Funny story, that “muscle guarding” of joints I mentioned here, yeah, it’s pretty hard to guard while sleeping. So Sunday morning, I woke up with my knee, (the one that can easily slip out of place, both knees can, but my left is the chronic offender), completely and painfully slipped out of place. This is not the first time (and I dare say not the last) that I have woken up from simply sleeping with an injury. Luckily, bracing it for a few days helps it heal, (sort of).
The interesting thing is how it feels to walk around with a brace on. It is such a contrast to how I usually feel, because my knee feels practically indestructible with this brace on. The same thing occurs when I have an issue with my wrist, and put my wrist brace on. As a kid, I was an expert at using tensor bandages of various sizes for all my “weak” spots, but now I have a cupboard full of various braces from my local drug store from which I can select. A few days of “resting” [insert offending body part here] with a brace on, the pain is mostly gone and I feel safe leaving it, once again, unprotected.
But the whole time with the brace on, my knee or wrist feels practically bionic! I just loved The Six Million Dollar Man (and The Bionic Woman) TV shows when I was a kid. I thought the whole concept of having ordinary human powers increased by the aid of bionic devices (real or fictional) was amazing! And yet, with a brace on, I feel like I am getting a taste of what it would truly be like to be bionic.
And then it hit me, maybe people without hEDS never feel so “weak” in the first place? Maybe what is normal for other people is to feel “bionic” (in comparison) all the time? Wow, what a thought.
It’s been normal to me for my whole life that I do not feel all that strong. I figured I was just one of “those” kids, the ones that play the piano and read a lot of books, the ones that just did not develop the strength that they could have. I felt different than the rest of the kids, but I did not think I was made differently. I just thought I hadn’t done the things I needed to do, like climb more trees, etc., to be like them. Even at a young age I knew that I could easily injure myself, simply because I had and did easily injure myself many times. I remember the first time I tried to play volleyball, one hit of the ball hurt so much! After all the fingers I had broken and sprained, (and no, it was NOT to get out of having to practice the piano), and maybe from watching The Bionic Woman, I came to gym class the next day armed with tensor bandages around each wrist, and wow, that made such a difference! Bionic!
I definitely look back at some of these childhood memories through a new lens. I am just put together a little looser than average, and that means yes, I can hurt myself in my sleep.
I recently watched this series Run Away on Netflix. I usually multitask a bit while a series plays in the background, so I miss little bits here and there while I am still “listening” to it, but not watching it. But at one point, I did think, “Hey, I didn’t notice before that the daughter was in a wheelchair, oh well, whatever.”
But then this article about it came up on my Facebook feed:
“It looked like a mistake at first. A detail that slipped through editing. But the truth behind it is far more human than viewers expected….
…Anya is played by Ellie Henry, who lives with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. It is a genetic condition that affects collagen, making joints unstable and movement exhausting. Some days, a wheelchair is necessary. Some days, it is not.
That reality was carried directly into the character….
…By not turning Anya’s condition into a storyline, Harlan Coben’s adaptation shows something simple and honest. Disability is not always visible. It is not always permanent. And it does not need a spotlight to exist.”
Frankly, 6 months ago I had never heard of Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. That was until I was told I had it too, (hypermobility-type), and it explained why my heart mitral valve has torn, why I am struggling with small vessel constriction and circulation in my hands, why I have significant osteoporosis at only 54-years old, why I have sluggish digestion, why I now have bilateral inguinal hernias while simply working at a desk job, why my knee caps slip all over the place, why my shoulder dislocated so easily, (and was then also easily reduced, multiple times in one day, but not without tearing things and taking months to heal), etc.
I never realized with all the walking I do, it involves “muscle guarding” of my joints, especially my knees, which adds to my overall daily fatigue. But I need those lean legs muscles to keep going, so I don’t lose mobility! I notice almost right away, if I stop regular walking, how fast I de-condition. Faster than average, for sure. And my heart mitral valve leaflets did not tear because of some strain I put on my heart. Instead, my heart has strain on it because the valve leaflets are torn. So I need the cardiovascular exercise to keep my heart muscle strong, so it can handle the strain of the back flow of blood (regurgitation) caused by the torn valve leaflets.
Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome is a group of disorders, and has a spectrum, just like so many other things. Previously, I have not been high enough on the spectrum of resulting issues to have ever needed a wheelchair, for example, which is one of the reasons I went undiagnosed for so much of my life. My mother remembers taking me to the doctor at about 18 months old because I “walked funny,” my gait was very strange. She said it was almost as though I was swinging my hips to push my legs forward. In hindsight, it seems so obvious…but I totally understand how hard it would have been to realistically diagnose a loose joint/connective tissue issue at that age. Needless to say, after constant verbal correction, I eventually figured out how to hold my legs in a more steady way, and to walk straight. I also remember constant verbal correction to “stand up straight,” stop walking “knock-kneed,” don’t sit like that, etc. (Of course, extra flexibility alone, which kids naturally have their fair of, does NOT mean you have hEDS, but when you start adding up all the other issues… “If you are having trouble connecting the issues, think connective tissues”).
Anyhow, I just think that it is wild to hear that an actress hired to play a roll on a Netflix series has this same condition. And when cast for the job, Netflix just filmed her either standing and walking, or in a wheelchair, simply depending on her physical needs for the day. I think that is wonderful.
So, I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I would write about my new plan of action. It’s fairly specific to me, because at 54-years of age, my lumbar spine has been diagnosed with a t-score of -3.3, which is already half way through the osteoporosis scale heading for really severe (-4.0), whereas my hips are only osteopenic, (-2.1), but inching fairly close to osteoporosis themselves. This difference is common in connective-tissue–related bone fragility. So, maybe none of this would really apply to a fifty-something-year old woman who did NOT have hEDS. And even then, not everyone with hEDS will get dealt this osteoporosis card, (or the heart mitral valve card either, for that matter).
I used Chat GTP as a sounding board for the things I am about to talk about in this blog. To be clear, Chat GTP did not diagnose me. I was diagnosed by a doctor, by an echocardiogram done at a hospital, by a bone density scan done at a radiology clinic, and even by a Dexa scan, which even though is not considered medically diagnostic according to my doctor, did show questionable findings that got the ball rolling for me. (Best $249 I ever spent on that Dexa! The rest is covered by my medical insurance).
Anyhow, Chat GTP has real information at its disposal on my real diagnosed medical conditions, so it was a great place to have an evidence-based and knowledgeable chit chat. This is not medical advice, it’s just my experience and decisions based on information I have gathered.
When it comes to the different t-scores between my spine and my in my hips, the bone densitometry I had done on October 3, 2025, also looked at the neck of the hip versus the total hip, where again there was a slight difference for me:
“In your case:
• The total hip is lower than the neck
• This suggests relatively greater compromise of cortical bone than trabecular bone at the hip
This pattern is actually very consistent with connective-tissue–related bone fragility, where:
• Collagen defects affect bone matrix quality
• Cortical bone can become thinner and less resilient
• BMD may underestimate true fracture risk.”
Hmmm. Good to know.
Here’s the interesting part, if my osteoporosis was just because I started menopause about 2.5 years ago, then firstly, my t-score should not be this bad already! It’s only been 2.5 years! So we can feel confident my osteoporosis is connective-tissue related. And:
“Contrast this with:
• Postmenopausal estrogen deficiency, which often hits trabecular bone first (neck worse than total).”
Okay. It is my total hip that is worse, not the neck, (and it’s my spine that is really bad for my age). None of this would make any sense, really… except in terms of my having hEDS.
Because I have hEDS, I am very hesitant to take any bisphosphonates (like Fosomax) because of my digestion issues related to having hEDS. “GI intolerance risk is meaningfully higher in your case.”
And besides, for me specifically:
“Potential limitations of Fosamax for you
• It does not address collagen or bone quality
• It can over-suppress remodeling, which:
• May be problematic when baseline bone quality is abnormal
• Is a concern raised specifically in some hEDS populations
• Spine BMD gains tend to plateau quickly
• Fracture risk reduction in younger postmenopausal women with non-classic osteoporosis is less robust than in older populations.”
Yeah. Many women with these same t-scores that I have, are actually much older than me. I have strong legs and good balance, (and I can work on increasing my core strength also), so I am not really at risk of falling in the same way a woman coming up on 80-years old would be, (although if I did fall, I could break more easily, yes, that is true). Fracture risk is a huge concern for older women, especially in their seventies and eighties. All it takes is that one fall, leading to a fracture, and they can lose their independence. Woman in their seventies and eighties that find themselves with significant osteoporosis need to pull out the big guns to get the best return on their fall prevention investment.
