Tuesday 25th April 2017
3 things that I'm grateful for today...
- the warm (overcast) weather.
- Cheeky my trusty canine pal, (German Shepherd that I walk Mon-Fri for a friend).
- My mum, who dropped off my wallet to the chiropractor during my appointment, (I had accidently left it behind at her house).
Almost forgot to take my anti-depressant again today.
Lucky I remembered....eventually.
12 hours until my pre-op diet starts.
6 days until I move out.
2 pre-op body pics taken in my under garments.
0 house prospects.
Dropped off another car load of my bedroom to mums house today.
My poor back - the chiro said that my mega tight leg muscles felt more relaxed today.
Hopefully once he gets my pelvic girdle aligned properly again my spine might straighten up again.
Ohhh...the perils of growing older then the age of 23.
My body seems to be giving up on me - jumping ship.
How many problems can a single body carry and still be functional I ask???
The answer, it seems, is many, very many - the more the merrier.
I'm living proof.
I'm going to run out of aliments to develop when I'm older because I will already have them.
I might have doubled up on a few .
This is why I'm having the weight loss surgery, for my health.
I'm not having it so that I look hot in a bikini, ( I never did look hot in a bikini so there goes that idea), or to look better,
I'm doing it to improve my heath.
If it wasn't for my dazzling myriad of health issues then I wouldn't even be considering it.
I'm not going to list all my health problems in point form right here for you to read because I don't want to get all serious and crinkly browed about it.
My health issues don't define me - they are part of who I am but I don't want everything to be about them.
I don't want this blog to revolve around them and give them too much power and head space.
I can write and entertain plenty without them dominating the show - hell, I AM the show, not them.
They can piss off.
Anyway....
So I walk this dog called Cheeky for an elderly couple that I know through my charity work.
Cheeky is a 6 year German Shepherd and she is a big girl.
There is a story to how we met and started working and walking together.
I moved to Kew 5 years ago and met Cheeky and her owners about 10 months after arriving in Kew.
I had just started working at the charity shop in Hawthorn and Cheeky and her owners lived right next door to the charity shop.
I saw Cheeky and one of her owners tending to their garden one day on my walk to work when I struck up a conversation and asked her owner if they would like me to walk their dog every now and then.
I was soon to be embarking on a dog training course and explained that I would love to have some dog experience since I didn't own a dog myself.
They needed a dog trainer for Cheeky and I needed a dog so we had a couple of 'meet and greet' sessions over at the local park with her owners present and the rest as they say is dog history.
She was/is a good dog for me to practice my dog training skills on.
She had originally been trained as a tracker dog so our first few months walking together, during which I was only walking her once a week, were spent with her constantly pulling at the lead with me trailing behind her trying to hold on.
She was obsessed with sniffing everything on the ground, never raising her head except to smell a higher hanging plant.
She also constantly walked zig zagged in front of me and had absolutely no thoughts on how my shoulder joints were handling her walking style - it was like I didn't exist for her at all.
Initially Cheeky was definitely comfortable with my presence as her lead holder but that is as far as the love went for her.
She trusted me but she didn't respect me.
So it took some time, practice and bonding but eventually we improved our lead walking out of sight. We both enjoy our walks a lot more now and work as team.
Cheeky has learnt that there is more to walks then sniffing the ground ignoring everything else - there are other smells, sounds and sights to enjoy.
We walk our usual route around town then we end up at the local dog park where Cheeky can run around off lead with the other dog park local's and their dogs.
She is not a hugely social dog but she has her favourite humans and dogs that she interacts with over at the park.
We make a great team - she has taught me so much about dog behaviour and about her breed.
She loves chewing on a tennis ball when we are over at the dog park and loves chasing after it too.
She is also a great traveller in the car, is very relaxed sitting or lying down in the back of the car.
2:39am...
I can't sleep.
I was just congratulating myself about how well I've been handling the last couple of stressful weeks and then I remembered that I accidentally drove into a tree earlier today and a few nights ago I gave a parked car a love tap with my car.
Yeah...I'm handling my shit like a pro.
It's Anzac day tomorrow.
Can't even begin to imagine the horrors of war - it's too much for me to think about right now, too much to bear.
I would attend an Anzac morning service if I was any good at waking up in the mornings.
As it is I am embarrassingly woefully bad at waking up in the mornings - woeful.
It's a bit hard to decipher your role in life when you sleep for up to 12 hours a day.
It might be my sleep apnoea, or my depression, or my Chronic Fatigiue, but my brothers remember me sleeping excessively even when I was younger and lighter - minus the sleep apnoea.
I think I deal with the stress in my life by sleeping lots - and eating lots too.
The eating part is going to be rudely and promptly dealt with by the weight loss surgery.
