Fine, I'll Slow Down

[Note: This was written in bed a little more than a week ago, roughly 12 hours before I made an unexpected trip to the emergency room due to unbearable pain]

Are you an overachiever? Are you a people-pleaser? Do you put everyone and everything else before your own needs? It's hard to balance life when you are a wife, a mother, and have a full-time job...and when do you find the time to just be a woman? And in the case that you figure out how to make time for yourself, how do you decide what pat of you take priority? Do you focus on your mental health needs? Do you make time for social interaction? Do you process your emotional responses to the hazards of daily life? Do you take the time to connect with your higher power? Do you care for yourself physically, as in exercise, nutritious food, *and* enough sleep? 

That's the part that's definitely being neglected for me right now - my physical needs. I feel compeltely disconnected from my physical being and my body is apparently not feeling the love. When I was younger, such blatant disregard for my own shell resulted in the really bas respiratory infections, the ones that incited asthma attacks and led to wheezing that lasted for weeks. Since turning 30, the full-body shutdown source has moved further south - directly into my digestive system. The more time and energy I put everywhere else, the more my guts revolt: cramping, gas, indigestion, diarrhea, constipation, bloating, tenderness and sore spots, as well as full-body symptoms of fever, fatigue, sore joints, and achiness from my bellybutton to my knees. Standing hurts, sitting hurts, walking hurts. The only semi-tolerable position is propped on one side, stretched out in bed, surrounded by pillows. Which is why I'm writing this on a yellow legal pad with a pallpoint pen. I'm guessing blogging while bedridden is probably much easier with a laptop than a desktop.

I wish I had some insightful, lovely way to wrap up what is really a dismal, gross post - I mean, who really wants to read about my angry guts? It's distasteful enough for me to deal with and write about and they're part of *my* body. My weekend has been spent heating water for tea, motivating myself to chug water, taking acetaminophen as often as allowed, and trying to keep myself calm and physically relaxed during too-frequent trips to the bathroom. You know your body is trying to tell you something when you can't pee without abdominal cramping. So not cool.

But I got nothing. All I know is I don't know what to do, just that I have to do something. It seems like the first step will be slowing down and trying to figure out what I can change. So, fine, I'll slow down.