Brioche…I Mean Withdrawal

For the last four days, I’ve limited my sugar consumption to ≤ 24 grams per day, which is the recommended daily allowance for women.  That is significantly less than what I usually consume. I keep telling myself that a low-sugar diet is better for my mental acumen, my physical health and my creative process.   But I’ve been dreaming about French-toast style brioche with extra maple syrup.   

I cannot eat brioche this weekend.  Addicts never adhere to boundaries.  They spiral out of control.  If I eat brioche this weekend, it’ll be cookies next weekend and pie the week after that and pizza the week after that then it’ll become cookies, pie and pizza in one week.

Fuck boundaries!  Fuck health!  Withdrawal sucks!

~ Hours Later ~

Dear God,

Thank you for my health.  Although I would give my left tit for some brioche right now, please know that it’s just the sugar addiction talking.  Thank you for my liver, kidneys and gall bladder, which detoxed all the shit I have consumed throughout my years of hedonism. 

Amen

My Name Is Angèle, and I’m an Addict

One of my friends was in town last weekend.  Even though we speak on the phone every week, she doesn’t come to town often, so I was excited to see her.  I suggested that we meet at this little breakfast place that serves great French-toast-style brioche.  While we waited for the waiter, she told me about her latest therapy appointment and some revelations she had made.

The waiter asked if we were ready to order. My friend went first, but when I asked for maple syrup with my brioche, the waiter said, “I’m sorry.  We’re out of maple syrup.  We only have the regular kind.”

My mouth fell open.  I clasped my heart.  My friend gave me a sympathetic look.  All of my closest friends know that I abhor imitation syrup.  These so-called “regular” syrups are made primarily of corn syrup, and they taste like sugar-flavored ass.  I was in such a state of shock that I could not even speak.  What kind of breakfast restaurant runs out of maple syrup on a fucking Sunday?  

I had been rationing my sugar intake all week!  The only reason I didn’t eat ice cream or pizza or cake or pie or cookies or fresh-baked bread or any of the other high-sugar dishes I could subsist on was because I was holding off for my Sunday reward!  I went to the gym four times last week as opposed to three (Have I mentioned how much I hate working out?), so I could eat my French-toast style brioche!  Goddamnit!!

Finally the waiter said, “I apologize.  Would you like to order something else?”

I still couldn’t speak.  I was too busy calculating the distance between the restaurant and the nearest grocery store.

“No,” I said.

The waiter left to put in the order.  I fumbled through my bag for my wallet and keys.  I looked at my friend.  “I have to go buy some maple syrup.”

My friend looked stunned, but I could tell she was trying to hide it.

“The store’s not far.  I’m sorry,” I said scooting out of the booth. “I know this is extreme. I know I have problems.  I can’t do cheap syrup.  I been dreaming about this brioche all week.  All week.  I just can’t.  I need my maple syrup.”

“I understand,” she said.

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she reassured me.

I rushed out of the restaurant, ran to my car and sped to the grocery store.  I ran at least two red lights. I sometimes speed through a yellow light, but I scarcely ever run red lights.  Did I mention that my friend doesn’t come to town often?  Did I mention that she was talking about her therapy appointment?  She wasn’t crying or anything, but she was talking about something that was emotionally difficult.  God, maple syrup is love in a bottle.  Did I mention that I’m a fucking asshole?

I was gone 24 minutes.  On the way back to the restaurant, I realized that I am worse than an asshole. I’m Gator!

