Laughter is not always the best medicine....

*sigh*

Sometimes I wish I didn't have such a strange sense of humor. I really hurt a friend of mine inadvertently. And its killing me that I hurt him. He thinks I was laughing at him, he's in a VERY tough place right now. I wasn't laughing at him, I was laughing because otherwise I'd cry. I wish I knew what to do, I know I can't make things better for him. All I could do was listen and try to be a friend. And because I have this odd way of looking at stressful situations (I always have done this, its the only way I've survived), it made it worse. I try to see the humor in things, the absurdity of situations that are so awful it makes you want to scream. Because sometimes you can't change things, and can't make things better. But I'm sorry I laughed. It wasn't a 'its so funny laugh, haha' it was a bitter laugh, an ironic laugh. Its the laughter that stops me turning into my bitter obsessive neighbors... that keeps me working in a job that I sometimes love and sometimes despise.

I try to see the humor in every situation...that's why I sometimes call myself Miss Havisham, or an old maid... or even, sometimes, very quietly, even though its a phrase I HATE, a 'fag hag'. Because most of my good male friends are gay these days... (God forbid anyone else call me one...because I really am not. I do have straight male friends too, its just a question of my morbid sense of humor making an appearance once again)

I love to laugh.... because, otherwise, I'll cry.

And I wish I knew how to make the situation better with my friend. This is one thing I can't laugh about, hurting someone. I can't stand conflict...

Bits and Pieces. Or should that be Kibbles and Bits?

Hehe. My brain is so random, sometimes. Does anyone else remember that ad? Is it just me, or did ads used to be much more catchy? Although I have to say I loved the Verizon takeover of Big Red...THAT made me smile.

Thanks to my friend MaryAnne, I am now trying to figure out what to name my house. My house needs a name! And no, I'm not calling it Mallsview Manor, although that would be accurate.

I'm finally slapping up paint samples on the walls. I'm going to be so happy when its painted inside...

A friend asked me yesterday what I am doing for my 40th Birthday. I answered that I am in denial. Its not just a river in Egypt! Eeek, 40. I don't feel 40.

I'm going to get my legs waxed for the first time today. See? You can still have firsts, even at 39!

On a more serious note, I'm all for organics, but most people can't afford them. We need to do something to make good, healthy food available for people. Food that hasn't been genetically altered, or sprayed with toxic sludge. Conventional crops are sprayed with the raw sewage waste from animal farming... and most things now are so artificial that they stay 'fresh' forever. I have a thing of lettuce in my fridge that has been there for a month (still in its packaging) and it still looks fresh. What does that say about what we are putting in our bodies?

I need some summer work clothes. I have no clothes. Bleah. I need one more pair of jeans, some light slacks, and summer clothes. I have nothing. And I need shoes. Wheeeee.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place.

So many things are coming to a head now. The oil spill in the Gulf shows this in crystal clarity. We need oil in this country, badly, but this need, this desire, hunger, craving, insatiable appetite for oil has caused an environmental disaster. We use oil in so many, many ways. Not only to heat our homes, but to make plastics, paint, throwaway things. To make pesticides, herbicides, fungicides. To fuel big agribusiness (which is causing its own brands of environmental chaos). To run our cars, busses, trains. To light our cities, houses, towns, run our computers, gizmos and gadgets. Where does it stop? How do you stop it when there is a relentless mania for cheap? Cheap is not healthy or environmentally sane. However, there are fewer and fewer good choices these days, and even at Whole Foods you end up buying the same commercially raised, big-agribusiness foods, for more money. But back to the oil spill...

maybe, just maybe this oil spill will wake people up to the fact that we use way too much oil, that we need to be more environmental. The oil spill will kill the wetlands...and they will become fiction, like the cartoons of The Princess and the Frog, or The Rescuers. They will be gone. So will cheap shrimp (shrimp farmers are in danger too...they are their own version of environmental chaos, but still, once they go out, we will have to rely more on the wild, which causes its own enormous environmental load). I'm starting to wonder if we have now slapped Mother Earth with more than she can take. The oceans are becoming overfished as it is, with huge amounts of bycatch being discarded every day, and fewer and fewer fish.

I'm honestly scared. I honestly wonder if we are going to be losing our food sources. We need to rally now. We need to buy local as much as possible, support local farmers. We need to find sustainable options for our fish, our meats, our dairy. We need to find environmental alternatives to sucking up huge amounts of power....

How it happens...

So I have not been to the dentist in an embarassing number of years. I've also, yes, become a little lax with hair removal, things like that...

