Drivers Wanted? Here We Are!

Buying a car is a complicated matter in our family. It isn't just about finding something that will get us from point A to point B. It is about finding the right balance of practical and fun. Finding an actual option that fits that balance. Making sure that it complements our Jeep Wrangler, which is a permanent member of the family but only seats four and can't carry much cargo.

Then, of course, finding it at a deal we can swallow without choking.

We've been talking about it for years, especially after each major expenditure we made on our lovable but irritating and rapidly deteriorating Jeep Cherokee. Then recently we realized we didn't own a vehicle we'd feel okay about driving cross country. My sanity requires that I have the capacity to drive cross country at all times.

Yesterday the planets finally aligned. We said goodbye to our Cherokee and hello to our new VW TDI Jetta Sportswagon. And when I say new, I actually mean new. We haven't bought new since we ordered the Wrangler nearly 20 years ago. We made the decision based on the same logic this time around: it's a car that holds its value well. The gently used ones we found were nearly as much as the new ones, and if we bought new we could get exactly what we wanted and an awesome warranty.

Here were our main must haves that are now our do haves:

• Standard transmission (more fun to drive!)
• Lots and lots of pep (but pep that flies under the insurance rate radar - and as it turns out we're actually going to save $200/year on insurance!)
• Great gas mileage (possibly nearly triple what our Cherokee got!)
• Low miles (the odometer read 17 when we drove it off the lot!)
• Room for five plus gobs of stuff (but compact enough for easy city driving and parallel parking!)
• Air vents in the back seat so passengers can have a little more climate control (maybe an odd and insignificant deal breaker, but I promised Jack!)

Unexpectedly, we bonded with the dark gray. Who knew? I must say, it looks very sharp parked next to our red Jeep. 

Physical Feat #3: On the Road Again

I decided I'd count what I did today as one of my 50 Physical Feats because it represents what I hope is another turning point since my last post (which, yikes, was over a month ago!).

If I plotted points on a graph to represent my progress since then, it would have some nice highs and some crazy lows with a general rising trajectory. My vitamin and meds regimen has made a difference, but it hasn't been magical. I think the body part of my challenges had a far greater impact on my mind and spirit than I realized. It's been an uphill climb to say the least.

The scariest part was discovering that in my exhaustion and resulting depression, I'd gotten detached from everything that is important to me. It would have been just so easy to let it all go. The image that ran through my mind over and over was releasing the grip of my fingers from the monkey bar. So easy.

I had an epiphany while watching all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer over the past few weeks (yes, that is what I've been up to in the guise of regrouping from meeting the barest minimum of life's requirements). She spends several seasons grappling with her ambivalence about being the slayer, and then ends up sacrificing herself to save the world. Her friends figure out a way to bring her back to life and it seems like all will be well, but she realizes that she doesn't want to be alive again. She disconnects. Then it takes another near-miss with the world ending for her to realize that she doesn't want it to end, and she does want to live.

In a (much less dramatic and less well dressed) way, I am Buffy. The sense of calling to make a difference, the ambivalence, the sacrifice of exhaustion, the prescriptions bringing me back, the renewed ambivalence and disconnection. And I've realized that if I totally disconnect, my little corner of the world will end. I can prevent that if I reconnect.

So I've been trying to get outdoors more. I've been diving deeply into books rather than aimlessly surfing the web. I've been spending more time with Roger and Jack. I've been trying to be more engaged at work. I've been spending more time with friends. I've been playing the piano. I've been eating food that tastes good and is good for me. I've been cleaning and organizing the house so I can enjoy a more pleasant, uncluttered environment. I've been more focused on nurturing my spirituality. Stuff like that. (And it really helped that I turned in grades for the semester!)

I've also been exercising more regularly. This afternoon, for example, instead of taking the nap that I yearned for, I walked to the mouth of the canyon on our city bike trail. I meant to walk back, too, but decided to run some intervals. After the second interval, I just ran. Ran about a mile, all the way back to our neighborhood. I totally surprised myself.

And given the state I've been in for the past few months, I count that as a physical (and mental and emotional) feat.

Reset

Over the past 48 hours or so since I began treatment for my ailments, I have felt the dense layers of fog I've been buried under start to clear away. I'm catching metaphorical glimpses of enough blue sky to make a Dutch boy's britches.

I don't even care if it's just placebo effect at this point. For the first time in a long time, I can imagine being myself again.