Yes, Gator (Samuel L. Jackson) from Spike Lee’s Jungle Fever. The main differences between me and Gator as addicts are: 1) our preferred addictive substance, 2) sugar and sugar-addiction are socially-acceptable and 3) I’ve never stolen for sugar.  But the other symptoms of addiction align pretty damn well.  According to Mayo Clinic drug addiction symptoms or behaviors include, among others:

        ·         Using the drug regularly—this can mean daily use or even using several times a day

        ·         Having intense urges for the drug

        ·         Over time, needing more of the drug to get the same effect

        ·         Making certain that you maintain a supply of the drug

        ·         Not meeting obligations and work responsibilities, or cutting back on social or recreational  
         activities because of drug use

        ·         Doing things to get the drug that you normally wouldn’t do, such as stealing

        ·         Focusing more and more time and energy on getting and using the drug

        ·         Failing in your attempts to stop using the drug

        ·         Experiencing withdrawal symptoms when you attempt to stop taking the drug

They forgot to mention the tell-tale symptom of addiction: Prioritizing the substance above your personal relationships.  So there you have it—My name is Angele, and I’m an addict.

“I’m sorry it happened…but it doesn’t define you.”

Although some people are born with clinical depression, I’m pretty sure I was not. I’ve heard people use “chemical imbalance” as a synonym for clinical depression, but according to Harvard Medical School’s Harvard Health Publications, “chemical imbalance” is a gross simplification of real clinical depression. The aforementioned webpage states that a clinically depressed person may have multiple chemicals that are imbalanced, and there are neurological, genetic and situational factors that also come into play. My doctor believes my brain was altered by trauma, which resulted in what I call “acquired clinical depression.” Remember, I’m not a doctor. I’m just making up a term to help me convey my experience.

From the peer-reviewed articles that I’ve read (and I have read too many over the last 10 years to cite), I learned that clinical depression relates to how one’s brain regulates and produces hormones. These articles explain how, for example, the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland work in people who have clinical depression and those who don’t. People who don’t have clinical depression (or a history of drug or alcohol addiction) may experience situational depression after a loved one dies or after they were fired unexpectedly, but they move through the depression, and their brains, for the most part, continue to function like normal. Their hypothalamus does not “react” to the death or job loss as a “circuit-damaging tragedy” (my term), e.g., their hypothalamus will continue to synthesize oxytocin (the love/trust hormone), and their pituitary gland continues to secrete it. This helps them feel love and trust for the important people in their lives. The memory of the painful event may arise, but it will eventually feel less devastating. People who are clinically depressed may have a hypothalamus that doesn’t function as it should. My hypothalamus interpreted the childhood trauma as a circuit-damaging tragedy. She has to bust her ass to produce oxytocin, and she doesn’t produce as much as the hypothalamus of someone who’s not clinically depressed.

The way my hypothalamus functions definitely affects my relationships. When I tell people that I have trust issues, they never believe me, but eventually they ask me, “Why don’t you open up more?” or some cliché shit like that. I always wanna say, Fool, I told you I have trust issues! You didn’t believe me.

By the time I was in high school, I had seen enough talk shows and read enough about basic psychology to know that my aloofness and lack of trust was, in part, a repercussion of trauma.

One night at the Christian depression support group that I go to, we talked about our experiences. I spoke about the trauma, my brain functioning and how I’m dealing with depression now. I’m ridiculously succinct when I talk about all this. I should be. I been talking about this shit in therapy for more than two-thirds of my life.

At the end of session, someone told me, “I’m sorry it happened…Just remember, it doesn’t define you.”

In true Angèle form, I shut down all emotions, smiled and politely said, “Thank you.” 

I thought about that discourse the entire way home. Am I sorry it happened? The trauma helped me develop some amazing survival skills. People often compliment me on being resilient and empathetic. When things don’t work out the way I want, I bounce back like no body’s business. When I taught at the college, I worked well with the difficult or troubled students. I made myself available for them; I set high expectations and clear boundaries with them. I never made things easy on them just because they wrote a reflection essay about having a disability, being beaten as a child, being raped or witnessing their family being shot and killed by soldiers. I said, “I’m sorry you went through that,” I listened if they wanted to talk, suggested they speak to the campus counselor, and in the next class, we moved forward with the curriculum. I didn’t treat them like they were doomed. I treated them like survivors.

