Anime Superhero

My health continues to vex me on many fronts. so I haven't wanted to post much. My pain continues to be a daily (mostly nightly, affecting my sleep) annoyance, and the tumors in my spine are affecting my body functions. I'll likely get them removed sooner rather than later, but I have to wait to see when I can be slotted into my neurosurgeon's schedule.

On top of that, I just had to have multiple people assault my uterus in order to replace an IUD that had migrated and was trying to embed itself in the uterine lining. Whee! There was some good news to come out of that, as the way we discovered the errant IUD was an ultrasound to track growth of an ovarian cyst. Happily, the cyst has shrunk, so I don't need surgery for that. Unhappily, the IUD I had inserted in July (a replacement for one I had put in 5 years ago) had decided to take a walkabout. I don't really need it for birth control; I just want the hormones to regulate my cycle, so some shifting would have been okay, but there was a chance it could perforate my uterus, so off to get it swapped out again I went. During the ultrasound and the subsequent appointment, I learned some things about my physiology: My uterus points straight back, instead of curving slightly towards the front of my body. Additionally, my left ovary likes to sit directly on top of my uterus. I imagine it like a jaunty hat. And finally, my cervix is quite high up, and most counfoundingly pointed towards my sacrum. All of that together meant that a 20 minute procedure took 3 times as long and an extra set of hands to complete. The ARNP was so impressed by my patience and pain tolerance that she said she wishes she could give me a badge or a medal. I said that I would accept stickers, so she gave me 3 Troll stickers for my troubles.

Later, I was describing all of this to my sister, and she that even if I had wanted children, it's very likely that I would have had problems getting pregnant. I've always known that my lady parts were situated a little differently than normal, but this is the first time that I've had all of the differences described at ones. Bodies are weird.

When I was younger, I was very thin. At some points in my life, too thin. But once I turned 30, my metabolism started slowing down and I started putting on weight. It was just around that time that I got involved in sports and exercising regularly. My running joke used to be "I used to be skinny and weak, but now I'm fat and strong." That, sadly is no longer true. With recovery from surgery and just the general pain and exhaustion that are symptoms of my condition, I find myself not being able to exercise as much as I'd like to. And because I'm stubborn, and not very smart sometimes, when I do try to exercise, I try to approximate my old habits and my current level of fitness can in no way support that. What that means is that when I do try to be active, I push myself too hard and spend way too long recovering afterwards.

Recently, my pain has gotten worse, and I've been taking more of my nerve pain medication, which causes drowsiness, general lethargy and weight gain. Up until recently I had been able to keep just active enough to keep from gaining too much weight, but that's changed. I'm starting not to fit my clothes and feel uncomfortable and it's bringing up all of the body image issues that I've dealt with for years. But since I can't wave a magic wand and lose weight, or get rid of the pain, I'm going to have to re-learn how to inhabit my body. I can't skate or bike or lift weights like I used to, so let's go back to square one.

This week, I started walking from my place to the transit center to catch the bus, instead of hopping on the bus right outside my building. It's about a 20 minute walk and I'm shocked that it's just within my limits. Walking longer that that at this point causes too much pain that takes too long to recover from. I'm going to keep walking to the transit center as many times a week as my body will let me, and gradually adjust my bus commute home to also include the return walk once I think my body can handle it.

Talk about baby steps. I've ridden a bicycle from Seattle to Portland. Now I'm having trouble walking to the bus stop. At least I can only get better from this point.

The new thing that I'm starting is eating breakfast salads. I should really say eating salads for breakfast, because there's nothing breakfasty about them, other than the time of day that I'm eating them. I need more plants in my diet, and this was the quickest and easiest way that I could think of to do that. With all of the good food options around the new office, I know that bringing salads in for lunch was going to be a non-starter, so we'll see how this goes. This weeks salads are spinach with cucumber, red pepper, and goat cheese with balsamic vinaigrette dressing.

