It's a constant process, trying to find that balance between good stress in my life that keeps me feeling useful, purposeful and functional vs. that bad stress that triggers me and can even put me back in the hospital. So I'm asking for help from you with that, people who know what that's like from experience.

I'm back from Spring Break now at work in my little community college teaching job. I'm so glad I was able to work again after my PTSD crash in 2010-2011 took me out of the work force for a while. I have close friends here who are on disability, and I know that's a very real possibility for me, too. I almost went on total disability in 2011 myself. But we gave full time work another try, and it wasn't time for that yet. Not quite.

8 more weeks and I finish another school year. I'm always having to ration my energy carefully. Daily flashbacks, trouble sleeping, and all of my other PTSD symptoms that take each day's energy from work have to be accounted for in setting my work pace day by day.

I have a calendar on my fridge where I mark the days off one at a time. That way I try to remember the "Goldilocks" rule--not to let my porridge, as it were, be too cold or too hot.

How do you all pace yourselves? What tricks have you developed, like marking off days on the fridge and so forth? Any help is welcomed.