Kindly forgive the tirade- there is not much sense in the stream of consciousness to follow:
When I was 11 my mother told me the day I got my period she would bake me a cake. We'd have a little party with streamers and candles and celebrate all that is womanhood. Even at such a tender age, my sarcastic streak intact, I balked at the idea of raising joyous glee over something that would bring me monthly excrutiating cramps, emotional swings that would make any and all intelligent people avoid me for 2-3 days, tender breasts, inability to zip my pants because of bloating...and we're not even going to touch on the demon itself. Other women out there, I think, will understand why.
My mother didn't find out I had gotten my period (months before) until a doctor's appointment quite a bit later. To this day, I don't think she forgave me for robbing her of her earth-mother celebratory dance. Hoo-rah, we don't have penile appendages weighing us down and we are the bearers of all mankind...Hoo-rah! OK- perhaps that's a bit extreme, but she was irked. Her return to the feminine mystique at the time makes morse sense when I remember that it's the same time frame she came out as a lesbian. She was always a little granola, that one.
I was talking to a male friend of mine today, and somewhere the topic of his wife's stretchmarks came up. "She only has them on her stomach," he belabored about her post-babies figure, "but they're noticeable...you can see them from like 40 feet away." My instant reaction, given my penchant of late for cosmetic procedures was to tell him she should see a dermatologist, or a plastics guy if there was excess skin they could just snip off. It didn't occur to me until later to wonder WTF?!? since they didn't seem to bother her all that much.
Oh the sufferings we women endure (as I fondly think back to my summer readings of Nora Ephron and her guilt over neck rings). Even if we somehow manage to find acceptance in ourselves, to proudly take our clothes off in the gym locker room without feeling inadequate, too fat, or too thin; to wear that little black dress without a shawl; to manage to conquer our own demons of the non-flo variety, we shall always feel the need for more it seems.
I'm not saying I mind the upkeep, for there is male upkeep to, albeit of a far lower expense and production. I'm not looking to trade my breasts or my uterus (although, in fairness I don't plan to use it; so whose brilliant idea it was to give me one and deny thousands of women their own fair use is beyond me) on ebay for a penis and some testosterone. I like my heels for the power they instill in me when I wear them...the instantly sexy feeling. I would still get my waxings monthly even if I had no man expecting it, just because I like it. I would continue to have my weekly pedi/mani if for no other reason than the stress release of a spa footrub. I would even wear makeup.
But god damn it, if my man; after providing him his children from my ripped open nether regions following 9 months of hell and intense discomfort moaned and groaned at me about a few stretch marks; particularly if he was a little soggy in the middle section, particularly if he were lax in a grooming area...I swear I would raise some holy hell.
Somehow, I think we got the short end of the stick.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
The Expense of Sanity
In this time of economic woe and strife, with Mom and Pop Midwestern clammoring on about the mortgage they can't afford, or the gas prices skyrocketing every day, or that they've had to cut back on their weekly trips to Wal-Mart, and practically begging for a socialized medical system, I find myself directed more towards the insane costs of keeping sane.
Don't get me wrong, I have a healthy dose of sympathy for those who are shelling out large portions of their salaries to get from Point A to Point B, but I just don't see it everyday; so like the adorable, yet starving kids in Africa that Mom and Pop are ignoring, I tend to ignore Mom and Pop. I like to picture them in little swaths of clothing with their hands together asking for more of my tax dollars to pay their bills. OK- I don't picture that...but it's a fair image, no?
I have never had a health plan that looked kindly on mental health care, and I've had some pretty damn good health care plans in the past. We're not talking HMO crap here. I'm beginning to think there's some sort of matched animosity between the insurance companines and the mental health providers that slowly but surely refuse to deal with them. It's like they throw therapy up there with other "optional" and self-driven things like plastic surgery or the chiropractic/accupuncture quacks. I can see the conversations they'd have with insurance compay reps insisting that therapy is hokum and malarkey they won't pay for and various psychotherapists shaking their dead chickens and voodoo charms back at them. HA
Owing to my emotional need to eat everything in sight these last few months, I wisely (I thought) elected to try therapy again with an LCSW (someone who doesn't care for the long and arduous route to PhD or MD land, so takes the quickie route of a Masters or even Bachelors' and a bit of testing). She was nice, soft-toned in her appeal, but essentially a sounding board who listened attentively (at times) and didn't have much to say back. I began to see the insurance company's point of only approving 30 visits per calendar year. Oh well...at least she was in network.
