Dysfunctional States in America

Morning minions.
So, last day before vacation and all through the house there are things that need doing and cleaning and such... Stay-cation. whatever. No money, so there ya go.
Truth is, it's going to be a sort of retreat and stuff. Gonna try to get my Buddhist groove back. I seemed to have misplaced it in my cobwebbed untamed mind. Got mandated to a training on assertive communication this week, so i suppose that means it is time to go looking for it again.
The victim is back in full effect and i hate when she gets to drive because it means i am terrified of everything and only want to be invisible. Not helpful in my particular line of work. Feeling powerless due to a supervisor who likes (she has said this) to be called "gestapo" does not instill confidence. At home, i dread geting up to see what the cats have done when i am not looking. I keep all the room doors closed to minimize where they can let known their displeasure, but i am so frigging sick of it. Dave seems not to give a shit enough to help prevent it, so i am again feeling powerless.
Time to find the peaceful center in this tootsie pop mess i am living so that the mess matters less somehow. And time to stop letting the universe walk on me again. The hard part is not going into abuser mode. I have tools to be the middle ground, but it is not what i was taught first, so that is why having some time off will be a good chance to gain ground.
Enough bitching about that.
So, four more years. I voted green, so it is not my fault. Good or bad. She seemed like the only one with a rational plan who was willing to give a straight answer to any question. So tired of double-speak. I get it at work, home and up the ass from politicians. Just once i want fewer words and accurate information. Tell us we are screwed. Tell us Congress is in it for the money and the glory. Tell us lobbyists count more than us. It would be refreshing to hear it said. And the electoral college is a fucking joke that is no longer funny. We have the technology now to do fast, accurate popular votes. Let's use that. It is way more reflective of how much none of us trust any of them and might change how they campaign. It could be less about states and more about people. Wouldn't that be a novel thing.
Maybe i would have voted differently if my state wasn't already projected to be absolutely blue. My vote didn't count in the scheme of things, so why not step out and vote green. It wouldn't have done anything to make the state more blue or red to vote otherwise. I really wish i counted sometimes.
On the state level, who knows. Everybody goes to court, everyone is a sore loser. I don't want to be governed by sore losers, so i am glad they lost. I don't want to be governed by sue-happy bastards, either, but that has yet to be determined in a court of law.

Long and short, i want government to shut up and leave me alone unless they are keeping basic services like roads, education and safety going. You don't owe me anything else. If i can't pay my own bills, i deserve to starve in a box somewhere. If i am disabled, i paid money in for that, so give it to me. Or stop taking the money out of me and i'll figure it out myself.
I think social security should be (a) voluntary and (b) only pay you back what you paid in. Problem solved. Tell me what i have saved and i will put the rest aside. Or, let me manage my own damn retirement. Like i said, the government owes nobody anything beyond what we invested for our future (ok, added that) and the basics of safety, roads and education.

And i definitely want to stop being ruled by the 1%. You push us down long enough and it will get ugly. You make your money off us because we need the jobs. Maybe it's time we push back and go local. Screw you and the global bullshit. No one owes you anything, either. Severance packages are for people who can't do their jobs. None of us get them, neither should you. Bonuses should go away, too.
Do your work for what you are paid like the rest of us.
Enough bitching about that.
But, first, we have to organize. Not just some camp in the park crap. Really organize. Outplay their game.
And for that i have to stop wanting to be invisible. Which was my original point.

This is the Helination and I approve this message.

Hozen

People always talk about mania. I have little first hand knowledge. My moods swing the other way most of the time. However, second hand i can tell you that the godlike feeling that you can do anything and never need sleep goes bad by the end of the first week. Like the old lady who constantly talks in half german about her leiderhosen, underhosen, klienerhosen and going peepee in the heisler. I sincerely doubt she would be doing this in public, or yelling for her husband to go inny inny while gyrating her hips in her reclining chair while waiting for dinner in the dining room, if she had any choice. She can't stop it any more than a net can stop a meteor. Mind trumps all. She says she lost hers. I am not so sure about that.
Every time i see people drinking energy drinks that mess the brain chemistry up and jack metabolism all i can think is that we have no idea what the brain is doing or how it does it most of the time. We guess at how the meds might be working to correct probably imbalances. Look in any PDR. The mechanism for how they work is unknown. Even when we know what they change, the reason that particular mechanism helps out is unknown. I have seen red bull drinkers go psychotic and manic. It isn't good and won't help meet deadlines.
Why do we need to go so fast anyway? How much crap do we really need in this life? Seriously. I know this is capitalism and consumption is the only way to keep the economy going, but the marketing world is full of shit if they think faster makes happier or more makes joy. It makes crazy. And crazy is not happy. Hypomanic may be for a while; full-blown crazy, not even a little.
So, while everyone else goes faster, i'll be over here waiting for them to come through the unit doors for some sleep and chemical retrofitting. Job security. Or, stop looking out there for the happy that only comes from mind.
Mind trumps all. And the brain is a fragile thing.

Excretions

Facebook can have uses. One of which is that my friend Noel can snap me back from ego land. The post was "and then i stepped in a pile of cold cat vomit". He liked the post after i posted a comment rant about the cat being mean and vindictive. All of that is true. She was mad. This isn't the first time she's done this sort of thing. And she has medical issues. Kidney infection that will not die and is bankrupting me kinda issues.
However, Noel liked the post and something clicked. Karma ripens. I create causes and stuff happens. And then my mind makes it a huge drama pity party. On the basis of an "I" that doesn't exist. The "I" who stepped was not the same as the one who jumped, the one who typed... Each moment the "I" changes, moves on.
So, i had a good smile and giggle at my ludicrous self grasping and moved on.
And then the cat peed on the couch...
Sigh...
Anyone want to contribute to Cleo's kidney fund?
Please?

