Girls are Super, Girls are Terrific, Boys Stink!

The title was painted on a beach towel that hung in my room growing up.  My mother was a genius! The alternate title to this post was "Letting Go".

3 blog posts were started last night. None were finished today, and here’s why: 

Anyone who knows me, and knows me well, knows I am a highly-emotional being. I am very in touch with my emotions and have no problem expressing or sharing them. I get frustrated when emotional conversations aren’t reciprocated or when another person fails to show or discuss theirs.

In the course of 24-hours, I went from having the single-most amazing supporter in my corner to having someone who refuses to respond to me. This has happened once before – and it doesn't hurt any less the second time around. When someone just sort of stops responding and there is no gradual decline in the relationship or even a huge blowout, just one big ignore, there is no closure. Of course, nothing about this is made any easier by the fact that he is a man and I am a woman.

The first time this happened, I lost my best friend because he got engaged and is too immature to be friends with anyone pre-engagement (or maybe this was her request), so in my infinite hurt and anger, I sent a simple “go fuck yourself” text message.  Perhaps not the most adult approach, but it was my emotional hurt and frustration and disappointment all wrapped into 3 little words.

I have worked through my own 12-step program today; it is irrational, a bit nutty and a lot crazy (and subject to change), but it is mine and, as usual, I totally own it.

Conversation from previous evening seemed normal.
Next day:

Step 1.  
Send funny text message.

Step 2.
Send sarcastic text message a few hours later.

Step 3.
Repeat step 1 a few hours after step 2. 

Step 4.
Facebook stalk and realize this person is checking theirs. Debate crying over realizing you really are being ignored.

Step 5.
Instantly send private message and hold your breath.

Step 6.
Wait for step five to be marked as read and send two more. (The second of which was the utterly irrational and pointless, “Seriously? You’re not going to answer me?”)

Step 7.
Let your heart sink as you realize that no messages, text or otherwise, are going to be replied to. Cry.

Step 8.
Debate calling said person, only to come to the conclusion it will only go to voice mail.

Step 9a.
Get angry. Debate leaving ranting voicemail demanding answers, only to realize you don’t know how to delete it if you forget something and know you refuse to send a 2^nd voicemail or leave any points untouched. Writing notes before calling seems too rehearsed because you know you’d list off the bullet points.

Step 9b.
Quickly debate leaving softer-toned voicemail requesting a call back so you can work through whatever the problem is, only to realize they still won’t be responding. Continue sobbing.

Step 10.
Get Angry. Debate un-friending said person on Facebook. That will show them that you will not be ignored and that you don’t even care if they are a part of your life anymore.

Step 11.
Understand that un-friending them is not even remotely close to what you want - Facebook or in real life. It is too final and too drastic since, after all, you don’t actually know why they’re ignoring you to begin with, so you change all of your privacy settings to leave them out of your proverbial Facebook loop.

Step 12.
Cry. Again. And realize that you absolutely DO NOT want to lose this person, that you want to get to the bottom of the problem, apologize profusely (and genuinely mean it) and fix it. Change privacy settings to include this person and hope that they eventually get back to you.

Okay, fine. I get it. I’m the creator of my own misery and this is self-torture. I also understand there’s nothing I can do about it. It blows. In a panic that I shouldn’t be in – I typically feel that if someone wants to bow out, you ought to let them. I don’t want to this time. Silently whisper, “Please don’t bow out.”

Pandora knows I’m going through a rough time. It is playing lots of Mariah Carey and Boys II Men…. “End of the Road”. Great. Oh and Carly Rae Jepson’s “Call me Maybe”. Then I listened to “Some Nights” by Fun. BTW the lead singer sings my new favorite duet with P!nk!! Now Lady Gaga is singing about a poker face. I have no poker face. Here is my equivalent: here is my table, here are my cards. Your turn. Readdddddy? GO!

Unfortunately the other person doesn’t give a shit…and it feels lonely here with my cards, table and apology ready for the giving.  Hopefully it works out. If not, well, I’ll move on. That’s the point of all of this, right? To move on, one way or another?

There is a secret step 13. Talk to someone you've been friends with since elementary school, nobody knows you better, and lay it all on the line. Cry a little. Laugh a lot. Get over it. Realize the 12 other steps don't matter, what will happen will happen. Let it go.

