Sherri Cornelius

You might remember the Thoughts from the Treadmill posts here on the blog. Well, the old, sticky treadmill I was using went the way of Freecycle, after gathering dust in the shed for many months. Apparently just having it in the shed helped keep the weight off, because, no lie, I’ve gained five pounds since giving it away a couple of weeks ago after being the same weight for a couple of years.

Of course that’s not true, but I wish having a treadmill in the shed and not under my feet could help keep the weight down. Instead, I guess I have to admit my knitting has played a part. Rather than taking the place of another sedentary activity (can you say Facebook?), knitting has taken the place of other activities I might have to actually, you know, get up to do. Not that I had that many active habits in the first place, because everything I do is on my laptop, from writing to bill paying to photos to social connections.

So now, after much pondering over which laptop-centered activity has to go and what the hell would replace it, I’m thinking I need to get a decent treadmill and set up another walking desk. The only reason I stopped using the other one is that it was just too damned hard to push myself on that horrible manual treadmill and still keep my hands on the keyboard. I actually enjoyed the walking when I had something else to do, and it felt like the creativity flowed more evenly as well.

Another factor in my weight gain is my crappy eating. I cook more than I used to, but I don’t think my improvement is keeping up with my metabolism. Oh, and that reminds me, I probably need to get my thyroid medicine adjusted again. That might help. Another thing is anxiety, which I’m working on slowly to alleviate. Stress has been shown to increase belly fat, or so the diet pill commercials tell me.

I think I’ll go look around for a small electric treadmill at the pawn shops and thrift stores. If I can’t find a decent one there, I guess I’ll have to consider a new one, even though the thought of spending the money sends me into fits of anxiety.

And there goes another button.

Where to start, where to start?

Well first, I'm just coming out of a migraine so if you haven't seen me around in a few days, that's why. Darn sinusitis.

I quit drinking coffee for a while. Figured out that I can have one cup with no ill effect on my tummy, but my problem is stopping at one cup. I enjoy the ritual of the coffee, and also I feel like I owe it to the coffee to drink it. Weird, but that's how it is. I think a lot of us have that "clean your plate" mentality, which affects all my habits around food. A while ago I said I was going to do better with my food choices, and I have. I've only lost about five pounds, but I'm really working on the habit part rather than focusing on losing weight. Things like making sure there are healthy things in the kitchen, not being lazy about cooking, and thinking about portions rather than just shoveling it in till I can't anymore. Those are the things that will make me a healthy weight and keep me there. I can wait to hit that mark if I know it will last.

What else...

Oh yeah, I finished my book. Sent it to my first reader on Tuesday and had a migraine headache an hour later, whatever that means. Thinking of everything I've gone through during the course of this book is a bit overwhelming.

I didn't have the confidence to write this book when I started. It doesn't fit into a template, I see now.  I tried to make it fit a template and ended up spinning my wheels for a couple of years. For a long time my forebrain told me it was a mess, even though it made a lot of sense to me, and the characters spoke with their own voices. Only when I threw out the template did it come alive and drive me to the finish.

We'll see how the public receives it, but whatever happens I've written the book I wanted to write, and that's a pretty damn good feeling. Later in my career, I will say, "That's when I learned how to be a writer." Shoot, this whole BVA period has taught me how to live.

Yesterday was crazy. Over the weekend, Maggie fell and hurt her arm, but other than a red spot which faded after a few minutes, it looked fine. That night it started to really hurt her, so I wrapped it up and gave her some medicine, mostly just to placate her because you probably know how big of a deal even minor injuries can be to little kids. But the next day it started to swell, she wouldn't use it, and it was painful to the touch. Time to go to the doctor.

So the doctor said it was probably a something-or-other kind of break that kids get all the time, sent us for x-rays and prescribed a brace, which nobody had in stock. Finally went to Wal-Mart and picked up a grown-up's wrist stabilizer, long enough to go almost to her elbow but an adjustable width. I thought it would be a good temporary measure to protect her tiny arm at school, but it works so well, we might keep it long-term, if she doesn't need a cast. I don't think she will.

I wish we'd gotten the brace from the doctor herself, because as we were walking to the car after our appointment, Maggie tripped and fell on her bad arm. She cried all the way to the hospital for the x-rays, during the x-rays, and all the way home. It's an understatement to say I felt her pain. It's hard to go about your business when your child is hurting, even when that business is the only way to make it stop eventually. The promise of ice cream helped a little, and once she had a cone in her hand she smiled again.

