Sleepy

My late Saturday night is catching up with me… I have been struggling to stay awake all day, made more challenging by the revolving door of appointments today — as one provider left, the next one was ringing up for access.  Jerry, as you might imagine, was less than impressed with this parade of strangers in his house attending to me.  The poor baby had to wear his collar — which he detests — because otherwise he’d be barking endlessly and loudly.  Don was likewise less than thrilled, as every time one of the nurses/other caregivers shows up, he’s banished to his “man cave” with Jerry until they leave.  I can’t have Jerry running around as there’s a warning about pets when the caregivers are in the home, so the boys are banished for short periods.  When I woke this morning, I forced myself up so I’d be upright when the first one arrived at 9:30; I just wanted to stay asleep… and all of them were anywhere from 15-30 minutes early!  After the last one left, I was hungry (yay, too many people!) but also so tired that cooking was out of the question.  

One of the visitors today was the dietician; charming young woman who is extremely bubbly.  She and I discussed how to stabilize my weight and help me to regain some of it.  In our conversation it became clearer that I have some lingering body image issues.  I’ve told you before that I’ve always been overweight.  From as far back as I can remember, I was being told to lose weight, cut down on my portions; that I was unattractive, that given a choice, boys would choose anyone else over me, because “just look at you!”  In some ways, I resigned myself to being the “fat friend” who would never play the lead in a romantic role.  Remember all those after school specials back in the 80s?  Where the bookish nerd would remove her glasses (I wore those too!) shake back her thick hair and turn into a slinky, sexy siren?  I would never be the sexy one, because I didn’t have the hourglass 36-24-36, 110lb frame that was de rigeur for beauty contestants — unlike my elder sister.  How’s that for hard to live up to standards?  I’m not angry or upset at that.  I was who I was, and I went ahead with life, but struggled endlessly with my weight, and put up with the equally endless commentary on how pretty I could be if only I “had the discipline” to stick to a diet and lose the weight.  I am, though, sharing that parents and elders need to be aware of the pressure that’s put on teenagers to conform to a beauty standard and they’d do better to ensure that they’re fit and healthy instead of meeting some unrealistic criteria for looks.  I mean, reports are that about 1% of women meet the looks in a magazine, so why should 99% of us suffer for it?  And to my teenage girls, if a guy is only interested in your looks, he’s really not worth your time or attention.  Someone that shallow will just make you unhappy and insecure.  If he, and his buddies, think it’s appropriate to rate women based solely on looks, consign them to the outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.  We’ll have a conversation on relationships and healthy vs. unhealthy ones soon.

Anyway, we’re back to trying to find ways to get me to take in nutrients on a regular basis.  She left me a sample of a nutritional drink — the ones I usually get are heavily backordered and shelves are echoingly bare at stores.  It’s surprising, but in the last year there have been more shortages of items than usual; first of children’s medicines, then general cold treatments and now nutritional products.  Now I need nutritionally dense foods, including drinks, to try and increase my intake so my weight doesn’t keep dropping.  Ironically, though, the social media algorithms keep flooding my pages with ads to lose weight rapidly, now adjusted for seniors (because I’m now totally invisible for my weight and my age.)  I really think that advertisers should not provide deliberately misleading and inaccurate statements, and not just print tiny “these statements have not been evaluated for accuracy; this product is not intended to diagnose or treat any condition…” legalese at the bottom of the screen in white-on-light grey background.

OK, I’m on a schedule of eating something every 2 hours, so I’ve got to go sort out what I’ll have this evening.  I think that I need either a personal chef or a rotation of donors to feed me… it’s so demoralizing to want to eat, but not have the energy to cook, and when I do have food, feeling full after a couple of bites.  I do still have functioning tastebuds, which is good, but my portions sizes… I had a half of a 6-pack of nuggets the other day, and felt like I’d gone through a bucket of chicken.  We’ll get this under control, worry not.  Besides, there’s dim sum upcoming, and I need my appetite for that!  Good night.