Cranky Fibro Girl

Harnessing the healing power of snark

Now Playing At The House Of Ryan: One Woman, Three Cats, And A Lizard:

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“The guts and the glory”.

It was only by the grace of God that “the guts” did not win, (although not from any lack of trying on Tigger’s part), NOR did I have to touch a lizard.

Although that was a close one.

Me (on an emergency phone call with my husband who, unhelpfully, is at work): “OK, I’ve gotten the cats out of the bedroom, and the lizard is trapped under the dirty laundry on the bathroom floor.”

My husband: “OK, well, can’t you just scoop it up?”

Me: “No, I can’t ‘just scoop it up’! I’M NOT A BOY!”

Signs That Your Chronic Fatigue Is Winning

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1. The barely controlled urge to punch out everyone in the grocery store for the sole reason that they exist on this earth.

2. The compulsive need to inventory every single one of your 400 or so Facebook and Twitter friends one-by-one to decide whether or not you still “need” that connection.

3. Forgetting that your husband is a scientist and an engineer when, in the course of a conversation about text messages never received, you accidentally blurt out, “Oh-I wonder if mercury is in retrograde again?”

Dude-Could You Please Stop With All The Crazy, Already?!

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Me: (quietly pondering all the things I could do with my day).

Suddenly there appears a tiny little woman, who whacks me on the head with a very solid stick.

Me: Ow!! (Looking around frantically for the source of the assault.) Who are you?!

Tiny Little Woman: (pulling herself up to her full, tiny height and puffing out her chest importantly) I am the Chronic Illness Delusional Intervention Fairy.

Me: (confused)

Me: But I haven’t even done anything yet!

CIDI-fairy: True. But were you or were you not just thinking about vacuuming the entire house, despite having had a raging migraine for the better part of a week and needing to resort to the nausea medicine you had leftover from your surgery?

Me: Um…

CIDI-fairy: And were you, or were you not planning on rearranging the freaking furniture when you have spent the past two weeks describing yourself as “numb with exhaustion?”

Me: Well…

CIDI-fairy: And isn’t it true that you somehow believed that you could spend an entire hour doing high-intensity water aerobics when you lack the energy to go buy food, and have been cobbling together alleged “meals” using whatever stale ingredients you can dredge up in your pantry?

Me: But…

Me: (looking around anxiously)

Me: How did you know all that stuff?

CIDI-fairy: (smiling mysteriously) Oh, we have our ways. So what’s up, sweetie? Why are you so resistant to just lying down and taking care of yourself?

Me: Well, I can’t just do nothing. I have to find a way to CONTRIBUTE somehow.

CIDI-fairy: OK. But what has everyone been telling you about that?

Me: (looking down): That I don’t have to justify my existence, and that I contribute just by being here, because they are so happy to have me in their lives.

CIDI-fairy: Yeah. And do you believe them?

Me: (quietly): I guess so.

CIDI-fairy: OK, so what else?

Me: Well, I’m afraid that if I just stop working for a while, that all my cool projects and ideas will disappear while I rest.

CIDI-fairy: OK. So,has that ever happened to you before?

Me: No, I guess not.

CIDI-fairy: OK, so what else is bothering you?

Me: I can’t just do nothing , because I freaking HATE to be bored.

CIDI-fairy: Lordy DAY, don’t I know it.

Me: What’d you say?

CIDI-fairy: Oh, nothing, dear. OK, so, boredom. You’ve worked A LOT on this one over the past few months, and remember, you know how to “do” boredom now. It doesn’t freak you out like it used to, right?

Me: (grudgingly): No.

CIDI-fairy: So what is it, baby? What’s really going on here?

Me: I can’t stop, because when I stop I feel how much pain I’m in. It hurts so much. I don’t want to hurt anymore. It’s too hard to feel all this pain. And it’s not just the physical pain, but also the pain of seeing everything that’s happened to my body. And the constant pain and frustration of bumping up against all the things I can’t do right now. And the pain of watching healthy people just being able to do whatever they want without even giving it a second thought. It’s too hard to feel all of that. So that’s why I’m always trying to be anywhere else but here.

CIDI-fairy: I know, baby. And that’s why I’m here. To help you.

Me: (excited): By taking all of this pain away?

CIDI-fairy: No honey, I’m afraid not. I’m here to remind you that when you’re exhausted-oh, and hello, just went on two trips in two weeks!-your focus needs to be on what feels gentle and soothing. I’m here to remind you to keep asking yourself, “What would help me feel a little more comfortable right now?’ The other stuff will be there when you feel better, I promise.

