DESPERATELY SEEKING

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about a lot of different things. Things I want to do. Things I want to write. Things I want to buy. Things I want to change. Things that may be too expensive for me to keep. All of this is surrounded with questions. Should we get another dog? Should we try to rehab the chicken coop? How do I get someone to repave my driveway for a reasonable price? Can I remove the bushes in front of the house and have a porch installed? Am I ever going to do something about my kitchen? Should I enroll in electrician school and learn how to rewire my own house? I think I should teach a yoga workshop about shoulder anatomy and straps?

That last sentence doesn’t really read as a question, but when I say it out loud I tend to illicit a questioning tone.

I am restless. Truly, restless. Even when I am supposed to be sleeping and resting, I am lost somewhere in my own thoughts. Just last week I was so lost in my own thoughts while on my morning building walk, that when I made it back to the first floor I didn’t know what floor I was on and could not remember walking all of the second floor. I am now up to three different wake up times in the night. Sometimes it is because I had that dream where I have to use the bathroom in an unconventional bathroom setting but mostly it is because I heard a noise and then I have to spend the next hour trying to go back to sleep while thinking about the noise. Before I know it, Josephine is tapping me with a paw and it is almost about time for my alarm to go off. Last week, Josephine started tapping me exactly one hour earlier than the alarm in anticipation to the time change. I am sleeping. I am just not sleeping well.

This is probably why I have finally fallen for one of the many hormone treatment ads that I am bombarded with on a daily basis. I poked around on the company website and then I went in search of some non-sponsored reviews. As a result, I discovered a community of women who all had similar stories of restlessness, no sleep, scattered thought and mood swings (I didn’t really mention those but…). This community had some very insightful and helpful reviews in regards to the product I was considering and after reading through many discussions, I was convinced. I filled out the survey, had a very brief chat with an online doctor and am currently waiting the arrival of an estrogen body cream along with a dietary supplement of DHEA. If I see some significant changes, I plan to contact my regular doctor to see about getting this stuff through my insurance.

I’ve been slow to admit to myself that my symptoms were not all in my head, a perfect example of how the medical industry has been gaslighting women since there was a medical industry. It doesn’t help that perimenopause is the great unknown of medicine with confusing symptom descriptions like “frequent or infrequent periods.” Perimenopause and Menopause are the epitome of Voldemort, He Who Must Not Be Named. No one wants to talk about it. No one wants to dole out grant money to research it. No doctor wants specialize in it. No one cares about a woman’s body unless it is still capable of reproduction. Perimenopause is that gray timeline where a woman could still have a baby. While there’s a whole lot reasons why a could is not a should, no one’s going to do anything that would exclude the possibilities. Women in America do not have rights to their own bodies.

I’ve had four periods since the start of the year. Yes, that’s two a month but so far zip all nothing but an occasional right ovary cramp for this month. I don’t think I’m having hot flashes, but experience moments when I feel hot. It’s nothing dramatic. I get hot, take a layer off and five minutes later I’m so cold my teeth start chattering. I have no energy yet I still do all of things. And since I have no idea what forty eight is supposed to feel like, I chalked it all of this up to seasonal depression and inefficient heating and air systems. Honestly, for all I know those things could be the problem. I guess I’ll find out soon enough once my prescription arrives.

I’ll keep you posted. Meanwhile, I’ll be over here looking at puppies.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Sunday

6 Likes, 2 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Sunday"

I have spent most of this week on the couch. Michael brought home some kind of virus from school and it has had me down for the count. I went to work on the third day and my supervisor sent me home. He sticks with that rule they use for kids now, something about fevers and twenty four hours. I used that time to delete hard drives of old MacBooks (yes, that's MacBooks plural) that I need to take in to be recycled. I started with Chris's computer and it really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Most of all the pictures had already been uploaded to clouds or where ever we send our files to be stored these days. Now all that's left is to take them into the Mac store. I was also home when they came and picked up our Bagster. It was very satisfying to watch a big crane pick up our big bag of garbage. 

I am back at work today and on the mend. I have been fever free for twenty four hours, though my supervisor did say that he was going to count the number of times I coughed today. It may seem really difficult to find gratitude in a week such as this one, but I am surprised to find that is is not. I am very fortunate. I have good health insurance and a decent amount of sick leave. I have a supervisor who would rather have me at home than in the office spreading my yuck virus. This is not the norm for many Americans. And it should be. I have never understood how some companies just cannot see the benefit in keeping their employees healthy. I still do not understand a government who doesn't insist on keeping it's citizens healthy. Today, I called my senator to beg him to not vote for the latest health care reform bill. I did this because I am grateful for my health care and others should be able to same the same. 

Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God. Proverbs 14:31

Call your senators today. Here's a link with a whole list of senators from every state. Health Care should be a basic right for every American. No one should ever have to choose between putting food on the table for their family or seeking health care that will prevent serious health issues. The new reform bill will increase the cost of reproductive health care for women. Reproductive health is more than just having babies. Tests and exams, such as mammograms and pap smears, are vital for detecting cancer and are all related to reproductive health. In fact, reproductive health are two very simple words for a very complex part of female anatomy, as every woman knows. Ovarian cysts. Sexually transmitted diseases. Pre-natal and post-natal care. These things fall under the category for reproductive health. Ask your senator why reproductive health care costs are not being increased for men.

I am grateful for my health. I am grateful for a voice that I can raise up against injustice. I am grateful for those who believe that Universal Health Care is a basic human right. 

SHE BAKES A PIE

Kiss

2 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Kiss"

Yesterday was my annual women's wellness visit and mammogram. I took the day off because I never know how long the waiting for the exam and the actual exam will end up taking. Plus I had some errands I had been putting off that I figured I'd actually do, like taking in the giant box of records and books that has been taking up the trunk of my car for the last three or four months to Half Price Books. Let's face it. That box has probably been in my car for five months. I'm living like a bag lady. Any way, I knew that I would have to step onto the scale at the doctor's office. Mondays have become my weigh in day at home, so after getting out of the shower and before getting dressed, I stepped on the scale at home. 176.4 pounds. I frowned at the number, but think "Okay. That's fine." It's fine because when I started the whole diet thing, that scale read 180. The frown was because just last week, that scale read 174.5. Weight fluctuates. I get it.

I'm trying to not be obsessive about the numbers. I am consistently about 200 calories short of my daily calorie allotment (except for that one crazy Friday when a veggie burger and fries put me over by 875!). I'm eating lots of green things and very few grains. I'm sweating on the treadmill now. I keep telling myself that I am healthy, which feels like a total bullshit lie, but what ever. I finally make it into the doctor's exam area and the nurse tells me to step on the scale. I cringe, but I know what the scale should say. I prepared myself for this. It should say something around 178 because now I'm wearing clothes. The number 180 pops up on the digital readout and my heart sinks. I frown my way into the exam room and pout while the nurse takes my blood pressure and checks my heart rate. I am not cheered by the fact that the numbers for both of those things are perfect. All I can think about is how I've got to be doing something wrong. 

My doctor comes in and we discuss life and changes. I tell her things are pretty normal except my weight. She looks at the numbers and starts to tell me that it's not a big deal, but then she sees the past numbers and then makes a face and says "well..." I tell her how I'm exercising and tracking my foods and I just don't know what to do any more. She looks at the food I've logged and says "here's the problem. You're not eating enough protein." She goes on to tell me that she knows how hard it is to get enough protein in a vegetarian diet. My doctor is respectful of my choice to be a vegetarian and she doesn't push me to start eating chicken or anything like that. Instead she tells me to eat more yogurt and cottage cheese. She finishes up the exam, declares that everything looks great and sends me down for my mammogram with something new to obsess over. 

I rummage the internet for women and protein and vegetarian protein options while I wait for my boobs to be smashed. Side note/rant: It is the year 2017 and we don't have a better way for screening for breast cancer other than to smash a boob as flat as a pancake and x-ray it?!?! I was offered the new 3D imaging option. I don't know how those images are taken, but my insurance doesn't cover that (more effective) option for breast cancer detection. And I have super good health insurance. But screening for breast cancer and insurance and women's health deserves an entry of it's own. Instead, I'll tell you about sitting in a half shirt that snaps down the front in a waiting room panicking about the idea of having to eat chicken and looking back at all the food I've logged in the past few weeks. It distracted me while I clung to the mammogram machine with my boob sandwiched between two plastic plates. 

Afterwards, I wandered around Half Price Books, waiting for them to go through all the records and books I had brought in. I ended up in the health section, scanning book titles for inspiration or insight or something. There's nothing wrong with eating chicken. It's just that the whole idea of eating it, is unappealing. I eat fish. I looked up the amount of protein in a can of tuna and considered eating a can of tuna a day, like a cat. I could eat a can of tuna a day. Maybe. Not really. I continued to look at things I've been eating and the amount of protein in each thing. I'm going to weigh 200 pounds by this time next year. I feel myself sinking deeper and deeper and all the ugly voices win out. I'm fat. I'm always going to be the fat one. I'm doing everything wrong. I'm so lazy. I should be running half marathons every day. If I was more athletic, more fit, I wouldn't have this problem. If I were better, smarter, enough. I suck at life. 

Finally, I hear them call my name to come to the front desk and collect my money. I check out and head over to Target where I buy cottage cheese, Greek yogurt and some organic peanut butter. I think about buying tuna or protein powders, but I don't even pick any of those items up off of the shelf. Small changes. Get just enough to curb the full on freak out for this moment right now. That's what I did.

And then I went home and made a lemon meringue pie from scratch because fuck you diet.