Our Family Beginnings

I’ll admit it, I have so much going on right now that I haven’t actually finished the book yet.  I’m only through Italy and India so far, but even those two segments have really been wonderful.  I can see aspects of myself and of greater humanity in the Gilbert’s words…

Have you had a breakdown like Elizabeth Gilbert’s scene on the bathroom floor (near the beginning of the book)? How did you come out of your crisis?  Did you adjust yourself to the situation, did you change your situation, or did you find a third alternative?

I have, actually, thought it was on the floor leading to the bathroom and not the actual bathroom.  It seems so pathetic, but it was actually about my weight.  Granted, most of my prior issues about my weight were about other things, but I digress.

I had gone with Mr. Badger to a bra store, realizing that my old ones were too small.  The woman measured me and said that I was a size (something much bigger than I had been squeezing myself into).  It was over.  I couldn’t deny that I had gotten heavy.  My job sucked, and I was totally depressed, and that was it…it was my breaking point.  I got home and got undressed, since my clothes didn’t really feel comfortable and laid on the floor, crying in the fetal position.  It was awful but cathartic.  I went on a great change that day, starting to cook right (or getting Mr. B to cook right for me at that point) and exercising.

I lost the weight, but it proved that once you are thin, if you haven’t solved the issues that caused you to eat/be lethargic in the first place, it won’t solve anything.  Three years later, I have to lose the weight again, thanks to fertility treatments, but I’ve dealt with the underlying concerns which had nothing to do with my appearance and everything to do with my thoughts about life.  It was an enlightening experience for sure, and I could totally relate to Gilbert’s pain.

The author writes that hard as it was she is “choosing happiness over suffering” and “making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises” but still laments the loss of her lover…
Have you ever found living with suffering to be more familiar, more comfortable than making a change even if you knew (rationally) that change would be better in the long run. Has inertia prevented you from making a difficult decision or instituting change?

I have been in therapy for about 3.5 years, and that’s just this time around.  I don’t think I ever stuck with it for more than a year when I was in my early/mid-20s.  I always dreaded (and sometimes still do) the mindset of the non-anxiety/depressed population that just wants people to get over it.  You can’t.  You simply – as Oprah once put it – Let go and let God.  Sorta.  You can’t because people say you should.  It isn’t something that can just be turned on and off.  Eventually, I did have to decide that being happy was hard fucking work.  Being miserable sucks.  It is just an awful, lonely place.  But in an awful lonely place, it’s easy to think you are only causing harm to yourself.  That lonliness becomes a partner, a friend, someone you expect to be around.  It’s scary to change, to get better, because you’re in a sense, kicking out the only friend you think you have.  It’s terrifying to put yourself out there in order to get well, when you don’t know if it’s possible – and in those darkest days, it feels like self-flaggelation to try to heal.

An object at rest stays at rest.  It goes for emotions as well.

When my IRL (in real life) book club discussed this we had widely differing opinions on the tone of the book.  Some thought it was “all about me, poor, poor me!” and “whiny” while others saw Gilbert’s self-focus in as a fascinating journey to becoming a better person.  What would you say?

Can I bring this back to Grey’s for a moment?  No?  Too bad. I’m gonna.  This souns a lot like my friends who like to pick a fight about Meredith with me.  I get offended when people call her whiny because I see a lot of myself in her.  Then I start worrying that people find ME whiny.  I see a similar parallel with this question about Elizabeth Gilbert.

I often joke that I am not a selfish person, but I am self-centered.  I do see the world primarily through my own eyes, and because of my stubborn nature, think I am more often than not, right.  I also give PLENTY of leeway to other viewpoints, but when I feel strong about something, dammit, my feet are standing their ground.

For some reason, I find that those who are the most sensitive are also the ones that worry so much about how they appear to others – thus Gilbert, Grey, and my own dilemmas.  I don’t know if it’s just something that goes along with the territory, but I see it as a personality archetype.  We are sensitive – we worry about how others feel, deeply.  Because we worry so much, we also then assume that others are viewing us through that same lens.  Sometimes people are, sometimes they’re not.  It’s hard to let go of the worldview that we need to be “on” or perfect all the time.  Maybe it makes me whiny, maybe it makes me an amazing friend, who knows?

The fact that I’m willing to explore it, though not to the degree that Gilbert did, I think more than makes up for any faults that arise from who we are…