Month: October 2019

Posted in Texas- Living with Parents

Yearly Medical Check Up: the Catalyst for an Explosion of Career and Health Fears

Posted on by Lizzie Gomez

When I was 8 or so, I went to the doctor and was told I was likely pre-diabetic. You’d think I would have been back the next year to keep an eye on that. Nah. I didn’t go back to the doctor until I was 21.  This week was my fourth year in a row I’ve gotten a physical. I had until December to get that yearly check up out of the way, but did it now because I really wanted to change doctors.

 

My Odd Journey with Personal Medical Care

The only reason I made an appointment four years ago was because we’d gone over labs in my nutrition classes and I wanted to interpret my results. Really. That’s the only reason. Once there, I got up to date on everything. And I mean everything. Yes, I’m talking about female care and prevention along with some shots that got lost in the college years. Plus that oh so attractive bloodwork, haha. Surprisingly, everything was fine. All labs were normal and everything was on the record.

The next year that clinic shut down. :/ So, I went to a new doctor. It was a very busy clinic where I felt rushed and unheard, but because I moved out of state for my internship, I went back to that same clinic the following year. Any concern of mine seemed brushed off and ignored. In addition to some “you should know better” looks/comments upon revealing I’m a dietetic student. I got that all year of my internship and every day in my own mind. I do not eat a very healthful diet nor do I regularly, without fail exercise every week.

 

Rant About my Fear of Becoming a Dietitian and my Own Weight Issues (Feel Free to Skip)

I am fully aware of my missteps and I know damn well what to do about it. Knowledge isn’t the only factor. That’s why, despite how uncomfortable it makes me feel and how much like a hypocrite it makes me seem, I let it slide while I was in university. I told myself I had too much going on to focus on my eating habits or exercise regime. My priorities were to be a good student and employee. My health came at the end of the list after friends, family, and even my mental health.

My idea was that once all that craziness was over, once I graduated and finished my internship, I would be able to breathe and focus on myself. Then instead of being a student and employee and friend and whatever else, I was going to be a health and exercise nut. It’s been four months since I moved back home after my internship and I’m about ten pounds heavier. I am ashamed of my body. I’m ashamed of my lack of studying to pass my licensure exam. Heck! I haven’t even registered for it. That’s how scared I am.

I’m scared of failing. I’m scared of passing and still not knowing enough. Of being an incompetent dietitian. Of being a very knowledgeable dietitian who no one listens to because she is obese. Or because she doesn’t have the best people skills. I’m afraid of gaining more weight and accumulating preventable diseases like diabetes (which I’m right on track for) or high blood pressure or anything else.

Worse than that, I’m afraid of losing weight and what would happen socially, physically to my body, and personally in the way I feel about myself. I’m afraid of going too far and hurting my body by not eating enough of what it needs in the name of losing weight. I’m scared of being judged for being skinny. I’ve never experienced that and would not know how to deal with it. Not that I think I’ll ever get to being skinny. Not with all these fears.

 

Back to What’s Physically, Potentially, Wrong with my Body

I am 24. I’m not old, but that’s where I’m headed as long as I take care of myself. I know the sooner I take care of myself, the better. I’ve heard it in all of my nutrition classes. Either you take the time to take care of yourself now and prevent diseases or you will have to find time to manage your diseases later in life. I know. But today I experienced it a little bit beyond that nice mantra. My new doctor took the time to listen to my concerns. I had questions bottled up for about 10 years. My two previous doctors weren’t the listening types.

…And she told me she is going to do some tests to make sure I don’t have arthritis. She thought out loud that it couldn’t be osteoporosis, because I’m too young for that. I thought I was scared of my blood sugar results coming back high indicating diabetes or pre-diabetes. I still am scared of that, but this… this was unexpected and shocking. I’m 24 years old. I didn’t expect arthritis.

I want to do things, but last week I couldn’t even safely keep up with a group of senior ladies doing water aerobics due to my messed up elbow. A few weeks before that I wasn’t able to get one bike session completed before my leg seemed to pop out of my hip causing awful pain if I so much as moved my leg an inch from a safe pedaling angle. That day I sucked it up at the expense of worsening my hip and biked the whole hour (12 or 15 miles). The next time the happened the following week I stopped at 30 minutes.

I’m not even supposed to run at my weight. I know that can damage my joints more than any benefit it could have. If I can’t extend my elbow to swim, safely peddle a bike, and shouldn’t even be running, how am I supposed to complete a triathlon?! Is this another pipe dream? :/ Probably.

 

Taking Time to Focus on Myself and My Health? More like Helping Everyone but Myself.