Does the trauma define me or doesn’t it? My entire day revolves around alleviating the effects of anxiety and depression. I would love to sleep later every morning, but I have to meditate, or the anxiety will take over. I have to think about every morsel of food I put in my mouth because the wrong foods can tip the hormonal balance, and the depression will take over. I still suck at eating right. I have to force myself to go to the gym, or the depression and anxiety will fuck with my head (releasing enough endorphines is not optional for clinically depressed people). I hate this one. I had to develop a system for taking my ayurvedic supplements (for my hormones) because I used to zone out and forget whether or not I took them. Every night I have to wear a mouth guard because the anxiety is worse when I sleep, and it manifests in me grinding my teeth. I even cracked a tooth from grinding and chomping down so hard when I sleep. I have to talk myself out of leaving my husband about once every six months (That’s actually an improvement.), not because he’s hurtful but because I love him and he loves me and my psyche believes love is dangerous. It leads to trauma.

As I readied myself for bed that night after my support group, I thought, It does suck! And damn if that pain wasn’t as debilitating as ever. It hit me like a scorching blade to the heart. I collapsed to the floor. I didn’t even have the strength to lift my hands to wipe away the tears. I didn’t ask for this shit. I was just a kid, and I was a good kid, a baby actually. Whether I like it or not, the trauma kinda does define me. As powerful and resilient as I am, the trauma can level me in a matter of seconds.

The Fallow Period

I have not worked on my non-fiction manuscript in three months, well, not in any substantial way. At times, this disturbs me immensely. I have set a deadline of completion for myself, and I believe in sticking to my deadlines. Back in October, I set quarterly ticklers on my calendar. I have wasted an entire quarter to-date. I shouldn’t use the word “wasted.” It makes me seem like a lazy fuck when I am nothing of the sort. It also makes it seem like the fallow period isn’t important in the writing process when I know full well that it is.

I’ve been reminding myself that this is and has been my over-arching pattern for years. I write for three months; I lie fallow for three months. But I must have this manuscript finished this year! And I really don’t have time for this fallow shit!

During these fallow months, I have been researching for another manuscript, and I have been interacting with my family.  Some conversations with my family…okay, most conversations with my family exhaust me so much that I could sleep for the following 20 hours.  The fallow period is supposed to be a period of inactivity and recovery. I do not, however, feel “recovered.” I’ve been eating shit on a daily basis—wheat, sugar, ice cream—my crisis foods. I haven’t been exercising consistently. Have I mentioned that my family exhausts me? I don't have the energy or skills to interact with multiple family members on the regular, so I decided to put limits on the number of familial conversations I can bear in a given week. On the other hand, I have been less active when it comes to writing although I have not been wholly inactive.

I read some books and short stories during this time, nothing live-changing except for Alice Munro. I was reading her short story “The Bear Came over the Mountain,” when a simple line in her story led to a deluge of ideas for a novel I’ve been researching off and on for years.

I first developed a Notes.doc for the novel back in 2012, but the inception for the novel happened in 2010. I kept having this dream about a scrawny lil white girl.  She was feisty and vicious.  Couldn’ta been more than 13 years old.  She looked positively feral.  She never talked in my dreams, just stared me down as if daring me to ignore her.  So naturally, I did precisely that. What do I care about some scrawny, cranky lil white girl.  But she was a persistent little fucker.  She started to grow on me. I have a soft spot for feisty, vicious, persistent kids, probably because I was one.  So, I started paying more attention to the dreams.  I figured out that she was German.  Then I really wanted to drop her ass.  How am I supposed to write a book about a German white girl.  Yet, there I was researching German states and female German names and German schools.  Before I knew it, I loved her…was down-right protective of her.  I had a basic idea for a plot, but I didn’t write anything down. I wasn’t ready to commit (I’m a bit commitment phobic). I knew that if I made the commitment, this book would be a huge undertaking.