Last night while we were getting settled in for bed, I realized I actually felt light hearted. I asked Roger and Jack if they could tell a difference and they both immediately said, "Yes!"

Today I looked at the basket of laundry on the floor and just started folding it. No feeling of overwhelming dread that my arms were too weak or that my brain could not manage it. Seriously, I had reached the point that a basket of laundry felt like too much to bear. A basket of laundry!

What's been especially hard is that I've fallen way behind on my 50 physical feats project. There are things on my list that I've missed or am about to miss because I'm not ready. Things that I won't have an opportunity to do again until next year. So I'm adjusting my plans and instead of finishing at the end of 2013, I'm giving myself through to the day before my 51st birthday in July 2014 to finish. And that's okay, because the whole thing is meant to be a joyful adventure, not a weight on my soul.

It might take a while to get back up to speed. It might not. But I'm grateful that I'm no longer falling deeper into the abyss.

I am reset and moving forward.

I Will Not Die

At least not from anything I'm aware of anytime soon. And even better, I am not crazy!

Yesterday I went to a followup appointment with the doctor and she went over the results of the myriad of blood tests they did. Everything looked really great except for a few things which explain a lot. I have now embarked on a regimen in an effort to set those things right.

(Frankly, I am not much for regimens. But I'm relieved and hopeful that it will help fix me. So I will follow the regimen.)

The small things: I was slightly dehydrated at the time of the test and I have a minor vitamin D deficiency (the doctor laughed when I asked if I could blame three months of inversion for that). The regime: drink more water and take a prescription level dose of vitamin D twice a week for three months.

The expected thing: Hypothyroidism. Not a severe case, but the indicator was enough below the bottom of the healthy range to impact my energy level. The regime: A daily pill, maybe for the rest of life. I can't say I'm happy about joining the ranks of people who have to take a pill every day. But I am happy that in the scheme of things it is a small sacrifice to make for increased metabolism (and maybe less itchy skin).

The surprising thing: A severe vitamin B12 deficiency. I'm getting plenty in my diet, but for whatever reason my body isn't absorbing it. This could explain why I have been able to function at a reasonable level for only a few hours each day before crashing. And why it's been so hard to make my brain focus. And why my memory keeps failing me. And why my hands tingle. And why it feels like I want to jump out of my skin. I did some googling, and came up with this article from the New York Times. Apparently elderly people are sometimes misdiagnosed with dementia when what they really have is a vitamin B12 deficiency. I confess that over the past month I felt like I might be going nuts. It is comforting that it appears I am not. The regime: weekly B12 shots for the next month and daily B12 supplements.

I will go back for a followup in three months. Or better yet, my old self will be going.

Reflection

It never fails.

Both of my jobs involve teaching and counseling with people. Of course, what I hope is that the people I work with come away from our conversations with some new insight or information that will be valuable for them. Or at least a reminder of something they'll hear differently this time and maybe remember.

What I know is that I usually do.

I recently spoke with a 20-year-old man who expressed bewilderment that a good woman had fallen in love with him. He had, he said, been doing drugs since he was 13. But he'd met her during his longest stretch of sobriety, when all sorts of things in his life were falling into place. Then he used again and screwed it all up.

What could she possibly have seen in him? he wondered.

I found myself saying something like this: It's so easy to see the "bad" things we do or think or say as reflecting our "real" selves. It's so hard to see that the good things reflect us as well, and maybe even more so. I'm not sure why our self-perception can get so scallywompus. But it can and often does.

I need to remember that.

Out of the Mouths

Warning: Explicit language ahead. So sorry. But, well, it expresses the point I was trying to make so succinctly.

One topic we discuss in the class I teach at the jail is how we react when we're called on something and how our reaction affects what happens to us next. We talk mostly in the context of being on good terms with people in the workplace, about not getting fired. And, okay, a little in the context of how to avoid being put in the hole.

"Hey," said a student from the back of the classroom. "If someone gives me shit, I'm going to give them shit right back."

"And then what do you get?" I asked.

He shrugged and grinned, "More shit."

Boom.

Tests

I've been more silent here on my blog than I've meant to be. I thought I would roar into 2013 with all of my plans. But mostly I've been tired. Deep-in-my-bones tired.

So tired, I actually went to see a doctor today.

That may not sound like a very big deal, but in the world inside my head it is a Very Big Deal. I rarely go to the doctor. I am seriously averse to being patronized when I report vague symptoms. Like fatigue.

Will find out what stories my blood has to tell early next week.