Tag Archives: adult

May21

Stages of My Post Surgical Life – Part One

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My Pre-Op Attitude

Stage 1: The Prelude
AKA Before Operation – Characterized by:

 

  • Insane optimism – I WILL return to full-time work in 1 month, tops! EVERYONE will be in AWE of my stunning recovery – there will be tears of joy, applause, balloons, puppies, because who doesn’t love puppies in a triumphant return day dream? All recoreded in slow motion video. Also, my hair will magically stop impersonating the Lion King and my skin will clear up.

  • Impressive consumption of bone strengthening supplement power, protein power (that only tastes mostly of chalk thats been scraped off a sidewalk), stupidly expensive (but totally worth it!) miracle powders in green containers from Whole Foods, and actual green things all combined in blender. My muscles and bones will the best muscle and bones the surgical team has EVER seen. They will so impressed they will take pictures and post them to their surgeon friends. I will be famous in the medical community for having the absolute BEST bones anyone has ever seen. There will be autograph requests and TLC will do a special on my amazingly strong bones. I will be remarkably humble and slightly embarrassed about the attention and fame.

  • Enthusiastic daily strengthening exercises! Squats, planks, leg lifts 24/7.
  • Rekindling of old flame, not because of lame reasons like I’m worried about pretty major surgery, because I totally GOT this surgery thing, but because this time it’s gonna be so different from all those other rekindles that crashed and burned, well actually flopped, fizzled and limped off whimpering. But THIS time he’ll really SEE how wonderful I am. He will sleep in a chair at my bedside, make me protein shakes and miraculously lose all those somewhat irritating character flaws just for me. We will bond. He too will be awed about my amazing recovery and some point we will ride horses. Into the sunset. On a Motherfucking beach. That’s EXACTLY how this is going to go.

 

Stage 2: The Deed
AKA Operation Day – How Things Actually Happened. According to Me. On Morphine.

 

Right. So surgery is just a tiny wee itsy bitsy bit more involved than we had planned. Something about complications… bones dissolving, lots of bleeding, extra hard hammering of metal parts that break my femur, but just in about 6 or 7 places, so no biggie. Not a problem, see impressive preparation above. I will still be triumphant. PT, OT, medical and nursing staff will be stunned by my Can-Do attitude and miraculous healing powers. Some will suspect mutant genes or that I am secretly an X-Man. Professor Charles Francis Xavier – the Patrick Steward version – will come visit and ask me to join him. I will tearfully accept. Music will play, hospital staff will applaud (in slow motion, because see above).

I am now short a couple of pints of blood and didn’t quite have the super impressive bones I had imagined. Sadly there will be no
autograph tours with orthopedic surgeons. But I am stuffed with awesome NEW bone grafts from cadaver bones, which is totally awesome because Walking Dead jokes for The. Rest. Of. My. Life. I’m certain my donor will turn out to be a famous salsa dancer so along with my upcoming remarkable recovery I will also develop a sense of rhythm and the ability to move my hips independently of my spine. My students will be in awe of my new salsa based sculpt classes and they will have to move my classes to larger venues to accommodate the huge influx of students.

I am part Borg now. Which is totally badass. Screws, clamps, ties, implants, kinda creepy claw thingy – Got ’em! Resistance is futile.

 

 

 

 

 

coming soon….

Stage 3: WTF Leg?
I’d Like to Move It, Move It

Aug3

breakup in bulletpoints, pictures and swear words

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Stages I go through in a breakup*
(*not in any order whatsoever. *reserve the right to revisit bulletpoints)

  • Singing loudly with Annie Lennox, Aretha Franklin, Pink and Carrie Underwood while driving – e99486bc49cfd4bec71dc8ed7da45efdam strong empowered woman who needs no man

  • Fetal position, rocking back and forth muttering things to the dog – am certain no will ever love me, that my hair will never behave respectably, that my feet are just plain ugly and I should just give up now and become a cat lady
  • Cool. I’m, like totally cool. No, actually I’m so important and so busy with all my important busy life things that I have no time to do anything buy my very important things that really just take up all of my time. Lord I just have no time to be worried about such trivial things! Am important, very busy person, anybody can see that, also I like wearing my pants inside out.

