Better Things Happening

Adam wound up going with Plan B, which was to rent forty laptops from a local computer company in Beijing, as customs still held his company's laptops and did not want to release them without a very hefty payment. The job sets up tomorrow and Adam will be very busy. But at least the major problem has been solved.

Low Dopamine Levels

Someone asked me about this a while back and I forgot until today, as my dopamine levels plummeted and I started feeling it and I remembered.

This is just for my records.

I was born with low dopamine levels. Not to extremes, but low enough to the point where it is not normal. There is a list of symptoms below. I have crossed out symptoms that I do not have. The symptoms that I do have are mild. For example, the symptoms "reduced ability to feel pleasure" and "low enthusiasm" come and go. One minute I could be all the way up, the next all the way down. Some days I feel nothing but pleasure and enthusiasm. Some days I just feel nothing. "Oh, but Joanna, you're so happy when you do stuff you love; you can be so focused and hyper! You have lots of drive and motivation!" That is when my dopamine levels are increased. When my levels are very low, I generally don't give a fuck. Thankfully, this does not happen often.
It can be easy for me to increase my dopamine levels naturally, but it is also very easy for those levels to plummet at any point. My doctors understand that my case is mild enough to be handled with exercise, nutrition, supplementation, and socialization. I don't need prescription DRIs. Yet.
Yes, I am fully aware that many of these symptoms are are also symptoms of fibromyalgia. This is because fibromyalgia patients have problems with dopamine levels. So do cerebral palsy patients. Hey, guess what two disabilities I have that can often correlate to each other?

Also, I am currently slightly irritated for reasons I cannot pinpoint. Maybe I just need someone to hug for a while.

( Symptoms of low dopamine levels )

And mother finally confirmed that I have a form of OCD. She didn't want to tell me when I was a child, because it might have caused my anxiety issues to explode. I don't blame her. But it explains an awful lot.

But now I shrug. I can live with it all. I can work around it. I am a warrior, after all.
And if someone wants to call me whiny, that's fine. At least I am working toward living with all this craziness.

Five Things Meme

This is mostly for new readers, since I've had a bunch of people friend me recently.
I think the meme says that that people have to ask me five detailed questions about myself or my interests, and I need to provide five detailed answers. So, ask away.