I’m no Catholic, but sometimes the best thing we can do to relieve ourselves of guilt is to confess. It’s cathartic, at the very least, and saying things out loud helps me process.
This weekend was strange. Some good, most of it not good. It started out well enough, with Joe and I on Friday night setting out in search of fiddleheads and ramps, (which are in season right now, delicious, wild Maine delicacies) and my favorite gluten free beer. I drank the beer, ate sushi, and snacked on salt and vinegar chips while we watched the bittersweet finale of The Office… with me sobbing over having to say goodbye to the characters, who feel like old friends to me. I’m not sure why I usurped my typical restrictive plan and indulged in all that food on Friday night, other than knowing that my chronic exhaustion gets in the way of my resolve at times.
Saturday morning I went to my yoga class, ran errands, ate TWO gluten free muffins (wtf?) and got a call from Joe’s friend Alex inviting me out on the boat for the afternoon, while Joe took the MCATs. Joe encouraged me to hang out with them instead of waiting around the 5 hours while he took the test, and so I went. The boat was great. Sun and water and great people… the perfect combination. But I also brought a six-pack of hard cider with me, drinking 5 of them throughout the day for a whopping total of 1000 calories. Typing that out makes me feel ill.
Joe took the MCATs, didn’t submit the score (which was planned) and was ready to go out the same night with all of us after we all showered and ate after the boat. I quickly lost my hard cider buzz and got sleepy, but went out with everyone anyway. It was a typical night, and I drank two vodka cocktails, which only added to my caloric intake for the day. The club we were in was over-crowded, smelly and hot, and Joe got uncomfortable in the throngs. Our whole group traipsed back to a friend’s apartment where Joe seemed perfectly content to hang out for an undetermined amount of time… and it was 2am. I was exhausted. I already live my life at a decreased energy level than most of my peers, due to the small amounts of sleep that I log. But after a day and night of alcohol, with no stimuli to keep me awake, I was painfully, drop dead tired and I kept asking Joe to take me home.
He ignored me. It was bizarre. He is usually the first person to want to head out and get to bed, but for whatever reason, he didn’t feel like budging and he was obviously annoyed by my repeated complaints of being so tired. Finally, at 2:30am he made the move to get us home but in the car I expressed my irritation and confusion at his recalcitrance to leave when I needed to. His anger was almost immediate.
Joe has a terrible temper. Things will be thrown, punched, slammed and he yells and swears and it never fails to frighten me instantly. I don’t know why he got so angry at me; I’m sure I wasn’t being very nice about wanting to go home earlier and I know that I have the unique ability to push his buttons, but that kind of anger is never okay, in my book. He takes after his mother that way. We went to bed in separate rooms and I shivered in our bed, so afraid of his outburst and for what it meant for our relationship.
He was sorry and afraid and upset about his behavior when he came into my room in the morning, telling me that there is nothing he wouldn’t do and nothing he wouldn’t change about himself in order to stay with me. He melted my frosty heart and expressed his desire to try to know why he lets his anger get the better of him. I love him with everything that I have and I was so glad to hear him acknowledge how scary and violent his anger is. Sidenote: He has never physically hurt me and never would.
But yesterday was still difficult, and in the grand culmination of caloric suicide, I ate french fries. It was the ultimate hatred of self and it was either going to be french fries, or a razor blade. And now I feel disgusting, bloated, out of control and like a failure. I feel adrift, and I screwed up my success with one weekend of indulgence. I feel the desire to give up, to let this failure overwhelm my plans for health and happiness. And I also think I feel the drug I’m on, Nortriptyline, and its side effect of weight gain. Time to quit it.
It’s also time to get back on the horse and not be derailed by one weekend of screwing around. I’m going to personal training tonight, I’m back to tracking my meals, and I’m going to stop Nortriptyline as it hasn’t really helped me sleep (it did for the first couple nights but not anymore). And I’m writing. Writing keeps me honest and strengthens my resolve. I hope you’re all well! xoxo, g.
