Still Kicking

Hey it's me again.  To all of you who are surrounding me right now with pitch forks and lighted torches, I'm sorry I haven't been responding to mail and other inquiries.  It's been a brutal few months for me and I could only maintain the mere essentials in getting by.  I simply don't have enough energy to do it all so I've been coasting. 

Let me start by saying the band is going really well.  We've been doing a lot of showcases.  Within the last two months I count five showcases so far including the one I just did last night.  It has been WONDERFUL!  The showcases are basically events sponsored by some local entertainment company.  A collection of wedding/special event bands get a 20 minute set each while perspective couples and event planners get to come and watch and potentially pick which band they would like to perform at their wedding or event.  It is mostly held in some local club venue rented out by the entertainment company for this express purpose or it's held at a performance studio.  The 20 minute gigs are the most fun but the least lucrative.  I'm not paid for them at all.  *sigh*  BUT they have the potential to get us recognition and paying gigs so the suffering isn't that bad for now.

Now for the non glamorous part.  About three weeks ago I landed myself in the hospital. A little history first: I have a blood clotting disorder for which I take daily medication.  It is very important that I take this medication every day because my clotting disorder is very aggressive.  I work early morning hours from 7am - 3pm or 6pm so I'm up every morning at 4.  After work I go to gigs or rehearsals and sometimes don't get home till midnight or sometime after, then it's up again at 4am.  With all these late night gigs and rehearsals I've been getting home and am literally entranced with tiredness.  I've often woke up flung across my bed still fully clothed with the lights still on and running blindly for the shower so I won't be late for work.  Such is the glamorous life of a struggling musician but not so much when your life depends on medicine that you must take every night before bed.  I forgot a couple of doses due to my falling asleep and within a week I was in the hospital with an angry clot in my deep vein and one in my lungs. 

For those unfamiliar with the danger, people die instantly from pulmonary emboli.  I've been through this countless times and managed to survive for reasons that only G-d knows, I should be dead right now.  I was scolded on a daily basis via my doctors and all my friends on facebook the entire time I was in the hospital.  My biggest worry at that time was a gig I was scheduled to perform in that was just a week away and was going to pay $450.00.  I needed that money.  A rehearsal was scheduled for the weekend and my blood pressure went up worrying if I was going to get out of the hospital in time to make this gig. Sure I should have been more worried about my health but since I was still alive I still had bills to pay.  I got out in time for the rehearsal and dang if I didn't miss another dose of my medicine?  Seriously, I had only been out of the hospital for 30 hours and it was a repeat of the last two times I missed my dose even with being so scared to death of what this disease could do.  It wasn't like I didn't care or anything, I was really just punch drunk exhausted and couldn't muster it.  That is all it took for my INR levels to drop out of the therapeutic range.  In my experience it takes three days to get back in therapeutic range once you fall out so forgetting to take my meds is very serious.

At one time I dreamed of living this lifestyle of late night gigs and being a part of a scene.  This was supposed to happen in my 20s however, not when I'm well past 40 and not as able to bounce back as easily.  I bought one of those weekly granny pill reminders to remind me to take my pills so that it would not have to dig through the drawer shuffling through vitamins and supplements but that has been hit or miss.  There is just no way I can take them the same time each day what with travel, schedule changes and different time zones.  I just got back from Vegas and keeping a schedule that is compatible with my home time has been challenging.  Then I gigged last night and woke up this morning dressed and lights blazing - no medicine.  I took it this morning but the damage has been done I'm sure.  I'm in danger of clotting as I type this.

I'm the type of person who is good at rituals, not at keeping time.  20 years ago I chose to take my pills at night before bed because it was easier and there was no rush to that time of day so I would not likely forget.  Times would be proximate enough at bedtime though I never anticipated I would be so disoriented from exhaustion that this would ever be a problem.  I'm still trying to find a solution but at this point nothing at all would be any easier than what I'm doing now.  The only alternative would be to switch to a hypodermic medication which would make me therapeutic instantly but this medication would not only create tons of byproduct due to needle disposal but it is much more expensive.  I may have no choice though if I want to live.  I would have to give myself two needles twice a day in the abdomen.  Who knows?  Maybe I can milk the needle angle as some sort of Amy Winehouse/Kieth Richards/Courtney Love drug dependent musician.  I guess Biggie was right: Mo' money, Mo' problems. 

