back in the saddle again

the temperature on the dash read 77 as i made my way home this evening. i rolled down the windows and enjoyed the breeze playing on my skin and in my hair. i kicked my shoes off and drove barefoot. the sun was low in the sky, causing me to squint for the entirety of the drive, but i thoroughly enjoyed the daylight.

i can feel a perceptible shift in myself. back to normal. the last bout of pms or post-ms was a doozy. my face is still recovering from the recent hormonal havoc - i have to make a conscious effort not to pick the shit out of welts that sprouted, red and irritated, in the past couple of weeks. i often think about whether or not such severe emotional tree-swinging is normal. it reminds me of my mom and her bi-polar-esque switching from maniacal happiness to ferocious anger. i fear becoming my mother... and yet i take solace in the fact that she's always been batshitcrazy... all the while i was growing up, all during my young adulthood, and before, during and after menopause.

my food situation was also completely tore up the last couple of weeks. i was primarily craving meat, fat and salt... i'd like to excuse the cravings with some scientific bit about my body building stores before it shed iron or other minerals, but i know i the truth... the truth is, i just gave up. i didn't bust out the willpower when i needed to. i let the "it's too hard" excuse drive me. i'm not going to beat myself up about it. the scale is 1.5 pounds up, but i am myself again. i'm quiet enough to hear my body and level-headed enough to respond with what it needs. tonight it needs leafy greens... a nice big, fresh salad with chickpeas and feta and a few black olives.... and then a nice long walk. this is what my body is asking for this evening and this is what i will give to it.

it feels good to be back in the saddle. i think i've got about six more days of this mellow, even-keeled mentality before the pms crazies kick in again... hey, i'll take whatever i can get!

it's enough

today has been a busy day - one of those days that swallow you up and carry you along and before you know it, lunchtime is nearly over, and you know that if you don't break now, the remaining abysmal amount of work will lose you in its depths for all eternity or the rest of the day, whichever comes first. these are the days i'm grateful that i keep a cache of nuts, cereal bars, healthy-but-tasteless soups in cups in an office drawer.

i wandered down to the kitchen with a change purse full of promise and that boring old cup of soup. i was looking to the vending machines for salvation from the day, from the never-ending needs of my co-workers, from the daunting task list that loomed large and ever-present at my desk. i stood hopeful in front of the food dispenser, leering at the imprisoned junk food, clanking the change in my cupped fist, delighting in those moments of want before the want is sated. my sights landed on the doritos. crisp, red bag, full of radioactive-orange crunchy yumminess...

i deposited a quarter. CLANK. it defiantly popped out of the change return. i tried again, with more determination. CLANK. no luck. the machine was broken.

fucker!FUCK-ERRRRRR!

this soup just simply will NOT be enough!!

i returned to my lair, defeated and uninspired by my meager afternoon sustenance. back at my desk and in just as foul a mood as ever, i burned my tongue on the first bite and could feel my disappointment and anger surface.

i got lost in the tappa-tappa-tappa of sending veryimportantemails while waiting for the soup to cool... a bite here, a bite there... soon the soup was gone, my midday respite over, and i needed to open my office door and let the demanding world back in.

but herein lies the beauty of the afternoon: that small, not as tasteless as i thought, 150 calorie cupofsoup was enough. i was no longer hungry and i no longer needed a hit of junk food. it was enough.

i know there's a lesson somewhere in here for me, but truth be told, i'm too wiped out to seek it out. for now, i'll just appreciate the bounty of one small, seemingly insignificant cup of soup.

mean

once again i find myself lost at sea, violently tossed about in the maelstrom of my own hormones. i am impish and mischievous. i am delicate and fragile. i am full of rage and malevolence. my breasts are gigantic tender fun bags that cause my back to ache. my face is a map of the stars. differing moods whips through me, ravaging my emotional sensibility. i have no tolerance for anyone, even myself. i am quick to take offense and tears come as easily and as involuntary as breath into my lungs.

i have no patience. i unceremoniously jerk my clothes on, jab at my face with make-up sponges. my words are cruel and slash forth in a venomous spray of spittle. my body strains at the seams of clothes that normally fit. it makes me angry and i want to rip them to shreds. even my own skin feels like its straining at the expanse of my innards. i am uncomfortable. i am mean. i am angry. i am scary.

