Today I set myself a goal.  I said I wanted to write five thousand words in the Sam and Mitch story, and I wanted to work out for two hours.  I met both goals, and fact exceeded both just a little.

The story is going okay.  I'm in the opening again, and it's clear what I'm putting down isn't quite right, but it's giving me the momentum to get back to the bit I posted as teaser the other day, and however you slice it, I'm getting words.  I'm thinking this story would do well around 80k, so if I write 5k a day, that's sixteen days.  So I'm going to try and hit 5k every day for the next sixteen days and get myself a draft.  I'm sure this is not going to work quite as smoothly/easily as all that, but I'll give it a go regardless.  And then it's Temple Boy, goddamn it.  I don't care how loudly STB knocks.  It's going to wait.

The fitness goal was because I've been so very, very bad lately about exercising, and it's starting to take its toll on me both physically and mentally.  I feel better now going to bed than I've felt in some time, and I actually got a lot done today.  I'll get more done tomorrow if even a fraction of this energy bleeds over. Which is good, because there's laundry.

The one really educational thing today was that when I began this exercise I was so tired and dull it was almost superhuman effort just to make my fingers go.  I couldn't imagine how my brain was going to get on board, but it did, and the more I worked, the better I became.  The same was true and with even starker shifts of the physical aspect.   But the most telling thing was that in both instances I could not get started until I let go, until I told myself there was no agenda, that I only had to do what I could, that yes, there was this goal, and we would keep at it, but it was just "two hours of exercise," not "get through the whole chart," and it was 5k, not three chapters that were so beautiful God would weep to read them.  I didn't have to sell anything, and I didn't have to cure cancer.  Just good work, and it was all between myself and my own limits.  It felt very good.  I hope I don't have to get that exhausted, anxious, and off the rails to find that spot again.

I will now reward myself with a bit of Spider solitaire.  I already answered all my email and popped into my groups, and after a few rounds of cards, I'll shower and read in bed.  Then do it all again tomorrow.

I have spent the week cleaning and working out. There surely were other activities as well, but I don't know what they were. A few phone calls, a lovely visit from ooshiny and her loved ones, and some viewing of House because there must always be a viewing of House. Dan has been sick and is getting damn tired of it, which I empathize with, though it's harder because I'm feeling so damn good it's hard to do anything but bounce. And by "feel good" I mean that I have energy. I'm sore, still, especially in the shoulders, which is why there has been so much focus on working out, because I want to move the arms and shoulders into the place where the hips are, which is feeling a lot more solid and stable and generally in the place where they should be. But I think the shoulders are just a bit fucked, personally. PT appointment in half an hour; will know more after, maybe.

Tomorrow is Coraline day. We are all trekking down to WDM to see the movie in 3-D at Jordan Creek's theater, and carylerg and mary35 will be in attendance as well. jeffreyjingles is a loser and staying home, though I hear he's coming for food later. I have plans to take the laptop along and ask the Apple store to check the battery, and at some point Caryle and I will kick out everyone else and watch the latest BSG on Hulu.

That's the report from this desk. I leave you with the Coraline trailer, which Anna has watched about a bazillion times. Also the official movie site, where you can make your own Coraline flower among other things.



Oh, and here's Neil Gaiman talking about buttons.

 I'm not sure what precisely what triggered it--new vitamins, herbal supplements, a fantastically huge energy release, some good mediations, the culmination of weeks of hard work,  Mercury leaving retrograde, or a cocktail of several or all of these things--but whatever made the switch, I'm very glad, because I am starting to feel pretty good, more good than bad, and the past four days in particular have been very, very good.  And today when I went to the weight room, I had to up all my weights, some significantly, because they weren't any work anymore, and I was able to add several I'd been told to wait on until I was stronger.  Then I worked on "real" fitness equipment instead of the grandma and grandpa machine, I worked very hard, and I have yet to crash after.

