"Leaving is not enough. You must stay gone. Train your heart like a dog. Change the locks even on the house he’s never visited. You lucky, lucky girl. You have an apartment just your size. A bathtub full of tea. A heart the size of Arizona, but not nearly so arid. Don’t wish away your cracked past, your crooked toes, your problems are papier mache puppets you made or bought because the vendor at the market was so compelling you just had to have them. You had to have him. And you did. And now you pull down the bridge between your houses, you make him call before he visits, you take a lover for granted, you take a lover who looks at you like maybe you are magic. Make the first bottle you consume in this place a relic. Place it on whatever altar you fashion with a knife and five cranberries. Don’t lose too much weight. Stupid girls are always trying to disappear as revenge. And you are not stupid. You loved a man with more hands than a parade of beggars, and here you stand. Heart like a four-poster bed. Heart like a canvas. Heart leaking something so strong they can smell it in the street.”
— Frida Kahlo
The last few years have been SO hard. I have felt like I have been losing myself, finding myself, worrying about my health, worrying about work, worrying about retirement, worrying if I am a good person or not, concerned I fucked it all up beyond repair. Struggled in living with the person I love, his kids, my kids, animals. Wondered what the hell it is I am going to leave behind...
All the struggles lead me to more compassion and more gratitude. Maybe with the chronic pain I have learned not to judge others in pain, just because they don't appear to be sick or hurting. Maybe I have learned that chronic pain can erode your spirtitual and emotional health, it can erode your relationships because people expect you can do various things that you are really not capible of doing at the moment...things that seem so easy.
The chronic pain has caused me to stop writing here...I stopped being real...I stopped being honest with myself, trying to just get through the day. Struggles we all have them, one way or another. I think my body has just had enough, I know my heart has. It was time to make some changes...think about things differently.
The last few years of death of my grandmother, my friends, WGBs stroke, eroded my health. And the state of my studio shows the decline of my mental health as well, the sadness that encapsulated me in clutter...over the top mess and making me frozen. Its time to clean up everything and get back into balance. For weeks I wake up with really bad heartburn and go to bed with really bad heartburn...so much so it sometimes scares me in the middle of the night. Like last night laying there trying to calm my mind to calm my acid stomach...worry will kill you.
When I read the quotes from Frida I remember the chronic pain she endured and how she made a beautiful life dispite the pain, and when she had emotional pain and relationship break downs, she ate life like it was a huge pomegrante juicy and ripe!
Finding hope. First getting the information about the book Stop the Thyroid Madness writen for patients...and finding that I am NOT the only one struggling so much with my treatment. I kept telling my doctor that ALL of my issues but my back pain ARE related to the under treatment of my thyroid! Now I feel like I have proof of that and can start to get healthier and enjoy my life again! Get all of my symptoms under control. Oh it will be nice to live without swelling in my leg!
On June 22nd I dared to believe I could change it. I started to see a homiopathic energy chiropracter. The first visit was more on the homiopath side, with natural medications to try to get me to be more balanced. I know that people say, hoo-do, but I am feeling better!
On June 29th I woke up with even my skin on my left leg hurting, espeically along my ankle, where ever anything touched me I had shooting pains. I brought him in all my latest blood tests. When Dr. M was doing the assessment he hurt me on my right leg just by touching me. The interesting thing was my left arm was less sensitive than my right arm. My arms were not responding at all to the reflex hammer. My hands were in a lot of pain, especially my thumbs. Wednesday my IBS came back wth a vengence. My sciatic pain was reaching the top again.
It was SO uncomfortable for me to lay on the chiropractic table. He checked the sciatic pain in my right leg, and I was shorter on my right side like I thought I had been. We talked a lot about adjusting my neck, I have not let ANYONE touch my neck since my favortie chiropractor ever moved from the area. I relaxed and let him adjust my left side of my neck. It cracked so loud it scared me. INSTANTLY I had an emotional response, but more amazing INSTANTLY my skin on my right leg stopped hurting. All together the pain was gone! He could touch my leg and not pain! He said "Intersting response!" You think? I think it is magic!
