This week I got to go see my psychiatrist to see how my medication is working. And yes, I too am part of the prozac generation although I resisted that designation for a very long time. Finally, when the panic attacks became too much and I got awfully tired of battling depression on a regular basis, I had to call in the calvary for some help.
The psychiatrist asked me how things were going (as if he could really tell a whole lot from 15 minutes of time with me every three months, but ah well!), and I told him that I was happy with my current medication. What with the complete lack of stability in my world these days, I know that without the pills, I'd be a nutcase. In fact, as I told him, I can feel the depression and anxiety, but thankfully it's over here floating in a cloud just beyond the barrier of Prestiq and Clonozepam. I don't like the weight that anti-depressants seem to adhere to my butt, but I do like being non-suicidal. And these days, with the stabilizing help of drugs, my GI system is not the happiest in the world. the little bundle of nerves governing that section of my body is in all kinds of an uproar about the amount of stress I'm carrying around with me.
Will I get the job, or not? If so, can I get to Alabama and be ready for school before it starts? If not, will things go ok here in Texas? Can I get my book ready, can I get that non-profit working? What does the future hold for me? And would it hurry up and just let me know already?? That person that I may have let past my walls and guards - why is he screwing with me now? Seriously, it's enough to make a sane person go crazy. And a crazy, IBS-living person might stray farther from the path of sanity. But then again, sanity just might be overrated.
In the meantime, I'm doing all sorts of relaxation techniques I've learned over the years. Yoga and I are becoming very very good friends this week, and running in the hot Texas nights is becoming a norm. Exercise, yoga, and a bit of too many cookies will help me get through this period of instability, both in life and in the body. I'm also going to start another blog here on quotes I find in books I read. I read far more than the average person, and I'm always stumbling across quotes that I would like to work with someday or that at the very least, should be shared with others.
Friday, August 6, 2010
Monday, August 2, 2010
Saga continuation
Last week, while I was on my way to Austin to visit folks, I nearly died in my car. I was on the service road of I-35, and wasn't paying attention to the road. To be so incredibly middle-class, I was looking for a Starbucks that the sign on the highway told me was off this exit. I was so concerned with looking for the entrance to the coffee shop that I didn't notice the light had turned from green to yellow to red. I looked up, freaked, tried to stop, realized that wasn't going to work, and then went through the light. I could have been killed, or worse, killed someone else. And all because I really wanted a cup of coffee. How pathetic.
But I was reminded again this past week that sometimes that person who sped through the light might be a dumbass like I was while looking for some coffee, but sometimes that person has a pressing need. (Need I say that defensive driving is a good thing?) The last post I made, about the the day I took the GRE, was also the last time I went straight through a red light. That time, though, there was a reason beyond coffee.
After I took the GRE, I continued down the road to go visit my friend Laura, who lived in Houston at the time and worked at Compaq. While well equipped with my toilet paper in the car for the trip, I was already emotionally and physically exhausted, and this was also in a time before I lost all sense of modesty. Laura was going to meet me after a 3/4 day at work at her apartment, but she wasn't there when I arrived. No problem, right? I've got AC in the truck and music to listen to, right? Well, yes, if you disregard the tiny little problem that presented itself forcefully in my gut shortly after ringing the doorbell to no avail. Oh shit. Literally.
I knocked on the people's door across the way - no luck. I went to my truck, thinking I could spot a place to do some business - no luck. The parking lot and apartment building was a wide-open field with windows and doors and pitifully few cars for cover. I jumped in my truck, sped out of the parking lot, ran two redlights and swerved across traffic in order to get to the Church's chicken store right down the road. I made it to the bathroom, which I'm happy about. But now when I think of it, I wonder what the price could have been.
After that, I called my friend and told her to call me back when she got home. I wasn't moving out of that joint until I knew I was able to go inside her apartment. I don't think I left her apartment again during that visit. I let the anxiety at my IBS issues take control. It wasn't the first time I did that nor the last.
But I was reminded again this past week that sometimes that person who sped through the light might be a dumbass like I was while looking for some coffee, but sometimes that person has a pressing need. (Need I say that defensive driving is a good thing?) The last post I made, about the the day I took the GRE, was also the last time I went straight through a red light. That time, though, there was a reason beyond coffee.