Viva Las Vegas..... Or So It Would Appear.

After all of this I was really looking forward to some R & R.  My annual sojourn to Las Vegas for BBW Network's Las Vegas Bash could not have come at a better time.  I had been looking forward to it for quite some time.  My sister lives there and I usually take time out to see her every year but not this year.  She's been going through some terrible trouble of her own and probably would have loved a visit.  Truth be told, I didn't want to see her because I didn't want to have to do any hand wringing over her.  Her circumstances are much more severe than mine, almost all of it self inflicted, and she is SO needy.  I seriously did not want to have to take care of anybody or be burdened with how badly she is doing.  I'm trained to be self sacrificing when it comes to such things but this time I had to force myself to go to the convention without telling her I was in town.  I felt so guilty about it and had to talk myself down almost the entire time. 

Clearly it seems I have a problem with taking on other people's issues when critical analysis indicates that it is unwise.  A wise person once told me that if you find yourself in the same situation over and over again it is something you are doing to cause it.  Apparently I have some kind of toxic behavior pattern that puts me in these circumstanced time and time again.  I've talked myself through this process countless times but I never seem to change. I was inwardly disgusted with myself as I listened to myself explaining to different people time and again about how I can't do this because I have to meet someone here or I can't do that because I must spend time with someone there and it was not because I wanted to.  I felt like I had to.  It's to the point where even on vacation I can't seem to get away.  By the last day I was so pissed off that I was ready to explode.  I tried not to take it out on people but maybe it's time I should.  Enough is enough.

I need to embrace the power of NO!  I've embraced NO well enough when it comes to some things.  In those instances I've been vilified for being a ball buster so often that I kind of assume this is true about myself in general.  In some circles I'm known for being a bold, no nonsense gogetter but in this particular area of my life I am completely vulnerable.  I'm trying so hard not to be a bitch because I genuinely don't want to be seen as a bad person.  I do believe though that it is time for some feelings to get hurt.   Instead of saying no, maybe I should say FUCK no. 

Hey Hey everybody!  Things are doing much better.  I'm not yet in command of my eating patterns yet but I'm eating a little better now than what I was.  Also I'm taking better vitamins and the heart issues I was having have completely gone away.  I'm drinking coffee again and it's not causing me any issues.  I do have to practice eating better but it's hard when you have no appetite.  Nothing looks appealing enough to make me want to eat it when I'm not hungry.  I stare blankly at my grocery list putting things on it and then taking them off.  Food is meh.  Maybe I ought to watch the food network or something.

Anyway, I'm not here to talk about that.  I'm here to talk about my hair.

Please forgive the clown makeup, I needed to show you the grays in the front.  In this photo my hair is blow dried.  It is nearly as long as my hair in the photo you see below.  When I first blew it out it was really long looking but within an hour it shrunk to the style you see above.  I really like the look of length, especially because it shows the gray in the front like this.  I do not like using blow dryers on my hair but for circus appearances I prefer this look.  Before I went natural my hair was usually styled like the photo you see below:

This isn't my best style work but I like this hairstyle overall.  You can see in the photo that my ends are damaged.  That's because I got lazy and decided to blow dry it straight and the damage was near immediate.  I had to do a quick photo shoot and didn't have time to go through my usual regime so I took a short cut.  The maintenance of my hair was a long process that became burdensome, especially after I got Lyme disease.  The mere thought of doing my hair wore me out and when I got faced with having to have my hair done fast I had to resort to the blow drying.  The style was no longer maintainable at that time and I wanted something easier.  

