Life Lately: Late Summer 2019

                                                art by me, some elder goths may recognize who this is....

Life has been humming along lately.

I still go to the gym and can do 20 minutes of the arm bicycler now. I like doing this new rope pulling exercise. I do hope to do more leg exercises on one machine. There haven't been any weight loss miracles, I did get a bit smaller on top but I believe the gym did help my lungs. We also need to go more times a week, I try for two when not housebound. Sometimes I enjoy exercise now, that is something new. Balancing the energy is not easy, definitely I'm one of the slowest people in there. Some of us have to work with what we got. Young people should be introduced to exercise in a positive way so it can remain a good influence on their life. Maybe the effects are not magic, but if I am still going a year later and like it, that means something. I couldn't even do more then 4 minutes on the arm bicycler when I started.

I'm planning to do another art class, it will be more painting or conceptual art. I also did some art work for a zine recently with husband and worked on those projects. There's been more drawing in my sketchbook.  I plan to do more water colors.

They told me I am going more deaf. My Meniere's has been progressing. My hearing always has fluctuated to be worse, when I have been sick but it's been a slow downward progress. My word recognition went down by 50 percent within a few years.  This has not been easy to deal with. I lost so much hearing, they ordered another hearing test in 6 months. So some of my health stuff does remain scary.  My life still has a lot of medical stuff to be dealt with.

There's blood tests to be done for the UCTD, I had a tooth die I had to get taken out. The thrush comes to knock on the door still and the chronic fatigue is not easy. The pain can stink. I am in bed now. Well a person can only do what they can. The going deaf stuff scares me, a cochlear implant is not possible due to other health stuff but I am researching what are the options for more powerful hearing aids. Sometimes it's frustrating because hearing issues can make life so isolating. One does not want to lose music and other things.

I am trying to live life, and went to a large stamp club yesterday for the first time with a friend, that was fun. It was stamp collector's heaven as they auctioned off stamp albums, bags of stamps and post cards. I limited my spending so there would be food money later in the week, but it was a fun time.

A couple of years ago, I did get involved in the "ex-evangelical" movement, probably around the time of my deconversion. I was able to help a lot of people who were facing the same things I was with coming out of conservative and fundamentalist churches. I made some interesting online friends who were very supportive. One thing we do work on is warning others about the dangerous of extremist religion and the emotional outcomes of spiritual abuse and "high control" churches and religions.

I've been enjoying my UU church a lot. They are great people and wonderful to be around and they have been a very good influence on my life and way of being. The place changed my life so much for the better. When I was young I enjoyed my UU years in ways I had forgotten but many good memories came back too with the intellectual explorations and other sharing. At the present I've been working on projects with them too. I was happy to see neurodiversity advanced there, and to be able to share life with Aspergers and what that means. I think educating people on these things does bring more understanding. This is a place I have felt safe and happy at and that has changed my life in many positive ways.