Given any situation, I will come up with two answers, one of which is complete failure (resulting in failure) and one of which is unattainable perfection (resulting in failure). Therefore if I choose either column, I fail, and am therefore subject to more mental berating.

If I attempt to choose another, more moderate option, I am berated for not being good enough to try for the perfect. There is elaborately cooked, time intensive dinner, or there is failure. There is compulsively clean, 100% taken care of house, or there is failure. There is 100% kindness to everyone all the time, or there is failure.

It’s a kind of twisted perfectionism that I’ve spent most of my life perfecting, it seems. (I should mention that even if I come up with something I initially think is good, my brain will pick holes in it until it looks like every other failure, even if I’ve accomplished something. It’s … kind of sick.)

Nowhere is this better illustrated than with exercise.

With exercise, there is either “exercise until exhaustion” and “nothing”. Compound this with my joint disorder, whereby I can’t do things like lift weights (because my joints go squishywibble and won’t work properly, so I can’t even get my muscles engaged) or run (impact is bad, yo) or really most “normal” exercise, and there are two options. Do nothing, or walk until you can’t feel your knees and then go lift weights anyway, even though it makes you feel awful for two days.

There are two kinds of exercise I mostly tolerate (verging on enjoyment) – biking and yoga. I’m not allowed to bike because of the pressure it puts on my wrists (which, plus my hands, are the only joints that hurt on an everyday basis anymore). I just bought a new bike in October. Failure. I’m not supposed to do yoga for the same reasons.

But Anna, yoga has infinite variations and modifications! Why not do one of those?

Because so far I can’t. Well, physically I could. Mentally I must either do the full version of the pose, or I might as well not bother because I’m a failure anyway. This is compounded by my relative ease with kinesthetic adventures like yoga and dance, which I learn quickly. I’m also naturally extremely flexible, so I have never really done modified poses. I am still adjusting to this new way of living in my body. (Also, let’s not even get into being fatter.) Doing a modified version anyway, in a sort of “fuck you, brain” only results in having to listen to myself for the rest of the day.

To be honest, I feel a lot of sympathy with Gollum.

It’s all extremely unkind, and difficult to live with a lot of the time too. There are entire days when I wish my brain would just SHUT UP and GO AWAY. I’ve tried asking it why I only have these two options, but the answer isn’t fit to type.

I fight against this every day, some days with more success than others. Some days the crazy is just too loud, and I don’t really function beyond going through enough of the motions to not get fired. Recently the crazy has been very loud, and so I’m not getting much done. It’s too much work to try to deal with it, to try not to resist, but to … not accept. Just… allow it to exist and do whatever I need to anyway?

My awesome therapist says that “What we resist persists” – the more mental energy I throw at resisting and arguing with the crazy, the more it pushes back. Instead, I’m supposed to say “ok, I appreciate that you feel that way” and do whatever else anyway. (I know it sounds crazy, but somehow this works better than the alternatives.)

It’s very draining, just doing everyday stuff.

I’m trying really hard to “work on it”, but its hard to change something that seems built in, if that makes any sense. Meditation helps, as do naps. Journaling helps when I manage to do it without automatically setting myself up to fail at it. (How you fail at journaling, I’m not sure, but I manage.)

Today I managed 8 hours of work, plus 3 sets of pushups and squats and a set of “hang on the pull up bar and think really hard about it” (I can’t do pull ups). I’ll put something together for dinner – probably out of the freezer (maybe tamales). After dinner I will sit on the floor and attempt to get my brain to slow down for awhile.

And that’s going to have to be enough.

Why beans made me cry in my car today.

Also pleased in the power of humanity, because it’s really good to see people helping each other out, but really sad because it sucks to be in that position, with no money and hungry people to feed, and no idea what to do with this so-called staple, beans.

As such, I’m going to be reading up on what to do with things like lentils (since I don’t really have a clue what to do with them) and posting some of my findings here.

For today, though, I’m going to share a recipe that I love. It’s easy to make, uses staple foods (beans and brown rice), and is absolutely delicious. It’s also really good for a shared dinner/pot luck, because everyone can add their own toppings.