I need to invest in fall prevention too, but, in theory, I should have many decades of life ahead of me, so it would probably not be good to be taking harsh medication for the next 30+ years!?!
Anyhow, even though my bone loss is not directly caused by menopause, that certainly has not helped things.
“But here’s the key distinction in your case
Postmenopausal osteoporosis:
• Primary problem = estrogen deficiency
• Estrogen replacement can be foundational therapy
• Primary problem = bone matrix / collagen quality
• Estrogen deficiency is secondary or additive
• Estrogen cannot correct defective bone scaffolding
So in your situation:
• Estrogen may help reduce the speed of loss
• It may slightly improve spine BMD
• But it cannot reverse the underlying fragility
This is why your hips are osteopenic, not osteoporotic — estrogen deficiency alone does not explain your pattern.”
So, estrogen may help a bit, so that is what my doctor and I have decided to do, good old Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Sure, there is a slight increased risk of breast cancer, but leaving my osteoporosis unchecked has risks also. Everyone must make their own informed decision in this regard, weighing benefits versus risks. (And for me personally, I am also taking micronized progesterone, because I still have my uterus, so a balance of both hormones on HRT is protective for that).
And for people with osteoporosis primarily because of menopause, if their doctor recommends it, I thought this was interesting:
“For lumbar spine osteoporosis, the timing of estrogen therapy is critical, with the greatest benefits occurring when treatment is initiated in the “window of opportunity” which is in the early postmenopausal years (typically within 10 years of menopause onset or before age 60).
Key Timing Effects
Early Initiation (Critical Window): Starting estrogen soon after menopause is most effective for preventing rapid bone loss. The first 5 to 7 years after menopause are when the most significant bone loss occurs in women due to estrogen deficiency. Initiating therapy during this period helps stabilize bone mineral density (BMD) in the lumbar spine and effectively reduces the risk of future fractures.”
I am only be 2.5 years into menopause. So, I now begin HRT as part of how I am starting to work on this problem for myself, based on my own personal “issues with my tissues,” that have been most probably been the main cause for me of this significant osteoporosis problem in the first place. And it looks like I am still within this good window of opportunity to be starting HRT.
That is it in a nutshell. I hope everyone has a wonderful New Year’s. Even with health concerns, being in the driver’s seat of my decisions, and putting those decisions into action, certainly feels better than instead simply allowing myself to be influenced, without taking the time to gather an adequate amount of empowering information on which I can make my own decisions.
Well, as if the Raynaud’s was not bad enough, this week I have been on a roller coaster ride with what Chat GTP calls Refractory Constipation.
“Refractory constipation is a severe form of constipation that does not improve with standard treatments like high-fiber diets, laxatives, and behavioral therapies. It is defined by the persistent and inadequate response to adequate therapy, which may be up to 4 weeks for each medication or 3 months for behavioral interventions. Management of refractory constipation may require a more intensive and specialized approach.”
Why your constipation is so refractory (hEDS-specific reasons):
People with hEDS often struggle with constipation not because of low fibre or hydration, but because of:
1. Dysmotility from connective-tissue laxity
• The bowel is physically more floppy and less propulsive.
• Transit time slows, so fibre can solidify rather than help—especially insoluble fibre.”
Well crap! (No pun intended).
Even though that all sounds really dramatic, to tell the truth, it truly sounds like a fit to what I am experiencing.
So, an hEDS related problem needs an hEDS tailored solution, which I am working on, (short answer includes regular but therapeutic-dose amounts of magnesium oxide). Although being really slow in that department is nothing new to me, it has been far worse this week.
And today is the second anniversary of my dad’s passing that I wrote about here. I should have gone skating. Instead, I spent most of the day having a lot more “what’s the flipping point?” thoughts. Add in gas build up when exercising, and it feels like my body is really turning on me! I used that as an excuse to avoid doing much in the moving my body department today.
Then we had a wonderful Sunday night roast beef dinner, and I ate a lot, without weighing my portions. My “who cares” thoughts fueled this. Then I ate a healthy dessert, (strawberries), but I really didn’t need any more food, because I was already starting to feel stuffed! Then the thoughts of, “If you are already going to feel like crap, might as well drink a big glass of that egg nog in the fridge that you have been resisting.” Good news, I managed to come here and blog instead of drinking the nog.
