Trying to find closure

 

Dear Bloggers,

 

“This wasn’t supposed to happen! Tell me why this has happened!” These are the spoken words of countless bereaved parents and boy or girlfriends that had a great day out in the old town of Brugge. Travelling by ship to the main land of Belgium. Townsend Thoresen was well known by lorry drivers and regular travelers that numerously crossed the channel with these ships throughout numerous years mostly foot passengers travelled for one pound due to an ad in The Sun — a never-ending and always present wound in the Souls of those who have buried their loved ones. After nearly 38 years, I returned to the place where the disaster with the Herald of Free Enterprise occurred. And the moment will never leave your brain many first responders have still some mental scars from this.

 

Disasters such as hurricanes, earthquakes, transportation accidents, or wildfires are typically unexpected, sudden, and overwhelming. For many people, there are no outwardly visible signs of physical injury, but there can be nonetheless an emotional toll. It is common for people who have experienced disaster to have strong emotional reactions. Understanding responses to distressing events can help you cope effectively with your feelings, thoughts, and behaviors, and help you along the path to recovery. And we are easily forgetting about the rescue teams that have to live with all the things they have seen and heard. The endless sounds of sirens and alarms that are going of constantly. These memories are hard to deal with for many and some of them cannot cope afterwards and get mentally stuck and some even take their own lives.

What are common reactions and responses to disaster?

Following disaster, people frequently feel stunned, disoriented or unable to integrate distressing information. Once these initial reactions subside, people can experience a variety of thoughts and behaviors. Common responses can be:

• Intense or unpredictable feelings. You may be anxious, nervous, overwhelmed, or grief-stricken. You may also feel more irritable or moody than usual.
• Changes to thoughts and behavior patterns. You might have repeated and vivid memories of the event. These memories may occur for no apparent reason and may lead to physical reactions such as rapid heartbeat or sweating. It may be difficult to concentrate or make decisions. Sleep and eating patterns also can be disrupted—some people may overeat and oversleep, while others experience a loss of sleep and loss of appetite.
• Sensitivity to environmental factors. Sirens, loud noises, burning smells, or other environmental sensations may stimulate memories of the disaster creating heightened anxiety. These “triggers” may be accompanied by fears that the stressful event will be repeated.
• Strained interpersonal relationships. Increased conflict, such as more frequent disagreements with family members and coworkers, can occur. You might also become withdrawn, isolated, or disengaged from your usual social activities.
• Stress-related physical symptoms. Headaches, nausea, and chest pain may occur and could require medical attention. Preexisting medical conditions could be affected by disaster-related stress.

How do I cope with this?

Fortunately, research shows that most people are resilient and over time are able to bounce back from tragedy. It is common for people to experience stress in the immediate aftermath, but within a few months most people are able to resume functioning as they did prior to the disaster. It is important to remember that resilience and recovery are the norm, not prolonged distress. There are a number of steps you can take to build emotional well-being and gain a sense of control following a disaster, including the following:

Give yourself time to adjust. Anticipate that this will be a difficult time in your life. Allow yourself to mourn the losses you have experienced and try to be patient with changes in your emotional state.

Ask for support from people who care about you and who will listen and empathize with your situation. Social support is a key component to disaster recovery. Family and friends can be an important resource. You can find support and common ground from those who've also survived the disaster. You may also want to reach out to others not involved who may be able to provide greater support and objectivity.

Communicate your experience. Express what you are feeling in whatever ways feel comfortable to you—such as talking with family or close friends, keeping a diary, or engaging in a creative activity (e.g., drawing, molding clay, etc.).

Find a local support group led by appropriately trained and experienced professionals. Support groups are frequently available for survivors. Group discussion can help you realize that you are not alone in your reactions and emotions. Support group meetings can be especially helpful for people with limited personal support systems.

Establish or reestablish routines. This can include eating meals at regular times, sleeping and waking on a regular cycle, or following an exercise program. Build in some positive routines to have something to look forward to during these distressing times, like pursuing a hobby, walking through an attractive park or neighborhood, or reading a good book.

When should I seek professional help?

