Ramblings of a Hypochondriac

[kaoticbaby]

I never had one of these before...but I figure now is as good a time as any, hey?

I know the title implies that I am going to talk about my hypochondria, but today was an alright day as far as hypochondria goes. I thought I had bleach poisoning yesterday, and I did panic over my kidneys for a few minutes this morning, but otherwise it's been alright.

 

However, this morning sucked for other reasons.

 

I've always had issues with waking up on time which is why I scheduled all my classes for 11 PM or later last semester... but for some reason during registration last month I got amnesia and thought that I could take Yoga at 8 AM.

 

...Which means that I would have to be up by 6:00, 6:30 the latest. Lovely.

 

I set my alarm last night to what I was SURE was 6 AM. I even triple checked it. But alas, when I finally woke up this morning, it was 7:45 AM...and considering the fact that my school takes 30 minutes to get to under perfect conditions (and that it can take nearly an hour to find a parking spot), I was pretty F-ed.

 

So what do I do? Do I go to class late -- in my pajamas -- and hope to God that some blessed soul will give up their parking space for me? THAT was unlikely.

 

Instead I think "well, if I leave in a couple minutes, then I'll at least have some time to find a parking-spot and grab a cup of coffee before my next class."

 

So off I went. My next class was at 9:30, and I got to the school at 8:45. You'd think that would suffice, right?

 

Of course not. The parking-lot was too packed with BMW-driving Guidos that were raging on their extra AM dose of steroids. Every time I would put my blinker on to get in a spot that someone was leaving from, one of those idiots would fly in from the other side and take the spot that i was CLEARLY waiting for.

 

I hadn't had coffee yet, nor had I done any Yoga breathing exercises. Don't mess.

 

I pulled up behind the next BMW that cut me off and waited for the spikey head in the drivers seat to turn and look at me, but he was either too busy applying his lipgloss or pissing on himself because some crazy short chick was waiting behind him with her middle-finger waving in the air. Yeah, that would be me.

 

I pulled away with the promise that I would key up his passenger-side door later on (which would have gone down if it were not for the bald security guard circling me at this point.)

 

So I finally got a spot at 9:15: a half hour later. It wasn't easy, though. I had to trap an Asian girl in between my car and a mini-van in order to prevent her from getting to the spot before I did. She didn't like that very much.

 

But now I get to walk to class in the beautiful 20 degree weather, while trying to avoid all of the black ice that is coaxing to my ass.

 

When I get to the building I decide to buy myself a diet coke, since I didn't have time to get a coffee. But an old friends sleezy boyfriend is standing behind me and decides that he suddenly misses talking to me, and talking to me, and talking, and talking.....until I only have five minutes left to class. But OOPS, I'm in the wrong building. Obviously.

 

So I book it back outside onto icy deathtrap and to my class which, incidentally, I have no idea what it's even about (Post-modernism... can somebody explain it to me?) When I finally reach the top floor I'm pretty much bent over and gasping for breath, so I reach into my bag for my diet coke.... which isn't even there anymore.

 

Well at least I could look forward to sitting through an hour and a half of my Professor sounding like a parent from The Peanuts cartoon. Oh, and surprise, I have exactly one week to visit the MET to see an exhibit that supposedly contains some aspects of post-modernism, but heck if I'd know anyway. She could have told me that it contains aspects of the Keebler Elf and I'd probably agree with her.

 

At least I like the MET, that's not the bad part. The bad part is that I have to write a paper on exactly which parts of the piece demonstrate the idea of post-modernism.... and I've yet to even get a real definition on what that term even means. "It's open to interpretation," she says.

 

Well then in that case I might interpret it as an enormous alien-hand, brought down from outer-space to issue me a slap accross my stupid face.

[jengh]

oh god, it sounds like your semester is going just as mine.... F morning classes. Seriously.

[Bad Wolf]

*wolf hug!*

[IndigoEye]

Keep going. You have a future in making people laugh.

 

So what piece do you have to crit?

[IphigeniaSaysHi]

AHAHAAA

They totally do wear lipgloss.. it's trippy to watch...

 

I have a saying:

Turning my blinker on won't guarantee that no one will cut me off, but if they do, the blinker guarantees that I will end their life.

 

*grr!*

[kaoticbaby]

My friend asked me to be his girlfriend today.

 

 

I was starving, and I really wanted some company (my uncle just had a heart-attack and my nerves were hanging by a string, and to top it off, his grandkids were over and screaming about Elmo in my ear.)

 

It says something that he was my last resort, though. I texted a bunch of my girlfriends, but they were all still in class. I asked my neighbor, but he was an hour away. So yeah, last resort... but apparently in his head I was sitting home circling his name in hearts or something because while we were out he got a billion calls from his friends asking about me.

 

"Yeah, yeah, I'm with her now." Awkward. All I wanted was a freakin sandwhich.

