Super snore
That's basically what my life is like these days ... a big zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Not that I'm complaining. Last time I started thinking everything was getting just a leeetle bit boring – if you'll recall – and feeling like I might be ready to take on some new kind of challenge or change ... the next thing I knew I was being diagnosed as diabetic.
And actually, things are not so much boring, as they are just stressful and unpleasant. Work is killing me for reasons I can't really discuss here, and I've started having anxiety attacks again, which I haven't had in several years. So now I have to give up my diet Pepsi Jazz habit, which is the only thing that's been getting me through the afternoons ... as well as all other caffeine, which I've done before, and which I know is not that hard to do – not even so hard that I'm worried about doing it, except that I don't want to do it – I want to keep drinking the damn soda, and the green tea, and dammit, I know it isn't good for me and it doesn't even make me feel good, but what's really left to me now if I can't drink a freakin caffeinated beverage every once in awhile? I can't just eat nothing but meat and vegetables all the time for the rest of my life, can I?
I need to make an appointment with the other diabetes nutrition expert – not the one who hands out free samples of 26-carb "nutrition" bars and coupons for "diet" tortillas and "heart-healthy" whole-grain cereal in a General Mills-logo gift bag, but the one who has been supporting another diabetic friend in his commitment to eating no more than 50 carbs a day ... I need to start figuring out some new things to eat. I think she'll be able to help me with that.
My next appointment with my doctor is in a week and a half and I'm realizing again that this is something I'm going to be doing for the rest of my life – obsessing about my diet, and wondering what my next round of tests is going to say. Not a bad thing, necessarily, but different from how I lived before.
Another thing that is feeling sad to me this week is that on Monday a 16-year-old kid was murdered in the park Mr. A is always telling me I shouldn't ride my bike in ... right in a spot I always ride my bike right through the middle of. It was the first gang-related murder we've had in town. I don't like seeing things go that way, and I also don't like it that one of my first thoughts when I heard about it was, "I'm so glad I declined the invitation to join that board of directors ...." because instead of being the kind of person who is strong enough to get in there and try to help kids find alternatives to violence, I am instead the kind of person who is afraid of people who shoot each other in the face. I'm the kind of person who wants to back away and pretend to be safe. I feel guilty for not wanting to get involved. But right now, I just don't feel up to it.
And really, the caffeine isn't the only reason I'm having these anxiety attacks, I think, though it surely can't be helping much, either. I feel angry, stagnant and decayed right now, and kind of powerless, unsure of what I ought to be doing with my life and lacking any confidence at all in my ability to make a good decision about that. Usually when I've felt this way in the past, my solution has been to pack up only as much as I could carry and get the hell out, start something new, or go somewhere else. Right now, for example, I keep thinking – go back to school! But for what purpose? How would I pay for it? What would I do afterwards? And anyway, how can I ever quit my job now that I have a permanent pre-existing condition?
Usually I don't like to write here when I'm feeling this negative. I guess that's why I haven't been writing much lately.
On the up side, the world – separate from all the hateful, murderous humans who live on it – I'm talking about the planet itself, the land we all walk on – still and always makes me happy enough to want to stick around and see how it all comes out. The last week has been breathtakingly beautiful, every single day of it. The colors, the temperature, the clarity of the atmosphere – plain old physical beauty still has a lot of power to keep my heart open, even when I really want to just shut it all down. Getting out into it every day is the main thing that's still working well for me right now.
And ugh – I hate how dramatic this all sounds! I'm not dragging myself around sighing and weeping or anything like that. I just feel anxious, unclear and insecure, and I don't like it. So until it passes or I figure out something else to do, I am just trying to let it flow on by.
Today I was sitting at a cafe with a friend I hadn't seen in awhile – one of my "commiseration buddies," in a way – and he was telling me some of his stuff, and I was trying not very successfully to find a positive spin to put on some of mine – when up walks this other guy we both know, who is a semi-famous (at least locally) musician from India or Pakistan or somewhere. He sat down with us and started telling a story about some sadhu-type uncle of his who has nothing and just sort of wanders around in his loincloth ecstatically sniffing mangoes and joyously exhorting his fellow humans to savor the bliss of each moment ... and I found myself thinking some rather cynical thoughts along the lines of, "am I supposed to think this is some kind of profound Eastern wisdom or something?" But then I started really looking at him and I realized, he may be telling a story of the kind I've heard a million times before, but that doesn't mean he's full of shit. He seems genuinely happy. Or at least trying.
Seeing that made me feel lonely for my own happiness. I've been missing it lately. I had kind of gotten used to having it around. But it was good to see someone else expressing a sense of peace and well-being, even if I wasn't able to tap into it much myself in that moment. I felt glad to see him feeling good. I'm sure I'll come around to it again myself before too long.