gimme a minute... just one... i can feel the tears starting to prick at my eyes. the next mood will be here soon... and all this mean talk will be gone just as soon as it washed in.

memory loss, mammary gain

wooooooo doggie! i am one messed up menstrual mutha right now. today the hormonal fog was so very thick. work was nearly unbearable. fortunately, there's a lot of activity going on outside of the office this week, so for the few of us who were in today, it was relatively mellow with minimal interaction. thank god. because the few interactions i did have with others were challenging. i was struggling to string coherent thoughts together much less speak whole sentences.

i do, however, possess enough clarity of mind to know that i'm making bad food decisions. and silly me, i'm trying to blame my bad decisions on the fact that "i'm menstrual. i don't know what i'm doing. i can't control anything right now."

yesterday i got an email from a girlfriend who was feeling extremely guilty after hunting down chocolate cake at work and devouring a very large piece, especially since she had been eating really healthy all day. after tapping off a cheerleadery reply of reassurance, i started thinking, (cue homer simpson drooley noise) "mmmmmm. chocolate caaaaaaake." and dammit if i didn't wander down to the vending machines and purchase one of those horrifying little dense bricks of diabetes-inducing mini chocolate cakes.

who's driving here??

i will say, though, that i thoroughly enjoyed every single point-loaded bite of that cake... so much so I BOUGHT ANOTHER ONE TODAY!!!!

i say again, WHO IS DRIVING HERE?

your turn at the wheel is up, whatever part of me that navigated my ass down to the vending machines. rational me is cutting through the excuses and the fogginess and taking the reigns. no more chocolate cake. no more vending machines. no more excuses. i know i can do. yes, it is challenging to retain mindful awareness especially since i momentarily have shit for brains. but i can and WILL do this.

i will have faith that my inner lighthouse will guide me through my temporary mental fog. onward to healthy frontiers! to weight loss! to feeling good in my skin! and away from the treacherous vending-machine-lined-shores.

waiting for the dust to settle

just wanted to give myself props for having a totally full and productive sunday:

• got up at a decent hour
• made a gourmet breakfast
• did 6 or 7 loads of laundry
• deep cleaned the kitties' area
• re-arranged the living room furniture
• cleaned the bedroom
• scoured the kitchen
• re-arranged and hung new photos
• dusted
• went for a family walk w/ my guy and the doggie
• prepared an amazing dinner

and now that i sit and reflect, treating myself to an exquisitely made vodka tonic and finally kicking back, i can't help but think that something else besides sheer burst of energy drove my frenzied cleaning and re-arranging today. as i read over my list of accomplishments, the first word that comes to mind is MANIC. upon further reflection, i attribute this mania to three things:

1. full moon
2. pms-crazies
3. i have been running from something all day

i have long been witness to my own physical and mental changes when the moon is full. i am a believer that the full moon affects me. so, weirdness abound is to be expected. i also usually have some sort of pms insanity going on when the moon is full - this just compounds the complexity of any deep emotions that might come up right now. finally, shortly after i woke this morning, i decided that today i wanted to hang some new photos... none of the rest of the stuff on my day's list of accomplishments existed at this point. first thing i did was to thumb through some old photo albums. this is when the levee broke...

i happened upon a photo album from 7 or 8 years ago. the photos were from a time in my young adulthood where i was floundering, trying to figure out who i was and who/what/where i wanted to be/do/go. during that time, i found myself delving into a very very dark place, a place where i hid for a couple of years. it was a place of deep shame, hiding from true friends and family, a place of denial, lies. my life today resembles nothing of those dark years - nowadays, i aspire to exist as a being of light. i threw myself into years of therapy trying to 'figure it all out'. i grew up. made peace. moved on... or so i thought.

