Freud

As we had storms and hail till about 8pm tonight I only went out for about 20 minutes for a bit of shopping, and at the end of the day could either wimp out and not post here, or bite the bullet and see what occurred. As Freud often encouraged his patients to, he'd start off with a subject and ask them to just say what came into their heads. Hence this post. Unplanned and not based on anything I did today, plus I haven't had any insights, ideas or other progress on any front that I can start from either.
There has been a theme of chaos in the last few months, as in the stressful sort. Life seemed to go out of control in the way you often enjoy it in a film or tv programme but not in your life. Without adding too many details, I got hooked up with some people who chaos followed around, and added to my own I also took on theirs. This involved regular phone calls from 1 to 2 am, trips round supermarkets at similar times, arguments, insults, and general hassle to add to my own dental breakages, usual disappointing email reply level, broken promises by tradesmen and businesses I deal with, family responsibilities (I'm the only child and grandchild so the buck tends to stop here) and anything else I haven't managed to think of. OK, this is life as most people know it, and most people do work full time as well (though this does mop up many of the hours I have available to get either caught or left indoors to languish as today). The trouble is, as I've said before and may repeat for the next 40 plus years, I have no one at home to help me out or talk to. When I did (with family) I still had similar stresses (though I was a lot younger and could handle them better) but knew whatever hell happened outside I'd soon return to a comfortable civilisation indoors. Somehow an empty, albeit similar house just doesn't do it the same way.

So, what do others do about it? There is little common ground from my enquiries. It depends on your interests and social skills whether you meet women in public or private places, and anyone living in a town of less than 100,000 people knows more or less every single woman personally and has no trouble, I've been told by people who used to live there. So that has no simple solution. As for the chaos, saying no is one very valuable tool. My hypnotherapist told me years ago how to turn people down from invitations I didn't like without rejecting them personally, which helped a lot. At 40 I learned I may as well just turn people down flat anyway as my time was running out I may as well spend it more the way I wanted to. But I don't have the heart to reject people directly, and have had all sorts of schizophrenics, manic/depressives (ie all variations) etc hanging around me for years, as my father said, because I encourage them by being nice to them. I presume this means most people just tell them curtly where to get off, which I don't ever witness happening, but apart from one who became very aggressive I've still not done more than subtly trying to avoid them, some for longer than others. I'd be interested to hear other experiences people have had in looking after number one rather than sacrifice time and patience for people who drain you dry. I suppose there are books and websites around, I should go and look.

Anyway, the chaos is now, like the wind measurements, down to about force 5, a fresh breeze. It's been worse but of course why is it there at all? My grandma's in hospital with a dicky kidney, which we all hope to god is fixed on Saturday when they 'go in'. D day is now 5 days away (d being for dentist, visit 3 from 4, as far as I can tell). Other things I've mentioned recently are wobbling (I hope not terminally) for no apparent reason, but most people fear the worst when people go quiet on you. I collected my Renault model yesterday which is now on the top of a large display. Other than that the sponge of recent experience has been fully sueezed out now, and though the clouds of medical and dental treatments float across the sky of life, half the people I know are in similar positions but don't bloody moan about it. At least my blood pressure is normal, and that must help. If a miracle could happen, now would be a good time. This posting should be edged in black, but it's been that sort of day...