It's Been a While: Darkness.

I know I haven't been too good at updating lately. Or being a friend. Or staying in touch.

I've been struggling with my mental health. I think I'm crashing into a depressive episode and I'm finding it hard to want to do anything, I'm finding it hard to find motivation. It's like there is a large swallowing hole inside me. It's not an excuse, just an explanation. I'm sorry.

I've been working here and there on some knitting projects. A bit on my mom's snow day slippers a bit on my  sister's mistake rib scarf, I cast on for The Husbando's birthday mitts. But none of these things light a fire inside of me. They're work. I force myself to do a little every morning. I know I'll love the end product and I'll love giving them to their owners, but I don't know.

It's a deep emptiness lately.

I've been filling it with two things. Reading and knitting the Herald Shawl.

I've been rereading Harry Potter and Darkness is My Only Companion a Christian Response to Mental Illness. I find both are very helpful in guiding me out of my own "darkness." The latter is extremely well written and a very good read for anyone who has bipolar disorder and is Christian. Or is mentally ill for that matter.

The Herald Shawl seems to be the only thing holding my interest in knitting lately. I knit my hopes, my thoughts, my sadness into it. I knit my dust ration out onto it. I knit and think through everything.

I knit it and think through my resentment about how I've been told I can't have babies because of my bipolar disorder and ocd. I knit it and cry. I knit it and feel better. I knit it and smile and laugh and play video games with my sister and The Husbando and feel like the sun will shine tomorrow. I knit it when I curl up on the kitchen floor overwhelmed with intrusive thoughts and am convinced the sun won't shine tomorrow. Either way, every day at least one repetition of the 8 rows gets knit. And it's helping me, A LOT. 

And it'll pass. The darkness. It always does. I probably messed up taking my medication once or twice this week, and need to be more careful about that. But I know it'll pass. I'm stronger than the darkness. My God is a brighter light than the darkness. 

Until then, bare with my fewer updates. I'll try to be better at it. Xo. 

Proverbs 15

I woke up cranky. The fan is broken so I'm not sleeping well, the dog got garbage out last night, the ash tray got knocked over in the wind outside last night as well and I was greeted with all these things before a "Good Morning" first thing. So I woke up REALLY REALLY REALLY CRANKY.

Livid is probably a better word. I was ready to burn some damn bridges. I think I even slammed a door at one point.

So when I opened my bible to do Sunday morning bible study, instead of using my bible promise cards as a compass point for where to start reading, I flipped to the back and found references of the word "anger" and flipped to Proverbs 15.

And it really took the umpf out of my anger. If I respond to harsh things angrily then I will just be adding to the fire, I need to try to step back, take a deep breath and control my tongue. 

I'm still cranky, but I'm trying to control the things I say and how I say them, as to not stir the pot any further.

So then I took a deeeeeeeep breath and worked on The Rank and File dishcloth for this week's dishcloth KAL on Ravelry. I worked until it was done. Because knitting makes me less cranky.

Knit with US size 8 bamboo needles and Red Heart Panther Pink yarn 

Finished and gifted to my sister.

It was a nice pattern, I like the texture and I learned a lot from it. Like I shouldn't use bamboo needles when a pattern calls for so many slips. My aluminum ones would have made it an easier and quicker knit. I messed up decreasing and ended up with 36 instead of 35 stitches, but k2tog on the next row seemed to fix this issue and my seed stitch border doesn't seem to suffer from it. It's not perfect, but I'm proud of it and my sister likes it so I'm happy. 

It feels good to finish a WIP! 

But overall, I'm still tired and I miss my fan. I'm grumpy and moody. But I have been minding my tongue. My mood square today is grumpy though. I tried to do Knot a twisted tie pattern for my square today and it doesn't show up, I think because it's too small, I'll try it again sometime because the pattern is so lovely and made by a friend of mine.

That's all for now, folks. I need a nap. And a drink, if only I drank LOL.