After I took the GRE, I continued down the road to go visit my friend Laura, who lived in Houston at the time and worked at Compaq. While well equipped with my toilet paper in the car for the trip, I was already emotionally and physically exhausted, and this was also in a time before I lost all sense of modesty. Laura was going to meet me after a 3/4 day at work at her apartment, but she wasn't there when I arrived. No problem, right? I've got AC in the truck and music to listen to, right? Well, yes, if you disregard the tiny little problem that presented itself forcefully in my gut shortly after ringing the doorbell to no avail. Oh shit. Literally.
I knocked on the people's door across the way - no luck. I went to my truck, thinking I could spot a place to do some business - no luck. The parking lot and apartment building was a wide-open field with windows and doors and pitifully few cars for cover. I jumped in my truck, sped out of the parking lot, ran two redlights and swerved across traffic in order to get to the Church's chicken store right down the road. I made it to the bathroom, which I'm happy about. But now when I think of it, I wonder what the price could have been.
After that, I called my friend and told her to call me back when she got home. I wasn't moving out of that joint until I knew I was able to go inside her apartment. I don't think I left her apartment again during that visit. I let the anxiety at my IBS issues take control. It wasn't the first time I did that nor the last.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Mind and Body
I was thinking today, since my stomach hurts, about the relationship between stress and the gastrointestinal system. All stress, all excitement, all of everything really affects how my GI system works. And now that I'm sitting on pins and needles waiting to hear if I get a year-long position at Auburn, I'm feeling the stress. Even though I know that if I don't get the position, then I'm ok - I've got the assurance of the adjunct coordinator at the local community college that I can teach a couple classes, and I'm pretty sure I can pick one up at UT-Austin. But still....a real position with benefits has my stomach in wads.
Yet I was reminded this past week of what it used to be like when my little bundle of nerves in the stomach was even more freaked out by my constant digestion of foods the tummy didn't like. I was asked to audition for Kaplan as a teacher for the GRE or SAT this past week. But that means that I would have to retake the tests since my scores are more than five years old. My mother urged me to study for the exam, but I didn't feel that way and so I felt like explaining.
The first and only time I took the GRE was so I could apply to grad school. I was in the midst of my 12 year fun and games with explosive diarrhea, and since all that was made worse by stress, you can imagine how much fun it was to take the GRE - a test so loaded with stress it should be called such. I was living for the summer with my dad in Longview, TX, but the closest place I could take the GRE was at Stephen F. Austin State U. about 2.5 hours away. So I got up at 5 a.m., drove 2.5 hours under high stress to arrive and take the exam at 8 a.m. I was so stressed out that I had to get up TWENTY-THREE times during the course of the exam to go to the bathroom. I swear this is probably a guiness book of world record for the most times a person has to poo during a three and a half hour exam. Thankfully, the proctors only made me sign out the first 10 times - because you know they don't stop the time on your exam just because you are having difficulties with the restroom. (Now, I would just wear depends and clean myself up later, but that was then, this is now.)
I still scored a 760 on the math, a 760 on the analytical and a 700 on the verbal. The analytical has been replaced by writing now. And I figured after 30 hours of math in grad school and a Ph.D. in English, if I can't score well on all parts of the test, I definitely have a problem. And it isn't the bathroom!
Yet I was reminded this past week of what it used to be like when my little bundle of nerves in the stomach was even more freaked out by my constant digestion of foods the tummy didn't like. I was asked to audition for Kaplan as a teacher for the GRE or SAT this past week. But that means that I would have to retake the tests since my scores are more than five years old. My mother urged me to study for the exam, but I didn't feel that way and so I felt like explaining.
The first and only time I took the GRE was so I could apply to grad school. I was in the midst of my 12 year fun and games with explosive diarrhea, and since all that was made worse by stress, you can imagine how much fun it was to take the GRE - a test so loaded with stress it should be called such. I was living for the summer with my dad in Longview, TX, but the closest place I could take the GRE was at Stephen F. Austin State U. about 2.5 hours away. So I got up at 5 a.m., drove 2.5 hours under high stress to arrive and take the exam at 8 a.m. I was so stressed out that I had to get up TWENTY-THREE times during the course of the exam to go to the bathroom. I swear this is probably a guiness book of world record for the most times a person has to poo during a three and a half hour exam. Thankfully, the proctors only made me sign out the first 10 times - because you know they don't stop the time on your exam just because you are having difficulties with the restroom. (Now, I would just wear depends and clean myself up later, but that was then, this is now.)
