My Bad Mood

I was in a bit of a bad mood over the weekend. It’s almost as if I woke up on the wrong side of bed both Saturday and Sunday. Everything my husband and son did irritated, annoyed and frustrated me and it triggered off thoughts of hopelessness, worthlessness and being unlovable so on and so on. Disappointing, however I dealt with it the best way I knew how. 

During the weekend whenever I felt irritable I tried so hard to remember that it could potentially turn out worse and that I could really put more dents in my already weak relationships with the boys. I said to myself to try and take breaths and just allow time before speaking and to use my GIVE skills (be Gentle, act Interested, Validate them and use an Easy manner). Unfortunately it didn’t work completely but I am almost positive the GIVE skill was in the back of my mind all weekend and I think this might have been the thing that kept me from completely losing it. I also had to take myself away from the situations quite a lot. I didn’t create a scene about it, I just went into my room and closed the door (which normally means I’m meditating). I tried so hard to figure out why I was feeling the way I was and I really couldn’t work it out but it gave me a chance to just cool down. I also tried to work out what emotions I was feeling and I was able to figure it out eventually and it then reminded me of a situation which had possibly created this irritability. In brief, I saw my sisters and niece on Friday night, something happened where I snapped instead of being interpersonally effective so I went home feeling disappointed in myself and couldn’t sleep until 4am. It was such a small thing but I had to ask my psychologist if this tiny event could possibly have caused this bad mood and she agreed it could have triggered things off, especially the lack of sleep. She did want to remind me though, because I was so disappointed in myself for not using skills, that I am going to have days like this for no apparent reason or for good reason and that it’s ok. It’s how I deal with the mood that’s the key. 

Thinking back now I could have done things differently by telling my husband and son that I was in a funny mood and even though I didn’t know why, that it had nothing to do with them. To make my husband feel like he was helping, (because he usually tries to help with really bad advice), I could’ve asked for a cuddle or a cup of tea. My psychologist was still really happy with how I dealt with my bad mood because I de-escalated it to the best of my ability and the bad mood hadn’t caused a huge fight or falling out because of that. 

All in all, a little bit proud of myself, even though a fraction of disappointment is still lingering. I was able to really have insight into what emotions were happening and why and I was really thinking hard about the skills that I could put in place. I wish I did more but I’m still happy it ended where it did. As I say in almost every post, these skills really do work and the more you practice the better you get and the more you see improvements in yourself and in relationships.