Hopefully I am not writhing in agony in bed later for over stuffing myself (thank goodness cooler heads prevailed before I drank that egg nog!) because I am still dealing with my “food is going in and who the heck knows when it will finally make its way out” problem. It will probably take weeks or longer to sort myself out with the new and evidence-based for hEDS advice I will be implementing. Sigh.
Sorry for all the bathroom talk. Now that I think about it, diet blogs do not usually mention the price some of us pay in the bathroom (hEDS or not) when we are NOT eating “perfectly” on our meal plan. But maybe they should. 🙂
My Raynaud’s attack yesterday afternoon, both hands at once, sigh, brought my mood down again. Many people feel the pain when the fingers go red and the blood rushes back into them. My personal experience is that it my fingers also feel very painful when my fingers go white like this:
Almost like I can feel the cold emanating from them. Numbness yes, but also a painful feeling of cold almost radiating from my hands, like I could cool the whole room down! Just like those scenes in “The Sixth Sense” when Cole knew a ghost was in the room…and he sat there breathing and we could see his breath.
“Primary Raynaud’s occurs by itself with no underlying disease, while secondary Raynaud’s is caused by another medical condition, such as an autoimmune disease, injury, or certain medications. Secondary Raynaud’s is less common but tends to be more serious.”—Google
“The next time you find yourself blaming or shaming someone, because they deserve it for how they wronged you, take a pause and a breath and ask yourself: What is it in me that needs attention here? Shift your energy. Take responsibility for your own life and embody the energy that you want to attract.”
Lately, I have been stuck in a rut of cycling into feeling sorry for myself for every time I have ever felt gaslit about my health, by doctors, and yes, even at times by my spouse. But truthfully? I was my own worst critic. I felt unheard and abandoned by myself. In fact, I experienced a lot of self-loathing, because feeling unwell usually resulted in bad food choices that made my feelings/symptoms worse. Those times my body was sending me a message saying hey, something does not feel right, I ended up feeling (rightly or not) that the narrative was: it’s all in your head, just stuff it down, and I regularly told myself exactly that. Instead of believing the signals coming from my body, instead I asked myself: what are you getting from “not feeling right?” What are you getting to avoid? Something feels “off” because you must WANT something to feel “off,” so then you won’t have to show up for your life in some way. Just stop it.
Ultimately, I was really hard on myself, and I have been grieving, in a way, that I treated myself like that.
I feel very bad for my former self that I put down and punished for “misbehaving.” I wouldn’t EVER treat anyone else that badly. Yet I blamed and shamed myself.
But now that I am no longer gaslighting myself, I need to ask: What is it in me that needs attention here?
I cannot change the past, but I can change my future. I need to quit dancing on the edge of that cliff. I need to take care of myself. I need to treat myself with kindness. I need to love myself (my body) just like I would my best friend.
This is cute. The post it was attached to said this was “self-care.” A bubble bath, a mud mask, a candle, donuts, a Starbucks-esque drink, a computer. But I think we should normalize self-care looking more like abstaining, rather than indulging. Taking a step back from what we usually do, for a period of time, which maybe is not the mud mask and the bubble bath, but which is probably food, drink, and social media.
Because, let’s be honest, how many people are probably doing those things, food, drink, and social media, every day? I know I am.
So, could I go I whole day without food? Yes, I think I could, and I probably would benefit from doing that once in a while.
“Not eating for a day can have other potential health effects. Research in a 2022 review suggests that intermittent fasting may help to reduce fasting glucose and insulin levels in people with type 2 diabetes.
Intermittent fasting may also help to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by reducing factors such as total body weight and fats in the blood.
Research in the review also suggests that body weight reductions due to intermittent fasting may improve systemic inflammation, which links to certain cancers and other health conditions.”—Google
I am going to admit, however, this is another example of when my hEDS can have a positive benefit, for me. I regularly experience delayed gastric emptying, which is awful when it flirts with paralysis, but it has helped me, yes I will admit, get pretty slender for my height, after years of being overweight. Because delayed gastric emptying leads to (for me) never really feeling hunger from my stomach. But I still get “head hunger,” so I continue to need to be disciplined and consistent in planning what I eat, and eating what I planned. (Careful what you wish for though, lack of physical hunger pangs is really one of the very few things I can say is “good” about having hEDS, hello chronic constipation…)
Drink? Well, we should drink water, at least, if we are trying a 24-hour fast. But we could make sure we only imbibe drinks from home for a certain period of time, (no drive-thru!), if that is something in which we regularly indulge.
