Okay you won't find any really deep thoughts, but in response to the demand of my few remaining readers, I figured I needed to blog something. The last few years or so, the onset of the holidays produce more than the average amount of angst and baggage, and my mind gets bogged down with sad memories, hypersensitivity, worry, stress, and all of those other not so charming feelings. As a means of coping, I avoid. When I sit down to write anything, or blog, I am forced to have a time of introspection. Since that is not a pleasant thing at this time of year, avoiding means not writing, which means I can escape any REAL evaluation of my thoughts or feelings. I can plod along in my day to day life and pretend that everything is happy go lucky and I am not being impacted by past events that hover over me like a dark cloud.
Two weeks ago, I had my check-in with my cardiologist. Things were mostly status quo, but despite my conscious decision to not delve into any of my mind crud on a daily basis, my heart has other ideas. It takes the things from my mind, and translates them into a physical response; racing heart, palpitations, beating so loudly within my chest that I am aware of every heartbeat. Let me tell you, THAT is annoying. I mean, you take for granted that your heart is beating, but you know it is, because you are walking and talking and living. However, when you FEEL every heartbeat, it becomes disconcerting and distracting. Noticing every skip or accelerated beat produces an edginess that I cannot adequately describe. Not much has changed recently from a daily perspective regarding my regular activities, with the exception of my caffeine intake. I was having one pop a day, not outrageous, but in hopes of alleviating these recurrent symptoms, my cardiologist said to try and cut it out of my life again. I have also been working out regularly the last month which is not something he recommended I stop (darn!), but more on those two things in a moment. Anyway, nothing specific raised his concern, nor sounded or appeared vastly different from my check 4 months prior, so it is likely, "stress". How I loathe the power that stress has over me, and yes, I know I somehow ALLOW it to have the power, but my conscious efforts to not give it power seem to fail. Read Here: I don't want advice right now, I am just sharing the state of affairs.
So back to caffeine reduction. I cut out the pop, coffee, what have you, until yesterday. I know better than to go cold turkey, which produced headaches each and everyday, growing exceedingly worse as time went on. None of the tylenol or migraine pain relievers were doing the trick, so I caved yesterday. Caffeine never "tasted" so good. My headache is gone for now, and I can function on a much nicer level than I was, much to my family's relief. My exercising has been fairly regular for the last month, and I have even amped it up to daily the last week, despite headaches. I watched what I ate, having modest Thanksgiving portions and not over-indulging, and I gained 6 pounds! Six freaking pounds! Before you claim it is "muscle", I would argue I would have to look like Popeye to put on that much muscle in a month. Am I bitter? Yes. Now, I did not workout yesterday, first time in over a week, but that wasn't from a personal revolt at the injustice though I did FEEL that way. Rather, I was sick; experiencing dizzy spells and nausea. Last night I felt like my bed was my own personal cruise ship to hell with all of the vertigo I was having. Thankfully, this morning my stomach has unclenched and my world has righted itself, but I am being cautious. I would prefer not to revisit those feelings any time soon.
Well, I can honestly say, this was not what I intended to blog about at all when I sat down to my computer. I was just going to make my apologies for delinquency and move on, but at any rate it is a blog post. I am thankful for those of you that noticed my blogs were not updated, but now you know a little bit of how my mind works and why they have been sparse/nonexistent of late.
