drive.

I'm making a content change. Or adding a content restriction: no more sick talk. Let's just from now on assume I'm feeling like crap a lot of the time, but posting anyway. When I get to the bottom of this mystery, I'll talk about it. Otherwise, mum's the word. The other day, it occurred to me that this may be a food allergy, so I've adopted a gluten-free diet, which seems to be making a difference. The last thing I'll say about feeling sick, is that if I figure it out before my doctors do, I want them to pay me for doing their job. 

Moving on. I've had a great week, even with a few snags. I went in Wednesday morning to fill out all of the hiring paperwork for my new job. It's complicated. It's amazing how things work out, because during that exact time, my Dad was starting over again, too. Happy detoxing, pops.

Am I not supposed to talk about this online? Is this the wrong forum for airing dirty laundry? If that's the case, I'll just talk about me.

I'm the daughter of an alcoholic. I can't even figure out all of the ways this has shaped how I behave, how I love, or how I will continue to become the person I'd like to be. If sometimes that crosses the clothesline of a reader's comfort zone, so be it. I'm not here to create a virtual utopia, and I don't have a way to filter the fact that people have the most impact on my life, whether I want them to or not. I share these things because in some way I think they are important to someone. Not because they are about me, but because maybe somewhere down the road someone will find me here, even by accident. 

And maybe that person will need to read about someone else who is anywhere, trying to sort everything out just the same.

Every one of these topics are based on things I might talk about in my daily life. My daily struggle to live. To live with my mistakes, my successes, or what I feel are my shortcomings. Sometimes I like to talk about things like our current medical culture. That they're pushing me and anyone else looking for help with emotional difficulties into taking prescriptions to solve their problems. Yet, suicide rates are up, and have continued to climb. I wish there were more I could do to address this, but I'm only one person. Part of my struggle with this is also related to some dirty laundry that I may need to air for clarity's sake, since I've also vowed to quit being vague and elusive on the internet. It's pointless. You either have something to say, or you don't.

[I digress. I have at least enough of a filter to know that mean things said without purpose or provocation are best kept to yourself. If you find you have to encrypt something so you don't sound mean, it's probably not worth saying.]

So I talk about me, with everyone in the world in mind. I'm not a narcissist. And if I seem to be, just think about how much time during the day a depressed person thinks about themselves. A hint: it's all fucking day.

O.K. Back to the part where I had a good week. I got a job. It seems like it's going to be great. I guess that was really the only great thing that happened, but it was enough to keep me going. 

“In my paranoid world every storekeeper thinks I’m stealing, every man thinks I’m a prostitute or a lesbian, every woman thinks I’m a lesbian or arrogant, and every child and animal sees the real me and it is evil.” --Miranda July, It Chooses You

while i was sleeping.

All that football was exhausting. I've been spending a lot of time trying to get my anxiety under control, and that said, I've been looking for its root cause. When I watch television, depending on what I'm watching, I feel a lot of things. I can't watch disturbing movies, or even some emotional dramas if the content is horribly upsetting. It's not even that I don't like them. If it's done well, and there isn't anything technically wrong that breaks my attention, I absorb everything. Bad guys, good guys...it doesn't matter. And once I absorb it, it's as if someone gave me an emotional transplant. The same goes in my everyday life. Every encounter is the same. If you feel sad, I feel sad and want to fix it immediately. If someone is homeless, I observe their position, their injuries, the discomfort and hunger, and then I literally feel all of it from the inside out.

I know that this is empathy. I'm in a constant state of emotional overload, and my walls are thin. I think over the past year I developed a feeling that if I could just become invisible, I wouldn't cause people to feel so much, which in turn would help me feel less of everything overwhelming. Off and on, I think I knew that I shouldn't be making myself invisible, so I'd try harder--almost force myself to get out there and be someone who isn't.

Anyway.

I landed a job this week at a college. I start next week, and having been around a few of the classrooms and in some of the halls, I feel happy. Even if I'm not taking any classes, I'm thrilled to be around all of that education and stuff. I love to learn. I hope to take a few lessons from the job, and maybe even a few classes at a later date. First I need to get a handle on the job. A better handle on my life, even. But for getting this particular job, I am proud. This means no more selling insurance, less unemployment, and a fresh start. It's not that I didn't like insurance. I knew it, and well. I couldn't stand working with the customers, and I think now it was the stupid empathy.

Over the last several months, I kept hoping I'd wake up one day and all of my health problems would vanish...that I'd get to start over. That's not going to happen, so I'm going to have to start over now, and hope all of these nasty symptoms begin to dissipate over time. Figures, I get empathy, but no patience.

I just hope I'm well enough to start this new thing without too much additional discomfort. And if I'm not, that's o.k., too. If I've learned anything on unemployment it's that I can do more than I thought I could with a lot less of everything. 