I still scored a 760 on the math, a 760 on the analytical and a 700 on the verbal. The analytical has been replaced by writing now. And I figured after 30 hours of math in grad school and a Ph.D. in English, if I can't score well on all parts of the test, I definitely have a problem. And it isn't the bathroom!
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Topsy-Turvy World
The world seems to be going a little crazy these days, and my mood is following the economic downturn as I search for a job, or some kind of income, have given up on having health insurance (no matter how important that might be to someone with a history of GI problems), and am a little freaked out by the fact that my truck wants another $1000 spent on it. It seems to want that much about every three months, and I can't afford either it or a new car. What's a girl to do?
Well, I certainly know that when my stress levels get high, I often turn to food as a source of comfort and a sense of control. And I've been doing just that for the past few days. It's a bad habit and is completely linked to my dis-ordered relationship to food. Rather than see it as something merely nourishing or a thing to enjoy, I off load a lot of my stress and lack of a sense of control onto eating and food. In the past few days, I've polished off a couple packs of KinniToo's vanilla creme sandwich cookies, a pint of pralines and cream BlueBell ice cream, and a few other items. Binge eating like that is not particularly rewarding except in the moment, and definitely makes for a poor body image and feelings of guilt.
But it's not just the binge eating that I am worried about right now, it's the emergence of an old pattern of hoarding and eating that gets triggered by a lack of control in the present and some kind of emotional trigger. I will seek to control my food intake, and thereby control my life, by not eating much most of the day. I subsist on coffee, a piece of fruit, and a handful of nuts. Then, by dinner time, I'm starving. So I eat a good dinner since there are other people involved. But sometime thereafter, I get hungry (and no wonder since I've not eaten most of the day), and I binge on sweets or salty depending on my preference that night. Sweet usually wins the taste competition.
So now I get to face this demon again. Like any recovering addict, I will fight this dis-ordered relationship to food my whole life. But for now, it's good that I recognize it and can begin implementing the strategies I have used to come out of this tailspin in the past.
1. Food diary including how I feel when eating, one hour later, and the next day.
2. Don't let it undermine weight goals - increase exercise while winning this battle.
3. Chew gum. Chew lots of gum.
I'll keep an update on how this goes as I continue to search for answers, a job, and oh-so-much more.
Well, I certainly know that when my stress levels get high, I often turn to food as a source of comfort and a sense of control. And I've been doing just that for the past few days. It's a bad habit and is completely linked to my dis-ordered relationship to food. Rather than see it as something merely nourishing or a thing to enjoy, I off load a lot of my stress and lack of a sense of control onto eating and food. In the past few days, I've polished off a couple packs of KinniToo's vanilla creme sandwich cookies, a pint of pralines and cream BlueBell ice cream, and a few other items. Binge eating like that is not particularly rewarding except in the moment, and definitely makes for a poor body image and feelings of guilt.
But it's not just the binge eating that I am worried about right now, it's the emergence of an old pattern of hoarding and eating that gets triggered by a lack of control in the present and some kind of emotional trigger. I will seek to control my food intake, and thereby control my life, by not eating much most of the day. I subsist on coffee, a piece of fruit, and a handful of nuts. Then, by dinner time, I'm starving. So I eat a good dinner since there are other people involved. But sometime thereafter, I get hungry (and no wonder since I've not eaten most of the day), and I binge on sweets or salty depending on my preference that night. Sweet usually wins the taste competition.
So now I get to face this demon again. Like any recovering addict, I will fight this dis-ordered relationship to food my whole life. But for now, it's good that I recognize it and can begin implementing the strategies I have used to come out of this tailspin in the past.