Bean and Brown Rice Burrito Bowls

Software:

• 4 tsp. olive oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped fine
• Optional: 1 red bell pepper, chopped fine
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 1/4 cups water (or 1 cup broth and 2 1/4 cups water)
• 1 boullion cube (omit if using broth)
• 2 (15 oz) cans black beans – drained and rinsed, or about 3 cups dried beans, cooked (NOT just soaked)
• 1 tsp salt and black pepper to taste
• Optional: ¾ cup corn kernels (canned or frozen and thawed)
• Optional Toppings: Salsa, sour cream, sliced avocado, cooked chicken or ground beef, corn tortillas

Hardware:

• Large oven-proof pot or dutch oven

Preheat the oven to 375° F.  Adjust an oven rack to the middle position.  Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven over medium heat until shimmering.  Add the onion (and bell pepper, if using) to the pan and cook, stirring occasionally, until well browned and tender, about 12-14 minutes.  Stir in the garlic and cook just until fragrant, about 30 seconds.

Add the chicken broth or water and boullion to the pan.  Bring the mixture to a boil.  Remove the pot from the heat, stir in the rice and salt, and cover.  Bake until the rice is tender, 65-70 minutes.

Remove the pot from the oven and uncover.  Fluff the rice with a fork, stir in the beans (and corn, if using) and replace the lid.  Let stand for 5 minutes.  Mix in the black pepper.  Serve in bowls with tortillas and a mixture of toppings. My favorite is salsa and sour cream, but avocado is nice if you can get them cheap. I actually like this recipe better as vegetarian than I do with chicken or beef in it, but it’s certainly OK to add those as a topping too.

Adapted from Annie’s Eats

The last year has been pretty rough for us both.

I can only imagine the kind of things he’s gone through as I’ve been through repeated doctors, medicines that made me crazy or sick, chronic pain, breakdowns, mental instability and a bunch of other really un-fun sorts of things. I also can’t imagine how I’d have gotten through all of that without him. He’s been my rock through all of this, even when it was as confusing for him as it was for me. I’ve been reminded over and over again how lucky I am to have him and get to be with him.

It sounds cheesy, but it’s really true.

When you say “for better or for worse” and “in sickness and in health” you don’t really expect the sickness and the worse.

I know I didn’t. And I really didn’t expect it to be “my fault”. I know there’s no blame involved, but on some level it bothers me that I’m the one that got sick. (I’m working on getting over that.) Part of what makes me so grateful and thankful and happy to be with him is knowing that our relationship survived a really big helping of “worse”. It took a lot of work from both of us, but we made it. I try to make sure he always knows how much I appreciate him and what he does for us.

So here’s to five years.

Our first handful, hopefully of many.

So I pumped a little extra air into my big blue exercise ball this morning and opted to give it a go.

So far I’ve noticed a few things:

• My lower back is having to work on keeping me stabilized, so the muscles are getting tired. This isn’t a huge deal, but will take some adjusting.
• My butt is cold. The ball doesn’t retain heat like a regular chair. I’m going to try draping it with a blanket and seeing if that helps.
• My cat has nowhere to sit. Charlie (spazcat) likes nothing better than to camp out on the back of my chair while I’m on the computer. He’s not sure what’s up.
• My posture is better. I CAN slouch, but it takes conscious effort.

Also? My inner child is pleased.

*boing boing boing*

2011 Recap

1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?

A lot of therapy related things. A lot of self-compassion related things. I also had the same job in January 2011 as I had in December 2011, which hasn’t happened before.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?


I don’t really make “resolutions”, or haven’t in the past. My one goal for 2011 was to get better at asking for help when I need it, and to be more compassionate with myself, as an extension of taking care of my mental health, and I think I did both of those things pretty well.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?


My best friend gave birth to a little boy, Caden, in October, and my coworker had her second little boy in mid-December.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

My great-aunt Helen (Auntie) passed away in April, and a close friend of my family passed away very suddenly in December.

5. What countries did you visit?

None other than my own this year.

6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?

A better paying, career-oriented job, and more mental stability.

7. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

No dates, but a couple of weeks and month-long spans are pretty well cemented, thanks to pharmacy roulette. I’m not sure exactly which date my doctors changed me from “Major Depression” to Bipolar Disorder (Classic, Mixed type), but the resulting change in medications was pretty dramatic and created a space where I’m now functioning better than I have in years.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?


