Welcome to 2022. We are all doing our best. Every person you talk to could be having the wort day of their lives, so please remember to be kind. Consider practicing your box breathing or Ocean’s Breath ( Ujjayi Pranayama),while you’re at it.
Hubby and I caved….we adopted a kitten. We saw his social media advertisement from the local rescue and immediately knew that come the end of July, we were adopting. Kitten Little is a male, very vocal, little tuxedo who is absolutely fearless around our older cat, who we will call Godzilla, and loves his cuddles He did not give one iota that our older male cat is the size of a small dog and didn’t want anything to do with him. Kitten Little just cuddled up right next to him and purred. He adores being held, scratchies of every sort, and comes to wake us up with sweet nose boops and kisses. He wants all the attention all the time and is absolutely smitten with the hubby. His only downside is the yowling and harassment over food. If his bowl is perceived as empty, his world is ending. So when the sky is falling, we pick his bowl up off the floor, give it a shake, and give it back.
Godzilla is not impressed with this rugrat, but after his nasty bout with pancreatitis he has warmed up. He is still not fond of “play time” but is a willing snuggle buddy and grooming partner when asked.
Kitten Little enjoys his “cronchy” toy ( red and green crinkly thing ) and is a sucker for hair bands. We caught him opening the top drawer of our bathroom and stealing one during a decontamination shower, last month. I think he forgot where they are kept because he hasn’t attempted a robbery in couple of weeks. Good thing, too. Much like me, that drawer keeps coming apart and I don’t think it can hold any more weight than what it already contains.
Kitten Little appeared right when we needed him to help lighten our lives. My health took a dive and started to repeat symptoms that were present earlier this year that we prayed would never come back in their full intensity. Like before, nothing I did for emotional self management had any effect and my physical pain started to become too much. I knew there something else going on. There was nothing wrong with my AVE or my VieLight unit, and the breathing techniques weren’t cutting it. The reason why I couldn’t quell the cascade of negativity was because I was spiking fevers again. You can integrate trauma but not inflammation, or pathogens. Talking positive and doing something cheerful is not going to make my infection go away. I sucked it up and contacted my medical doctor instead of my therapist.
Healing and wellness is a complicated journey. If your coping mechanisms aren’t working, it may not necessarily be the tools you’re using. Please make sure to continue to evaluate your physical health as it has a direct impact on your psycho-emotional well being. It’s not “all in your head” all the time.
My last post was August last year. My personal life erupted. A large amount of things have changed in that time span and it’s been an exhausting and heartbreaking whirlwind. My hubby and I were hoping for a quiet year in which we could establish some semblance of normalcy after the life altering events that began in October of 2019. Nope. Universe had other plans. Normal is a myth. Average is a statistic.
So here we are as a collective, in August 2020, staring down COVID-19, climate change, homelessness, unemployment, a corrupt government, and shortages of odd things at strange times. It’s all fun and games until you run out of toilet paper….and then can’t find anymore.
We got lucky and managed to find toilet paper. I tell you, I have never been so happy to see Scott Comfort Plus on my door step. The day the Lysol spray and wipes came, I about cried. I did cry when a bottle of Trader Joe’s hand sanitizer arrived all the way from Arizona. I am high risk, this stuff is like gold.
Right now, we still have our jobs, food to eat, medications and medical supplies to use, and somewhere to safely shelter ourselves from the crises outside. We are managing it with every tool in our toolbox, from neurofeedback, VieLight, AVE/Photic Stimulation. supplements, to good old meditation. Gardening, cleaning, baking ( I made allergy friendly banana bread, chocolate cake,brownies, and rolls for starters.) smoking meat, and any exercise we can muster that won’t get us run over by the speeding vehicles in our neighborhood, or exposed unnecessarily. Sometimes it’s a scoop of ice cream ( Cado N’Ice cream for me ) and another round of The Great British Baking Show that helps soothe the nerves. 4 months into the pandemic we went blackberry picking on the side of the freeway. At 6 months, we are contemplating a badminton set and making home made pickles. We do these things with gratitude.
Even with those, we can still be basket cases. Like the rest of you, hubby and I are having to adapt to our new normal and it’s not easy. It’s okay to not be okay.
With 15 plus diagnoses, things can get a little hectic. Managing all of my meds and my food schedule is a nightmare. I am not going for the best of the best of the best, just a little homeostasis. Homeostasis is when the balance within the body is just right, like Baby Bear’s porridge. Your temperature is a nice 98.6, your electrolytes and water concentration are balanced, and your food intake is right where it needs to be to keep the mitochondria in your cells pounding out the energy you need to make it through the next 24 hours. Most people’s bodies regulate this all by themselves. Mine has insurmountable difficulty maintaining stability and this causes problems for my brain.
A large amount of my issues arise out of an endocrine system that doesn’t function well, if at all. The endocrine system is bunch of glands that produce hormones that maintain help maintain homeostasis…you see where I am going with this ? The hormones’ signals are for regulating metabolism, growth and development, tissue function,sexual function, reproduction,sleep, mood, and more. Unfortunately, my little chemical messengers are at war with each other and my immune system so they aren’t paying much attention to the actual messages being sent. Telephone is a fun game as long it’s in a 4th grade classroom during school and not in my body.
