Oh noes! The 2014 defective verdict: "Seek professional medical advice."

I visited the doctor today. I was apprehensive and anxious…going to the doctor is not something I have made a habit of doing. I had demonized the medical community for years. My need to be perfect and the medical community never meshed well.

As a civilian I have mostly avoided the doctor because I am not entirely fond of mine, but I also have been too lazy to seek out a new one. She told me once when I went to her for my annual blood work that I should stop lifting so heavy. She doesn’t personally know me or my relationship with the iron but I did hold it against her. She didn’t get too excited when some of my blood work came back on the higher end of normal and that infuriated me. You see my need to be perfect has alienated a lot of medical advice I have gotten and had prevented me from seeking medical advice for years.

I have realized that I am never going to be perfect and striving for that is asinine. I am dying…not today…but that is how this journey will end – understanding that is comforting to me, and no longer threatening. I’ll do everything I can to prolong my life…and my sanity…and I am tired of self-diagnosing off the Internet…because the Internet always says I have cancer, and I think it is set up that way so you GO SEEK PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL ADVICE.

Alternative medicine can be great, but it is largely dangerous. Herbs and essential oils are not regulated. And now that the dietary dogma has been lifted off of me I see that it is foolish to try and cure a thyroid with Wild Yam Tincture - and actually when I read that I shake my head at that craziness.

There are some great things about alternative medicines. One of my favorites is massages. Massages were the only relief I got from the bursitis in my shoulder; well that and quitting bench press. Which was what the doctor had advised when I was under treatment and I refused and kept benching for three years, it wasn’t really the massage – it was a combination of quitting, getting the knots worked out and not re-inflaming it.

Finding medical solutions on the internet is a convoluted process you need to be aware of. You have someone blogging about their personal experience but you don’t know all the variables. And mostly you don't know this blogger - it could be a nine year old for all you know. You have to take into consideration that their experience could be a one-off or was it even a legit ailment to start with or just one of those body flukes? A body fluke is when you show symptoms of something and then even if you didn't do anything it magically disappears. We've all had this happen to us in some form or another. How do you know this person didn't just have a body fluke, rubbed some coconut oil on it and drank chamomile and wola they were cured? You don’t. You can also have someone writing a blog for sensationalism and blog hits…you just never know.

No one wants to hear “seek medical advice from a medical professional”. That means waiting and no one in 2014 is good at that. You have to wait for the appointment, you have to take time off work and rearrange your schedule, pay your co-pay and of course you have to tell your doctor everything that is happening so they can work with you on a diagnosis and treatment plan and that may not fit your “urgent” needs. Or even worse….you get a referral to a specialist; which means more waiting.

Doctors aren’t perfect but the great aspect about a doctor is there are a lot of them out there and available to you. I agree it isn’t as fast as going to google and typing in your symptoms and reading seven blogs, WebMD and Live Strong then taking your self-diagnosis figuring out the typical treatment plan then typing that into Google and finding the holistic, home remedy or alternative treatment you can do yourself. The hard cold fact is that sometimes what ails you needs a professional diagnosis and treatment.

Yes, a healthy lifestyle that includes eating nutritious foods in appropriate quantities, exercising daily, getting ample sleep, and refraining from too much stress, caffeine and alcohol are great approaches and good measures for health. They will do nothing but improve your health journey, but we are a complex organism and sometimes we need a little more than good foods and essential oils.

Being proactive in your medical care is taking care of yourself in the aforementioned health approaches, and even researching your ails but consulting a medical professional shouldn’t be shunned and it is. We are getting away from medical science and evidence based treatments the more popular blogging and the Internet become. We can’t forget the Internet is free and that anyone can post. There is a plethora of advice and information out there and not all of it is safe or accurate.

I know that someone will want to argue their horrible experience with a medical doctor and how they found salvation in going Paleo or going Raw...I'm actually really happy for the individual who found relief, however you cannot be 100% sure that your diet fixed you and you cannot be 100% sure that advising someone else to do the same vice seek treatment is safe. So stop it.