  • Fuck it. Fuck absolutely all of it. Fuck all of it somuch that I’m going to sit here and eat ice cream – NOT low fat or froyo, but FULL fat Ben and Fucking Jerry’s ice cream, AND I’m going to eat it straight from the container sitting on the couch at 11pm, because I can, okay??? Am so damn happy that no man will ever see me naked again that I’m gonna sit here and my godamm ice cream,  okay?

  • Obsessively checking WhatsApp to see who’s online and when. Not because I care, I 456ff36526284be28c434f4763d1027bb105178f4bced101b5abe3679a9d065ejust happened to pick up my phone. Am totally in control here, and do not care when anyone is on line and not sending me messages. Do not care even a tiny bit. Absolutely did not just check my messages just now.
  • Hang out with hot 30somethings. Decide right after gorgeous blonde in short shorts says, hey you’re my mom’s age, you look good and that’s what’s really important that I need to hang with my 50something friends maybe a little more.
  • Make empowered decision to go see all Marvel/Xmen/Star Trek movies by myself, because dammit I am an empowered and free woman who needs no man to go to movies with. Also I can eat all the damn popcorn myself.9owjc
  • Buy a parrot, because… because honestly I’ve got nothing here, but I did buy a parrot who is learning to dance and sing to Brittany Spear’s Work Bitch, so that’s pretty entertaining.
  • Revisit the ‘Empowered/Fetal/Fuck All of Things’ Cycle for a few more rounds.
  • Journal, Meditate just like Mastin Kipp says I’m suppose to, because you know he’s a 30something who is apparently enlightened, or at least has a book and a blog and sends messages on YouTube from Maui on how to cope with heartbreak. (aside – he would likely frown benevolently on a few of my other coping mechanisms)

  • Fail spectacularly and not being petty and bitter. Journal about greater than average pettiness and bitterness. Meditate on super charged petty bitter non enlightened behavior that would disappoint Mastin.
  • Wonder if I should share any of this with my therapist, but then worry she will think less of me, then wonder if maybe I am not approaching this correctly. Decide I’m fine, and will tell my therapist so.
  • Draw picture. Write poems. Mock picture and poem. Buy $50 worth of art supplies to colour picture. Continue to mock now coloured in picture.
  • Buy cute dress, because Fuck it.
  • Buy new bra, because really Fuck it
  • Buy groovy top that 30somethings wouldn’t be caught dead in, but would probably say would look good on someone my age.

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  • Look at bank account balance. Berate self over apparent complete lack of self control.
  • Remember that my birthday is in a week.
  • Fuck all the thoughts about what to do on your birthday. Will pretend to ignore the damn thing this year, and secretly stuff face with cupcakes and Ben and Jerry’s.46178953
  • Re-examine feet. Decide they are the ugliest feet that have ever existed. Wear open toed sandals anyway, because Fuck it, no one will ever see me naked again, so why worry about ugly feet. Right moving on.
  • Wonder why you have to write all this shite only after midnight, and not in the morning like normal writers.
  • Debate major hair cut vs finally embracing dreads. Buy more hair product because bank account still had a few dollars in it.  Decide that stress increases frizz, and hair products with cool smelling ingredients will decrease stress.

  • Write self depreciating blog, spends hours writing and rewriting it, finding pictures and clever gifs and memes instead of sleeping, because sleep is for wimps and people who have to have passable hair, pretty toes, and who don’t eat Ben and Jerry’s at midnight, who don’t need to sing Carrie Underwood in the car.
Jul24

have you considered flinging feces at it?

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creativity3

fairly accurate illustration of my brain and hair on an average day

 

So, you might already know I’m not the most meditative person on the planet.

Or maybe you think that because I’m a yoga teacher I’m just All Zen, All the time.

Pete was what you would call 'easily distracted....

