It’s been awhile. I'm not apologizing, just stating a fact,
and acknowledging the absence of that extra bit of joy in your life that you've
been missing (my blog posts).
People ask me what I've been up to (do they? I had to think
about that for a second. Yes, yes they do) and I try to think of what I can say
besides “work.” And really when I think about it, what I've been doing is
surviving. That is my life: survival of the not-so-fittest.
I made some
resolutions for the new year, something I rarely ever do. Most people
are all about making resolutions. I just find if I don't make them, then life is a lot less disappointing. Win, win. One
of my resolutions was to write more blog posts (I actually just made that up
right now, that wasn’t one of them). Another resolution was to go on the Paleo
diet. You see, I’ve become obese in the past year and… Just kidding! Psych!
It’s not a weight-loss diet, it’s a health diet. I want to figure out once and
for all why I am chronically “bunged up” as they say (do they still say that?
They shouldn’t). Yes I admit it, unashamedly (I also wrote an entire blog post
about it so it probably isn’t news to you, you can read it here: Potty Talk), well, a little ashamedly… Anyway, I started the diet the second week of January and have only cheated twice: once when my dog died...
This is the part where I talk about how my dog died. That was sad. Really, really sad. I'm still mourning her and every day I miss her. She was the best dog I ever had (she was the only dog I ever had) and she was my baby (technically she was given to my brother and I, however she clearly preferred my mom over anyone in the world which made me jealous on many occasions and slightly bitter until I looked into her eyes and CURSE YOU CUTENESS! she relentlessly hypnotized me into forgiving her). Seventeen years of my life were spent loving that dog and I don't regret a minute of it, even if a lot of it was simply procrastinating from doing chores, or anything for that matter, and instead was spent fawning over her and talking to her in that ridiculous voice that you can't help using which is usually accompanied by that intense feeling all over that makes you clench your teeth together to refrain from squishing them to death. You know what I'm talking about. If you don't, I'm sincerely sorry, it's increased my quality of life exponentially. I feel sure I'll see her in heaven, you can't tell me I won't, you would simply be guessing (as am I), whereas all the rational is in my favor (why wouldn't God want all His creatures in heaven? They're all made unique and we know from the Bible that He cares for all of them on earth and that there are animals in heaven. What, so God is going to make new animals just for the sake of having animals in heaven and say no to the amazing animals He already made? What because heaven isn't big enough? Give me a break. Just because your mind can't handle the idea of eternity and a God who makes space out of air doesn't mean you should make the rest of us feel bad. There. I said it.) Anyway, I will always miss her. We called her "boozum spow" as kids (don't ask). I called her muffin and my dad called her Pigmaleon. But mostly I will miss just saying her name: Kezzie. The cutest, nicest, most beloved dog in the world. Me and my old BFF Chelsea used to play a game called "One puppy on the go," which consisted of us running a relay with Kezzie as the baton and said, "One puppy on the go.. two puppy on the go!" etcetera. It's like Count Dracula but with puppies. Yay! Anyway as Kezzie lay dying I whispered in her ear, "One puppy on the go!" and I knew she was going home, to her Creator, where she truly belonged.
And the next time I cheated was at my friend Erin's bachelorette party. Because, how could I not? The cookies were sailor-themed. Sorry, was that a difficult transition? Sometimes I can be insensitive. It was just too sad so out of self-defense my subconscious changed the topic abruptly before I burst into tears. But moving on a little less insensitively, after the loss of my beloved dog cheating on my diet made a lot of sense. So does cheating for sailor cookies. So far the Paleo diet is definitely working. I also wanted to rule out once
and for all that my chronic fatigue/sleep problem/LTS (Leg Twitching Syndrome,
which is actually called Periodic Limb Movement Disorder) is food-related. Something is making
me twitch in my sleep, and the only way to rule out if it is something I’m
eating and shouldn’t be is to go to extremes. Hence, the Paleo. It's no crazier than those people who suffered severe back pain for years until they finally decided to go on an elimination diet and found out it was allergy to wheat. What is the Paleo Diet? Well the most succinct
explanation is no grains, no dairy (which I'm already allergic to), no sugar and no processed food; basically going back
to the hunter and gatherer diet. This is helpful: The Beginner's Guide to Paleo.
You may think, “But wait, she’s a vegetarian!” and I would say, “Actually I’m a
pescatarian. Like a sectarian but with a "p." " I say I'm a vegetarian because no one knows what a freaking pescatarian is and I always sound like an idiot or a pretentious hippy. Basically, I eat fish. Let me tell you, I tried being a vegan, but heck, that was hard... And that's the end of that story.
But who cares what diet I’m on and whether I am going to the washroom more frequently than I ever have since birth. I mean I do, I care. A lot. But anyway let’s
move on and talk about my sad little sleep-deprived life.
Did you know that sleep deprivation is a form of torture
used alongside water-boarding? Yeah, that’s right. Every day I am exhausted. I
am exhausted right now, and it is incredibly difficult to concentrate, hence,
why I haven’t been blogging, or writing my book. Hence why I say my life
consists of “surviving.” It is much easier to not-write, to passively take in,
which comes to my other resolution. I have dared myself this year to
give up TV for X amount of months. Basically I couldn’t say how long, I was
afraid to say anything at all, so I dared myself that once I started I was
going to do it as long as I possibly could. Unfortunately it didn’t last
long as I realized it was quite unnecessary and instead I just needed to give up
TV on week nights. Now listen, I am not a TVaholic, but I
have a very small amount of time to live in, the rest of that time I am either
working, eating or sleeping, so every second counts. Especially now that I switched shifts at work and now work from 11 am - 7 pm. This means I get an extra hour to sleep and will hopefully stop missing work so I don’t, you know, get fired, and so far it has been successful: I am still employed. It has meant I can’t really do much week nights, but hey! I often made plans during week nights in the naïve hope I wouldn’t be too tired to do them and then had to cancel anyway because… I was too tired to do them. And when I say “too tired” I mean I would be a danger on the road. There’s been many times where I have driven when I shouldn’t have because I was so tired. Why? Because it is so hard to miss out all the time, and it is so hard to say no, and I hate disappointing people, so I just say a prayer that I won’t die, or kill anyone, and hope for the best. So far so good!
And I FINALLY got another appointment at the Nanaimo Sleep Clinic. Last year after finding out I had LTS, I mean Periodic Limb Movement Disorder, they gave me a kind of Parkinson’s medication to try and said if it didn’t work there were more options. It didn’t work. (You can read all about my ten years + journery here: Leg Tourrettes or Why I'm So Freaking Tired). Then they changed my next appointment date and, unfortunately, only had my home phone number, whilst I was up at Auxano, not at home, and therefore did not get the message. It meant I drove up to Nanaimo in someone else’s car just to find out that because I had missed my appointment I now had to get a new referral from my doctor, which would mean I would have to wait another x amount of months for an appointment. On top of that my doctor never did send the referral I asked for and I had to force them to get me in sooner. I could get really upset about this, but you can’t live that way. It’s exhausting. And I’m already exhausted.
One night when I was contemplating how sad it is that my life consists mainly of survival instead of growth and prosperity, I remembered, “My grace is sufficient for you.” And I repeated it over and over in my head until it became a mantra and I wanted it tattooed in giant letters on my body. I'll let you know how that goes.
The End