I have since upgraded myself to a full-on PhD cognitive behavioral psychotherapist...a fabulous combination of wit and intelligence in a package of someone who gives me lists of things to track. Upon my 20+ years of experience in therapy-land, she is by far the best I've sat down with to bare my long and belabored life story. The catch is that she doesn't take insurance. At All. I'm assured by other members of the medical community that the $150/hour rate she charges is quite frugal for this area and I should be grateful. The insurance company still refuses to relent though, and like all shrinks, personal trainers, and medical specialists, she wants to see me at least once a week. ONCE A WEEK? Forgive my snark, but if I'm not about to go postal or jump off a highrise onto innocent bystanders, that seems a bit excessive.
That's $600 a month. More than I used to spend on rent. More than I spend a month on groceries. Equal to a pair of almost-equal in therapeutic value Manolo's.
But I digress. My new, trendy analyst of psycho-babble; as comfortable a necessity in Manhattan as a purse dog, weekly massage and facial, or bugaboo is not alone in her requirements. From the churchdoor mouse LCSW, to the quack MD I saw for weeks who was clearly shilling for the pharmacopia in his drug pushing mannerisms, they all want you back, and back soon.
As the economy worsens, and belts tighten I may have to abandon my quests for better mental health care in favor of eating, or more likely the necessity of the summer dresses at Banana Republic. But I ask you...shouldn't we be able to have both?
Don't get me wrong, I have a healthy dose of sympathy for those who are shelling out large portions of their salaries to get from Point A to Point B, but I just don't see it everyday; so like the adorable, yet starving kids in Africa that Mom and Pop are ignoring, I tend to ignore Mom and Pop. I like to picture them in little swaths of clothing with their hands together asking for more of my tax dollars to pay their bills. OK- I don't picture that...but it's a fair image, no?
I have never had a health plan that looked kindly on mental health care, and I've had some pretty damn good health care plans in the past. We're not talking HMO crap here. I'm beginning to think there's some sort of matched animosity between the insurance companines and the mental health providers that slowly but surely refuse to deal with them. It's like they throw therapy up there with other "optional" and self-driven things like plastic surgery or the chiropractic/accupuncture quacks. I can see the conversations they'd have with insurance compay reps insisting that therapy is hokum and malarkey they won't pay for and various psychotherapists shaking their dead chickens and voodoo charms back at them. HA
Owing to my emotional need to eat everything in sight these last few months, I wisely (I thought) elected to try therapy again with an LCSW (someone who doesn't care for the long and arduous route to PhD or MD land, so takes the quickie route of a Masters or even Bachelors' and a bit of testing). She was nice, soft-toned in her appeal, but essentially a sounding board who listened attentively (at times) and didn't have much to say back. I began to see the insurance company's point of only approving 30 visits per calendar year. Oh well...at least she was in network.
I have since upgraded myself to a full-on PhD cognitive behavioral psychotherapist...a fabulous combination of wit and intelligence in a package of someone who gives me lists of things to track. Upon my 20+ years of experience in therapy-land, she is by far the best I've sat down with to bare my long and belabored life story. The catch is that she doesn't take insurance. At All. I'm assured by other members of the medical community that the $150/hour rate she charges is quite frugal for this area and I should be grateful. The insurance company still refuses to relent though, and like all shrinks, personal trainers, and medical specialists, she wants to see me at least once a week. ONCE A WEEK? Forgive my snark, but if I'm not about to go postal or jump off a highrise onto innocent bystanders, that seems a bit excessive.
That's $600 a month. More than I used to spend on rent. More than I spend a month on groceries. Equal to a pair of almost-equal in therapeutic value Manolo's.
But I digress. My new, trendy analyst of psycho-babble; as comfortable a necessity in Manhattan as a purse dog, weekly massage and facial, or bugaboo is not alone in her requirements. From the churchdoor mouse LCSW, to the quack MD I saw for weeks who was clearly shilling for the pharmacopia in his drug pushing mannerisms, they all want you back, and back soon.
As the economy worsens, and belts tighten I may have to abandon my quests for better mental health care in favor of eating, or more likely the necessity of the summer dresses at Banana Republic. But I ask you...shouldn't we be able to have both?
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Nip/Tuck
Last week I found myself sitting neatly on the pink pleather covered examination table, which was really more of an elevated chair, trying to figure out how best to cover my breasts for my introduction to the young and talented Dr.X, a plastic surgeon on Madison Ave. I had seen him once before, at a support group for bariatric patients, and he came highly recommended from my own surgeon.
