Turning 40

I'm turning 40. Forty. Four zero. This is happening in a few weeks. I did the maths the other day but screwed it up, so will just say whenever it's 5:13 PDT on the 29th, I'll officially celebrate my 40th year and start my 41st year. I am old.

I have a lot of thoughts about this, but will just mention a few of them because ain't nobody got time for rambling. I certainly have other plans anyway. (My Sims 3 addiction needs some nurturing.)

Salon has an article about my generation going through a midlife crisis here. I read it and was like, huh. I don't feel middle aged. I certainly don't look it since I keep getting carded. I think I may look like I'm up to 26 or 28 now, if I'm lucky. I'm pretty sure I'm not in a midlife crisis, although on account of the turning 40 thing, I am examining my life as lived so far and weighing it with things I'd still like to accomplish. Long story short, I've been through an awful lot, and the best is yet to come!

You can stop reading now if you want to skip the details of all of that. Just sayin' since we're all pressed for time all of the time. Seems like that, anyway.

The article mentions that us Gen Xers don't really hit a wall of midlife crisis - we have crises throughout. I guess I can see that, although I've had crises throughout my life so far, not just this allegedly middle part. Let's see.... bad stresses and good stresses would be:

- my mom died when I was barely 15
- I had my first broken engagement at 20
- got married at 21
- got divorced at 22
- was diagnosed with endometriosis at 24
- got put on 2 meds for familial hypertension (thanks dad) when I was 25
- had my second broken engagement at 25
- remarried at 28
- was diagnosed with costochondritis and fibromyalgia at 28
- was tentatively diagnosed (not definitively via biopsy) with IgA nephritis before an actual factual diagnosis of stage 2A grade 3 triple negative breast cancer at age 30 (and I don't have either BRCA mutation!)
- my dad died when I was 32
- was diagnosed with gastritis, gastroparesis, an H. pylori infection (NOT FUN AND THE CURE WAS HORRIBLE), and Sjogren's Syndrome at 36
- had to quit working completely at 37
- went through 2 rounds of SSDI rejections (even though Sjogren's is on the list of "you're disabled if you have this because it sucks that much") but then was able to start working full time again (thanks to Deplin, Savella, and modafinil) at 38
- endured Very Interesting Job Things and family issues throughout all of this

I guess those would qualify as at least minor crises, huh?

Me unedited after a really great 80 minute
table massage this evening. So happy!!

At 39, there's still some weirdness going on, mainly with some eyesight issues but I get a recheck in November. I'm also going to ask my rheumatologist (assuming I remember next month) to check me for dermatomyositis and hypermobility syndrome, since that combo would explain both some skin issues plus my continually occasional rib subluxations (from the combo of muscle stiffness and loose joints).

You know, even with all of that, I still look awesome and way younger than my chronological age, or so everyone keeps telling me. Booyah!! I am pretty resigned to being carded for the rest of my life. I guess I don't look like I'm about 40 in that pic of me from tonight, but Awesome Massage Therapist kinda rubbed all of the makeup out of my face, so whatever. I really need to make myself get massages more often. I got in on the monthly Massage Envy prepaid deal the other year before the prices went up, so I really should keep that going. Guess I'll have to discipline myself with relaxation.

The Salon article mentions that "Xers are still in full construction mode" and that's really true. Hubby and I are consumed with our separate artistic interests (mostly graphite drawing for him though he's been dabbling in pastels and inks and other stuff; photography and writing for me). We're also unlike a lot of people our age in that we're happy to intentionally live in a nice apartment instead of a house because 1) we'd rather let someone else take care of home maintenance issues so we can do what we want to do, 2) property taxes are crazy stupid high here, and 3) it'd be nice to live outside of hot sweltering Texas one of these years so portability for the win! We also have no children, pets, or plants to worry about, although we've talked about caring for some sort of critter(s), like maybe a cat (Abyssinian for him, Nebelung for me) or dog (Scottie for him, Samoyed for me in a way less hot environment), or bunny, or guinea pigs (he misses his), or iguana (I miss mine!) or bearded dragons (I miss those too).

