Surprise! You're not entirely awful!

I can feel my meds working.

It's nothing as significant as being eager to get up and start the day, or feeling content, or even being hungry. I'm still exhausted all of the time and am having troubles both sleeping and waking, and I still have to read a page in a book four times before any of it sinks in. I still feel like there's a pharmacy on my nightstand and that it's all that's keeping me together some days.

However, the meds are working.

In the morning, I can't seem to remember why I don't want to get up. I know that there's a very important reason for me to stay in bed all day, but.. I can't recall it. This vague feeling rests behind my eyes. It starts out as a dull ache, but sharpens as I try to remember my nightmares, or the many reasons why I couldn't fall asleep. Those were important and awful too, I'm certain, but I can't seem to locate the evidence. This nagging feeling lasts until the afternoon, at which time I become preoccupied with fighting off a nap.

Also, I'm accomplishing things. Little things, sure, like finding a place for all of my sewing stuff. Or putting my laundry away. Or washing the dishes. Or starting books for school.

Sometimes, I have to do a bunch of little things in order to accomplish a larger task, which seems far too taxing. I nearly give up completely. But.. I now start one of the tasks, and say, Just this one. I'll just do this first part, and then I can stop if I really want to.

For example, I couldn't fathom knitting another sock that isn't out of worsted weight wool. It's thick and hangs onto the bamboo needles really well. I've tried knitting with a fingering weight so I could knit a nice dress sock or something, but it kept slipping off of the needles. I got frustrated and gave up. I was looking forward to the return of Stitch & Bitch meetings so that I could ask for help from some knitting friends. I was intimidated, though, and I didn't want them to see how defeated I felt. So, I told myself that I would at least prep my materials. I certainly didn't want to show up to Stitch and Bitch to ask questions about knitting socks and then only have a big hank of wool in my bag, like this one.

It's a gorgeous hank that my partner's mother sent me from the west coast. She also sent me some lovely bamboo needles and a sock pattern to go with them. I'll probably be visiting her in February, and I want to have a pair of finished socks to show her by then. Or.. at least one. So, I had to wind the wool into a skein (ball) so that I could knit it. Trust me, trying to knit from the hank will only end in tears.

I wound the hank into a skein, gathered the pattern and my needles, and felt like I had at least prepared myself for the tough knit ahead. But.. the puppy was sleeping soundly, and I didn't really feel like reading or getting back on the computer until after dinner, and I still had a good hour or two to kill. And, well, I was determined not to nap.

So, I started the sock.

I said that I would just see how the wool worked with the double-pointed needles, and that if it was a miserable failure like the previous attempts with different wool, then I would switch to the circular needle. Nobody else had to know about the defeat with the double-pointed needles. Nobody had to know that I tried, again, and failed. The puppy was still sleeping, after all, and she wasn't going to tell anyone without getting a tummy rub first.

So, I tried again. And.. well.. it didn't fail. I didn't fail. It worked. Somehow, this time, it actually worked. I was able to knit two entire rounds of the sock on the double-pointed needles, and not a single stitch slipped off.

I don't know what I'm going to tell the Stitch & Bitch group now, since I've already told them what an impossible task it is for me to do. But, well.. I guess it'll be a good kinda surprise. This certainly was. And that's also how I know my meds are working, for I hate surprises. And I hate failing. And I hate knitting on double-pointed needles. Or.. maybe I did. We'll see.