General chit chat

Good night @Faith-and-Hope, @Spookytookims, @BlueBay, @Former-Member and everybody. Sleep well 🙂

You too @Former-Member ..... 😘💕

Hi @Former-Member,

Well, I'm reading this after 2am and have clocked up a few sleep hours since heading to bed early last night. Thought I might try to answer your kind question about how I am feeling inside my head, my heart and my gut. I'm guessing you might already have got a sense of some of it in a general sense. I am especially inclined to write some of my deeper contemplations in the 'Writing as Therapy' thread, where you contribute your deep-questioning writing too. As for how I am in my gut, that's never very good as I have Crohns Disease.

Erosion of physical health and vitality is a central theme at this time in my life (menopause). With menopause I seem to be exeriencing a (probably natural) decline in these things, that were never good in the first place due to chronic physical illness since I was 18. Mental health struggles have arisen both out of the struggles with physical health over my life, and in their own right as primary illness in themselves. On that head and heart level, it seems that how I am a lot of the time is a bit up and down and round the place.

I can start a day unable to move from a chair, repeatedly falling back to sleep without meaning to. By the end of the same day I commonly find it impossible to sleep due to a hyper-awake mind and/or euphoria with my creative projects. I am hypersensitive in the way I process things and can be easily rocked off any balance I might have. I used to be very ambitious but have lost almost all of that. It was always something that tortured me anyway, as I never seemed to be able to find any balance with that either. Now I mostly just feel like a fool, and also ashamed, for being so lacking in capability with basic, everyday tasks of survival. At the same time, I have lived so long with this dysfunction, some level of tolerance of myself with it has been gained. I worry about my future and regularly remember traumatic times long in the past. Living in the present seems to be my friend.

But above all this, I am reminded of one thing: I am a lot better off mentally and emotionally at this relatively peaceful time of my life than when I was younger. Then things were often excrutiating and terribly bewildering. But I do not find myself in crisis often, as I did back then. Perhaps related to this, I don't question everything as deeply as I once did. Even now I like the still, dark pools of reflection. But I don't seem to be at so much at risk of drowning as I once was.

Thanks for letting me get some of this written down! It occurs to me that it's going to be an odd thing to read on first waking. Hope all the present moments of your day treat you well. Sending hugs, just because that's what I'd want to do right now if I met you.

Good Morning @Mazarita 🙂

What an incredible thing to wake up to . . . the truth - Thank you so very much!

So glad you slept past my bedtime, you remind me how lucky I am to sleep in a pattern. I've been told even when I sleep, I don't do it properly, I'm too alert and don't go into a deep sleep; to be honest I think that has something to do with my learning not to dream, or at least not to remember them, so that would be 30 odd years now. The 'Writing as Therapy' thread, where you don't have to use @'s because your not talking to one person, your talking to the World, Fate, the unknown; that's what I think it is.

I believe Crohns Disease is a constant battle, you must be so totally exhausted from fighting it for so long. My child has been diagnosed with Irritable Bowl syndrome and Celiac disease and has to be so careful with what they eat. Falling ill on a regular basis and suffering great pain for days or even weeks. They insist I have the Celiac too, and I may have, but won't consent to a biopsy - since discovering about gluten, I have found avoiding it avoids the child-birth like cramps. I have trouble 'passing' when it comes to the bowel and yet incontinence when it comes to the bladder, both of these are exasperated by physical damage. One of the cancers my Mother had was Bowel, and my child is convinced it developed from Celiac. But my Mother had 7 major cancers, Cervical, Bowel, Brain, Breast, Lung, Liver and Bone - it was in her Lymph System, bit by bit they cut pieces of her away until she chose to be made 'comfortable' with the last 3.

I hear you with the physical problems, creating and worsening brain process problems. An understand the fear of getting older and not being able to battle these things as you once did. Our immune systems have gone haywire, I have Psorisis both inside and out, from what I understand it's not a deficiancy, it's a proficiancy. My body sends a message to my brain that something is damaged, so my brain sends the neccessary repairs; the problem is the record is scratched and my body never stops sending the messages, on my skin it is very obvious large scaly patches, on my joints the thin membrane is getting too thick to allow the fluids in and out, on my spine it's growing to much bone. On a bad day I tend to think, appreciate this day because tomorrow will be worse.

Your experience of falling asleep against your will would be frustrating and frightening, to not be able to control basic functions of your own body. And like you say it takes decades to be able to accept it. So I see that as a benifit to getting older. Learning anything takes time, learning the self takes a lifetime; after half a century we may not be experts but we are experienced and have developed our own methods of acceptance - I think that's half the battle won 🙂

There will be bad days. Bad days pass. There will be good days.