I stuck with therapy, held down my job, and managed to stick it through all the craziness. I also hosted Thanksgiving for 10 and Christmas for 8, both of which I’m proud of, AND I threw parties for Halloween and New Years.

9. What was your biggest failure?

I’m honestly not sure I have a good answer to this question. There are some things I did that didn’t go as well as I’d like, but overall, I handled 2011 proactively and with as much grace as I could muster, and I’m pretty proud of that, even if it was kind of ugly sometimes.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Ongoing mental struggles aside, 2011 was the year of figuring out my joint pain. I was diagnosed with a very mild case of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (either classic or hypermobility) and am now operating 90-95% joint pain free most days. This is a big improvement over June, where I could barely walk and doing simple things like writing with a pencil or brushing my hair was excruciating.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

Technically I bought my iPhone at the very tail end of 2010, but that’s probably been the best gadget of the year.

12. Where did most of your money go?

Mortgage (duh), though I did also spend a good bit of money on clothing, thanks to the weight gain.

13. What did you get really excited about?

Star Wars: The Old Republic, Updating my Laptop, hosting holidays and parties, my little brother’s graduation with his Master’s degree. Having people come visit, especially my family. Lots of small things, really.

14. What song will always remind you of 2011?

Yael Naim’s New Soul

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:


– happier or sadder? much happier, though I still fight the depression and anxiety battles on a regular basis
– thinner or fatter? quite a bit fatter, thanks to the medicines
– richer or poorer? about the same.

16. What do you wish you’d done more of?


Meditation, spiritual seeking, and self care. Also, going to the gym (which is hard, because I don’t get that “woo I feel awesome!” thing from exercise). Also playing the piano.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of?


Doing nothing, while wishing I wanted to be doing something (especially something I used to enjoy)

18. How did you spend Christmas?

With my family, here at my house and then up with my brother and sister in law in Waco. It was wonderful, even if it did push the boundaries of my “amount of craziness I can handle” levels.

19. What was your favorite TV program?

Um. I don’t watch much TV? So probably Mythbusters or Dirty Jobs.

20. What were your favorite books of the year?

I really liked David Allen’s Get Things Done, Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Wherever You Go There You Are, and rereading some of my favorite children’s and young adult books.

21. What was your favorite music from this year?


I didn’t listen to very much new music this year, and if anything, I spent more time listening to Audio Books (in my car) than I did listening to music. This is unusual, and I hope 2012 is more musical.

22. What were your favorite films of the year?

I saw only one film this year, so it gets to be my favorite (and it’d probably be my favorite anyway): The Muppets

23. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

I turned 27, and I had my mom here visiting. For my birthday, we put in my spring garden, and it was immensely fun.

24. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Finding the right meds sooner. I’d like to say “not being crazy in the brainpan”, but I’m not sure that’s one of those things I can really change.

25. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?

I vacillate back and forth between “eclectic graduate student” and “nerdy bookstore clerk”. I’m slowly learning to be more grown up, and I’ve branched out most of the time from t-shirts and jeans, or at least I’ve started wearing fun and geeky t-shirts (mostly from Threadless or ThinkGeek) instead of just plain solid colored ones. I hope 2012 sees me learning more about style and putting together outfits, because I really enjoy doing it.

26. What kept you sane?

My husband, my friends, my cats, and my family. And my therapist. She’s pretty awesome.

27. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.


That if you’re comfortable sharing your stories, it’s almost always worth doing so – supportive people are everywhere, and I’ve found so many to offer support and empathy that it’s made everything so much easier. So many people don’t talk about the ugly parts of their past or themselves, and I’ve found that sharing that – even though it makes me more vulnerable – nearly always brings me closer to the people around me who care and who matter.

I’ve not always been super good at not EATING anything with gluten. Sometimes it’s things I don’t even think about, like making pound cake for a friend and licking the spoon, only to have horrendous stomach trouble for the rest of the day. Other times I start eating something – like fried mozzarella sticks – only to realize halfway through the first one that it’s been breaded and fried. (And then have horrendous stomach trouble for the rest of the day, and sometimes the next two days as well.) Or, at the beginning, deciding I didn’t give a flying f-sharp and eating a cupcake (only go have horrendous… well, you know).