Could I stay off my iPad (social media) for a whole 24 hours?
Ummm…
Anyhow, just thought I would throw the 24-hour fast idea out there. Maybe not a 24-hour fast, (I have heard women more than men can end up with counter productive cortisol spikes if we fast too long—however, more research on my part is needed), but just abstaining from something for a period of time as a self-care benefit that can give our bodies (do not have digest x, y, z, etc) and/or our minds (no doom scrolling) a much needed break. That sounds like some good self-care to me, because working on our health is self-care.
—Picture on the left, July 28, 2024, 124.9 pounds.
—Picture on the right, July 1, 2025, 121.6 pounds
—A difference of almost 1 year, and only 3.3 pounds=real maintenance for me, for the first time in my life
—Same beach, same driftwood tree stump, no filter
I talked about my “shrinkles” here last year, so the intention of this post is not to brag—woo hoo, look at me in a bikini—and at my age! This intention of this post is to show that my “shrinkles” look a bit better one year later, thanks to regular exercise, mostly just walking…(and maybe thanks a bit to my having hEDS).
Because I am trying to convince myself to look at more positives about my health diagnoses. Even though I know I have been dealing with hEDS my whole life, I just finally have a name for it, I want to instead flip my script about knowing about these new things about my health, in an effort to deal more positively with my recent struggles with up and down mood swings.
So, a person who has hEDS can experience “a characteristic feature of hEDS is poor and delayed wound healing.”
But, they can also experience “The skin in hEDS may be described as soft, velvety, and hyperextensible (stretchy), which can sometimes be mistaken for ‘good quality’ skin, but its underlying structure is fragile, leading to the observed healing difficulties.”—Google
Myself, I think I have experienced the hyperextensibility, which helped my skin to stretch to accommodate my numerous weight gains and losses over the years. (And luckily for me, wound healing overall has not been that bad either). But I have not withstood my decades of weight fluctuations without some damage. However, there is always hope, “While skin turnover is around 14–28 days for younger people, it can take 60–90 days or longer for people in their 50s and older.”
That means for me, every 3 months or so, my skin can still improve following my weight loss, (most recently for me, a 70 pound loss), even with aging in my fifties.
I just had to give it some time.
And lots of walking.
Admittedly, July of 2024 I had gone into a bit of a mental slump, and I only walked 30 kms that whole month (doing about a 1K to the mailbox and back everyday, but no other activity). Right now, I am averaging about 100 kms per month. And I think it shows. Not just moving more, but moving more consistently.
Also, this post is to normalize that our bodies will show our history, unfiltered, our damage and scars too, and we should NOT feel bad about it. I have chosen to put out into the public space that yes, I was not perfect, I gained weight on and off over the years, because I overate many times for emotional reasons, not because I was hungry. But I also lost my excess weight, and now I am working very hard to keep off my excess weight, and this is what it looks like for me.
After my post earlier, I felt so much better. It felt great to be…honest. “I feel what I feel, and yes, I feel sorry for myself,” she declared. Instead of a more acceptable, (because I feel peer pressure to constantly check myself, and invalidate my own feelings just in case when comparing myself to others, they have it worse than me), instead just saying, “I’m fine.”
I am not fine.
But I will be.
The 2 pictures above are from Halloween 2012 and Halloween 2025. A 13 year difference.
Three times in my life (before now) I saw the 130’s. Back in 1991, after I got married (not before, lol), I saw 132 and 136 pounds for about 2 weeks (then it was Christmastime, oops, that did not last).
I have dieted since a very young age, (grade 3=stepping on the bathroom scale at a friend’s house, and being happy I weighed one pound less than my friend, is my earliest memory of worrying about my weight). I am 5 foot 6 inches, (oops, thanks to osteoporosis in my spine, I am now only 5 foot 5 and a tiny bit inches), and throughout a lot of my life I have bounced between the 140’s, and the 170’s. There were a few times when I really got up there, the 190’s=in the years 1998, 2011, and 2023. And even twice I crested into the low 200’s=in the years 1999 and 2003.
Then it took 21 years before I ever saw that weight in the 130’s again, the first of the above pictures=Halloween 2012.
