The holidays came and they brought with them happiness. I was excited to watch our girls open their gifts and I was excited to see our family and friends. I took some additional time off of work to spend time with the girls and hang out and play with all the new stuff and purge the old stuff. Shortly after Christmas we took off for Arizona to go off-roading again with our friends. That was an eventful trip with only one mishap. On New Year’s Eve there was a man that was pretty intoxicated and was very loud and a little obnoxious. I mean he meant well and was having a good time but he was just a little too loud for comfort. We were playing a dice game, Left Right Center, and of course he had to sit directly across from me. As the game progressed the worse I got. My anxiety began to go crazy, I could not sit still, my mind was racing and I was struggling to keep it together. I kept looking for my husband but he was somewhere else. A friend saw that I was struggling and offered to get me a glass of wine and sent me a few text messages meant to make me laugh. Finally the game had come to a close and he left but at that point I was then done. I was mentally drained from trying to keep it together. Other people were getting a little frustrated with his behavior as well but we understand that he was just trying to have a good time. I’m not throwing blame or anything, it’s just these little occurrences that shut me down and most times I cannot come back from it. That night was one of them as I found myself back in our motor home, alone, way before midnight leaving my husband and daughter to celebrate New Year’s together.

It’s just one of those things that I will have to learn to accept unless I am able to develop some sort of coping mechanism that can pull me together. I’m learning that I just need to accept these occurrences as long as they don’t take over and affect my life. And by accepting the bad days and not giving in to the sadness/anxiety means that I am making progress.