I'll get the results from the x-ray back today.

Well, I feel much better today. When I was still working full time several years back I'd get headaches every evening that I recognize now as low-level migraines. I think the cause is a combination of stress, fragrance, and general sinus problems. I can handle one of those things at a time, but not all three. I've recently realized I clench my teeth all the time, so I'll probably get a mouth guard thingy at Wal-Mart to at least prevent it while I sleep. I really need to learn how to relax. My body tells me how to treat her, if I'll just heed her advice, and right now she's saying I need to have more fun. Hard to do without money, but my heart is open to opportunity.

One opportunity is the Red Dirt Book Festival, happening next weekend right over there, in the next town. As a wannabe writer I usually approach events like this as work so I put a lot of vague pressure on myself, which is silly because I don't have a book to sell. This time I'll go with no expectations. If I feel like leaving after ten minutes I will. If I feel like talking to people I will. My goal will be to have fun and only that.

I have a lot of housekeeping that needs to be done since I was sick, plus I have a lot of writing to do, and I have to pay bills and go to the store...I can feel my jaw start to clench just thinking about it. When I worry about everything I need to do, it gets done...but when I don't worry, it still gets done. My body is telling me to choose the second option today.

The migraine cycle is like driving a Kansas highway at night. You can go for miles in a straight line, the road gently sloping up toward the sky, the night air growing cooler as you get higher. But you can't see the apex of the hill, it's so subtle, so eventually you realize you've passed your healthy time and you're going downhill again. It's too late to go back at that point, you're already rolling steadily into the next shallow valley, but you can't tell where the bottom is until you hit it. Sometimes it's an hour later, sometimes seconds.

Luckily, I'm on the upward slope right now.

Thank you all for being so supportive and kind when I complain about my bad health. I just feel like crap all the time, you know? I guess that's one reason why I stopped blogging so much (before this month). The only thing I have to talk about is how crappy I feel. My low vitality is related to one thing: my inability to have fun. I'm bored and stressed and have no outlet, really. Every corner of my homestead reminds me how much I have to do, yet going elsewhere for pure fun would require funds I don't have. Even if I could work around the fragrance thing.

Goddangit, I need to make some money! A job would give me something to do, even if it's not for fun, at least I'd be occupied. I just feel like my hands are tied. If I get a job, the constant headaches will undoubtedly come back. I have no skills that could translate to working at home. Besides writing, that is, and I've tried freelancing and it's definitely not for me. If I made even a little bit from my novels it would ease the noose. I contemplate going back to school, but I couldn't swing it, for lots of reasons. So I go around and around my few futile options and feel like there's something I'm missing.

Do you feel successful where you are? Have you ever been really poor? What do you consider "poor", and by that I mean personally, what is the line for you. If you ever came out of poverty, did you pull yourself up by your bootstraps, or was there some deus ex machina involved?

Wow, my head feels even better now that I let off some steam. I should do that more often.

Despite a relatively quiet Internet on my end, the blog traffic doubled for some reason. Does WordPress count the spam comments? Because at 30 per day, that would explain it, disappointing though it would be. I used to be able to sift through them all before they were deleted, but now the volume is too high. If you have a comment which doesn't show up, that's why. Just send it again.

I ended up crying at the doctor's office yesterday. I feel pretty dumb about the blubbering, but it just serves to show how frustrated I am by the whole thing, how much I really need to figure this sinus thing out. The X-rays showed nothing abnormal (it so cool to see inside my own skull) so he gave me a course of antibiotics and steroids.

I told Doc I'd been dealing with this problem for 6-7 years, but as I look back I think it's been closer to eight or nine. I'm not sure if Doc believes me when I tell him how my old doctor dealt with these chronic problems. With the backward lens of time and experience, it seems like the old doc hated me. I wish I could see what he wrote about me in my chart.

It won't surprise me at all if antibiotics clear it right up. The old doc refused to consider it. I love having a doctor who listens to me, even when I'm crying.

And oh yeah, I told him about the fragrance thing and he didn't laugh at me. He didn't get defensive. He didn't dismiss it. He said some people have sensitive airways, and that was it. I'm hoping that the fragrance sensitivity will shake out when my sinuses are healed. I'd probably never go back to the old level of stinkiness, but at least I'd be able to be around people again, which means writer's cons and a job and TCoB in general. To be normal would be the height of awesomeness.