Exam week...blogs to follow if I survive.

Piss happens.

Well, it's been quite awhile since I have written about IC, the original topic of this blog, so I suppose I should sneak one in every now and then, right? If you are a reader of this blog for reasons other than IC, you may want to skip this one as it is probably TMI.
It's been two months since I underwent hydrodistension, which is a "surgery" used to diagnose IC. When they fill the bladder with water so that it stretches, a normal bladder wall will remain pink and smooth, however an IC bladder looks like it has the measles. Even coming out of anesthesia, and having no idea what the inside of a bladder should look like, I knew as soon as I saw my pictures that something was amiss at the Circle K. Hydrodistension is also performed as often as every six months as a therapeutic tool (if you have one of those insurance companies that cares about you...wonder what that's like!). For reasons unknown, stretching the bladder like a water balloon gives most people with IC a few months of pain relief. So far, the shooting pains in my urethra, which I mistook for passing kidney stones, have not returned. THANK GOD. Alas, some of the stranger symptoms of IC have returned. Each person with IC experiences their own range of symptoms. Mine include urinating as often as six times an hour (seriously, yesterday I went right before getting in the shower, and had to go as soon as I got out again), and always feeling like my bladder is full, but rarely being able to empty it completely. I will be honest in saying I'm not in pain as much as discomfort. It's like having an itch I can't scratch or a joint I can't pop. Some days I forget I have IC and others I am very aware.
There is something new going on however, that I am apprehensive about sharing, perhaps because I will have to admit it might be a real problem in my future, or maybe just because it is both embarrassing and personal. I haven't told anyone this, not even J (who knows way too much about my bathroom escapades), but as the blog gods are my witnesses, I said that I would be open and honest about my IC, so here it is.
Yesterday I almost peed my damn pants. Not in the "I can't hold it anymore" sense, but the "what the hell? Did a drop just come out!?" sense. I felt as though whatever muscle keeps you from letting go was about to let go on it's own and I tried to hold it until I made it to the bathroom. Unsurprisingly, I wasn't able to go. At least five times a day the full bladder sensation sends me sprinting to the bathroom on a fool's errand. This feeling of almost losing control out of nowhere was new though. It was the first time since being diagnosed and coming to terms with IC that I got angry and scared and bitter and pathetic. It was the first time I really hated my body for betraying me. I'm 25 and I swear to God if I start pissing myself....I mean I was the kid who never wet the bed (right, Mom?). I was the one at parties who could hold it and let the girl who looked close to tears go in front of me. Hell, I once held it for a ten hour bus ride in Ghana because the only place to go was on the side of the road and I thought it would be rude to go on some poor family's coffee plants. I am not the girl who pees herself!
It's low moments like these, and I know there are going to be a lot more, that make me wonder if this is Karma. This has to be punishment for something bad I've done, mean things I've said, committing the seven deadly sins, right? Then it dawns on me, "how self-absorbed is that?" Just the thought that there is a cosmic force out there keeping tabs on all my wrong doings, and paying me back by making me piss my pants, is so hilariously self-centered. I'm sure the Karmic forces have their hands full with Kim Jong-il and Charles Taylor and the Kardashians (just kidding.....kind of). The truth of the matter is that piss happens. My bladder didn't stop doing it's job because I've been bad, and it's not going to get better because I'm good. It is what it is, the future will be what it will be, and even though I may not always see the silver lining, I just have to accept it. For now, I'm going to stick the whole "I almost peed my pants like a 5 year old" thing in the denial file and cross that bridge when I get to it. Hopefully in no less than 60 years.

Happy Thanksgiving, Y'all

I'm not going to lie, I woke up this morning in the Bitter Barn. As I logged onto facebook I was inundated by hundreds of messages about people traveling home to see their families, craving their mom's cooking, etc. I don't get to spend Thanksgiving with my family because I have an evil teacher who is requiring me to stay in class until 9:30 p.m. tonight, with the threat of failing if we miss. This isn't much of an inconvenience to the 99% of students whose families live in the New Orleans area, but the 1% like me are pretty offended. Someone suggested that I merely "talk to the teacher and explain that my family lives 6 hours away". Nice suggestion, if she were a hooker with a heart of gold, but this is the teacher who gave me a zero for the day while I was in surgery. I've come to the conclusion that the idea that everyone is inherently good and kind is, well, crap. Some people just aren't kind and a semester spent with this woman has made me convinced of this.