Writing as Therapy

I haven’t been watching much TV lately. Now that it is summer, there isn’t much on – I did, however, catch Ryan and Tatum O’Neal’s show today. That is a relationship that has had many highs and many lows. Though I have not read Tatum’s first book, I do understand why Ryan was hurt by it. Even more so, I understand why Tatum wrote it and that writing is highly therapeutic.

Here are the questions: Is it appropriate for a member of a family to write condemning things about another member, and is it alright to air dirty laundry publicly? On the other hand: Why shouldn’t someone share their life and the good and bad experiences they have had? Watching these two try and work through their relationship has awoken a few things within me that I deliberately buried and purposely chose to forget where.

My own father and I had a tumultuous relationship, and he would deny everything if I wrote it all down for the world to see. This is mostly because he has an extremely warped memory and sense of blame, ownership, fault, reality and truth. He would tell me how none of those things ever happened, what a terrible daughter I am, explain how stupid I am and ask who brainwashed me. Just for reference: that’s how each of my conversations with him has ended….and it’s also why I haven’t spoken to him in almost 10 years.

Why is it more acceptable to write and share stories about people who have outstanding success and are well-loved than to write and share stories about men who were so belligerent to their children that those children will never speak to their father again? I, for one, don’t see a problem putting it all out there.  We are all owners of everything about us….good or bad, and whether you want to be or not. At the end of the day, things that happen make us who we are. Why not share those things? It’s not about my father, it’s about me and how I felt and feel about closing the door on my relationship with him and coming to terms with the fact that our relationship was our relationship. It was never going to change. It would never magically become what I had hoped for it to be. It was what it was. Take it or leave it…when I couldn’t take it anymore, I left it. I wasn’t forced out of it; I chose to give it up. I am the owner of that choice, and I absolutely do not regret it.

So, back to the first question – is it appropriate for a member of a family to write about other members? I say go for it. They can choose to accept it or not. I don’t think people should live their lives in fear of doing something so terrible it becomes worthy of being written about - nor should they strive for such notable greatness – but I do think people should own up to things they have done and take credit for it. If my father had been a knight in shining armor opposed to a jerk wrapped in tin foil, that would have definitely been noteworthy. If my father had any ability to take credit for the relationships with his children being what they were, that would have been great and equally noteworthy: stepping up to the plate, correcting wrongs, moving forward.

New question: does it matter when someone takes ownership? That's where there are hangups. There are many relationships, that if the other person called or reached out in any way, shape or form, I would let everything go and move forward without questioning it. If my father called me tomorrow and apologized for things that he has said and done, it wouldn’t prompt me to run into his arms telling him how much I missed him. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t answer the phone. That ship has sailed.

Is that fair? Maybe it is dependent upon how many times a relationship has been tried and failed for various reasons. Is there a scale – what is the weight of the damage done? Does it matter who caused the damage: friends vs. family?  

What it boils down to is this: relationships and their dynamics are ever-changing between any two people. Even they may have opposing opinions of their own relationship. Sometimes you just can't worry about it anymore and have to let it go, whether that process is in print or not.

Waiting...

Things have definitely been busy. Work stuff, of course, has no place in a public forum….but my health, that’s not off-limits. People don’t talk about this stuff. There is no discussion of problems, diagnosis, treatment or side effects. Only the aftermath, the end result, how they got through it. Well, I, for one, have no issue with sharing the problems, diagnosis or treatment and side effects. We all have a process, and this is how I will get through it.

Shortly after my January post I started to not feel well. Burning upset stomach, constant heartburn, no sleep and an ulcer diagnosis shortly after. I only went to the doctor once I hadn’t slept in almost a week. She wanted to have my labs done because apparently I looked like shit – my description, not hers. She was nice. Asked if I had been sleeping and said I looked a little more pale and tired than she anticipated.

In the meantime, she loaded me up with antacids and a list of foods to stay away from and sent me on the trip to New Orleans for Patrick’s ½ Marathon. (He did very well and the trip was great!) Upon our return, I had the labs done. The Phlebotomist  looked a bit surprised at the many pages the doctor wanted results of.