Basically I am back on all the vitamins I was on two years ago, minus the weird adrenal special-order ones that cost $60 a bottle and the chromium, plus some ginko biloba and ginseng.  Having the B-vitamins back helps, but I am of the opinon that the ginko is doing a lot of the heavy lifting.  My head is a lot clearer--well, except for the lingering sinus pressure from a cold I cannot shake, but beyond that, I'm very good.  My arms still hurt a lot, but it's less every day, except when I'm cycling through to a new level of muscular health, and then I really, really hurt, but now I'm starting to trust that it will go away, especially if I keep working.  My hips hurt only occasionally, and a little anti-inflammatory med takes care of it spit spot.  I am loving my weight training right now.  Sometimes it's really hard, and today when I added the new hip work, it was so tough I had to shut my eyes and breathe through it, but it feels so good when it starts to work.

I had a long, long conversation with my favorite doctor on the planet, and I have an appointment with her March 13 to have a physical and do this thing up proper, but she asked me several questions, heard the story of what I've been doing, and said that she didn't want to upset me, but she suspected that I probably did have fibromyalgia after all.  BUT, unlike the asshole doctor, she explained to me what living with that meant, and why what I was experiencing made her think that, and how important it was for me to keep moving, especially when I hurt.  The more I hurt, she said, the more I should move.  Yesterday I put that to the test, doing a lot of (careful) arm work after dealing with a lot of pain all day, and after I did the exercises, I did feel much better until the evening.  She talked me through when to take muscle relaxants and when not to, and she debunked a lot of the whacked out granola stuff I'd gotten from another source last week.  But she also agreed that, yes, given my family history and my situation in general, the more vegetables and more healthy in general I can eat, the better I will feel, and the more sugar I can avoid, the better, but more because there's a strong track record of people who just don't process sugar well than anything else.

Essentially today I am feeling very informed and empowered, and educated, and the fact that I have now been working out (to a degree) daily and regularly for over a month makes me feel good, especially as now I am seeing a marked jump in my performance.  I also notice that, despite the arm pain, I can do things like haul my purse and a heavy bag across the car to the passenger seat without hurting.  I didn't realize that it hurt until today, when, for the first time, it did not.

I have one more PT appointment this Friday, which I'm going to use to grill them extensively about what I should and shouldn't do in exercise, what I should be looking for, and what I should aim for.  I'm going to spend the rest of February working hard to keep upping my routine, slowly and carefully, going a minimum of twice a week, aiming for three or four times, and working out in at least a minimal way every day.  My goal is to get back with a trainer in March, and by the time the roads are clear enough and the weather is warm enough for bike riding*, I want to be biking Anna to school from then until the end of the year, taking extra time for an extended ride several days a week once I drop her off.

I have no weight goals, though I'd love to be writing that I weigh 200 pounds or less by this time next year.  Once I hit that, I really don't give a damn what I weigh; 180 is the average for my height.  Mostly I want to feel good.  I don't want to hurt.  I want to feel strong and fit physically, and I want maintaining that to feel like a comforting routine, one I embrace and not in any way resent.

For the first time, ever, I feel like I'm off to a good start.

 So.  Apparently the pattern is that exercise or massage will initially make me feel wonderful, then I will feel awful, and after some rest, I will feel around 70% of par.  Also, apparently eating a lot of vegetables and staying away from too much simple sugars and starches will help with the adrenal crash/high cycle.

Noted.

Now if I could just get my upper arms to not feel frozen.  They were fine all day.

Setting a timer for 40 minutes.  I'm going to write a short story that popped into my head before bed last night, and then I'm going to go lie on the foam roller and lift three pound weights.  Then apply the biofreeze pre-emptively.

I'm serious.  I've had enough of this.  You want a piece of me, life?  COME AND FUCKING GET ME.

 As I mentioned, last night I went to a new massage therapist who talked about lymph nodes and other things.  She actually referred to my physical status as "a challenge," said with some relish, an attitude I appreciate, because I certainly don't enjoy this much.  I fixated, as you can tell by the icon, on the notion that my lymphatic system only clears through movement, and as a result I have been moving.  A lot.  Probably too much, but a lot of it is little stuff, like rotating my hips like a belly dancer every now and again and raising my arms and stretching.  Also, I am drinking absolutely ridiculous amounts of water.  

But today I also went to the gym for an hour.  I was only on cardio equipment for about twenty-five minutes, at the beginning and the end with that time split between those sessions; the rest of it I was using rubber bands and doing leg lifts and, for the most of that middle period, laying on the foam roller and swishing my hips on the yoga ball.  I could not stop the latter.  I looked like that kid in your preschool who had found the rocking motion comforting and just couldn't quit, or Anna's hum when she's concentrating.  It felt good.  It felt really, really good.  So I kept swishing, and rocking, and circling, then circling the other direction.

