Sick-pression

I've come down with a bad case of sick-pression and I'm afraid that I've only got my own hubris to blame. I'm a champion non-believer in flu shots; every year I say, "I've never gotten a flu shot and I never get the flu!" My skillfully selective memory blotches out that first week in January last year, when I was couch-ridden for 120 hours straight. Karma's a boar, because this year I got hit again. Luckily, I had a little more juice in my system than my previous bout with Flu-nami, but I've still been in the bathroom and asleep for the past four days. For me, the problem with getting sick is that the malady never stays where it starts. It always seeps from my stomach right into the little nuerotransmitters in between the brain-coils of my already-plagued mind, sending the electrons all the wrong ways and rendering me a depressed bundle of snotty gook.

Before I detail my current depressed state, I'd like to give you all a little to laugh at. I got hit with the stomach flu while house-sitting a bachelor pad belonging to a man named Bob and his dog named Bear. I had agreed to spend a night there, walking Bear and feeding him while Bob did business-y activities elsewhere. Well, lo and behold, I got hit hard by one of the worst cases of stomach flu on this side of the Equator. His house looked like it had been hit by a really, really gross tornado. Eventually I called in Troop Mom. She found me naked in this poor bachelor's bed, a trail of destruction in my wake, the dog whimpering from ignorance and stench and not having been fed in hours (I couldn't think about any food, his or mine). My mom took the dog for a walk, I cleaned up, and Bob won't know the difference (I just hope that he doesn't notice the cleaned bathrooms because I don't think they had been cleaned in a long time...) Was this all worth $25? I'll let you decide. Still, if anyone is in the market for a good movie plot I'll sell you the rights to this story. For at least $25.

The first day of being sick is always the worst. When you're fighting for the life of your bowels there's little space for darkness to creep in between your ears. The second day I begin to feel better and might actually enjoy being laid up. After all, when else do I lay on the couch for days on end, watching television and allowing myself not to stress about "all the things that I have to do?" But after that is when things get dangerous. Unfortunately, they've hit real hard this time around.

In my sickness I've realized a few things that turn my hope and motivation into cheese curds. First of all, I've realized how insignificant I am in the operational schedule of The World and of The People who inhabit it. So I miss two days of my temporary job? I've got so little actual responsibility or impact there that no one really notices. A friend stops by to drop off some Ginger Ale for me; I appreciate the gesture but really I've got so few friends these days that even that comes as a surprise. I realize that the reason I've got so few friends is probably because I haven't brought Ginger Ale to any one of them in a very long time. I look out the window and see groups of cheerful friendly young people walking through the sunny streets and I wiggle a little deeper into the quicksand. My family comes home and dotes on me but this is functional: first of all, having a family member sick puts all family members at risk. Second of all, as my little sister said, "That's what families do for each other." I count my blessings that I've got my parents' couch to sleep on. Then I am smacked by the realization that this time last year I had the same sickness on the same couch with the same general life-scheme. The only difference was that I was pre-versus-post recovery. And this sends me down the next spiral...the hopelessness that is my current state of being.

Yes, people, you say you like the whole dirty story, so I'll give it you. Right now I'm sick and the gurgling in my stomach whispers much more than "you might vomit at any moment." It says, "You're still in Denver, on your parents couch, and you'll be here forever. You've got nothing to look forward to except more searching, turning up empty-handed, pretending, making yourself feel important..." When you're sick you lose the incentive to wake up every morning and make up Important Things to do. Attending networking events to try to make friends and get a job? Out. Go to work for your mother? Boring and embarrassing. Garden in the yards of rich people? You'll give them the flu. Apply for jobs? As if you have the energy. Research leaving the country? They'll never give you a medical pass. And without all of the ways to Feel Important, you're left with the very obvious realization that your days aren't actually Important or Interesting at all, and it doesn't matter.

Now let's talk about Sick-pression and eating disorders. Of course ED is my favorite couch-time buddy; he's real good at keeping me company when the rest of the world is making me jealous by being Very Busy. He and I sit on the couch and we watch TV, discussing the bodies of the stars and comparing them to mine. He whispers all the ways that this sickness is ruining my body and keeps telling me to get off my fat bum and go for a run, that this is the real cure to any problem, REMEMBER. He tells me that my swollen intestines are not merely upset from being sent to China and back for 24 hours straight but that they are actually getting bigger from lack of exercise and that since I'm too unhealthy to move the only way to rectify this problem is to eat as little as possible. Sickness and ED work together this way because my intestines gurgle in some foreign language that can be easily interpreted to suit the needs of any other party, including ED's Truly. When I finally feel up to take a run he chases me the whole time, telling me to run faster and longer than I can and then calling on Guilt to stop me in my path when I actually decide to walk.

All this is the norm. But something else happened to me and ED this sick-time-around. I can't determine if it's positive or negative growth but I guess it's a change all the same. I finally got on the scale to see if I'd lost as much as I worried that I did (I was only one pound from my goal before El Flu-no). I had. But as I stood there on the scale I realized that my body didn't explode from lack of exercise like all of the illogical mental worms in my mind told me it would. I lost weight, which wasn't welcome, but I also didn't balloon, I didn't lose all of my muscle mass, I didn't look completely different, and it wasn't actually all that much of an altered state. I turned to ED. He gesticulated and laughed at me. "What's it all about, then?!" he teased. "You work out to keep this body and here you find it actually doesn't change all that much! Why bother?!"


So that's the final straw to sick-pression: it rids me of that go-to means of achieving daily Importance that I know I can count on or trick myself into believing matters. When I'm sick and on a run it isn't fun, especially not with ED running behind me and Guilt blocking my path. And I probably got sick because I did exercise and now want to exercise because I'm sick. What matters, what matters, what matters?

As if to foreshadow the coming tidal wave, I had a sad little conversation with a friend before I got sick on Wednesday night. We were sitting discussing God and Humanity and how important it is to be passionate about something. He talked about his passion for skiing. I asked him what he thought I was passionate about. "Working out," he replied.

The lights in the cafe simultaneously shut off. I swear to you it's true they did. Somehow, the darkness couldn't hide the tears in my eyes.

"Really? When you think of me and what I'm passionate about that's all that you can come up with?"

He looked at me in amazement. "Well, it's what you like to do every day. And I guess your career. Yah, I guess you're passionate about your career."

Oh, great, I'm passionate about my career. WHAT CAREER?! The one I idealize in my mind that at this point in time is about as likely as Palin-for-President? Oh, no, he must be referring to that career that I actually do, working for my Mom and a client-less, income-less, clue-less "consulting company." Wait! Silly me! It must be my career in Funny Money, including but not limited to house-sitting, pet-sitting, gardening, mystery shopping, and flyer-posting. Yes, I am passionate about my career. All 9 million versions of "it."

I do believe that's enough complaining. There's a homeless guy laying on the sidewalk that's reminding me just how self-absorbed I've become. Send in the National Guard; this storm is winding down and some serious clean-up is going to be required. Let's begin by taking inventory to find out what really needs to be cleaned and what may bloom once the wind blows the ash away. Here's my Ten Gratitudes:

1.) Little sisters who like to play nurse.
2.) Little sisters who win soccer games and speech tournaments.
3.) Classical music.
4.) Being taken to the symphony by a friend.
5.) Betsey Johnson pink dresses in lace with velvet bows.
6.) Friends who hand-down such dresses.
7.) My Aunt Beth, who is both a human and an inspiration.
8.) Cookies.
9.) Disinfectant 409.
10.) Toilets.

Thanks for listening.