I've been infuriated with doctors myself, nothing will make you want to pull your hair out more than being in the Shock Trauma Unit of Baltimore's largest hosptial, surrounded by the best medical team and they are telling you that your husband is imagining spleen trauma. My husband ruptured his spleen in a unconvential (not heard of yet) way and this caused a lot of grief and waiting. The head doctor came with his disciples 12 deep and we had a nice chat where he did all the listening and I did all of the talking. If I would have sat back and just accepted their diagnosis it would have prolonged him getting treatment - it was a huge pain in the ass, it was the most stressful thing I have ever gone through but still....they were the only people who could help him. Sometimes you have to embrace the suck with medical treatment....like I said we are complex organisms.

If you are adversely against medication then discuss that with your doctor. I’ve been to my doctor three times this year: once for my annual, once for the flu and now today for a new aliment and she didn’t offer me drugs at any of these appointments and if I wasn’t comfortable with something she prescribed I would have discussed it with her.

I saw a FB post where a woman claimed to have healed her bulimia with fasting. This is baffling to read but I know that there are a lot of folks out there that are trapped in their dietary dogma and believe this woman in fact healed herself with a fast. Bulimia is a serious mental illness that needs to be medically treated – fasting only fuels her mental illness. The problem here isn’t the food, but her relationship with food.

I see dietary advice being dealt out in abundance on various FB pages (and mine used to be one of them) about different medical afflictions and how to cure them with various demonization of foods, herbs, kombucha and sunshine. Yes, sometimes it is the food – most of the times it isn’t, and it is wise to check with a medical professional to be sure – and if you don’t like what they tell you seek another opinion or do what you think is best for your health. It is after all YOUR health; you can do what you like with it.

My best personal advice for everyone out there is to stop getting medical advice from the Internet and take care of yourself and this includes the occasional unplanned trip to the doctor and your routine medical check-ups.

Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Bones!

The back bones connected to the hip bone, the hip bones connected to the thigh bone….do you remember this song? Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Bones!

Our bodies are this wonderfully organic and adaptable machine, almost too adaptable. Everyone I talk to lately is suffering from an injury – some are debilitating and some are just nagging. This got me thinking about how magical and wonderful the human body really is.

Unfortunately and fortunately the human body adapts when we are injured. Unfortunately because this causes other anatomical problems and fortunately because we can still function and be productive. Pain medications are almost detrimental for some – we go to the orthopedic specialist and they give us a shot of cortisone and magically that sore shoulder is “100 percent”; we pop 800 mg of ibuprofen and magically that nuisance in our wrist is gone! But then all the sudden your neck and jaw bone start to ache, or your elbow starts to ache and feels like it is on fire…but I didn’t even injury my elbow! What is going on?

Dem bones, dem bones, dem bones, dem bones!

Anatomy has always…and I mean ALWAYS…made my head hurt. WHAT ASSHOLE CAME UP WITH THESE NAMES!? Why can’t the tetanic contraction just be called a painful spasm? Or a plexus be called knitted? Oh that’s right….we can’t have a cult without fancy jargon. A short…very short…lesson on muscle connections. Our bodies have 250,000,000 muscle cells and 420,000 motor neurons. A motor neuron pairs up with a bunch of muscle cells to make a muscle fiber. The motor neuron is the messenger that runs back and forth between the Central Nervous System and the muscle fiber relaying messages…like contract – or for laymen like me…SQUEEZE. Or relax. One single muscle can be a number of motor units – and they all work together, when the muscle needs to do work the Central Nervous System sends out stimulating electric messages saying DO WORK! If your neck needs to do work it is going to rely on some of the muscle fibers from your shoulder. One central area….all dem muscles.

Nerves – they are everywhere!! Your Lumbosacral Plexus is a nerve plexus (knit) where your spinal nerves intersect. They work the muscles in the lower body, such as calves, knees, groins, thigh, abdomen and lower back. This is where an anesthesiologist would perform a nerve block for the lower body. So one central area….all dem nerves.