When I was done, I felt great.  Not quite as great as when I came home from massage therapy last night--I'd gone to the appointment at 5:30 half-comatose and wincing, begging Dan to please go to the store after I got back because I just couldn't bear the thought.  When I came home, I was bouncy and peppy, and when I saw Dan looking wiped, I coaxed Anna along with me, then cheerfully did the shopping until 8PM, then put everything away myself.  Then stayed up watching House.  But as I went to bed, the ache started to return, and a shorter version of that happened today after the workout.  With heat and rest the pain seems to go away, and God bless Biofreeze, but so far the cycle is, release and energy, and then OMG OWWWW! Couch! Bed! Biofreeze!  Heating pad!  

At this point I am tracking symptoms before I go to a doctor, and despite the pain, I'm trying to move.  I am also eating and drinking vegetables like crazy.  I was already craving them with an intensity that had my right eyebrow lifting, but after talking to the massage therapist, it makes sense.  But I am already not happy with what I know they will tell me.  So far various health professionals have tossed out adrenal fatigue and chronic fatigue, and now I am hearing fibromyalgia and even lyme disease.  Dan even tossed MS into the mix (thanks, hon).  I really don't know what the hell it is, and I only care so much as it pertains to giving me direction of what to do to make it go away.

It's also about now I want to rant and scream at the uselessness of the traditional health care system and insurance companies.  I know I could get an appointment tomorrow and get painkillers and muscle relaxants.  This is all that would get paid for--this and 80% of a battery of tests which would just get me more specific painkillers and muscle relaxants.  Maybe, if I were really lucky, I could get some PT.  But the lymph massage and energy therapy and gym membership?  The biofreeze?  No.

I guess I did just rant, in the short version anyway.

For the moment, though, I'm back in that adrenal shit.  Energy is hard to come by.  It was happening in Novemeber, but I tried to say it was just a fluke.  It's not.  I know that reiki works, but at $60 a session and the massage which is $70--well, it's nice being married to a pharmacist, but it comes with lots of school debt and bills, and we had that house thing.  Yeah, that's not stuff we have lying around.  Again, IT WOULD BE NICE IF OUR FUCKING HEALTH CARE PAID FOR STUFF THAT ACTUALLY WORKED.  Also, if my local health care providers allowed by my insurance were not [deleted for strong anger and adult language beyond even the usual cussing].  Because now I'm looking at $60 energy therapy sessions, $70 massage therapy sessions, and $300 for a new hormone test, and $500 for the doctor visit out of network--not to mention the driving and gas, because the doctor is two hours away.  It makes the thirty dollar santa present I need to go get by Saturday before it goes off sale feel extravagant--but guess what I'm cutting, a massage or my kid's present?  Actually, what will happen is I'll buy the present, say I won't go to the massage, hurt like hell, and Dan will make me go, cutting something for himself, and then I"ll make him do it anyway.  We're like the O Henry story if they'd had credit cards.

All this and I am not going to get the socks done by Sunday, damn it.

So I don't know what's going on with my body, and it's affecting my energy and my brain and my work output.  I'm also not getting my rosy Christmas stuff in.  Yesterday I swear it was Monday December 1, and now suddenly tomorrow is Friday the 5th.  What the hell.  Well, I'm going to win anyway.  My hips hurt, and so do the joints of my shoulders, but not much if I sit, at least right now.  My gluteal muscles are oddly cold, as if there is not blood getting there, and my legs are sort of tingly.  I'm better than I was, but not tons.  I will endeavor to get to the doctor next week, and I'll try not to chew their heads off in my rage over their incompetence.  Or I won't.  But what I am going to do is make Christmas cookies this weekend.  I'm going to put away the laundry and get the house in some damn order, and I'm going to have Crystal and Her Man over on Saturday night, and I'm going to get some writing in, starting tonight.  So I'll be slower than I want, but I'll stop and meditate and rest and have a lot of extension cords for the heating pad.

And this will go away, or I will make it bow to me.  I swear to god.  I don't care if I hurt every time I get off that stairmaster.  I am fucking getting on that goddamned stairmaster.  Three times a fucking week.  JUST TO PISS WHATEVER THIS IS OFF.

