I have never known I could have the power to enact any sort of change in the world, and I am fascinated by the fact that it might actually be possible to do one little thing and see a ripple effect in real life.
My focus, as a yogini particularly, is to evolve, to change myself.
I write; I take pictures; I draw: I bake.
I post stuff online. I get it out of my head. And, I heal.
Thursday, September 25, 2014
Monday, September 22, 2014
with a roach on top
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| postcard |
Canned
Fruit Cocktail: Normally edible - I hadn't eaten this sort of thing in
years. I prefer to butcher a fresh pineapple.
The
saddest thing was parts-is-parts-breaded-and-fried. Chickens (I assume)
should not live to die and be turned into this clusterf*ck of a meat product.
I
have been a pescatarian since I was 27, for over a decade. Before that, I
was a strict, dairy-free vegetarian for a decade. I think people should
have a choice in their diets, but I do not think anyone should eat the low
grade food described above.
Every
mealtime, in December 2012 at Alliance Health Center, I looked forward to see
what was hiding beneath the lid of the gigantic food tray labeled with my name.
For some reason these food trays are over 2 foot wide, making it an
exercise in strength training for the smallest version of me to carry to my
room. The only joy came twice during my stay: banana pudding.
There were real bananas!
I
craved avocados for weeks. I fantasized eating avocado sushi. I
just wanted simple, recognizable food.
The
cockroach just happened to be inside a closed-lid food tray, the main meal
after my mother attempted to explain her version of my diet to the kitchen and
the dietician met with me without a notepad to take notes. Coincidence?
Sure, why not? It's the South; roaches are part of life.
Curiously,
every single tray is marked with a slip of paper with your name and a whole
long list of optional diets that I assume the kitchen offers to someone?
I'm sure they honor a diabetic diet, at least.
Regular
Diabetic
Cardiac
Vegetarian
Dairy-Free
Saturday, September 20, 2014
Asymmetry, Skewed Body, and Fibrocystic Breasts
So,
early this month, September 4, I woke up to discover that my right breast had
spontaneously shrunk half a cup size. In all the years I have had
fibrocystic breasts that swell up and down a couple of cup sizes, I have never
had asymmetry of any noticeable amount or any size change happen this quickly.
So, this is new and weird.
I
waited a few days, thinking perhaps I'll wake-up and these body parts will have
corrected themselves over night. It didn't happen, so I took out my
dressmakers tape-measure just to see how well my eyes were seeing the world.
I measured horizontally straight across the nipple line. The breasts are exactly 1/2" different
in size. Weird.
So,
I've seen the doctor by now; and I'm to have an ultrasound just to check them
out. I figure nothing is actually medically wrong with them. So, I
imagine I'll just wait to lose weight and see if they'll even out again.
My left breast is the size I would expect it to be at this body weight,
but the right breast is the boob of a smaller version of me. Oddly
enough, my cat had a sarcoma removed from fatty tissue on his right size
earlier this year; so we are, coincidentally, both dealing with a smaller right
side than left. His is definitely permanent, though, and he suffered
poor health and major surgery. I am thankful to still have my breasts and
pleased they recovered from shriveling to raisins at the end of 2012.
At
the end of 2012, when I was locked away in a "Health Center,"
somewhere in the middle of Mississippi, I was horrified to look down one day
and realize that my breasts resembled shriveled raisins. The nipples were
turning black and there was absolutely no sensation left in them. The former flesh of youth on my body was
nothing more than loose skin on my thighs.
I don't know how to explain it, but at nearly 4'11" tall, I'm not
supposed to be the weight of a young teenager or younger.
At
age 37, with my civil rights removed (I asked more than once on this journey
for a lawyer and received no response), I would watch this new, strange world I
was dropped into involuntarily and wonder why my health was so insignificant. Dressed in 4 layers of clothes, attempting to
stay warm, I wondered why my priorities were so oddly unaddressed. Luckily, over the years I learned a lot from
life and yoga philosophy to understand that there are so many things in life
that there are absolutely no good explanations for. You cannot control things that are out of
your control. You have to try to change
yourself and see how it affects the world you live in and others. I was not even allowed to control what
appeared on my breakfast tray every morning.
I could only control what of it I actually ate.
Extreme
Fibrocystic Breasts: They feel like knotted-bruises, painful to touch.
The best treatment is to wear a sports bra 24 hours a day to keep them
immobilized.
 |
 |
I've
tried evening of primrose oil capsules, iodine, Wild Yam cream, and topical
progesterone cream with little success.
I
worked up to 500mg of Evening of Primrose Oil. I really hoped this would
help, but I could not tell that it made any difference in the cysts in my
breasts. I stopped a bunch of nutritional supplements because it is just
too hard on my digestive system to take copious amounts of anything.
Topical
Iodine: Placebo effect the first week? I quit when I realized both
it wasn't resolving the issue and that iodine interplays with the thyroid, but
not in a way I understand.
Wild
Yam cream: I really liked this stuff, but when cysts are still going up
and down in size, you realize these creams are not effective enough.
Life-flo
Progesta-Care Body Cream, 480 mg of progesterone/ounce. I used this for 3
months. For this time period I had cysts that were stable; they did not
get any larger. I stopped this because progesterone also somehow
interacts with the thyroid hormone. After I stopped using it, my fibrocystic
breasts went into what I call "remission." So, who knows.
I think its an all over shift in body chemistry that determines whether
or not you have cysts and how abundant and how painful they are to you.
Shortly
after gaining enough weight back in 2013, to not be underweight, a cyst
appeared in one of the breasts.
Resources:
Best Sports Bras
The
best sports bras for women who are super petite or short-torsoed. It has
fully adjustable straps and back. You
can run as fast as you can in one of these bras.
You
know all of those super cool and hip yoga tops with lots of lovely spaghetti
straps? I used to wonder, "If only
I had a little dancer's bosom, I'd look awesome in yoga class or out for a
latte afterwards." Yeah, I got over
that. Here's my pick for petite women
who want support and need adjustable straps.
This top can help raise the elegance of your workout outfit when paired
with those cheap Old Navy girls size 10 - 12 bottoms??!!! Vanity sized children, too . . .
Oh, I actually own this top, and it provides plenty of support for ashtanga yoga practice.
Saturday, September 13, 2014
Postcard Before and After #1
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| Postcard of Before and After in the Same T-shirt |
I'm working with the truth and, of course, untouched photos.
I spent my late-teens writing to penpals sending lovely colored envelopes and one-of-kind collage and watercolor postcards.
Thank you.
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