Treading Water

Do you ever just stop when you are swimming and gently tread water and look around you? You take in the sky, the trees, the sounds of summer and wonder how you can miss this stuff on a consistent basis because you are so busy trying to get through the next thing. My days have become small increments of getting through. I get through work by blocking off my day in increments and counting down the increments. I get through the week waiting for the weekend. I push myself into getting a certain number of things done per evening, per week etc. My life goes into a tailspin if it gets out of hand because I lose control in my mind.

I am so out of control in some areas that I’m obsessive about others. The result is that I don’t always stop and enjoy just treading water. I don’t take the time to feel the coolness against my skin, the feeling of freedom from gravity, the joy in the song of a bird, and the sun shining on my face.

I’m not happy at work. My job is boring and it’s just a job. There is nothing exciting or challenging or even remotely stimulating about it. It is merely a paycheck to keep a roof over our head and health insurance. A trained monkey could do my job. I think my job would be more interesting if they would give me some freedom, let go of the short leash they have me on, quit micromanaging me and let me actually DO my job and work with my vendors and customers. However, I feel that I’m just the paper pusher behind the scenes, stifled in a corner while other people get to go DO. It’s suffocating. I don’t look forward to going to work in any remote way. I only look forward to going home and thus the past 2 ½ years of my life have passed in this manner. I’m only thankful that I HAVE A job in this economy.

The summer is half over and I have not taken the time NOT ONCE, to lie out in the pool. This used to be one of my favorite pass times. I could easily have given Sookie Stackhouse a run for her money in the tan department. I have not thrown ONE pool party or dinner party. My deck isn’t even cleaned off nor is the patio around the pool. The lawn furniture has not been cleaned because we haven’t used it.

Instead, this summer has been one giant unending cycle of cleaning house, working in the garden, preserving foods, stressing out and trying to overbook myself to keep me from thinking. I’ve been planning huge 60th birthday parties, Infertility Journey group for church, exercise sessions with friends, fall garden projects, but I haven’t just enjoyed the stage I am in, which is mid summer, with veggies coming in, opportunities to fire up the grill and eat healthy. I’ve barely used anything from my garden…it has gone into cans and in freezer bags for the winter and we have been living off sandwiches and quick heavy pasta’s because I’m so busy dealing with the produce. I haven’t even ENJOYED canning, I’m just doing it to get it done. Then what do I do? I complain about it.

This blog that was going to be full of fun and insight and keeping me sane has gone down hill on a consistent basis to drivel about weightloss plateaus and disappointing charts. I keep making promises to myself to pull my bootstraps up and start writing something worth reading again, but I don’t even take the time to do that.

I’m being forced on a TTC break thanks to a ruptured cyst and resulting infection. I’m not happy about it at all. I want to cry if I let myself think too long on it but the choice has been taken from me. I’ve been living with constant pain and soreness in my abdomen for two weeks now. I start antibiotics today. Follow up appt next Monday.

For the next month, I can solely focus on my weight/diet and LIVING. I don’t want to look back and say “I wasted five years of my life waiting on a child that never came.” Right now, I look back and feel that I’ve wasted so much of the last three years of my life being obsessed with that next phase of our family that I’ve lost precious time of just living. I read back over this blog and I’ve had this same argument several times so I am at a loss of how to actually accomplish living. How do you learn how to live?

I’m relatively happy. I’m not depressed. I appreciate so many things in my life and I try to be thankful for those and focus on those: the joy of dogs who love me like crazy, a supportive husband, my ability to turn a few ingredients into an orgasm for your mouth, a ripe tomato, a lovely home that has stood through many a storm (even if the moldings, cabinets and counters are stuck in the 80’s). I have recently rediscovered my love for going to the movies with my husband. An activity we abandoned some time ago due to the expense but we have taken it up again as “us” time in our busy schedules.

How do you live? What activities make you feel your life means something? I keep moving in the direction of trying to help others through their infertility struggles, starting groups etc but I’m having second thoughts on this. I feel like it’s dragging me down in the same muck that I’m stuck in now and I need to get OUT of the mire, not further immersed. I need a break from my own fertility issues and maybe giving it “a bigger meaning” by helping others isn’t the best way to do that In this moment.

McFatty Monday update: still stuck on the plateau. No loss this week. Going to work on furthering the low carb endeavors and working out harder.

I really want to write. I love to write, but if I don’t talk about fertility or weightloss, what would be interesting for anyone to read much less me to write? I’m in a very confused moment right now. Before posting this, I ran over to Blair's Blog to see what her questions of the day are and saw this paragraph:

Why is it that weight loss is such a journey? (& why does it always feel like such a whiney one?) I wish I could wave a magic wand that made every week be fantastic, that made medications not alter appetite, that made it easy to admit that I just couldn’t hack it when it came to losing another round of big numbers. Is it because I’m afraid of success? Am I afraid to be deserving of good things, to want good things for myself, & to make them happen? In weight loss, but maybe even in life?

I wanted to weep because she always sums everything up so well and I feel the same way but not just about weightloss....about fertility. I am definately struggling right now trying not to think that I deserve what I get (or don't get) because I haven't done enough or worked hard enough or I'm not perfect enough, or nice enough. As for that question? Sometimes I wonder what I've learned about myself through this journey. Everytime I think I've learned a lesson, I have to relearn it.