Tour de France

You know that saying “man of few words?”  Well, I’m a woman of many words. Words, communication, conversation, writing...all of it comes easy to me. I tend to over-communicate with my fiancé, my friends, my family, even my boss. I find there are far fewer regrets with those you love; almost no “I wish I had said it when” moments when you just come out with it and move on. But when things are really heavy, when I should be able to talk more than ever, when I need to talk more than ever, I can’t seem to find the words. I can’t even find a train of thought to sort through. It’s as if the emotions come so fast that they slam into each other from behind and underneath and every fathomable angle. The feeling reminds me of those Tour de France cyclists that would end up tangled and twisted into an impenetrable wreck after some idiot press car nipped one rider with his side view mirror on a sharp turn.

My parents have been married for over 35 years. When it’s all done, maybe 36. I found out a year ago. I still feel like I've been nipped on a sharp turn.It still seems as if one day they were holding hands and the next day they were oceans away from each other. They didn’t come out and say it was over. I had to ask. And when I did, my mother simply said their love was then, and this – this separate life - is now.

I didn’t cry. I just hung up the phone, walked into my office building, sat down and started working. I didn’t think about it for days. I just went about my business in a little bit of a daze. Then I realized I should tell B. So I told him and turned around and left the room to start dinner. He came into the kitchen after me, waiting for the words to start pouring out of me like they always did. He looked at me, waited. The words didn't come. So he asked if I was OK and I cried in his arms and then I finished cooking dinner.I got mascara all over his white t-shirt. I didn’t say much for the rest of the night. It took me another week to say it out loud. When I did, I was a woman of very few words. I think it was sometime in that 2nd or 3rd week that I Googled “adult child of divorced parents.” I thought there might be something wrong with me because I couldn’t find any words when I thought of their faces or their life together or our family the way it used to be. I actually Googled it.

I never thought this would happen. Never. There were things I knew, things I didn’t; sides of stories I heard; sides I never will. As a child, a teenager, a woman, there were certainly signs that this might happen someday. I never saw them. I never saw them.

Now I’m stuck with this big, dense, thick brick of stuff I have no idea how to sort through. I just keep thinking of the Tour de France and all those sharp turns and tangled cyclists and I hope I’m blessed with better eyesight in the future than I was in the past.

Your Body is FOR Something

I've learned quite a bit about being kinder to myself and my body over the past 10 years. I've fought long and hard to get to a place where I value strong over thin, well-being over good-looking. I still have moments, days, weeks though where I catch myself determining too much of my self-worth with physical appearance. Sometimes what frightens me is that it's become more of an undertone – an old demon that sneaks through the door when I'm more vulnerable due to major life changes or curveballs that I struggle to handle with grace.

I'm at the tail end of a particularly challenging few months. A few days ago, I went to bed feeling gross after eating a big piece of cake and woke up still feeling gross. I started that day with about 15 minutes of "Ew. I'm so bloated and squishy." And then I caught a glimpse of the newly formed scab at the base of my spine and was tempted to slap myself across the face.

I had back surgery 5 weeks ago yesterday. I was in pain ranging from moderate discomfort to mind-twisting, so-bad-I-wanted-to-vomit-pain for 3 months before the surgery. During those 3 months, there were many sleepless nights; countless frustrating, disoriented days when I couldn't sit or stand or lie down regardless of how exhausted I was. They finally did an MRI after various tried and failed courses of treatment including oral steroids, 2 corticosteroid locals, physical therapy, active release therapy and 10 days of mind-erasing pharmaceuticals when the pain became beyond unbearable. The MRI revealed I had snapped a 2 cm hunk of my L4-5 disk off and the “extrusion” had entered my spinal canal. That sucker was big enough to force my spinal nerves to re-route around it. Thus the pain from which there was no relief. I was told it had to come out. I said "Great. Find me a fancy-ass surgeon and let's do this."

They put me under for 3.5 hours, went in through a 1.5 inch incision, parted the muscles around my spine, set a rod on the bony nob and entered the spinal canal through that rod to remove the 2 cm piece of crap that tortured me for 3 months. The surgery was a success. I wasn’t paralyzed or blinded in the process; no permanent nerve damage that we know of. I spent one night in the hospital and have had a totally manageable recovery so far – thanks to my loving, attentive B and a wonderful support system of friends, family and colleagues. I can walk. I’m alive and healthy. I have good healthcare that gave me access to the right doctors. I’m not going nuts from nauseating levels of pain anymore. I can sleep through the night. I will be able to eventually return to Pilates and yoga and should have full feeling in my leg and foot within the year. My favorite part of it all? I got to watch B enthusiastically embrace the roll of caretaker, homemaker, nurse, chef, and advocate. He is definitely going to be the one the kids run to in the middle of the night.

After all that, it took me less than 5 weeks to start worrying about my weight. As if that’s important. I can walk for Christ’s sake. I have everything and everyone I need in my life to be happy, healthy, fulfilled.

I may not have internal meltdowns after putting on too-tight pants anymore. I might be able to go for months at a time without obsessing about my stomach or getting anxious about my weight. But in my 5th week after back surgery, I caught myself doing the same “rib check” I used to do 15 years ago. It’s amazing how you can come so far and then have moments where it’s as if nothing has changed at all. I was immediately ashamed of wasting my thoughts on such trivial observations. But knowing they don’t belong there doesn’t stop the same old demons from sneaking through the back door.

The day I found myself forgetting all I was reminded of through the back ordeal, I asked myself how I had made it all the way to 30 without freeing myself from the encumbrances of associating self-worth with appearance. How is it that all the fighting and therapy and clawing my way to a better state of mind only results in temporary pardons? How the hell do I forget in less than 5 weeks that being kind to myself and kind to my body is far more important that being skinny?

I am an intelligent, confident, well-rounded, well-educated woman. I am strong and sometimes even wise. But none of that matters. What matters is that I am human. Body image and weight issues are sentences that no modern woman manages to entirely elude. We all deal with them at some point in our lives to varying degrees - whether we have the guts to admit it or not. The best thing we can do for ourselves is find self-worth in any and every other place. And as my dear friend Jenna says, try to remember that your body is FOR things far more valuable than looking good in a bikini.