If you notice persistent feelings of distress or hopelessness and you feel like you are barely able to get through your daily responsibilities and activities, consult with a licensed mental health professional such as a psychologist. Psychologists are trained to help people address emotional reactions to disaster such as disbelief, stress, anxiety, and grief and make a plan for moving forward. To find a psychologist in your area, I did work on myself over more than 35 years. Lately I went for psychological help and I went back to where it all happened. 37 years after there are hardly any traces left of the things that have been printed in my brain forever. The night before I went there my brain was going back to the dark and cold night on the 6^th of March.

The searchlights in he sky and the screaming and crying people in the helicopters and ambulances. The Belgian army guys and firefighters and the Red Cross people who all worked with everything in their powers. It was like a bad and totally crazy movie in my head and I was in doubt if I should go there. Somehow there was something that calmed me down and told me this will bring you towards closure.

It will still take some time before I can say this is over. 

Although slowly but surely I will get there.

 

The Old Sailor,

I was thinking about leaving

Dear Bloggers,

As I read through the web for conversations, questions, ideas about depression, I am struck by how many people who write to forums and blogs are desperately asking for help not for their own depression but for that of their spouses, partners, loved ones. So often, they report bewilderment. They feel stunned to find anger and rejection in place of love. How can it be that the person I have known so well is suddenly different, alien, hostile and wants to break out of the relationship that is so precious? 
 

What is this longing to leave that so many depressed people feel? I have no simple answer to that, but I can describe my own tortured experience with an almost irresistible drive to break out and start a new life.
I spent many years feeling deeply unsettled and unhappy in ways I could not understand. Flaring up in anger at my wife and two great young girls became a common occurrence. I’d carry around resentments about being held back and unsatisfied with my life, fantasizing about other places, other women, other lives I could and should be leading. 
 

My usual mode was to bottle up my deepest feelings, making it all the more likely that when they surfaced it would be in weird and destructive ways. I’d seethe with barely suppressed anger, lash out in rage and, of course, deny angrily that anything was wrong when confronted by my wife.

I was often living on the edge, but there were two threads of awareness I could hold onto that restrained me invisibly. One was the inner sense that until I faced and dealt with whatever was boiling inside me, I would only transplant that misery to a new place, a new life and a new lover. However exciting I might imagine it would be to walk into that new world, I knew in my heart that it would only be a matter of time before the same problems re-emerged.
The other was a question I kept asking myself : “What is it that I am leaving for? ” What was this great future and life that I would be stepping into? Could I even see it clearly? More often than not, the fantasy portrayed a level of excitement I was missing. Crazy thoughts or a very lively fantasy I would call it now.

Some buried part of me knew that a life based on getting high on non-stop brain-blowing excitement wasn’t a life at all. Maybe it wasn’t alcohol or drugs that lured me, but it was surely the promise of intense and thrilling experiences, the opening scene of an adventure film without the need to wait for the complicated plot to unravel. There was no real alternative woman out there waiting for me, only a series of fantasies with easy gratification, never the hard part of dealing with a complicated human being in a sustained relationship. And inwardly I knew, I would still face the fears, depression and paralysis of will that had plagued me for so long.

That bit of consciousness kept me from breaking everything up and leaving the wonderful family that I’m blessed with.

So just imagine what my wife was going through. She had to face the rejection of my anger at the deepest levels. At the worst of it, she had to hear me telling her she wasn’t enough for me, that I needed more than she could give. And the tension and pain between us, the frequent rage that I felt, spilled into the lives of my children in ways that slowly and painfully were to emerge over time. 

That is the hardest part of talking about this now, to grasp how my closest loved ones disappeared from awareness into the haze of my own self-hatred, my own feeling of emptiness that I was desperately trying to fill. I had no idea how my behavior spread in its impact, like widening circles in water, to touch so many around me I’ll continue with this theme and try to get at what can be done or said to someone possessed of a longing to leave.

The longing to leave one’s intimate partner brings out something that isn’t much discussed in descriptions of depression. It is the active face of the illness. We often focus on the passive symptoms, the inactivity, the isolation, sense of worthlessness, disruption of focused thought, lack of will to do anything. But paradoxically the inner loss and need can drive depressed people to frenzied action to fill the great emptiness in the center of their lives. They may long to replace that inadequate self with an imagined new one that makes up for every loss. 
 