I feel an incredible bond with you, I don't want to frighten or burden you with that - I want to empower you with it. You feel like a friend and I haven't had one of those for so very long.

So ignore this if it's the wrong thing to say, but . . .

love you Mazy

@Former-Member, thank you for your wonderful message. Love back to you! I feel a bond with you too. I get images of where you are and what your life is like. They are sketchy and no doubt different to the reality. But they make me want to know you better. Already, you too feel like a friend.

You mentioning that you learned not to dream or remember them speaks volumes about what you must have been through in your life. I already had a sense of it being a very difficult one in the past, the legacy of which you seem to be living with now. Your health sounds very challenging too. My understanding is that psoriasis and crohns disease are related, in that they are both diseases of the auto-immune system.

I have been experiencing some urinary incontinence too just recently, but only when I've been coughing hard with this cold. I understand that this is one of things that can also happen simply with menopause. I like it that we can talk about such things in a little bit of detail because I find they are not acceptable subjects for conversation to most people. Another of the ways in which this forum is a valuable space for helpful exchange. Prior to coming into menopause, I'd heard so little ever spoken about it.

I am in remission from Crohns. That means I don't get the childbirth-like cramps you mentioned. But my bowel movements are still completely abnormal in a tiring, sickening way. My gut is still generally sensitive and I eat only in small portions. As you guessed, I have chronic fatigue from living with the disease for over 35 years. There have been quite a number of surgeries along the way including removal of total 70cm of small intestine that became like scar tissue and blocked the bowel.

I too see acceptance as a gift of growing older. I like what you said:

There will be bad days. Bad days pass. There will be good days.

Thanks for your empowering friendship. I send you the same in return!

Maz

@Mazarita Gidday 🙂

I went into my local town today, I needed honey, I prefer it to sugar and the only sugar I had in the house was refined castor sugar - probably not the best for me, particularly not by the shovel fulls in my cuppa's 🙂 I decided to stop at the State Forest on the way home and give my young dog a bit of a walk; I didn't really walk him yesterday, I just threw the ball for him, up and down the driveway a while, it was too wet for me to go stomping through the grass along my properties boundry lines.
I had it in my mind that it would just be a short walk, as only a few days ago I had taken him there and walked a lot further than usual. The State Forest has dirt roads in it, last time I was there I'd walked to a cross road and realised I gone further than usual, but just couldn't seem to stop . . . and continued probably the same distance again! Not only was I buggered when I got back to the car, it was nearly dark! So this time I was firm in my decision it would be a short one.
I've mentioned some little caves I've come across, in a post yonks back, but that they were in a fenced off part of the Forest, being used for some sort of Quarry. I don't know what made me do it, I wasn't heading for the caves, I just wanted to see what was up there, what was the danger the signs warned about? So I slipped through the fence wires (making sure the young fella went first, just in case it was electified - figured he'd at least yip ;)) and made my way up the fairly steep driveway/track.
It was a much bigger Quarry than I'd imagined, it even seemed to have it's own dam! 🙂 though that may have just been the lowland where recent rain waters would have gathered. I didn't find anything overtly dangerous and think the sign may have been just to help keep people out. I did find the reminants of a little camp fire, nestled in a corner of two huge tall boulders and stood there thinking 'this would be a good place to get out of the wind'.
With no direction in mind I found myself wandering over to the edge where I knew the caves were at. I continued wandering along that edge, occasionally looking over to find those caves. I found them and the next thing I knew I was very carefully climbing over that edge. There were plenty of pretty safe Roo trails to follow, and I followed the ones that led to the caves. As far as caves go I think they are rather young and there were no signs of any ancient people, but I was thrilled all the same - my very own caves! I did find a trace that someone had been in one of the caves; a couple of empty beer bottles and a rather nice round bar-b-que plate to one side of the mouth of it. Somebody had lived here for a little while. I can't help thinking what led them there, was it desperation or there own choice? If I was younger I think it would make the perfect camping spot! 😄

@Former-Member amazing tale of your real daily life! I am on my mobile away from 'home' and computer (my most adventurous landscape). Very weird emotional states today. Sorry if I sound a bit weird in what I am writing now too. You seem such a brave person. Your writing is really good to read.

@Mazarita Thank you for your wonderful words, they don't seem weird to me at all (except I'm not used to them being used about me!), but I'm guessing your feeling weird. Everything positive, including love to you. I know it's scary out there - your doing great 🙂

My internet connection is playing up (really slow), so I'm going to watch some Waltons (do you remember them, such a 'good' family!) and then some Gotham (modern day batman stuff) and pop back on later.

I nearly slipped into 'flip-out' material today on here, trying to help a young one. I hope I didn't do any damage. Good grief seems my emotional state might be a bit weird too - maybe the weather?