 

It also says something that he asked me immediately after telling me a long sordid tale about his ex. Because THAT is totally the way every girl wants to be asked, right?

 

I must have hurt his ego by laughing at him. And by accidentally implying that he has a small penis.

 

 

 

In other news, I got a parking-spot a little bit easier today. I had to steal it away from some tiny little girl, but I got it nonetheless. Whatever works.

 

Wow, I'm just making myself sound so nice and respectful tonight. I swear, I'm not as horrible as I portray myself to be. Only a little bit.

 

I've been writing all day long in my journal for Creative Writing, so I'm sort of out of fuel. Eh, nobody wants to read this anyway. I'm going to go circle my friends name in hearts now.

[kaoticbaby]

so i'm pretty sure that i'm having an aortic embolism... or at the very least a stomach ulcer.

[FloatingAnchor]

I was just at the Met recently and they had this sculpture of a vagina made of rubber tires. It was awesome. You should really check it out. I forget the name of the exhibit, but it had to do with race. If you get the pamphlet with the featured exhibits, you'll find it.

[kaoticbaby]

I went to see a psychologist today. I didn't have a lot of time with her after all the paperwork and initial questions about family and so on, so I only skimmed the surface of everything that I have been feeling.

 

She kept telling me to do breathing exercises and to find a "happy place." Seriously? I didn't know I was paying for Dr. Suess.

 

She kept reiterating that I need to just "focus my attention on something else" other than the hypochondria. Like I haven't been trying. What do people think we do? PLAN to sit in the mirror scouring our body for skin cancer, or checking our pulse 90 times in a row, or frantically calling doctor after doctor? I sit in class, trying with all my might to concentrate. But instead I am tapping my foot against the floor impatiently, and incessantly checking the time on my cellphone so that I can get out and run to the bathroom to check that beauty-mark one more time, or to grab my thermometer, or whatever is my soup of the day.

 

Anyway, she didn't tell me anything that I couldn't figure out for myself. She suggested I try aromatherapy, yet somehow I don't think that sniffing lavender is going to cure me.

 

Sometimes I think that the ones who have the issues, like me, are the ones who should really get into social work. How can I take the advice of a normal, sane person who's never had such invasive thoughts before? How can someone who's never felt the obsessiveness, tell me that I can just "focus on something else?" I CAN'T focus on something else. I try. I try so hard. I write, I go for runs, I call a friend, but no matter what -if i'm having a bad day- NOTHING is going to make it better. At the end of said bad day I still always end up crying my eyes out on the floor. Still feel a weight on my chest, like I can't breathe.

 

Oh yes, I have fun. Having to set aside time during the day for checking or else risk being late to everything. If I have to get ready for something, I have to set aside at least two and a half hours for it. A half hour to shower and shave my legs. A half hour to dry and style my hair. A half hour to do my makeup and pick out my clothes. An hour to stare at the mirror making sure everything is even, panicking that a beauty-mark is getting bigger, debating whether or not I should even go out because I might not have immediate access to a hospital and, besides, I don't want to have to ruin my friends night by needing CPR or an ambulance.

 

I asked her if there was a diagnosis, just because I was curious. Really I just wanted an affirmation to all of my speculations. She pretty much said what I already knew "I need to get to know you a little bit more, but I suspect health anxiety and a form of OCD."

 

But I've been okay today. My aorta isn't exploding anymore, but I do think my throat cancer is coming back. Aside from that, I'm alright.

 

Thanks to everyone for their posts in the "Because We Love Eachother" thread. You all said some really sweet things, and I do think that the mid-winter blues is starting to hit everybody and that we could all benefit from hearing something nice about ourselves. Especially thanks to ILMBC and Tyler, you guys really made me smile.

[NowandZen]

If you don't mind me butting in, here's a Zen story that might help:

 

How do you put a cat in a box? If you try to force it, she will claw and fight and bite. You will end up with wounds and the cat will still not be in the box. OTOH, if you simply set the box in the middle of the room, the cat will wander around it for a while, check it out, and eventually settle in the box.

 

Moral: You can't force a mental/emotional change. This idea of "think of something else" is the mental equivalent of forcing it.

[kaoticbaby]

If you don't mind me butting in, here's a Zen story that might help:

 

How do you put a cat in a box? If you try to force it, she will claw and fight and bite. You will end up with wounds and the cat will still not be in the box. OTOH, if you simply set the box in the middle of the room, the cat will wander around it for a while, check it out, and eventually settle in the box.

 

Moral: You can't force a mental/emotional change. This idea of "think of something else" is the mental equivalent of forcing it.

thank you for your reply. that's exactly how i feel. all anybody keeps telling me is to just "force myself to think about something else," so i was really surprised when even my therapist told me that. you'd think that someone with experience like hers would know how hard it is. she tried to give me the whole "mind over matter" talk but seriously, it just doesn't work that way.