1. Food diary including how I feel when eating, one hour later, and the next day.
2. Don't let it undermine weight goals - increase exercise while winning this battle.
3. Chew gum. Chew lots of gum.
I'll keep an update on how this goes as I continue to search for answers, a job, and oh-so-much more.
Monday, July 26, 2010
creating a non-profit
This past week, I drove up to Austin to see some friends, and help out my friend with home schooling his kids. One of the great ideas that came from that trip was the creation of a non-profit organization to raise awareness of food and digestion issues as well as the emotional impact such problems can cause. Since this is basically exactly what I'm writing my book Survival Strategies about, I thought it would be good to actually have an organization to help target my market (most Americans) and begin the process of raising awareness.
The organization will be called "Eating Well" and the logo will be a well where one can draw water, but also a place notorious for drowning. Andy and I agreed that the logo captures many of the nourishing, life-sustaining aspects of food and one's relationship to one's body, but it also carries the connotation of depth (psychoanalysis anyone?) and potential danger.
The first step to the creation of this new entity, "Eating Well", is to incorporate it. Not only does this create the organization itself as a separate entity legally, but it also gives me a title "Executive Director". I say "yay" to that. In order to do all this legally and correctly, I need to have a board of directors, who will operate as final budgetary decision makers, etc. So I'm looking for those qualified individuals who like my idea and could contribute to my overall aims:
1. raising awareness of food related problems, including binge eating, food allergies, celiac disease, etc.
2. helping provide strategies for living well in spite of the limitations of diet and the body
Let me know if you're interested!
The organization will be called "Eating Well" and the logo will be a well where one can draw water, but also a place notorious for drowning. Andy and I agreed that the logo captures many of the nourishing, life-sustaining aspects of food and one's relationship to one's body, but it also carries the connotation of depth (psychoanalysis anyone?) and potential danger.
The first step to the creation of this new entity, "Eating Well", is to incorporate it. Not only does this create the organization itself as a separate entity legally, but it also gives me a title "Executive Director". I say "yay" to that. In order to do all this legally and correctly, I need to have a board of directors, who will operate as final budgetary decision makers, etc. So I'm looking for those qualified individuals who like my idea and could contribute to my overall aims:
1. raising awareness of food related problems, including binge eating, food allergies, celiac disease, etc.
2. helping provide strategies for living well in spite of the limitations of diet and the body
Let me know if you're interested!
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Quite Possibly the World's Perfect Food
Yes, I know that Chiquita banana used that title as a slogan a few years ago to encourage Americans to eat more bananas, and it is true that bananas are excellent as a snack, a cooking item, and they're awesomely portable, but I'm not convinced that bananas are the world's perfect food. For that, I'd give the prize to my favorite grain - quinoa (pronounced keen-wa). It has to be the most amazing food source ever - without quinoa, the Incans would have had a hard time living well in their high Andes' homes. Without quinoa, I wouldn't have my favorite pasta, or many of the recipes I use. Quinoa is one of the super-foods - one of those nutritional sources that is nearly perfect and has so many vitamins, minerals, etc. that it is heads and shoulders above those pithy normal foods.
Besides being an excellent addition to any meal (and SUPER easy to cook - soak for 30 minutes, rinse, simmer 1 cup with 1.5 cups of water for 15 minutes, and eat), quinoa is also the basis for the only gluten-free pasta I've ever found that is decent to eat. Most rice pastas are icky gummy and don't mimic the feel or taste of regular pasta in any way that could be considered non-parodic. But Ancient Harvest has a quinoa and corn pasta that is absolutely delightful. Tastes and feels pretty much the same as regular pasta, and it's better for you! This is one aspect of having celiac disease that was good. I ate a lot of pasta, and I still eat a lot of...well...quinoa. But just to give you the breakdown, here's what quinoa has compared to our oh-so-loved wheat:
Quinoa is 16.2% protein - wheat is only 14%, Quinoa has 1.2% more fiber than wheat.
But even more important is comparison of the amino acid pattern of quinoa to other grains. As even the box of Ancient Harvest will tell you, quinoa "stands alone as a complete protein grain. It supplies all the essential amino acids in a balanced pattern." In comparison to the ideal reference pattern for evaluating protein, quinoa is almost a perfect match, whereas wheat and soy are so far off the mark, they should be embarrassed to sit next to quinoa.