I thought it would be nice to try growing it natural.  If you look at the picture up there in my profile you will see a hefty fro which is actually a wig I threw on for halloween.  I liked the look a lot and thought I might be able to rock that look.  Also   I'm getting older and there are grays coming in the front.  The way my grays grow in I thought it might be a good way to exploit the look with the fro.  I don't see anyone else in the music business doing this so I thought it would be a unique signature style that would be easy to do and maintain for me.

 Here is the issue.  This photo is of me with my hair completely unmanipulated.  It's just washed and air dried.  No straightening, nothing at all.  In this photo my hair is nearly as long as it is in the 'before' photo I posted above it.  It is taking FOREVER to get my hair to show any length at all to get the look I was going for.  I've tried braid outs, twist outs, flat twists... they look terrible on my hair and blow dryers are DEADLY due to the texture.  The thing is that the texture of my hair is unique even unto other black naturals.  My hair is kinky but it also has a defined curl pattern that is uncharacteristic of most naturals.  Also my hair really is course by the original definition in that it is truly porous.  When I got relaxers my hair really took to them and my hair would become insanely straight.  It drinks up everything: conditioner, water, dye, ketchup - it will drink it right up without much effort.  My hair will release it just as fast too AND my hairs catch on to each other a lot more than most.  The porosity makes it extra sticky and clingy to each other.  I can only detangle it with water and jostling it free.  Notice that I left out conditioner.  Conditioner is not helpful at all to my hair, in fact it sometimes counter productive.  My hair will tangle and knot up more because of the nourishing properties.  The hair immediately responds and the curls engage like an angry mosh pit of tangles.  My hair literally has to be shaken free from one another as much as possible without pulling or they will snap apart, and it will retangle immediately in another spot.  The surface of the hair catches because of the cuticle's natural form.

I don't even really care about that so much.  The main issue here is that I'm not going to get the look that I'm looking for.  The big badass fro is going to take YEARS to achieve.  I literally have to grow my hair to my waist and beyond in order to get even close.    Do I really want hair down to my waist though?  This was supposed to be easy.  It's not.  It's easy in the sense that if my hair gets funky smelling at the gym, I can simply wash it and not have to go through what I had to go through with my permed hair.  Halleluia!  Wash and go.  Love it.  Love.  What I don't like is having to leave the house with wet hair and not having it look the way I want it to.  It's okay, but it's not the look that I wanted.

Let me tell you something about the natural community that I don't like.  There are many people within it that force the idea down your throat that you simply must be comfortable with any old way your hair falls.  You're not supposed to want it long, you're not supposed to want it short, you're not supposed to want to color it or anything. If you're not simply satisfied with the fresh out of bed look of your natural kinky hair then this says something bad about you and how you feel about your origins.  You're ashamed of being black or ashamed of your hair or whatever.  This is a steaming pile.  Hardly anybody rolls out of bed or out of the shower and loves whatever happens.  People like clothes that flatter, styles that they identify with.  I feel like, as a black woman, anything I do gets called into question.  If I seek dreds I'm making a political statement, if I wear it nappy I'm unprofessional, if I wear a weave I'm conceited and weak.  Gees!  Why do all my choices get questioned when anybody else is able to do whatever the hcke they want with their hair?  Black women are especially adept and promoting this hysteria.  Meanwhile half way around the world we are vilified as whores because we don't wear burkhas. I get so sick and tired of hanging around with people who try to guilt trip you about choice and style.  I do shit because I can and because I want to.  That's all you need to know.  Though we be liberated, we are yet still slaves. 

For now I've been putting it back into this fake kinky ponytail and I like it.  I've been getting raves over how wonderful my natural hair looks when styled like this and no one knows it's a wig.  Even if I grew my hair in this long it would never look like this. It would be down to my ass and still not be this big.  It's not the dramatic look I want. Overall I like having my hair natural but I'm not certain it is something I will always do.  I don't generally like the maintenance of relaxed hair but the maintenance of my natural hair takes just as long.  It takes just as long and in the end I'm not crazy about the results.  It's nice but I don't feel it says what I really want to say visually.  I'm an artist afterall. Everywhere I go people say that my hair is perfect for dreds but I'm not sure I want to be confined to dreds either.  I'm thinking I will stick with it and keep growing it out but there are days when I really miss my relaxed hair.

