Come Down

So today took me back to work.

My Boss was being sickly nice and it soon became apparent why - I was needed to cover the work of a colleague on holiday. So there I was, first day back off holiday, rushing around at my quietest time of the month while my Boss checked up on her internet orders and chatted on the phone. My colleague who technically does the same job as me (definitely not in practice though...) had so little to do they ended up sweeping.

I wonder what she would do if she knew she did not have to be nice to me, to get me to do my job, to work, to do what I can between the hours of 9 and 5? Would she be mean all the time?

I see the cycles in her relationships with others as well - mine just seem a little more drastic because she never really actually likes me. Two people in a different department are it seems changing roles at the moment... one goes from non-friend to friend and the other from friend to non-friend - for now.... Given a little time it will flip back, it always does.

Returning to work was dull and depressing. It was nice to see certain people and that was it.

I also had no idea how tired the holiday had left me, until I had to go back to work. Sooo tired.

Baby Steps

Yesterday I wanted to get back off holiday and get cracking, sort my body and house out. But F wanted time off to do zilch and that just kinda took all the wind from my sails and I did zilch too. But this morning I woke up and got cracking to sort things out for a nice healthy breakfast. I woke at 7 and got breakfast at half ten.

So why did it take so long? Yes a pint of yogurt, banana, blueberry, strawberry, raspberry and grape smoothie takes a little time. So does a nice healthy cooked breakfast of quorn sausage and bacon, scrambled egg, mushroom and a slice of lovely white salt and pepper bloomer. But washing up and then clearing a bit of work surface took a fair bit of time.

I have not really cooked since I was ill last year. Food has been about no effort. Pack nastiness or something F has conjured up from the freezer. The less I cook, the less inspired F becomes in his cooking. If I am occasionally making nice, from scratch dishes, he makes some occasionally as well. The height of vegetable use has been pre-prepared or frozen. Our cooked breakfasts have slunk away from grilled, low fat niceness to full on badness.

F has stopped me living entirely on sugar and stick in the oven and heat food. His diet has been better than mine because he eats at work as well. My weight has slowly slunk back up again. Not to my heaviest (23 stone) but to my fat fighter starting weight of 21 and a half. So that painfully lost stone has gone back on. It could be worse.

So we try not to put anything we use much in any of the cupboards with damp. This means things spread across the work surfaces and if we let up, we have no work surface. But given time, damp gets those things as well. So I cleared a patch, checked dates, put things aside for recycling. Then I scrubbed my small patch. F's coffee had congealed over the surface and paper and card had stuck to it.

I chucked our spice collection, some might have been fine but others definitely were not. I bought a few new ones yesterday and will begin to build up my collection again. But they can not sit around too long... Part of me wanted to keep these lovely little jars with their shaker lids for a craft use but no... declutter...

Why do we live like this? How long is it going to take us to sort it all out? How much money to correct the damp?

Small steps I guess....

But at least I know I do not need to do any washing up or space clearing before I begin my veg rissotto later on today. The one that I am going to eat for lunch tomorrow as well. Maybe later I will clear a bit more work surface later...

Fat for Life / Dying to be Thin?

I have just finished reading The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl which is a lovely and inspiring book about a fat fighter... but not like me. I am beginning to suspect that the stories of us larger folk are as varied as our shapes. We really are not all the same shape - i think this is why fat clothes tend to be so awful - as we get larger, the differences in our fundamental shapes are emphasized.

So if I have different reasons for wanting to lose weight, what are they?

To be able to do all the fun things I would like to and to be healthy. My body is a ticking time bomb. I can see my parent's health problems and I can see my body working it's way towards them - not for my retirement but in my 30s. My weight is signing my own death warrant - I know that may seem a little over dramatic but my weight is reducing my life expectancy by decades...

My Dad has always been pretty healthy but then he started getting erysipelas. This is a skin infection also known as St Anthony's Fire. The skin blisters and burns and stings. all because some little bacteria have gotten where they should not, migrated maybe from the nose to just under the skin's surface.

Now this might not sound to bad except that if not treated it can go real, real bad. It can get in to the blood, it can cause the skin to be eaten away. It can kill.

My Dad got it more than once, on his face and on his legs. Then he ended up in hospital on IV antibiotics. His leg has a permanent set of dimples from the damage it did. This time the infection worked it's way into his lymph and ate his flesh.

Now he takes antibiotics every day and will for the rest of his life. If he feels the slightest tingle in his skin he has free licence to up his dose of antibiotics befoe he goes for an emergency Doctor's appointment. His legs are swollen, his lymph system struggles and walking hurts...

Then there is my Mum. Her problems are a little more well known so require less explanation... Diabetes, under active Thyroid and high blood pressure... She takes many little pills each day, tests her blood, battles weight and tries to fit in as much exercise as possible. Diabetes alone has many growing side effects. She now has permanent athlete's foot for instance...