Bones – they support and protect organs and produce white and red blood cells and store minerals. They come in all shapes and sizes and a complex structure. Your bones have all sorts of tissues inside them: marrow, endosteum, periosteum, nerves, blood vessels and cartilage. Bones are amazing….a matchbox size of bone can support nine tons! That is four times the amount that concrete can. Dem bones, dem bones, dem bones.

I broke my foot last May and I found ways to keep training. I did one legged burpees and other exercises bilaterally. This was amazing that I adapted to this pain – I have done this with every single injury to date, I hurt my shoulder – I test out different exercises to see what I can do and then I just do them. Hyperextended my elbow…test out different exercises to see what I can do. Again I find this amazing because I have given birth twice and both times I cried, screamed and even threatened to cut people if they didn’t give me drugs. You would think that the idea of having a whole new human being to love, care for and call my own would have been enough to keep me focused – but threaten my mental health with an injury and the possibility that I can’t train and I am the terminator.

It’s all connected…just like the song we learned in pre-school taught us. So what can we do about it? Stretch, strengthen, massage and manage your pain….all appropriately.

Stretch…if you are over 30 and not stretching I don’t know how you are a productive human. Seriously, stretching for me was no longer a should-do and a must-do once I pushed 30. If you are young get in the habit of stretching – it is a very hard habit to develop and it fucking sucks developing it just because you are injured. Nothing sucks worse than working out and getting your muscles warm, the blood and adrenaline flowing and then saying fuck you stretches, then cooling off and trying to scrape your sorry ass off the floor/bench/couch and then hobbling around for three days all cause of your lazy inability to create a new habit (and when I say you…I mean me).

Strengthen…but do it the right way – if you have an injury and you still want to train, but if you are unsure of how to train the right way with an injury go to a physical therapist……..I SAID A PHYSICAL THERAPIST….not a personal trainer…sorry but they are not trained to deal with injuries. A Physical Therapist attends school for about 6 years and is required by LAW to be licensed. If your personal trainer who has their Level I (or Level II) Certification with XF or there online certificate from AFAA is telling you they know injuries they are full of shit and you should run away. The lines should not be blurred between medical treatment and personal trainers. A personal trainer or coach is there to design you a safe workout program and teach you proper form. Nothing more.

Massage…….I can’t tell you enough how much massage saved my fitness career – I get one at least once a month and more if I am hammering away on a goal. Massages have been hands down the best muscle therapy for me personally. I don’t believe in chiropractors – sorry. I think it is pseudoscience.

Manage your pain – if you get a cortisone shot and your orthopedic told you to rehab for 6 weeks. Rehab for six weeks. Just because the fire was put out by the medicine doesn’t mean the smoke is cleared. Pain is your bodies way of saying “hey asshole, don’t do that” – your body really does know best. Our bodies talk to us all the time, we just have to listen. If you are tired that means rest, or sleep not pound coffee, NSAIDS and hit it hard. I can’t explain enough how stressful lifting is on the Central Nervous System. Add in lack of rest, injuries, pain meds, caffeine and mismanagement of stress and you are asking for cumulative injuries.

Dem bones, Dem bone, Dem bones….be good to them, you only get one set.

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-motor-unit.htm
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-lumbar-plexus.htm

Not naive...open minded.

A few things that got brought to my attention after my last post that I'd like to clarify.....I’m not here to change the world….I’m working on myself. I used to think that I could change every person I came into contact with…now I realize I can only control myself, and my reactions to others. And keep an open mind.

I don’t want to change that black man who walks into the room and the first thing he thinks about is his color. Why do I need to? Why does he need to? I am sure he is proud of his color. What I want to change about myself, and raise my daughters to do…and if I’m lucky…bring it to someone else’s attention, is that being different is GOOD. Celebrate differences. If we were all the same – life would…suck. What I want my daughters…and for myself….is to determine if a person is someone we want to spend time with based on their personality, intellect and talents. If we want to further know someone based on these attributes, not the color of their skin, their gender, their hair color, their jean size, their jean brand or their sexual orientation.