Me: But I’ve already had to do this like 50 bajillion times, already. I don’t WANT to have to keep starting over at the beginning again. It’s not fair!

CIDI: I know, baby doll, it’s not. It’s hard. It hurts. And it sucks. And, it’s where you are.

Me: (sighing): I know. At least I’m getting really good at taking care of myself, right?

CIDI: Absolutely-you are one seriously bad-ass babe! And remember, I am always here, helping you.

And then, in a shower of fairy dust, she was gone.

A Day At The Beach

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So last week my parents took me, my husband, my brother, my sister-in-law, and my 5-month old nephew to the beach. It was fun for a whole lot of reasons, especially because it was the first time I’d gotten to meet the baby in person.

It definitely made for an interesting dynamic, having a baby there. Among other things, it meant that we all spent the entire weekend casually offering things like, “Oh, would you like me to hold him while you change your clothes?”, and, “Oh, let me hold him so that you can eat dinner.” But of course that was just our pretending to be polite, when what we really meant was, “GIVE ME THE BABY NOW!”, and, “NO YOU CANNOT HAVE THE BABY, BECAUSE IT IS STILL MY TURN TO HOLD HIM!”

Another cool thing about the trip was that I discovered that I do, in fact, have some Important Aunt Skills, including NOT accidentally squishing the soft spot on the top of the baby’s head, and laughing evilly at my dad when, in the middle of his special Gramp-Grandson bonding time he turned to me and “generously” asked, “Hey, Jen, would you like to hold him?” as soon as we both began to smell that there was Something Going On down in the diaper region. Not to mention the ability to look innocently and expectantly at my mom until Grandma stepped up and took the baby off to change him. (And I thought I had no natural instincts with kids-Pfft.)

However, the skill that turned out to be the most valuable was the fact that I can sing. I’ve sung in choirs for practically my whole life, plus I almost pursued a career as a pianist, so I am pretty musical (not that that would particularly matter to the baby, but since I pretty much have no other talents when it comes to babies, I’m taking pride in myself wherever I can.)

My mom is also an excellent singer, so between the two of us we dredged up all the kids songs we could remember including the smash hit, “The Eensy-Weensy Spider”, which was by far the hit of the weekend, due to the fact that Grandma excels at the hand motions that accompany the song. And then, when our repertoire ran out, we turned to the Completely Age-Appropriate And Not At All Traumatizing ditties about the farmer with a chick who couldn’t lay an egg, so he poured hot water up and down her leg, and the story of Tom Dooley, The Poor Boy Who Was Bound To Die. (Whee! We do parties, too!)

And then what that failed, we just turned to the ever popular option of Making Things Up On The Spot. This is pretty much second nature to me since I maintain a running narration/commentary on everything that’s going on in and around me. That’s actually what helps me write this blog-I just bring a mental pail up to the never-ending stream of words, let it fill up for a while, and then come and slosh it all out here. So it was no problem whatsoever to just set that puppy to music. As a matter of fact, I composed a very catchy tune explaining the fact that I’m sorry, but you cannot fit your foot, your pacifier, and your teddy bear’s head in your mouth all at the same time, so unfortunately you’ll just have to pick one of them. And I don’t know if my mom has the same internal narration going on that I do, but I did watch as she extemporized a very compelling ballad discussing how we were packing everything up and waiting for the bellman to come and help us take our luggage down to the cars.

There were lots of other things that happened on this trip, including COPPERHEAD!! or, “Snakes at the Beach: The Universe’s Ultimate Betrayal”, along with, “Thank you so much, left hip, for going out of joint on our very first night there, leaving me with an extremely painful, gimpy gait.” But I have to get off of the computer because my husband’s on his way home, and I’m supposed to be resting (and we all know how great I am at that.)

Bye for now.

Cranky Fibro Girl And The “F” Word

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The “F” Word, or The Karma’s Gonna Getcha

(originally published March 24, 2006)

When my brother and I were growing up there was a joke in our family that in our house the “F Word” was not the actual “F Word”, but instead was the word “flexible.” As in, “You need to be flexible.”

This is actually really good advice, and it is the reason that now I am able to get along with just about anyone I meet. But at the time my brother and I reacted to this parental guidance as if we were being asked to swallow broken shards of jagged glass, washed down with a chaser of smoking sulfuric acid. (Incidentally, this is exactly the same reaction my mom would get whenever she said, “I think somebody needs an ‘n-a-p’.” “I do NOT need a nap, and I am NOT CRANKY!” we would roar, as flames erupted from our skulls and incinerated half of the kitchen.)