Not that I'm complaining. Last time I started thinking everything was getting just a leeetle bit boring – if you'll recall – and feeling like I might be ready to take on some new kind of challenge or change ... the next thing I knew I was being diagnosed as diabetic.
And actually, things are not so much boring, as they are just stressful and unpleasant. Work is killing me for reasons I can't really discuss here, and I've started having anxiety attacks again, which I haven't had in several years. So now I have to give up my diet Pepsi Jazz habit, which is the only thing that's been getting me through the afternoons ... as well as all other caffeine, which I've done before, and which I know is not that hard to do – not even so hard that I'm worried about doing it, except that I don't want to do it – I want to keep drinking the damn soda, and the green tea, and dammit, I know it isn't good for me and it doesn't even make me feel good, but what's really left to me now if I can't drink a freakin caffeinated beverage every once in awhile? I can't just eat nothing but meat and vegetables all the time for the rest of my life, can I?
I need to make an appointment with the other diabetes nutrition expert – not the one who hands out free samples of 26-carb "nutrition" bars and coupons for "diet" tortillas and "heart-healthy" whole-grain cereal in a General Mills-logo gift bag, but the one who has been supporting another diabetic friend in his commitment to eating no more than 50 carbs a day ... I need to start figuring out some new things to eat. I think she'll be able to help me with that.
My next appointment with my doctor is in a week and a half and I'm realizing again that this is something I'm going to be doing for the rest of my life – obsessing about my diet, and wondering what my next round of tests is going to say. Not a bad thing, necessarily, but different from how I lived before.
Another thing that is feeling sad to me this week is that on Monday a 16-year-old kid was murdered in the park Mr. A is always telling me I shouldn't ride my bike in ... right in a spot I always ride my bike right through the middle of. It was the first gang-related murder we've had in town. I don't like seeing things go that way, and I also don't like it that one of my first thoughts when I heard about it was, "I'm so glad I declined the invitation to join that board of directors ...." because instead of being the kind of person who is strong enough to get in there and try to help kids find alternatives to violence, I am instead the kind of person who is afraid of people who shoot each other in the face. I'm the kind of person who wants to back away and pretend to be safe. I feel guilty for not wanting to get involved. But right now, I just don't feel up to it.
And really, the caffeine isn't the only reason I'm having these anxiety attacks, I think, though it surely can't be helping much, either. I feel angry, stagnant and decayed right now, and kind of powerless, unsure of what I ought to be doing with my life and lacking any confidence at all in my ability to make a good decision about that. Usually when I've felt this way in the past, my solution has been to pack up only as much as I could carry and get the hell out, start something new, or go somewhere else. Right now, for example, I keep thinking – go back to school! But for what purpose? How would I pay for it? What would I do afterwards? And anyway, how can I ever quit my job now that I have a permanent pre-existing condition?
Usually I don't like to write here when I'm feeling this negative. I guess that's why I haven't been writing much lately.
On the up side, the world – separate from all the hateful, murderous humans who live on it – I'm talking about the planet itself, the land we all walk on – still and always makes me happy enough to want to stick around and see how it all comes out. The last week has been breathtakingly beautiful, every single day of it. The colors, the temperature, the clarity of the atmosphere – plain old physical beauty still has a lot of power to keep my heart open, even when I really want to just shut it all down. Getting out into it every day is the main thing that's still working well for me right now.
And ugh – I hate how dramatic this all sounds! I'm not dragging myself around sighing and weeping or anything like that. I just feel anxious, unclear and insecure, and I don't like it. So until it passes or I figure out something else to do, I am just trying to let it flow on by.
Today I was sitting at a cafe with a friend I hadn't seen in awhile – one of my "commiseration buddies," in a way – and he was telling me some of his stuff, and I was trying not very successfully to find a positive spin to put on some of mine – when up walks this other guy we both know, who is a semi-famous (at least locally) musician from India or Pakistan or somewhere. He sat down with us and started telling a story about some sadhu-type uncle of his who has nothing and just sort of wanders around in his loincloth ecstatically sniffing mangoes and joyously exhorting his fellow humans to savor the bliss of each moment ... and I found myself thinking some rather cynical thoughts along the lines of, "am I supposed to think this is some kind of profound Eastern wisdom or something?" But then I started really looking at him and I realized, he may be telling a story of the kind I've heard a million times before, but that doesn't mean he's full of shit. He seems genuinely happy. Or at least trying.
Seeing that made me feel lonely for my own happiness. I've been missing it lately. I had kind of gotten used to having it around. But it was good to see someone else expressing a sense of peace and well-being, even if I wasn't able to tap into it much myself in that moment. I felt glad to see him feeling good. I'm sure I'll come around to it again myself before too long.
Labels: diabetes
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