Putting all my time and energy on my health and fitness and studying isn’t working. It’s been four months of movies and TV series. And unemployment (because again, the stupid idea of only focusing on health and studying). It’s not working for me. I am tired of living in limbo. I’m tired of being ashamed of answering that wretched question “so, what do you do?” I’m not a student or just focusing on myself. Nah. I’m getting distracted trying to help out my family in little ways or at least things that feel little and thus putting off my health, happiness, and success.

I am proud that my parents, brother, and I eat out once a week instead of the three or more that I returned to when I moved back in with them four months ago. I’m proud that my brother has stopped gaining weight and is beginning to lose it because of that. I’m proud that he finally signed up for community college after years of just talking about it.

I am proud of my mom for taking English classes after years of not doing so and I’m proud of how fast she is learning to swim. On our third session she took it upon herself to swim out to the deep end. My mom is a straight five foot tall woman and viscerally afraid of drowning, yet she swam out to the 9 foot deep side of the lap pool this week. I’m proud that my mother, brother, and I have gone swimming three times a week for the past two weeks. My brother used to go to the gym to exercise less than three times a month! Maybe even per year, if we are being completely honest.

You know what would have been much, much, much, much, much easier than all of that? Sitting down to study for one hour every day these past four months. Or doing a dance workout video or an ab workout in my room for 20 to 30 minutes everyday for the past four months. But nope. I’ve been trying to help my family because I feel guilty for having left them for college and the internship for a total of five years and because I feel a sense of responsibility for them. The best thing I’ve done for myself in this time is take a trip with Mariah to visit Sherri and Richard in West Texas back in July.

 

From Here on Out…

I need to be more selfish. And for that, I need to get out of limbo. One way to do this is to get a job for financial means and in order to have structure in my day. From there I can work on building a study and exercise schedule around it. I’m done trying to have all the free time in the world and expecting to be happy because of that. It’s not working for me, so I’d rather get to work myself.

 

…or I can mope around for another two months, fail my licensure exam (effectively not becoming a dietitian) and then get a job out of necessity. I suppose time will tell. *shrug

.

.

.

.

.

P.S. Time will Tell by Oh My! is a great song. Check it out. 🙂

Posted in Uncategorized

I Am Miserable- three months after moving back home with my parents

Posted on by Lizzie Gomez

It’s extremely depressing to realize you currently have nothing to live for. My mood is a fucking roller coaster. It is exhausting and always refreshingly strong in its mania and depression.

 

Be Careful What You Wish For…

So, I realized why I’m so miserable since I came home from my year-long internship in Puerto Rico. (Believe me, I was miserable there too, but in a different way.) I have nothing to live for. I don’t have anything going for me in my life. I thought this is what I wanted. I thought I could use several months to reset and improve my life. To focus on myself and in a sense set myself up for success when I ultimately begin my career. Nope. That did not work.

I’ve been back at my parent’s home since July. It’s been three months. Feels like so much longer. I hate the emptiness. I thought I wanted to be free of school and work stress. I dread getting a job, because people stress me out. I can’t live without anything at stake though. I’ve gone from one extreme to the next and every day I feel like I’m worse off. I had the opportunity to move to West Texas with a friend and I decided against that because my father in a heartfelt moment told me “you’ve suffered so much already”. He pretty much told me to take a long deserved break. That got to me.

 

Another Flashback to my Less than Perfect Childhood. Boo Hoo. Feel Free to Skip; You’ve Read This All Before.

Thinking back, my life has been as easy as an unfortunate life can be. By age ten I was used to the idea that I had to look after myself. Moreover, I felt responsibility for my family (my mother, brother, and father). By 14 and for the entirety of my high school years, I felt little to nothing. I was practically a kid. My mind was older, sage and self sacrificing and my body was grossly overweight like a middle aged woman, but my age was young. Too young for how I went about life and how it treated me.

I felt almost nothing those years. I remember admitting aloud that I did not feel love from my parents nor did I have feelings of love for them, but from my behavior you would not have been able to tell. They were my obligation. Fact, not feeling. I helped in anyway I could. Ways that shouldn’t have been asked of me and, to be fair, ways that were not asked of me.

 

Why I’m Obsessed with Achievements and Why I am a Masochist

But that is who I was. Who I still am, if these last three months mean anything. I tried to keep them happy. As happy as they could be, given the circumstances. I felt like their protector. I felt strong and learned to enjoy that spark of a high. If nothing else made me feel anything, being responsible for my family made me feel accomplished. Well, not that I could really feel that then. That may be why it did something for me. I didn’t have to feel it. It was evident. On paper and not in my heart, it was clear my playing the part of comedian, translator, perfect daughter, etc. was an accomplishment.