Close Call, But Still Alive

Happy Belated New Year Everybody!  Yeah I know, it has been a while since I've written.  Lot's of stuff's been going on.  First up on the health front.  For those who are just walking in, I am morbidly obese.  I am over 400 pounds and I am clinically malnourished.  Yes that's what I said. I've been obese for all of my life and it runs deep within my family.  Most of the fatties in my family are 450+ but I've been fighting a losing battle all my life trying not to get that big.  it's not so much because I don't like being fat or anything.  It is part of my identity as far as I'm concerned.  I suppose I just have a love/hate relationship with it because the world is so anti fat.  I'm a musician, a singer really, and we are most especially judged on looks so much in this industry.  If I had it my way I would be slim and trim and touring the world in fancy clothes and diamonds.  On a visceral level I'd rather be fat and full and roaring like a lion for all the hot boys who want me.  **RAWR**  As it stands I do have to live in this town so the need to keep things neat and tidy wins out. 

Anyway, I am so terrified of becoming fatter that I've adapted to a very poor way of eating to prevent it, which now that I type it out, at 400 pounds it seems a waste of damned time.  Basically I'm starving myself because sensible dieting doesn't keep the weight off.  As I mentioned before I've been trying to fix my eating patterns, eat better and eat more.  Doc says if I balance it out and eat small meals all day it will fix my metabolism and I'll have the energy to burn fat.  I know that this is a load of crap, I've already tried this before a long time ago.  Nothing is going to 'fix' a metabolism that isn't broken but I'm tired of being tired and fatigued all the time so I'm willing to try anything at this point. 

So I did this.  It was difficult and I'm not just saying that.  I had to eat crap I wasn't interested in during times when I didn't want to simply because it was the right kind of food to eat.  Greek yogurt at 9:30?  100 Calorie bag of almonds at 2:30?  Come on.  I didn't want it.  And I had to take Vitamin D supplements because my count was near non existant.  It was touch and go doing all this.  I hate being focused on food but I figured if I wanted to keep my health I have to do it.  I did as the doctor instructed and right on schedule my weight began to climb.  Now mind you, I was feeling wonderful.  My energy had returned and I was doing pretty good but I did not like that I was gaining. The doctor suggested swapping out some foods.  Maybe instead of eating 'this'  you could eat 'that' and don't have real cheese.  Or only have 'this' on alternate Wednesdays in months beginnig with 'M' and 'J' - it was getting ridiculous. 

Then I got asked to do another gig at the Museum of Fine Arts.  I thought, "I can.not go up there looking like this, I *have* to drop some of this weight!"  Now folks, once you go over 400 pounds, gaining 10 or losing 10 isn't going to make that big of a difference visually to the average person.  It was enough to spook me though and I went back to the way I was eating before, which meant eating nothing.  I had a decent lunch but that was it.  Lunch was my only meal of the day and I barely ate at all on weekends.  When that didn't work I started cutting out carbs.  Then my scale broke and I couldn't tell if it was working or what was going on.  The gig came and went and was fine, but I was feeling more tired and fatigued.  I started souping up my CPAP therapy, got a new mask, was going to bed earlier, was taking walks, started taking vitamins, joined an aqua aerobics class.  Nothing seemed to fix this, I was still falling asleep at my desk.  I started having irregular heartbeats.  You'd think this would scare the shit out of me but nooooo. I stopped drinking coffee which seemed to help the fluttering but the fatigue was still very real.

I've been really strapped for cash lately so I've been bringing my lunch to work each day.  Yesterday I forgot to bring my lunch.  What a mess!  I had some cheddar cheese and some low carb tortilla bread in the fridge at work so I made these microwave roll-ups for lunch.  By the time I got home I was dragging.  I was litterally pulling myself along and felt so stiff. 

