Dear, guys – welcome back to Letters From Liz.
It’s been way too long since I sat down and wrote something that wasn’t creative writing related. I’ve been really enjoying being on the blog and writing out The “Something” Series because it allows me to be in a head space where I don’t have to worry about personal things or thoughts that would trigger my anxiety. Also, I’ve been really enjoying living in these world of characters, so that’s why the blog has been mainly creative writing as of lately.
I wanted to come on here and just free write some shit because I sometimes miss it. There are days when I want to sit down and write these type of blog posts but worry that I might be saying something too personal or simply no one cares about what’s up with me. I guess in the long run I do these type of posts for myself; to allow myself and time and space to air out some things that have been on my mind or just some things I want to share to the public.
First things first: surgery has not happen yet. My last test needed to take was delayed due to scheduling conflicts and availability, so I had to wait a couple of months to get the test completely done with. Two weeks ago, I went to the sleep center to take my sleep study test; it primarily tracks your sleep to detect any sleep disorders and issues regarding sleep so that when they put me under for surgery, there’s no problems or issues. It was extremely different than what I thought; they hooked me up to about 20 different wires and then had to hear a net around my head but nevertheless, I went to sleep and woke up and now it’s finished. I have some blood work that I had done last week and now we are waiting for the results and then I’ll officially be in the pre-op process. This process has been an extremely long one; sometimes I fear that I’ve done all the testing and preparing for nothing because God forbid one of these very last things on the list doesn’t clear me or something. Sometimes it feels unreal that this is a process towards weight loss surgery, but here I am, almost at the very end.
Secondly: the journal article process is also coming to an end! (Hopefully!) My mentor and I got reviews back from the editors a couple of weeks ago and we have just one minor revision to do and hopefully we are good to go! This article has also taken way too long to conclude: we discussed possibly doing a collaboration piece back in Fall 2018 when I was a Teacher’s Assistant for Ro, my mentor. We then started to do some brainstorming and reading over the Summer of 2019, but then I got hired at my job at the bookstore and things were put at a halt while I was working and she was teaching at the college. Then the pandemic happened which then I used it as an opportunity to reach out to Ro and ask her if she was still wanting to work on he piece since we both now had time, and long and behold: our very first draft was 30 pages and it was written in a week. Personally, I enjoy writing (and reading) academic pieces like this and it’s a field I would love to be a part of one day without the whole slaving myself at a graduate school trying to get my PhD in Rhetoric Composition and Writing Studies. Within this process I’ve been diving into some Zoom conferences about the topics I would love to be more well-rounded on and taking notes on the presentations and whatnot. But yeah: mid-April is our next submission month and hopefully it’s our last before publication!
I’ve been diagnosed with something new. It’s something that I figured I was dealing with for years, but always stayed silent or believed it wasn’t that much big of a deal until I realized I literally had a breakdown and had to talk about what was happening to me. In hindsight, I spoke to both my therapist and psychiatrist about what was happening and both came to the conclusion of PMDD. It’s pretty much a severe case of PMS and it usually is onset before your 30’s. Severe depression and impairment of functioning is usually apparent during the first two week leading up to your period and boy it’s not fucking pretty. Since then, I’ve been taking medication to regulate my mood swings throughout the month. So far, I’ve been feeling a bit better and my last cycle wasn’t as brutal as the one in late January/early February. I still have my highs and lows, but for the most part I am trying my best to get through each month as calm and okay as possible these days.
Lastly, I am just taking it one day at a time. I go to work on the days I am scheduled, I go to my appointments whether they are for my bariatric surgery or mental health, and I’m still doing my collecting thing! I’ve been finishing up my Seungsik album collection for Victon’s latest comeback and gathering the other photocards that I want for my collection. I’m thinking about redoing my binder collection and my collection area: I have some more space and are getting into a lot more groups that have really good discographies! I’m also trying to be a bit more active on my collection account because it does give me great joy to make layouts and post parts of my collection! Also, two of my favorite boys in Victon have birthdays in April, so I got to plan ahead on those collection pictures for that!
That’s all I really have to talk about! Life’s just been slowly going as the days pass and I’m taking it one day at a time, especially while I wait for this bariatric surgery clearance process goes on.
Welcome back to the blog, readers. 🙂
Letters From Liz. 