Sick

It’s the week in between Christmas and the New Year, so I’m sick. This has been true more often than not for me at this time each year, at least in adulthood. I would run myself into the ground trying to get through that mad holiday dash and my body would just give out. Not so much since I stopped working five years ago. In fact, this is the first time I have had steady, conventional employment in recovery, much less at the holidays. I hope that’s just a coincidence.

So I’m sitting here writing this because I don’t seem to have much energy for anything more. I’m on the mend now – I think – but damn. I don’t know if I still have a job or not so my anxiety is nagging at me in spite of my attempts to distract myself. 

Going into the holidays I hadn’t been getting a lot of sleep. I know the day after Yule, [which also happened to be a Self-care Sunday], I let myself flop and just sleep/rest/take it easy all day. But after that I went right back to eyes-popping-open-by-five-like-they’re-spring-loaded short nights. On Christmas I got there early so the presents were done well before dinner went in the oven. I kicked back the recliner, grabbed a fluffy blanket, and snoozed for a good while, maybe 1½ -2 hours.  She said I twitched the whole time I was out and was quick to offer coffee when I was getting ready to leave. I wonder if she saw that glazed-over eyes thing she claims she always saw when I was sick as a kid. It was a long ride home so when I got there I headed straight for the couch to kick off my shoes and cuddle up with my cats. That’s when it started and I didn’t get up long enough to put on my glasses and acknowledge life until around 11 am this morning.

There were sweats and chills throughout, intense itching the first half, headache the second, and intermittent diarrhea that caused me to soil myself. I got up to pound a cup of water once or twice and look at the empty bowls until I could gather the strength to get back up and fill them. I also changed clothes twice due to sweat or other fluids. Some time yesterday I checked my phone to see what I might have been missing and I saw the missed call from Sabrina.

Shit, I was supposed to be at work…when? It can’t possibly be so soon. What day is it? What time is it? Shit, I think it was today. Yep, (the calendar on the fridge confirms)it was today and I’m supposed to be there right now. OMG What can I do? I can’t go, hell, I can’t even sit upright. I can’t call, I can’t think long enough to put three words together right now. I might lose my job. There’s nothing I can do about this right now. OMG I gotta go lay back down. I can’t deal with this right now. Goddess, I have to give this one to you. I’m scared.

When I finally did get up and felt reasonably sure that I could stay up, I called the house. I didn’t want to call my boss directly if she had already left for vacation. No answer. Ten minutes later my voice came out shaky and yes, she had already left. I’m supposed to get a call back this afternoon, likely within the hour. 

OK, I guess I’ll just work on practicing acceptance. If it doesn’t work out then I guess this wasn’t my time or place. Hard to believe people once trusted me with their children’s lives.

LOL I’m a dud

I chuckled out loud to myself tonight while washing dishes. The thought occurred to me that, from an evolutionary perspective, I’m a complete dead end. Disappointing but anticipated, like that one steamed clam that doesn't open, we accept that some paths simply  lead nowhere.	I think evolution probably tosses out far more duds than it does winners. Given even the rudimentary road map that we currently have of the human genome, my mind spins at the total possible combinations of all that data. I have to think that the house usually wins, and that evolution gambles on innumerable variations before finding anything significant enough to catch on.
I broke the chain that, as the sole offspring of my two parents, only I could have continued. I’m also an only grandchild on my mother’s side, so my progeny would have been the Hail Mary pass for much of the family recipe to squeak through. I wonder what percentage of women in the world will spend their lives (assuming they have some kind of life) never having borne or raised a child. I once heard someone say that this was actually the original definition of the word we now understand as “virgin,” but I digress.
That code is like God’s blueprint.  Man might be able to glimpse the script but I doubt he will ever fully comprehend it.

Gratitude revisited

I caught myself in a moment of humanness today. I was grumbling to myself about how I can’t find a good set of ice cube trays that fit into my <$0.00 budget. The ones I have don’t stack, (I have 2 different sets of 2, graciously offered by a neighbor along with a nice bin for the cubes, and they are better than the dollar store kind I had before that.), so they take up a crazy amount of space in my freezer. Space that I need for food and ice packs to put on my spastic skin. Now, I use a lot of ice because I like my cold beverages to be super cold. Once the ice gets too melty or the liquid gets to warm, I dump it and get more. (HSP thing?) It’s one of those ridiculous little irritations that has been stuck in my craw for a while. (OCD thing?) But it’s the holidays and I shouldn’t be buying things for myself, especially when I already have so little to give away. And I’m thinking about all of the other “ridiculous little irritations” that I see all over the house. Ones that I long ago identified and set about correcting but still lay unfinished. My judgement these days is very much in question. (Anxiety/PTSD/Depression/Other...?) And then… wait.

Girl, check your privilege. You’re wasting precious energy on ridiculous little irritations.

I talked on the phone with Debbie the other day. Not too long because I can’t tolerate the untreated mental health, but we needed to collaborate on Timmy’s driving education. She started going off yet again about the casino cheating her and how she thinks it’s terrible that they take people’s money like that. My brain is searching for a quick and convenient way to get off of this track. Then she said something that I don’t think I’ve ever heard from her before. At least not quite like this.  

« I think I’ve had a hard life. I think I’ve had a much harder life than most other people. »  Yes, I would agree Debbie, I believe that you have. I’m telling the truth and I kind of feel that way too. I wonder how many other people feel like this. But no, Debbie, that doesn’t mean life owes you anything. If we all got what we deserved the world would be a very different place. I gotta run Deb. I gotta get ready to go.