Being of the rather well-endowed set for as long as I can remember (I'm pretty sure I had fantasies of breast reduction in junior high when most of my classmates didn't need a bra and I was inventing more and more creative ways of covering my full B's up), I had imagined how this meeting might go for years. However, no strings of imagination can quite prepare you for a man who is a stranger to you lifting and pinching your breasts in an orchestrated aria of technicality to show you how they will look when he's done with them; particularly when that man is very attractive, quite probably your age or younger, and looks more like he's 18. Hell, Dr.X is a man I might have dated in college, or even late-high school. (yes, he looks that young) I'm doing my best to avoid Doogie Howser references, but it would be appropriate under the circumstances. Since I'm sure Dr.X is a far cry from 18, prides himself on his medical accomplishments which took years to fulfill and would resent any and all Doogie references, I won't use his real name here.
Somehow I managed to maintain composure and decorum whilst Dr. X drew a large W on my left breast and lifted and tugged and the areas that will eventually need more attention than my personal trainer can provide. I asked all the questions I could think of; even throwing in questions I already knew the answers to just to keep silence from filling the room. Silence is a bad thing when you're standing half naked in a frosty room wishing to god you had worn the pretty bra today instead of the beige one that looks like it's for Grandma.
I'm pretty damn anal about medical research (if you couldn't already tell that), and even self-diagnosis. Much to most of my doctor's chagrine, I almost always know what I have and/or need before I even enter a doctor's office. The only things that eluded me as far as Dr.X were the specific prices, and his judgment about whether I should go for the tummy and breasts at once or have my doses of excrutiating pain separately. I had seen his work at the support group and was impressed; moreso than the dozens and dozens of other plastics guys and gals I had peered at online over the last several months. It seems shopping for a plastic surgeon is like shopping for produce. Those are too square, or oblong etc... Dr.X, along with his high recommendation had pictures to back up his reputation.
Since that day, and several peanut gallery chimings later about the overall pain of the procedures I plan on having, the relative positives and negative of having "gigantic hoohaa's", and thoughts of scarring, not to mention thousands and thousands of dollars to consider, I am still at somewhat of a loss as to exactly what I will get and when I will do it.
It will surprise no one to hear that my boyfriend enjoys my double D's so much that he's rooting for implants, if anything is done at all; that my girlfriends of comparably modest endowments would like me to save some of the natural tissue for their own surgeries, and that those friends opposed to the nip/tuck genre are telling me to avoid the "butcher" altogether.
Thankfully, in some ways at least, I'm not planning on having anything done until towards the end of the calendar year. Perhaps by then I'll have my mind made up.
Being of the rather well-endowed set for as long as I can remember (I'm pretty sure I had fantasies of breast reduction in junior high when most of my classmates didn't need a bra and I was inventing more and more creative ways of covering my full B's up), I had imagined how this meeting might go for years. However, no strings of imagination can quite prepare you for a man who is a stranger to you lifting and pinching your breasts in an orchestrated aria of technicality to show you how they will look when he's done with them; particularly when that man is very attractive, quite probably your age or younger, and looks more like he's 18. Hell, Dr.X is a man I might have dated in college, or even late-high school. (yes, he looks that young) I'm doing my best to avoid Doogie Howser references, but it would be appropriate under the circumstances. Since I'm sure Dr.X is a far cry from 18, prides himself on his medical accomplishments which took years to fulfill and would resent any and all Doogie references, I won't use his real name here.
Somehow I managed to maintain composure and decorum whilst Dr. X drew a large W on my left breast and lifted and tugged and the areas that will eventually need more attention than my personal trainer can provide. I asked all the questions I could think of; even throwing in questions I already knew the answers to just to keep silence from filling the room. Silence is a bad thing when you're standing half naked in a frosty room wishing to god you had worn the pretty bra today instead of the beige one that looks like it's for Grandma.
I'm pretty damn anal about medical research (if you couldn't already tell that), and even self-diagnosis. Much to most of my doctor's chagrine, I almost always know what I have and/or need before I even enter a doctor's office. The only things that eluded me as far as Dr.X were the specific prices, and his judgment about whether I should go for the tummy and breasts at once or have my doses of excrutiating pain separately. I had seen his work at the support group and was impressed; moreso than the dozens and dozens of other plastics guys and gals I had peered at online over the last several months. It seems shopping for a plastic surgeon is like shopping for produce. Those are too square, or oblong etc... Dr.X, along with his high recommendation had pictures to back up his reputation.
