Oh, so that's what I've been doing wrong!

Over the last couple months, I've been growing more and more... frustrated?  Stressed?  Annoyed?

Whatever it is, it's been bad.  It feels like the sky has grayed out, which is, in my experience, one of the signs that I'm depressed.  Naturally, I've been concerned about this.

But the thing is, I haven't felt depressed.  I've been smiling less, true, and I've been seeing some of the symptoms... but not all of them.  Not even half of the ones I'm so familiar with, really.  Which, to my mind, meant I was in the "danger zone", but not actually depressed yet.  Mostly just stressed, which is no minor thing--stress affects an awful lot--but it's not the inescapable spiral of the depression.

So okay.  I've been aware of this, as I say, for a couple of months.  And it's been frustrating:  I'm finding myself frequently aggravated with people who aren't really doing anything wrong.  I've been finding myself wanting to snap over things which, hey, would annoy anyone, but they're probably annoying me a bit more than they should.

And, you know, Hilary's condition isn't helping.

But it wasn't until today that I realized what the problem was.  And in a way, it's gratifying, because I was right:  I haven't been depressed.

I've been without Joy. 

Joy is seriously freaking important.  Which we knew:  I'm sure there are plenty of studies out there on the effects of love on a person's personality, and the effects of vacation on productivity, and so forth.  Some day when I need post material I'll go dig those studies up.

But what I hadn't realized is that a lack of joy was what was affecting me.  I've been busy, okay:  there are times when I don't see my best friend the whole week, and I barely read fanfiction at all these days; I cook less because I don't have time, and I don't do yoga anymore, and I don't even have a cat these days, much less a significant other.  I don't have time:  I go to work, I come home, I sleep; I go to school, I come home, I volunteer, I go to work; I visit my sister, I come home, I do homework, I sleep.  No time.  I am not making this up or exaggerating.  No.  Time.

I've been trying for almost a month to get together with my college advisers (somebody decided it would be best for us to have two, for some reason), and of course the schedules haven't been meshing, but the reason I've been trying to get ahold of them is because I've known subconsciously what I just figured out the reason for:  I can not do this another quarter.  Next quarter I must have a lighter schedule, because I almost had a breakdown over a lost earring today, and that's really not acceptable.

Even if it was one of my favorite earrings.

And the reason for all this is, no joy.  Joy is what makes everything else worth it, and without joy, it really hasn't been seeming worth it.  I've been wondering what the heck I'm bothering for, really. 

And it's not like my reasons have gone away; I just... forgot, for a little while:

When I'm dating, I want to be the sort of person my significant other is proud of.  When I'm a mother, I want to be able to support my children.  When I go to Meeting, I want to be an elder, and I want to support my community.  I want to be the person that other people lean on.  When I look back on my life from the age of eighty, I want to be able to say honestly that I lived up to my full potential and, consistently, helped people. 

That's all stuff in the future; but to get to the future, I need a solid base now.  That's why I'm doing this. 

But it's hard to remember that when you don't have time to go see any of the people you love.

Well, that's one way to put it.

This article, I feel, wins some sort of an award for best introductory paragraph.

And yes, we did already know that... sort of.

Things learned sitting in a cold car on the way back from the ICU

I haven’t been updating this blog for a while; the cardinal sin of blogs, I know.  I have to tell you, that anaconda I mentioned a while back?  It hasn’t quite managed to, oh, masticate and digest me (I don’t think anacondas masticate anyway, but go with it), but it’s definitely got at least a grip on me with its jaws.  And if I’m going to drop anything to keep myself from going down in flames, I have to say, the not-for-profit, maybe-three-readers-a-week blog is going to be the one I put on hold.

I apologize: I know how disappointing that probably is to my three readers.

Sorry.

I’m taking the time to post now, though, because I really need to just chill for a while, and I suspect that posting to the blog will do it.

