Revisiting "Raising Awareness"

I've been doing this blog for a number of years now, through a tumultuous marriage and eventual divorce, and during a couple of my dating escapades. All through them I've done a couple of "Raising Awareness" posts. I wanted to go back and revisit them to give some people advice on how to cope.

My very first blog post ever was Raising Awareness of Dyspareunia. I was never officially diagnosed with it, yet it was definitely a thing I was dealing with at the time. My life has changed drastically since this blog post was written, and I'm happy to say that it's no longer an issue. It turns out that, despite my constant self-talk of "everything is okay", it was definitely not okay and nothing was going to convince my brain otherwise. Now that I've moved on from my not-so-great marriage and dating a couple of other guys, I can safely say that it was my horrible relationship that caused the dyspareunia. This just proved further that women are emotional beings; they need that connection, that love, that commitment (unless you're just horny as crap and find any guy you can find - which is definitely not me), and if you're having issues in your relationship, that can easily carry over into your sex life. It's quite a relief actually because, if you read the blog post, I was pretty depressed about ever being able to find someone to love me with an issue like that (if I ever needed to). It's good to know that it wasn't a permanent thing.

The next one I wrote was Raising Awareness of Gallstones. This is another happy ending. I finally broke down and had a consult with a general surgeon about getting my gallbladder removed, which was mentioned in an update I made to the original post. It cemented my belief that I shouldn't go through with it. I was never having constant, like weekly attacks. They weren't even monthly. They were easily managed with Vicodin. I brought up my concern of that fact that each person (who spoke about their gallbladder removal) had a different experience in the aftermath. Some were perfectly healthy. Some could never eat fatty food again. Some had to basically live their life in the bathroom after every meal. And, I self-diagnosed myself with IBS (which isn't really hard to do, to be honest. I'm surprised I never wrote a "raising awareness" post about IBS), and my biggest fear was that removing my gallbladder would exasperate my condition. The surgeon obviously couldn't guarantee that it wouldn't. He also told me that it was completely my choice. I chose to leave it in.
Anyway, this is all beside the point. Along with not having any gallbladder attacks, I haven't had an IBS attack in a very long time either, and I'm going to contribute this to my healthy diet. My diet is quite low in fat, which has been known to exasperate both conditions. I do believe that I essentially "cured" myself with a good diet, 100%.

The next post in the series was Raising Awareness of Blepharitis, which is basically the inflammation of the eyelids, and is annoying as f*ck to treat and often reoccurs anyway. I only ever had the issue when I was wearing my contacts because that's when it became very noticeable, and I could not treat the issue (with the antibiotic ointment) with my contacts in, so wearing my contacts at all became a chore. There is no cure for it, but a lot of people on forums and other more legit research articles say that doing one thing or another (like taking fish oil supplements) helps decrease attacks. I found that not to be the case, but let me share my "cure" with you. I have been doing these two things for a couple years now and it basically brought my attacks to zero:

I wash over my eyelids during every shower with a Clarisonic brush. The type of face wash I use doesn't seem to matter. I just think using it to wash my eyelids in this manner helps keep the pores from being blocked and the eyelids from getting inflamed.
The second thing I do is use my own mixture of coconut oil/olive oil/vitamin E oil/almond oil/essential oil blend as an after shower moisturizer for my skin and pay special attention to my eyelids. Coconut oil is probably 80% of the blend (so it stays solid at room temperature) and it has anti-microbial properties. I think that helps keep my eyelids clean as well. I've been able to wear my contacts issue-free for a long time. I'm quite confident that I won't have another flare-up. Also, this moisturizer is pretty bomb and I recommend anyone with dry skin to make their own. I also use it in my hair after I shower as well.*

*I wrote this a long time ago (this post has been sitting in my drafts folder forever) but I figured I can keep it for those that might be suffering; because as of August of last year I actually got the LASIK procedure and although I hadn't had a blepharitis attack in a long time, I won't even have to worry about them messing with my contacts ever again!
 
The last one I wrote about was Raising Awareness of PVCs. There's not really much to mention here besides the fact that I haven't been getting them anymore. It might have something to do with a better sodium to potassium balance. 


 [Hardly anyone gets enough potassium in their diet even when they're trying - a banana has 400mg, and you need around 4,000mg. Even supplements only give you 99mg because they will disrupt your, um, bowels if you have too much at one time. This is why people complain of getting sick when they're using Keto-based BHB salts that bind with potassium.
Also, off topic here but you know that stuff you drink when you're going to have surgery in order to clear your system? Magnesium citrate? Yeah, too much magnesium will do it too!]


