Tag Archives: health

The Plight of the Hypochondriac

It’s official, I’ve had 2 panic attacks in the span of 10 days. I am now panicking over my sudden onset of panic. Awesome.

I’ve been experiencing some chest pain on the left side for a few weeks. During the last two days, I’ve been noticing a fluttering in my left groin area near my femoral artery. I had chalked it up to muscle spams and just kind of ignored it, but this morning while on the train going to work, I decided to google it and see what it could be. Big mistake.

I see nothing but hits stating that this could be a warning sign of an impending aneurysm. That’s all I needed to read for full on hypochondria to kick in causing me to have an epic meltdown in the middle of rush hour. I got dizzy, my vision went black, my heart started to race, I broke out into a cold sweat, and my chest hurt. It took me over an hour to calm myself down, and was only able to do that by forcing myself to think about “happy thoughts” of moments I shared recently with someone very important to me.

I’m sure my epic paranoia and hypochondria combined with the fact that I’ve been under an extreme amount of emotional stress as of late, are aiding to my sudden onset of panic attacks.

I need to chill out and remain calm and stay off of Google!

Whew!

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Focus, or Lack Thereof…

I have been having an unusual amount of trouble focusing as of late. This has been a growing phenomenon with me over the last 8 months or so. Focus was always my strong suit, especially when it came to work. My strong work ethic, combined with my need to succeed, often propelled me to great heights in my 20 year career. I feel like I still have a large amount of interest in what I do, as well as a need for success, but I just can’t seem to lock myself down and concentrate. My mind is all over the place, and I don’t know if that stems from unhappiness, or just masked disinterest. I’ve been trying to figure it out, but try as I might, I see no answers.

I rarely allow myself to get lost in daydreams, or become so unfocused on myself that I begin to let everything in my life start to fade. I find myself in this strange stage of my life, and everything about me is changing. I’m not sure if it’s for the best, or the opposite, to be honest.

For example, when I’m sitting in a meeting, that is very important and involves potential clients, I find myself drifting. I have to consciously force myself to sit up straight, listen to what people are saying and contribute with useful information. I almost feel like I have A.D.D. I have endured my share of ups and downs, whirlwind romances, breakups, career highs and lows, but this is simply mind boggling. In fact, I cannot remember a time in my life that I was this distracted! It’s scary!

Could it be a medical problem? Am I simply so I dissatisfied with my life that I am losing interest in everything around me? Have I reached a breaking point? Is it the fact that I am turning 37 in July? I wish I knew this answer because this is frustrating. While there are outside factors that have notably contributed to my lack of concentration, I cannot blame it all on those. I’ve been down this road and never lost myself in the process. I always worried about me, my life, my interests, my health. Well, besides my stint with heroin in my 20’s, but even that didn’t last more than a year, and I was able to pull myself out of the deepest abyss I’ve ever seen!

On top of that, I constantly feel like I’m being monitored and need to watch everything I say and do because of it. It’s frustrating for a person like me, because I am so forthcoming, honest and open. I have had to “put a lid on it” for almost 6 months now, in fears that anything I say can be misconstrued. Gah! There are some days that I get so angry about it that I literally want to choke someone. Do you know what it’s like to be a blog writer, who has been writing online for years, writes columns based on her life, blogs that have hundreds of thousands of followers and fans, yet have to censor yourself because 1 person is mentally off? It’s ridiculous. I know I shouldn’t care, and just live my life, but how do you do that? It’s almost selfish behavior, and I don’t want to cause any more waves then I have to, although I’m currently not doing ANYTHING WRONG!

In life there are positives and negatives, good and bad. In my life right now, I am dealing with lack of focus and motivation, and the one thing that always helps me sort out my feelings, I cannot do. That has me feeling angry, resentful, etc. I’ve learned to push it to the back burner as best as I can, and realize that some people just are who they are. I can only take solace in the fact that I have managed to surround myself with amazing, artistic, confident, and reasonable people. I guess that’s all that matters in the big picture. Right?

Anyway, I’m trying my absolute best to take the high road, center myself, focus on ME and what’s best for me and not worry about all of these outside bullshit factors that stress me out. It’s just not worth it. I’m forcing myself to do what I do best, and that’s make myself whole and happy. My home life is not in the best state it could be in, rightfully so. My work life is stressful, but I manage to separate that from my personal life, for the most part. My finances are not where they should be because I feel like I am financially supporting everyone, which is somewhat true, although my own fault. While I’ve lost a good amount of weight, and I am looking great, I am not feeling great. I am always tired, cranky, my weight fluctuates up and down like 15 lbs, which is not healthy. My diet changes often due to my stress factors on any given week. I need to have some consistency in my life. I need to create a workout schedule and stick to it, no matter how difficult. I need to set some financial boundaries with people, just because I have money it does not mean I should support everyone around me. I need set some social boundaries and let my friends know that I too have a life, and my life does not revolve around them and that fact that they all decided to have multiple children. I did not choose that life for a reason.

Ah, I don’t know. Things always manage to work themselves out in my life, but I feel like I’m getting to the point where I need to take more of a stand, and I will, it just takes time.