So, the anaconda thing:  It’s a little frustrating.  Because, I have to tell you, I wasn’t going to get swallowed by the anaconda at all.  I was going to make it—boy howdy, was I going to make it; I was on top of everything—except that people kept getting blood clots.

First it was a friend of mine.  He was in terrible condition, but he’s much better now; up and walking around and basically back to being awesome again. 

Now, it’s my sister.

I’m not terribly comfortable talking about my sister’s condition on the internet, so I’m going to leave it at “she’s in very bad shape”.  If you’re someone who prays, please do.

But this blog is, after all, about the things I learn for myself re: being a healthy individual, and I have learned something from all this.  It’s something important that I really do have to share.  And you needed to know that bit about my sister to understand it.

Anecdote number one:

I skipped a class today.  We had a lecture and then a quiz, and I asked to take the quiz and then leave, and they let me.  There was a review session on Monday for the same class, and I skipped it, too.  And you know, I could have gotten a higher score on that quiz—about 20%-25% higher, I’m guessing, although they haven’t graded it yet—if I had stayed.  I decided it wasn’t worth it.

But I let the TA's know why I was leaving.

Anecdote number two:

I had a total meltdown on Saturday.  Basically, I had that one day to catch up on everything, and my boss told me (in a non-optional sort of way) that I had to come in and work a double.  I looked at everything I needed to do, realized I couldn’t do it all, and started just sobbing.

I cried for about an hour and half, and then I sort of pulled myself together while visiting my sister (for all of about three minutes, because I was already late) before going on in to work.  I got to work, and someone asked me if I was okay; I put on my apron, and another person asked me if I was okay; I walked onto the floor, and a third person asked if I was alright…

…and I started sobbing again.

I explained to management that I was in a somewhat altered emotional state, and that I could not pretend to be normal long enough to give the guests a pleasant experience.  My managers, sympathetic, sent me home.  Another server traded me my scheduled shift that evening, too, which blew me away:  all of a sudden, I was able to get everything done, spend time with my family, and have enough time to get my head on straight and recover. 

Needless to say, my sympathetic managers also know about my sister.

Other than that, though, I haven't been talking about it.  I've been reluctant to tell people about her, in part because, if I’m not taking time off of (whatever) specifically so that I can spend it with her, I feel like I’m using her as an excuse to do just what I wanted to do, anyway. 

Except, as I realized tonight, that’s not it, really.

What is it, is that the stuff I want to do: get ahead on my lab notebook, pre-cook breakfasts for the week, spend some time walking around campus, visiting my parents and cuddling both them and their cats…  That’s the stuff I used to want to do.

Now, given the outrageously high stress levels I’ve been thrust into, that’s all stuff I need to do.  I no longer have the option of just bottling up the stress, because there’s too much to bottle.  And I can no longer not-bottle by doing the same amount of, uh... decanting?  My metaphor is starting to break down, here.  The point is, though, that I need to do more than I used to need to do if I’m going to deal with the pressure that is upon me. 

I was about to say that some things are going to have to get dropped, but I just realized that that’s not the case.  Some things are going to have to be put down.  And what I realized tonight is that when I put things down, I should tell people why I’m doing it.  Because it’s not a ploy for sympathy if it’s all true, and the fact that I’m not spending the time at my sister’s bedside doesn’t mean that I’m not spending it doing something-I-wouldn’t-need-to-do-if-she-were-well.

Two more notes and then I’ll put this away and go study for my exam tomorrow:

Number one, if you’re reading this blog because you’re a friend of mine (and I’m pretty sure everybody who reads it is a friend of mine), and you haven’t heard from me in a while, this is probably why.  It’s not personal.

Number two, if you have the urge to do something for my sister, you can pray, or… no, prayer is pretty much the only option, here.  Her name is Hilary D. Hatch, one L.

Let us hold her in the light.

Glow In The Dark

Even apart from the incredibly awesome visuals, this research actually may contribute to a cure for HIV.

Plus?  Glow-in-the-dark cats.

I broke out in hives, once...