Right. About that. Left unattended, I have the average attention span of an over caffeinated squirrel.

So in the pursuit of some mental calm, for scraps to mental peace and quiet, for maybe 3 or 4 thought free nano seconds, for the answers to life the universe and everything, or maybe just how to figure out my “it’s really so fucking complicated I can’t even” relationship status (get ON that one willya Facebook?), I have started meditating again.

images-16

I drink Kombucha. I have a freaking LOTUS FLOWER tattoo. Still want to smack.

I also found Mastin Kipp and his blog The Daily Love and just to be safe I’m reading his book.  Also, I started journalling. I have done these things before, but in my usual, mostly distracted about some little thing or another way, I had dropped both a long while ago in favour of more worthy pursuits, such as:

  • Netflix
  • Ben and Jerry’s
  • Netflix with Ben and Jerry’s
  • Pokemon Go
  • Pokemon Go with Ben and Jerry’s
  • Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, but NOT Pinterest (not sure why, maybe I’ll pop over there for just a second)
  • All of the above with Ben and Jerry’s
  • Googling stupid things (long story, but you really, really, REALLY don’t ever want to Google ‘asshole yoga’ looking for funny yoga teacher stories. Just don’t. Learn from my mistake.  Did you just Google it even though I said not too? Are you sorry now? Don’t ever say I never warned you.
  • Looking at approximately 3 bazillion*  (*estimated, rounded down to the nearest bazillion) memes, images and gifs about being distracted, having monkey mind, having too many thoughts, Hyperbole and a Half,  hair products (completely unrelated, because… Squirrel!) Wait But Why, and only just at this moment noticing The Irony.
  • Lamenting that I am now out of Ben and Jerry’simages

I also discovered how fun passive aggressively coping with frustration by live Tweeting could be. Like, say that time I didn’t show up 15 minutes early to my Discount Tire appointment.

 

And you wonder why my friends dubbed me Zen Bitch.

So meditating. How hard could it be? I mean I used to belong to the is way cool Buddhist group that mediated for 2 freakin hours on Sundays. I semi regularly pop into a sensory deprivation float tank – Anicca Float Club, awesome place, and I can sit on my couch and do essentially absolutely nothing for hours (see Netflix, Ben and Jerry’s etc bullet points).  Picking up meditation again should be a cake walk.

My monkey mind has apparently been doing one arm pushups while I was distracted with my other important pursuits. My monkey mind, because even my monkey mind has to be more special than anyone else’s, flings feces, screeches, grooms, and scratches in the most Inappropriate places and at the most Inappropriate times.

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Ideal conditions – seen for approximately 3-4 nano seconds per week

On any given day my monkey  mind is having a party with several friends you wouldn’t consider introducing to your mother, like ever, and my panic monster is running around the room flapping its arms and screaming at the monkeys to calm the fuck down. The rational thinker part is generally sitting crossed legged in the corner focused on my smart phone screen and considering the best Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat posts that would make me look the most clever, witty, intelligent and attractive.

And don’t forget my lofty journalling. I have made some profound insights in my beautiful hand made by a local artist with red and shiny gold bits on recycled paper.

Actual Profound Knowledge Quotes from my journal

  • my bed is super awesome!
  • well I sure fucked that up didn’t I?
  • hey, that think I fucked up? yep, did it again, but better this time
  • I think maybe I procrastinate more than the average bear
  • dammit* (*multiple entries also #dammit, because handwritten hash tagging is a thing, I think, maybe….)
  • people are not behaving, this is irritating
  • Party on Garth
  • Fuckity Fuck Fuckery with a side of Fuckstockings
  • My hair today, wtf? natural-hair-humidity-meme
  • meditation is irritating
  • why the fuck am I doing this to myself?
  • #dammit todo list!
  • developing good habits is a pain in the ass
  • Motherfucking Lord of Middle Aged women! What was I thinking?! ** (**personal fav)
  • 3 responsible things in 1 day – BOOM!
  • Donald Trump, no words
  • Why am I still awake?
  • I did my MF journal and mediation, so am actually a total boss today
  • I may or may not be able to move mañana
  • Spanish, ye gods! (see ** comment)
  • FIVE extra minutes of meditation – fist pump for me!
  • day 3 of not giving fucks about this, yah me.
  • I don’t wanna
  • I might not have approached that in the most mature manner
  • My dog and I have a few things in common it would seemdogs10
  • Do NOT Google ‘asshole yoga’ looking for funny yoga stories (see ** comment)
  • and now for MORE flung feces
  • confirmation bias is actually a thing, like whoa
  • Burning Man….. now there’s a thought