Another new thing is going to the gym at work. The Peloton app now has running and bootcamp classes that I can access on my phone, so I did a 20 minute power walk just to get myself started. I'm probably not going to get to full on running, ever, but there are quite a few power walking/jogging classes for me to choose from. I'm pretty sure that Peloton added all these classes to directly compete with OrangeTheory fitness, which is great for me, because I loved OTF, but had to stop after surgery, and this is much more convenient and way less expensive.

I spend so much of my life wrestling with my health lately, but this is feeling like a positive change that I can actually sustain. Pain has gotten in the way of so many things in the past couple of years, and I'm just really learning how to approach life so that I can actually, you know, live. A 20 minute power walk isn't much, but it's a start.

I just emailed HR requesting use of the disabled parking spot in the lot attached to the building. I also asked if there were going to be similar accommodations in the new building, since we're moving offices in July. I haven't heard back yet, but I consider it no small feat that I even sent the email. But having to drag myself up and down the hill to get to and from work/my car the past couple of days has been excruciating.

The really weird thing is that I am requesting both an accessible parking space AND access to the bike room and gym in the new building. I'm hoping that the one won't negate the others as far as HR is concerned.

I absolutely LOVE reading advice columns. Reading about other people's woes, and reading the different advice given my different columnists are fascinating. Plus, I really like judging the behavior of other people that I will probably never ever meet in real life. Lately, I've been reading through the Ask a Manager archives in my downtime at work. I've read quite a few letters from people asking about working out and they almost all say that they don't shower before changing back into work clothes because they don't sweat much. These always make me shake my head. I have never ever encountered anyone who didn't need to at least rinse off after working out and returning to the office. There were plenty of times that I went straight from roller derby practice to a bar without showering, or even changing clothes, but that is very different, since the office is not a bar. Unless you work in a bar. So yeah, I am amazed that the advice doesn't start off with an admonition to do your co-workers a favor and shower before returning to the office. I get that as far as workplace faux pas go, it's fairly minor, but I've had to have meetings with people who biked in to work and don't change, and it is NOT pleasant.

Do I have other things to worry about? Sure, but this is a nice distraction.

I had another dream that I was participating in the Seattle to Portland Bike ride. I haven't been on a bike (outdoors) in over a year, but sure, I'm going to ride 200 miles. I think I'll have to take one of my road bikes for a short spin this weekend just to quiet my thoughts. I know that the weather is nice, and I like bike riding, okay brainmeats.

I was supposed to go on a bike ride this past Sunday, but the weather report was ominous, and collective laziness had my friends and I deciding that bunch and board games seemed like a preferable way to spend the afternoon. Of course, the weather was nicer than expected after all, but we had a lovely time nonetheless. However, that means that I haven't been on my bike in well over a year, and maybe closer to 18 months. I'll have to try to remedy that sometime soon. Maybe just a quick ride around my neighborhood to make sure that everything sill works. Both on the bike, and myself.

I'm loving the sunny days, recently. I hope we get lots more of them. I've convinced my sister to let me buy an above ground pool to put in her back yard; we just have to figure out which one. I'm hoping for many days spent in the sunny backyard this summer, and a pool will make everything that much better.

My physical therapist told me expressly not to do any of the exercises that she has given me thus far any longer, and prescribed 4 simpler, more targeted ones to do. Even the lightest resistance band is too much for me these days. I used to be so strong, but age and my nerve pain condition have changed that dramatically. I used to be able to skate or bike for hours, but recently driving to Port Angeles (via the Edmonds/Kingston Ferry, not even all the way around) on Saturday and back on Sunday had me incapacitated on Monday. It's the right decision to pull back on the exercises, but it feels like a setback.

In more positive news, I'm having a facial with a massage on Saturday, so I'm looking forward to a little pampering.

