back from the netherworld

Or at least from U of T. Its been over 18 months since I've written in this journal, but yesterday, Maria from the Family Care Office said to me "I miss your blog!" To which I replied "Somebody actually read the thing? Amazing." So I suppose I will start writing it again. I've also started two other blogs since then, one is a pictorial blog inspired by my ANA300 class, and one is a journal that I'm required to keep for my buddhist psychology class.

I'm in fourth year now. My daughter is four years old, and has started school herself, junior kindergarten is treating her nicely, but whoever heard of giving a four year old homework? I fundamentally disagree with that, as she does more on her own time in terms of learning her letters or anything else for that matter. She is frighteningly brilliant, some days I worry very deeply that she will be in a position sooner than later that eclipses my wits, and then I'm doooomed, heh. But that's not today, and I still have a threat of a naughty step in my arsenal.

I had a very tough year last year. There were a variety of reasons for it, which I will list briefly because I am on the other side of them for the most part, and can look back in retrospect and be happy that is no longer what I'm dealing with. At the end of second year, all hell broke loose in terms of my gut. I lost approximately 35 pounds in about 6 weeks, and was really struggling as I wasn't really getting very many nutrients. I had had a localized rash in first year that had been treated by a dermatologist in second with liquid antihistamine (which had a side effect of being an anxiolytic, it was awesome, and I was sleeping 12 hours a night because it knocked me out cold), but through various clinics and skin tests and upper intestinal tract biopsies, it was eventually determined that I have a gluten intolerance. So, no wheat. This caused a lot of problems. A lot of problems. As in, I was vegan for 3 years in my early 20's and that was a cakewalk in comparison to this. One of the things that I did in order to save time for studying during the day, for example, was buy a slice of pizza - cheap, semi alright in terms of food, and the best part about it? edible walking to my class/library. Not possible with a gluten intolerance. Problem 2: no chinese food. Soy sauce has wheat in it. Problem 3: can't eat french fries that have been cooked in the same oil as battered food. Problem 4: I really really like cookies. And on and on and on and on ad infinitum. So literally, I had to start from scratch and start, and rebuild not only my diet but how I thought about food. Rather than regarding food as fuel, I had to all of a sudden worry about it constantly. I felt like I went from losing weight because nothing would stay in me for more than 20 minutes to losing weight because I could no longer eat anything at all on this planet. It took a long time to adjust, and really was probably one of the hardest things. The other problem was that when I started the gluten free diet, I no longer took the liquid antihistamine, so my anxiety levels shot through the roof, and I was no longer sleeping more than 5 hours a night. It was a bit of a shock to the system.

Now, compared to that, believe it or not, a custody battle is a relatively minor undertaking, but yes, it did present itself to me. It will have to wait for another day though, because my 15 minutes is almost up. As well, the severe crisis of confidence I was having in my belief structure and core motivations for being at school, but I have a feeling that will be a post in of itself. Yeah. A lot happened last year.