take care of myself

Not because I am sick, but rather because I am well. I had a checkup — first one in five years.

This is a real step toward taking care of myself.

For years, I swore that “taking care of myself” was a mystery. I had no idea what it meant, or how to do it. Mostly, I would be good to myself the only way I knew how — more booze, more fried food, more trips to the strip joints, more gambling, more fun.

It was all more misery as it turned out.

I have been long over due for a trip to my doc for a checkup. That is what I need to do soon to take care of myself.

Taking care of myself meant taking Tylenol and crawling back into bed. It didn’t really work, but you can’t fault a guy for trying.

I have always tacitly accepted that men in my family die in their 60s, and in the back of my head I figured I had about 25 years left.

Then I realized that they all smoked and drank to excess. None of them exercised. Most of them were over 300 pounds.

Well duh!

Found myself “dealing” with my problems by drinking a six pack.

That’s not dealing. So I’ve started AA.

Fell into old, self-destructive patterns this week as an unforeseen crisis kicked me in the arse. Thankfully, I have friends who love me. They took me out to a museum show of Jim Henson’s work, then to a dee-lish Mexican lunch.

Then I came home, ordered a pizza, watched the USC-Ohio State game. Cool weather and college football always make me want to go back to school, get a PhD.

Dr. Thomas has a nice ring to it, no?

I have never understood what self-care meant, and it still throws me, sometimes. I am prone to co-dependence and so try to manage other people’s feelings while burying my own.

Now, in addition to the physical, I am working on taking better care of my own emotional and spiritual needs. I do Co-Dependents Anonymous, I’ve stopped medicating with alcohol or bad relationships or donuts (well, I’ve mostly stopped the donuts).

Taking care of myself means acknowledging and honoring my own feelings.

After years of having stomach issues, I gave up dairy. Cold turkey. All of it so far.

Oh. My. God.

The difference is like night and day. I have always heard my entire life that in our family we just “go to the bathroom a lot.” I now understand that we all have IBS, and our love for dairy is probably the culprit.

The first few days were really tough, but it has been getting progressively a little easier every day.

And I have never felt healthier.

I started riding my bicycle. At 38 years old, I have begun to exercise. I can’t ride very much yet – my longest ride was about 6.5 miles – but I feel so GREAT after doing it. I evem bought proper spandex cycling clothes – though I instinctively sucked in my gut while riding past a bunch of high school kids.

And it makes me want to do more for my body.

My shrink ended a session once “take care of yourself” and he left me to ruminate on that for the week. I had to confess that I had no idea what it meant – none. Whatsoever.

Self-care is obvious to most people, but to me it is dreadfully confusing. What is it? My body is like a foreigner to me, and I have no idea why it matters. “It.” Not me, it. I refer to my body – myself – as it. Only the brain matters. Everything else – the muscle, the viscera, the blood – isn’t real to me.

I took a quiz online which said that my physiological age is 51. Upon learning that I am 13 years closer to the grave than I should be, I felt oddly vindicated. Here was proof (albeit in the form of an online quiz) that my body is defective. Why bother trying to fix it? Why take care of myself?

I do not see the point in self-care. I assume most people with this goal accept that self-care is important. The fact that I don’t understand it says a lot.