...But it was right after a weekend in which I consumed approximately two gallons of Mountain Dew, so I was probably getting what I deserved.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/sns-rt-us-black-allergiestre7842ho-20110905,0,3102037.story

This story basically says that allergies are genetically linked, and are more prominent in people of African descent.  It was pretty interesting, I thought;  my main experience with allergies is of two kinds, and both involve fakers. 

The first one is an acquaintance of mine—whom I’m not going to name for her privacy, although she absolutely knows who she is—who dislikes certain vegetables and has therefore declared herself to be allergic to anything even related to the “deadly nightshade” family.   She cheerfully eats many items containing relatives of that selfsame family.  This is somewhat exasperating (although I still love her dear stupid little heart.)

The second one is professional; I serve in a restaurant, and about once or twice a month or so I get in someone who claims to have an allergy.  About half the time they are lying.  No, I don’t secretly feed them (butter/cheese/gluten/pork) or anything like that, but I work with people all day:  I look at their faces, and I know they are lying.  I also know our menu pretty well, so I’m able to answer a bunch of questions, and I cheerfully hook them up with our allergen menu:  after all, whether or not they’re lying, they almost certainly don’t want to eat the (butter/cheese/gluten/pork). 

And I’m here to serve the best interests of my guests, so I make sure they don’t get it.

But the interesting point of the above anecdote isn’t that half the people who tell me they have an allergy are lying; the interesting thing is that I only have this conversation about once or twice a month.  (And a quick conversation with some coworkers reveals that I may get it more often than most!)

The first thing I’ll notice is that the children in the article are between the ages of two and three; that’s pretty much entirely too young to be faking an allergy for attention, so that source of inaccuracy is out.  According to the article, 22% of white children and 38% of black children show evidence of “sensitization” to foods—that’s roughly one in five and two in five, respectively. 

On a reasonably busy night I’ll take care of roughly forty people  (very roughly; that might be a bit low…)  Granted, sensitization is not the same as allergy, but according to Wikipedia allergies are present in 5-7% of children, and roughly 3% of the overall population.  I should be seeing at least one a night, right?

So why aren’t people saying anything to me?  Well, if their allergy isn’t severe, they may be willing to take the risk.  They may think they can figure it out from reading the menu—and if they’re allergic to large quantities only, they may well be able to.  If they have trace sensitivity, though, then they’ll need to ask about it. 

That’s the point at which I’m confused.  Why wouldn’t you ask the person who has specifically been assigned to answer your questions the questions you need to ask in order to, you know, breathe? 

Courtesy of "Hyperbole and a half"

I found this relatively descriptive of reality:

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-is-why-ill-never-be-adult.html

Hush, my child... (Part I)

This article states fairly baldly some facts which, I think, are relatively well-known.  Raise your (metaphorical internet) hands:  who out there didn't know that humans need sleep?

However, we tend to be pretty bad at putting it into practice.  Much like that whole thing about "don't eat a whole bunch of sugar" and "make sure to get plenty of exercise", "make sure you get plenty of sleep" is one of those rules that, well...  I'm sure other people need to get plenty of sleep, but I'll be just fine!  Right?

I have a friend doing the experiment noted in the article; that is, he is actually getting eight hours of sleep every night and seeing how it affects him.  And you know what?  I think he's happier, more effective, more together, and less stressed.  Of course, school isn't back in session, either, but the point remains.  I have both subjective and objective evidence that this works, here.

So why can't I (and several million other people) get the sleep I (we) need at night?

Well, one answer is the one alluded to in the article, that our minds are racing with unsolved questions and problems.  This is especially true if you're in the camp I am, which is the "finally come home to fall asleep" camp.  (As opposed to the "come home and relax, then fall asleep" camp.) 

This is largely necessity, as I work second shift, and the restaurant I work at doesn't close until two some nights.  Attempting to "chillax" between coming home and going to sleep can keep me up until four in the morning; unfortunately, I have a difficult time falling asleep without chilling and/or relaxing after coming home.  I can crawl into bed, sure enough, but being exhausted from the mental and physical labor of my job is insufficient for actually falling asleep:  my mind is simply too active.

