Welcome to AM/PM, where Autostraddle team members share our morning and evening rituals.

I kind of didn’t realize until this week that I super don’t have a morning routine beyond, get up (because if I don’t I will wet my pants), take my meds, pray, and then brace myself for whatever’s gonna happen outside my bedroom door (not that huge things happen, I’m just a brace-yourself-just-in-case type of gal).

So, I wake up hopefully before the sun is too far into the sky, but it’s been up in the air this summer as I’ve tried to handle working, helping out with a summer workshop, attending two other workshops, writing and doing poetry critiques, and getting ready for coding bootcamp. But I have no idea what it’ll look like in two weeks so it’s an adventure for all. Regardless of the day, this is basically the face I’m making post-nightmare:

i can’t see ten inches in front of my face so no kind of great picture was coming out of this

Then, I use the bathroom, take my meds, brush my teeth, rinse my face, make a face at the mirror…

usually not with my phone, but faces are made

…pray (though my attention span is shit, so it takes me a lot longer than I think it should), and go downstairs for coffee.

While I wait, I try to figure out if I’m hungry enough to eat and then I end up making something anyways because I don’t want my stomach to yell at me later. I am confident about my ability to make sandwiches and cereal, and coffee and cereal make me not happy, so breakfast usually looks like this:

i was almost finished my sandwich when I remembered this post and luckily my memory came through in the clutch cause even if I made another sandwich I would’ve probably eaten it before taking a picture

After I talk to whoever is in the house (everyone is home since it’s summer)/maybe watch a show/more likely gossip with them, I come back upstairs and go through my OneTab which is usually like this:

multiple people have told me i have a problem but do i listen? nope i don’t have time i’ve got tabs to focus on

and try to figure out how I can get that into single digits.

Depending on the day, I might prep notes for therapy, or mourn that I’m in a polo shirt for work and try to figure out how I can become rich in the next five minutes so I don’t have to go in, or I might have cramps (like this week) and just take the L and go right back to bed after reading a library book. What I’m getting at here is, it’s always an exciting time with me.

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