OMG I can't believe I've never been "officially" diagnosed with OCD, because I related to so many of the things Jess was talking about in this video, like how she was talking about how things were placed around her and how her mind says "go fix that or you'll get sick" (though my mind says "fix that or you'll die" and things like that, which she did mention as an example of things other people go through). When I was a kid, I had to keep touching the floor with my foot before I got into bed, and it had to be just right, otherwise I just kept doing it..it was so frustrating! I'd also read the signs on classroom walls a certain amount of times, and felt stressed I wouldn't be able to finish before class started. When I wrote in notebooks, none of the letters could touch the lines, otherwise "something bad would happen." When my cat Cheetah was alive, I couldn't end petting her with my left hand, and had to touch her with my right hand to make it feel right. Like she was saying, doing it temporarily relieves the anxiety, but it eventually just circles back again. She was saying it's all the time for her, and unless I'm super focused on something else (like a glacier calving), it's always there. It's definitely exhausting having a voice running through your head all the time, like she was saying (maybe that's one reason I get tired easily?). Saying the thought out loud definitely sounds ridiculous, but it's so real inside my head. I'm really glad I'm not the only one that struggles with things like this! Sometimes I can resist the compulsion, sometimes I can't, but I'm always fighting back!

Another thing I was like "YES" to was people who cope without medication and say "I go outside, it will make you feel better too. You need exercise!" etc. Yeahh it's definitely NOT that easy and it frustrated me when people said that to me. I remember one time I was outside geocaching when my depression and anxiety were bad, and it didn't help at ALL..I just felt even worse! I would be a complete mess without my medication..if you can cope without it, awesome! Some people just can't, and there shouldn't be anything wrong with that. Like Jess said, we just need empathy and understanding :)

I think Alaska forgot it's May, because it's been in the 30s and earlier there were huge flakes of snow falling..that's just mean :P

( May 2 - What would be your ideal date? )

Today's trivia: The duffel bag gets its name from the town of Duffel, Belgium, where the cloth used in the bags was originally sold in the 17th century