere too. I can't just work constantly that isn't healthy for me and it could be potentially dangerous for my patients. This is where I hit my barrier. I don't know what to do other than work and sit in my apartment and watch Netflix. Once in a while though, I get an idea or someone suggests an idea for something else to do. The idea recently was to go visit my grandparents if I had at least 4 days off. It just so happened February 1-4 I was off, so I went to Florida to visit my grandparents.


    I flew out on the first right after my last shift of the week, I drove to the airport and went through security in my scrubs. (Side note: After I made it to my terminal I did change into my Gronkowski jersey and probably became the most hated person in the Pittsburgh airport, but I had to represent the Super Bowl champions because I couldn't not! What kind of New Englander would I be if I didn't!) Anyway, so I flew to Florida and my grandparents picked me up in Orlando with their matching Patriots t-shirts and it was such a wonderful feeling.


    Going to Florida was such a good idea really. It got me out of Morgantown and I was able to visit two of my favorite people on this planet, and the weather was nice too. For the first time in a long time I was able to see the light of day and I actually had sun on my skin (it's cloudy in Morgantown like 97% of the time). It felt so, SO good. While I was there I did some different activities. I went to a state park called Sebastian's Inlet, where the beach was sandy and beautiful! The wind was howling but that didn't stop me from walking barefoot in the sand and letting the water hit my feet. While I was there walking that beach I actually felt at peace, It has been so long since I have felt that. There's just something about the ocean, looking out at the water and hearing the lulling sound of crashing waves. This one was my gram's idea, not only did she just want to show me this beautiful beach, she knew I feel at peace there and she wanted me to bring that back with me. Now gram and I are eerily similar so she feels at peace on the water too.   
    
It's really incredible how I spend most of my time wanting to be somewhere else, I am never in the "now", I never want to be in the present, unless I am on the beach. When I'm there I don't think about anything else except where I am at, at that moment. I desperately want to be able to feel like that more often than not, but that  is where I struggle. After moving away I have learned a thing or two about myself and why I feel like I want to be anywhere except here. Lesson one, I am a beach bum and should probably just live in a beach house :) Which is hard to do in a landlocked state. Lesson two I like being around my family and my friends. When I'm not around them, I want to be around them. One of the reasons I am not at peace here is because I am not around them and I am so far away.


    One of the major struggles I still face is making friends down here. I have my co-workers but I don't really talk to them. Sometimes when I do talk to them I feel like they don't really care and just listen to be polite. Or when I go into an area where there's a group I feel like they leave not too long after I enter. Now I understand that part of this is the depression which causes me to look at it from a negative perspective and not the positive. The other part is I am so scared to get attached to anyone because of my plans to go back home, and the fear of being hurt. Because I am so afraid to get hurt by those I love (which has happened in the past) I convince myself I don't need any friends down here. I bask in the phony glory of being a "lone wolf", when deep down I kind of want a friend, or two. I am left with an exhausting internal conflict. Even writing this and putting it out there I worry that someone somewhere will use my weaknesses against me.  


    One of the other major struggles I am still facing, which is kind of making me go backwards instead of forwards is sort of a lack of motivation to try new things. I really do enjoy trying new things but for whatever reason I haven't been able to scrounge up the motivation to do so. I don't try new restaurants, I don't explore the area, I don't go to sporting events, instead I just barricade myself in my messy apartment and binge watch Blacklist. Again, the depression plays a role in this, but I don't know why I convince myself not to do all these things when I know I like to do new things. It extremely frustrating. Now going to Florida did help out a little bit in this department because while I was there I ended up doing a segway tour, now I was hesitant because I didn't want to look goofy (a silly reason) but I did it because my grandfather a.k.a "Gramps" made the arrangement to surprise me.


    For those of you who don't know Gramps is my Main(e) man (see what I did there? :) )
I am such a grandpa's girl it's ridiculous. So because he made the arrangement and wanted to do that with me, I had to. Honestly, it was actually pretty cool! The segway itself is very unique and it took a while to get used to operating it, and eventually I didn't care how I looked because it had worked out that the tour was just me, Gramps, and the tour guide. It also helped that we just cruised around a state park which didn't have a whole lot of people at the time. I did see some pretty neat things! I watched a Bald Eagle circle us and squawk at us, like it was showing off, I saw turpentine trees, tons of different birds, and the occasional armadillo. My favorite part about it though other than just being with Gramps, was just being in the sunshine.


    Like all good things, my time spent in Florida had to come to an end. I had a hard time leaving my grandparents but I am so grateful I even got to go in the first place. After Florida, I went right back to work and now I have a few days off and maybe, just maybe I'll try to do something a little crazy, like go downtown and eat at a local restaurant, there is a diner I want to check out!



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