Okay, so even though I'm railing against my lot in life, I can still appreciate where I've got things pretty good. I belong to some Facebook support groups for people with my and related conditions. I just read a comment from a woman who has a schwannoma on her sciatic nerve whose doctor won't consider removing it until it starts causing paralysis. I already thought that my neurosurgeon, Dr. Ko was a rock star, but this just gives me a deeper appreciation of his skill. When I was first going through the process of getting diagnosed and then figuring out what to do with that diagnosis, the first neurosurgeon I met with patently refused to consider removing the tumor because the surgery was incredibly risky and told me to manage the pain with medication and get another MRI in 6 months to track growth. By this time, I was in constant pain and beginning to have trouble with some types of exercise. I had already made the appointment with Dr. Ko at this point, so I kept it to get a second opinion. I am so glad that I did. He was kind of brusque, but did not immediately dismiss my concerns like the previous neurosurgeon. Most importantly, he looked at my MRI results, did a quick physical examination and asked me if I wanted it taken out. I asked him to tell me the risks, and he assured me that while there was indeed a chance of loss of sensation or motor function, he had performed similar surgeries before and had every expectation of a good outcome. I was so impressed with his confidence in his abilities and the fact that he listened to me instead of talked at me that I decided to go ahead and schedule the surgery for several months in the future to give me some time to consider my options. I am so very glad that I did.

Until recently, I was car free for about 4 years. I did it mostly on purpose. I decided that I was going to give up my car and start commuting by bus and using the car sharing services that were becoming more popular and available but then my car died a pretty dramatic death and I decided not to fix it and just start what I have taken to calling my Grand Experiment. It was mostly okay. I bummed a lot of rides, rode my bicycle a bunch of places, gave kind of a ridiculous amount of money to Car2Go and ReachNow and spent a LOT of time waiting for various buses. I'm fortunate enough that my company pays for my bus pass, so that this experiment was actually a workable premise, AND I get paid a decent wage, so that I could afford the added expense of all that car/ride sharing when I needed it.

However, the past year has been challenging, health-wise. I had surgery to remove a nerve sheath tumor that slightly affected my mobility, and just when I thought that I was in the home stretch for full recovery and returning to my previous (very) active lifestyle, I got diagnosed with three more nerve sheath tumors, these directly affecting my lower body, specifically my legs. (The tumor itself is in the spinal column, but they are pressing on the nerves that enervate pretty much everything from my belly button down.) Once I got the diagnosis, my doctor recommended that I start weekly physical therapy in order to stave off possible incontinence, which can happen well before the onset of serious mobility issues. Just adding one more appointment to the already long list of appointments that I go to on a weekly basis to try to keep my body reasonably healthy and mobile kind of broke me. I had already been thinking of buying myself a kicky Vespa with the bonus money that I got early this year, so the idea of a vehicle wasn't exactly out of nowhere. But just learning about these new tumors sent me into a tailspin, and since I am VERY guilty of using retail therapy to self-soothe, I took myself to the Mazda dealership in the University District, test drove a few cars and went home with a new to me 2008 Mazda3. The car has a TON of miles on it, but someone took excellent care of it so I have hopes that it will last me quite a while.

My original plan was to keep mostly bus commuting, and only drive in when I have an appointment to go to. But I've got a ton of appointments. And I've also got a LOT of pain, and sometimes I just need more sleep, or not to have to walk and wait a bunch at a bus stop, and I've got this car here so conveniently, so . . . You get it. I've been driving myself in a lot more than I planned. Even besides the cost of gas, I'm pretty philosophically opposed to SOV commuting, but also I'm human, and I'm lazy and convenience wins so many times. I'm hoping that I can get into a better routine, and that I can figure out a consistent pain management approach, not only so I don't have to car commute, but also because I'd like to get back to my life. I have put so much of my life on hold because I just feel like crap so much of the time, and some days it's all I can do to get through the work day and drag myself home to sit on the couch with my cats until bedtime. Don't get me wrong, I've had some fantastic times in the past year, just not as many as I'd like, and nowhere near as many as is usual for me. So it's not just about driving, or having to drive, but also about me trying to eke out as much as I can from my dumb life right now.

And to think, this post all started out because I actually caught the bus in to work today, and feel guilty that I haven't been able to do it more often.