sueeeus

Poppy and George have been together for a long time. Forever, even.  They got along well enough when they were younger, but as the years passed, they lost touch of each others’ needs.  It’s not unheard of…

George is pretty much a self-centered bastard.  He’s generally ignorant of Poppy’s ups and downs.  Granted, her ups and downs are far more pronounced as the years go by.  Oh, sure, every once in a while he says he’ll do better, be better, turn over a new leaf, and he he may do a fine  job of being on his best behavior for a while.  But only for a while.  It never lasts, and bit by bit, they find themselves back in that desert place where neither can tolerate each other.  George wants to do what George wants to do.  Poppy reacts.  It’s not that Poppy wants to react.  It’s just that her defenses have eroded after so many years of hiding behind the issues.  She starts to feel better when George plays nice, and she starts to think that everything is just swell, and things are getting back to the way they used to be, back when they were young.  But it doesn’t take long for reality to slap her in the face.  Because sooner or later, George will fall back into his selfish ways.

I don’t know why that is.  It just is.  I don’t think George wants to be a self-centered bastard.  I think he would want to be better, in a perfect world.  There are probably a million factors that contribute to the entity that George has become.  A lifetime of factors.

It’s complicated.

Be that as it may, George is George.  Poppy is Poppy.  It’s clear that something has to change, or nothing ever will.  They will continue living a marginal existence until they do each other in.  Literally.

It’s a scary choice, in many ways, for many reasons, but Poppy has decided that George has got to go.  Poppy has  high  hopes that she will be able to find her stable place again, that she will feel good all the time, and that she will find her old self.  She hopes that she will no longer feel like she’s wasting her life, but instead like she’s embracing and living her life.  Loving her life!

It may seem harsh to send George packing, but at this point, it’s the only solution.  This limbo has been going on for over twenty years.  It will continue another twenty years if nothing changes, or if they don’t kill each other in the process.

Goodbye George.

She wonders if she will be so fickle as not to ever miss him or regret that she made him go.  She can hardly think about it, though.  It’s just too much.

~*~*~*~

Installment 1 of the Poppy Plight.

Characters:
Poppy the pancreas.
George who likes to gorge.
Steve the sleeve.

~*~*~*~

So I’m preparing for bariatric surgery.  I start my pre-op liquid diet on Friday (4 Oct 2013).  This is not a trigger decision.  I’ve contemplated it for YEARS and after much research and thought have decided to move ahead with it.  Surgery is 14 Oct 2013.  I will have the better part of my stomach removed, leaving all my digestive plumbing intact.  This is called a Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy (VSG).  This surgery will allow me to eat, but not overeat.  My body will still  absorb the nutrients I ingest.  I’m very much looking forward to feeling satisfied after eating a normal amount of food.  I stumbled across a blog in which a ‘sleever’ named her sleeve, and thought that was clever.  Also, putting character names to my organs helps me inject a little humor, or at least look at it from another angle.  Because it’s scary.  And it’s permanent.  So I thought it might help me as I embark on this journey.  Although weight and self image factor heavily toward this decision, the driving factor is the fact that I can no longer play the ignorance card regarding diabetes.  I have it.  It’s very clear that my pancreas is not functioning as it should, and that my blood sugar control is erratic.  I have proven to myself that it can be controlled, but I have also to be honest with myself and know that I fall to the same patterns, no matter how vigilant I am, or for how long.  Eventually I slip back.  Hello, my name is George.  I’m on a life-changing journey.  I’m taking steps to make dramatic and permanent changes to improve my life.  This is one of those steps.  So goodbye, George.  It’s time for you to go.