Discrimination doesn’t just come in color or gender – it is largely social too. People can base whether they friend you on if you live in the right house; your parents (or you) have the right job; youmake the right amount of money; buy the right clothes; and have the latest styles and fashions. This is particularly sad to me.....and oh so shallow.

I was asked if I have ever felt discriminated against in my job. I think the presumed answer was going to be no, because I am a white female that has above average aesthetics I’ve been to college and served in the military. But the answer is hell yes!! I work with a population of largely 45-65 year old men, of all races, who have retired from a branch of the service and were generally officers. I just hit 35 this year and I have been in this civilian job for the last 7.5 years. From the get go I was dismissed by certain folks because I am young, because I am a woman, because I am attractive, because I didn’t retire from the military, and sometimes even because I was enlisted. The fact that I was a Sergeant that served “only” eight years in the Marine Corps has become my “dirty” secret. And it is largely thought that I got my current position because I am an attractive female. I was even told that once at a conference. And let me tell you…sometimes being told you are “pretty” is an insult. Nothing takes the wind out of your sails like someone telling you that you are unqualified because of your birth year and ownership of a vagina. I wanted to put on a parka and wipe all the make-up off my face and be an invisible, ugly person. For a long time it really made me think…way too hard….about what I was going to wear to work, who I was going to be seeing that day, if they would take me more seriously if I had a pants suit on vice a dress. If I wore my hair up versus down did it make me look to young if it was styled this way or that. I eventually….and it took way too long to come to this conclusion….realized that these issues were THEIRS, not mine.

 I WAS hired because I was young, my boss got tired of hiring folks who were coming into the profession with a “I’m retired, I just don’t want to move to Florida and die yet” attitude. He wanted someone who had some passion and spunk, and hadn’t been beaten down by politics yet; had faith and hope that the world could change!

Is it the same as being racial discriminated against? Feck no, I’m not trying to compare it. That wasn’t the point of my previous post either. My point is BEING DIFFERENT IS GOOD!

Like I said I will NEVER change the world…I can change myself, and I continuously try to. I can “attempt” to raise my daughters to the best of my abilities with the knowledge that I have now.

Going from one extreme of hatred to tippy toeing around a race or gender is not going to fix the problem. It will only exacerbate it. And I would personally think this would be insulting to someone. It’s hard for me to even say how I feel about my personal situation - I got hired over someone that was retired with more experience because of being young, will it ever be seen that I got the job because I would have more longevity, passion and ability to go further in the career position? No, it will always be contrived based on being a young, attractive female.

 

How can we fix it? Well we can’t, I can’t. We can only worry about what WE do as a person in charge of our own actions. I know I will not look at a man who is homosexual and ass-u-me that he is weak because he has on female clothing or his gait is not that of a heterosexual man. I know I will not look at a Mexican woman and ass-u-me that she is stupid because she may not understand English. I will not meet a 20-year old intern and automatically ass-u-me that they don’t have valuable feedback or perspective just because they are “only 20”. The list goes on and on my friends. This reminds me of the meme that a fish isn’t stupid just because it cannot climb a tree. (Am I killing you with the meme's yet?)

Embrace being different, recognize that there are going to be folks who are NOT going to embrace your difference and that is NOT your problem. Love YOU, be good to you; work on being a better you – whether that is reading more books, traveling more (travel is one sure what to kill bigotry) 

or just stopping and talking to someone you normally wouldn’t. Be open minded – I didn’t say naïve…just open minded.

Slippery Slopes, race and gender domination.

I recently watched a video on FB of a teacher….or maybe she was an instructor (eye of the beholder) that was performing an experiment with her class on race domination. There was a white girl who cried and blubbered and screamed in unfairness to the experiment….and yes, I am being judgmental with my words I use to describe her actions and she did make a point for the video but wow, was she just crazy train. Anyways, the point of the video (and I am grossly over simplifying the meaning here) was that anytime a person of any race other than white walked into a room it was the first thing that was noticed.

