definatalie.com

I just had my first ever pedicure and it was THE WEIRDEST EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE. Nick and I decided to pamper ourselves after all our intrepid plodding last week, and surprisingly Nick was the one who was enthusiastic about getting a professional to tend to our sore feet. I was less into it because it takes a lot for me to let someone into my personal foot bubble of space.

Being pretty terrible at small talk I like to avoid most feminine-oriented beautification services (please see chapter 4: My Fear of Hairdressers) and I was quietly terrified when Nick looked up a place to get our marital mani-pedi. When the technician (I think that’s the proper job title!) put my feet in a warm bath that vibrated I started to get into it, but then she snuck her hands in the water and started rubbing my heels. Cue the freak out.

As more of the 75 minutes of pedicure torture ticked over I awaited the next attack on my poor unsuspecting feet. Exfoliation, massage (I actually liked that bit), some foot… shaving with a pumice paddle, a bunch of oily moisturising stuff slathered from toes to calves, and then… the paraffin wax. I thought my blood was going to boil in my veins, it was so hot! After it cooled it sort of felt nice, despite the squicky feeling of stuff between my toes. After having some time to myself while the wax set I grossed myself out by thinking about how much dead skin had been sloughed off in that little room. Ew. Finally it was time for some polish – a pale pink.

The whole process was a little bit shocking to me, having never participated in such an experience before. Once I tuned out a little bit and had a giggle at all the hilarious comments on the Grill’d blog post I started to feel like I was being rightfully pampered. I’m sorry to the lovely woman who professionally tended to my feet, I’ve totally forgotten your name, but seeing as you’ve handled these feet I feel we are the most intimate of friends now.

Today I put some of my work up at Urban Grind in New Farm. Urban Grind are wonderful about supporting local artists and connecting with the community, and I’m really appreciative that Morgan let me put my work up!

Today is World Mental Health Day, and the theme this year is:

Making mental health a global priority: scaling up services through citizen advocacy and action.

I advocate for complete openness about mental health issues, including my own. I hope in some way it helps other people feel that it isn’t taboo, and think of mental illness as a medical condition – just like Juvenile Diabetes (which I also have). I’ve encountered people who suggest “getting off your arse and making a change” and those who say “oh but it’s all in your head” and they’re really dismissive, simplistic and often unproductive suggestions, in fact, I feel personally that they encourage those who suffer from mental illness to not talk about their condition.

So, in the spirit of breaking taboo and stigma: I’m Natalie and I suffer from depression and anxiety. I’m interested in living a wonderful life, but sometimes it’s hard to act out a wonderful life when your brain tells you other things. Sometimes I am sad for no reason. Sometimes I panic about things that other people do without a problem. It doesn’t mean I’m less of a person, and it doesn’t mean I’m less worthy of respect or medical care.

Illness by sctag1015

This week is National Invisible Chronic Awareness Week in America, and even though I’m international I thought this questionaire would be helpful not only for myself, but for readers of my blog!

1. The illness(es) I live with are:
Type 1 diabetes (T1D), depression and anxiety with a little tendinitis (and arm cysts!) thrown in

2. I was diagnosed with it/them in the year:
T1D – 1998
Depression and anxiety – 2001
Tendinitis/ RSI – 2007

3. But I had symptoms since:
T1D – a few months before being diagnosed (generally you don’t let that shit slide or else you get dead!)
Depression and anxiety – since 1995
Tendinitis – since about 2005

4. The biggest adjustment I’ve had to make is:
Having to interrupt my day to jab myself and eat on a schedule, being a slave to doctors (currently my beef is that they will only give me 1 repeat of insulin so I have to keep going back!)

My depression isn’t as severe as it used to be, I think learning coping mechanisms has helped me a lot in my day to day life. Surprisingly, my anxiety has been largely ignored by the doctors and shrinks so I’m still doing unproductive things like not answering calls from numbers I don’t recognise, putting my phone on silent for weeks on end, having trouble going outside by myself, etc.

I have to wear a wrist brace when I’m working, and if I really aggravate my arm I can’t work for days on end. It interrupts my workflow, and affects my ability to consistently earn money. It also makes me feel pathetic and useless when the pain is at its worst.

5. Most people assume:
I’m fat because I have type 2 diabetes. No. I’m probably fat because I give myself too much insulin, which results in fabulous to low Hb1ac levels (the coating of sugar on my blood cells) and weight gain. T1D sufferers who are very skinny (as a result of rapid weight loss, not natural body weight) likely have very high Hb1ac levels, which leads to diabetes complications like blindness and kidney disease. I will likely meet my end with a stroke or heart disease, maybe even an amputated limb.

People assume that I’m useless and aloof because of many of my anxiety symptoms. When I was a child and teen, people used to get so frustrated with my avoidance tactics and would reprimand me because I would refuse to call places when they asked me to, or because I was socially awkward.