Since that day, and several peanut gallery chimings later about the overall pain of the procedures I plan on having, the relative positives and negative of having "gigantic hoohaa's", and thoughts of scarring, not to mention thousands and thousands of dollars to consider, I am still at somewhat of a loss as to exactly what I will get and when I will do it.
It will surprise no one to hear that my boyfriend enjoys my double D's so much that he's rooting for implants, if anything is done at all; that my girlfriends of comparably modest endowments would like me to save some of the natural tissue for their own surgeries, and that those friends opposed to the nip/tuck genre are telling me to avoid the "butcher" altogether.
Thankfully, in some ways at least, I'm not planning on having anything done until towards the end of the calendar year. Perhaps by then I'll have my mind made up.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Ayyyy Dios Mio
So I rolled over round about 3am; an almost instinctual body movement at this point which reminds me that I've had too much water before falling asleep. I move to shimmy my down the end of the bed, around my snoring boyfriend (believe me, there's plenty of nights when I'd like to just climb right over and wake his ass up as a reward for putting me in the bitch spot, but I don't this time) and it hits me. OH my f'ing god, the pain. My abdominal walls feel like I've been prison shanked on every inch of muscle, my legs are suddenly wobbly in ways they weren't before I laid down to sleep, my trapezius is throbbing...; and then I remember, I hired a new personal trainer. I'm PAYING someone to feel exquisite pain in the core parts of my body.
I suspect it will not go on this way. I suspect that the throbbing I've got from head to toe that's making going down steps as equally uncomfortable, if not moreso than going up them, will subside in time. I have a distinct feeling that the punishment I'm receiving now has more to do with months of inactivity than the workout I completed yesterday. But still.....DAMN.
I hired a new trainer because I have difficulty with self-motivation. When I was skinny I had trouble with self-motivation. This is not rocket science to me. I chose a trainer my friend had been with for the past nine months rather than to scroll the tombs of Craigslist again, or go skulking back to HRC or Equinox. It also helps that this trainer charges less than any Manhattan trainer I've seen, and the gym membership is discounted to boot.
Essentially, I decided in the last week I was done being controlled by my wobbly bits. Upon suffering tear-saturated glances in the mirror, I finally said NO MORE. If I had the courage to cut my belly open and have a band surgically placed around my tummy, I can get to a trainer and reduce the likelihood I will need plastics. I can work my ass off and get to the goal weight and fat percentage I want to be.
I will become one of those women who trot proudly naked through the locker room on the way to the shower, their saggy breasts and cellulite a glaring reminder that they too are not perfect, but are more accepting of the way they look. (But hey, If I choose to continue to hide, I fit in just one of those gym towels now instead of two- hallelujah)
My ass hurts today...my calves...my thights...my forearms...hell, I think even my toes hurt from the calf curls. But by some strange token, I feel better.
I suspect it will not go on this way. I suspect that the throbbing I've got from head to toe that's making going down steps as equally uncomfortable, if not moreso than going up them, will subside in time. I have a distinct feeling that the punishment I'm receiving now has more to do with months of inactivity than the workout I completed yesterday. But still.....DAMN.
I hired a new trainer because I have difficulty with self-motivation. When I was skinny I had trouble with self-motivation. This is not rocket science to me. I chose a trainer my friend had been with for the past nine months rather than to scroll the tombs of Craigslist again, or go skulking back to HRC or Equinox. It also helps that this trainer charges less than any Manhattan trainer I've seen, and the gym membership is discounted to boot.
Essentially, I decided in the last week I was done being controlled by my wobbly bits. Upon suffering tear-saturated glances in the mirror, I finally said NO MORE. If I had the courage to cut my belly open and have a band surgically placed around my tummy, I can get to a trainer and reduce the likelihood I will need plastics. I can work my ass off and get to the goal weight and fat percentage I want to be.
I will become one of those women who trot proudly naked through the locker room on the way to the shower, their saggy breasts and cellulite a glaring reminder that they too are not perfect, but are more accepting of the way they look. (But hey, If I choose to continue to hide, I fit in just one of those gym towels now instead of two- hallelujah)
My ass hurts today...my calves...my thights...my forearms...hell, I think even my toes hurt from the calf curls. But by some strange token, I feel better.
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