The holidays have been cruel to me, health-wise. Anxiety is at an all time high, meaning my temporo-mandibular joint issue has escalated, causing me to slightly dislocate the left side a few nights before Christmas. I had to slurp down my turkey dinner, and now it’s finally getting better thanks to a stress massage, some muscle relaxers and anti-inflammatories, but the anxiety’s still a bit high.
A good therapy: Knitting. In fact, it’s been prescribed.
I don’t tell many folks this, but in the interest of a good tale… I see a therapist every few weeks for my anxiety, in an attempt to work on natural methods of controlling it as opposed to being on medication. This has included successful ventures like cutting out most sugar and caffeine, working on identifying trigger factors, etc. We had this very conversation a few months back:
Dr. T: So, this may sound like an old-woman thing, but… knitting, crocheting, needlework and the like are all great hobbies to pursue. In your case, they can be a focus exercise when needing a distraction from the trigger point, as well as keeping hands busy as not to fidget.
Me: I knit. And crochet, a bit. (more on that below.)
Dr. T: Oh? Excellent! Does it work?
Me: yes. Generally my first reaction is to grab the needles and knit something.
Dr. T: Very nice. Keep that up. Might be a good thing to bring your knitting with you out for social activities (it can be a trigger for me), but I guess it might be hard to tote…
Me: Nope. Got a sock in progress right here. (I pull out my RPM.)
Dr. T: … clearly I need to learn from you, here.
Now I can count knitting as physical and emotional therapy, though we all knew it was such.
I’ve successfully made some granny squares in the past little while.
They’re furiously addictive. I want to make a blanket of them. Like those awesome oldschool 70′s ones, but perhaps with nicer colours. I’ve been poking around at Attic 24 for inspiration as well as the all-knowing Ravelry. I also have The Happy Hooker which taught me all I needed to know, as the original Stitch n’ Bitch did.
I’ve also made decent stripe progress on the Who Scarf:
It’s just over 4 feet. Final length will be about 16 feet. I’m a quarter done! Wow!
Tonight is a night of settling in with some knitting, watching a movie, and working on de-stressing from the holiday.