"Wealth, in terms of dollars and so forth, could be counted up, because dollars were finite. It doesn't make any difference how many dollars you have--at a certain point you only have dollars. You start with finite, you end with finite." -Mike Nesmith

a bucket list.

Once again, I'm on the tail end of a bunch of tests and nothing comes up. Nothing always makes me feel good, until the next day, when I realize I still don't feel great and there's no explanation or end in sight. It's okay, because I'm not here to complain today. I'm here to talk about what I'd like to do if ever I feel normal again.

My MeMaw, 2007

Because of everything, my bucket list is getting longer, although the items on it for the short term are smaller and less of a big deal. To most people. It would be nice at this point to have enough stamina at the end of the day to go out to dinner, even if I have to skip the glass of wine. Even better would be to have the energy and be comfortable enough to take a trip to Louisiana to see my family. I miss them terribly, and my three uncles are performing with a new band that I'd love to see. I want to talk to my grandmother, who is the most lovely and kind person I've ever known.

This family of mine, the one that lives in the South, informally adopted my sister and I more wholeheartedly than I could have imagined possible. I was five or six when my mom left and my dad remarried, and my sister was about four. My step-mother took us in, and brought us into a life we'd never have known. Even though I missed my mom, I remember feeling all of the warmth and the hospitality a six year old child could ever know. I remember feeling loved, and not conditionally. It happened instantly, without reserve. Some of my best memories sleep in Shreveport.

The South is just different. It has its good and bad, like anywhere, but the good is wiser, better, and more soulful. I like having roots there...that's just it, I feel rooted there, more grounded. It's solid. So bucket list item number one: get South.

As for today, I'm watching some football. Maybe it'll mark a Pats victory. No matter who wins, this time of year always reminds me that it's the end of football season, which means Spring is coming soon.

Here's to happy endings and new beginnings. Please pass the wings.

Wednesday 1 February

143 lbs. (but post unemployment), alcohol units 0, cigarettes 5, calories 350 (but it's only 8:15 a.m.).

Food consumed today:

One cinnamon donut, Market Basket brand

One coffee, Folgers with three organic sugars and organic cream

This morning, Gardner, my apartment. I like to think of myself sometimes as Bridget Jones. One part ambition, two parts irony, one part serendipity, and 3 parts incompetence, both emotional and intellectual.

But I'm not a character in a book, I don't have a weight problem, and I've finally found a Mr. Right, although we did have to work through a whole bunch of unhealthy strife and indecision before we could get to where we are today. Lucky for me, he's in it for the long haul. Seriously.

I have a job interview in three and a half hours. I'm trying to take George Clooney's advice from last night's episode of Inside the Actors Studio. I don't have a job going into the interview, and I may not have a job when I leave. The only thing left to happen is that I may get a job. You can't lose a job you don't already have. Profound, right? Well, how profound can it be if you're getting your shit from the television? But it works for me, for right now.

I won't think about the endless possibilities were I to get this job. Like finally having the opportunity to go to college. I want to learn how to write. I want to really hone my skills. Sure, I've had some informal training. My former editor and boss was perhaps the best teacher I've ever known. She always gave me the freedom to screw up, and somehow made it seem like she believed in my talent even when I gave her 750 words of absolute horse shit. She helped me turn those particular stories around. That part of my life was the best time I can remember. Hands down.

As for my health today, I'm pushing through it. I need to ignore it today, just long enough to get to the next thing. I slept well, which is more than I can say for the two nights preceding last night. I feel hopeful, which is more than I can say for a whole lot of days leading up to today. Six months ago, I could barely read because my sinus problems were affecting my eyesight. I'd write and mix up the words, then find my mistakes later and worry that I'd lost my wits. Well, they're back, if in fact they were ever gone. I'm back. Not me, as in Bridget Jones, but me the way I've always wanted to be. Sick or not sick.

I think I'm finally just fed up with everything I've had to do, only to find it's barely keeping me afloat. So I've been through the mill. Big fucking deal.

All of this is going to make me stronger. Or, it'll make me feel like a fool. I sincerely hope it's the former.

sometimes it's a bitch.

Well, I'm still here today. I've survived a lot of chaos, and I've muddled through with a lot of more recent health problems. Some of my health problems may be related to anxiety about other health problems, and they still don't know what might be the underlying cause of those. I took a break from doctors and trying to figure it out, but I got back on the train yesterday. I feel more hopeful than I did--I have a new doctor and she's much more helpful than my old one. She's truthful, which can be scary, but as I learned yesterday, also an absolute must when it comes to my health.

She was truthful enough to tell me that based on my records, the Lyme disease test that my old doctor told me they had already performed, wasn't actually performed.