In 2012, I found out I was Celiac. And after struggling with my food for decades, not just to soothe emotions, but also to some degree self-medicating digestive upset and low iron, going gluten free was truly a game changer. It felt easy to lose weight, and I was a lot healthier not battling against maldigestion, malabsorption, and other things that an undiagnosed Celiac experiences when they don’t know they should NOT be eating wheat, barley, and rye.
(The feeling great did not last, because I did not know then I also have hEDS. I saw the 130’s briefly in 2016, but experienced some of the same struggles self-medicating digestive upset and low iron for years before going completely grain free in 2019, which has helped me a bit with that. But there is no such thing as a PERFECT diet for someone with hEDS).
Needless to say, I coveted this picture. When I regained some weight, I would pull this picture out and stare at it=OMG, was that really me?? Wow, how did I do that? How did I actually get to that weight, and in my forties, no less?? (Which was 138.8 pounds, knowing that exact weight proves how diet obsessed I am/have been). Can I EVER get there again? Stop stuffing your feelings with food, you silly woman!!
Yes, that is how I talked to myself.
Anyhow, battling some depression lately has sent my brain to thoughts along the lines of=You know what would make you feel better? A whole bowl of pudding. Or these Almond cookies you just saw on Facebook. I bet your stomach could handle those…
Or this…
Of course, my stomach could NOT handle a whole batch…which would probably be what I would eat if I made them. Because I am desperate to feel better, ug! And only a whole batch will truly stuff me to the point where my physical discomfort will be enough to distract me from my emotional discomfort.
Which leads me to the second picture. OMG, is that me?? Wow, how did I do that? How did I actually get to that weight, (122.3 pounds), and in my fifties, no less??
So…
I must never forget that stuffing my feelings with food is NEVER the answer.
Next time I am tempted to overeat to soothe my feelings, I will just come here and read this post.
P.S. Obviously when I am struggling, I want to blog more, lol.
Moving through stage 4 into stage 5 of the 5 stages of grief is not an “all at once” event. I am experiencing it as a roller coaster ride of one day in depression, with the next day lifting somewhat back up out of those depths, but then it only takes one thing to plunge me right back down.
I am getting sea sick just typing that out, because it so viscerally reminds me I am currently living those exact whiplash ups and downs.
Unfortunately, I am also experiencing a certain feeling that I am NOT supposed to feel depressed at all. I should feel lucky…because other people have it worse.
I am just going to put it out there: thoughts of other people having it worse has NEVER made me feel any better about whatever I am dealing with. If I was lucky enough to be pain free yesterday, but I am experiencing pain today, how does thinking about someone else’s pain help me deal with my pain today?
Yes, yes, I get the logic behind that thinking. You ask yourself, how bad is your pain? And you answer that by asking yourself how bad does it compare to other times in your life, and/or how does it compare to someone else who has it worse off than you? Then maybe you feel better because the pain is not as bad as another time in your life, and/or it is not as bad as someone you know who is really, really, having the worst time in life, that you can imagine. And you count yourself lucky, and write out a gratitude list, and you do feel grateful.
But then…you are still left dealing with your current pain, because no matter what, you hurt.
And if you used to soothe your pain with food, (as I used to do), and you don’t do that anymore, then you are just left with…feeling the pain.
For me, I felt pain after I tweaked my knee Saturday, and it brought my whole mood down because…I felt pain.
Maybe it was not a lot of pain.
Maybe it was not even close to as bad as someone else’s pain.
But I kept feeling it, it bothered me, it stole the peace I had been feeling before I encountered it. If I say I “let it” bring my whole mood down, am I self-blaming? Am I weak because I couldn’t “shake it off” and push it aside with thoughts of how bad other people are suffering instead?
I know in the past being told, “well at least you don’t have it as bad as so and so,” has never made me feel better about whatever it is/was that I am dealing with. Instead, statements like that have left me feeling unheard, and even negated, as though I have no right to feel any pain at all if it does not rise to the level of being “the worst it could be.”
I know this blog post comes across as me doing some complaining, oh woe is me, but this space is where I do feel heard, even if it is just being heard by me, myself, and I. I am in pain, and I feel depressed, and the only way out (for me) is through. So, no, thoughts of other people’s pain, or a gratitude list (which I do have, and it’s long, and I am grateful), will make me feel better right now. I just have to feel what I feel.
The Bio Joy Diet 