So, gone are the days where I waste my time worrying about everyone else. I need to focus on me and what’s best for my life. For real. Fuck everyone else for once.

Now if only I could stick to that, I’d be golden! πŸ™‚

Happy Memorial Day weekend, all! Enjoy your BBQ’s, beach time and fun.

XO

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MC: Day 10

I start eating full time again today. This go round was not as successful as my last in terms of cleansing and weight loss. I still have 7-10 to shed to hit my goal. It did, however, shrink my stomach and get me off of wine, which is always a plus. πŸ™‚

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MC: Day 9

Day 9!

I ate a small piece of grilled chicken last night. I was so full. It’s weird because this cleanse usually turns me into a vegetarian for a least a few weeks. There’s something about animal products that turns your stomach when you deprive yourself of food for so long.

I will say it was delicious. Nothing nauseating about it. πŸ™‚ I’m breaking the fast completely on Friday. So, just about 11 days. I’m feeling pretty awesome, looking pretty awesome and accomplished for pulling off yet another MC!

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MC: Day 8

Day 8! I’ve started to introduce a small amount of food. I have my bro in laws wedding on Saturday, don’t want to be sick. So, last night I ate 3 bites of salad, no dressing. It was delish!

In other news, I’m down 14 lbs, feeling great, pink tongue, fitting into clothes I haven’t worn in ages (size 4!)

I’m staying on until Thursday, but will slowly taper off.

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MC: Day 7

My stomach is all fucked up. Couldn’t tell you why. I think I am stressed out, going through detox symptoms again. They say that days 4 and 7 are the hardest.

Here’s to powering through. Wish me luck!

Happy Monday.

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MC: Day 6

Day 6! I ate a few small pieces of cheese yesterday, and it made me sicker than a dog! You can’t go from no food for 5 days, to cheese. I learned that lesson the hard way. πŸ™‚

Other than that, I’m back on track and feeling great. 6 more days. Down 12 lbs, looking great, got myself a nice tan/glow, went blonder, feeling happy, healthy and hot.

Good times!

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MC: Day 5

Down 10 lbs in total. Feeling pretty good, for the most part. I notice that I have NO desire to drink alcohol, which is great. I am chock full of crackhead energy, and can literally run a marathon right now.

I have an action packed weekend ahead of me, and 2 parties to attend. This will be interesting. Delicious home cooked Italian food (my fave, of course), vino, sweets, etc. I plan on staying strong, I am sure I will be fine.

Wish me luck! xo

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MC: Day 4

It’s Day 4, and I’m down a total of 8 lbs. I’m feeling better every day. I do find, however, that my hunger and food cravings are hitting me at night. This is a first. I’ve been dealing with it by drinking hot herbal laxative tea, which basically tricks your stomach into thinking its soup. Ha!

I’m still going strong, though. 8 more days to go. I think I’ll end up dropping closer to 20 this time around. That will be too much. I don’t need to drop that much, I’ll look like a little boy! If i find myself dropping too much, i’ll stop. We’ll see.

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MC: Day 3

Day 3, and I’m down 6.5 lbs! My body and metabolism is amazing, and I’m grateful and lucky that it still kicks this much ass at 36 years old.

I haven’t been doing the SWF, no time in the morning, as I get up at 4 am for work. In lieu of the SWF, I’ve been drinking an herbal laxative tea in the morning, and at night. It is very important that you do something to flush the toxins out, otherwise fasting like this is pointless.

Last night was difficult. I was going through cravings for all kinds of crap. I was standing outside of the Stillwell train station in Coney Island and smelling McD’s, Nathan’s, corn dogs, pizza. I almost never eat any of that shit, in fact, can’t remember the last time I sunk my teeth into a Big Mac. On days 1-4 of the MC, you will crave the most disgusting food! That’s your body going through the detoxification process, and while it sucks, if your willpower is strong enough, you’ll power through and by day 5, you’ll be happy you did.

I know a lot of people who have tried this. Some have failed after the first, or second day because they convince themselves that “it’s not healthy,” or, “it’s too extreme.” It’s neither, that is just your addiction to eating talking. Chances are, if you’re overweight, you emotionally eat. When you remove food from your life, even for 10-17 days, you have an emotional hole that needs to be filled. For me, the MC is almost a spiritual experience. Depriving myself of food, and alcohol shows me that I am strong, but it also makes me more self-aware than I am.

The fact is, I’ve been miserable for a long time. Food, alcohol, social life, work… Anything to distract me from myself. I do this fast often, and it’s to keep me emotionally grounded, and keep myself in check before I sink into a depression that makes me fat, and completely unaware of what I’m doing to those around me.

I digress…

On day 3, your tongue starts to turn colors. It’s nothing short of terrifying. Right now? It’s a yellow purplish color. Gross. You can spend 45 minutes brushing the shit out if it, and it does nothing! When your tongue turns back to pink, that is how you know you should stop the fast. The longest I’ve gone was 17 days, but after day 4? Not eating is cake! After a while you don’t even want food because you feel so amazing.

Anyway, day 3, 6.5 lbs down, cravings subsiding a bit, tongue yellow/purple, and the insane motivation to keep going!

Happy Thursday. πŸ™‚

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