I made it up stairs put my stuff away and walked towards the kitchen.  As I moved along I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and gasped at what I saw.  My eyes.  I had dark circles like I've never seen.  My eyes were sunken like a corpse.  For the first time, I saw myself for real and I was a horror to behold.  There I was at 400+ pounds and the malnourishment could be seen on my face.  I could tell right away that I was in rough shape.  I could barely muster the energy to make my dinner.  When I thought about what I had planned for dinner I knew it wasn't going to be enough food.  I sat bemused for a moment knowing that my current course simply wasn't working.  I needed to eat a good dinner, no skimping on carbs or anything else.  I wasn't really sure how I should go about it and then I spotted two cans of low salt V8 juice sitting on the counter.  I have no idea how long they've been there.  I opened them, drank them down and within about a half an hour or so I began to feel better.  I made my intended dinner and followed up with some apple juice and some frozen blueberries.  It was all I had but it did the trick.  Later that evening I checked myself in the mirror and could not get over the difference.  I looked healthy and normal again.  I thought maybe I had imagined the hollow eyes but I know I didn't.  It was there as clear as day.  I looked like I had aged 20 years.

As for the heart fluttering I think I pretty much nailed down where that was coming from.  It seemed strange that I could be drinking coffee every morning for years and then suddenly I lose my tolerance for it.  The heart trouble seemed to happen shortly after I started taking vitamins again.  When I stopped taking the vitamins, the fluttering went way.  I take them again, it came back.  I thought maybe ther ewas something funny about the omega vitamins I was taking, then I took a closer look at the multivitamins.  They were high performance vitamins I bought on sale and they contained Ginseng and Ginko.  Between those two ingredients and the huge cup of coffee I had each morning it's a wonder I didn't zoom off to the moon!  I tossed the high performance vitamins and openes a small sample bottle of Centrum viatims I bought at CVS a month or so ago.  I took one with my vitamin D and so far so good!  No heart fluttering. After a few days I will reintroduce my coffee and see how that does.

Man I have GOT to turn over a new leaf.  I can't keep doing this to myself.  I have to start eating normally, weight gain be danmed.  I was just invited to do a gig at the House of Blues in a few weeks where an agency is going to be there watching.  As I sit here typing this I'm tired again because I havn't eaten. I simply don't have any food, just the stuff I already devised long ago which we already know isn't sufficient.  This talent agency may take an interest in us which will bring us more gigs.  OR they could hate us and I'll be fired.  That's what happened to the last string of singers this band had.  The agency said the singers were bland and the boss fired them all and hired me.  I'm feeling a lot of pressure from this but I have to focus on taking better care of myself.  It's just very hard to do, I'm so damned high maintenence.

Well folks, I got a marriage proposal.  Yep.  A guy I've been friends with for a few years now has expressed an interest in getting married and I'm seriously considering it.  I don't know if I'll be happy being married to this guy or if he will be happy being married to me.  To marry him would require an insane move overseas and I would have to learn a new language.  It would mean leaving my friends and family behind.  It would mean giving up my job and being unemployed over there till I could learn to communicate in that language on a professional level.  That could take a very long time and I'm not certain The Mister could support both himself and me for all that time.  Now my friends seem to be convinced that all I have to do is stand in the middle of the street there and start singing "Que Sera, Sera," and I would have a job within hours.  I could bring in money doing that or teaching English.  Everybody says that though.  How many American's are milling around in foreign countries trying to live on teaching English?  I don't know.  So far I really like this guy though.  I didn't at first but he's starting to grow on me.  Plans are in the works for me to travel to his country and see how I like it.  He sent me a sweet gift for Valentine's day and he has been strangely absent of late.  He's been training for another job in his division that pays more with hopes that he will get it.  I think he might be serious folks.  Either that or he's just telling me that so that I wont catch on that he's cheating on me already with another woman.  That's usually how my stories end up.  We shall see....