He rechecked my reflexs and they were now normal in my arms! I could finally feel both side the same! No difference! The only strange thing was that under my right elbow and right knee I expereinced some tenderness that night until I saw him next.
On July 2nd We talked about the tenderness in my elbow and knee. He assessed me again and adjusted my elbow and my wrist. He then adjusted the right side of my neck and the amount of loud sounds and pent up emotions came flooding out! I had to take a moment! The left side was not as dramatic as the right side of neck but I just was so stunned by all of the emotions flooding out of me. He also adjusted my left jaw. So much relief though.
The next step was he wants me to go gluten free and no nightshades! I didn't know what nightshades were, they are tomatos, eggplant, pepers, potato. He wants me off of Wheat, Barley, Rye or Oats. No soy or tofu. And wants me to cut back on sugar.
This is the interesting thing to me as he was talking about inflammation in my body, I was keying in to a book I bought in 2010 "The idiots guide to the Infammation Diet", I told him that my intuition had been leading me here, and he said I REALLY need to follow my intution, that my energy is really good and strong and that I am just not trusting myself. He said that sometimes patients can have what they call a leaky gut, and that gluten free eating can help in healing that. Plus with all the things I have been trying to do to lose weight over the last two years only to gain more! So frustrating to me...and started to make me feel hopeless.
So for now I can eat Fresh fruit and veggies, quinoa, beans, rice, corn. This has been a HUGE learning curve and I have not been experiencing hunger like I would before. I am not thrilled with eating...so not having a great experience with food right now. Everything is making the switch including my taste buds. My mouth tastes terrible, my tongue feels thick. I am still taking the suppliments he suggested and I don't know if that is what is causing my mouth to taste so bad... all changes.
The trick to this new way of eating is all in the planning...which I have never been good at. But in order to succeed I am going to have to be better at having foods I CAN eat on hand. The other thing is how WGB always wants to go out to lunch...my stats have gotten higher doing this bad habit and I really just want to go home for lunch where I can control what I eat more...its all a learning curve.
July 13th he adjusted my neck again, and then he used a tool to adjust my lower back and some spots between my shoulders. He then had me stand up and he adjusted my back holding me weird. And then adjusted my right leg that I have the sciatic pain on...
I was able to tell him yesterday that I lost 1.5 pounds, this morning I weighed myself and I had lost another 1.5 pounds so that is FIVE pounds in a week! So happy to see movement DOWN...since the last week in April when I started the plantar fascitis and not being able to walk like I was, I had gained 24 pounds! So hard... To me this 5 pounds is such a huge win!!! I am loving it! It is making it easier to stick to the gluten free to see results, finally positive results!
He added a couple of more suppliment treatments yesterday and I picked one up at whole foods. I bought some gluten free food and so far hate everything. I think I will stick to rice, quinoa and eat fresh fruit and veggies! I was REALLY hurting looking at all the pasta and things I can't have...but I am trying to make the best of it. I tried the gluten free pasta, won't be going there anytime soon. And it is REALLY hard not having the nightshades! I love my bellpeppers and tomatos not to mention a good potato chip! So I got some sweet potato things including chips.
Maybe doing all of this I will get balance back in my life...
The fact that you’re struggling doesn’t make you a burden. It doesn’t make you unlovable or undesirable or undeserving of care. It doesn’t make you too much or too sensitive or too needy. It makes you human. Everyone struggles. Everyone has a difficult time coping, and at times, we all fall apart. During these times, we aren’t always easy to be around — and that’s okay. No one is easy to be around one hundred percent of the time. Yes, you may sometimes be unpleasant or difficult. And yes, you may sometimes do or say things that make the people around you feel helpless or sad. But those things aren’t all of who you are and they certainly don’t discount your worth as a human being. The truth is that you can be struggling and still be loved. You can be difficult and still be cared for. You can be less than perfect, and still be deserving of compassion and kindness.
~ Daniell Koepke.