Dear Diary: Sort of mini hiatus?

Sorry I've been sort of AWOL, friends. It's been a crazy month for me. Toward the end of July I started having weird blind spots in the center of my field of vision that would come and go for about an hour or so at a time. After having my vision basically crap out on my every day for a week, I finally went to the eye doctor, who said my optic nerve in both eyes was elevated and slightly tilted. Boy, did I learn a lot about eyes and the optic nerve! He referred me to another eye doctor to get some photos of the backs of my eyes, and he basically said that pressure in my skull/brain was causing me optic nerves to become elevated (or basically sort of pop out into the ball of my eye, rather than just chilling back behind it like they usually do).

That eye doctor then referred me for an MRI to rule out the possibility of an actual tumor in my brain or any blood clots, and when my MRI came back clean I got my diagnosis of Pseudotumor Cerebri, or Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension. Basically, there's too much cerebrospinal fluid in my brainbox (either because my body is making too much of it, or not absorbing it back into itself correctly) and it's causing pressure on my brain.

Dr. Eyeballman put me on a drug normally used for Glaucoma and, weirdly, altitude sickness that's supposed to help reduce the amount of fluid in my head. It made me pretty sick for the first week or so, and I still can't drink soda because of a weird side effect where the bitter sensors in my tongue are extra sensitive to the carbonation and make it taste like rancid armpit (GROSS), as well as having weird tingling in my heads, feet, and lips that comes and goes. I've also been just really TIRED, and have had an almost constant low-grade headache as well as a lot of blurring in my vision, as well as being hypersensitive to light and sound... BUT, I haven't had any blind spots since I started the medication, so we think it's working! And I go see a neurologist today to talk about next steps, so I'll know more about what the next month or so will be like for me then.

With dealing with all this eyes/brain stuff this past month, it's been taking most of my energy getting through my workday. What little energy I have left is used up with my family (it takes a LOT of energy mothering a 2- and 4-year old!) Anyway, I've been doing about the bare minimum to keep my blog up and running, keeping my tour commitments and trying to get reviews posted for ARC's I've committed to. I'm hoping to get back into the swing of things in September, and get some discussion posts up. I'm a little disheartened because I think most of the traffic through here tends to be when I'm hosting a giveaway, so when I didn't have a New Release Giveaway Hop for August my traffic died WAY down. On top of already struggling with depression, it's been tough to make myself keep going with my blog... I've also fallen behind on reading other bookish blogs and keeping up with commenting and the like...

But you know what? I really LIKE blogging, and I do it for me. And I've connected with a few other book bloggers that I'd like to think of as friends. So I'm going to stick around. I'm starting to ramp up some of my crafting projects for the fall, so I might share about some of those here. One of these weekends soon I hope to experiment with some new candle scents, colors, and GLITTER I recently acquired, so I'll post about that a bit. If you've got some fun fandom candle recs, I'd love to hear them. :)

Dear Diary: In search of some encouragement and postive energy (weight loss and depression)

OK friends, this isn't book-related but I need to put it out there in the universe. So you get a personal post today - yay?

Real talk: according to my BMI, I'm morbidly obese. I'm 5'4" and 268 lbs (that's right, putting that all out there in the public eye) and I've been fat as far back as I can remember... Just not THIS fat. When I say that I'm morbidly obese, people go "Oh come on, you are not" because I think that the picture in some people's heads of what morbidly obese looks like is a person who doesn't fit through doorways and can't get off the couch. And while I think the BMI chart is kind of a load of crap, the fact remains that I'm a good 100 lbs overweight.

"Why are you telling me this?" I see you wondering. WELL. Let me explain... No, there is too much. Let me sum up. Buttercup is marry Humperdink in a little less than half an hour. So all we have to do is get in, break up the wedding, steal the princess, make our escape... After I kill Count Rugen.

Oh wait, that's not my story. This is my story: I've struggled with Poly-cystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) since I was a teenager. Basically it's a hormone disorder with a lot of fun side-effects, one of which is an ease at gaining weight and a difficulty losing it (which throws the hormones further out of balance, which makes weight loss even harder, which throws hormones more out of balance... Yeah, it pretty much sucks.) It also tends to come with a great big dollop of depression, so fun times!
In the Year of Our Lord 2017 I decided enough was enough and got with it, joined Weight Watchers and did the low carb thing (as prescribed by my doctor, because PCOS also comes with some body dysfunction when it comes to processing carb, so no "Low Carb is The Most Horrible" comments plz). I lost 30 lbs in a little over 4 months and was rocking that crap. Bought new size 18 pants, got rid of all my size 22's - life was good.

Then in mid-April I was slammed with a wicked recurrence of my stupid depression, and it all sort of slipped away. Fast forward one year (ONE MEASLY YEAR) and I've gained back that 30 pounds plus an extra 15 for good measure. Because there's nothing like fighting a losing battle!

So here I am... I had to buy a few new pairs of size 22's and they're getting snug, and I just REFUSE to buy size 24 pants and have that be the new biggest size I've ever been.

