Sometimes I make changes in my life and know they're not going to work. I make them because I'm supposed to, I'm supposed to make myself a "better person" and engage in this constantly evolving concept of who I am and ascend the continuous spiral through the progressive stages of enlightenment and peace and tranquility and blah blah blah blah...
And even as I'm justifying this new-age crap to myself I know its not going to work. I do a half-assed job of talking myself into it so that when, not if, I fail I can easily justify falling off the wagon and back into my lazy, self-indugent behaviour that I know is so wrong but I do anyway because the cover of Cosmo told me to "treat myself"...with a brick of cheese and a magnum of cheap wine.
Any smoker (ex or current) knows what I'm talking about.
Because the best thing about quitting smoking is when you start smoking again. That first cigarette out of the pack is sweet surrender and delicious self-loathing all wrapped up in carcinogen-soaked paper.
My bad habits are like all the "bad boy" boyfriends I've had, the worse they got the more feverishly I'd throw myself idiotically back into their arms. Every time I tore myself away I'd have a good cry, one hell of a pity party for myself, and I swear off the man (the boy), the ciggies, the booze, the apathy, the self-hatred and self-doubt - I'd swear it off forever.
But then there are those other kind of changes.
It's quite weird because all the genuine moments of change that have come about in my life were all...quiet. They came without grand declarations, the buying of self-help books or weak attempts to go to the gym on a regular basis. They came as if some deep internal mechanism finally turned over and the hum of my engine settled into the right gear for moving forward at speed.
Two months ago I fainted while getting myself a glass of water in the middle of the night. I remember standing at the sink, the pint glass half filled with ice was sitting on the counter. And then...
I was confused. Why was I lying on the kitchen floor? A wild tangle of hair was all I could see and as panic took over I frantically brushed the hair out of my face and felt the numbness on my cheek and temple. I'd toppled like a tree and caught the full impact of the fall with the left side of my face.
Over the next few days the effects of the accident became disturbingly clear. At work I couldn't focus, I just couldn't get things right. Orders that I'd written down correctly on my note pad would come out of the kitchen inaccurately; steaks the wrong temperature, sweet potato fries instead of regular and cheese on the burger for the girl with the lactose allergy.
And no matter how hard I worked I couldn't fix it.
Outside of work a paralyzing exhaustion gripped me, I woke with axe-like headaches splitting me in two, I'd find my keys in the fridge and vegetables in the dish rack.
I was a certified mess.
Several visits to the disinterested docs at the walk-in clinic later (and several panicked calls to my MD mother) and I had a diagnosis...a moderate to severe concussion whose aftereffects would linger for at least three months...maybe more.
To speed the healing process along for my bruised brain the docs (and mom) were full of suggestions:
-no booze
-no drugs
-no exercise
-no work
-no reading ("US magazine is ok," said one of my docs.)
-no stress/anxiety
-no thinking
Essentially: DO NOTHING!
At first this regimen was extremely hard to follow. I work in a bar, most of my friends work in bars or restaurants, most of my friends don't lie in bed all day watching back episodes of "The Great British Bake Off" because it requires minimal brain activity. It would be safe to say I was at a loss. Without my bedtime herbal cigarette I found it hard to sleep, I found I was constantly bored and fidgety. I wished and wished with all my might that I would wake up in the morning feeling magically better and I could just get fucking on with it! ...with life!
But that didn't happen...obviously.
And as the weeks started to trundle by, weeks where I went home immediately after work, puttered around the house on my days off, and kept my body clean as a starched white collar, I got used to it. Everything felt slow, painstakingly slow at times, but for the first time in a long time I felt every moment as it approached, arrived and passed from my consciousness.
I've started to enjoy life without alcohol or my herbal cigarettes to distract or entertain me, as if life weren't enough. I've REALLY started to enjoy feeling that I am my best self.
I confess that I do miss a good glass of wine or champagne but I think it's time to own the fact that I feel better, in my body, in my heart and in my soul, without it.
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