She crouched down in the recesses of my mind after that. I guess she just wanted a little attention.  She let me be for two years.  Then she came back, not as an aggressor or a dream, but as a whisper.  It was creepy hearing her in that gentle, vulnerable state.  It kind of freaked me out. I didn’t know she could be so fragile.  When a feisty, vicious, persistent person shows their vulnerability, you need to pay attention.  I went back to her immediately. I did not deny her. I did research obsessively for months. I expanded the plot and the characters.  I had committed myself at that point then let it sit some more.

Munro’s short story brought me back to her, now the plot is a whole different animal. It’s far more layered and complex. That seemingly unrelated short story easily led to about 16 hours of research for that novel’s plot. 

Write. Recover. Revise.

I’ve been working on the memoir manuscript for the last month despite my ardent desire to work on the lighter, breezier novel manuscript.  I am averaging 6-8 hours of writing, 4 days a week (sometimes more). 

The days when I produce new non-fiction chapters are the most draining.  This is no surprise, but the completeness with which I feel drained does surprise me.  I can sleep 10 hours after writing a new chapter, and I still feel exhausted the next morning.  It takes days for me to recover and start writing new chapters again.  I know my diet isn’t draining me because when I’m writing, I eat crazy healthy.  Ninety percent of what I’ve consumed this month has been raw/sautéed vegetables with clean protein and gluten-free whole grains (e.g., quinoa and buckwheat).

During my recovery days, I revise previously written chapters.  I may revise a chapter 20-50 times over the course of a year before I am okay with it.  Sometimes I’m still not okay with it.   Even the revision process can be taxing when I have to revise a chapter that involves trauma or a painful revelation.  Last week I revised a chapter about a deceased relative.  After I finished, I felt good about the chapter, but I also felt cranky as hell.  I kept wondering why.  I was having a good, productive day.  Then I started smelling that relative’s perfume.  That hadn’t happened in umpteen years! I was unknowingly transported back to all the pain that person caused me, and it didn’t hit until after the revision.

I completely revised the dialogue for a chapter that I wrote and revised a year ago. The chapter is not emotionally difficult, but it is technically and analogically difficult for me.  There’s quite a bit of dialogue and exposition, and I finally feel like both are equally strong.  The over-arching analogy is quotidian, but the significance for the non-fiction characters is anything but.  I want the chapter to unfold in such a way that the reader thinks, Why are they arguing about this little object? Then, much later, perhaps even after the reader is finished reading the book, I want her/him to see that the character that is introduced in the next chapter is not the impetus for change, but that little quotidian object is. 

I’m working on subtly.  Kym Ragusa, one of my professors in grad school, used to tell me not to bludgeon or overwhelm the reader.  My work, like my personality, can be so fucking intense that it overwhelms.  I don’t have a little smile; I have an electric smile.  I don’t have a quiet laugh; I have a bombastic laugh.  I’m learning to ease people into me.  Give a little intensity here and a little intensity there, so when the power needs to be unleashed, the reader can bear it because I’ve trained her/him to anticipate it in my writing style.

When I write trauma chapters, I handle each word with kid gloves.  Also, I never type trauma chapters (as opposed to writing about the events in my journal) unless:  

1.  I have had enough distance from the events;
2. I have reflected upon the events extensively; and
3. I feel at peace with the situation. 

There’s a scene between my mother and 30-year-old me where my mother reveals something I always knew but never wanted to believe.  This chapter bleeds with tenderness.  When I read that chapter, I don’t even recognize myself.  It was not written by Scrapper Angèle who has busted her ass to get to this creative/emotional place but by Spiritually-Rooted Angèle who is still fairly new to me (i.e., She’s only about 9 years old. I started meditating and gradually changing my eating habits 9 years ago).  Scrapper Angèle is a relentlessly honest fucker.  She temporarily took up jogging after her mother’s revelation.  This was an alternative to cursing her mother out and punching her fists through walls.  In the years after my mother’s revelation, Scrapper Angèle wrote journal entries that were so scathing and frenzied that she occasionally tore through the page with her pen.  Scrapper Angèle vented and kicked her legs in therapy like a petulant child.  Who the fuck says that to her daughter! she once yelled to her therapist.  And thank God she did all the drudge work.

