OS Singlies - We Do It Our Way!

dibuzz

calicocat wrote: »

But they would send it to the old address as it stands now, so i'll have to do it at a PO and then change address sending log book off.

Of course they would, I never thought of that

JustKeepSwimming_2

Well I just typed out a long reply to you all & lost the whole post :mad: This seems to happen a lot lately - IE will stop working when I try & submit my post, then it will close & reopen every tab but MSE tab will be the only one that wont reopen.

Haven't got time now to repost/comment, so will just wish you all a good day!

Byatt

JKS, it's so annoying when that happens! All the posts I lose are the ones that are especially eloquent and well thought out :rotfl:honest...

Mtstm, the chooks I look after love raspberries . It's funny I can be very good about not drinking, but eating...:(...last night for example the compulsion to eat came over me as it always does around 9-10pm even though I'm not hungry in the slightest, I did manage to stop myself this time, but I can't find anything to replace it, as the loneliness is heightened at night. I miss the noises of other people.

LB & Calico, enjoy your day! Hope you find some fab bargains :T

RPP, I thought it was just the one day for Devon C S but my DD called me in a panic to say it was 2 days, she must have misunderstood that it was 2 days of show not cancelling. Glad the 2 days were a success.

I've just hauled a bureau downstairs, it wasn't that heavy but it nearly killed me! I'm getting old...:( I'm trying to revamp my house! The size is limiting so it's a bit difficult.

greenbee

Byatt - if you crave sweet things, then try dates. They're SO sweet that's usually enough. Also try to ONLY eat at the table, so you don't associate eating with sitting on the sofa/being in bed etc. Hard to do but really does help.

If you miss the noise of people in the evening, try putting the radio on to a talk channel. Or playing music. Something to minimise the silence.

I'm just hauling the top of my desk outside as I've decided it makes sense to sand it down BEFORE I put it back together. So after lunch I'm going to shut ALL the windows and doors, and get out the electric sander

moneyistooshorttomention

My personal take on something sweet is often a few sultanas or few dried apricots.

At 9/10pm type time then I might go for a hot milky drink (in my case that will be carob powder instead of hot chocolate, with honey for sweetening). I find that's quite good for helping me sleep too and possibly even better with a little grated nutmeg in it.

calicocat

I can write long posts and have them disappear too, don't know if it's coz i'm on a mobile?.....especially PM's....they disappear all the ruddy time.


Anyhow, just got back in so will post later.

MTSTM.......how funny you mentioning the drinking thing today, I have just been chatting to LB this afternoon about mine getting out of control recently. I think if you know why it helps....say mine has certainly gone up since work vile and i'm really struggling to cope with that....plus I think as singlies...we have the opportunity....no-one there to say no, or notice, or to distract with other things etc.

I have to scoot off at the moment, but will post back later with more thoughts on this, and it is an area I want to change myself too. Thing is being told and knowing the theory of what to do is a long way off actually managing to do it.

I have lost time of the amount of times i've said that's it over the last few months....to go out and get a bottle of vino the next time a fancy...I don't know if it's getting past that gut reaction and impulse for a while....then review the need half an hour later?.

I have a friend who has a REAL drink problem, so I guess it depends where down the line you think you are with it too.

Glad you mentioned it though...it's been bothering me the last couple of months too....or more if i'm honest thinking about it.

And you have been having quite a lot to deal with recently to be fair...pretty stressful by the sounds of it.

moneyistooshorttomention

Calico,

You are right and I would be interested to hear your further thoughts on this.

Besides being the one "civilised" thing I could afford, I think the main driver almost certainly has been that last job I had. I was seriously having to force myself out the door each morning to go to work. That job was very stressful and the stress went on for a l..o...n...g time. I could have coped more if I had known it would be short-term. As it was..it was very long-term. I knew exactly when the stress would end at last (ie the day I retired). 2-3 bottles of plonk a week isn't heavy drinking, but its more than I'm happy with and more than I can afford at the moment and I could do without the bit of weight gain its helped cause.

I think that particular stress having been so extremely long-term gave a lot of time for that particular coping mechanism to get a bit entrenched.

Following retirement at last thank goodness I pretty promptly got into selling my last house and moving to this house. I didn't understand that the houses here are, on average, in worse condition than in my home area (poorer area maybe?) and therefore did have some surprises at just how bad I found the condition of it to be. It was touted by the EA as being "ready to move into". They musta been kidding mustn't they? It was pretty uninhabitable, but I've been having to live here anyway whilst all the work has been going on. Now I know that every single incomer I know is, without fail, gutting their house they have just bought, but I didn't know thats how things are before I moved here.

I think I'll stand a chance of "getting back to normal" once the worst of the work is over soon now and the house won't, by any means, be finished at that point, but it will at least be habitable at last. That will help a lot on the stress levels.

Calico - It does sound like your job is very much a contributory factor in your case. Both the job itself and the antisocial hours involved in doing the job. I hope you find a way to resolve it, as I know just how much stressful jobs can drain you.

calicocat

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Calico,

You are right and I would be interested to hear your further thoughts on this.

Besides being the one "civilised" thing I could afford, I think the main driver almost certainly has been that last job I had. I was seriously having to force myself out the door each morning to go to work. That job was very stressful and the stress went on for a l..o...n...g time. I could have coped more if I had known it would be short-term. As it was..it was very long-term. I knew exactly when the stress would end at last (ie the day I retired). 2-3 bottles of plonk a week isn't heavy drinking, but its more than I'm happy with and more than I can afford at the moment and I could do without the bit of weight gain its helped cause.

I think that particular stress having been so extremely long-term gave a lot of time for that particular coping mechanism to get a bit entrenched.

Following retirement at last thank goodness I pretty promptly got into selling my last house and moving to this house. I didn't understand that the houses here are, on average, in worse condition than in my home area (poorer area maybe?) and therefore did have some surprises at just how bad I found the condition of it to be. It was touted by the EA as being "ready to move into". They musta been kidding mustn't they? It was pretty uninhabitable, but I've been having to live here anyway whilst all the work has been going on. Now I know that every single incomer I know is, without fail, gutting their house they have just bought, but I didn't know thats how things are before I moved here.

I think I'll stand a chance of "getting back to normal" once the worst of the work is over soon now and the house won't, by any means, be finished at that point, but it will at least be habitable at last. That will help a lot on the stress levels.

Calico - It does sound like your job is very much a contributory factor in your case. Both the job itself and the antisocial hours involved in doing the job. I hope you find a way to resolve it, as I know just how much stressful jobs can drain you.

Mmmmmm.......this doesn't bode well for me, I have at least 12 fantastic years left to work. Unless things change (which I doubt as think they will only get worse) i'm not sure I can see me retiring working for the NHS.....but this will ruin my plans and skrew my pension etc.

I'm sure you will get back to a more normal existence once things have finished in the house. I think you have done really well....Way better than I would have coped to be honest with all that work.

But you are right, it does become a way of coping, and I also think it depends on your whole lifestyle etc. I wasn't brought up around alcohol, but from early 20's was partying all the time...lunch out diner out,parties,weekends away...I was living with someone quite well off financially....and it was the late 80's / 90's......the time of excess ...spend spend spend and party until you drop I think looking back. When I explain my lifestyle to younger people now they can't believe I was out every night, every weekend, spending 500 on a top, 1k on a pair of boots etc...it was mad when I think now. Anyhow....so alcohol played a part of most days...not to excess then by any means...but it was there, and it becomes normal...and the a habit I think.

Then if you are unlucky...a way of coping with krap....as is food for others, except food doesn't make you say really stupid things to people or make you make an arze of yourself.

For me I think the first time I used it to 'cope' was when my dog died 3 yrs ago....then my step mum died, the my dad....and now job is vile, and i'm in this cycle of using it to blot out my head.

Also, and I can only kinda chat about it from my perspective, I think it's going wrong at the moment as when off work sometimes I want to just boil my head. I haven't had this before, this is totally new to me and I think I'm at a crossroads as to where to put it, up till now I loved my job and could never imagine not feeling that way about it....and work is a huge part of our lives when you think about it.

So... for me, i'm going to have to try and go out at the danger points or trigger moments (when I finish my shifts)..and see if that helps.


Hope I haven't rambled on too much, but it's a hard subject to put into a few words.

moneyistooshorttomention

Calico - "blot out your head" exactly sums it up I would say. In my opinion anyways.

The tendency to buy a bottle of wine seems to correlate pretty exactly with an individual person/people as a whole doing stuff they didn't oughta and that then triggers a "Why on earth do I have to put up with this sort of thing?" reaction and a couple of glasses of wine helps to blot out that person/people/situation.

Could do with another way to blot out the "shouldn't be's" in life. I tend to think I will personally be able to do so with more wholesome stuff like country walks/gardening/music/etc once I'm not having to focus on making the house habitable.

I don't know if the "shouldn't be's" is your trigger or if its something else?

I'm conscious that some people might say that it would help if I could re-label "shouldn't be's" into "Life's like that/some people are like that", but thats not my way personally. I acknowledge some people/situations are like that....darn it...and I cant change them...so sometimes the way to cope with them is to "blot them out".

calicocat

I think the main thing is that we have both been able to turn around and say we don't want this to become a problem....or a worse problem, and want to do something about it.

My friend is way down the line with it, in an utter out of control situation where she is quite paranoid now, hasn't been to work for weeks if not months, can never be relied upon to turn up with arranged outings due to drinking and not being able to drive. Oh and she now has to spend half her life telling lies...most of which she can't remember.

This is what I don't want..! So far I am using having a drink in a better way than her (if there is a better way really), but it doesn't interfere with my work or other arrangements, I control when I 'cope' if that makes sense?....at least so far, and intend to do something about it....as to be fair it doesn't alter anything other than temporary stuff, and just makes you feel poo the next day.


I'm not entirely sure as yet as only now really focusing on it, but so far the end of my shifts is for sure a trigger, i'm tired, angry, frustrated...etc and want my head to stop. There may be other triggers, i'll have to look at this now as the next few weeks go.



Edit.....also, there's the ruddy extra calories I must be consuming in a month!!....and due to not being a fully fledged alcoholic I eat...so it's all extra...bummer.