Tears On My Pillow; The End Of An Era

A couple weeks ago, before fleeing the country, my friend Karin and I had a conversation about depression. Fortunately for her, she doesn’t have this affliction and she admitted to not really understanding it. She didn’t know much about the clinical types of depression and so I explained my “condition” to her.

My version of clinical depression, the one that – for those of you who don’t know – is the most common type, is called dysthymia. Basically people with dysthymia have a “low grade” depression pretty much all of the time, with occasional lapses into more severe depression and, at least in my experience, even less frequent bouts of feeling not so bad. (God forbid it should be characterized as “feeling good.”)

Karin asked me where I was on that spectrum at the time. I told her, “I guessed I would have to say that I’m on the high end… and that’s almost worse.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Because it’s not real,” I told her. “Because all the time that I feel this way, I know it’s only a matter of time before it ends and the bottom drops out again.”

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I had a really shitty day yesterday.

My doctor told me I was twenty pounds heavier than the last time I saw him, fourteen months ago. I knew I had gained back some of the weight that I lost, but I didn’t realize it was that much. To be honest, I’ve been in a bit of denial about that. Trying not to think about it and definitely not accepting how bad it really is. Most days I feel like I’m not that heavy. My birthday party should have been a wake up call…

Weight is an issue for me. Always has been and most days I want to just throw in the towel and say, “Fuck it! I’m never going to have any control over this anyway. I should give up trying.”

The only success I’ve ever had is being vigilant about following the nutrition program on the Abs Diet program I’ve talked about before and by going to the gym regularly. The nutrition program is good but it becomes tedious after a while. I don’t know how to use most of the weight equipment in the gym and so all I can really do is aerobic exercise. The only time I can stomach going to the gym is mid-morning or mid-afternoon. Any other time is either too crowded or too early/late for me. When I can get there mid-morning or mid-afternoon it works out pretty well, except that It takes 90 minutes to two hours round trip (including travel, changing clothes, shower and dressing again.) And if there’s any disruption in the office schedule, like someone not being there, then it’s hard to get away.

I’ve given up any hope of ever being buff like I really want to be, just being fit and healthy – thinner will do, but even that seem so far out of reach…

I’m ready to consider more drastic measures. While I was waiting for my doctor to come in to the exam room yesterday I noticed a flyer on the wall. My healthcare organization now offers Cosmetic Surgery. I was shocked. Liposuction was listed. Someone recently told me that you can’t get fat again after liposuction because your body doesn’t grow new fat cells. Is that true? One of the side effects of liposuction is hair loss… I don’t have to worry about that…

A few months ago, my friend Lori (have you noticed all my friends are girls – sad) started a medical fast. She has lost 47 pounds in about six months. When she started, I thought it was overkill, to be honest. I tried to be supportive, though I’m not sure I succeeded, but I didn’t think she needed to do it. She was not grossly obese, in my estimation, and I felt like if she had the determination to stick to the fast then she had the determination to change her thinking and watch her nutrition. Now…. I’m wondering how much it costs, and if I would have to pay for it all at once or if I could make installments.

Once upon a time, specifically because I drank too much and knew I would feel better faster if I threw up, I tried to induce vomiting. I apparently have no gag reflex (something that might be useful someday – but probably not) and I don’t think bulimia is an option. Not that I could really be bulimic. I hate to vomit and will do everything in my power to prevent it.

I don’t know what to do.

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I’ve been obsessing all day about my ordeal yesterday. And I’m pissed off because IT’S NOT RIGHT and I have no recourse. My options are to get the physical and pay the money, effectively paying my health care provider twice for one instance of service, or not getting the physical and not being able to get my ambulance driver license. Clearly, I don’t really have a choice, but the egalitarian in me can’t let this injustice go. I’m getting screwed and there’s nothing I can do about it. That makes me physically ill.

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Last year, my boss, John, decided that I should be involved in the Green initiative for our building. Then he went off to Hawaii for four months and expected me to run the program in his absence. The fact that I have made it abundantly clear to him that I don’t give two shits about green initiatives was irrelevant. He had created this Green Advisory Council with a handful of building employees who wanted to be involved in “greening” the building. The whole lot of them are hippies (sorry Karin) and they’re all gung ho about the programs. They all annoy me in that capacity, but there’s one person on the council who is like a rabid dog with a juicy bone. He will not let anything go. He comes up with an idea that is not achievable with the limitations we have (or just not advisable at this time with good justification) and when told “no” brings it up again at the next meeting. He just keeps bring it up and keeps pushing until he gets what he wants, because ultimately, John is a push-over people-pleaser who will say “yes” just to satisfy this guy, even though it’s not the right thing for the situation. He pushes my buttons at every turn and as hard as I have tried I just can’t manage to like him. After the meeting today, I’m finished even trying to like him.

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I’m lonely. When I left work today, a Friday, at around 6:00, I tweeted this:

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All day today, when I wasn’t feeling murderously angry, I felt like I needed to cry. But as we know, I don’t do that.

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Between me and the fence post, I’ve been craving Vodka for a couple days…

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You know when I started this post, it was going to end with me saying, “I hope this is just a bad day and not the end of that all too infrequent “not so bad” time. Now that it’s written…

(Sigh) It was nice while it lasted.