29 September 2007

Still here...well half of me is

Yes I'm still here everybody. I know I haven't posted for a couple of weeks. There are lots of reasons. One being that I'd forgotten just how much time and effort is involved in keeping up with some of The Recovery Group mailing lists. I mean some of them generate less email than others, but I joined a new one recently and it generates like 20 emails a day. I need to work out how to change my subscription on that loop to a daily digest subscription. I love these loops and they are the core of my recovery. I always prioritise keeping up with loop email before other recovery activities. Perhaps it's not the best program, but it's working ok so far. I've lost 20kg so I can't complain.

The Worst Luck In History (well almost):
Ok so another reason I've been away is that I've had an incredible string of bad luck.
1.
First off, I got a bad cold/flu off my mum.

(She's a casual teacher in primary schools around the district so she's got a different bunch of 30 kids every day to catch nasty bugs off.) That took me two weeks to get over properly. After I got better my parents (whom I live with) went away for a week and left me in charge of the house. I had about a week of good health and then....
...Near the end of my week in charge of the house. I was riding from the university to the local train station (doing my exercise like a good girl) and
2. I crashed my bike. If I had simply damaged the bike this would have been inconvenient, since I was at least 15km from home and in a rather deserted place. Fortunately, my bike was not damaged. However I was not so lucky

3. When I got up, my left hand was bruised and grazed where I had used it to break my fall, and my left foot was letting me know that it did not appreciate being squashed under my fat bum and my bike at the same time. It felt like it had been fractured or sprained, and I didn't think I'd be able to walk back to the campus on it.
Two not-too-harsh-on-the-eye medical students were driving past and stopped to help me.

4.But I was too focussed on my injuries to make a play for my eligible rescuers. They locked my bike up to a nearby fence, while I took out my mobile phone, wondering who to call. Unbelievably...

5. My mobile phone battery was flat! Of all the times to be flat!! I was pretty annoyed. This meant, of course, that not only could I not call anyone from the crash site, but I couldn't call anyone whose number was stored in the mobile phone and not my head. When the medical students offered me a lift back to campus I thought that if I could get to the Chaplain's office I might be able to get some help.It was about 4:45, and there are sometimes people there until all hours. I thought that there would probably be at least one person there whom I knew, and they would be able to look up some friends on their database and get me some help to get home. I hobbled/hopped the 200 metres or so from teh nearest parking spot to the Chaplain's office only to find that in keeping with the way my day was going....

6. There was no one at the Chaplain's office. Breathe deeply...! I sank into a nearby chair. In my head I went through the numbers I knew off by heart...my parents (both 1000km away), my home (no one there) the university switchboard...Ah yes, my sister works on campus as a trainee receptionist...if I could call the switchboard they could put me through to her. Only problem is that my sister is not the sort of person whom you call for help unless you are desperate. But I had no choice. I couldn't face moving again, so I hailed someone walking by and asked to use their mobile phone.

7.The reply came back "Sorry, I don't have any credit in my phone"! With no alternative I made my way to the nearest payphone by hopping, thereby doing my best impression of a flee-bitten amputee on speed. I did finally get through to my sister's office. Too bad that

8. on Wednesdays she does a technical college course and doesn't go to work. I'd forgotten that...and I'd forgotten her mobile number since she'd changed it recently. Resisting the urge to smash the phone to smithereens, I decided to call my parents and ask them what my sister's new mobile number was. I started with my mother's phone.

9. My mother's phone wasn't answering. So I called my father's phone

10. My father's phone wasn't answering. My parents are always pulling that trick, they're just so technologically backward that the idea of being available via mobile phone just doesn't seem to be a part of their paradigm. My next move was to hop/hobble down to university security. There they were able to put ice on my ankle and charge my phone up enough to get my sister's number out. I had hoped that she would be able to simply take me with her on her way home, but

11.My sister was already at home. This meant she had to drive all the way from my suburb to the uni and back again. She and her brother in law did do it, because they realised I was in a bind and couldn't get around it. They arrived ready to take me home, but I asked them to help me secure my bike. At first I hoped that, with the quick release front wheel removed, it would fit in their car

12. It wouldn't fit in my sister's car. So I had no way of getting it home. I asked my brother-in-law to ride it over to the campus, where I would be able to put it in a safe place.