The dentist is actually mostly a fear. I had a lot of doctors sticking a lot of things in my mouth when I was small, and I just hate it. I start to panic at the thought of going to the dentist... and I know a couple of very nice dentists, personally, but I would never go to them because I start to panic... literally, I am scared to death. A friend asked me yesterday, "And you kiss boys with that mouth?" No, I don't, and that's part of the problem. I get a little lazy when I'm not really dating (at this point, I've pretty much given up. Most of the men my age are slimy, married creeps, as far as I can see). But yes, I know I should get my teeth cleaned. I'm just terrified. And I know they have drugs, but drugs intensify the problem for me. I can't take sleeping pills either...

But things like this start small. If you are single, you start going to bed without showering, sometimes. Or you fill up the other side of the bed with books...or you have cheese and crackers for dinner. You neglect to shave your armpits or your legs in winter because its too much hassle when its just for you.

And then one day you look at yourself and you are the crazy-cat-lady without the cats. I don't know why we are so programmed to look nice for other people, but not for ourselves. Don't get me wrong, I do shower, I do eat healthy food, and do have some pampering time. I do wear makeup, sometimes get a mani or pedi, but I'm not high-maintenance girl, either.

I do, however, need to get to the dentist. I know I do. But God help me, I'm so scared. I know its not rational. But its true.

In Which Stacy and Clinton would have a Field Day with me and my wardrobe.

And Trinny and Susannah would be aghast. I love funky clothes. I love shopping at Forever 21. I like a mix of leggings, yoga pants, no bra (hate, hate, hate bras with the white-hot passion of a thousand suns). I like form-fitting clothes (not tight, but form-fitting..I have a reasonably shapely figure, even though I'm a few pounds heavier than I'd like). I wear a lot of knits, but also have some very girly clothes.... I love lace, pretty shoes, hats (love love love love hats). I love dressing up. I love color.

Yes, I could go out and buy a bunch of suits so I can look polished and professional. Strict blouses, tie my hair back. I hate chinos and khaki and beige with a passion. I hate baggy clothes, that look like you are covering things up. (however, don't let things spill out all over creation either... there is such a thing as too much cleavage and too much skin). I like feeling feminine... I love dresses.

Trying....

Ok, I know its been forever since I've written a post. There are so many things I've tried to start writing about, get halfway through, and then give up. I'm getting busy again, and running around like a maniac. So I'll give you some bullet-points.

I just finished J.S.F's Eating Animals. I cringed and whimpered so many times while reading that. Such cruelty in these slaughterhouses. Such waste in the fishing industry. We've got to fix these things. There has got to be a way to fish sustainably. We have got to get back to eating the whole animal, and killing them without needless cruelty. Do we really need cheap meat that much? (yes, we've also ruined agriculture, too with huge monocultures)

I am single, female, and like sex. In the culture I grew up with, that would get me shunned at best, and probably killed. Even in this culture, a single woman who likes sex is seen as a slut. Um, no. I like looking at men, I like the feel of the male body. This does not make me a slut.
I also have endo, which can make sex problematic at times. When I go to the dr asking for help, I don't want to be told 'Avoid penises'. This just makes me avoid the dr.

On a related note, men are strange. BLEAH.

And on the sex note, I am not a cougar, or a BBW. I'm larger than I'd like, yes, but I don't see myself as being that large. And a cougar is someone who aggressively chases younger men. Um no. Not me. I look, I admire, but too much younger? No. And I'm not really aggressive.
(Yes, sometimes I like playing the dom... but that's a different story)

Also, trying to find a balance... yes, there is a part of me that wants to find the 'right' man, but mostly I doubt he even exists. And I like having my own space, my own life. I'm having real trouble trying to figure out how dating and a romantic relationship would even fit into my life. But I don't want 'Wham, Bam, Thank You Ma'am' either. I want respect, even in a sex-only relationship...

On Endometriosis

I'm posting this today because, on Facebook, at least, its Yellow Shirt Day, where people wear a yellow shirt to honor people with endometriosis. I am just one person with endo, but I hate this disease. Its debilitating, exhausting, frustrating. Doctors are usually no help. Right now its under control. more or less, by my having gone gluten-free. But I was one of the lucky ones, as I was diagnosed relatively early in my life.

This is my story. Its longer than my usual posts, and has some TMI moments. Just warning you.

So, I've always had horrible periods. Truly horrible, first-day sick, periods. Periods that were so bad I would have to take massive amounts of Advil just to survive... People can still, to this day, tell when I have my period. I'll show up for work looking white and exhausted... but back to the saga of my endo.

I was 18, in my freshman year in college. I started having severe abdominal pain. And feeling absolutely exhausted. Went to the health center. They were no help. Went to a couple of drs. No help there. The health center started telling me that it was all in my head, and I should go see a shrink. *grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr* um, no, this pain is real, thank you. My parents and sister came over from Egypt for Christmas, to try to help me get diagnosed. Now endo can really only be diagnosed through surgery, through a laparoscope.

