More naked

Panic. I am panic tonight. I decided to wear my favourite shirt and it was too big. All of a sudden I felt terribly naked. I still feel it, more naked than just my skin would be. Isn't it ridiculous? All this time I thought that carrying extra weight was a sign of weakness, when really it's been the sign of an ongoing battle with my own body. As the extra me sort of whittles away, I'm left feeling exposed and unsafe. I'm not trying to lose weight, I'm just trying to create harmony and order in my thoughts and actions, and this is how my body has responded. I feel...what? I feel just as out of control of this as I did of my weight.

I had a childhood friend tell me once that she remembered me when I was 'thin and pretty'. I'm thinking to myself that I might always have been pretty. What does it mean?

I know for certain that my body and spirit have never responded to restriction with anything but rebellion. I know that I have never shamed myself into any lasting change. So maybe what scares me so intensely is that this feels like a greater change than weight shed. It feels more profound, like I am just touching the edges of some greater understanding.

In the meantime, I will notice myself being afraid and uncomfortable, and I will ask a husband to hug me, and I will do my best to let the fear go.

I went for a beautiful hike today. I hike with the Community Recreational Initiatives Society (CRIS for short). There was a nippy little breeze, but in among the trees it was just perfect. It was good to be out, to connect to the world of snow and not have it be an inconvenience, or something I had to work around. It was just part of the day, and it was perfect for snowballs, too. I'm glad I went, but I'm kind of shocked at how tired I was afterwards. We were out for a couple hours; not on terribly challenging trails, but by the time we were done all I wanted was a nap. I feel so convalescent, which isn't unreasonable, I suppose. I've only been out of the hospital for a week or so. I'm finding it difficult to balance the needs of my IBS with those of my diabetes, but I'm going to be seeing a dietitian to help with that. Tonight it's just a little hard to be sick again, still, whatever. I'm trying to remember that even sick I do things that are good.

One of the things I've learned from CRIS is that I'm much more interested in finding out what I can do than in enumerating the things I can't. So, apparently I can hike for 2 hours in the snow, as long as I plan a nap. Unfortunately, I have set myself a whole list of things I 'should' be doing, regardless of how I feel. This is unproductive, but I seem to do it pretty regularly anyway. My house feels grubby, and I still don't quite feel up to the task of getting it not-grubby. Is it okay for me to be a little afraid of how tired I am? I guess it'll have to be. I'm torn, you see, between feeling crappy and knowing that I tend to stagnate in the winter. I know I sometimes don't do stuff because my mood is down, and that leads to more not doing, which leads into the Pit of Despair. Push, don't push...I keep waiting for this to get simpler.

The simplest fact of my life is that it's mine, I guess. I'll just have to do what I can.

Today I am forty-two. It's funny. I always felt like I was so much older than my age, and now I feel so much younger than it. Perhaps it's only that I've finally got enough years to fit all the events comfortably. I don't know, but I feel joyful today. I feel victorious. My insides still ache some, and I know it's going to take a while for that to calm (assuming it ever does). But I feel like I've regained my optimism, that ridiculous spark of belief that has carried me so far. I want to believe that things will work out, and so, eventually I do. One good thing I can see out of all the tests at the hospital is that apart from the IBS and all my other existing health concerns, I'm absurdly healthy. I'm still epileptic, and I'm still diabetic, but they're both well controlled. The doctor told me that my results were "pristine" and that he wished his were as good. While it wasn't comforting in the middle of my pain, I find it comforting now. Ever since the stroke, and my sister's death a few years after that, I've had this terrible feeling that I was dying. That something was very wrong, and we just didn't know. It has been more than just a feeling, actually, it has been a rock-solid belief that creeps up from time to time, usually when I'm stressed. So while I'm doing as much dying day-to-day as anyone else, I can be sure I'm doing as much living, too. Maybe more. I'm aiming for more, that's for sure.

So thank you, Universe, for another year. Thank you for hope, and for conviction. Thank you for the people I love, the people that love me, and thank you for everyone else. Thank you for my peace, thank you for my healing, and thank you for giving me the lessons you have.

I auditioned for Canada's Got Talent, and I'm waiting to hear whether I made it to the judges audition. E-mails are supposed to be going out by the fifteenth, and I'm starting to worry. Worrying is counter-productive, I know, but I start my whole run of 'what if' questions. What if I make it. What if I don't. What if I'm not as good as I hope I am. Bleah. My monkey-mind is in full gear, and pelting me with rotting bananas. There's no point in trying to answer the questions, it's all theoretical, and there's nothing I can do now to change the outcome in any case. Time to stop. Time to breathe and be grateful for the moment, and to live in it fully.

Okay, so deep breath. Today I'm going to make pumpkin pie, and then I'm going over to my friend Cheryl's place for dinner. I'm grateful for my friends, grateful for my darling Kelly, who will be there too. I'm especially grateful for pumpkin pie. With whipped cream. Oh yes, and other food. I'm sure there will be some other food, too. It's just that pumpkin pie is an especial favourite. I've still got some apples from my Mata's tree, and they need to be used up, so I'll probably make apple pie, too. I might even share.

It's so easy to forget what I know about peace and living in the now. Does everyone have to keep learning the same lessons, or am I just especially special? In some ways I have an advantage. I forget stuff. It's a brain injury thing. I get to see movies for the first time twice or even three times, and even then I may get another first time in six months or a year. I'm never sure what will stick or what will disappear. Maybe that's why I worry about the future so obsessively. I want some control over my moments, some assurance that I will be permitted to keep them. There's a lot of my past that I'm really okay with losing, though it is a strange sort of way to live, here on an island of 'now' attached only tenuously to 'then'. I think it's that illusion of connection that draws me into thinking about the future. A future that hasn't happened yet is something I can remember perfectly well, in my imaginings.

I don't want to lose 'now' in favour of that illusion. I want to make pie and have dinner, and not worry about what's in my e-mail or not. Things will work out as they do, right? They always have before, somehow or another. Whatever's next will be next whether I tie myself in knots over it or not. Deep breath again. Going to make pie.