How are you doing, Fred?

Fairly well, Jesse. I've been making a lot of effort to get healthy. And I'm making progress. (In some ways, it helps that I'm eligible to retire in September -- where has the time gone? -- even if I'm likely to keep working another year to solidify the financial picture.) One big issue remaining to be resolved, which I'm not ready to discuss in detail.

I don't remember -- did I mention my back surgery at the end of April? (Herniated disks pressed on spinal cord, causing numbness in feet.) I'm in the physical therapy stage, so oddly, I may be in the best shape I've been in for years. I'm using a cane because my feet are still pretty numb -- it takes time for the inflamed nerves to calm down.

And between physical therapy and other appointments, I'm working from home most of the time and going in to the office about one day a week. Which saves a couple of hours a day on the commute.

Timelies all!

I don't know how Mr. S can watch the same episodes over and over and over. Right now he's watching an episode of Puppy Dog pals that he saw on Sunday. sigh...

Fred glad you are doing so much better.

Gud I want to second what Fred said. It's been 3 years since I was hosptialized for...well a nervous breakdown is the easiest way to describe it . I was seeing a therapist at the time but I also didn't really understand what was going on that was behind all of it. A big huge reason was I was filled with self loathing and hatred. I had no compassion for myself, very little kindness and I didn't really like myself. There were parts I liked but not a lot My therapist calls that part of me my toxic inner parent and this toxic inner parent barely tolerated me.

It's weird to try and talk about.

I also struggled with a lot of grief and anger over some things that happened when I was a kid and teenager. I wasn't really allowed to feel and Express those things and it got to the point where I thought if I ever did it would break me.

What was breaking me was suppressing all that and hating myself for not getting over it but I also wouldn't allow myself to deal with it so it was a cycle. A bad cycle.

What started healing me was dealing with this grieving and letting myself get angry etc.

I kinda like myself. I have compassion for myself. And a huge giant weight has been lifted off of me.

You deserve to have that weight lifted off of you to. And it's hard and sometimes scary work but it is worth it.

Gud, please take these stories by our fellows to heart. You need to like yourself better. Your kids need to know you feel good about yourself.

Fred, I'm glad you're better. askye, you too.

Therapy has been a lifesaver for me. Hard work sometimes (a lot of the time, really), but work worth doing. I definitely recommend it.

Please don't do what I did. I had to have a nervous breakdown (and trust me, that's a bit of a euphemism) before I could start turning things around. It's much better to start working on yourself before you get to that point.

SAME. Hard same. Do as we say, not as we failed to do, I guess.

Library is discarding 7 hardcover Dorothy Sayers Peter Wimsey books. Anyone interested? I can put a pic up on the FB page.

That all sounds good, Fred! And askye, you sound great!

I had the funniest email chain this afternoon -- a friend asked if she could bring her girlfriend on our friends trip. Last time she asked, we said no, but that girlfriend was a nightmare (and we had no idea how much of one at the time). So the others of us got on a separate chain to confer and decided it was fine, and one wrote back to the whole with a super-formal committee report, and in short, it was good times.

Library is discarding 7 hardcover Dorothy Sayers Peter Wimsey books. Anyone interested? I can put a pic up on the FB page.

Yeah, kind of, but mailing hardcover books doesn't really sound worth it?