So12919897_1019903358084771_9205901722785851826_n yeah, I’m still figuring this stuff out. And that’s okay. I suppose…. mostly.

 

 

 

Mar20

things I should have figured out by now

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Swear to God, when I was 18 and 19 years old, I thought I would be handed a playbook, or a key, or knowledge would just magically appear in my brain when I turned 20. Just like that, one day a kid who knew nothing, and then BOOM! instant adult, ALL questions answered. Also, my skin would clear up.

Imagine my profound disappointment. Maybe 20 was unrealistic, but surely 30?

I was raised to think that ‘adults’ knew everything, that ‘adults’ never questioned things because at some magical ‘adult’ age all the answers simply landed in their brains. I am not making this up. I really thought, well into my 30s that I had missed the important download of ‘adultness’ and that everyone else had this shit figured out and I was the only one who was just flying by the seat of my pants.

Things I have still not figured out:

  • low maintenance hair
  • clear skin
  • walking in heels – gracefully
  • how to file (neatly)
  • spell words with all the right letters, in the right order
  • money, the part where I earn it and spend it only on responsible and prudent things, save for vacations,  and not say,  on another low maintenance hair product
  • how to paint my toenails (neatly)

    20160309_183324-01.jpeg

    professionally done

  • how to store art supplies (neatly)
  • not worry if these pants make my ass look flat/fat/good/not good, or if this shirt/bra makes my boobs look less pathetic/perky/worth noticing, and does my hair work with this outfit, or should I scrap the whole look and start over? Never mind, starting over…
  • Plastic surgery, worth it for my floundering self esteem, or shameless vanity that I should find beneath me
  • how to Ohm properly, or pronounce Sanskrit words
  • how to remember and pronounce 90% of people’s names
  • men. I haven’t a clue. I know I’m okay looking , reasonably intelligent, and also men like the hair,  but I keep ending up with a different version of the exact same guy
  • how to fake enthusiasm when I give zero fucks (zero fucks blog link)
  • eyebrows, pluck, wax, tattoo….
  • how to ‘stand up and greet your neighbour!’ without wanting to vomit into my purse first, or crawl away secretly underneath the chairs
  • get to bed at a reasonable time
  • making soup, eatable soup
  • fly kites
  • remove contact lens
  • read bad poetry – I can’t even

 

What I can do reasonable well:

  • doodle/draw/paint for hours upon hours wp-1457917804786.jpeg
  • fold socks and towels in an organized and orderly fashion
  • make my bed
  • teach yoga
  • make people laugh
  • tip well
  • playing cribbage in an unsportsmanlike but entertaining manner, or as we like to say, 31 ….. Bitch..
  • jigsaw puzzles
  • watch movies
  • cook and bake, not counting soup
  • eating – I’m super good at eating
  • 20150913_144951-01.jpegdrinking coffee, but I’m really fussy…
  • dressing up and passing for an elegant intelligent woman for entire evenings at a timewp-1457917806537.jpeg
  • being generally half decent to peole
  • supported fish pose – I totally rock this pose
  • staying calm when things get crazy
  • getting a massage – so good at this
  • dessert
  • rationalizing reasons to eat dessert
  • sleeping in  contact lens
  • drive a stick shift

Ultimately, I don’t have a clue. I am making everything up as a go. I suppose this is okay, but the skin not clearing up, I’m still pissed about that.