My experience with this phase of illness occurred when I had only limited awareness of the hold depression had on me. That may be a key to understanding the dynamic and how to respond to someone in the grip of this drive to turn life upside down. Unhappy without knowing why, I had to find an explanation, and the easiest way to do that was to look outward. I could only see my present life, my wife, my work as holding me back, frustrating my deepest desires. In effect, I was blaming everyone but me for my misery. In that state, I could only focus on the promise of leaving, finding a new mate, new work, new everything.

Every suggestion my wife might make that there was something wrong with me only brought the angriest denial. Every time she said how much she loved me only felt like a demand that I stay stuck in this unfulfilling life and do what she wanted me to do. I knew so clearly that I was not the problem, certainly not sick but for the first time on the verge of escaping into the exciting life I should have been living all along.

There is something very close to the power of addiction in the fantasy of escape. I found it almost impossible to see through the dreams of a new life. It meant so much – my survival as a person seemed to be at stake. Unaware of the full effect of depression, blocking out what my wife and others were trying to tell me, I inflicted a lot of pain on my family, thinking that I had to be brutally honest in order to save myself. Fortunately, as I noted in the last post on this subject, I had been through enough work in therapy to have glimmers of the truth, and that helped me step back from the brink.

I’m big on offering advice, but the potentially devastating impacts of depressed people on those closest to them leads me to go a bit beyond just reflecting on what I’ve been through. I see it different now my wife is stuck in a similar situation that has caused a burn out due to her boss.

If you’re trying to deal with the sudden transformation of an intimate partner, get help, starting with friends and family. You’ve likely felt such a deep assault and wound that it would be easy to get lost in the sheer humiliation, hurt and anger of the experience, searching for what you’ve done wrong, what you could do or say to set things right. That’s a trap set for you by the voice of depression. That voice tries to persuade you, just as it has persuaded your loved one, that it’s your fault. Not true. It’s your partner’s illness that’s at the root of it. 

Those closest to you and your partner have doubtless noticed something strange and may have been hurt as well by new behavior. That will remind you that you’re not alone in this. And remember that you can’t cure someone else with your words and love. They only backfire. At most, you can help your partner gradually gain awareness. It will take the combined influence of you and many others to get a depressed person to start seeing a different explanation for what’s wrong. Only your partner can do the heavy lifting. Only your partner can experience the inner change of thought and feeling that comes with the recognition that there is an illness to be dealt with.

I realize how different everyone’s experience is about the impact of depression on their marriage, and how desperately hard everyone works to reach what is for them the right answer about staying married or not. For me, though, it was a fantasy born of depression. I often wonder how it is, given where I began in my struggle to build a loving relationship with another human being, that my wife and I have stayed married for so long. “Marriage is survival,” I once heard someone say at a wedding, and the uncomfortable laughter in his large audience confirmed the truth of it. Despite all our struggles, we’ve managed to survive the worst of times.

For so many years, though, and long beyond adolescent dreams, I was searching obsessively not for the real work of two people always learning about each other. Depressed and full of shame at who I was, I searched desperately for someone who would make up what was missing, gifting me the worth I felt I lacked, so that I could feel like a whole person at last. I simply imagined I was falling in love. 

It would start with an attraction that soon became obsessive for a woman whose spirit and warmth I reached for instinctively to take in as my own. This was falling in love in a strangely one-sided way. I needed the responsiveness of the other person, to be sure, but only to a certain point. I can try to explain with a story, really a moment when something began to get through to my isolated mind.

I had, or imagined I had, an intense bond with K for nearly a year in my late teens. Her loving me meant everything. She was beautiful, talented and lively, and deep down I felt not just proud that she was part of my life, I felt alive and justified because of her presence. More than that, I projected into the minds of everyone I met the love of my live because such a woman loved me. That was the reality of what I needed from her, the sense of self-worth that I lacked on my own. I ignored what was clearly happening so desperate was I to believe that we would be together forever. After all, I was nothing without her. Our relationship came to end and I have been sick for days. My life was over. I promised myself not to start a relation again but to enjoy life