When I wear a wrist brace out in public people are generally nicer and more helpful. Which is surprising considering when I had a bung foot going to Melbourne in December, I had to use a walking stick and some people were rude and inconsiderate. On the flight down, many of the families with children waiting to board encouraged me to get on the plane first but I was nearly bowled over by some impatient special snowflake who didn’t have any trouble walking, nor did he have children!

6. The hardest part about mornings is:
Having to wake up at a timely hour to have my insulin. If I don’t stick to a schedule, everything gets screwed around a bit.

7. My favorite medical TV show is:
I don’t really like watching the real life shows, but I like Scrubs.

8. A gadget I couldn’t live without is:
Insulin pens

9. The hardest part about nights is:
Having hypos at 3am and having to get up and force carbs into my face when I don’t want to eat.

10. Each day I take [?] pills & vitamins.
I’m really bad with taking pills and/ or vitamins!! I’m lucky in that pills aren’t really a part of my health care regimen, even though a multi-vitamin probably wouldn’t hurt!

11. Regarding alternative treatments, I:
Certain people have tried to convince me that my diabetes can be cured with homeopathy and a raw vegan diet. Righteo!! If there was a bona-fide cure I’m sure I’d have a mailbox stuffed with excited proclamations from Diabetes Australia/ Queensland!

I want to get hypnotised and see if it helps my anxiety. I’m very curious about it because I have a few people close to me who have been helped by it.

I’ve tried a course of acupuncture for my tendinitis and while it provided short term relief for a matter of hours, it really wasn’t the relief I was looking for (IE: LONGTERM!)

12. If I had to choose between an invisible illness and a visible one, I would choose:
I really have no experience having a visible illness, besides wearing a brace in public occasionally. I can’t conceive of a life without diabetes – sometimes when I have dinner with friends I find it strange that they don’t whip out their insulin pens and jab themselves when I do. Most of the time, people don’t even notice when I inject myself!

So yeh, short answer: I can’t choose, and I don’t know differently.

13. Regarding working and career:
Having hypos in the workplace can be very embarrassing sometimes, because a low blood sugar attack can make one look quite drunk and disoriented. Many workplaces I’ve been in I’ve had to simply wait until I could excuse myself to get sugar – which is completely unfair, I know.

Having an anxiety disorder and working has been challenging, but generally it has helped me confront things that I would have put in the “too hard” basket.

14. People would be surprised to know:
That I would be dead if insulin wasn’t on the PBS. It’s expensive as it is, but it’d be 20 times more expensive if it wasn’t subsidised by the government.

15. The hardest thing to accept about my new reality is:
I’m going to die younger than Nick and my friends.

16. Something I never thought I could do with my illness was:
Go overseas. I’m still not sure how I would manage it, with the time zone changes and what not… it’d royally screw up my insulin regimen.

17. The commercials about my illness:
There are very few commercials about T1D. Usually it’s scare tactics about T2D (which means that people assume I have T2D).

18. Something I really miss doing since I was diagnosed:
I miss not giving a shit about when I eat or what I eat.
I miss the strength I used to have in my wrist.

19. It was really hard to give up:
Smoking. I’m still weening myself off them and I’m not the type to get all sanctimonious about it. I actually really enjoyed smoking as a way to alleviate some of my anxiety!

20. A new hobby I’ve taken up since my diagnosis is:
I’m trying to do new things in my creative practice that don’t involve such intensive use of my wrist. Right now I’m making rosettes out of ties.

21. If I could have one day of feeling normal again, I would:
Go traveling and eating.

22. My illness has taught me:
How to be a control freak.

23. Want to know a secret? One thing people say (about my illness) that gets under my skin is:
- XXXXX CURES DIABETES
- CAN YOU EAT THAT?

24. But I love it when people:
Look after me when I’ve had a hypo or panic attack. It makes me feel like less of a freak.

25. My favorite motto, scripture, quote that gets me through tough times is:
I usually just say to myself that tomorrow will come like yesterday came, and pretty soon it’ll be next month. It really helps me feel like there will be a future when I think the world is going to end.

26. When someone is diagnosed I like to tell them:
Ask me anything.

27. Something that has surprised me about living with an illness is:
How little some medical professionals know. Like, when I’m in hospital getting hourly obs – THE NURSES ALWAYS COME IN AND PRICK THE TIP OF THE SAME DAMNED FINGER.

a) Don’t stick the tip or the pad of my fingers. There are helpful nerves in them! Lance the side of my fingers where there aren’t as many nerves to damage.
b) DIDN’T YOU DO ANATOMY AS PART OF YOUR TRAINING?
c) OW! That hurts! Rotate those injection sites.

28. The nicest thing someone did for me when I wasn’t feeling well was:
Get me orange juice or something similarly sugary. There’s no one time, it’s not a standalone occurrence, but my friends and loved ones always know what to do!

