There are a few things I do on a regular basis. I first started doing these when I started therapy; I just felt I needed these daily tasks to make definitive progress toward recovery. A few months later when I started group therapy, I realized I was already doing "dailies" that our therapist recommended. I started individual therapy in early 2010. In April of that year I attended Wood Badge, a leadership training course for adult leaders in the Boy Scouts of America. That first weekend I brought a notebook and my scriptures along with me. Since my mission both my journal and scripture study were hit and miss. Since that weekend, I have read scriptures and written in my journal nearly every day, missing only a few days per year. Writing in my journal is a type of creative outlet and gives me time to meditate and ponder life, the universe, and everything.
Also as a part of Wood Badge, we set 5 or more goals to complete the course and get our beading award. We had to finish our goals within 18 months to complete our ticket. Some were scouting related and one was a personal goal. For my personal goal, I resolved myself to run a 10 km race under 45 minutes. I knew that I could easily run that fast - if I trained for it. In high school, my fastest 10 km was about 36 minutes. Since my mission I had run about 3 races but hadn't finished under 45 minutes. I knew it would be hard but that I could do it. So I started back into running. There was a field near our house. Running around it, gave me just over two miles. For the first few months, the most I ran was about 15 miles per week. Then, I went to Monterey, CA for work one week. I brought along my bag of female clothing and my running stuff. My longest run in my entire life was about 8 miles, and that was during high school and took about two hours. But during that week in Monterey, I ran 10 miles along the beach a couple times. I couldn't get enough of it; I had to force myself to turn around. Not long after that, I started running with a friend from group therapy. He talked about his marathon running, how he had qualified for Boston and was planning to run it the next year. Our first run together was about 14 miles. I nearly died. I was hooked, and running long distances had become one of my dailies. To finish my goal, the city I lived in had a series of 10 km races. It took me 4 attempts before I ran under 45 minutes. Since then, I've learned how much I need to run on a regular basis. My mood is definitely better on the days I've had a nice run.
Early on, I decided to never run on Sunday. It is a day to worship God. It is true that many of my runs I have felt closer to God than during any sermon at Church. Running in the outdoors, enjoying God's creations is very spiritual for me. But even then, Sunday should be a day of rest from worldly cares and worries, a day to focus on our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. There are so many races and training runs that are on Sunday. Sometimes I feel torn. Thankfully, there have been plenty of races on Saturday. For my 100-miler that started early Saturday morning, I did run on Sunday and missed Church. I guess I'll have to run faster next year so that I finish before midnight on Saturday.
I've noticed one other thing that keeps me in check every day. Currently, I'm on 2 mg of estradiol and 50 mg of spironolactone (an anti-androgen). I'm not the best at taking my medicine on a regular basis. I've noticed that when I take my medicine late or completely forget it, that I'm more irritable, angry, depressed, sad, etc. When I started back on hormones, I realized how moody (mainly angry) I was without the hormones. The attacks nearly stopped after the hormones were back in my system, and I slept better.
So in summary, my dailies are:
- Study scriptures
- Write in journal
- Run (4-6 times per week)
- Take medicine (estrogen and spironolactone)