These are the people who's genes I share... My Mum's Mum also has diabetes and apart from Epilepsy (which I thankfully escaped) it seems to be the main health problem visible in my family. Then there is the chronic athiritis and my Grandfather who died of Hodgkins lymphoma, a cancer of the lymph (for which previous infection with the Epstein-Barr virus can apparently give you a higher chance of developing it).

My Dad's side is a little less obvious. His father had circulation problems and died of lung cancer. His Mum died at a ripe old age of cancer and her sister is (I assume) still going strong.

So let's see... diabetes, high blood pressure, thyroid problems, circulation problems, lymph problems (cancer and infection), epilepsy, skin infections.... and which of these am I heading towards.. all of them ....except epilepsy...

Let's catalogue my health issues shall we....

I think my health problems began when I was about 7 or 8. I developed what has since been labelled as Hidradenitis Suppurativa. This is a skin condition caused by deformed sweat glands which become blocked easily causing lesions. It is not to do with cleanliness and can not be cured, only controlled. Being obese and wearing tight fitting clothes makes it worse. I get lesions of varying size in my groin, under my arms and under my breasts.

I think these have considerably upped my pain tolerance over the years! Luckily the scars are hidden away and generally they cause me few problems. Sometimes one goes a little mental though and this has resulted in a trip to A&E followed by an op to remove one (anastethic makes me talk a lot it seems). more recently a cyst became infected and my doctor gave me a local and sliced it open. I seem to get a few cysts as well, including a long time visitor on my lower arm. Generally, these all also show that my lymph is not doing what it should as well as it should...

My other real long term health problem has been glandular fever, which I first got at 14, then again at 19 (although Doctor's have told me I can not have had it twice). It slowly fizzled into ME and it took 4 years before I felt able to return to studying. Even then, it is noticeable that the amount of sleep I need is still slowly decreasing, but still somewhat higher than average...

I sometimes feel as if I have spent half my life asleep.

So those are my two long term thingies so let's work up my body.....

Feet - they hurt all the time, I think carrying my bulk can be tough! I get athlete's foot sometimes as well.

Ankles - swollen and painful. The skin is stretched, dry and shiny. A sign of poor circulation and inaffective lymph, it can be caused by infections and high blood pressure as well.

Lower legs - If I walk any real distance my circulation can not cope and lactic acid builds in my calves and they burn. Apparently burning calves is also a sign of diabetes...

Knees - I suffered from growing pains as teen which were diagnosed as rheumatism. I learnt to avoid the hated gym skirts as soon as I was allowed to and strangely the number of times I suffered from it dropped rapidly! Sometimes if my joints get cold, I still get it...

Thighs - cellulite and my generally bad skin, oh and they rub...

Stomach - IBS and odd periods

Hands - prone to pins and needles and recently I have started to get twitches in my left hand.

Lower arm - one large cyst that often gets bruised

Under arms - bad skin and one permanent cyst

Breasts - same old bad skin thing

Ears - survivors of many infections with my left ear drum being burst twice. I also get dermatitus behind my ears.

Nose - hayfever and occasional sinusitus

Eyes - I don't make moisture easily in my eyes! I can not use contacts and use drops and sprays to keep my eyes moist.

So what bits of my body are healthy? I have nice hair, teeth (only two fillings and my dentist loves me) and strong nails. I feel tired and fat and unfit most of the time and I am sure you can see how I would feel that I am heading towards my parents health issues... all of them pretty much.

Obviously this is no fresh realisation.... So why am I not already shocked into sorting myself out? no idea.... Isn't a list of health problems like that and an early grave good enough reason to get thin? Maybe you have to love your life first

Return of the Me

So here I am again. I am actually thinking about taking up the bloggy reins a little more firmly. This last year has been a fallow year. After being ill with what I suspect was swine flu and pneumonia, my life sort of collapsed. Bloglandia had gotten too big for me. Too many commitments, too many things to do, too many blogs to read.... Too much when you have been really ill but have to go back to work to earn some money...

I suspect blogging would have helped with the whole work place bullying thing but I just didn't have the energy. Not that that situation has resolved itself but I do feel more on top of it right now. Oddly this year of fallowness is drawing to a close and by the time I really get going it will have been a year. I have felt it coming, this change in myself, time to get going again.

The blog will not be my priority as such.... I need to be thinner, fitter and healthier. Really I do! I also need to get my house sorted out. F, S and I have just returned from two weeks away and the smell of damp greets us strongly, to say the least. My Parent's birthday pressie to me this year is to be a dehumidifier.

Time to get my life sorted out and blogging is great fro helping with life's little issues, but I can not let it take over like it did before. I want to keep it small. I have not even told any of my old blog fellows that I am back. I feel guilty for disappearing so abruptly. I don't want to disappoint them again....

Circles Within Circles

Do you ever feel as if life has a habit of taking you back? You can not ever truly escape anything or leave it behind, eventually life circles and you find it all there waiting for you. Not the same for sure, but still there....

