Breaking a dry spell + a revelation in Going public

Last Sunday I ended up seeing Cairo!! He’s gone again now, he left on Tuesday morning. He found a job in NOLA working for a politician on education policy. After that he’s going to China to make curriculum for an ESL program there. Somehow despite his problematic drug/alcohol use, he manages to have a pretty cool career.

I took him to my building’s rooftop and we drank beers, cuddled, kissed, and talked. Mt. Rainier was out, and we had a view of the sun setting over downtown.

He was less manic than last time, which I called him out on. He said the difference was “one adderall instead of two.” We had some really cute moments in which we talked about how well we connected, but still understood our time together was temporary. He really does see parts of me other people don’t see. Because he’s not in tech he doesn’t really connect with my techy side, and instead appreciates the other types of intellect I have. He told me he doesn’t think my job uses my full potential, which is soo validating for me. It feels good to be seen, you know? It feels good to have someone on the outside recognize how dumb and empty that industry is, and that I have value outside of it.

He’s also a writer, and had in the winter had sent me one of his short stories to review. I had done that and left comments on the doc, and just sort of forgot about it. He told me that he had gone through a sad time where someone screwed him over or something, and at that time he had happened to see my comments. He said it meant a lot to him that I did a careful job of reviewing, that it signaled to him in that moment that someone really cared.

And of course he broke my dry spell. The sex is always good, we talked about that too, how it’s good between us. He may smell like cigarettes and beer, but he really is a sweet and amazing person despite all his darkness.

I had an incredible revelation in therapy this week. Well, I guess it was my therapist’s revelation about me, but it was incredibly valuable. I was telling him about how I’m still struggling to get back to life before illness. How I’ve had to jump headfirst into work (I’m on call for two weeks, running this intern program, etc), and how I’ve been completely uninterested in dating, and even having a hard time wanting to see friends. I was straight up disturbed by my lack of interesting socializing.

In talking this through, I realized how how much my health issues are still taking up space in my mind. I seriously think about it all day everyday. Every time I swallow I’m thinking “omg, did that hurt?? does my throat feel swollen??”, and sometimes my ears still hurt and I get all paranoid about that. Every time I go to the bathroom I shine my phone’s flashlight into my mouth and examine the surgical site. The area has completely sealed up now, which brings its own set of worries. The whole point of the surgery was to open things up and clear out the infection so it would stop retaining fluid. But now that it’s closed up, what if it just swells up again!? My throat is really asymmetric now, so in general it’s hard to tell what healed looks like.

Anyway, back to the point. I’m still rather traumatized by everything that happened to me. Frequently I think about all the pain I experienced, and the awful procedures I had to have done. I think about the money and time I lost. I think about the stress I put on my friendships from having to ask for help (and if I did a good enough job of expressing my gratitude). Then there is the constant paranoia about it all coming back.

A week after my surgery I had made this decision to jump back into everyday life. Some things I NEEDED to get back to, I had no choice (intern program and work, mostly). I felt like if I admitted any weakness or that things were hard, I would crumble and fall apart. So one week after surgery I went on a TOUGH bike ride. I jumped back into work. I got back in the gym and lifted heavy. I started running. I made plans with friends. But fuck, it all tires me out, and everyday is a struggle. And even still I was feeling bad about not being at full capacity, and I didn’t know WHY.

But then my therapist was able to point out how much freaking energy I’m spending on just worrying about my health. And that it’s OK to still be recovering. I guess I was just trying to convince myself I’m healed and everything SHOULD be back to normal, but that’s just not the case. So my goal now is to give myself some space. My therapist says that he sees that I always push myself, so I shouldn’t feel worried that everything will crumble if I let up on myself a little bit. That was a relief to hear. So I’m setting some small boundaries, and hoping that I can start to work through this health stuff and it will fade from memory.

I have an appointment with my regular doctor on Tuesday to report that my antidepressants are working well, but I’m sure he will want to take a look at my throat, and his assessment should offer me some peace and clarity.