What am I going to do when I can no longer eat to deal with the stress in my life?
I've thought about that a lot over the past 12 months.
There's other ways that I can that I can relax, rest and unwind.
Practicing mindfullness, walking through nature, reading, (I love trashy magazines), talking to friends and family and managing my stress levels.
All these activities relax me, it's just that food gets me there a lot quicker because it's an instant distraction.
I need to be more mindful of my stress levels, and not let them reach the RED ZONE.
I'm sure with better stress management and a bit of patience/practice I can cope without the instant hit and distraction of food.
I'm also planning on returning to therapy in July.
I've already had 5 years of ongoing psycho therapy and am currently on a 12 month break.
For me I have found the therapy to be very beneficial.
It's helped me to get to know myself better.
Towards the end I was only going once a month as that was as often as I felt I needed to go.
I'll return to monthly sessions to help with the post surgery lifestyle changes which will take time to
adjust to.
Strictly speaking I am not a person who likes change - like EVER - but I'm going to have a lot off changes coming my way very soon.
Hopefully the changes will be for the better with no complications or nasty stuff involved.
All of my family are a bit aghast at the idea of me getting weight loss surgery but they know my reasons and motivations for it.
They all know that I haven't always had an easy life or time of it.
I'm having the gastric bypass done, (SPOILER ALERT - I ended up getting the SLEEVE) and it does sound like an extreme thing to put yourself through.
But as I've mentioned before, I'm getting it done for health reasons and they warrant this procedure.
It's hard to know whether the private surgeon who approved my surgery is working from a purely medical agenda or if it's more financially motivated - and if so, to what degree.
I guess we are all guinea pigs with our health - we all have to try different things and keep trying different things before we are lucky enough to hit jack pot - but even if the approval for surgery was financially motivated to a degree, my surgery will help to further educate the allied health professionals in my team, (the surgeon, the dietitian, the nurse, the psychologist, the physician) and it will contribute to furthering best surgical practice.
That's the way I see it anyway.
I have a make up party to attend to later today - it's with my local dog park frineds.
I also have to go into the post office at some stage to register my 'change of address' and change my address for everything.
What else?
I have to service my car while I'm recovering from surgery.
Put on a load of washing tomorrow.
I'm giving away my queen size bed and have advertised it online.
I might get a King single instead.
I need to try to sleep, it's 3:30am now.
Crazy town.
3 things that I'm grateful for today...
- the warm (overcast) weather.
- Cheeky my trusty canine pal, (German Shepherd that I walk Mon-Fri for a friend).
- My mum, who dropped off my wallet to the chiropractor during my appointment, (I had accidently left it behind at her house).
Almost forgot to take my anti-depressant again today.
Lucky I remembered....eventually.
12 hours until my pre-op diet starts.
6 days until I move out.
2 pre-op body pics taken in my under garments.
0 house prospects.
Dropped off another car load of my bedroom to mums house today.
My poor back - the chiro said that my mega tight leg muscles felt more relaxed today.
Hopefully once he gets my pelvic girdle aligned properly again my spine might straighten up again.
Ohhh...the perils of growing older then the age of 23.
My body seems to be giving up on me - jumping ship.
How many problems can a single body carry and still be functional I ask???
The answer, it seems, is many, very many - the more the merrier.
I'm living proof.
I'm going to run out of aliments to develop when I'm older because I will already have them.
I might have doubled up on a few .
This is why I'm having the weight loss surgery, for my health.
I'm not having it so that I look hot in a bikini, ( I never did look hot in a bikini so there goes that idea), or to look better,
I'm doing it to improve my heath.
If it wasn't for my dazzling myriad of health issues then I wouldn't even be considering it.
I'm not going to list all my health problems in point form right here for you to read because I don't want to get all serious and crinkly browed about it.
My health issues don't define me - they are part of who I am but I don't want everything to be about them.
I don't want this blog to revolve around them and give them too much power and head space.
I can write and entertain plenty without them dominating the show - hell, I AM the show, not them.
They can piss off.
Anyway....
So I walk this dog called Cheeky for an elderly couple that I know through my charity work.
Cheeky is a 6 year German Shepherd and she is a big girl.
There is a story to how we met and started working and walking together.
I moved to Kew 5 years ago and met Cheeky and her owners about 10 months after arriving in Kew.
I had just started working at the charity shop in Hawthorn and Cheeky and her owners lived right next door to the charity shop.
I saw Cheeky and one of her owners tending to their garden one day on my walk to work when I struck up a conversation and asked her owner if they would like me to walk their dog every now and then.
I was soon to be embarking on a dog training course and explained that I would love to have some dog experience since I didn't own a dog myself.