I suspect I'm not the only one who has this problem; in fact, I know I'm not.  The solution seems to be to account for "relaxation" time when building a schedule, but the fact is that's not always possible.  (Going to school and working full time, there will be nights (Tuesdays) that I get home at one thirty and have to be in class by nine the next morning.  I sincerely hope my Institutional Management professor will understand about the absurd volume of coffee I'll be drinking.)

Another answer is routine.  As a server, I am frequently (Friday and Saturday every week) out until two in the morning just getting home from work.  Add to that the fact that going out for a drink after work is a social activity which significantly improves the work experience in restaurants (was that diplomatically-phrased enough?  I also genuinely like the people I hang out with,) and there's usually one night a week when I'm awake not only until two, but until four or later.  That makes it difficult to fall asleep at midnight the rest of the week, as is my goal. 

However, again, I'm in a situation where the current sleep schedule is the best alternative.  For one thing, although I almost never get the full eight hours of sleep unless I sleep through the alarm (not ideal), I almost always get at least six.  That seems to be enough for me to function at a pseudo-normal level. 

For another thing, the late hours caused by my job and the early hours caused by my schooling (and I gave up two great shifts at work to get out of taking Organic Chemistry at eight in the morning!) are the sacrifice I have to make to eventually get into the career I want:  the schooling is a pre-requisite, and the restaurant job I have now is the most flexible job I have ever had.  I can give up a shift the day before and be fine--and it's completely acceptable by the standards of my workplace; in fact, to an extent it's expected. 

That means that if I need to study extra hard for, oh, maybe an Organic Chemistry exam, I can do that.  This flexibility is a dream for a girl with 18 credits this quarter (and three labs, what was I thinking?)

Of course, maybe I wouldn't need to study so hard if I were getting enough sleep at night.

Just in case you wondered...

This article is a fairly standard one.  It reports some new statistics (from new sources) which mean basically the same thing we've known for a while:  obesity, high levels of alcohol, and lack of exercise all raise the probability of getting some form of cancer.  This is not news:  it is commonly accepted in the medical community, due to the high number of studies on the subject which largely reached the same conclusions.  Mos reasonable medical professionals will not only not debate this finding, the will use it when making diagnoses.  Trying to debate this finding, no matter how you do it, is pretty much going to make you look like an idiot, because you're denying not just this one study, but decades scientific studies.

Or, to put it another way...  If a large number of pranksters tell you that you have a spot on your face, you can choose disbelieve them; after all, they're not very reliable.  If a generally reliable friend tells you that you have a spot on your face, you can choose to disbelieve him (or her); after all, there's only one of him (or her).  However, if a lot of your generally-reliable friends tell you that you have a spot on your face, denying it is pretty much just willful at that point.

The number and quality of studies done on the subject are more like that last situation.

Now read the comments for the article.  They range from complete agreement to complete disagreement, with stops along the way at Blamingville, Denial Street, and "But What About the Pesticides?" Station.  What they don't include is, generally, an understanding of what is actually being said:

It's not saying that "If you're fat you will get cancer."  It is saying that "If you're fat you are more likely to get cancer than if you were not."

It's not saying that "skinny people don't get cancer."  Obviously, they do; however, the likelihood of it is much lower.

It's not saying "People who get cancer are to blame for getting cancer."  For one thing, likelihood is not the same as certainty.  For another thing, no one is dumb enough to blame cancer patients for their own condition. 

Unless it's lung cancer, and they smoked, in which case, unspoken though it may be, that sort of blaming does happen sometimes.  On the other hand, there is increasing evidence that the link between obesity and certain forms of cancer is similar.  (Although not the same, and it's not all forms of cancer.)  So maybe in the future, people will be saying that.

However, that's not what was said in the article, and if people are reacting to this article as if it had been said, perhaps they're protesting too much.

