After being so depressed last night, Kate was herself this morning at least until it was time for us to get a bite to eat before our haircuts at 11:00. Here’s what happened. About 9:45 I went back to her office where she was working on her laptop. I told her we would need to leave in 30 minutes if we wanted to get something to eat before our haircuts. She indicated that would not be a problem. In the meantime, I went back to my computer. After 15 minutes, I went back to let her know that we had 15 minutes. Before I could say anything, she said somewhat angrily, “What do you want? You can see I’m getting ready.” Seeing that she was well on her way to being ready, I let her alone and didn’t say anything more. At 10:15 she called to me and asked, “Where are you?” She was all ready to go. Knowing that she would wait for me while I was getting my haircut, I asked if she wanted to take her iPad. She said, “And my computer too.” I could see that she didn’t have her computer; so I assumed that I needed to get it for her. Since she had been using it in her office, I went there to get it. I didn’t find it. In the meantime, I discovered that she was looking for it as well. I told her I had seen her using it in the office but didn’t see it there. We both started looking in different rooms of the house. Then she asked where her iPad was. I told her it was probably in the bedroom, but I had no luck there. Then I asked her, “You wouldn’t have taken both of them and put them in the car, would you?” Before she could answer, I went to the car to check. They were in the front seat of the car. She acted quite relieved to know they were found; however, she had already gotten pretty worked up and couldn’t immediately calm down. This was not a full-blown panic attack but her heart appeared to be racing and she was breathing more heavily than normal.
We went to Panera. On the way over I asked, “Are you back to normal now?” (This is something that occurs somewhat frequently. I ask the question, and she tells me if she is or isn’t.) She told me, “Not yet.” I sense that this routine exchange seems to facilitate her calming down IF I don’t I appear to be pushing her but simply being sympathetic. I told her I thought she would be perfectly calm by the time I brought her food to her. That didn’t happen. She told me (in a nice way) that she still wasn’t back to normal. About half way through her sandwich, she said, “I’m all right now.” We both smiled and went on with our lunch.
I dropped her off to get her haircut while I went back home to take care of a few things and to stop by Walgreens to pick up a prescription. When she finished, I took my place to have my hair shampooed. In a few minutes she approached me and indicated she wanted to get a Dr. Pepper out of the car. I gave her my key with some hesitation and gave her instructions as to where I had parked. Kate left. I felt uneasy, and Dawn said she would follow her to the car. I told her what my car looked like and where it was parked. She came back in a few minutes and said that Kate had immediately turned left as she walked out of the shop instead of going straight as I had told her. Then she couldn’t find the car, but Dawn helped her.
When I had finished, we both went to the car. I asked her for the car key. She didn’t have it. I went back in the shop and found that she had put it on the bench beside the spot where she had been sitting. When I came back with the key, she was quite relieved. She was about to panic again. She joked abut my having to put up with so much from her that sometime I was going to lose my patience and just shoot her. I smiled at her and said, “It’s not going to happen.” We both laughed. I said, “At least we can keep our humor.”