Alzheimer's

I went for a walk this evening. Only an hour, nothing extravagant. I like to try to stay in the moment and use it as a way to let stuff go. I walked by an older couple. He was yelling at her, then tipped over the recycle bin and yelled at her when she said they were out because the trash collection is in the morning. "Alzheimer's," she said as I passed. "I had guessed that. My gramma had it." "Tell everyone our business," from the recycle bin. She started telling me how she was waiting for the sheriff. He was trying to get the car keys and take off on her. He was refusing his meds. She asked what happened to my gramma. I explained about the broken hip and forgetting how to walk after surgery. How old? 72. He's 78. Nicest man you ever met, but you wouldn't know it now. Nuclear engineer. Yea, it's so hard because you can see them right there, but it isn't them anymore. I didn't mention diapers or the times gramma took off naked down the road. The sheriff should be here soon. I guess we're heading for that, too. But, maple wood is the county home and that's $6000 a month. What would I live on? I don't tell her that my grandfather had deeded the house to my aunt several years before this or he would have lost it in the spend down. I don't tell her he went from a proud farmer to a broken old man. I tell her that he found a way and that the rules may be different now. I wish her well and she walks back to check on him. I walk away knowing I lied and that she is going to lose her husband and her possessions by degrees. As the sheriff car passes me about a mile up the road, I sigh. The Four Noble Truths run through my head and I really wish the Path were shorter, for her sake.

Confirmation

Medical doctor on responding to medical codes on a psych floor: "We walk to your codes. They were medically cleared in the emergency department before they were admitted, so we figure they are just playing possum."
So, that dead guy in room 3 was faking? And the woman with the stroke (turns out the e.d. missed that when they screened her for cognitive and motor changes), and the one with respiratory failure (she had actually just been medically cleared and admitted about an hour before the code), and the one with the infarc... Really?
The frigging system sucks. Label them once and neglect their needs forever.
I tell no provider who has no reason to know that i have depression and ptsd. I refuse to give them grounds besides the "peri-menopausal woman" card to dismiss everything i say.
My job stresses the hell out of me, but i can't walk away while the system still labels everything they say and feel as a symptom. We are all humans first.
Hearing that doc spew confirmed that i have a lot of work left to do.

I hate whiners

Seriously. Which is why i hate a lot of blogs, music, teens, and folks on public assistance. Suck it up and quit telling me the universe owes you anything. It doesn't. As a Buddhist, the whole hate thing may seem/be wrong, but hypocrisy is in the human DNA, so there ya go. Buddhism has a no tolerance policy for whining, however. It's called karma. Your past actions got you into this mess and only you can get you out. So, suck it up and move on.
Doing is trickier than saying, but not impossible.  Trust me on that. I have always had some severe issues, but i hold down a job, keep the house going and haven't killed myself yet, so i figure i am doing ok. If i had the pity me thing going on i would be out on disability and never leave this house. I would be in my comfort zone 24/7. I would live alone and talk to no one except on the net where there is a delete key and words can be taken back before they are heard. I don't do that.
Yes, i know how to use punctuation. If it isn't there, there is a reason for it. I isn't capitalized on purpose. Since when should i be more important than anyone else? Besides, in my world, drawing attention to myself is bad.
Here's today so far: Wake up. Decide whether or not i will get in trouble for wanting to shower and get dressed before i get my breakfast. While Dave watches a comedy on Netflix, i lay in bed considering this for at least 20 minutes, in the end deciding that i am being stupid again and forcing myself up and into the shower. No one yelled. Grab some breakfast and take it out on the deck. Worry Dave will think i am avoiding him. Check my email, bank balance (yay pay day!), click on the care2 and hungersite buttons so no one dies on my account. Wait until he heads to work to start typing so he won't ask why i am blogging. And that's an easy day.
I don't know why i am wired this way. I am afraid of everything all the time. I blame me for everything and am suicidal on a regular basis. I won't act on it because i know where that karma gets me and because i refuse to let this feeling win. I fight every frigging day.
I work in the field. I was a counselor in the community residence program side and now i work on an inpatient unit. Talk about fears. I have to be the damn dog whisperer 40 hours a week there. There is yelling and violence and loudness all the time (i hate those things), but i refuse to stop helping them because they are so maligned by everyone in the medical profession and misunderstood by everyone. I get that. I don't get how they can sit back and let the illness rule them and sit home doing nothing but being a mentally ill person. How can sitting around help anyone? I know psychotic folks who can't work. I also know a lot of "mood disorder" patients, polysubstance abusers and borderline p/d sufferers who think benefits are a right. They piss me off a lot. They are as unfit to work as Donald Trump. If they had less time and more responsibility, maybe they would have less time to wallow in how bad things are and figure out they don't need someone to wipe their asses all the time.
I think that all people should be treated like adults who are able to take care of themselves. Most of us do. Public assistance programs make it to easy for them not to try. Like i said, i am too stubborn and refuse to let it win or i would probably have been hospitalized and out on disability by now.
Instead, i confront my fears, see emotions for the random chemical reactions they are and try to work on what i am telling myself that paralyzes me.