Thursday, September 22, 2022

Link! Listen!

 Sometimes I wish I had an annoying little Navi to tell me when I’m really not listening to myself at all. Or rather, not overpowering some aspects of myself with good intentions. Okay, Navi is a horrible example. When you realize you can’t off the little fucker, sometimes plunging to your doom is the only way to escape her with a smile on your face.

I quit diet and exercise. Not completely abandoning. I’ve kept an edge of the nudging consciousness that says ‘ah, healthy, good job’ or ‘today definitely could use pizza so let it happen’ and ‘get up and do housework’ or ‘you won’t heal without rest’. I was certain when I went to doctor, I’d see a huge weight gain and my numbers would be awful.

I was two pounds lighter and my BP has never been better. One month after quitting dieting and exercise.

I don’t want to say to everyone ‘just give up’ but my body was telling me something that I kept ignoring. It’s going through the major changes of a middle aged woman. I need more of some nutrients, less of others. There is pressure in my left eye that could lead to blinding glaucoma but stress is far more likely to make it worse than obesity.

What I am going to do is ask my doctor about tirzepatide treatment. Even though my levels are good, I do need to lose weight. I have zero energy, no stamina and have to power through everything these days. I need day naps and evening naps and struggle to get restful sleep at all. This is largely due to hot flashes and weird dreams but I’m vastly uncomfortable with this body in ways that have nothing to do with how it looks. I don’t want highly invasive surgeries that could upset an already sensitive digestive system. I’ve read up on tirzepatide and I truly think that this would work well with my current moderate diet and reasonable exercise. I don’t need a miracle; I need a push. I was making myself extremely unhealthy by going to extremes with weight loss practices. That used to work, mind you.

But I am not who I was and this stage in my life needs different tactics. Mood stabilizers I didn’t need or want were the culprit in my initial weight gain and an appropriate medical treatment I’ve researched now could help me undo that damage.

Of course, like scars, you don’t actually wipe the slate clean. Fibromyalgia also presents a unique challenge but I’ve learned to understand chronic pain and to work around it too. I’ve learned that, like depression, I have to actively battle it even when I truly have no will to fight. Fibromyalgia was present before I ever had a weight problem. ADHD doesn’t vanish conditionally either. I’m present but distracted and it’s not this cutesy ‘oh look a squirrel’ bullshit. It’s stubborn when I’m hyper focused but no less controllable when I’m in a perpetual state of distraction. I’ll get unreasonably frustrated when I’m interrupted because only I know how much I struggled before I found that elusive focus, just to have it torn away. I’m disciplined in ways others can’t fathom but I don’t get to turn it on and off at will and it will always present challenges when people insist I’m being willful or deliberate.

Anyway, I’m swirling in a pool of thought but I want to surface for a moment. I’m enjoying some cool fall weather at the moment and I want to throw in some of the superficial details. I got a screwdriver set so I can attempt to repair a robot vac that encountered a poopocalypse. I would explain but you can actually search this one. I have some phone calls to make and I’m nervous as hell because I hate making phone calls. And it’s not the fun kind; I need to call the pharmacy, the eye doctor, the regular doctor and a dentist because I’ve put shit off too long. But I need some NSAIDs for pain, see if my glasses have come in, talk to the doctor about tirzepatide, and… I hate going to the dentist but who doesn’t? I don’t want to lose another molar. I wish insurance did bridges or implants. I can’t bear to lose another back tooth. It’s hard as hell to eat healthy foods without them. Raw veggies and any kind of nuts are a bitch hitting exposed gums…

But that’s the gist of it. Deep end, shallow end. I need a Navi to get through the phone calls, but my inner voices need to shut up with the pushing for a while. I pushed too much and I need to stick to more reasonable choices for now. Every little thing is a battle and sometimes I just want to play idle farming games and not do any of that.