Quinoa is versatile, filling, and so good for you. It can take the place of rice in a dish, but what I love to do with it (besides cook it with some pine nuts to accent the nuttiness of quinoa itself), is to use it in place of bulgur in tabbouleh. It's light, and so perfect for those hot summer days. I think you could survive and thrive quite well eating quinoa tabbouleh and drinking iced yerba mate tea. The body doesn't need much else!
So while bananas have tried to pass themselves off as the perfect food, and acai berries are doing a good job with PR these days as a perfect food, my vote is and always will be for the following foods: quinoa and goji berries. If you put them together in a sweet-ish dish, you might start levitating because of how healthy you would be.
Besides being an excellent addition to any meal (and SUPER easy to cook - soak for 30 minutes, rinse, simmer 1 cup with 1.5 cups of water for 15 minutes, and eat), quinoa is also the basis for the only gluten-free pasta I've ever found that is decent to eat. Most rice pastas are icky gummy and don't mimic the feel or taste of regular pasta in any way that could be considered non-parodic. But Ancient Harvest has a quinoa and corn pasta that is absolutely delightful. Tastes and feels pretty much the same as regular pasta, and it's better for you! This is one aspect of having celiac disease that was good. I ate a lot of pasta, and I still eat a lot of...well...quinoa. But just to give you the breakdown, here's what quinoa has compared to our oh-so-loved wheat:
Quinoa is 16.2% protein - wheat is only 14%, Quinoa has 1.2% more fiber than wheat.
But even more important is comparison of the amino acid pattern of quinoa to other grains. As even the box of Ancient Harvest will tell you, quinoa "stands alone as a complete protein grain. It supplies all the essential amino acids in a balanced pattern." In comparison to the ideal reference pattern for evaluating protein, quinoa is almost a perfect match, whereas wheat and soy are so far off the mark, they should be embarrassed to sit next to quinoa.
Quinoa is versatile, filling, and so good for you. It can take the place of rice in a dish, but what I love to do with it (besides cook it with some pine nuts to accent the nuttiness of quinoa itself), is to use it in place of bulgur in tabbouleh. It's light, and so perfect for those hot summer days. I think you could survive and thrive quite well eating quinoa tabbouleh and drinking iced yerba mate tea. The body doesn't need much else!
So while bananas have tried to pass themselves off as the perfect food, and acai berries are doing a good job with PR these days as a perfect food, my vote is and always will be for the following foods: quinoa and goji berries. If you put them together in a sweet-ish dish, you might start levitating because of how healthy you would be.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Changing Ideals and Loving Your Body
My friend Sophia let me borrow this book (ok, she told me, you will like this, read it!), and although it is a bit repetitive in parts and probably could have been much shorter to make the same points, it was quite provocative to me as I try to love the body I am in rather than be at odd with it. The book, College Girls by Lynn Peril, traces the trends and discussions surrounding womens entrance into college from the early 19th century until today. It's actually a quite interesting book on many levels (i.e. why are we still having the same debates about the masculinization of women who have careers???), but the part I want to talk about today involves body image and changes in the ideal about women's bodies. A lot of this I knew just from a general sense of history, but some of it was fascinating.
We live in a world dominated by ultra-thin bodies, or at least that's the ideal that is set out for us. With 2/3 of Americans being overweight or obese, though, it is quite clear that we fall far short of the idealized mark. What struck me about College Girls was two things: first, all the pictures of college girls and women from the early 20th century and before show women with healthy curves and a normal body weight. The women aren't tiny; they aren't small. And these were the women being shown to demonstrate that girls in college are normal and beautiful just like girls who didn't go to school. It's a fascinating look at the changes in our beauty standards. The fact that so many letters home to parents quoted in the book read like the opposite of what we desire today is astounding. Rather than worry about the "freshman 15", or what turned out to be in my case "the four year 50", these girls wished to gain weight. They wanted to be pleasing and plump.
