On reflection, sleep, even in these sticky high temperatures, is OK. I serviced the cooling (evaporation) fan and it does its work well. I'm getting about 7 hours sleep with perhaps 2 wakes during the night. Those two are generally fine and I can just go back to sleep most of the time. It's the waking around 5:45 to 6 that is proving difficult at the Cortisol kicks in and so I just get up and come down stairs, perhaps write this blog or wander around or sit and I can normally close my eyes and just let my mind go blank - not sure why I cannot do that in bed.
It is a little better at the moment as I am controlling the dark thoughts and getting on with things. It is still way too hot to do any meaningful work though. As I understand it, the temperature from today is dropping to manageable levels. Let's hope so. I like it warm but the past few weeks and the previous heat waves have been exhausting.
These thoughts are problematic and to do with (I think) arriving in the world of retirement without a plan to be here. My poor old INTJ brain really hadn't contemplated I'd be retired for at least another year and so this is all a bit of a shock to me. My hobbies, such as they were, included playing Golf but I stopped that over 30 years ago wen my children were born. I was never much of a one for exercise but I used to do a lot of walking and I need to get back to that but not in this heat. I was heavily involved in a charity and enjoyed that but it was work work not a hobby.
I enjoy genealogy and F! motor racing yet even that is having the shine taken off. So there's nothing there at the moment. I no longer have the business to occupy my time and the weather has stopped me organizing the garage space and tackling the garden area.
So there's empty space in my head and in my days and it is filled with awful thoughts and whilst I can catch those and control them eventually, they do mess with my equilibrium. Mood swings and dark periods, stress, anger, close to tears sometimes too. It's all a dark place not helped by the news, the politicians seemingly driving us over a cliff ruled by ideology rather than what's good for the people that put them in power. That's going to end badly but nothing I can do so my 'control' is affected by seeing what's coming and being powerless to do much about it.
There's some light as I am managing 7 hours sleep a bit less than I am used to but can take the odd nap to catch up if needed. It's the overcoming of the thoughts and working on my inner calm, my breathing, and trying to stop the thoughts which I know are causing this. When I work on this and impose "The Now" I can have a good calm time. It needs to last longer and I need to catch myself getting stressed and going down the dark hole earlier so I can overcome it.
I am better than I was a few weeks back and better than a few days back so the change in weather and the opportunities that will bring will be good.
I am off for a few days to see my mum and the grandchildren and my daughter and her husband will be around for a few days which will be excellent. I am sure my spirits will lift being with them
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