This last week I decided, since I’d been doing so well, to try a normal beer and see if I was ok. I’m not sure why I thought I would be, as beer is fermented barley mash, and barley contains gluten, but I love beer… so I tried.  Been sick for two days too. No more beer for me, unless it’s sorghum beer.

I’ve found that I don’t really crave a lot of things I thought I’d miss, like pasta (easy enough to make rice or rice pasta instead) or breakfast cereal (GF oatmeal woo!), or even cookies, which make up pretty easily with gluten free flours. And after getting really sick from most of those things, I find they’ve lost a lot of their appeal.

Bread, however, I can’t get away from. I love bread. I spent years getting good at making yeast breads.

And now I’m having to really think about this whole food allergy thing, and how I will never be able to eat those breads again.

Which is kind of huge.

I’ve had some decent gluten free breads too. They’re just not the same as wheat bread. They taste good; they have good texture… but they are different. And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.

When I started out this GF thing, it was all an experiment, a sort of side strategy to help with my joint pain and with my tummy troubles that my arthritis doctor said I should do for 3 months to see if it’d help. While I didn’t think it’d do much, I figured I’d at least try. I got past the freak out pretty quickly (about a week of freaking out, really), but it was always “I can do this for 3 months”. Even when I felt better, when I was finally having a normal relationship with my digestion* for the first time in my adult life, it was still “I can do this for 3 months”.

But it’s been three months, and I’m still doing it. And if my little beer experiment means much of anything, I’m going to still be doing it three months from now. And the three months after that.

I know I have it easy, that 10 years ago there was almost no support for people who couldn’t process wheat, barley, rye, and spelt. On the other hand, there’s a big perception that gluten intolerance is the latest fad diet**, and so many restaurants don’t take it seriously. Heck, for awhile I didn’t even take it seriously.

Three months later and I definitely take it seriously. I know what I can eat at restaurants (Asian and Mexican foods are my staples for eating out), and I know I have to plan in advance if I’m going to be able to eat on my lunch break and not have to eat noodle soup every day from the local Vietnamese place. I know where I can shop in the grocery store and what parts of the store I don’t even have to visit anymore.

As much as I’ve learned, though, I’m still feeling like I’m adjusting to a totally new way of food. After all, “never” is kind of a long time to think about.

*For the record, it’s really nice not to have to plan my errands around which stores I visit after eating, and whether they have bathrooms I can tolerate.
**It’s a fad diet I kind of understand. For a lot of people giving up Gluten means giving up all processed foods and eating more fresh vegetables and lean protein – a change that would make just about anyone feel better if they’ve been eating a lot of processed junk. That said, there’s a difference between “feeling better” and the kind of gastric distress someone with an actual gluten intolerance (or a systemic histamine allergic reaction type allergy) will have.

• I’m definitely a 5 day a week blogger more than I am a 7 day a week blogger. Without cheesy weekend posts, I have little interest (and less inspiration) for weekend posting. I think because I know that the majority of my hits are during the week, plus the fact that…
• I write posts ahead of time whenever possible. Usually on Saturday evening. Several weeks this month I managed to write posts for a full week ahead (or longer). It’s the only way I made it through Thanksgiving, and the “Schedule Post” option on WordPress gets a lot of use around these blogs. It was really nice to know that on the days I work, I didn’t have to think about coming up with and writing out a post.
• It’s not that much harder to keep up with two blogs than it is to keep up with one. While I just posted 5 days a week over at Too Many Annas, I didn’t have too much trouble coming up with ideas. In fact, it was sometimes easier to do the gaming blog posts, since my topic is pretty well set over there.
• I keep a running list of post ideas in ToodleDo, which I have on my phone as well as my computer. That way I am less likely to think of a really great post idea and then forget it by the time I sit down to write. Some of those posts will never see the light of day, but it’s nice to have an ongoing list of ideas.
• On the other hand, I don’t really like lists of manufactured blog post prompts. I think because I don’t usually write posts that are easily set into blog prompts. (Other than ficlets, of course). Writing about my most memorable meal doesn’t make much sense in a vacuum to me, though I still read prompt lists to see if something is inspiring. Usually I don’t get much though.