29. I’m involved with Invisible Illness Week because:
I never really considered that I have invisible illnesses, but I do. I always like to imagine I’m a normal person, but I’m not. That’s a delusion that healthy people don’t have to suffer.

30. The fact that you read this list makes me feel:
Thankful and a little weirded out, considering this blog is so public! But I think it’s important to talk about our health, especially about depression and anxiety.

Disclaimer of sorts: This awareness week was started by a Christian ministry, and while I am an atheist I think it’s important to make people aware of chronic invisible illnesses. I also think it’s important to treat them with medical science, not just prayer – like in the case of the diabetic 11 year old who died because her Christian parents refused her medical treatment, preferring to pray for her healing rather than providing her treatment.
/controversy

My husband and I seem to disagree when it comes to Yoko Ono: I think she is wonderful and I admire her work as an artist but Nick being the avid Beatles fan thinks she split up the band (yada yada ya whatever). When I saw the the SMILING FACE FILM by Yoko Ono group on flickr I decided to submit after browsing through several pages of all these smiling faces, with different smiles, and different faces.

I’ve not had the happiest of weeks, being very busy and stressed. Today the maternal figure in the passenger seat of the family roadtrip that is my usual shrieking, forever accelerating brain turned around and yelled at me: IF YOU DON’T BUCKLE UP BACK THERE, WE’RE TURNING THIS CAR AROUND. So I decided to cheer the frick up. It started with me considering the notion that it might be ok to laugh about things. So I did. And then I found more things funny, and soon after that… the car-full of passengers in my brain did settle down, buckle up and quit whinging about when and if we were going to get there yet. We haven’t quite gotten to the sing-a-long portion of the trip, but I’m sure in no time the paternal figure will slip a cassette of the Grease soundtrack into the dashboard and start hamming it up to the doleful sounds of “Sandy“.

How To… SMILE by Yoko Ono

I told you to smile when you are feeling down.
However, there are steps you should know.
First you go to the mirror and smile to the mirror in anyway you can.
You probably will not feel any different.
Smile a few times that way.
If that is not enough, smile a few times every morning when you see the mirror.
That won’t do much, either, right?

Because there is a way to smile and change not only your mood, but make your body healthy and young, and change your life for the better!

1) Smile just by twisting the ends of your mouth up. That doesn’t get you anywhere, I bet. But that’s a start.

2) Smile with your eyes and mouth. That’s better. Your smile will make somebody feel good, maybe. Add a little giggle, and they will either think you’re crazy or like you for it.

3) If you really want to smile so it will make yourself feel good as well – you have to smile from your heart and your lungs. Don’t worry, if you are ending the smile with a quiet sound like ummm.

4) The next step will make you feel still better. Smile from your solar plexus. This has an added benefit of making your solar plexus healthier, and active.

5) The next step is to smile right down from your stomach. When you do this, make sure to breathe deeply and pull your stomach muscles in as you smile.

6) The next step – yes, there are more steps! – you should smile from your knees. Again, just pull your knees in – as you pull your stomach in – at the same time you use your lungs, heart and solar plexus. You’ll see that by then, you are smililng with your whole body. You won’t forget to smile with your eyes and mouth at the same time. It will happen anyway. That’s how you will get the true benefit of smiling.

How about giving a smile to others? Should we forget that? Don’t worry. They’ll notice your smile. Only, this time, you’ll feel good, too. Very, very good!

I love you! yoko

Yoko Ono
24 July 2009

A new piece (or, drainting! A drawing and a painting) for exhibiting, hopefully, if KILN still want me to participate in the Illustrators show coming up soon! I usually know I’m on the right track if a new piece scares the crap out of me, and this lady sure scared me on several occasions! Despite studying art at university, lots of fine art skills escape me and I usually feel quite incompetent beside other artists because I am mostly self taught. Her skin colour really worried me for a while, but I just ended up layering the colour a bit, and it came good. Horah!

I’ve been thinking a lot about how we hide ourselves in public, to become normal or to blend in. From my early teens I wore make up religiously because I had terrible acne, and it got to a point where I couldn’t answer the door without having a full face on. These days, while I love my cosmetics, I’m a bit more relaxed about “putting on my mask” but you’ll never catch me in a social situation without being fully made up and dressed ridiculously. Because, you know, people might find out… that I have… flaws!

Externals aside, I’ve also had a lot of practice at covering up my various idiosyncrasies. It’s easy for me to say I have experience with depression, suicide and anxiety but harder for me to go in to details because I am so used to people trivialising my fears. Mostly, I’m scared of phones and of falling over in public when I’m out by myself. And because of those fears I come off as quite aloof (I’m pretty hard to catch on the phone!) and I only ever go out when I’ve got someone with me, so in the case I fall over I’ve got someone to laugh about it with me! I mask a lot of my anxieties with a huge laugh and a big personality but lately I’ve been feeling quite guilty about it. This work is one of my ways of coming out as hiding.

So there, that’s my story about being a masked woman. What masks do you wear?