today i came across a photo album containing images from that troubled era of my past. the photographs stopped me cold in my tracks. i was looking at pictures of a girl i barely knew. and yet i was also looking into eyes that were deeply familiar. my stomach flipped as my eyes recognized a part of me from so long ago. i turned a page in the album. a hot burn rose to my cheeks as i remembered those days. i turned another page. faster and faster, i flipped through the pages of that album. i needed to flip past those photos faster, so they were no longer visible, so they were eclipsed by the exposure of the next page, and safely hidden. i feared that if i stayed too long examining any of those pictures, the girl from so long ago would creep back in, take over, send me into the flames of shame and darkness of those days. i got scared. i panicked. and yet, i could.not.put.the.album.down. i struggled to remember strange, pallid faces, club backdrops, half-lidded eyes and sleepy grins of people i used to hang out with. i could now barely remember those lost souls, none of whom i kept in contact with, all of whom are completely irrelevant to current me.

i've been running from those photos all day. i've been running from the memory of that girl all day. i've been cleaning and scouring my house ALL DAY because all i really wanted to do was clean and scour the me in those photos. the me in those photos was lost. i was broken. i was exploring the darkness because i didn't think i was worthy of the light. it was as if the act of cleaning of my home could cleanse not only my soul but also memories of the darkness i crept into during my early adulthood.

i think that rehashing the memory of the girl in those pictures, coupled with the fucked up friday night i had in the presence of another very dark being have led me to this place of feeling unsettled. i feel like some emotional dust was stirred up when i looked in that photo album - like the girl in those pictures never found true peace. throughout all those years of therapy, my work revolved around my formative years, the hurt and wounds of a child. my therapist and i NEVER TALKED about the fucked up shit that went down during my dark years.

i so desperately want resolution for that girl. i want peace for that girl. i want peace for me. but for right now, all i can do is be cognoscente of the deep feelings that came up for me today. soon i will be able to go back to that photo album and sit with each image, let each photo into the light, let it be exposed long enough for me to take in every detail. but for right now, all i can give is recognition.

i know you exist within me, dark girl. i know you haven't yet found peace. here is my promise to you: i will remember you. i will honor you. i will make room for you in my heart and in my memory. you are part of me. and together, we are whole.

crazy-making lady bits

ah heightened hormones... sometimes ye are the bane of my very existence. i can count on you to make me an absolutely unrecognizable nut-job for a good two to three (and sometimes, if i'm lucky, four) solid weeks out of the month. my respite from emotional helter skelter has once again given way to all out bat-shit-crazies...

last nite it started innocently enough and without my knowing... i ran around the house after work in a cleaning frenzy... but not just any cleaning frenzy. it was the type of frenzy that would put any ADD, sugar addled kid to shame. the frenzied cleaning part wasn't the problem. the problem was that i could only spend 30 - 45 seconds on a task before jumping into the next thing... before finishing all the various chores that i started, i ended up crashed out on the bed, drooling on a crossword puzzle. this is how my guy found me when he came home.

"did you overdose?" he asked coyly, noting my unnatural, splayed position on the bed and my drooly crossword.

"unghHHHHH" was my irritated response.

"you look like you've taken big game tranquilizers.... what's wrong wit.... uh oh. are you... premenstrual?" he gingerly asked as he slowly backed out of the bedroom.

judging from the way he flattened himself against the wall and tried to sneak out of there unnoticed, i knew he was bracing for some kind of maniacal response from me. fortunately, through my menstrual induced crazy-haze, i was able to see the hilarity in the moment and started to laugh.

the rest of the evening held more of the same... me chattering on like a crazed chatty cathy one moment, then falling into a near-coma stupor the next... following my guy around while he cleaned up all my half-finished cleaning projects... today, however, was much more tolerable. though i can sense the emotional instability creeping into my sanity like the first wisps of menstrual fog crawling forth from the shore, today was somewhat back to normal. all bets are off for tomorrow though...

so while i have the clarity of mind (at least i think i do), i'd like to offer up a little prayer that i make it through the next couple of weeks without too much fallout from 'altered me'. and even if it gets really crazy up in 'dis muuuug, there's room for it. just please, god, jah, allah, goddess, please, regardless of the insanity i may suffer in the coming days, please help me stick to something that even remotely resembles my daily weight watchers points... and even if i can't do that, just help me from careening too far off into an ocean of chocolate.

i am woman. hear me roar. then laugh. then cry. then laugh again. then laugh harder. then cry again, laughing a little while crying. then yell. then cry some more. then.....