I’m not going to continue with NaNoBlogThing indefinitely though.

As mentioned, 7 days a week is a lot of posts, but 5 seems a lot more manageable. I’m going to shoot for that, and we’ll see what happens.

I really have enjoyed being back at the keyboard, if you will, and it’s nice to put my thoughts into words again. I get a lot out of blogging, if only because it makes me think through something enough to put it into coherent sentences. While I won’t even attempt to argue that all my posts have a goal or some greater point to make (they don’t), the writing process itself is good for helping me clarify ideas, especially when it’s related to the crazy!brain stuff.

Regardless of all that, it’s definitely nice to have finished what I set out to do. Going forward, we’ll see how it continues.

Morty was also my lunch buddy, as he had a penchant for people food. Especially turkey. Since the break room is always freezing cold, he didn’t usually turn down a warm lap to snuggle in or next to either. Since I tend to take little cat naps on my break at work, he was a nap buddy too.

Sadly, Morty got very very sick last May, and though I and another coworker nursed him pretty much constantly through it, eventually they discovered he had inoperable cancer. As much as I am glad I was able to be there to help care for him, I wish they had found the cancer sooner, as I really think he was in a lot of pain.

This week, I think because it’s the holidays and getting chilly outside, I’ve been missing Morty. I still think I see him around the store sometimes, usually when I glance over and mistake a black sweater or hat for a snoozing cat in my peripheral vision. I ate the last of the turkey soup at work (made from the Thanksgiving turkey carcass), and I couldn’t shake the feeling of wishing he was there begging for a taste. Last year he actually got up on my little tray table and licked at my soup bowl when I wasn’t paying attention (he also stole cheese).

Still, I’m glad I got to “work with” Morty – he was a big source of comfort during the holidays last year, when I was pretty unstable and work was beyond challenging. He was a good cat, and I miss him, but I am glad I got the chance to miss him, if that makes any sense at all.

*For those curious, the store is not getting another cat. Morty was grandfathered into the rules, which now do not allow for store pets of any kind.

It’s hard to “love yourself” when you don’t feel very lovable. I was talking about it with my mom though, and she said something that made me kind of re-think the whole self-love thing. That maybe it wasn’t about finding yourself lovable with all the crap that’s going on, but finding yourself worthy of being loved for your human-ness. It’s not about accepting all the shit in your life, but accepting that you’re a human being, and that you’ll deal with it as best you can, and you are worth accepting yourself for that.

I really struggle with this whole idea, even down to having a mental battle when I do things to “take care of myself” (like going to the gym). I’m hoping that reframing it a bit will help with the immense motivation it takes to do the self-care things I need to do to stay healthy. Maybe instead of seeing self-acceptance as “I have to think I’m awesome” (which I can’t do most of the time), I can see it as “I can accept my humanity” will help change some of the ingrained thoughts and beliefs that are so very very very hard to shake.

Something I didn’t expect to be so significant about being in a house, versus an apartment, was the level of “ours-ness” that would come about as we both added our own style to the house and as we changed with it through the seasons. I can’t speak for SSH, but setting up the house for the holidays this year brought back memories of our last two holiday seasons here, and how things are so different for us now than they were three years ago, or two years ago, or even last year.

The more memories we have here, and the more time we spend, plus the work we’ve put into making this place ours – the house feels more and more like a reflection of us. The gardens, especially, make me feel plugged into this little chunk of land with our house on it.

Decorating for the holidays, I realized that there are some decorations that no longer fit anymore, and others that I may not have put out in the past that seem to fit better now.

The out of place things stick out more than they used to, since I feel so settled in.

I am, at my core, a homebody. I enjoy traveling to new places, but I don’t have the wanderlust, the sense of adventure that some of my other family members seem to have. I like my home, and being able to return to that home is one of the highlights of a long trip. The safety and security of my own place is something that I treasure, especially during the winter months.

Seeing the house decorated for the winter holidays only reinforces how much at home I feel here, and how thankful I am to have it.