Today that leaves me in a waiting game once again for more blood work results for that, and a slew of other things. On one hand, while you're waiting it feels like you'd be glad to have some answers. I mean, no one wants Lyme disease. So on the other hand, while you're waiting, you're shitting yourself hoping you don't have something horrible that requires a whole lot of medical treatment over the next several months. And that horrible 'C' word. Let's just forget about that for the moment.

What I'm trying to do while I wait, is think good thoughts. Thoughts about the days that I've felt better. Thoughts about how much worse I felt six months ago, and how some of the initial symptoms have subsided. Thoughts about how effective positive thinking can be.

I've become frustrated with the comings and goings of my symptoms. Sometimes, when I'm feeling good, I make plans to do things. The next week comes along, and I'm not feeling good, so I have to break them. This just feeds the anxiety. I feel like I've let people down. Like I've let myself down because I'm not strong enough to break the cycle. I keep trying, because sometimes it feels like I'm fighting for my life. Not in the literal sense, but fighting to maintain some kind of normalcy during this somewhat uncomfortable time. I also have to stop fighting sometimes and remember that I can't always win. Sometimes I have to call a truce with this stuff and save my energy for doing some regular, everyday things. The dishes, some cooking, and a load of laundry or two. Sometimes I have to remind myself that my friends are there for me, too, and that they care enough to know that I'm in the middle of a struggle. That they're not unsympathetic to my plight. I put a lot of pressure on myself, and it's really about something over which I have no control. I have to remember this.

So it's Tuesday morning, and I'm waiting to find out if my blood tests are normal again. I'm waiting to find out whether or not I have Lyme disease, or possibly TB. The goal is Thursday. I have to stay sane until Thursday.

And I'm throwing it out there into the universe, 'C' word stay the fuck away.

HappyThankYouMorePlease.

Life is just like the movies. Not like what happens in movies. Life is like the part where you think you're going to get one thing based on the trailers, and then maybe you've just seen all of the funny parts and the rest of the movie is very, very serious. Or sometimes it's the other way around.

I've tried to train myself not to expect anything in particular, but to try really, really hard to make things come out all right. I don't know if that's the right thing to do, but it's still what I do. It probably always will be. I can't help but notice that sometimes you can try really hard, and things still come out shit, or at least someone else will think they're shit, and well, I just can't always make everyone happy. I had a friend once mistake me for someone who would try really hard to do things their way--if I succeeded, they would be happy and like me. It took me about 20 years to realize that we weren't meant to be friends. That was about three years after she realized that we weren't meant to be friends. Does it bother me sometimes? A ton.

Even without her, I guess I just try to be the best possible version of me. Nothing less. If it's like the movies, one day that might mean it's not as good as you'd have expected, and sometimes it's better. I had one of my better days last week, which helped me during a telephone interview, and I'm happy to say that they emailed me today (on Sunday!) to schedule an in person interview for this week. So, if anyone really did send those positive thoughts I had asked for in my previous post, it worked! Thank you, and please keep more of the same coming. I've been feeling more under the weather than usual...I think it's just post-cold residual, so any encouragement and positive reinforcement goes a long way.

An aside, four months of unemployment goes by very, very fast. I know I'm going to look back and kick myself for not making more of the time.

possibly, maybe.

I may survive this cold/flu season yet. And maybe I'll survive this mystery illness that's been hacking away at me since last March. 

I've been unemployed now for four months as of tomorrow. We've adjusted our lifestyle to fit my new and improved budget. I say improved, because we've fixed it so that we have less of what we think we want and more of what we need. The food's better, because we have to plan our meals, and have adjusted our diet accordingly. We spend more on the food, but I spend much less on gas. Currently I'm running through one tank a month. I refinanced my car around September, knowing in advance that it may come down to this, so I earned a better interest rate and a lower payment. We had a lean, but meaningful Christmas. I buy toothpaste at the dollar store, and we finish our leftovers more often, which means I'm even more creative with the food we have instead of being lazy and ordering out. I exercise for fun sometimes, which has the side effect of getting me more healthy. We moved, and with the "no more smoking in the house" rule, the cold outside has effectively cut down my cigarette intake by half. I'd say unemployment has lead me down a better path. Better for my health, better for the environment, and oddly enough, better for my finances.

Having made these adjustments is leading me to a place whereby I can go back to work part-time, and possibly manage to start something to--after 20 years away--continue my education. And having finally met the guy that's completely behind my sometimes unconventional approaches to life and work, I can say with confidence that I'm more than content, if not happy. The wheels are finally in motion. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a long-awaited interview that might place me in just this kind of position. I can only hope that my health continues to improve as I try to get a running start. I'm also hoping my friends, new and old, can send some positive thoughts my way to help keep me moving toward this new chapter. Who knows, maybe it will lead to a bunch of new chapters. The kind I can bind together and hopefully find in a store window someday. And yes, you'll all be obliged to buy a copy, even if it's rubbish. That's what friends are for, right? 


So. What's everyone else planning for the rest of their life?