Anyway, besides committing to a standalone potassium supplement and keeping my intake of salt pretty decent, I'm getting more potassium in my diet with avocados and such as well. So I'm hoping that contributes to a healthy heartbeat.



Well, I hope y'all learned something today. I'll keep writing more "raising awareness" blog posts if and when I get new shit going on as I get older. I'm sure it's bound to happen.

Raising awareness of dyspareunia

This blog post may be a little TMI for some folks. If you know what dyspareunia is and will continue reading (I promise not to be too graphic) then great. If you don't know what it is, well hell, that's what I'm here for, and here's a link:

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/painful-intercourse/DS01044

Yeah okay, link clicking probably not necessary.
So, if you're still here, I want to start off with that I kind of want to write a book about this, but I don't really have enough experience, so I'll go with the blog. (And I don't mean experience in publishing. More on this later).

Having dyspareunia is a life-altering diagnosis. It can ruin relationships and make you feel like crap. If you read the link, you'll remember that there are different reasons for having dyspareunia. Basically there are two if it's on-going: One, there's something physically wrong with you, or two, you might have psychological issues. I'd bet I'd ring at number two, since my paps are normal and I've had a CT of the abdomen.
But, this is getting a little off-subject. What I really wanted to talk about was the relationship-altering part. Sex bombards us every day. What pleases our partners, how much sex to have each week, how it helps relationships to have more sex yadda yadda. Your typical guy will think about sex, what was it, every 6 seconds? And probably want it 3 times a week, or at the very least once a week. Go much beyond that and they're screaming at you. Oh, the stress of it all is killing me. Cuz sex is a stress-reliever, you know.

With me, and probably with a lot of women that suffer along with me, I could care less about sex. A psychologist would probably tell me that when sex is painful, it causes a negative reaction to it (duh). Makes you want it less, and you fear it will be painful every time you try, so you try less. Somebody tell me, what guy would want to marry a woman like that? (Well, Justin did, which I love him dearly for his patience and understanding because our sex life has like, been on vacation for months. In fact, Sex lives more in Barbados now than it does here, and it's more like a vacation when it comes back.)
Painful intercourse, for me at least, is not guaranteed 100% of the time, although it's in the majority. I'd say 70% of the time it's painful, 20% of the time it's more like a numbness where it's like "I know you're there, but I got nothin", and the other 10% it's normal and feels good and yay! But that's only 10% of the time. Not very good odds.

And that brings me back to the lack of experience part. These numbers, although fairly accurate in there standings, are based upon sex that happens once every 3 months or some damn thing, with one partner. I've only had 2 in my life, so to write a book based on the fact that "typical guys hate dyspareunia and will never marry you" would not be very accurate. But, this is what I believe. It makes sense to me. You tell a guy upfront about it, he'll probably never call you for that second date, if he understands what it really entails. You wait until it's time for sex (which, let's face it, at this day in age is about date #3. But, since I've never dated I probably shouldn't be spouting off random numbers.) By date #3, you don't know if he's marrying material, and besides the fact that I'd probably never have sex with a guy that soon, it's just too early for the guy to be so head-over-heals in love with you that he just doesn't care about your dyspareunia.
And yes, of course, there are gems like Justin, who obviously doesn't like it, but is basically okay with it. There are probably more guys out there like that than I think. After all, I've never been on the dating scene, so I shouldn't be writing this at all, really. I mean, I found Justin so what the hell am I complaining about?
I'm just letting people know that it sucks. It really sucks. It's a vicious cycle that even our relationship, as patient as it is, can't handle. Yes, sex brings you closer to your companion. You share; you experience together. Without it, it's like a gaping hole. It's more like being roommates where you just happen to sleep in the same bed. Because, like I said above, dyspareunia is caused by, and can cause, psychological issues. I'm sure my issues came before the dyspareunia, as I always had a low self-image and self-esteem. But I think the  expectation of pain during sex can cause more pain. Also, I believe it has severely lowered my libido, which I guess I can count as a blessing as wanting sex and not being able to have it might be worse.

Is dyspareunia a relationship killer? Maybe, maybe not. You might marry a guy that says he's perfectly okay with it, but two years down the line you're at each other's throats and you don't know why. And suddenly, lacking sex is in the forefront. Everybody that's anybody says that sex is meaningful and important. If you can't have sex, even if it's just not as often as your partner would like, you may be in for a surprise a few years down the line.