I had an awesome moment the other day and it involved being sad!  I was with some friends and something one of my friends said triggered me and I became sad.  Everyone else was talking about happy, positive things and I had to tell them that I was feeling sad at the moment and that I wasn't going to participate for a little while.  I sat back and listened to everyone else talk for a while and after approximately five minutes I felt much better.  It may not sound like much, but I realized when I got in my car to go home, that I had done something that I would not have been able to do half a year ago.  Before getting experience in dialectical behavior therapy, I would have tried to avoid feeling the emotion, with the result that I would either be wildly attention seeking and dramatic or I would have pretended that I wasn't feeling sad and so would feel worse later.  Knowing me, I probably would have at first tried to be happy, wouldn't be able to do it, start crying and then try to get someone else to comfort me, perhaps making them feel used, manipulated, or burdened.  The ordinary sadness would have turned to suicidal ideations.  But this time, I handled the emotion myself and by not denying what I was feeling, I was able to move on to a more positive emotion a lot sooner.  No one had to comfort or soothe me and I was able to stay calm and cool.  I am very pleased with myself!

Speaking of awesome things and being pleased with myself, check out these cool tights: I got them on clearance from Hot Topic.  I was a little skeptical, because the package said "one size fits all" and we all know that that isn't really true, but fortunately they do fit!  I got several compliments on them and I think they really jazzed up an otherwise boring outfit.  (For the rest of the outfit - shirt: Target  skirt: Torrid hairclip: Hot Topic shoes: Abbadabba's - Dansko necklace: gift)

I love this crystal necklace given to me by my aunt, but even more do I love the fact that I can see the progress that I am making.  Not every day is smooth sailing, but my emotions are slowly becoming more and more regulated, which is such a nice feeling.

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