So, I had the surgery, and yay! They found endo! At least now I could feel vindicated, although I never appreciated the surgeons' little comment about 'well, if you really want to cure it, you should get pregnant'. ha, freaking, ha. At 18! A freshman in college? (And a virgin at the time, too). I don't think so, Dr Doofus. So then I went on the Pill, full time, to stop having periods at all. This I liked. I was functional. The only problem was, I gained weight on the pill. Big time (or so I thought, at the time). But otherwise, I was functional. Then the doctor decided I should start having periods again.

GAAAAAAAAAAAH. It wasn't any better. I was right back with severe, incapacitating pain. So I took the logical next step, asked the doctor what to do next? (This was the summer between my junior and senior years). And the answer was to simulate menopause (or go on a male hormone that would essentially do the same thing, but have some permanent side effects). I opted for the simulated menopause. NOT a good idea.

Mood swings, night sweats, lack of ability to concentrate... I basically flunked out my senior year because of this drug. It was all menopause, all the time. All the symptoms, all at once. Fortunately, I had good enough grades from the previous three years that i was able to transfer in enough credits to graduate later on. I missed graduating with my peers. I never wore the cap and gown.. and that is something I'll always regret.

In Baltimore, I was living with someone. (I just felt I didn't have another option to get away, to try to make my own choices). What they didn't tell me about the menopause drug is that it also was a fertility drug. I got knocked up.

Now on the one hand, I was overjoyed. i'd had five years, at this point, of doctors telling me, "The best cure for endo is to be pregnant, but it also causes infertility, so you may not be able to become pregnant'. On the other, I was essentially alone, in the city, with no-one to talk to. I couldn't talk to my parents, or any of my family. I couldn't talk to any of my friends from college, because I was ashamed of not having graduated with them. The father shut down and wouldn't talk to me at all. I have never felt so alone, and so terrified, and so angry. I had an abortion. It was a horrible experience, and one I regret every day as I pass out of my thirties without ever having another chance to be pregnant. Without having had other kids.

Anyway, back to the saga of the endo... so about two years later, the endo was getting really bad. It hurt to go to the bathroom because things were so twisted and adhered inside... I remember crying because it hurt so much, not wanting to have a bowel movement... (yes, TMI, I know) I found a wonderful surgeon (who, unfortunately, retired) who did a lap, found that my ovary was twisted up behind my uterus, between that and the bowel, and covered in so much endometrioma that it was the size of a grapefruit. He had to remove part of the ovary, but he cleaned up as many adhesions as he could... and put things back the way they were supposed to be.

So I came out of that, recovered...and then started to try various dietary approaches. Because surgery is a last resort. You don't want to have regular surgery for the rest of your life, unless you are Joan Rivers. I tried adding soy. I tried eliminating soy. I tried going vegetarian... I tried a lot of supplements, herbs... and a lot of it was still just survival...

I dated, moved in with someone, lived with him, dumped his sorry ass after a few years, and got back on track with my health. I had gained a ton of weight with the ex as he insisted that what I really needed for the cramps was alcohol. So he medicated me with large glasses of grain alcohol in fruit juice every 23 days (my cycle has always been regular, 28 days). I ballooned up to a size 22/24 because I had no energy (one of the effects of endo on me, was having killer cramps, and was having all this alcohol poured into me one week every month).

So, after getting rid of the ex, moved up to MA to detox. I bought a book on Endometriosis and nutrition. And one of the things it suggested, among other things, was that the majority of women with endo are allergic to wheat, dairy, or both. I went on an elimination diet, discovered I had a wheat allergy. I stopped using tampons, and started using washable pads to try to eliminate some of the toxins in women's feminine products. I started going to a gyn who was into supplements and natural healing, which helped some.

I still have horrible periods. I am probably never going to have a kid, as much as I would have loved to. I use some natural cramp bark and supplements to try to manage the endo, but eventually I am going to have to find a surgeon.

The things I wish I could change about the treatment of endo? The drs need to learn sympathy. I can't tell you how many doctors made the crack about 'haha, all you need is to get pregnant and your endo will go away'. WRONG. And the 'cures' are basically the same things they have been using for about fifty years. The pill, simulated menopause, and then "ok those didn't work, lets take everything out". But then they put you on hormones because you are still too young, and the nedo responds to the hormones......

Some of the things I have gone through with endo...pain with my periods that is overwhelming. Pain with sex. Hormonal fluctuations. Frustration with doctors and the traditional methods of dealing with endo...one surgical technique is to sever the nerves to the uterus to minimize the pain... and yes, I was desperate enough to authorize it, although it wasn't done. In my support groups, women have gone through horrible things, undergone quack remedies, because they were not getting relief from the traditional treatments. The traditional treatments are almost as bad as the disease. You end up assessing how functional your life is before going in.... and there are still shade of a story I read, in high school, of the room with the yellow wallpaper, to the treatment. That if you remove the offending organ, the uterus, all will be cured. It won't. And we need new treatments, new approaches, and a cure for this debilitating disease.