my therapist has been out of commission since about last november and, while things have been pretty okay in the interim, the changes in my life over the past couple of months have really amplified for me how much i still need that impartial ear and guidance.
because sitting in my apartment, with my mind racing and my anxiety levels climbing, is becoming increasingly uncool.
as everyone on the planet knows, work has been stressful. a huge amount of work, a huge amount of responsibility, and no signs of any of it letting up anytime soon. my brain is fried, i'm tired all the time and my life revolves almost entirely around the office. even as i drift off to sleep, i'm thinking about what needs to be done the next morning, what didn't get finished in the day that's ended, and how much longer i want to stay on in this role.
my only solace has been coming home at the end of each day to the comparative peace and quiet of my apartment... peace and quiet that have now been thwarted by the arrival of new upstairs neighbours.
last friday, on my way out of the building in the morning, i saw the super. i asked if anyone had yet rented the unit above mine and she said, "yes. they move in today."
my heart sank. "they?"
(if you recall, the property-management company decided to turn the one-bedroom apartment above mine into a two-bedroom unit. the second "bedroom," which is actually a shoebox, is above my office/living room. the management did this so that they could double the rent for the unit.)
the super said that my new neighbours are two girls -- students at the university of toronto.
"oh no," said i.
"they're high-class girls," said the super, in a bid (i think) to reassure me. though, i have no idea what "high-class girls" means.
"i'm not worried about that," i said, "i'm worried about noise."
my super said that she's already told the girls this is a "quiet, professional building" and that they should "keep it down." i did not feel any sense of reassurance that this would actually work.
university students have spelled t-r-o-u-b-l-e almost everywhere i've encountered them as neighbours. back at hell house, before all the ex-cons and crack addicts moved in, my across-the-hall neighbours were, for a while, a young brother and sister who were students and living away from home for the first time. recurrent DEAFENING music, friends coming and going at all hours of the day and night, parties... all despite repeated warnings from, and being yelled at by, the super. good times. in this building, i had the asshat next door for a while -- he of the 3am hammering! -- and more than a few elsewhere in the complex, who trashed their places, had loud parties and the like.
and let us not forget the big house next door to my building, where most of its four or five apartments have been inhabited by assorted university of toronto asshats and loud, obnoxious drunk girls for most of the six years i've lived here.
my previous super would never have put two students above me. but the new property management company (and, by proxy, the new super) would love it if my apartment were to be vacated so they can transform it to a two-bedroom, as well, and likewise jack up the rent. as such, they don't care if a herd of buffalo move in above me -- if it means i move out sooner, great!
so, ever since my previous upstairs neighbour (who was very quiet and who i only ever heard on occasion, usually when she'd clickclickclick her way to her front door in the morning to leave for work in her heels) moved out, i have lived in fear of who might take up residence upstairs. i'd prayed it would be a quiet, middle-aged woman who'd live alone and use the extra bedroom as her office. or a family of pillows.
instead, it's two university girls.
and, on friday, they moved in.
saturday was, understandably, a little noisy... but surprisingly quiet. almost as though they'd moved stuff in on friday and then went away for the weekend. i wasn't home all day yesterday and spent last night chez mes parents so, when i came home in the middle of the afternoon today, i actually ran into one of the girls in the elevator and, for the first time, got a look at what i'll be dealing with.
she was petite, maybe 5'1", and looked like a teenager. not especially "high-class," just very young. when we got on the elevator and she pressed the floor above mine, i said, "are you new in the building?"
she said she'd moved in two days ago, and i asked which unit. then i told her i was her downstairs neighbour. "oh! did you just move in, too?" she asked.
"no, i've lived here for almost seven years."
we didn't have a lot of time to chat (we weren't going up that many floors), but i introduced myself and she told me her name is cara. i got off the elevator and, as i walked to my door, i could hear her in the (carpeted!) hallway overhead, clomping to her front door above mine. the floors are cement under that carpet, btw.
that was around 3:30pm, and she and her roommate (or just her by herself?) have been thudding back and forth and back and forth and back and forth for the past six hours. they've been moving furniture, opening and closing doors, moving furniture again and, from the sounds of it, bouncing a giant yoga ball to and fro (i have no idea if that last on is what they've been doing, but it's what it SOUNDS like they've been doing).
and all it's done is send my anxiety through the roof. what if they're like all the other university students i've lived near? what if they throw a loud party? what if they keep on thudding day after day and night after night? the more i thought about it, the more panicked i felt. i started searching rental apartments in toronto. i started looking for rental houses, reasoning that i clearly can't cope with the stress of neighbours. i started recalculating down payments and mortgage payments and the like, trying to figure out what i can afford now should i choose to buy. i even started to figure out how i might manage moving in with YB if i had to.
and so on and so on and so on. i wound myself up so tightly that i didn't finish any of the work i needed to get done today. i didn't have dinner until 8 o'clock and, even then, it was a toasted baguette with butter and some juice. i keep trying to talk myself down off the anxiety ledge, because i know my mind is catastrophizing everything. my hell house PTSD is flaring up -- as it did when my first super left, and then when the building was sold, and then when they announced a condo building might be going up next door, and then when my second super left.
and i keep telling myself that, when each of those things happened, i felt the same sort of jittery panic i feel now but that, in each of those instances, my fears were somewhat unfounded. only the change in management has proven to be an ongoing challenge, but that's largely because of the non-stop construction noise in the building.
now, its choice of tenants. and, this time, the anxiety is triggered by the constant thudding and the fear of what else might come with it.
this is exactly the type of stuff i'd be going over in depth with my therapist, but she's not back for another month. and i don't want to work myself into a frenzy (or any more of a frenzy, anyway) in the meantime.
i thought maybe typing this all out in a stream of semi-consciousness way might be helpful. i put headphones on and have been listening to music... but i can still hear/feel the thudding.
and now, i think there's a leak in their bathroom/shower. the wall above my showerhead has suddenly (as in: within the last two days) started to blister, and i can hear a "drip drip" behind the wall.
f-word.
