I’ve been writing about dating a lot lately because it’s on my mind. Before the pandemic hit (two years ago!), I had decided that I wanted to start dating again. Or at least tapping that ass on the regular. What can I say? I have terrible timing. When the pandemic hit, I obviously set aside thoughts of dating. The idea of mashing bits with someone I didn’t know was unthinkable.
Fast-forward a year-and-a-half. Vaxes were a thing, and I got both of my jabs as soon as I could. The first one was on my birthday, which made me inordinately happy. Once I got my second jab, I was jubilant that there was a ray of sunshine in a previously grim outlook. I started to cautiously open my world, just the slightest bit, when disaster hit. I had my medical crisis and ended up unconscious in the hospital.
Once I got out, I wasn’t thinking about dating, understandably. I was just grateful to be alive. I concentrated on getting my strength back so I could resume my life. Now, nearly seven months later, I’m there. I have a few lingering issues from my medical trauma–slight problems with my short-term memory, for example. In general, however, I’m back to where I was, if not better.
What has changed is my outlook on many things. I have had body issues my entire life–ever since my mom put me on a diet when I was seven. She said I would be so pretty if I lost weight, and that started a decades-long antipathy towards my body. The summer before I went to college, I decided to lose weight because I had come to believe that I was just too disgusting for words. I exercised seven hours a day and restricted my eating severely. I lost forty pounds in two months and developed anorexia at the same time. Because I couldn’t keep up my exercise schedule in college, I added bulimia to the mix.
My mom was no help. When my junior counselors notified her about my eating disorders, she did not handle it well at all. She clearly didn’t see it as a problem and privately, she only expressed jealousy that my waist was smaller than hers. (I’m taller than she is by 4 inches.) What I’m trying to say is that she has her own body issues.
I gained a bunch of weight after that. I swung the other way and started overeating. You can bet my mother had something to say about THAT. It got so bad, I had to tell her that any mention of my weight was verboten. She tried to say that she was only worried about my health, which was bullshit. As I said, the only comment she had when I was suffering from anorexia/bulimia was that my waist was smaller than hers in a very unhappy tone.
Her whole life seemed to revolve around this mythical five pounds that she was constantly trying to lose. I’ve seen pics of her at her heaviest and she just looks healthy. But it was always on her mind and she constantly judged her worth by what the scale said. Oh, sure, she tried to disguise it as a matter of health, but the amount of brain juice she gave to those mythical five pounds was sad. And it permeated everything I thought about myself.
For forty years, I refused to look in the mirror because I hated the way I looked. I was fat and ugly and just too grotesque for words. Taiji helped that some because I was able to see what my body could do. In other words, I could see the usefulness of my body, which was a step further than I had ever been before. When I had a minor car crash several years ago, my Taiji training kicked in, relaxed my body, and saved me from any injuries. That’s when I became neutral about my body. Hey, after a life time of hating it, that was a big step for me.
Then, my medical trauma happened. Yes, I’m going to talk about that again because it’s changed my life in many ways. No I don’t have much lasting physical trauma, or any trauma, really. The negatives from it are not directly related to the actual medical issues.
The positive changes, though? Those are legions. One, I am so impressed with what my body has done for me. I mean, it was hit with walking (non-COVID-related) pneumonia, two cardiac arrests, and a stroke.
Side Note: I always forget about the stroke. I don’t know why, exactly, but it’s always a ‘oh, yeah. I had a stroke, too.’ Maybe because it didn’t do any noticeable damage to me. Or because the two cardiac arrests are just so huge. Or because the pneumonia started everything. For whatever reason, I never think about it unless I’m focusing on the medical emergency in general.
Is it a humblebrag? Yeah, kinda! Not exactly, but it’s not NOT a humblebrag, either. I know I sound very blasé about it, but it’s easy to forget that I died. Twice. And all the other stuff that goes along with it. When I wrote the Elden Ring piece for publication, the editor of the piece talked about how powerful my personal story was. I was taken aback because it’s just something I take for granted now.
It’s partly protective, honestly. I can’t go around always thinking about how I almost died. Or rather, how I actually died. Twice. It’s too big to always be at the front of my mind. I do feel as if I can say with certainty that once you’re dead, you’re dead. There was no white li7ght or angel or anything like that. One moment, I was. The next moment, I wasn’t. A moment later, I was again.
I like to say that when I woke up, I was scared, angry, and ready to fight someone. I wasn’t sure who, but I knew that someone needed fighting. Fortunately, I didn’t literally try to fight any of my medical team because they did so much for me. I’ve been called a miracle. If that’s the case, then they’re the miracle workers. They’re the ones who brought me back to life–twice! That was the EMTs, actually. But my medical team kept me on ice to keep me alive until I could breathe on my own again.
It’s been nearly seven months. I can hardly believe it. If you were to look at me, you would never guess that all that had happened to me.
Back to my body. I’m so grateful for it getting me through my medical crisis without losing a step. No rehab. None! I walked out of the hospital two weeks after I entered it, one of those week being unconscious. I had a person who washed my hair once a week for six weeks or so. Maybe two months? I didn’t need it after a month, but I let it go longer just to be sure.
Three months after I got home from the hospital, I was 100% recovered. No rehab, no home aides (except the one who washed my hair), no therapists of any kind. None. My life was back to normal, though it wasn’t really, was it? But it was. But it wasn’t.
I want to date and I am completely over thinking I’m fat and ugly. I’m cute as fuck and my body did its thing. I am 100% that bitch (I discovered Lizzo today and will never be the same) and anyone who wants to get with me better recognize it. I do worry that my tolerance for bullshit is zero now. I am not going to put up with negging of any kind because I am more than happy to be on my own. You wanna get with this? Then you better enthusiastically want to get with this. I have so many exes who negged me, which I just took.
Not any more. You don’t like my body? You don’t need to touch it. But you don’t get to say shit about it. That’s my bottom line now.