That’s how I learned the intoxicating power of selflessness. Of putting myself last. Of suffering for the health of others. And liking it. So, yes, to all of my friends who have come to know me personally and have asked me why I put so much on my plate or why I’m such a masochist. I finally have an answer for you. Selflessness meant something to me when nothing else did. So, in a sense, it wasn’t true selflessness, though I wasn’t aware of it at the time.

It gave me a purpose. School also gave me a purpose. My parents were preoccupied with other much more important things than me. I understood that and accepted it. I still do as much as it still hurts. I wasn’t about to stress them out more by being a mediocre student. So, I had a goal of high grades and going off to university to escape my home.  As paradoxical as it sounds (and get used to that, because it’s the essence of my being), I strived for new academic heights as a way to please my parents, (well, not even that, just to not stress them) and I also did this for my own personal gain- escape.

 

But It Was Not Enough To Make Me Happy

I, understandably, was miserable. I grew up being told I was melodramatic. I believed it. I thought I should have been happy. My parents weren’t divorced, I had an older brother, had good grades, and a couple of friends plus those everyday things sometimes taken for granted like clothes, clean water, electricity, etc. and I was capable in many areas as my never ending new hobbies proved. I felt I should have been happy, but I knew I wasn’t. So I left.

Without more than enough money awarded to me by my high school to pay for the dorm fee and without the support of my father (to move several hours away) I left for university where my purpose was free from my need to please them. I learned my own values and began therapy. I learned to feel. I was finally happy. I was free. I was me. Then I, confused and without anyone knowledgeable to ask, I picked my major. Then changed it the next semester. (As always here is the link to that story.)

 

And I Set Myself Up For a Life of Self-Loathing

I feel as if I tried to fail out of that major throughout most of my time completing it. I almost did, in fact. An internship is mandatory in my career. I almost did not get matched….but I did. If you’ve read my blog during the last year, you’ll know how that went. (Hint: I say this in the truest sense of the word- I am traumatized.) Now I have to take an exam. That’s it. I’ve tried so hard to sabotage myself and this could be it.

I went through the education to become a pharmacy technician and simply did not take that exam. That sent my life in a completely different direction. I ended up doing hospitality/customer service work (more trauma there) instead of a much higher paying job in the field I originally sought to pursue. (Link to that story here.) This lead to my first choice of major (hospitality) and ultimately my degree (nutrition and dietetics).

 

I Believe I Could Be Happy if I Chose to Be… But Will I?

I think I could be happy in this career, but I spent so long fighting it, I don’t know with certainty anymore. I should feel blessed. I am grateful. I understand a bachelor’s degree is an accomplishment. But it doesn’t feel like anything to me. I feel like a failure. I am very disappointed in myself and my life choices. Half the time, I fully hate myself. After five years of working for this wretched career, I’m at a critical point of make or break. I have no doubt in my ability to pass the exam. I have the capacity to learn. I just have to convince myself it’s something I want to do.

That’s terrifying. I still don’t have an exam date. I haven’t registered. (I don’t have the money for it, plus I’m just putting it off.) I also don’t doubt the possibility that I simply will not take it. That I will have suffered though that despicable internship for nothing. I’m in limbo. If that’s the only thing I have to work towards, if that’s the only guiding light in my life right now, it’s no wonder I feel dead inside. I don’t have anything to life for. Worse yet, the only thing looming in front of me is a career that so far has brought me more pain than joy (and not the good type of pain!).

 

WOO HOO! Summary Time Finally!

That was to be my first point in this rambling: the biggest thing I have to work towards at the moment is something I’m almost convinced I dislike. Obviously, I’m resistant. Obviously, this makes me unhappy. My second point is that, being back in this household, I’ve lost the sense of myself I’d gained during the last five years on my own. I’m not the perfect daughter or sister, but I still have strong urges to help my family before myself.

With how depressed I’ve been, that has proven difficult, but when it comes down to it they are a higher priority to me than myself. That isn’t healthy. My third point, and one for a separate post because that’s a much longer complaint, is that triathlon training is slow. My faulty coping mechanism of emotional eating was never resolved during my years away from home, but it was improved, for sure. Nope. Now I hear my parent’s voices sometimes and instinctively reach for chocolate.

So yeah, TLDR: I’m miserable. I’m all kinds of messed up and I recently realized I currently have no pleasurable purpose in life.

SO… life sucks. Try to have a decent day, but if you can’t, I don’t blame you.