Week 34

 Short update today.

 Health-wise, I'm doing pretty good. My second week back at work went OK. I didn't burn out completely on any of the four days. I'm still struggling with "stressing out by habit" but I've managed to recognize that and am finding ways to deal. 

 Life-wise, this week was shit. Our cat of many years passed away. HR continues to be flaming a-holes and the outsourced company who are supposed to be handling my ADA request are proving just as incompetent and obstructionist as the disability insurance people. 

 The stress from life is not playing well with my health. You'd think I'd just crash, but I'm actually doing the opposite. The stress holds me up and pushes me along like a wave... until it runs out and then I crash.

 I believe I have made it perfectly clear to HR and the ADA people that I am not putting up with their crap any more. Now I just need to make it clear to myself. 

 Let's see what next week brings, shall we...

Week 33

 So, I went back to work last week. That's a thing.

 Actually it wasn't too bad. I didn't managed to do 4 hours a day, every day, though. Most days I burned out after 2, but managed to keep going by laying down with my work laptop and doing something light. One day, I just had to stop after 2 hours and go to bed. Meetings are really, REALLY draining. Still, on the whole, my manager and I are calling it a success. HR are still being a--holes, but that's another story.

 The weekend was weird because I've gotten used to basically doing the same thing every day. So, I spent some of Saturday morning thinking I ought to go to work. I spent a brief moment on Sunday afternoon stressing about work until I realized that that I appear to have an old habit of stressing about work on Sunday's. Literally nothing at work to stress about anyway, so once I realized what I was doing I was able to work on shutting it down. (I'm getting better at that, which is good.)

 Finally, I evidently picked a good week to come back because we got today (Monday, Presidents Day) off... so my first week ended in a three day weekend. 

 On the whole, not bad. A lot more draining that I'd hoped but still not bad. I continue to take things one day at a time, so we'll see how next week goes.

Week 32

 Honestly, this is a "not much and quite a lot" kind of report today.

 Health wise, I'm still hovering around 4 hours functional time each day and my non-functional time is actually not as bad as it has been in the past. That's not really progress though. I've been like this about two weeks now. Recovery seems to have hit a plateau.

 Work wise, I'm going back next week (starting Monday) for 4 hours a day. Unfortunately, HR are being controlling bastards about this. I finally declared them as creating a "hostile work environment" ... which frankly they have been. These are the people who threatened to fire me for being sick a couple years back. They have not improved. They're actively making my coming back to work harder than it needs to be. In declaring their actions as harassment, I'm telling them that I'm not going to take it anymore.

 Returning to health, my new medication from the neurologist actually is having some side effects. For days I've been waking up in the middle night and also remembering my dreams (which I used to do only rarely). It turns out nighttime wakefulness and vivid dreaming are side effects of the medication. I say bring it on! These vivid dreams are awesome and I'm actually starting to have lucid dreams... I'm dreaming, I know I'm dreaming and I can shape the dream.

 All in all, a good week (HR notwithstanding). I'll let you know how next week goes. It should be "interesting" going back to work.

Week 31

 Had my monthly Doctor's visit today, hence the slightly later update.

 After a good month, we've agreed that I can finally get back to work. I honestly have some mixed feelings about that. It will be nice to have an income again. It will be nice to have some tasks and things to do "outside" the house again. At the same time. let's face it, working myself to death and stressing out about work made me sick in the first place. I need to find a new balance and not do that to myself again.

 Still, I want to be focusing on the good here (which I part of finding that balance really). I am feeling a *lot* better than I did before. I am able to start interacting with the world again. I'm not 100%, not even close but I'm so greatly improved it's staggering.

All in all, a good week.