I want to clarify: there is nothing wrong with being a size 24 or larger. I am all about body positivity and loving yourself whatever your size. There are many woman who are larger than me that are GORGEOUS, and I'm not just talking about their faces. I am very much apple shaped and carry a large part of my weight in my gut, so it's that extra unhealthy visceral fat. I also have a small chest so I'm all out of proportion, and I basically look like I have very pregnant lady tummy all the time. It's not a look I like, and I'm not comfortable in my body. I went for a walk with my kids last week and couldn't make it down the street and back before I was all "My back! My hips!"

OK, this post is getting way too long. Are you still with me? I started back on a low carb diet two and a half weeks ago, and then last week my whole family got the stomach flu and I went "Well this is stressful, time for a pint of Ben & Jerry's and a bag of potato chips to calm me down!"

This week I'm back on track, and I've been doing well. I had started out doing Atkins, but a week in I was already driving myself crazy with compulsively measuring every little thing. I have an addictive personality and I've found that tracking my food can very quickly take me to a pretty unhealthy place, which is why I decided I would just stick to a high fat/moderate protein/low carb diet without actually tracking; sticking to a list of acceptable foods, letting myself deviate and indulge IN MODERATION when things like birthday parties invariably happen (because otherwise I am "good" during said birthday party, and the next day crack under the pressure of having been super strict and end up binging on a bunch on garbage that's way worse than a sliver of cake in the moment would have been...)

I guess the positive side to my past struggles with weight loss is that I've got a LOT of lessons learned. My struggle is being kind to myself and letting weight loss happen at an organic pace. The great thing about tracking every gram that goes into my body and being super strict with how many net carbs I consume in a day is that the weight comes off FAST. It's also not sustainable, and my head knows that. This new approach IS working - it's just slow AF.

And that's where the encouragement and positive energy comes in! I need some good juju from you and the universe and whatever, reminding and reinforcing that this less strict, more sustainable approach I'm taking makes it so I can enjoy my life while also losing weight. I deserve to be happy NOW, not when I've lost so-many pounds. Part of being happy means eating delicious, healthy food; exercising (which I am rocking, btw, but I want to go full throttle and my body can't so I feel guilty for not doing MORE).

WHY AM I NEVER ENOUGH FOR MYSELF?

Seriously! If I friend told me they were sticking to their diet 80%+ of the time, were going on the treadmill for 30 minutes a day and then also hitting the gym 4 times a week for whatever they can take, even if it's just 5 minutes or 15, and had talked to a personal trainer about developing a personal exercise plan, I would be throwing them a damn parade with flowers and balloons and great big flashing neon signs that say "YOU ROCK!" That is EXACTLY MY LIFE RIGHT NOW, so why am I so much harder on myself? Why would I be so proud of someone else, and for me it's not good enough?

UGHHHHHHH, I don't know, you guys. There was a moment writing this where I felt a bit more positive, and now I'm back to wavering.

Dear Diary: Depression, therapists, and homework

OK, I decided it's time to start including a bit more of myself into this blog. So this post isn't about books (I mean, there will probably be mention of books because books = life, but still...) but instead a bit of a conversation between friends, eh?

I was seeing a therapist to help with my depression back in the fall, but then I got the first bill and had a bit of sticker shock ($199 per visit!?!?!) so I quit seeing her. I had a rough time over the holidays and into the new year, so I got back with my doctor and got back on an anti-depressant, and she encouraged me to start seeing my therapist, Susan, again.

I told Susan about how I'd started this blog since seeing her last, and boy was she proud of me. It got me thinking that, you know, I'm pretty proud of me too. I've started a lot of blogs, like I've started a lot of projects (crafts, journals, writing books...) and I usually come in hot and then fizzle out fairly quickly. I'm really proud that I've kept up with this blog for over 3 months. I started Nov 8, so yesterday was my 3 month blogiversary. :)

Susan and I agreed that for the next 90 days, we're working on two things: my self-confidence, and what I call "adulting." My homework until my next session is to:

• Take a 20 minute walk 3x/week
• "Adult" for 20 minutes 3x/week (spend 20 minutes doing laundry, dishes, cleaning the bathroom...)
• Keep track and figure out what my dominant thought is - what is the thing I tell myself most often?

That dominant thought thing is really tripping me up. I've been paying more attention that that little voice in my head, and so far... it mostly just sings a lot, LOL. I must have had about 3 or 4 different songs stuck in my head so far this morning. Maybe that's because today is a good day? I just know that voice is a real jerk sometimes. Susan asks me hard questions like "Where does that voice come from? Is it your voice, or someone else's?" She also asks things like "What motivates you?" Boy, I do not know the answers to these questions. She also assures me I'm really funny, but my humor is of the self-deprecating variety and I think owes a lot to tone and timing, so it's hard to show you how funny I am in a blog post. ;)

Aaaaanyway. She encouraged me to share some about me and my life in my blog, instead of just many many book reviews, so here we are. Now I need to think of something to call these little nuggets of personal insight. My son James (age 3) just asked me "What are you going to build?" I told him it's a blog. "But, it's not a house! You have to start over. You have to start over right now. Come onnnn, start over." Haha, that's so funny he chimes in with that just when I'm thinking what to call these type of posts. (And no, James, I'm not starting over!) Hmm... I think we'll just go simple: