Sick & Tired of being Sick & Tired

When does it end?  The vicious cycle of self condemnation.  I throw stones at myself over and over and over again!  Not sure how I got to this point of “hyper-self criticalness.” When I was young, I thought life would get easier as I got older.  I set myself up for disappointment from the start.  All these years I have poured my energy into making myself perfect.  Trying to reach something only Jesus succeeded at.  I created a mold for myself at a young age and it was nurtured by society…finish high school, go to college, get married, have kids…as if there was not an alternate route.  I wanted to live the “American” dream.  I still want that.  But because of my “misprogramming” I can’t seem to view life from another angle.  Instead I get mad at myself for not following a timeline that was not necessarily intended for me to begin with.  Everyone is different therefore their journey will be different.  But instead we castrate ourselves for being unique in an effort to fit in with everyone else.  Fitting in sounds like a punk move to me.  However, I am guilty of being just that….

I am 34, unwed, and without children.  This scenario is not that farfetched to me but the first question I often receive is “what’s wrong with you?”  I never imagined I would be judged for being single at 34 but I am….heavily.  And frankly it hurts.  Not for the obvious reasons though.  Of course I hate being judged.  I would like to think of myself as “out of the box” so I don’t mind not fitting in from time to time.  But because I have been diagnosed with a plague called spinster, it has caused me to wonder if there is something wrong with me.  I should know better but my intelligence is drowned out by the loud ticking of my biological clock which I never had until society decided to deliver it to me in Movado case. The trickery!

I am also addicted to numbers.  Specifically size, weight, calories, and inches.  I never knew how much I weighed until I started dancing.  Amazing how the thing I loved the most morphed into something that caused me so much grief.  I was always the largest girl on the squad.  Uniforms became smaller and smaller.  My self esteem shrunk right along with it.  I even resorted to taking diet pills which rendered a horrid side effect of palpitations.  At some point, I began to care more about what size I was instead of WHO I was.  The older I got, the more life evoked emotional eating.  Exhausted from life’s tests and too tired to cook I would resort to fast food and take out.  I felt like such a hypocrite promoting high self esteem, healthy eating habits, and being unique to other young ladies while doing the total opposite to myself.  Television now promotes beauty without limits: liposuction, fad diets, models size 0-2, relaxed hair, extensions, hair removal.  Everywhere we turn we are reminded to be something that we were not created to be…perfect!  Looks far outweigh talent and there is even a study that shows that people who are “attractive” are more likely to get hired for jobs.  Really????  The average size for a woman in America is a 14 yet you don’t see her on the front of Sports Illustrated.  Instead we gasp and gossip when celebrities who live in the light and are judged the most have nervous breakdowns or take a hiatus from the media.  As if they did something wrong!

Lastly, I thought I would have “arrived” by now.  I am quite saddened to say I don’t even know where I am going. At 34, I don’t have a map, compass, GPS, or OnStar.  I literally feel as if I am on 285 just going in circles.  At some point I am going to have to exit, I just don’t know which exit to take.  I see others around me living the American dream.  Yet my life seems mundane, unremarkable, and undesirable merely because it does not fit into that mold.  Now it makes since why the Ogre in Shrek wanted to remain in the swamp alone.  He didn’t have any fight left in him…fight to please people, fight to keep peace, fight to better himself only to be stereotyped and put down by others, fight to find love and give it a chance….He didn’t have any fight left to LIVE.  He was content with playing it safe and being alone in an effort to avoid the judgement and heartache that comes second nature to taking a chance.

The negativity manifests into mental and physical attributes such as insomnia, low self esteem, crying spells, lack of motivation, headaches, nausea, and anger (to name a few).  It’s debilitating to the point of not even being able to look at yourself in the mirror.  But at some point, you get sick and tired of being sick and tired. At some point we say enough is enough.  Today I say “It’s OVER!!!”  So what if I am not married?  I will not settle just to have the title of “wife.”  I prefer happy spinster to miserable wife any day!  So what if I don’t have any children?  I have enough nieces and nephews as well as children that I work with to call my own.  I do not plan on having a child out of wedlock or with a man that I can’t stand to be in the same room with just to be called “mommy.”  Applying for the job of single mom is not appealing to me therefore I will pass.  So what if I don’t feel as if I know where I am going in life?  In the meantime we will consider this the scenic route.  I will just take it all in and enjoy the ride until I see something that interests me enough to stop.

In a perfect world, I would have nothing but positive energy to expel each and every day.  Unfortunately, I don’t live in a perfect world.  Therefore I have to create another equation for life as I remodel my American Dream.  The challenge?  I will only allot myself 10% negative energy per day so I have to be very picky about how I use it.  Anything that exceeds that has to go in the “Let Go & Let God” file.  Yet another selfish moment in my life but at this point selfishness = sanity.  How will you spend your 10%?