Back to baking in Going public

I was able to do some baking, which was nice. I was craving pizza the other day, but didn’t want to pay for good pizza and didn’t want to eat meat, so I decided to make my own. I made the dough, sauce, and even made vegan ‘pepperoni’! It turned out great, and I have frozen the extra ingredients for round two in the future.

I also baked heart shaped apple hand pies for galentine’s day. Because of the snow storm, I have yet to actually give them to anyone, so some of them are baked and in the freezer, and some are assembled but unbaked in the freezer. I’ll hand them out as I see people.

I intended to make them vegan, and bought vegan ‘butter’ for the crust. I also made regular crust, in case the vegan one didn’t turn out. Sadly I had a brain fart and later realized I used real butter in the filling, so even the ones with vegan crust aren’t a fully vegan dessert >.<

This week is also the week where I bake my first birthday cake for charity, so I’m nervous but also looking forward to it. I want to make the world’s most impressive birthday cake, but it’s also for a 13 year old boy so I’m not sure how much that demographic cares about beautiful cakes, haha.

I can’t believe I only had Lasik 9 days ago! It feels like so much longer, I suppose because of how well it went and how good my eyes are feeling. I still use artificial tears a few times a day, mostly because I know I ‘should’, and not so much because I feel that my eyes are especially dry. I’m definitely more comfortable now than I was in contacts.

I did break out in a monster cold sore yesterday, which is bizarre since I just had one like.. a month ago? I went so many years without any, and now I’m breaking out in them regularly. I don’t understand. One other thing is that I’ve developed a very light red area in a couple inch radius surrounding the corner of my mouth where the cold sore is. How weird is that?

Sometimes I suspect something is a little wrong with my immune system. The first indication probably is my ridiculous propensity to get intensely painful UTIs. The second is that I got two serious post-surgical infections. And now, my immune system’s apparent failure to contain HSV-1.

Anyway, I was semi-expecting something to go wrong with Lasik or that I’d have a tough time with healing, especially since my prescription was pretty strong. As it turns out, I think things are going better than expected! No infections, no real side-effects. So I’m pleased!

I am so happy for this day off, but also afraid of the week(s) ahead. I feel like I have been doing badly at work, and it feels like I will have some explaining to do soon. I used to catch up on work by staying up all night, but that has stopped since I’ve been trying to fix my sleep schedule. All it’s done for me is reduce productive hours in my day.

My therapist referred me to a psychiatric NP (sadly my appointment isn’t until next week), and we believe I have ADHD and that some medication would take my life off of ‘hard-mode’. I think this would help address some problems I’ve had my whole life relating to focus and executive-dysfunction. Turns out that girls and women express ADHD differently than men (there is less presentation of the hyperactive component).

I pretty much feel incapable of doing anything unless some other person or circumstance is putting pressure on me to do it. This model has worked ok for me over the years. I struggled a lot as a kid, but (as douchey as this sounds) was always smart enough to still do well in school, despite a lack of focus. Thinking back, adhd symptoms were the target of the majority of my parents emotional abuse toward me, which is sad to realize. All kids have trouble doing their chores and schoolwork at times, but I wanted SOOO badly to do better, but could never manage to do what was asked of me. There were more problems with that dynamic and more complexity to it (I had a deficiency and my parents also had adult-level expectations for me and zero interest in helping me cope), but it does explain some things.

As an adult I had built my life in way where I had a lot of structure to keep me on track. Now with covid, things have fallen apart in that respect. Luckily I am able to take care of myself reasonably well - I don’t live in filth and am reasonably good at taking care of myself. But I’m below my own standard, and it makes me hate myself.

My friend built out her garage to be a little socially distanced chill spot, so I’m planning to hang out there tomorrow. It’ll be interesting to have an in-person hangout again. Will my social skills be totally gone? We shall see.

Oh, speaking of socializing.. I was messaging with a college friend who lives in Boston now. She said her bf will be gone for the summer and that me and my cat should come live with her (and her two cats) for the summer since she will be alone. I think she’s definitely serious, and hell, I may do it. Either way, thinking about the possibilities is nice.