#this ended up being much longer than a 10-minute journaling session smh

[lantur]

I've read lately about the value of doing a 10-minute journaling session on most days to help relieve stress and clear your mind, so here goes. Things I've been thinking about:

I love brushing Westin in the morning. He loves when I brush his face and he purrs so much when I do that. I feel like mornings are our special time together - I give him breakfast and the scraps of milk left from my tea, and he sits with me while I stretch on the rug before I go to the gym. Starting every day with him is great.

How lonely it can be to be a student. I spent most of today catching up on work at my job and at school. I didn't get to hang out with David for playing board games and watching our show until the evening, and I missed him. I've been feeling a bit lonely lately. I think it's because of all the time I now spend doing my readings and writing papers, on my own. It needs to be done, but it's still an adjustment.

I've been feeling more anxious lately, and it may be because of how short the days feel.

Long-term goals. It's been a year and three months since I got back into weightlifting. I'm proud of how my routine has paid off, but it's taken a lot of consistency. There are some goals where the progress is measured in months or years, and I'm right in the middle of that with learning Spanish and with school. The path ahead feels so long. I'm trying to encourage myself by reminding myself to take one day at a time, rather than thinking of the ~3 years that are ahead for Spanish and the ~1.5 years that are ahead for school.

It seems surreal that I'm scheduling meetings for December and already thinking about things that will happen in January - March of 2025. Where did this year go?

the final thought - trigger warning for pandemic-related matters,

The news is stressing me out -- bird flu news, recalls for e.coli in ground beef and carrots. The truth is that this time of year brings up frightening and unpleasant memories for me. I didn't even realize that until last Monday, when I was in line at Target and happened to read an article about bird flu on The Guardian.

It was late November/December of 2019 when I first started to see posts on Reddit about Covid in Wuhan. I remember seeing the speculation in Reddit comments about what would happen to the world if this coronavirus could experience widespread transmission outside of the localized region where it was identified. I remember asking David if the stuff I was seeing on reddit was legit and if this would be a problem for us. He said no, don't worry.

I remember the way things unfolded from November to March, and how deeply scary and uncertain things were in March. It's November again, I've seen articles about bird flu crossing my path on The Guardian and CNN again, and it scares me. I never want to go through a repeat of 2020.

I've started gradually building up on cat food for Westin, canned beans and tomatoes, cooking oil, and planning on doing some other shopping, just in case. All this has been on my mind for days but I haven't told anyone besides David or my in-laws or written about it on here because I don't want to be a crazy person or paranoid or frighten others. But I would be dishonest to myself and my friends if I didn't admit that was a big cause of my anxiety lately.

I will breathe easier when we make it through the end of March.

I am trying to give myself grace because as I write about it now, I know that 2020 was a legitimately traumatizing event for the world, and that applies to me too as someone who lived through it. Winter is dark and cold, and things have felt frightening and uncertain in the United States due to the political situation since earlier this month. It's sort of the perfect storm for anxiety in a person who has a long history of anxiety.

I think I can try to cope with this by again, focusing on taking things one day at a time.