I hated my school although I loved College where I did my A-levels. School was full of girls, Christian morality and a social set in which I could never be popular. In a boarding school, those who do not board are always on the edge of things, never there when the fun things happen. I grew up feeling alone and unlikeable for the large part. No BFF for me.

I loathed it all and everything it stood for. When I left, I shook the dust from my feet and never look back. Didn't stay in contact. Didn't want to!

The modern world doesn't let us really escape though. I got found on Facebook...

I accepted the friend request because it seemed futile not to. Then followed 23 friend recommendations. I added a few extra friend requests and a couple of requests found me. There I am in the old school photos people have posted. Drawn back in to the circle of school. Maybe it is time I forgave them all for being what they were which was not what I needed. Just because I was once the day girl on the edge, doesn't mean I always have to be that way.

being on the edge is a long term habit though. I look on facebook and wonder where I am in friends photo albums. I had a habit of moving around the country and having multiple circles of friends. I guess I didn't like to believe one circle really wanted to own me. There in the photos though, my absence hurts. I was at that party. That man who posted all these photos used to really, really fancy me. That woman was supposed to be my best friend and we lived in the same city for four years. Sometimes I feel like I drifted through life, in and out, here and there... then gone again...

But school, school seems to want to own me and claim and doesn't forget I was there. So many of the school parties I seem to have been absent from... and then I remember... I really wasn't there. The glandular fever meant I missed out on a lot. I also turned my back on so many of them because of my hurt, I had a great social life outside of school. When they were locked away in school, I was out drinking and kissing boys.

Before school found me I was feeling a bit lost one day and went and looked at F's photos on facebook - and there I was. I existed there because of him, with him, happy. We walk our circles together sometimes meeting a bit of one of his circles, sometimes one of mine, till my paths become his and his become mine. Separate but joined.

I exist within the world. I am not forgotten. Is that enough?

The Low Down

I am sat here feeling pretty low, with no idea what to do with myself. F is at work and has been pretty much all weekend, except to sleep. WoW seems to have run it's course a little and feels.... pointless.... Like I said in my previous post, I throw myself into things and then it becomes too much and I back all the way off. Sometimes there is a catalyst and boy is there ever this time round.

My work situation has long been a little interesting. I talked a lot about negative energies at work in my previous blog. I also talked about the Little Princess - she is still a Princes but her tricky life has helped her grow up a bit! What has really helped though is that we have both come to see how much of our not getting on was actually due to our Boss, the Bitch Queen, meddling and playing games.

After I was really ill back October, November time last year, things were never the same between us. Then they announced the redundancies and a couple of lovely people ended up leaving us in January. Things were so touchy, that when my Boss really began to bully me, I just kept my head down. it did pass, but not surprisingly, it never went away and recently it has begun again and stepped up a notch or two as well.

Things are different this time round though. My lovely colleagues and I have talked, really, really talked about it all. The scale of her unpleasantness goes way further than any one of us knew by ourselves. Now when she is picking on me, I know the quiet people in the corners are witnessing it and sending me supportive vibes. This little thing really helps change things around. The more pissed off she gets, most days, the more amused I get. I quietly sit and take what little pleasure I can from her stress. before, the more stressed she got, the more anxious I would get, waiting for the lightning to hit me.

So I have choices. I leave - not to many jobs around right now and i am so bad at applying for jobs - I hate the whole thing. I stay and keep quiet - a temporary wait and see sort of a thing. I stay and I kick up a fuss - I suspect my putting in a greivance would maybe get her a warning but would mostly result in my leaving, maybe the same day, maybe in a few weeks when my contract is up again or maybe when they announce round two of the redundancies.

My company is making itself more efficient machinery wise. They can say otherwise, but you just know that that is going to mean they need fewer people.... Also the HR person responsible for running the redundancies is still here....

I don't see myself staying long term but for now.... I really love the people I work with, except of course the Bitch Queen. I have even become very fond of the Little Princess.

It never felt like time to leave before and I guess I understand why now. I feel like I have to weather this situation, to prove I can, to prove I am strong. To remind myself that the only one who has control of the way I feel is me. That sticks and stones really can break my bones but words will never hurt me. She can not break me, unless I let her.

I left two other jobs due to unpleasant behaviour by work colleagues. I left at the first sign of it. I just walked away and really they were jobs I should not have been in a hurry to walk away from. I got it wrong. This time is about being stronger and unless I want to go through this repeatedly, I have to try harder to learn my lessons.

This does not make it easy and I guess I am just kinda waiting for that little sign that now is time to go, now it's alright, I did, enough is enough. Mostly I dream of winning the lottery and buying the old mansion I fell in love with last year and doing it up.

So all this work stuff blew up and i couldn't do WoW and now I don't really want to go back. What else do I do with myself? That life I created for myself using my last blog is sort of gone, slipped away... And I don't want to make my life that busy again.... Too much

I guess I don't need to decide anything. I go away on holiday soon. Maybe things will be clearer after that. I will have time and family and a lot of love. Those things will surely help my soul.