13. My brother-in-law was wearing thongs (US english= flip flops) so he couldn't ride. I was very reluctant to leave it there, in the open, but I had no choice. We took off the front wheel so that people would be discouraged from breaking the lock and taking the bike. I just had to hope it wouldn't rain. My sister and her husband drove me to the medical centre in my suburb. Now these places are good because they offer free medical care after office hours, but on a weeknight you have to wait FOREVER. But I wanted to get my foot looked at asap. I knew I needed to see a doctor and get an x-ray. Unfortunately, by the time we got there it was about 6pm

14. The x-ray machine closes at 5:30pm!! So I had no choice but to come back the next day! I asked my sister to take me round to the pharmacy to hire some crutches so I could get around until then, but my sister, being my sister, refused. So there I was at home, alone, unable to walk

15. It did rain that night on my lovely bike. My sister didn't offer to help me get to the medical centre in the morning. I woke up early and booked myself a taxi there. I hadn't slept much the night before, and it took me longer than usual to get ready on account of my inability to walk. So, of course, I was rushing to get the taxi on time. When I've had little sleep and I'm in a hurry, I always forget something...


16. I left the housekeys inside! I was locked out! My parents weren't getting home until 8pm that night so I had 12 hours to wait and it was cold and raining and I had nowhere to sit. I managed to find somewhere safe and dry to wait, but the problem was

17.I had left all the housework till the last minute. Being locked out, I couldn't do it. So now the house was a total shambles. My parents were furious when they got home. But they were more forgiving when I explained everything that had happened. The next day they took me to get my bike. THe bike hadn't been stolen but

18. Somebody stole the seat off the bike!!! I mean can you believe it? Is nothing safe unless it's nailed to the ground?


My ankle wasn't broken, just sprained.
I'm still not walking on it.

19. However, my wrist turned out to be quite damaged as well, so now I have bandages on my left wrist and my left foot! Now this has turned out to be an even bigger problem than you might expect, because another disaster happened this Wednesday

20.My mum fell over and broke her ribs. She's in heaps of pain and can hardly do anything. I'm doing what I can around the place, but I'm limited. My dad has had to take time off work to care for us.

So as things stand, my wrist and ankle are feeling better, but I'm still not walking. I'll let you know when I am


16 September 2007

Return of the Jelly-belly:
Hello everybody. Yes I’m back. I know it’s been a looooooooong time. But I sort of relapsed/went into a depressed period and I’ve been hiding from everything to do with OA. I was having some troubles with uni stuff and things went downhill from there. I know that hiding from the cure and isolating oneself is not the most sensible solution when life gets out of control, but who said that COE’s were sensible?

I’ve been coming back to the program in stages., starting with just trying to keep in regular contact with my sponsor. It’s so easy for me to take on too much and then give up. But this blog really has to be an important part of my program. It’s where I use the writing tool. Being an incorrigible approval-seeking, people-pleaser the idea of other people reading this gives me the incentive to write that an ordinary journal wouldn’t.

Thank you and big hugs to all who expressed concern for me while I was away.

Where it’s at now:
In terms of my program. I’m still on step 2, but I’m seeing some progress there. I’m praying more and I’m also starting to honestly face up to some of the big spiritual questions that have been bothering me lately but which I've been sweeping under the carpet. I know that being on step two after 6 months seems like very slow progress. But I’ve never been the type to do things by halves. I always do things slowly and thoroughly.

With regards to weight, I shot back up from 83kg to 86kg, but as I’ve gradually started to embrace the program again the weight has been dropping off again. As a result I am now 80.2kg! I am over the moon about that. I don’t even remember when I was last down that far. For years I’ve been dreaming of being 80…and now I’m there. But the fact I started to put back on should be a warning to me that it is only with the program that I can do this. I still need to lose an absolute minimum of 12kg, preferably 20kg just to be safe, so what with maintaining my loss so far and getting almost as far again it is going to be an uhphill Still 80.2kg!!!!

Once again, a big thankyou to Christine and Sober Chick for checking up on me. I'll try not to disappear again