Hot flashing in Sept 2010. I was having a great
time with friends but this was NOT FUN.

It's nice being pretty unlimited with home things and critters not tying us down, but my health issues limit me more than I'd like. It's not really as bad as it used to be though, mainly as I'm much better at pacing myself these days. I can push myself at 75% of my previous full steam because I'm stubborn, plus the new med combo has helped me to work a 40 hour week for over a year now. I wasn't able to do that for the five years prior. I'm also really ecstatic that I haven't hot flashed freaky bad in a long while, thanks to realizing that the BCP I took non-stop for endometriosis was putting me into early menopause which got increasingly frighteningly worse each year. Seriously, looking at some old pics of me drenched in my own sweat in not hot weather is such a bummer, especially with remembering how drained and continually worn out I was, but I'm so glad I'm past that crappiness!! Yay for better living through chemistry!!

Full construction mode now is making me so happy since these days I'm surrounded by even more artistic people. What am I constructing? Eh, several books, a screenplay, eventually some music but definitely some photoey things soon, and who knows what else. You'll just have to pay attention and see. In the meantime, you can check out the awesome nerditry I help with via SCNS Live, now powered by Cinelinx!

I got your PointsPlus right here, pally!

So... three months on the job and I'm happy that I've not gained any stress weight. In fact, since I still have stress weight from the last two jobs plus gained poundage from years of medication roulette, and since I like the idea of "1) here's how you calculate points, and 2) only eat so many points a day to lose weight," I'm doing Weight Watchers At Work. (Yes, I'm doing this through my awesome workplace in a supportive group setting, and I have to say, the stresses I have there are familiar yet somewhat unfamiliar, and I definitely do not want to let the stress go to my thighs and arms again!)

So far, so good. Today was our three week weigh-in and so far I've lost 6.2 pounds. I'm not drinking Dr Pepper as often but I am drinking the shit out of diet 7up, diet Sprite, and diet Sierra Mist (and the dSM strawberry kiwi is impressing me). I'm not doing much exercise because of post-exertional malaise (thank you fibro and Sjogren's for the lovely uber-fatigue) but we found an elliptical that doesn't make my creaky knees hurt and I'm working out on that as I'm able. I also go down and up at least 6 flights of stairs a day so that's helpful.

Things I've learned from the first 3 weeks of Weight Watchers (because there's always something new to learn even with already knowing a ton about nutrition and healthiness and all that):

- Following the PointsPlus thing is really freakin' easy, especially with the handy special calculator. For fatigued and sometimes fibrofogged and somewhat lazy me, this rocks.

- Some of the proprietary Weight Watchers food is actually pretty good. I'm loving the mint cookie crisp snack bars, chocolate pretzel snack bars, bbq chips, and chocolate swirl cookies something fierce, although I'm definitely looking for popped bbq chips when grocery shopping since it's a lot cheaper. The snack bars are literally two bites worth of food, but that's really all that's needed for a quick snack since these are kinda dense and taste more rich than they look.

- Feeling deprived means you're doing it wrong. It's all about choosing what to eat, and when. Today for breakfast I had morning meds, a vanilla Chobani, and coffee with almond milk at 7:30 am. For a 9:50 am pre-two-meetings-in-a-row snack I had a mint cookie crisp bar. For lunch at 12:45 I had four slices of honey deli ham, 1 slice of colby jack cheese, and 1 tbsp of light Miracle Whip on an everything thin bagel, along with 15-16 French onion Sun Chips and some diet Sierra Mist. For a why-am-I-still-at-work snack at 5:40 pm, I had a chocolate pretzel blast bar. For dinner at 6:45 pm I had some strawberry kiwi diet Sierra Mist with a SmartOnes ravioli florentine, followed by 30-32 Sun Chips (harvest cheddar and french onion) and evening meds. I don't feel deprived At All. Points-wise, this takes up my 26 daily points and 9 of my 49 point slush per week. (It actually takes up 11 points but I had 2 activity points and traded those for food points. For me, 10 minutes of low intensity activity equals 1 activity point, and lotsa stuff counts as activity.) If I feel hungry later on tonight, I'll have some apples or cherries or grapes. Actually, cherries sound kinda good right now. BRB.