They needed a dog trainer for Cheeky and I needed a dog so we had a couple of 'meet and greet' sessions over at the local park with her owners present and the rest as they say is dog history.
She was/is a good dog for me to practice my dog training skills on.
She had originally been trained as a tracker dog so our first few months walking together, during which I was only walking her once a week, were spent with her constantly pulling at the lead with me trailing behind her trying to hold on.
She was obsessed with sniffing everything on the ground, never raising her head except to smell a higher hanging plant.
She also constantly walked zig zagged in front of me and had absolutely no thoughts on how my shoulder joints were handling her walking style - it was like I didn't exist for her at all.
Initially Cheeky was definitely comfortable with my presence as her lead holder but that is as far as the love went for her.
She trusted me but she didn't respect me.
So it took some time, practice and bonding but eventually we improved our lead walking out of sight. We both enjoy our walks a lot more now and work as team.
Cheeky has learnt that there is more to walks then sniffing the ground ignoring everything else - there are other smells, sounds and sights to enjoy.
We walk our usual route around town then we end up at the local dog park where Cheeky can run around off lead with the other dog park local's and their dogs.
She is not a hugely social dog but she has her favourite humans and dogs that she interacts with over at the park.
We make a great team - she has taught me so much about dog behaviour and about her breed.
She loves chewing on a tennis ball when we are over at the dog park and loves chasing after it too.
She is also a great traveller in the car, is very relaxed sitting or lying down in the back of the car.
2:39am...
I can't sleep.
I was just congratulating myself about how well I've been handling the last couple of stressful weeks and then I remembered that I accidentally drove into a tree earlier today and a few nights ago I gave a parked car a love tap with my car.
Yeah...I'm handling my shit like a pro.
It's Anzac day tomorrow.
Can't even begin to imagine the horrors of war - it's too much for me to think about right now, too much to bear.
I would attend an Anzac morning service if I was any good at waking up in the mornings.
As it is I am embarrassingly woefully bad at waking up in the mornings - woeful.
It's a bit hard to decipher your role in life when you sleep for up to 12 hours a day.
It might be my sleep apnoea, or my depression, or my Chronic Fatigiue, but my brothers remember me sleeping excessively even when I was younger and lighter - minus the sleep apnoea.
I think I deal with the stress in my life by sleeping lots - and eating lots too.
The eating part is going to be rudely and promptly dealt with by the weight loss surgery.
What am I going to do when I can no longer eat to deal with the stress in my life?
I've thought about that a lot over the past 12 months.
There's other ways that I can that I can relax, rest and unwind.
Practicing mindfullness, walking through nature, reading, (I love trashy magazines), talking to friends and family and managing my stress levels.
All these activities relax me, it's just that food gets me there a lot quicker because it's an instant distraction.
I need to be more mindful of my stress levels, and not let them reach the RED ZONE.
I'm sure with better stress management and a bit of patience/practice I can cope without the instant hit and distraction of food.
I'm also planning on returning to therapy in July.
I've already had 5 years of ongoing psycho therapy and am currently on a 12 month break.
For me I have found the therapy to be very beneficial.
It's helped me to get to know myself better.
Towards the end I was only going once a month as that was as often as I felt I needed to go.
I'll return to monthly sessions to help with the post surgery lifestyle changes which will take time to
adjust to.
Strictly speaking I am not a person who likes change - like EVER - but I'm going to have a lot off changes coming my way very soon.
Hopefully the changes will be for the better with no complications or nasty stuff involved.
All of my family are a bit aghast at the idea of me getting weight loss surgery but they know my reasons and motivations for it.
They all know that I haven't always had an easy life or time of it.
I'm having the gastric bypass done, (SPOILER ALERT - I ended up getting the SLEEVE) and it does sound like an extreme thing to put yourself through.
But as I've mentioned before, I'm getting it done for health reasons and they warrant this procedure.
It's hard to know whether the private surgeon who approved my surgery is working from a purely medical agenda or if it's more financially motivated - and if so, to what degree.
I guess we are all guinea pigs with our health - we all have to try different things and keep trying different things before we are lucky enough to hit jack pot - but even if the approval for surgery was financially motivated to a degree, my surgery will help to further educate the allied health professionals in my team, (the surgeon, the dietitian, the nurse, the psychologist, the physician) and it will contribute to furthering best surgical practice.
That's the way I see it anyway.
I have a make up party to attend to later today - it's with my local dog park frineds.
I also have to go into the post office at some stage to register my 'change of address' and change my address for everything.
What else?
I have to service my car while I'm recovering from surgery.
Put on a load of washing tomorrow.
I'm giving away my queen size bed and have advertised it online.
I might get a King single instead.
I need to try to sleep, it's 3:30am now.
Crazy town.
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