Today sucked.

Today my body stopped being in crisis mode from blood loss, and decided it was time to acknowledge pregnancy loss. AF is here and with her comes all her attending CRAP. I’m a big purple bruise emotionally. I really need a fucking shower. And… and… and I just feel bad.

Oh, and my fucking hormones decided I was perimenopausal again, so I had my own special brand of almost-panic attack: rapid and uneven heartbeat, adrenaline, sweating, temperature swings from fever to freezing, and fear. Fear. FEAR. Fear for my fucking LIFE.

And it went on for four or five hours. Because clearly I haven’t had a bad enough week and need to be punished additionally. Bah!

That I know these fits are ‘merely’ chemical, and not truly the Big Bad Wolf come to EAT MY ENTRAILS WHILE I LIVE, doesn’t make them much easier to bear. The knowledge that it’s ‘just’ some hormonal/glandular/chemical malfunction simply makes me feel shittier, somehow.

There would be so much more grace in actually being at death’s door. I could be theatrical, at the very least, and command satisfying attention.

But, no. No actual theatrical dying for me. Just ADRENALINE FOR NO GOOD DAMNED REASON. And since I lost so much blood the other day I can’t really get up and do isometrics like I usually do when I’m fucking full of fight-or-flight hormones. So I sit there and rock, or jiggle my knee, and feel terrible and terrified and stupid and useless.

After an hour or so of today’s attack I went to bed, stuck the iPod buds into my ears, and jammed tunes loud enough to practically do permanent aural damage, and rocked myself like a freaking autistic for a couple hours. It’s enough distraction and movement that I can ignore my heart doing the watoosie, at least. And the adrenaline makes the tunes seem even more intense than usual.

It was the best compromise to exercise I could come up with. *shrug* Anyway, you should see my hair now. I’m like a cross between Don King and your standard dirty hippy Deadhead.

The body scene was still pretty shitty when Brett got home from work, but I went to Menard’s on an errand with him anyway. Sometimes distracting myself takes the edge off of these little episodes.

Today it didn’t, of course. Why should I have such luck, today of all days? So I walked around Menard’s while my man looked for the little tool he needed for work tomorrow, and I wondered if I had enough blood pressure to actually be out shopping. I knew that since I was, I did, but my animal self tried to argue with me because it thought it knew better: IT at least had read the memo from the hormone glands that said NO, YOU DON’T HAVE ENOUGH BLOOD PRESSURE. THAT’S WHY YOU FEEL THESE GHOST PAINS IN YOUR CHEST, THESE PHANTOM SPASMS IN YOUR LEGS! IT’S NOT BECAUSE YOU’RE INCREDIBLY TENSE FROM THE STRESS OF A MULTI-HOUR ATTACK, NO NO NO, IT’S BECAUSE WE’RE FUCKING DYING!!! DUH!!!

My heart felt like it was taking vigorous salsa-dancing lessons and my palms were dripping wet with sweat. (Guess what: having sweaty palms for four hours really doesn’t make a girl feel particularly pretty.) (And all the rest of the sweating doesn’t make her smell all that pretty, either.)

After Menard’s we got drive-thru and headed home. Heart pounding, fear messages flying, I rocked in the passenger’s seat. Brett said, “Oh Mushlette, I’m sorry you feel so bad,” and he reached over to squeeze my little hand a few times.

I said, “I. Am. Just. So. Fucking. SICK. of being a useless piece of shit. I’m SO. Tired. of feeling a little bit bad, all the fucking time. It’s just wearing me down.” (Yes, I knew I was being dramatic. I don’t feel bad ALL the time. But when I do feel bad, it seems like all the time.) (And at this point, my intellect was thinking, ‘You know it’s just a silly attack because you can go out in public and conduct transactions and no one can even tell you’re in hell. If you were really dying, well! You just can’t hide THAT kind of shit.’) (And my animal self is saying, “Scared. Scared. Scared. Heart thumping. Palms sweating. Arm pits stinking. Lost blood the other day. Tired. Scared. Scared. Scared.”)

“I’m sorry, baby.” Brett soothed. “You’ll feel better soon.” I could HEAR him thinking, ‘This is the miscarriage, I will be gentle and understanding. She’ll get over it. She’ll be fine soon.’

I LOVE HIM SO MUCH. God DAMN. (You know you’re lucky as hell in your partner when you can hear him thinking and it makes you melt rather than want to do murder.)

When we got home, I spent an hour sobbing into his chest. He petted me and murmured sweet things and half-watched RDTV. (It was a show about tractors and there was a whole section about antique wrenches, of all things.) (The man will watch anything on TV, y’all should be grateful he doesn’t have control of YOUR clicker! For real. I am NOT KIDDING when I say he will seriously watch a show about ANTIQUE WRENCHES. This is not, as some of my blogging is, an exageration for effect. Oh no. HE SERIOUSLY WATCHES SHOWS ABOUT ANTIQUE. FUCKING. WRENCHES.)

After my good, long, gut-wrenching, shuddering session of weeping, the anxiety attack finally faded. Fucking finally! So now I just feel depressed. I think my body finally realized I’m done being pregnant, so I’m going to be moody as hell while the rest of THOSE hormones go away…

…and then I’ll just be left with the ones that have been plaguing me for nearly three years now. The ones that make me just-under-the-threshhold of MISERABLE about 70% of my life, the ones that make my heart thud and my hair fall out and my libido play hide-and-seek and my palms sweat.

These ‘attacks’ suck, because I walk around feeling like I’m dying, but I know I’m not ACTUALLY dying because I’ve never died from any of the previous ones. Because my basic constitution is so fucking healthy that I can bleed like a stuck pig for two-plus hours and trained medical professionals don’t even bother to give me an IV because I look and act and speak like I haven’t lost even half as much blood as I have. I know I’m not having a heart attack.

I know it’s hormones, I know it’s perimenopause, I know I’m not in danger.

Intellectually.

But I FEEL like I’m dying. Every nerve in my body is tight, every cell is CERTAIN I’m dying because my glands are pumping out messages that say, WE’RE FUCKING DYING! RIGHT HERE! RIGHT NOW! THIS IS FUCKING IT, PEOPLE!

The only thing that keeps me from actually having full-on, bonafide panic attacks is that I know how to meditate, how to be in my body, how to breathe, how to keep things just under the limit of total insanity.

But it’s hard. And today I just couldn’t fucking take it. I’m tired, I’m run down, my guts have acknowledged the indignity and become tender and a little sore, I’m a little depressed, and I felt all lonely and sorry for myself – because, well, shit, I know I’m not really lonely but my HORMONES DON’T KNOW THAT – and having a five-hour panic attack was just too much insult to injury.

And now I should be in bed, but I’m not. It’s past 11:30. I haven’t even had the energy to wrap our fucking Christmas presents, but I’m here in front of the goblin box because, well, because I needed to vent, goddamnit. I have no idea why anybody reads my blog, but I’ll tell you right now that the love I felt from all those comments on my last entry broke my heart. I’m so glad that JCH didn’t kill me just so I could read them!

Ah shit, I’m such a mess. I’ve made myself all sniffly just thinking about it! People, don’t let me post anything else until I’m SANE! Okay?! Jeez. And merry Christmas, damn it. **smootches to all**
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