I have a good friend who told me this once; that the first thing that he felt when he walked into a room was that he was black. In my inexperienced mind I thought this was “dumb”….I thought that was HIM projecting HIS issues on the folks in the room. As a much more seasoned human being I see that I was being an asshole.

The comments on the post were even crazier. People were commenting that the teacher was empowering folks of race to cry for indiscrimination…and I am rephrasing the comment to make it “polite”.

It got me thinking…WHY is there race domination to the point that in 2013 a black man walks into a room and it is the first thing he thinks about? It led me on a journey to a book (and National Geographic five part series) “Guns, Germs and Metal”. I will wrap a quite lengthy book and five hours of TV into one word….geography.

I definitely recommend you watch the TV series – the book is dry, but actually more palatable if you watch the TV series first. My daughter….god love this baby, she is her mother through and through…and she picks up on every damn word that slips out of my mind…wants to start a revolution to kill the Disney Princesses. After discussing with her, her plan to revolutionize and destroy Disney, I got to thinking after watching Aborigine tribes…and even the tribes that are still around today in New Guinea….why did the male sex become a dominant gender and why does my little female warrior need to make a plan to destroy Disney and it’s gender discrimination?

Sydney designed this meme that said everyone is a princess regardless of what Disney tells you; and my question to her was WHY do they have to be princesses? I mean, I don’t want to be a princess. Why can’t it just be all bodies are good bodies? WHY does it have to be gender specific? Men have the same body image issues as women. They just aren’t AS conditioned by the media and culture to be as self-conscious about it. They still are conditioned by the media, but not nearly as much as women.

Where in history did we move from an egalitarian structured society to a society with male structured societal roles of power and leadership roles? Yes, yes, I know there are plenty of women in powerful positions and leadership roles. Just like there are a lot of people of other races outside of white that are successful…..it still is a fact that a black man walks into the room and that is the first thing on his mind. It is still a fact that people will make jokes about a woman being president and we will go to war every 28 days. It’s still there….it is becoming more of an elephant in the room and something you shouldn’t talk about…….but it is still there.

Why do I see (mostly) women trying to become as small as possible? Why do some women put so much pride into being small, petite, pretty, and attractive to the masses to the point where it is self-destructive? And remember…I am asking these questions about general women, if you happen to be a self-empowered bad ass woman than carry-on, I’m not trying to fit all women (or men) into a box, but you also know from sitting in that position that you are not the majority. Where did this COME from? I have feeds on my FaceBook of vintage pin-ups and the whole goal of this genre is to have a “Barbie doll like” waist, large boobs, long hair and enormous amounts of makeup. Makeup to give you “flawless” skin, pouty lips, and large curvy shaped eyes. All with the goal of sex appeal. Not that there is anything wrong with this, I myself did a pinup ‘esque look for the Marine Corps ball I just attended. Again all bodies are good bodies, and more importantly it is YOUR body to do with as you please. Even if that means self-destruction for no other purpose than to look appealing to complete strangers, I am not here to destroy anyone’s happiness, if these things make you happy, by all means carry on. If you perhaps ask yourself, yea, maybe I am not doing some of this for myself but for some sort of acceptance than maybe you have the same question.

How and why did the male gender evolve to be the dominant gender?

It appears that the male gender domination came with agriculture….I’m still doing research on this (and trying to finish Guns, Germs and Steel so perhaps there is an explanation in the book I haven’t come to). One of the most popular theories I have read was that men were the hunters, and although gathering provided most of the food that a tribe ate when agriculture came about and having a food surplus allowed for trade skills and crafts, the men were in an advantageous position to take their hunting skills and translate them into skills of war, conquering other tribes, the start of slavery, and politics.