Fructose Corn Syrup

A conversation between me, my Roomie, and my roommate's Boyfriend:

Roomie (indicating a necklace shaped like a heart with a keyhole in it):  (RMBF) has the key to my heart!
Me:  I have to leave now.
RMBF:  I am sorry if she gave you diabetes, because that was sappy sweet.
Me (agreeing):  It was the high-fructose corn syrup of romance.
Roomie:  Ewww!  She just ruined it--I hate 'fructose corn syrup.
RMBF:  Especially when it gets all high an' stuff.*
RMBF (raspy):  Man!  Man, I can be in anything!
RMBF:  Check it out!  Man, I can be in bread!  What the heck am I doin' in bread?!

*He did not say "stuff".

Environment, Part II:

I may (or may not) have mentioned in a previous post that I'm a waitress. 

There are a lot of really witty people in the service industry.  There are also a lot of very dramatic people--consider how many servers eventually plan to be actors!  I may have some evidence, here. 

This is not a slam against servers, because servers are some of the most entertaining, fun-loving people around.  There are exceptions to every rule, of course, but I generally find them to be more genial, more accepting, more sympathetic, and more generous than, as it were, the average bear.  They're scintillating.

But holy cats, they sure aren't restful!  If I'm looking for restful, I turn to my other friends: the ones who can spend an afternoon hanging out and cuddling, and count it a good afternoon; the ones who come over and we bake cookies all night.  The ones who can sit on the couch with me for three hours without either of us speaking a word, and it was a good three hours. 

It's a question of style, really. 

Some people, you walk into their house or dorm room or whatever, and you see something essentially clean, but covered with knick-knacks, like little boxes or chests or statues, and there are five of them on every square foot of surface. 

Some people, you walk into their house and there is precisely one object on the coffee table, placed precisely in the center, and that object is a coaster. 

And the people with all those knick-knacks think the coaster-person is depressing and spartan, while the coaster-person thinks the knick-knack guy is claustrophobic and also crazy.  Like the Odd Couple, right?

I freely admit, I'm more inclined to be a coaster-person.  (And again, I'll emphasize that it's a question of style, not superiority.  I can't say that enough!)  My point here is that the observation applies in a more-than-literal sense.

I didn't realize that it was bad for me to spend too much time around people who are more inclined to witty flippancy than ponderous profundity (and I hope I have managed to highlight both the advantages and disadvantages of each) until I got home from hanging out with a group of such people and realized I was exhausted, shaky, and meepish.  And then I thought back over the night, and realized I'd spent half of it either saying or wanting to say, "Slow down!" 

This reaction was not entirely reasonable.  After all, everybody was having fun going really really fast, right?  And it's not like this was news; they've always been somewhat... exhilarating?  It's just, this really isn't new, and I've encountered this feeling before, and always before it has led to me drawing back and retreating.  I have two really good reasons for not wanting to do that this time: 

Number one, in specific:  because I really like these people, and drawing back will mean severing ties with them... which I don't want to do.   Number two, in general:  I am done retreating.  I am retreated out.  Retreat is one of my first instincts, the product of a therapy-inducing childhood, and half the time said retreat is bad for me.  (And, almost all the time, it's bad for my reputation; how many retreats have historically been well-respected?) 

So I know that these people (whom I genuinely like) constitute, not a bad, but certainly a frenzied environment, and I know that a calm environment is important to my mental health; but I'm also not willing to abandon them just because of a little frenzy! 

It is, as Yul Brynner would say, a puzzlement.

Environment, Part I:

I mentioned in my last post that I am not natively a gym-goer; well, I'm not natively a tidy-er, either.  Given no additional stimulus, an increasing level of clutter and then outright mess will accumulate in my surroundings. 

It used to be (and by "used to be" I mean "when I was a teenager") so bad that my parents would come into my room, stand over me, and order me, piece by piece, to pick things up and either throw them away or throw them out.