Had Scrapper Angèle not processed through that rage, she could not hand over the experience to Spiritually-Rooted Angèle to make of it a tender narrative.  Spiritually-Rooted Angèle took the experience, meditated on it and contemplated it as she drank her green juice and green smoothies.  She evaluated hundreds of sweet, little everyday experiences and choose one that she could juxtapose with the painful one, all so the reader wouldn’t feel bludgeoned or overwhelmed.  Who knew dissociation could come in so handy?

A Balanced State of Mind

I ate eight full ounces of ice cream yesterday.  Ice cream is one of my toxic foods, i.e., food I eat when I am sad and doing my damnedest to repress it.  These foods include, but are not limited to: cake, cookies, donuts, pizza, milk chocolate, alcohol—anything that’s high sugar, high wheat and/or high dairy.  I know better than to consume these things.  My constitution is quite sensitive (e.g., I’m allergic to wheat, and I get drunk after two beers), and I always feel like shit afterward.  I feel constipated and congested and my mood plummets.  I also know that repressing emotions only exacerbates them, but as I’ve said before, sometimes I just like to fuck things up.

I tell myself: I’m fine with rejection.  I’m used to it by now.  Publication doesn’t matter.  There are more important things in life than being a published writer.  But to some degree, I’m just bullshitting myself.  I’m sad and depressed, and I want a level of comfort that no outside force can give me.  Sure, I’m balanced-on-a-razor’s-edge depressed most days of my life, but after a rejection (sometimes weeks after a rejection), I enter the realm of self-acknowledged depressed.  Here’s the distinction.

Balanced-on-a-razor’s-edge depressed means I’ve been meditating four plus times weekly, taking my Ayurvedic supplements consistently to balance out my serotonin and other hormones, kinda-sorta-half-assed eating healthy, writing (even if it’s just journaling), and exercising an average of once a week.  If I meditate and exercise more and eat better, I can elevate myself to a balanced state of mind.

Self-acknowledged depressed means I just don’t give a fuck about one of the vital components mentioned in the previous paragraph.  Perhaps I only meditated twice that week or I skipped my supplements.  Perhaps I haven’t been writing or exercising.  Perhaps I ate ice cream or drank alcohol (even if it’s just eight ounces).  I end up vegging out on the couch, trying to calculate the exact moment when I failed myself and God.  Note to reader: I am the first to admit that I’m dramatic as hell.

So, I gotta pump the brakes; otherwise, I’ll eat cake or some other toxic food then I’ll skip the gym and meditation, and I’ll be in full-throttle motherfucking depression within two days.  I forced myself to make lunch this morning when I really wanted to sleep late and go out for fast food on my lunch break.  On my commute to work and throughout the day, I repeated over and over again:  I will go to the gym after work.  I will work out.  Yeah, I went to the fucking gym.

I want to throw a tantrum and lick my wounds for the next month, but I have to woman-up.  When I’m hurt, I have to try harder, become even more regimented.  I have to plan my meals, go grocery shopping and cook consistently.  Fuck, I hate domesticity!  But I have to do it.  My husband and I both cook about twice a week, but I have to do more.  He can eat and drink whatever he wants and is a balanced as all get out.  This is not the case for me. 

I have to exercise twice a week at a minimum, ideally more.  I have to read more.  This calms me.  I can work the shit out of a treadmill when I have a good audiobook playing.  I have to meditate and not miss my supplements.  I have to write even if I feel like a loser.  I have to fight for a balanced state of mine every day, or I won’t write.  And I have to write.