Among the more ill-informed things I read……“men are naturally more aggressive” “men were the protectors of their family and had to be strong” “because men have the courage and willpower to confront danger and hardship”

First off, back in da day, it was not uncommon for a woman to be pregnant and not know who the father was – she was part of a tribe, therefore the baby was received as a member of the tribe. There wasn’t much “protection of the family” by a gender specific role. It was the tribe looked out for each other as a whole, and if shit went down then it was a gene pole clean up….the strong survived, and this included men and women. “Men are naturally aggressive”….this really kind of cracks me up, this quite possibly could get the most ignorant statement I’ve read today award. “Men have more courage and willpower to confront danger and hardship”….OK I stand corrected….THIS is the most oblivious thing I’ve read today. Women aren’t genetically inclined to like the color pink, want to wear skirts, bake, clean house, primp their cleavage and wear more face paint than a Cherokee Indian by nature, this is strictly nurtured into them by their surroundings and the feedback they get from media, their culture and peers.

Men aren’t more aggressive than women – if you still believe this I invite you to spend a day with me and my husband and you can rationally deduct which one of us is more aggressive by nature. He can naturally be more destructive faster with his aggression than I but give me a few extra minutes and I can fuck a bunch of shit up too. My husband is by nature much more docile than I am and he is much more forgiving as well. That isn’t science – I know, if you want science you came to the wrong blog.

Men aren’t designed to endure hardship more than women –during hunting and gathering times the women were the gathers while the men went off to hunt. Hunting only brought in so much food – it took days to track an animal and one animal provides only so much meat. The gathering that the women did was a more lucrative food supply. Watching an aborigine woman cut down a sago tree and turn it into food will make your shoulder muscles ache and this was a process that took several days and once a tree was completed another would be started so that they could continue to eat. For hours on end, day after day, a woman would process a wild sago tree into dough, physically exhausting work….all just to eat. Eat or starve….sounds like hardship to me. I’m going to wrap up my thoughts on gender specific domination in a quick paragraph. After a teeny bit of research, my opinion is strengthened that racism, classism, and sexism are mutually constitutive systems. I don’t think one exists…or came to be…without the others. Therefore it came about with agriculture and agriculture was a product of geography. In short, men aren’t smarter, stronger, or better than women in any way. I know some women will spout off that women are a better gender because we can make babies. Well not really, a woman grows a baby, not makes them, and it still takes a man to make a baby. If there were no men the lands would be just as barren of babies as if there were no women.

I also know that most men will argue with me on the stronger piece and hell some asshole will want to debate the intellect piece too. But it just isn’t so. There are plenty of women that these inexperienced and unenlightened men can point to as examples of weaker and dumber – I will definitely agree with that. But it isn’t because of their sex, it is because of choice, and media/cultural/peer provoked exposure. Given the chance a male baby and a female baby raised with no gender expectations could be physically and mentally equal – just as a white baby and a black baby would be physically and mentally equal. There are those that are born genetically stronger and/or smarter – woohoo genetics – but race and sex doesn’t decide these factors.

In summary…..long live the Disney princess….wait….that can’t be right…..

If I knew I was going to live this long......

I used to fret when I had to log that dreaded “F” next to a failed attempt on a lift. It really upset me and left me doubting myself. If I had to log an “F” next to a lift I had done previously…oh boy, that’d really send me down doubt lane. 

I now realize that I’ll have more chances to attempt that weight. There is more to life than just this minute. That is something I try to impart on my daughters daily. Especially my oldest daughter who is a very “right now” kind of person, if it isn’t happening to her right now it doesn’t exist. It is good to focus on this minute, it currently is the only one we have and it is the most impactful at this moment but we do get many more. I am not conveying that you should be wasteful of your minutes; you should take joy in all your minutes. There are many folks out there that have no more minutes….. 

 My grandfather, who I call Pap, is not well and has deteriorated to a point that frustrates me. He is a good man and I was hoping that he would have a lifetime of peace, not a bumpy end of the road ride. I have been able to go back home ( a three and half hour drive) on the weekends and spend time with him and I have never felt so honored and blessed to spend time with a person as I have been to spend this time with my Pap. He doesn’t remember minute to minute and is extremely weak. His lungs are damaged and he cannot have any liquids or he will aspirate. All of his food is in a pudding consistency and they add a thickener to his liquids. I’ve had the honor to help him eat, hold his hand, stroke his hair and remind him to keep his oxygen cannulas in. 