It's not like that any more.  I won't lie, I'm still not a natively tidy person, but I think my surroundings look more "harried person with not enough time to clean" and less "going to be a hoarder in ten years" at this point.  (Actually, now that I think about it critically, my surroundings look a lot like my parents' surroundings did during my formative years.  I know that there's substantial evidence that eating habits are formed by watching the eating habits of the parent; anybody know about cleaning habits?)

Here's the part that sucks, though:  I need to be a tidy person.

Two reasons for this.  One, I spend way too much time looking for things.  Seriously, it's just embarrassing.  Two, I'm so much happier when I'm in a clean environment.  It's like there's this pile of bricks on my chest all the time which just unloads when my surroundings are clean.

And I don't even know how much the clutter is hurting me until it's gone!  If you ask me what the single biggest source of stress in my life is, I'll probably cite my job, or the fact that I have gotten not nearly enough done on my novel, or (come September) school, but in fact, my medium-grade level of organization (it's not a lack of organization; lack implies that there's none, and that's not the case) is probably in the top three greatest sources of stress, if not the greatest. 

Look at the visual aids again; which one makes you happier?  Now imagine you're living with each one for a year; which one would drive you bonkers? 

There was a time in my life when I actually lived like the first picture.  Like, all the time.  And it's not all that long ago.  And, when I'm stressed, or tired, or in a hurry, things slide a little more in that direction again. 

The problem is that, just like not exercising because I've had a bad day, or going for the chocolate because I've had a bad day, not cleaning up after myself (because I've had a bad day) is only going to make the problem worse.

What puzzles (and frustrates) me is that I've known this for years, and I still can't do what needs to be done on a consistent basis.  Seriously, what is my problem? 

Anaconda

You know that scene in the movies?  It's the one where the redshirts are trucking through the swamp, and there's movement under the water, so of course they turn around and stare, and now the water is still, because they're looking at it.  This may or may not repeat itself once, or even more times, but still our clueless redshirts are wandering through the swamp, somehow able to convince themselves that they're not about to be eaten by a giant snake.

And then, of course, the orchestral score starts going "Eee!  Eee!  Eee!  Eee! (doomdumdoomdumdoomdumdoomdum)" as a giant freakin' snake jumps out of the water and, naturally enough, eats them.  Whole.  Because that's what snakes do.

That's my life right now.

Right now, we're just hearing the movements from the water, because, well, I'm just starting the yoga thing, and I'm just starting this blog, and they're still being overtime nazis at work, so my hours are down, and I'm signed up to start volunteering at a hospital nearby (so excited about this eeee!), but that doesn't start until August, and of course it's summer, so school is out (I'm going to the local university for Dietetics/pre-med).  But.  Also in August, I have a leadership conference for my religion, I have to start at least looking at the texts for Organic Chemistry and Food Science, and I'm betting by then the overtime nazi thing will have gone away at work because we'll be hemorrhaging waitstaff as they all go back to their respective universities...

...all of which means I'm about to be eaten by a giant freakin' snake.  Either that, or I am the snake, and I sort of like that interpretation better.

I already know how hard I'm going to have to work to make that interpretation happen, though.  When the world is ready to turn into an anaconda on me, experience tells me that I can be the anaconda, but that there are a lot of steps I have to do to make that metamorphosis.  The biggest one is the cleaning... more on that in my next post.  But also, the yoga is actually an anaconda thing:  if I don't exercise, I'm not going to have the energy.  And there's a financial aspect, too; more control over my work hours helps a lot with the going to school thing, but that means I need to be financially stable enough to trade out my shifts.

Still, I know I can do it.

I just have to work my tail off.

Choose your potion...

So, I used to belong to a gym.

I should say, I'm not natively a gym-goer.  I did not grow up with parents who went to the gym; I was active as a small child, but once I discovered the wonderful, magical world of "reading", that went away fast.  So I don't generally go to a gym on my own, or of my own initiative:  I have to have a buddy and/or an executive order to get me on a treadmill.

