My last post was probably a little vague about how this last year has kind of been the worst of my life, emotionally. Not to mention all the uncertainty about jobs and where we'd be living, etc etc. 

I did find a new job. I will be in a combined high school/college library. So a lot of advanced high school students, and college students from all walks of life. The pay is much less than what I was getting before, but we'll make it work somehow. It also means moving back to Wichita. It kind of makes the last few years here seem like they amounted to nothing, considering I am ending up back where I started, but I'll eventually work that out in my own head as well. 

I had a few very scary weeks at the end of last month/beginning of this month. I was extremely suicidal to the point I was seeing my regular therapist and a crisis counselor every single day for a while. I've come out on the other side of that, but I still feel a bit fragile sometimes. Not much I can do about that I suppose. 

One of the good/bad things about moving is starting with a new therapist. It's stressful, going through all the same stuff again. And I hope I don't get someone who wants to fight my autism diagnosis. I did have one idiot psychiatrist say it looked like I had "outgrown" it because I can fake eye contact on a good day and he assessed me for all of five minutes. So I am not looking forward to fighting with someone about it. 

The good bit is the possibility of getting someone who has actually worked with autistic clients before. My current therapist means well, but if she says "but you're so high functioning" one more time, I may not be responsible for my actions. I had a really bad day on Friday. I started off with some serious executive function issues that resulted in a massive coffee mess in the kitchen. Of course that was certainly a day I should have gotten myself to the therapist, but I didn't think I had the spoons to deal with her telling me "but you're so high functioning" as if that is some magic balm that should make me able to do the things I have trouble with. 

So, we're like... half moved to wichita. I am not able to lift anything over 15 lbs because I ended up having to have emergency surgery last Thursday. My stomach was completely blocked and NOTHING was getting through the stoma. You have not puked violently until you have puked up barium. It was literally two hours from the time they said "you need surgery" until they were cutting me open. I barely had time to e-mail Melissa my coeditor on one of the Sherlock Holmes books and ask her to hold down the fort. If you have a pitch you wanted to send us, or wanted to talk about what we're looking for, etc. feel free to talk to Melissa or Tara O'Shea first, because you'll get an answer quicker from them. You can still contact me, but my brain is mostly a haze of painkillers and moving woes so I can't promise i will be coherent when I reply :)

 I will put an LJ post about the books up  at some point when all the moving is done. We're really excited, and we think this could end up being a really super awesome thing. i am about crapping my pants with news I want to share about the books, but, alas...   

I also have a first draft of a novel done. I am 3/10ths through the second draft. On some days I feel it is really sellable and I really like it. On bad days, I feel like I still like it but no one will want it. I guess we'll see how that goes. 

I start my new job Feb 1st, and  our new place isn't going to be ready to move into until like feb 12th-ish-maybe, so that's going to be a litte weird. It's all going into storage until we sort out the details and we will be bumming  couch space with the inlaws for a bit. Of course, it looks like we will be moving in to the new place (which is probably still a temporary space until we find something bigger and more appropriate for our menagerie of animals and need to not be crawling on top of each other. So we'll just be squeaking in there. 

As for Gally--we are indeed going. We'll be getting in late-late Thursday and leaving Monday afternoon. We were very blessed to have friends wiling to help us out, or it would not be happening this year, after an entire year of unemployment and moving so close to Gally. But I would horribly miss my friends, and after how thing have been this last year, I kind of need just a little time with friends. I don't actually have any friends in Leavenworth, so it's been pretty lonely and isolating. 

The weird thing about conventions is... I deal with crowds and my social anxiety far better when I am on panels. Like... I need that barrier of the table or the stage between me and everyone else to feel safe. That and I can go on and on about nerd things. I have trouble in conversations about like... myself or personal stuff. So... well, there you have it. 

Still fighting major depression, still fighting (and losing, more often than not) the anxiety disorder. The sensory processing disorder I can't do much but try to live with. Last year, the overstimulation of so many people and the noise at Gally really freaked me out and brought on the panic attacks. I am not sure what I am going to do to manage it, but I am hoping someone will allow me to glom onto them for the weekend since James will be busy working staff for the autograph line.

And the autism is what it is, and I'd feel a lot better about coping with Gally if I had a better hold on some of the problems autism poses for me, especially in social settings, but what can I do? I have always been shitty in social situations, but I learned to fake it decently. Probably so decently that a lot of people wonder why I have suddenly turned into an inept asshole because, over the last year, I have lost a good portion of my ability to fake it. It take a lot of energy to be in social situations, and even more to try to act "normal," and I am so burnt out that I am not sure I will be as effective as usual. 

I'm basically terrified of pissing people off or weirding them out. In addition to social situations to begin with. Which isn't the greatest position to be in when asking people to write for your anthology. 

Either way... feel free to talk to me. I don't mind. I'm crap at starting conversations but if you start a conversation with me, then I know you want to talk to me and I am not being an inposition. I promise to do my best to keep my shit together. 

I may post another one of these before Gally. I don't know. I just felt like... with all the weirdness going on, maybe it was time for an update. Especially since I got a new job, and had that really scary suicidal bout at the beginning of the month. it even scared the shit out of ME, so I have no idea how my husband must have felt.