At about the same time that women in college was becoming a bit more mainstream, women were also beginning to be taught how to exercise as well - in a womanly way of course! There were even standards for what constituted the perfect athletic woman's body. Let me give you some of the measurements as proposed by Dudley A Sargent, M.D. who directed the Harvard gym and gave these as "A Fine Type of Athletic Figure":
Weight: 118 pounds
Height, standing: 61 3/4 inches
Girth of Chest, full: 33 1/2 inches
Girth of waist: 23 1/4 inches
Girth of Hips: 35 1/4 inches (in Peril, pp 253)
There's a whole bunch more there that is just silly (like who cares about how big around your wrist is???), but I was interested in the fact that the ideal athletic woman at the time was not a small person except in height. 118 pounds seems to conform to today's ideals, but that's for a woman who is 5 feet 1 and 3/4 inches tall! They say you should add 10 pounds for every inch, so that means that as a woman who is 5 feet and 9 inches tall, I should weigh 188 pounds! How's that for a difference from today's ideals! And the ideal woman had hips that were wider than her bust - child bearing hips they used to call them. Now this is an ideal I can live up to!
So it just goes to show that even though we live in a time when the ideal for women is so far removed from what is normal or even possible for most, this hasn't always been the case. I would have been a raging beauty back in the day, whereas today I struggle to love the body I have because it seems bigger than it should be.
Today, then, and every day, I want to remember this and give my body the affirmation it needs. I'm going to look my body straight in the face/eyes (yes, this seems like an odd statement) and give it a hug energetically. I'm going to stop berating it for being what was once considered the standard of beauty, and love what it can do for me. I'm going to love it, period. And yes, this is going to be hard since I have a lot of history with my body and I often feel like it betrays me. But then, my body probably thinks I'm an asshole for being mean to it all the time. That has to change.
We live in a world dominated by ultra-thin bodies, or at least that's the ideal that is set out for us. With 2/3 of Americans being overweight or obese, though, it is quite clear that we fall far short of the idealized mark. What struck me about College Girls was two things: first, all the pictures of college girls and women from the early 20th century and before show women with healthy curves and a normal body weight. The women aren't tiny; they aren't small. And these were the women being shown to demonstrate that girls in college are normal and beautiful just like girls who didn't go to school. It's a fascinating look at the changes in our beauty standards. The fact that so many letters home to parents quoted in the book read like the opposite of what we desire today is astounding. Rather than worry about the "freshman 15", or what turned out to be in my case "the four year 50", these girls wished to gain weight. They wanted to be pleasing and plump.
At about the same time that women in college was becoming a bit more mainstream, women were also beginning to be taught how to exercise as well - in a womanly way of course! There were even standards for what constituted the perfect athletic woman's body. Let me give you some of the measurements as proposed by Dudley A Sargent, M.D. who directed the Harvard gym and gave these as "A Fine Type of Athletic Figure":
Weight: 118 pounds
Height, standing: 61 3/4 inches
Girth of Chest, full: 33 1/2 inches
Girth of waist: 23 1/4 inches
Girth of Hips: 35 1/4 inches (in Peril, pp 253)
There's a whole bunch more there that is just silly (like who cares about how big around your wrist is???), but I was interested in the fact that the ideal athletic woman at the time was not a small person except in height. 118 pounds seems to conform to today's ideals, but that's for a woman who is 5 feet 1 and 3/4 inches tall! They say you should add 10 pounds for every inch, so that means that as a woman who is 5 feet and 9 inches tall, I should weigh 188 pounds! How's that for a difference from today's ideals! And the ideal woman had hips that were wider than her bust - child bearing hips they used to call them. Now this is an ideal I can live up to!
So it just goes to show that even though we live in a time when the ideal for women is so far removed from what is normal or even possible for most, this hasn't always been the case. I would have been a raging beauty back in the day, whereas today I struggle to love the body I have because it seems bigger than it should be.
Today, then, and every day, I want to remember this and give my body the affirmation it needs. I'm going to look my body straight in the face/eyes (yes, this seems like an odd statement) and give it a hug energetically. I'm going to stop berating it for being what was once considered the standard of beauty, and love what it can do for me. I'm going to love it, period. And yes, this is going to be hard since I have a lot of history with my body and I often feel like it betrays me. But then, my body probably thinks I'm an asshole for being mean to it all the time. That has to change.
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