Told her (the Phlebotomist) that I’m a fainter. Asked her for a room to lie down in since all I saw from the waiting room were open doors to rooms with adult high chairs in them. She rolled her eyes at me and took my insurance card. She’s a real gem. Called me back, sat me in a room and then rolled her eyes at me when I sat across the room in the little chair…reminded her I’m a fainter and we can do this on the floor or on one of the little patient beds…but we would NOT be doing this in the high chair. What I didn’t tell her is that I’ve fallen from those more than once by someone wanting to be a hero and thinking they could draw my blood without incident. Without saying another word she took me to another room, pointed to the little bed, grabbed my arm and took the blood – was all done and over with within a couple of minutes. She had me bandaged up before I even knew what happened and she was back to the front desk.

Here’s what I didn’t know: stressing out over having labs done and whether or not I’d rather faint (again) was the least of my issues.

A week later the labs came back with a note from my doctor requesting a follow-up appointment. They never request a follow-up appointment from me. Crap. And how do you even read those lab results anyway? I was convinced I had kidney failure. According to my doctor, my kidneys are fine. Other parts…well…not so much.

I’m deficient in quite a few things, so now I’m on prescription strength vitamins for 3 months when we will retest. We are also testing for Celiac at that time. I’m not worried about that. If my labs come back low again, I do the same thing I’ve been doing for 3 more months and retest. If I’m still deficient and there is no Celiac or absorption issue, I continue on these vitamins forever and move on.

The labs also revealed something else: I have PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome). Ok, fine. This isn’t exactly a big reveal. I’m not shocked. I’m also not alone – fortunately and unfortunately, it is really common. What I am is really pissed and a disappointed.

Seven years ago, I went to the doctor that I had at the time with issues; after a few appointments, she wanted to remove my ovaries….I never really knew the diagnosis - just that I had cyst issues. I was 23, what did I know!?  The specialist she consulted said no, that wasn’t necessary, so we did nothing. Nothing! All the while I could have been given options. There are several options to help control the symptoms and side effects. I’ve been in hell for 7 years not knowing what was really wrong or why I was in the pain I was in....and left totally in the dark about possibilities to make it all go away. I just thought this is how it was for me. My new doctors along the way haven’t seemed alarmed or bothered that I had cyst issues and I had no clue any of this was indicative of PCOS. I hadn’t been told I had PCOS, so I figured I didn’t have to worry about it.

Now I’m 30 and have been told that I may not be able to have children. Okay. Fine. I can handle that. I’m not necessarily convinced I was put on this earth for the sole purpose of being somebody’s mother. There are other risks though associated with this though. My body processes insulin differently, that means a higher risk for diabetes. Also, a higher risk for cancer, cholesterol, excessive weight gain…. All things that I could have been looking after more closely for 7 years. Okay, I get it, I was in my 20’s, and for some reason 20-year old people don’t have the same troubles 30-year old people do. But I was never not at risk; it was just lower.

It is swimsuit season. There are visible side effects – a weight I have never been before, for starters. Horrific cysts covering my back that leave God-awful scars. I have them treated with laser beams. Hurts like hell.  The doctor has to numb my back with Lidocaine shots in the cysts and surrounding area then applies 2-3 layers of topical numbing cream before she can get started – then the laser hits my skin 100 times. I can feel most of it, even with it numbed. The first time, I cried throughout the whole appointment. I cried again when I tried on a swimsuit last weekend; it’s a mess and I don’t want anyone to see. We have 2 upcoming weekends with friends, and they will see it. I am mortified. They will understand, and I will survive.

A few of the internal treatments for all of this seem viable – they really are solid treatments to get the PCOS under control. One of them, on the other hand, sounds awful – Ovarian Drilling. I will so not be doing that! Ever. I’d rather have them removed – they’re causing nothing but hate and discontent – but don’t drill into them!

This is not a woe is me moment. It is however, a lot for me to deal with. I can’t get in to the specialist until the middle of June. That’s 3 whole months of waiting. My doctor doesn’t see the big deal because I’ve "had this for 10-15 years, so there’s no rush".  True. But, really, I’d just like to feel better, especially now that 'it' has a name and potential treatments.

So…here I am…waiting…trying to find humor, and failing miserably, in my needle phobia, getting shot up with Lidocaine once a month to make it through the laser treatment, having labs done every 3 months, taking a plethora of pills and thinking Ovarian Drilling sounds like the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.