Anxiety and Running out of Spoons

If you're not familiar with spoon theory,  you can read about it here.

Yesterday I had a bunch of stuff to do.  I had promised Mike that when I moved out, I would pay someone to come pick up all the dog poop in the yard.  Did you know there are professional pooper scoopers?  Well, there are.  It cost me $10 to have all the poop picked up and it was definitely worth the cost.

Since I had to be there to pay the pooper scooper, I planned to do some other errands while I was in town.  I had a coupon for 10% off anything I bought at Lowe's, so I wanted to get curtain rods and some other things there.  I wanted to go to the thrift store and get some shorts and tee shirts for summer and a few other things.  I thought I might stop at Hobby Lobby and the dollar store, too.  I had also asked Mike if it would be OK if I did a load of laundry while I was there.  I hate the fact that I now have to pay to do laundry.  And speaking of paying to do laundry, I also had to go by the bank to trade in some nickles and dimes for quarters because the washers and dryers in my building only take quarters.

I went to the bank first, which Isaac likes because they give him a doggie treat there.  Then I went to the thrift store, and there was another service dog in the store, and Isaac barked at him.  He stopped when I corrected him, but I was still really embarrassed.  I bought the stuff that was already in my cart and got out of there, but I was annoyed because I wasn't really done shopping.

Then I went to Mike's and visited the cats and started my laundry.  I decided to leave Isaac there while I went to Lowe's.  I was unhappy with his behavior at the thrift store and I knew I would have to look around for a while at Lowe's and I just thought it would be easier to leave him at home.  Well, that was a bad decision.  I had a lot of trouble finding stuff at Lowe's and ended up getting so frustrated and anxious that I decided to just buy the curtain rod and forget about the rest of the stuff I wanted and get out of there.  Then I couldn't remember where I parked and had trouble finding my car.  By the time I found my car, I was exhausted and super anxious.  I took some medication and felt a little better, but not much.

I went on to the dollar store and then I just went back to Mike's.  I was too tired to go anywhere else and I felt frazzled.

Mike was supposed to help me with a couple things on my new laptop, which I just got right before I moved.  I'm still getting used to it and finding things I don't like or want to change, and I get all confused if I try to change the settings on it.  Well, I thought it would just take him a few minutes but he was messing with the laptop for a long time and finally I told him I had to go home and maybe we could work on the computer another time. I took another pill for anxiety before I left and I actually wanted to take a third, but I was afraid to take that much when I had to drive.

On the way home, I got mixed up and missed a turn and ended up driving way out of my way before I figured out what I'd done and turned around and got on the right road.  I was so relieved to be home.  At least my apartment feels like home to me and it feels good to be here.  It feels like a safe place.  I took another pill for anxiety and lay on the couch and finally started to relax.

I know it doesn't sound like I did that much stuff - I went to the bank, the thrift store, Lowe's, and the dollar store.  I did a load of laundry and sat on the couch while Mike messed with my computer.  It seems like I shouldn't be so exhausted and overwhelmed and anxiety-stricken just doing those things.  But I was completely out of spoons.

I need to plan better and not try to do so many things in one day.  It seemed to make sense to do all those errands at the same time since I had to drive 40 minutes to get there, but for me, it would be better to make the drive another time and do fewer errands on one afternoon.  I hate that, though.  That's something I hate about my disability.