coffeebarconfessions

...so I mine as well go to class. Yes, I actually said that to my husband when he called to see how I was feeling yesterday. And even though I started laughing at the absurdity of my statement I couldn't have possibly been more serious. Fall semester has started and I am thrilled to be back in school. Except for every Wednesday when I have class I've been a mess. Either going on two hours of sleep or in a major flare or plagued by some horrible female problem or another. Getting back into the swing of things is always hard, I guess I just forgot what a challenge it truly is. This semester is scary, too. I am turning in pages of my ready-for-the-rejection-letter manuscript for both peer and instructor review. But unlike my fear of sharks and spiders this is one anxiety I must conquer, or give up my dream of actually making money at this writing thing and go back to pimping lipstick for the almighty buck. Spanish showed me my brain still worked. A year before I had the strokes I ...

After watching Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead I stumbled upon another documentary about food, nutrition and human health called Food Matters. Oh it was right up my conspiracy theorist alley. The information was nothing new to me, especially concerning aspartame and margarine, but I gained a lot of inspiration to take my nutritional medicine, ie. the food I eat, to the next level. So the next day I went out and bought that juicer. Then I went onto the Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead website and printed up Joe Cross' juicing recipes. I purchased the majority of the produce at Costco, but there is a list of fruits and veggies that are especially sensitive to pesticide corruption, so I had to head to Sprouts for the things Costco didn't carry in the organic version. It was at Sprouts I realized how expensive organic apples are, and a few other items I couldn't afford the pesticide free version of. Never the less I went home undeterred and ready to cure what ails me with my new juicer....

A month ago today I bottomed out. The negative, angry and depressive spiral I spent my days pinging around in for the last few years finally sucked me under. I didn't know how to carry on, snap out of it or fix the problems plaguing my body and soul. No matter what I did, how much pep I put into my self-pep talks or new angles I tried to approach my current situation with I couldn't overcome my burden. Whenever there was a small mile-marker of progress it was only a matter of days before a huge backslide shoved me so far past my starting point any good I achieved was wiped out like a sandcastle in a hurricane. The tireless, endless, fruitless journey that had become my life was simply too much for me to endure any more. Yet there were still good things in my life. Wonderful, glorious blessings I was not only taking for granted but completely squandering, too. I realized how much worse I would be without my assets and decided to narrow my world, isolate myself from the responsib...

Well I am doing exactly what I promised myself I wouldn't do. Walking around the house wailing and freaking out like the walls are coming in on me. I am supposed to tell myself such a frivolous display of emotion is useless, counter-productive even. Then shove the unpleasantries from my mind and focus on the positive, accept my reality and only expect from myself what is reasonable. Fat chance my mind over matter is gonna work today, though, because I hit my wall. After two weeks of a very sick dog, multiple vet appointments, rounds of antibiotics, blood tests, antihistamines, more blood tests, x-rays, different antibiotics and spending the GDP of a third world country we have a diagnosis, Valley Fever. While the name may sound innocuous it's actually a horrible fungal infection contracted from inhaling spores in the dust that causes pulmonary pneumonia and lameness in furry canine babies. In extreme cases it is fatal, frequently chronic and life long, and all together awful. T...

I literally told my husband last night, with the belief beating strong in my heart, that I could get a grip on my life and be successful. Not only are my expectations for success changing, but my determination to simply not engage in negativity seemed to be improving my attitude exponentially. So as I skipped merrily down the road of possibility and improvement of course I tried to change my behavior. The behavior that I blame the majority of my problems on. In my mind I romantically built up what a wonderful day today would be because of this shift of action. I would wake up when the sun was still positioned for morning, not noon, and engage in outrageously productive activities. My attitude would be calm and positive and I would be one step closer to living the life I want, not the one I have.   Well my attempt to go to sleep a half hour earlier than I usually do resulted in the same frustrating outcome it always does. I couldn't freakin' fall asleep. I laid there feeling pun...

Personal responsibility is a son of a bitch. I didn't realize how skewed the entire concept was in my mind until I spent this past weekend reflecting on my feelings and separating them from the feelings of other people. There was a significant amount of crossover, meaning I had adopted many criticisms toward myself that weren't truly mine. Perhaps they were suggested, implied, or explicitly stated by others, it didn't matter. I accepted them as truth. I took responsibility for them. I held myself up to those expectations and when I fell short, beat myself into a proverbial pulp. My third grade teacher who spent a significant amount of time instructing us on the difference between fact and opinion would have been sad to see the lesson hadn't stuck with me. The longer I pondered this jumbled point of view the more the two concepts started to separate. I realized, for the most part, I am not disappointed in myself. I am severely disenchanted my life became about illness an...

My late night documentary viewing has introduced me to some interesting people. From Ayn Rand to Che Guevara to Roman Polanski, there is no shortage of odd, extreme or passionate people intent on leaving their mark on the world. Last night I was introduced to a man named Werner Erhard and his famed "est Training" from the '70's and '80's. Of course I'd heard of it, growing up in hippie-flower child Los Angeles, but I didn't really know anything about it. While he lacked formal training in psychology, theology and philosophy, Erhard never the less bundled his own version of how the world worked and set out to sell it in a 60-hour seminar intent on leaving the participants "transformed." He helped a lot of people, pissed off more than his fair share, fed starving people via The Hunger Project and fled the country when his checkered past came back to haunt him. Yeah, I think he fits into the interesting category. I struggled to grasp the essence...

With a flood of consciousness I became aware of a fundamental flaw in my thinking. As much as I blame my illness for my problems, I don't. Because I place far larger emphasis on my behavior than I ever do my diseases. Yes, I may give up in a huddled heap of despair with my angry fist shaking high in the air at Fibromyalgia. But that is only after I have emotionally beat myself to smithereens for allowing it to happen in the first place. For not being stronger, more disciplined, succumbing to pain and exhaustion. Being unable to rise above the aches and fatigue that envelope me. Natural stress on a life force is what inspires survival of an organism in the first place. Shouldn't I, a being with intelligence and a soul, be able to find a way to survive most anything that can happen on this planet? By using my intelligence and soul to override the worst of circumstances? This is the expectation I set forth.  And this is the expectation that has contributed to a significant amount ...