I am doing my body’s work for it. To that end, in order to maintain a mental homeostasis I have had to set up rules for myself. By recognizing and hold up my own boundaries, by doing things I can do when I can do them, I create a much more me friendly environment. When things become unbalanced inside of myself, I turn to my indulgent coping crate. This vesicle contains comfort of all sorts. I have mine filled with a familiar book for a story with an ending I know, a new book to get lost in, Lindsey Stirling and Enya for soothing upset neurology, drawing supplies, knitting, chocolate, ibuprofen, thermacare heat wraps, a tennis ball in a sock (this works wonders when my herniated disc is giving me back spasms), a list of things I can do to recenter myself and written notes of encouragement from people I love.
What’s in your carton of comfort ?
I will admit it, I am stressed out. Seriously stressed out to the point that even though I have had 100 hundreds of sessions of qEEG Guided Neurofeedback, I still need some support. This comes from being stuck with 15 plus diagnoses to manage, and most of them chronic. It’s far from fun.
Stress does funny things to you that turn into not so funny things if it goes on too long. It’s damaging in multiple ways. You have acute stress, chronic stress, eustress, and distress. Reading about stress is stressing me out.
Acute Stress : The“Fight or Flight” reflex is a short term response as the body prepares to defend itself. It’s so intense, that it can take 90 minutes for your metabolism to return to normal.
Chronic Stress : Defined as the cost of daily living…bills,kids,job, chronic health issues, relationships, etc…. You know what I am talking about ! It’s all the things that leave you drained by the end of the day and no matter how tired you, you can’t get to sleep. If it’s left unchecked, it can cause some serious problems. Why ? Because it means the immediate response is now long term.
Acute stress over a long period of time changes your metabolism in such a way that it damages important systems in your body. It definitely raises your risk for heart disease, high blood pressure, obesity, and Type 2 Diabetes. If you have any other inherited health conditions, it will certainly make those worse.
Adaptogens are nontoxic plants that help the body handle stress, i.e. adapt. They do so by interacting with the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal-Axis (HPA) and the sympathoadrenal system, which are both involved in our body’s stress response system. Alternative practitioners says they may tweak your hormones to ensure appropriate bodily functions. I am sure mainstream medical is shaking it’s head. There is so much they don’t know and they are just plain afraid to admit it. I digress….
There are a number of different adaptogens out there
Alternative practitioners say that what you eat effects your health, mainstream says there isn’t enough research on them regarding human health. I think mainstream is missing the boat on this. This is just my unlicensed opinion…I am NOT a medical professional. I am a professional patient.
Our favorite adaptogen is Ashwagandha Supreme by Supreme Nutrition Products. It lists multiple pieces of published research right on the website where it explains what it does.
https://www.supremenutritionproducts.com/AshwagandhaSupreme/index.html
It is only available directly from the manufacturer or a licensed provider….like an MD, DO,DC,Naturopath…etc . I have seen it on Amazon, and no, Amazon doesn’t send it to you via Prime 1 day shipping. It comes from the manufacturer so you still have to wait 5 days. However, it’s soooooo worth the wait.
When I could take the Ashwagandha, it was a dream product. It woke me up, helped me stay functioning, and let me go to sleep at the end of the day. Disasters would happen and it would be okay, because I was okay. Then I developed a Solanine sensitivity, and that was it. No more Ashwagandha. I like holy basil and Schisandra, but they did different things in my body than Ashwagandha. However, I am happy to report that I have other ways of coping with said stress….
Chocolate. Stress management by dark chocolate dates back to 2000 B.C. I am going to go bake a cake now.
I am tired today. As somebody with 15 plus medical diagnoses, using my energy is like managing a bank account. Sometimes, you miscalculate what’s currently in your account versus when your bills are due. Then you end up over drafting and incur that lovely $35.00 fee. I was expecting something bigger out of myself today for the first post, but I think I may need to lower my expectations a little and keep in mind what it’s actually here for.
I am atypical presentations for each one of my conditions and that makes it frustrating and confusing for everybody involved in my care, especially me. I cannot be appropriately helped with the standard protocols currently offered and I am always on the hunt for something that will tip the scales in my favor. At this point in my journey, my focus is on wellness. Wellness meaning well being : calm, centered, focused…in a place inside myself where those big decisions I make with my healthcare team are handled best. I am looking for peak performance support. It can be nutritional, spiritual, wellness technology, or the latest research. I am not on Google, but there are some good resources on Google, if you know where to look. GoogleFu is my specialty. I figure that I will share what I am learning along the way.
Please keep in mind, the information posted on this site is for informational purposes only. It is not intended to treat, diagnose, cure or prevent any disease. Though the information provided is based on published scientific research, it merely reflects the opinion of the author,who is not a licensed medical professional. Those seeking assistance for medical problems should seek the care of a licensed medical professional.
Some days, the best thing for my well being is a meme of a cat with his head stuck in a peanut butter jar. Don’t worry, I will share those,too.
~ C
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