Employment - Constant Overstimulation?

[Chava]

Full time work and full time school is ALOT to manage, PTSD or not. But with PTSD, yes, easy overload. It also sounds like you have a job that demands a lot. Is any sort of slower-paced or quieter work an option for you? Or cutting any hours between work and/or school? How much more school do you have? It will get easier when you get something off your plate but I know it's scary when you feel like you are going to crack. What do you do to take the speed down and decompress in your few hours off?

 

[Weemie]

Been looking for alternate employment. Live in a rural area, there aren't that many jobs that I can work. I have a physical disability so I can't stand around all day, and I have my own apartment, so I need to make decent money. School for another year. Off in May until September, then back until May 2017. I write. Listen to music. Talk to friends. Sleep. Cook. Go for walks. Pet my cat. Upload to my uReddit course.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I understand. However, I do not have the ability to take things in moderation. The only solution for me is to not have access to them. If I was prescribed a PRN benzodiazepine like clonazepam I would take the whole bottle and then forget the next 2 weeks of my life. Limiting access and distracting focus are the only things that work for me.

I understand as i am a addict as well, i just dont get how people get high off Xanax but ive had addicts as roommates that turned my house into a crack, herion, opioid, Xanax, who knows what else, selling house and ny step mom is addicted to them. Im prescribed three 1 mg a day and on days i work i take 1 right before work, i mid day, lunch hr, and 1 at night but on days i dont work i take them only if my anxiety is in the red zone and my entire body is shaking like im having colvulsions and sometimes my step mom has to beg me to take one. I work in a call center and have been caught twice going off on a customer whom was sceeaming at me and i cant do that so work days i generally sm regualr w/ them and on lunch sometimes i forget to take it and an hr or so after lunch i start to go in a severe panic attack. I just a type of addict that wants what will give me the numbing results i want, Xanax isnt that nor is my pain meds im on & i cant walk w/o those so i guess im lucky that way. My therapist knows im a clean addict, he knew i was huffing duster before anyone so he monitors my meds; i have a morphine pump in me now so my pain dr is tiering that up as he's tier down my oral meds so i tell him if theres any change and what it is and show him the print off for the pump that i get. All of my Drs know all of other Drs, they all know each other's names and numbers and what meds im on and any change by any of them.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I have a physical disability so I can't stand around all day, and I have my own apartment, so I need to make decent money.

Me too! We have that in common.

 

[dnp]

@lightraze It's so wrong that you should have to wait months and months just to be assessed for some alpha or beta blockers. If you have a few hundred dollars come across the border and walk into an urgent care place.

 

[Weemie]

Thanks for your responses, guys.

I'm quitting my job. (For real, this time. No Costanza shit.) I stay working there because I have my own place and I am so proud to have actually moved out on my own, and know that I can do it. But I am not happy. I have my own place that I am so proud of but I am never here. I have no time to enjoy myself. I get anxiety attacks just thinking about going back to work there.

It sounds so silly, but. Five days a week I am in hell, so I can spend 3 hours each night in my apartment stressing about what to do for the next day. I have one day out of the whole week where I don't have to get up and go to work. (The other day I'm volunteering.) I think it makes more sense for me to devote my stressing to real things. Like school. And how to get to the hospital so I can volunteer. I have this month's rent. I have a month to get my shit together. Hire a mover. Clean this place out.

I will miss my friends at work. They really don't know how much they inspired me to have the confidence to be independent and pursue my education.

Education is what I've always wanted and I can't even focus on it because I'm too busy stressing and working and (working for what?What am I doing at work that is this important to be stressing over?) and yeah there are. Other considerations. My dad. But my grandmother is a buffer, and I only need to stay there a year. When all is said and done, they do leave me alone. They do leave me my space. It is tolerable and I experienced happiness there. More than I am here. So I'm done. The only way I tolerated this was to think about my escape plan and that's all I think about anymore.

It's been eight months and I learned a lot about myself. That it's possible for me to be independent, but that life like this isn't worth it. All we have on this whole planet is our joy, and our lives. And squashing mine for the sake of a box with four walls that I'm never in? It doesn't work for me, anymore. It doesn't work for me. I thought that I would never be happy unless I was productive and it turns out, all I wanted was education. The chance to pursue my dreams. Everything else? It's secondary.