Doing The Next Right Thing

I am a tall, skinny, tomboy girl-jock.  I have always been a tall, skinny, tomboy girl-jock.  I got my 1st non-surgical scar at 5 … and it’s still visible on my right knee.  In all of my elementary school class pictures, I was always in the back row, always the tallest girl, and a couple of times I was even the tallest classmate … period.  I started taking gymnastics classes in Kindergarten in SW Kansas.  I began my stint as a basketball player in 3rd grade in Colorado Springs.  4th grade in Longmont brought me to the YMCA soccer program.  By the time I reached 5th grade, my gymnastics instructors at the Longmont Athletic Club informed me that, at 5’2”, I was too tall to compete in my age group.  In 6th grade basketball, I made my 1st half-court shot at the buzzer.  In the fall of 7th grade I found my soul on the volleyball court and by spring I was striding and gliding over hurdles with the “big girls” at track practice.  For the rest of my junior high and high school years, I was the starting Middle Hitter and occasionally Back Row Setter on the volleyball court and starting Center on the basketball court.  My bony hips, knees and elbows became my weapons of mass destruction.  I broke opponents’ ribs and noses, dislocated knees, caused sprained ankles, and was the distributor of countless, dark, painful bruises.  A few weeks before I was to leave for college, I was playing in a pick-up game of basketball at the athletic club (yep, same one that kicked me out of gymnastics) where I lost a rebound and scored a sprained knee (FYI - these are still my pre-RSD years).  My freshman year of college started without me in a uniform.  Desperation set in as my knee healed and I needed to be back on the court.  So I added tallest member of the Drill Team to my “Tallest Of” résumé.

In 7th grade, at the age of 13, I began my rebellious teen phase … I started smoking cigarettes back behind the Track Shed at LJHS.  I have now been smoking for 30 years.  Are you fucking kidding me??  (not gonna apologize for this one, because IF my mom cussed, that’s exactly what she’d say, and she knows it!)  I have quit booze, pills, cocaine, acid, and caffeine (for a brief period of time, post gall bladder surgery.  I resumed my coffee intake as quickly as my body allowed … 2 years later.)  I beat my RSD every single day just by getting out of bed.  But I have not been able to successfully quit the cancer sticks.  My best run was last year.  3 weeks the e-cig, and Nicorette gum.  When the stress moved back into my life, so did the tar and additives.  Having recently discovered that heart disease has reached out and smacked my fam upside the head, I am more determined than ever to break this damn habit.  This time I will not do it for my folks, my siblings, my Munchkins, or my l’il fam ... I will do it for myself.

When I was younger, having lost a brother when her was 9 months old, I began living by the mantra, “If only the good die young, I must be immortal.”  Every time I stare into the mirror now, I stand nose to nose with my mortality.  I finally love my life, RSD and all, and I want as many years on this planet as I can get.  Yes, I have days where I would rather be anyone but myself because of the pain, but I always come back to my tall, skinny, tomboy, girl-jock mentality.  That frame of mind that says, “take a deep breath, shake it off, get back out there and show those people what you can do.”

Yesterday, I ordered the replacement parts that I needed for my e-cig apparatus.  My next SSD check comes next week and I will be reinvesting in Nicorette gum (citrus flavor).  By the end of next week, I will be a non-smoker.  Last week I began a private Facebook group for RSDers Breaking the Habit.  Since stress affects us RSDers differently, I needed a support system that really understands and won’t just spew rhetoric.  We already have six members!!

I have faith that I will break the habit of nicotine.  I have faith that this is the next right thing for me.  I have faith that the people closest to me, and my cronies in RBH, will hold me accountable to myself.  I have a lot of life left to live, and dammit, I want to LIVE!!!

                                                          ♡..♡  _________________________ ♡..♡

OOHH!!  Quick update about Kiva, he said "Yes!!!!"