- A sushi roll is generally 12 points (3 points per 2 roll slices). Nigeri is better at 3 points per 4 nigeri. A hibachi filet mignon meal at Benihana (includnig veggies, soup, salad, etc.) is freakin' 27 points. I could splurge on that if I wanted to but yikes.

- Nuts are from the devil, y'all. Holy bajeebus. I'm way better off as a steakaholic!

- I generally eat healthy anyway, but now have a better idea of how much I go overboard when I know I go overboard. Like when I splurge on the coconut shrimp at anywhere. Or use as much olive oil as I'd normally use for any kind of stir-fry.

- I've totally missed out on incredibly indulgent eating, thanks to combinations I've learned about from coworkers. The french fries in a Frosty thing I knew about, but not the breadsticks dipped in alfredo sauce.

- I'm kind of an emotional eater in that I'll graze a lot and not really care about how much I graze, especially when I'm bored. When I'm upset, I go for either dairy (which usually makes my gut protest all violent-like) or fatty (nuts or the aforementioned coconut shrimp). Otherwise, if I'm really upset or in the zone doing work or focused on whatever, I'll forget to eat.

- I've tended to not remember to eat lunch until around 2pm for many years. Now I'm straight up eating lunch at 11:30am some days, by 12:45pm other days.

- I've been really pissy the last few days, wanting to eat a ton of anything in sight because my metabolism is currently ramped up, but yay for apples and carrots. Apples and carrots (and Sun Chips) are delicious.

- I'm totally getting a ton of protein-filled yumminess the next time I shop for groceries. Mmm... bison. Speaking of protein-filled yumminess, it is possible to go to Babe's Chicken House and eat only smoked chicken and a little bit of corn and come out absolutely stuffed and satisfied. Their smoked chicken is what we had for Thanksgiving or Christmas last year, or was it the year before? I dunno. I don't care. It was totes worth it.

In other news, fibro/Sjogren's flares from summertime really suck, photography is happening in bits and pieces, my Sims 3 addiction is still in place, and I have a good start on a screenplay I've been asked to write. It'll be a docu-fiction, and I'm really amazed that there's not been a movie done about the particular era of time I've chosen. The setting combined with the perspective of the person with the brilliant story idea makes me want to get it written as quickly as possible so no one else ganks the awesomeness. Seriously, I don't know how this isn't already a movie, and no, I'm not even mentioning general details since omg this is not going to be ganked from me!

And now is the time on Sprockets ven ve danz! 

Size shouldn't matter.

Besides, it's not the length that matters, it's the girth and how you use it. Ahem.

If you don't already know about the awesomeness that is Nancy Upton, see:

Dallas Actress Nancy Upton's Creative Protest of American Apparel's Plus-Size Model Search 

exclusive: nancy upton takes on size, style, and american apparel

Personally, I believe that women are beautiful regardless of size. I'm easily frustrated because I can't work out like I used to on account of post exertional malaise from several illnesses, but I also believe that it's possible to be zaftig and fit.

Post Exertional Malaise Series

Can You Be Fat And Fit? More Health Experts Say Yes

Long rambling short, size shouldn't matter. Health should. 

Without further comment aside from IT'S ABOUT TIME!, see:

A victory for curvy ladies: Ann Summers' competition to find 'real woman' to front campaign is won by only plus-size finalist

'Most runway models meet the BMI criteria for anorexia', claims plus-size magazine in powerful comment on body image in the fashion industry