But!  I did have a buddy; for a while, anyway.  There were three of us, and we went to this gym together for almost a year.  I also got into yoga, which I did once a week, and that was by far my favorite part of the whole gym.  There's just no way to describe how wonderful I felt after a round of "Hey, look at all these nifty things we can do with our bodies!"

The rest of the gym-going experience was not my cup of tea.  It was boring, and hard work, and, to my mind, unpleasant.  But, despite the unpleasantness, it was awesome.  I had so much energy.  I lost thirty pounds.  I felt great.

Unfortunately, that buddy-system collapsed, because one of us was no longer able to attend that particular gym, but instead one twenty miles away, and then I wasn't able to go during their time-slot, and soon none of us was actually going to the gym much at all.  I even stopped going to my yoga classes, which was a shame, because I had felt so good afterward.  

So now I've got a lot less energy (a lot less; I was wondering what was wrong with me, and then when I realized why, I was... chagrined), and I feel guilty instead of great, and I'm not as strong...  And I've gained twenty of my thirty pounds back.  And what's more, I've been feeling like a hypocrite (I was a hypocrite, and I hate hypocrisy) because here I was, a dietetics student who was obese, and I didn't belong to a gym.  I couldn't even stand the thought of going back to the gym, and every time someone would suggest it, I would flat-out refuse.

This had gone on for more than a year.

And then, last Tuesday, one of my former gym-buddies suggested we go to a yoga class together again.  The yoga, you will remember, was my favorite part; the only part that I looked forward to, and attended on my own on a regular basis.  I'd have turned him down for a workout, but the yoga I could do.

So we did.

And I had an epiphany! 



 Why have I been fretting over the idea of going to a gym?  Why?  Where is it written in the Holy Book of Exercise that all exercise must be performed in a gym?

There are yoga studios all over this city.  None of them are cheap (they all run about a hundred bucks a month, plus or minus ten, and that's with the most cost-efficient package), and some of them are a bit more, er...  esoteric?  Atmospheric?  "Now focus the mystic energy through your aura"-ish?  ...than I was looking for.  But some of them are of that old "Hey, look at all the nifty things we can do with our bodies!" school that was so attractive to me, and I joined one of those.

And it's awesome!  I have so much energy!  I feel great!  My muscles are sore; it's the pain of growth!  Show me a mountain; I will climb it!

(Or, no, I won't climb it, but I'll feel like I can.)

So here's what I've taken away from this.  You know that saying, "Choose your poison", or sometimes "Pick your poison"?  Well, choose your potent potable:  You can go to a gym, sure.  You can trying Spinning.  You can try swimming.  You can try Pilates.  You can be one of those people who takes like eight dogs on a leashes and runs them through the park every day.  Pick one.

I made a mistake by trying to force myself to do something that I really didn't like doing.  There were alternatives available; alternatives I loved, in fact.

Learn from my mistake:  choose something you enjoy.  I have a friend who hates ellipticals, but enjoys swimming; let her swim.  I have another (straight male) friend who enjoys Zumba; let him Zum.  My gym buddy?  He can't run, due to surgery in his leg, but he's a nut for the treadmill.  He has an entire desk set up on his treadmill, computer, notepad, everything; he walks five miles a day.  Let him tread.

And don't stop exercising (or don't not-start exercising) just because your paradigm is bad.

Every enterprise must have a beginning...

There are a lot of different kinds of health:

Physical health, obviously; nutrition, exercise and activity health, dental health, bone health, reproductive health.  Mental health, which can mean living a fulfilling and satisfying life, but which can also mean taking your anti-psychotic medications.  Spiritual health, which is a great deal more nebulous and less well-formed than physical health, and which some will argue doesn't mean anything, although some will argue that it means everything.

Good health.  Poor health.  Failing health.

Nobody has perfect health; certainly not me.  And so I hope that stories, information, even jokes relating to the quest for improved health (of all varieties) will inspire others in their own quests.

Hence, this blog.