 It has also been some of the most heart wrenching hours I have spent; you see I love my Pap. I know you are thinking of course you love your grandfather, but everyone has a duty to love their family. I don’t know my mother’s father very well. He worked a lot when I was younger and I had a falling out with my grandmother ten years ago and we quit talking. I wish them well but although they are family they are strangers to me.

 My Pap has been a corner stone in my life; he is the one who always gives me advice. My dad doesn’t like to give advice. Call him with a problem and he usually will commiserate with me but won’t provide any solid feedback. My Pap on the other hand will tell me to suck it up, and he isn’t telling me to suck it up because the other option was to look weak. He was telling me to suck it up because most of the time the right thing to do is hard….and hard sucks and the only way to overcome that particular adversary was to suck it up, put your head down and work. 

 My Pap said if he would have known he was going to live this long (he is a month short of 88) he would have taken better care of his body. I think this is such valuable advice. When he said it I instantly thought of all the times I have beaten my body up because it would not perform to what I thought it should be. Times I had pushed myself to some crazy limit to accomplish…..well that’s the crazy part; I can’t even identify what I was trying to accomplish with my crazy exercise induced abuse. 

 Some of the things I love about my Pap the most have absolutely nothing to do with his physique or his looks. The thing that sticks out the most was his home was a home. You could go in there and run up and down the steps and he would never yell. You didn’t have to take your shoes off or close the door behind you. He had an easy laugh and was always patient with me. He would listen to whatever wild story I was telling and laugh. And he had lots of idiosyncrasy sayings that made no sense at the time but as I got older would make me laugh. Like, “Ang, you are goofier than a three dollar bill.” “Home is where you kick your shoes in the corner and piss on the world.”

 Now when I log that “F” I remind myself that I will have another attempt, I will take good care of my body because I have the genetics to live into my 80’s and that the people who love me the most don’t love me because of the exercise that I can do. Be good to yourself.

A lack of mental maturity in grown woman

When I was a bit younger I used to recall certain aspects of my childhood with my mom and beat her up over them in my mind, or to my friends.  One memory in particular always bothered me, I was about seven or eight and we were in Daytona Beach visiting her boyfriend. He was that guy that rented bikes and body boards and umbrellas on the beach. I had been playing with another girl I had friended on the beach and her mom and dad invited me to go to SeaWorld with them the next day. My mom agreed. 

To me as an "adult" I was baffled that she agreed to this. We didn't know these people. I viewed this as irresponsible and selfish. She wanted alone time with her boyfriend....who to me as an adult was a loser...really...a grown man renting gear on the beach. Of course I wasn't going to cut him (or her) a break regardless of his profession....and as an "adult" that sounds feckin awesome!  

I don't really remember much about Sea World. I'm sure I had a lovely time. The only thing I do remember is the little girl throwing up in my hair on the ride home. 

Now....as an adult (and I use that word loosely to describe myself, every time I think I have this "adult" thing down I learn something new that completely crushes me into submission of just how stupid and naive I still am) I break this down and have to give my mom some credit. 

You see this was the mid 80's before the ubiquitous white van started showing up offering candy to young kids and abducting them to sell to satanic cults for blood rituals. This was before Jaycee Dugard was kidnapped walking to the bus stop while her step-father witnessed the whole thing.  No one really stole kids at this point...or well they did, it just wasn't on the news putting fear into the American parent yet. 

I can tell you after Jaycee Dugard's kidnapping in August of 1989 I was on lockdown until I graduated from high school. My mom was sure at this point I was going to be stolen and sold to the black market for sexual slavery.  (My mom's very all or nothing). 