This afternoon I realized that the reason my voice has become hoarse over the last several weeks isn’t entirely from dry winter air. I’m singing. This is new. When I’m working in the kitchen or driving in the car, I’m singing full-blast-don’t-give-a-damn-how-I-sound-but-I-know-I-could-never-sing-this-well-in-front-of-another-person because it feels so joyful. This is new. I’m putting as much love as I can into this holiday season because quality is going to have to be better than quantity, at least for the foreseeable future. I’m feeling so grateful for the opportunity to show others that I care about them and value them. That’s the best thing I can give. I wonder how many other people feel like this.

 

This ugly bag of mostly water

“Très vite dans ma vie il a été trop tard. A dix-huit ans il était déjà trop tard… J'ai un visage lacéré de rides sèches et profondes, à la peau cassée. Il ne s'est pas affaissé comme certains visages à traits fins. Il a gardé les mêmes contours mais sa matière a été détruite. J'ai un visage détruit.”

~Marguerite Duras (L'Amant)

My whole life is written in and on my body. When I quit drinking my youthful face transformed overnight into a road map of my emotional journey. Everywhere I look there is some mark or scar, like points on my timeline. The way my body looks is generally a pretty good indication of what’s going on inside of me. I have always been something of a slave to the weather and the seasons, both literally and figuratively.

Several times last week I noted an unfamiliar sensation. At first I thought the seat of my pants was damp because it was this sudden, cool feeling when I got up from a seated position or moved just so. Then I realized it was actually air against the backs of my thighs as the fabric from my loose pajama pants swung away from my skin. (I’m picturing Susan Powter on a television stage yelling to her ex-husband that her thighs don’t touch.) Something similar happened once before idk how long ago when I noticed a strange sound while brushing my teeth. Turns out it was my upper arm flab smacking against my side boob flab as I brushed.

My weight is seldom related to my diet or fitness level and it fluctuates a great deal. Twenty pounds fell off of me practically overnight when I left my husband, but a major depressive episode saw me close to 300 and in physical therapy. These days my biggest food group is chocolate in all of its delightful forms but I spent this past year in a culling phase and now my clothes are all too big.

My skin is second only to my brain in imagination and unpredictability. Allergic reactions, dermatitis, eczema, pox, hives, rash, acne, you name it. New ones tend to manifest during spring and autumn transitions, ranging from the mundane to the disturbing. For about the last year I’ve been dealing with chronic, relentless itching. It comes and goes as it pleases but it tends to kick up at night. Sometimes there’s a visible irritation on the skin surface, sometimes no mark at all but this almost supernatural-level itching sensation erupting from somewhere underneath the surface. Nothing quells it. Topicals, you say? Cortisone cream, calamine lotion, colloidal oatmeal baths? Tea tree or other essential oils? All-natural herbal home remedies? Good old fashioned Benadryl? My itching laughs at your ridiculous attempts to tame it. At times the severity is maddening.

I could go on but I’m already behind in my weekly posting schedule and I have to stop somewhere. I look forward to shedding this human vessel. Existence in this form is exhausting at best.

Symptoms

I’ve got a new skin thing.

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve said that. Well, a dollar for every time I’ve said that silently to myself. Boy I'd be rich, head to toe Prada.

In the time before I can remember, my mother claims that I had terrible cradle cap and that I was the only baby she had ever heard of who was allergic to Ivory soap.

In the second grade I discovered a huge rash all over my stomach while working quietly at my desk. When my fear of the rash finally surpassed my fear of Mrs. Heagney, she yanked my shirt up in front of the whole class to show off the rapidly spreading pox. Anyway, the doctor had to look it up in a reference book. Nobody had ever heard of it.

In the fourth grade I got a funny rash that popped up while visiting the tanning booth. The doctor said it was Scarletina. (Nota bene – Later in life I would have three suspicious looking birthmarks cut out of my flesh.)

As a young adult I saw a dermatologist about my ridiculously sensitive skin. After a quick scrape with the broken edge of a tongue depressor, he diagnosed me with dermagraphism.

Then there was that wart on my shin.

And that rash that grew up my arm like a vine.

These are just some of the more notable skin-related ills I’ve seen. I share these to establish a timeline and context. Of course there have been so many more and in such a wide variety that I couldn’t list them if I wanted to.

Fast forward to today. At 12:45 I sat in the waiting room of my GP’s office. It was pleasantly quiet and dim until 13:00 when everybody came back from lunch. Weight, check. Temperature, check. Blood pressure, check. Medications, check. 

“No, since end of October or beginning of November of this year…No, this past year...2019…Is there any way that you can take a sample?...Can you test it?...It’s just that this behaves like a virus…Can you tell if you look at it under a microscope?...No?...Ok.”

Bollocks. 

I got my hopes up.

I am all too accustomed to finding some aberration that just appears out of nowhere on my body. I try not to get worked up if it it doesn’t go away quickly enough to be dismissed. I decide in advance that it’s a manifestation of my anxiety and not a legitimate concern. Experience teaches that anything too serious would be out of control within the first 36 hours. I might complain about it out loud to someone in conversation if it’s particularly bothersome or if it’s been hanging around a while. If it’s persistent I will go online and try to research it. I also like to try mixing up homemade remedies if I can. Heat or ice, etc. If that doesn’t get me anywhere, I’ll research some more and start questioning people I know who might have some ideas. I am accustomed to all of this nonsense. But actually making an appointment and talking directly to a medical doctor about it? Now that is not something that I do very often.