So I have to admit that a small part of me was secretly pleased when she called me the other day and said, “Well, they’re telling me that I’m going to have to be really flexible at work these days.” This is not a new thing for her, as this is the same company that sent out a profile of its ideal employee as one who was “not fearful of acting with a minimum of planning,” and who, “makes tough decisions in a timely manner, sometimes with incomplete information,” among other things. (This is also the same company who causes her to frequently remark on how she now finds herself living inside of a Dilbert cartoon.)

Apparently she is being assigned to a new project, one where “you cannot write down the instructions.” My first thought was that she was getting to work on something cool and classified, and so you weren’t allowed to write anything down. But no, you can’t write anything down because “every step is an exception”. So she is working on a project that is composed entirely of The Opposite Of Instructions.

This got me to thinking about my own job history, and about how my mom is a MUCH better employee than I ever was, which is why I now work for myself. If there is craziness in my company, I have only myself to blame. But I also have the power to fix it.

That was not the case when I was teaching at a small, private, religious school a few years ago. I was responsible for Spanish, music, and being the librarian for all 120 students from PK3 to the 8th grade. One day I was told to teach all the kids a specific song for a school festival. That was fine, since I was the music teacher. What wasn’t fine was the fact that I was only given the words. I never received the music to this song, music without which there could be no singing.

One day the principal of the school cornered me in the hallway and demanded to know why none of the children knew yet how to sing this song. I explained to her that it was due to the fact that I, the MUSIC teacher, had never received the MUSIC that accompanied the words to the song.

“But [your supervisor] gave you the words to that song a long time ago,” she replied, staring at me like an evil Svengali, trying with all the power of her not inconsiderable might to bend me to the force of her will.

“But. I. Don’t. Have. The. Music.” I replied. “I can’t teach them how to sing the song if I don’t know the melody.”

So we stood there staring at each other, locked in an epic battle of wills until the bell rang and saved us from having to settle this matter once and for all by wrestling each other to the death in the middle of the parking lot.

Then there was the time that a bunch of us faculty and staff were standing around in the office discussing The Pantyhose Rule (you had to wear them if you were a woman). As was the norm, there were a number of pregnant woman there participating in this conversation.

“But what about if you’re pregnant?” I asked. “Do you still have to wear pantyhose then?”

“Well, yes,” they all replied, stunned that it would even occur to me to ask such a question.

Now, normally I was MUCH better at keeping these kinds of comments to myself. But for some reason on that day my inner shit kicker rose up, leaped out of my mouth, and before I could stop her, said, “Well, clearly a man made up that rule.”

And there was silence. Not just any silence, but the kind of silence that would’ve been appropriate had I just said, “You know, in my free time, I kill kittens. Just Because I Can.”

(And these people were S-U-R-P-R-I-S-E-D when I told them I was not coming back to teach there the following year.)

Not that I am bitter. Or cranky. But it is clearly not by chance that I now work alone in my home all day long, surrounded by no one but cats.

If You’re Hoping For A Point To This Post, I’m Sorry To Have To Tell You That There Really Isn’t One

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So a few days ago I posted this really great quote about how even little bits of movement matter, and make a difference.

And then I proceeded to act on the wisdom I’d just received in a way that showed that I had completely understood the concept of “small movements” if, by “small movements” you mean, “moving at the speed of a herd of zebras fleeing the  pride of lions that is pursuing them across the plains of the Serengeti.”

But unfortunately, that is just how that week went.

Because later that week I went to get my hair cut, and somehow my stylist and I got to talking about how some people-and specifically, how some of her clients-just will not stop talking. And I said, “Yeah, some people are just really narcissistic and have no clue how they’re affecting the people around them.”

Then that led to a discussion about the exact definition of “narcissistic”, and I was happy to explain it to her. For w-a-a-a-y too long. I mean, I told her the entire story of Narcissus, for crying out loud, when all she’d asked for was a definition of the word.

And people: if that’s not a flagrant abuse of a liberal arts education, not to mention a PERFECT example of someone who doesn’t know when to shut up, then frankly, I don’t know what is.

But I like to think that maybe I redeemed myself at least a little bit at my pedicure, because I made a concerted effort to  listen to the manicurist’s stories instead of just blathering on about myself. And it was worth it, because in addition to the intense surge of virtuous pride I felt at being A Good Listener, her stories were really funny.

Like the time she was stopped for speeding and then explained to the officer that her speed was not actually her fault, but that of gravity.