Ok, now I need to make a list of gratitudes before I dive into a full-blown pity party:
1) Although I don't get to spend this day with them, my family is healthy. We received news that an acquaintance of J's, who was in a terrible accident with his wife and two young children a few weeks ago, was taken off life support yesterday, and his wife is still fighting for her life. There are things SO much worse than missing my second Thanksgiving in a row. In fact, I feel a little petty now as I imagine how this family will feel tomorrow.
2) I get to spend the day with the love of my life. Miraculously, the ship scheduled for tomorrow decided not to come to port until Friday, so I get to spend tomorrow with my other family; J and our pets :)
3) I get an extra day to study....and boy do I need it!
4) Thanksgiving is the day that J has deemed officially acceptable to deck the halls, so I finally get to add a little sparkle to our home, which invariably will put me in a good mood while I prepare to survive the last two weeks of school.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I hope you get to spend your day with the ones you love!

Happiness is overrated.

I haven't written in quite some time, partly because life has been busy, but mostly because I haven't felt inspired by anything lately. Nothing too terrible or too wonderful has happened to thrust me into a blogging flurry. In fact, my life has felt consistently in a rut lately. Wanting to avoid writing a bitter diatribe, I just haven't written at all. Today however, in an attempt to procrastinate from studying, I came across an article on the Nobel Prize winning journalistic marvel that is People.com that got me thinking. I know, the articles that get me thinking should probably be from the New York Times or CNN, but let's face it, mindless time-wasting celebrity fodder is just easier to stomach these days than following sex abuse scandals and watching our economy fall apart. The article was written about an interview that Brad Pitt had with Australian TV. Normally I'm not too interested in what's going on with the Jolie-Pitt's and their multi-cultural child army, but like I said, I'm procrastinating. When asked if he was happy in life his response really hit home for me.
"I think happiness is overrated, truthfully. I do," he says. "I think sometimes you're happy, sometimes you're not. There's too much pressure to be happy. I don't know. I don't really give a shit. I know I will be at times and I know I won't be at times. Satisfied, at peace, those would be goals for myself."
Holy crap! Anyone else feel a huge sigh of relief over those words? I know I did. Lately, I haven't been happy. Maybe it's hormones, not enough vitamin D, the fact that my IC symptoms are really obnoxious, or just the fact that I don't like school and I don't like my job. I have spent more than a few nights lying awake trying to put my thumb on my general apathy for life lately. J and I are experiencing a rut. Is it that? Am I unhappy in my relationship? When I think about a life without him in it I get truly sad, so whatever is making me unhappy has to do with nobody else but me. There are a lot of things contributing to it and sometimes when I'm in a valley it feels like I need drastic changes to get me on top of a hill instead. Then that snowballs into over-dramatism about the state of my life, which just isn't a good color on me.
I had never considered that the idea of constant happiness IS overrated. Just because I'm not happy now doesn't mean that I don't have an amazing life full of blessings and a lot of happiness ahead of me. Now that I think about it, who wants to be happy all the time? It would be like living life as a chocolate lab puppy....annoying as shit. As cliche as it sounds, maybe the valleys are necessary to make us fight for the hills, and appreciate the view when we're up there. I just need to stop over-analyzing my life and stop trying to force happiness into every nook and cranny. Hell, I will probably be happy the second I stop trying to be so damn happy.
Philosopher Pitt has it right. The goals of being satisfied and at peace with yourself (and I'm going to add in being aware of your blessings) are enough for the times when perhaps unconfined joy isn't necessarily overwhelming your soul. I'm really grateful that my penchant for vapid celebrity news paid off today because I'm pretty sure that the top of the next hill is right around the corner and I don't want to miss the view by always trying to go higher. I'm fine just getting through this rut, appreciating it for what it is, and looking forward to what's next.

Hahahahahaha!

This morning I stepped on our notoriously inaccurate scale, just to see ballpark where I am weight-wise. I ran 2 miles yesterday then walked another 3 with J and Roux, so obviously I must have lost like 15 lbs right?! Oh, it's so sad how my hopeful thinking works sometimes. Well, I stepped on and ping! the scale flew past my usual weight, saying that in the last two weeks I have gained over 60 lbs. Hahahahahahahahaha. Seriously, scale? You think I'm going to buy into your evil trickery? Our scale is like a live-in used car salesman. I did the math on how many calories I would have to have consumed over the last two weeks to validate this super-reliable scale's assertions. 3,500 calories consumed or shed is equivalent to a pound gained or lost, so I would have to have eaten an extra 210,000 calories in the last two weeks to gain 60 pounds. That's a lot of halloween candy.
Sometimes I think life throws me a bone and gives me a little chuckle every now and then to keep things light and to remind me not to take myself too seriously. I have a long day of mind-numbing schoolwork ahead of me, and I've been sleeping like a mother with a newborn lately because my bladder wakes me up every couple of hours, but I started this morning off with a laugh. If you ask me, that is the best way to start a day.