I was home, and we were up early, getting dressed and ready to get up for breakfast. I was avoiding deep talk. The windows were open to a fine Dutch winter morning. I was dousing my face with cold water in the bathroom as I had great hangover when suddenly I was startled by a beautiful singing voice floating in coming from the bedroom. It was a woman’s voice pouring a haunting melody into the air. It seemed to surround me, and the feeling and the sheer beauty of the tone put everything else out of my mind. I relaxed into its flow for a few still moments, and then I started to move. I had to find out where my future would start again. It seemed that I was ready for life again and I opened my heart and started a relationship again with the woman that I now call my wife. When I snapped out of my memories, I walked back to the bedroom and found my wife quietly sweeping a brush through her long blond hair.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.
“Hear what?”
“That incredible singing – it was the most beautiful thing. Where could it have come from?”
“Oh,” she laughed, “that was just the alarm clock.”
“Just now? Just right now? I mean, it stopped a few seconds ago.”
She nodded slowly, still brushing.
“I mean … I never heard that song before.”
She smiled into the mirror. “Well… now you have.”
She finished brushing her hair. We got our clothes on and left the room. 
 

To say I crashed when she left is putting it mildly. What could happen when my sense of who I was and what I was worth in the world walked away? Gone! There was nothing left! I would start drinking heavily, fall into complete depression, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t work, crying a lot, burned with the obsession of having to get her back. For the second time in my life, I don't think I will survive and end up at a psychiatrist. To heal enough so that I could function. Then I’d be able to resume my obsessive quest for a woman to make me feel whole again!

And so the pattern continues for years. When I met my wife and we got married, things seemed so different. But as soon as we got past the intense early years into the time when the relationship gets real or gets broken, I picked up again the habit of obsessing over that shortcut to fulfillment. I could dream of other women, other places, other careers that would end the inner fear, emptiness and pain. It was the sort of dreaming that would always keep me from hearing the song close by. The dreams gave me a way out instead of opening up and talking to the woman who loved me about the real crisis I was in. There was always a fantasy person elsewhere who wouldn’t need all that talking and honesty!

It took me many years, but finally the escape artist in me called it quits. Those fantasies came in such abundance that I just couldn’t take them seriously anymore. Only then could I get on with the work of recovery and the work of marriage.

I understand now when my wife says to me: “Are you still in love with me and if you don't than you should leave.” I guess that she is having a hard time now.



The Old Sailor,

Did I fail in this life?

Dear Bloggers,


This week I have been transfered again to my old station and had to pick up on my knowledge again. In a way I feel happy on the other hand reality is that they could not find anyone else. I have at this moment the feeling that the things that happened in my life so far have only brought me more and more worries about the future. How do you know if your life is a failure or a success? Many queries are bubbling up in my brain, it is busy in there it’s like a real autmn storm in my little grey area.

Or, maybe instead, how do you know if your life is a success?

What are the criteria? Who gets to decide? Is your life a failure if you are send to prison? If your kids go to prison? Are you a failure if you don’t do what you want to do for a living? If you don’t do what are you supposed to do for a career? Or if you made once a mistake do you get the blame forever? Unless you are being protected by people on higher positions you might have a chance to make some mistakes.

When is it too late to fix it?

Considering that a life includes many stages and levels, maybe the answer is always subject to qualifications and/or temporary current circumstances. Maybe a person can always make amends and change. Or, maybe it is part of the human condition that we are always just a few degrees away from either success or failure…and the decisions we are always making are constantly swinging the pendulum back and forth.

The person that goes to prison can reform. The person responsible for a drunk driving accident can make amends. The person commiting adultery can quit. The person engaging in destructive behaviour towards other people can stop. It is a kind of nature that we are like wolves, if there is no strong pack leader the other ones might tear you apart.

Or, maybe they cannot?

Maybe the criteria are locked and fixed. Maybe the hands of fate don’t allow for a second and third chance. Maybe our flaws are too many to overcome. Maybe even those with apparent success are hiding significant faults.

Is it only at death that we are judged as good or bad, success or failure?

Decisions made years ago, and early in life, have a bearing on incidents that happen later in life. No one is ever truly able to escape their past. Decisions made at one point with the confidence of correctness can later be determined as incorrect. Time marches on. Nothing is ever over. Does this knowledge force us into a state of intellectual paralysis?

Does enlightenment occur from the knowledge of this pendulum of good versus evil and success versus failure? Maybe those that are aware of the precarious balance are thus successful as a result, while those who are oblivious are failing…will fail…can’t stop from failing.

You need to set some goals in this life. Altruism, kindness, generosity…those are universally recognizable and realistic goals. Those are goals that benefit both the individual and society as a whole. Pursuit and realization of those goals should probably allow a person to be considered as successful.

Failing to follow those guiding principles…well, failure is as failure does.

So, are we feeling sorry for those that don’t get it? Can we help those that choose to make mistakes? Can we look the other way while they fail? And, are we then also failures as long as there are those without the knowledge of this path to enlightenment…those who fail to see it…those who fail to do what is right…those who just fail? It’s a philosophical thing that keeps my mind running.

“You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”

My thoughts might sound kind of negative somekind of dark and people may call me a doomthinker. I really wander how can I change things into better prospectives? I feel that I have failed on many things in my life. It has been a long time ago that i felt successful.

On the other hand i did do in a way quite well. But who am I kidding actually as the last few years everything went downwards. When I had to stop sailing my income fell with more than 40% in a year, I got a body to live in that only works on half power and is painful every day. Yes I became trapped in my future plans and there is no light that guides me to the end of the tunnel. Now I am renting myself out to get my hours filled as the holiday season is coming. For crying out loud no one cares about you or your feelings.

“It is no use lying to one’s self.”

I have trouble to stay positive in this jungle of emotions. Must I just stay positive when everything in life turns you down? I live in a house that is hardly sellable, a job with an uncertain future, I drive an old car which I cannot replace due to less and less work. My family suffers from it as well and everyone has it’s own needs. Are we slowly going our own way and what happened to the unity?

Honesty and the right action determines success…regardless of the endeavour…anything and everything short of that is failure.

The Old Sailor,

Earth Hour is done for this year

Dear Bloggers,


I am not an environment guru but I think that we can make a difference by switching off the lights, at least to get the idea that we are using a lot of energy.

we are trying to reduce our carbon footprint and live a more sustainable life and it can often feel like an uphill battle with no end in site. For every bottle and can that's recycled, there are ten more thrown in the landfill, and it can be quite frustrating to make the effort without seeing much change.

If you've ever wished you could make a statement about climate change that would make the world sit up and take notice, all you've got to do is turn off the lights.

On Saturday, March 27th at 8.30pm (local time) Earth Hour 2010 will begin, and homes and businesses around the world will extinguish their lights for one hour to create awareness about climate change and demonstrate the powerful affect of a single decision.

Critics of Earth Hour have pointed out that even with millions of people participating, the energy and emissions saved during these 60 minutes isn't going to save the world. In fact, some have gone so far as to accuse the environmental movement of wanting to "throw humanity back into the dark ages," and have proposed their own Human Achievement Hour, encouraging people to turn on every possible light and appliance on during this time.

So if you're asking yourself "what's the point?" here are three reasons to consider spending an hour in the dark.

1. Just because an act is symbolic doesn't mean it's pointless

Again and again people have said that the only way to truly knock out greenhouse gasses and slow climate change is to create an international regime that puts a cap and a price on climate pollution. This possibility, sadly, is in the hands of the world's politicians and diplomats who have been reluctant to take a stand. So, if turning off the lights for an hour starts to show the world that we're serious about fixing this problem.

2. Tons of carbon dioxide emissions will be eliminated

No, even millions of people turning off their lights for just one hour won't bring global warming to a screeching halt, but it will prevent hundreds of tons of carbon emissions from entering the atmosphere. Hopefully, this significant act will make people think more seriously about the magnitude of the world's energy usage, and they'll find it easier to turn off the lights day after day, which will make a big difference.

3. Learn to appreciate (and conserve) what you have

Contrary to what some would say, the purpose of Earth Hour is not to convince people to give up electricity and stumble about in the dark and cold. Environmentalists don't hate technology, we just think it should be used to help reduce our negative impact on the planet instead of charging full steam ahead until there's nothing left. Turning off the lights, air conditioner, computer, and television for an hour is likely to make you much more appreciative of these luxuries than if you simply left them on for another night. Once again, this small sixty-minute observance is a chance to change your thinking about the energy that's available to you, and make a conscious effort not to spill it.

I hope that it will give some people some positive ideas about the world that we live in.
I will join again next year, to make also my kids aware of our planet and that we can really do something.

The Old Sailor,

Happy Birthday Old Sailor

Dear Bloggers,


It is that time of the year again, soon there is my birthday to celebrate and year 42 is there (that is 15.340 days).
Like every year the discussion starts what should we get you this year.
And funny enough the answer is already there, like always.

This year I get a bunch of flowers as the real thing comes later. But when it comes to surviving middle age, sometimes a man has to lose his bearings to find his way

Ever since Erik Erikson coined the term "midlife crisis" more than 30 years ago, male melancholy around halftime has been poked and prodded. The skeptics believe that the 40s funk is just a self-fulfilling prophecy for self-indulgent guys.
And given all the therapeutic silliness that gets sold as midlife fixes, it's tempting to treat the male willies as a psycho-bunch. Bad idea. Male midlife crisis is a time-honored trough, described by Dante and Shakespeare.

"There are multiple paths through midlife crisis,"at least that is what the experts say. Each man's journey is unique, shaped by his history and his hopes, his relationships, his blood pressure, and the angle of his dangle.
To be sure, the intensity of the midlife passage varies greatly. For some men, it's a dark ordeal that includes depression and is best navigated with a doctor's help. For most, it's a less perilous, but still demanding, midcourse correction. But whether the midlife transit is traumatic or just tricky, self-medication with bourbon is a bad plan, and nobody is served by pretending we're too tough to have troubles.

Our goal is to come through middle life as better men. Sure, we'll be a tick less quick off the dribble, and yes, we'll need to rely on others once in a while. But we'll also be wiser, calmer, stronger of spirit, and even more attractive to women of all ages. There are no perfect routes to your best older self. But we asked experts and some men we admire for guiding thoughts will ease the transit.

The midlife stew often starts with some garden-variety boredom. If you've been hoeing the same row for 20 years, only an idiot wouldn't wonder if there aren't some more interesting rows somewhere else. On top of it, we often get our first bolt of serious bad news: the death of a parent, trouble in a marriage, a career setback.

Often, come our 40s, some undeniable facts start eroding the dubious pillars on which we've built our notion of a man.
Remember Tolstoy's wisdom that "all happy families resemble one another, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."
"The sadness of growing old is part of becoming an individual," and "The spirit finds an opening in the brokenness."

Express yourself, with anger. Nobody is suggesting that every hostile thought should get fired across the port bow. We've got to live together. But part of becoming a fully grown man is saying what's on your mind, respectfully, without rancor, straight up, no ice. But when the mortgage payment isn't at risk, it might help to be ever-so-slightly less eager to please. Speak your piece. Conflict is rarely catastrophic; it's just the sound of life happening.

Nope, sorry, this is not permission to act on those frisky feelings about Fiona from finance; just a reminder that the routinization of life saps our energy. Seek new tastes. Try new foods. Try reading a book, maybe two, maybe even one written by a woman. Or better yet, by a Latina woman. Get respectful of legends in areas other than war, and money. You're bored because you haven't learned anything new since the day you graduated from school.

Take up a new sport. Any new skill or competence -- cooking, gardening, carpentry, car care, golf, guitar, or origami -- makes the spirit more receptive. Get outside. Walk in the woods or even down your street at dusk or dawn. There is consolation in nature, inspiration in angles of light.

The Ferrari won't help. Nor will that teinted driver. There's no talismanic cure. "We deny our own sense of failure," says Levinson, "by using narcissistic pleasures as a device for reassurance." The only answer, wrote Jung, is to turn directly toward the approaching darkness and "find out what it wants from you."

The Old Sailor,

Yet another year is nearly over

Dear Bloggers,

2009 started with many questions but the main question was: what am I going to do with my life? I was working as a receptionist but wasn't too lucky with my body. And pain became my enemy, it wasn't the job itself as I was enjoying it very much, my body was hitting the brakes more and more and in the beginning of May it came to a full stop. Not like the years before where I could have sworn that it was my "call".

Well this year has been wonderful to me when it comes to personal and spiritual growth. I have been blogging and writing like never before, I was at home on sick leave and experienced lots of other things. I have banned the “R word” out of my vocabulary.

Unfortunately the last few months I had plenty time to concentrate on this blog like I want to but that is to change now. At least at this moment I can say that the postings will be better in every way but you know how it is, it looks good when you say it but once you are there...