I realize now as an adult...that perhaps my mom deserves a break from me....after all I've done shit I'm not proud of as a mom and I am 100% positive Sydney will write a book exposing all of them in a year or two. I see her scribbling away in a notepad giving me that seething look at least once a week.

I also realize now that my mom wasn't very emotionally mature when she was in her 20's and even in her early 30's.  There are certain things women who don't have this maturity do.  Like let their little children go off with strangers for a few hours of time with their boyfriend. Or act like a tough guy that could beat your ass if you smile wrong. 

As we watch TUF 18 this becomes very apparent to me.  There is a significant difference between the way the two coaches act. You have one woman whose father killed himself because he had a terminal illness when she was very young and the other whose dad coached her wrestling team in high school. Very involved and very absent. 

At first I was pretty harsh on the fatherless coach's behavior....which my little ears were all so eager to pick up on it and so began the parroting. Ugh...another failure. Now I am back pedaling a bit and trying to provide some face for this poor woman to my seething 13 yo...who much to my chagrin is very all or nothing. 

We can't all be perfectly behaved and wow, what a huge blessing it is to have that stable father (and mother) figure to provide that emotional maturity before you become 20 something and attempt adulthood. Wow...you can pick it out instantly can't you? 

So in yet another long winded rant, the point is!!! Be nice to your mom.  

Identity Crisis

I am personally facing a parenting hurdle of helping my daughters’ define who they are while not putting other girls down. Being a vigilant mother of daughters is not for the faint of heart…but truly parenting in general isn’t. Trying to help the girls wade through and giving them the freedom to pick and choose pieces of their identity to their prerogative and privilege….ya know, first world problems, is hard. 

 One day we want purple hair to be different and weird, only to quickly realize that being weird is easy and anyone can be weird. What she truly wanted was creativity. And quickly complained daily that the purple wasn’t washing out fast enough… I want my daughters to know that to be defined as a truly awesome person your virtues cannot come from your jean size, the length of your hair, the shoe brand you sport or your fuckability measurement according to the masses. 

People obsessed with these and like traits act as if dressing, primping, shopping, dieting, etc. “well” is a virtue…sometimes this “well” is the only quality they have…..oh see there I go with the shaming…shame on me. Perhaps being “fairest of them all” isn’t their prerogative? What if their time and energy is spent being the smartest, strongest, fastest, or most creative amongst their peers….does their appearances have to be the epicenter of their identity first? “She’s so pretty….and talented”…..if she wasn’t pretty would her talent be noticed? Of course it would….but would it be a double edged sword? Would someone say “it’s a good thing she’s talented cause she isn’t pretty.”…of course someone would, there is always one asshole in the group. And herein lies the wading through this facet that for a woman, pretty is best. 

 I don’t want their self-esteem to ride on some fuckable scale that those around them have contrived. Because never forget it is a sliding, unattainable scale. How do you take an incident like Miley Cyrus’ viral twerking and the “slut shaming” that ensued? Do you jump on the band wagon and call her a slut? Do you use the less take a stand path and say it was “inappropriate”? It is hard to draw a line in the sand and take a side against sexualizing girls but not having an issue with women having sex. I didn’t hear much clamored about Robin Thicke’s actions that same night and he is a married man.

 How do you empower a woman who cuts off her hair? Well you don’t…it’s not up to me to empower her; it’s also not up to me to call her a dyke or a feminist. It’s not my business to call a woman who chooses not to wear make-up ugly or a woman who chose to fight as a career crazy. It’s none of my business….and it is none of yours. 

This rabid materialistic attitude will chew you up and spit you out, especially if you are a girl! I am not trying to cry for equal rights, or bang the table and burn my bra…..I’m just trying to raise two women to be independent, self-assured, USEFUL people. I don’t need an Ariel who wanted a man so bad she gave up her voice, or a Snow White or Cinderella who’s only gift was cleaning and looking lovely, or a Mouseketeer or a Hannah Montana so thank you Disney….but I got this. At least I hope I got this. 

What was this rant about??? Hell if I know, but lucky for you it is over.