So.  Off to piano.  Except--wait, what time is it at?!  Phew.  5.  Okay.  

See?  Winning already.

 I learned many things this evening.  Chiefly, I learned how vital the lymphatic system is, and how messed up mine has become.  I learned that I need to set a timer for every 45 minutes at the computer and then take a walk around the block.  I learned that the cravings I've had for veggies lately is because that's the best thing for my lymphatic system.  I learned that there is no pump for the lymphatic system except movement or massage.

I will be going to the gym tomorrow to ride the bike, and I will begin in earnest a campaign to get one for home.  Somehow.  

I love my new massage therapist.  I love her a lot.

 Thirty minutes: I took a walk/jog around the neighborhood, then came back and did some yoga and stretchy things and a few situps.  Stomach still feels like blubber, but my shoulders are a little better and I am more alert now after shitty sleep than I was yesterday even after a nap.

Four year-old Heidi, you get to do the things you want to do, better, stronger, faster, and with more satisfaction if you take better care of the body.  Please try to remember.

A special thanks to Atomic Kitten, Sugababes, Gary Barlow, the Scissor Sisters, and the Genuis playlist system in general.

I went to bed last night at ten, because despite a nap, I was still tired.  I woke at 12:30, a little too warm, and I paddled to the bathroom for the usual.  I came back to bed, but at best I could enter an odd semi-dream-not-sleeping state.  At 3AM I admitted I was not going to sleep anymore and finished Wonder Boys.  Then I slept from 4:30 until 7.

This is the one day I substitute teach this week.  Thank God it's at the place I taught last year and only half a day.

I think this is the point where I come to Jesus over the fact that my body needs a hard kick in the proverbial patootie.  I am too soft all around.  I have very poor muscle strength.  My eating isn't awful, but it needs to become the epitome of awesome.  I need to make radical changes, and they need to become the new normal.  I have to do this because I just don't function like I should right now, and clearly waiting this out isn't working.

I would say I should wade in, but it doesn't work.  Neither does radical change, though.  I think I need to have an idealized goal of what I will be doing and eating and how I will feel inside my skin, then work towards it for six months, then reassess how realistic the goal was and what I need to change.  Because I can't write sometimes because I"m so tired, but then I can't sleep.  My legs fall asleep when I sit in chairs.  I feel doughy in my middle and my shoulder scream with pain because the muscles are distended from slouching.  

When I was twenty, I hated how I looked because I thought I was fat.  When I was twelve, I thought I was fat.  What I was that entire time was a female with heavy German ancestry of farmers and women who hefted things.  Part of my problem is that my two sisters are both slender and ballet-like in their grace and beauty, and even my brother is rangy.  I always feel like the fat elephant around them, and I translate that to being ugly, too.  This isn't true--we have the same genes, and we're all four quite handsome.  

And I can spot the metaphor here.  What I need to do to my body is make it strong, to allow it to be the strong it actually is well-equipped to be.  I need to change my mind more than my body; my body has been ready to be fantastically athletic since birth.  I think, in fact, that my body is bored.  I think my brain craves sugar for the comfort hit, and my body likes it because it's something to do.  I always feel so good whenever I exercise in any way; it is genuinely a pleasure.  I feel good when I eat well.  But there is a four year-old in my head that is FURIOUS that this is even happening at all, and why the hell does she have to do this?  And I keep letting her win.

I keep trying to do this, but I keep getting derailed by one of two things: either something with writing comes up and I can't bear the idea of taking time away, or I get sick.  If I get a good routine going, it always fails for one of those two things.  I hired a trainer this fall for three sessions, partly in an effort to combat this; I bailed.  Part of the reason this time, though, was the regimen she had me on was so easy I was bored, and it didn't feel like it did much.  It made my shoulders okay.  And when I tried to keep up the gym, on the last day I went it was a nightmare of this woman turning the TV on so loud I could hear it over my headphones.  I felt so much rage at her and then the workout in general that it was good I didn't have a weapon.  Then nanowrimo happened, and I never came back. 

What I need right now is a schedule, and I need energy.  Waiting for it is not working.  I'm going to have to go counter-intuitive and expend more energy to make more.  And I need to buy the four year-old a box of crayons.