For 2010 I have a few projects planned and I am sure it will all go well. I am using my time to get things rolling to start a new life and in a new job. Financially it will probally get a lot better. As soon we have sold our house. The new lifewill be less hectic but that is good forevery one.

Now the question for 2010 is no longer " what am I going to do with my life?" but instead " How can I get better at what I do?". Life is a long journey and we learn from everything that happens on the way.

Well yet another year has passed, I am very happy with mine, how was yours?

A verry Happy New Year to all of you

The Old Sailor,

Staying active with FMS

Dear Bloggers,


Staying active when living with fibromyalgia is a necessary challenge. If you rest, you rust, like the old saying goes. And I think that's true when it comes to fibromyalgia. Something is off-the hook in our central nervous system, and that produces exagerrated responses to things that would otherwise not be painful to a person without fibromyalgia. Sometimes, there's nothing to respond to, the pain is just there and nobody knows how it was caused. Sitting still is the logical response, intelluctually speaking. If I just don't exercise, maybe I won't cause any pain and I'll feel better. But the exact opposite is true. If you do not stay active, you will be in even worse pain. Believe me, I have done both, and it's far better to stay active than it is to become immobilized. This following section is devoted to a once-active man with fibromyalgia who wanted to get back to his active live. Who is still active but may be having trouble modifying his lifestyle to accommodate fibromyalgia's impact.

Each fibromate has to learn his own energy “accounting system”. This will take a few weeks or months or even years for you to establish, but once it’s established it is possible to keep the balance stabilized, and even to make a deposit once in a while. I’m deliberately trying to explain it the easy way. But it’s very simple really, to understand it. Think of it as a cash drawer, or a jar of coins.

You have 24 hours, but less than 24 cents or Euros. Eight hours are devoted to sleep, so that leaves 16 waking hours, but less than 16 Euros/cents. Assuming you’re working full-time, that’s another eight hours, which will use up more than eight currency chips. Why will working eight hours use up more than eight chips? Because, with fibromyalgia any mental or physical exertion, and any work-related stress, uses energy faster than that expended by a person without fibromyalgia. And you still have to take a shower, get ready for work, take care of the kids, fit in some exercise, eat right, work on a hobby, grocery shop, clean, cook…

No longer can you “do it all” like you once could. Those days are gone. Give them a bittersweet goodbye, it’s time to style a new life. Grab hold of your new chapter, this is a positive change. Fibromyalgia is not a death sentence, it can be one of the most positive things that ever happened to you. It’s just possible that you are “doing too much”, and fibromyalgia has forced you to slow down. That’s what happened to me, and it’s one of the best things that’s ever happened in my life. So, please, don’t let it get you down. Learn to live with it, work with it and grab life with both hands and enjoy everything you can do. This is what life is about: Even it looks like a dead end street, but if you look right you will find the small alley in it for a new way into life. I truly believe fibromyalgia was a just certain sign to stop me from running all the time. Before I had fibromyalgia, I was running around, never tired, overmotivated, and hyperinspired. I was given the gift of an invisible illness that was incredibly hard to diagnose. So that I could share my experience with others and find out more and more about myself.

So, what needs an active man to do? Why because rest rusts, I need to stay active, of course! Everything in moderation, though. And I need to keep track of those pennies. It makes cents.

Just Say "No"
With just saying no, although it is not easy in the beginning you will keep better track of your energy.
The danger always is there and when you have a "good" day, you have to take extra care.
I’ve always admired a friend of mine who isn’t afraid to say no, and isn’t afraid to insist on what she wants. I would think to myself, “I want to be her.” We all need to learn to be true to ourselves and not be afraid of what people may think if we excuse ourselves as we know what we want and need. Most of us fibromyalgics are not that easy to live with. As we are not want to ask for help eventhough we need it. Smiling as we do not accept yet another “assignment” from a neighbor, friend, co-worker, relative who is laying the lazy speech on us. No, actually, it’s not fair, because I have a chronic, invisible illness. I’m sick every day of my life, every minute of every day. It’s just that the assigner of the project can’t see that, or maybe even doesn’t know.

Maybe it is better for me to learn what my friend does. Take an invisible, deep breath, sit or stand nice and tall, adjust your posture, make direct eye contact, and just say "No."

The Old Sailor,