Or the time she was stopped for wearing her seat belt the wrong way (like all other short people, the top strap cuts right into our neck). And the police officer said she’d have to pay a fine. And she asked him, completely unfazed, how much the fine would be. And he was kind of taken aback and her laid-back attitude. And she explained that no matter what the fine ended up costing her, it would be cheaper that what the insurance company would have to pay out to her husband on her life insurance policy if she ended up strangled to death by her own seat belt. And the police officer really had nothing to say to that.

And, in a final burst of randomness, you may remember that a few months ago my parents made a trip to some family property in order to get it ready for summertime use.

Well they had to go back a little while ago to do some more work and, according to my mother, they did not have to break into the house this time, which really disappointed The Family Friend who came to pick them up at the airport. I guess he hadn’t had the opportunity to walk on the Possibly Committing A Felony Wild Side lately.

Here endeth The Random. You may now return to your regularly scheduled day.

Thanks To Gamers And Gaming, I Will Never Lack For Blog Material

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It Was Somebody’s Job To Think This Stuff Up

(Originally published March 8, 2006)

Recently my husband has been excited to find some new friends with which he can play video games. While I am an excellent wife and companion in many ways, I do not share his enjoyment of gaming. So it has been good for him to connect with others who do.

Last weekend one of The Gamers arrived at our house and announced: “I just went to Blockbuster and found The Best Game Ever! You’re a samurai, and you wake up one day, and all of your body parts have been stolen. You have to go out and fight the bad guys who took them so you can like, get your arms back and stuff!”

Fortunately the main character was also fitted with substitute body parts, but of course these parts also double as deadly weapons. For example, when he meets up with an enemy his fake arms and hands fly off to reveal swords, his knees open up to reveal machine guns, etc.

Every time the samurai defeats a “Fiend”, he recovers one of his stolen body parts. I witnessed one of these pivotal moments, and while the hero writhed in agony on the screen we all pondered what vital limb or organ he might have just regained. His heart? His lungs? His eyes?

Oh no. After valiantly defeating the Fiend in battle, and undergoing the agonizing, torturous process of re-incorporating one of the inner organs necessary for his continued existence the hero looked up to see that he was now once again in possession of…his esophagus. With a corresponding reminder in small print that said, “Please note: The esophagus will not work without the rest of the digestive tract.”

What?!

So all week I have been facilitating cryptic correspondence between my husband and the other gamers. I pass along messages like, “Tell her I got my hippocampus back last night and can now remember how many bad guys I have killed,” or, “Tell him that I also got my left leg back so I can run now. Luckily the leg cannon is in the right leg.”

To quote one of the gamers: “Good times.”

From Ronna Detrick: My Body-Enough!

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I read this yesterday on Ronna Detrick’s blog, RENEGADE conversations, and was completely blown away. So she has graciously granted me permission to post this piece here so that you can be blown away too.

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Over the weekend I had some rare spaces of times to sit in the sun and read. First on my list – trying to make it through a few more pages of my new Sacred Text: Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes. One chapter in which I soaked: Joyous Body: The  Wild Flesh and these quotes:

To take pleasure in a world filled with many kinds of beauty is a joy in life to which all women are entitled. To support only one kind of beauty is to be somehow unobservant of nature…There cannot be one kind of baby, one kind of man, or one kind of woman. There cannot be one kind of breast, one kind of waist, one kind of skin.

Why have I believed the lies that there is only “one kind” that matters, that’s good enough? Enough!

In essence, the attack on women’s bodies is a far-reaching attack on the ones who have gone before her as well as the ones who will come after her.

I’m not OK with my own longstanding contempt for my body to even remotely impact my daughters. Enough!

Destroying a woman’s instinctive affiliation with her natural body cheats her of confidence. It causes her to perseverate about whether she is a good person or not, and bases her self-worth on how she looks instead of who she is. It pressures her to use up her energy worrying about how much food she consumes or the readings on the scale and tape measure. It keeps her preoccupied, colors everything she does, plans, and anticipates. It is unthinkable in the instinctive world that a woman should live preoccupied by appearance this way.

How is it that I became this preoccupied with my appearance; that I stopped living in the “instinctive world?” Enough!

Suppose…the body is a God in its own right, a teacher, a mentor, a certified guide? Then what? Is it wise to spend a lifetime chastising this teacher who has much to give and teach? Do we wish to spend a lifetime allowing others to detract from our bodies, judge them, find them wanting? Are we strong enough to refute the party line and listen deep, listen true to the body as a powerful and holy being?

Why have I spent a lifetime chastising a body that is “a God in its own right?” Enough!

I am strong enough to listen deep, listen true to my body and a powerful and holy being. I am enough!
copyright 2010 by Ronna Detrick