Sometimes people say my hearing loss is ironic. I have been involved in the deaf world for all these years, and now I have a hearing loss of my own. People love to comment about the irony of this, so much that I’m tired of hearing about it. Now I think of it in terms of fate. Maybe all those years were preparation for my own hearing loss. I certainly didn’t cause it intentionally – it hurt like a bitch and messed up my vacation – but it did happen. So maybe the stars were just aligning me to that point. Hell, I don’t know. But every time somebody says how ironic it is, I can’t help thinking to myself about fate.

I have to go back to homework now, but that’s food for thought.

So I’m a member of a site called FatSecret.com, which is a funny name but they have good food/exercise tracking tools. It’s similar to SparkPeople (which I’ve used in the past) but has a better look to it IMHO.

I have been hovering at 200 pounds for a long time. I wear size 14/16 on top and 18/20 on bottom. I am surrounded by skinny people constantly at school. I try and try to remember that my weight doesn’t matter, and I love that my friends like me even if I am fat. But I’m not happy. I just can’t be. I want to lose weight.

Partly because I want pretty clothes for cheap. (Lane Bryant has some nice stuff, but it’s so expensive – Torrid too.). Partly because I think the people around me are so much better looking than me. And because this, because that. Isn’t it enough that I’m just not happy?

I dislike when people are on diet sites with a start weight of 111 and a goal of 105. Shut up!! Don’t you realize there’s practically no difference? Don’t you realize you make us ACTUALLY fat people feel like whales? Don’t you realize I would love to be your start weight? And yet I know that every time I have those thoughts, some 350-lb person thinks the EXACT same thing about me. So I try to remember that everybody has to determine their own best weight. (With the possible exception of anorexics, who are incapable of determing their best weight due to mental illness. Have I ever mentioned how much I admire anorexics? Such astonishing willpower.)

I talked about this a little bit with my therapist a month ago. But she probably doesn’t weigh over 115 herself, and I just can’t see talking to someone who I am jealous of, about the thing I am jealous of. No, I don’t know her personal experience, maybe she’s lost 300 pounds in the past. But she’s a grad student, and I suspect she is just a skinny little thing like everybody else at college. And I don’t feel that talking to someone who can’t empathize would be helpful. She was a pretty good therapist (for a student) but talking to her about body image just made me feel embarassed and sick. So I don’t think I’ll go back about that particular issue.

If I had $121/week, I think I’d go back on Diet to Go. Of course I’d have to figure out refrigerator space, but I think it would help. It would at least kickstart me and might even get me to 180, which is my current goal weight. My dream weight used to be 110, which is what I weighed in college (the first time). That’s so unrealistic now that I don’t even think about it. Right now I’d like to be about 140 on a long-term basis. I’m 5′4″ so I think that might be okay. But anyway, yeah, Diet to Go…I miss it. I just don’t have $121/week anymore.

It’s all a willpower issue. I have lost weight before; when I first realized I had begun gaining beyond my college weight, I was 168. I went down to 134 on WW but I can’t get back there. I don’t want to do WW again because it’s too easy to cheat. Maybe I should try an all-frozen-foods diet. I could have waffles, soy patties/sausages/bacon, and Amy’s stuff for breakfast. Then various frozen meals for lunch and dinner. I’m not sure there’s enough variety there, though, and when I tried a tiny nibble of meat a couple of months ago I didn’t like it.

This is all just musing, obviously. I’m just whining, really. I’ve been trying to lose weight since 2002 and food has become an obsession. I think about every bite I take. I write long blog entries like this. I plan meal schedules, and I guilt-trip when I break them (which happens almost daily). I’m tired of all this, but I still can’t stop the desire to lose weight. I think if I could be a size 10/12 I would be so happy and feel better. Blah blah lifestyle change etc, yeah yeah. Sigh.

Once again, the idea of eating meat is on my mind. I’ve been a vegetarian since November 1993, nearly 15 years. For the past five years or so, I’ve thought about eating meat again. I originally became a vegetarian for ethical reasons, I used to do the “I won’t eat anything with a face” thing, but I now feel like it’s just become a habit. I know about being vegetarian is better for the environment and all that, and I like doing things that are good for the environment, but I am just so curious about eating meat again. Today we went to Chutzpah for lunch, and :A: ordered the matzoh ball soup. Here’s the conversation we had:

Me: So…what does the chicken broth taste like?
Her: Uh…chicken? (pause while I keep peering at her bowl) Do you want some?
Me: Well…I’m thinking about it.
Her: (gets a spoonful of broth ready)
Me: (stares at broth)
Her: It would be the first time you’ve intentionally eaten meat in 15 years.
Her: No! I can’t do it! (resumes eating egg salad sandwich)

I just don’t know. I’d like to open up my diet meal options, there are only so many different foods available from Lean Cuisine and Healthy Choice, etc. I just don’t know. I think about it a lot, actually. I like saving animals, I like saving the planet, but it just feels like a habit I can’t break. I’ve been doing it for 15 years, after all…more than half my life. Is it awful to just try eating a chicken dish from Lean Cuisine? What does it mean if I do? Will I have given up vegetarianism? If I decide I don’t like it, can I really call myself a vegetarian again, if I ate meat deliberately that one time? Will I still love chicken with cashew nuts like I did when I was a little kid? Will it taste good? Will I feel immoral, breaking my long-held beliefs? I just don’t know what to do.

Well, a few people asked me questions. So I have answers!

What is your waist measurement (if that’s not too personal)? It’s *very* pretty.

Right now I honestly don’t know! When I started wearing corsets, I think I was wearing 32″ and probably 35″ natural. Over time I got down to wearing a 24″ but with much more reduction, so probably 28-30″ natural. I’ve probably gone back up, I don’t think I can wear my 26″ anymore, or even my 28″, but I am working on bringing it back down because I miss wearing corsets. I have them in my closet and I see them all the time, so it’s a good motivator! (I can’t afford to buy one that would fit the shape I am now.)

Buttsechs?

On occasion, under specific circumstances.

You posted a lot about your recent diagnosis of permanent hearing loss and that you’ve been reclassified at school. How has that affected your classes and friendships at school?

It’s funny…most of my friends are really happy for me, and at least one of my hearing friends is jealous! Pretty much every time I told somebody, they said “oh congratulations!” or something to that effect. It doesn’t affect my classes or friendships at all since everything is in ASL all the time anyway. In fact, school is the only place having a hearing loss has absolutely no effect whatsoever! Outside of school I’m constantly asking people to repeat themselves, etc – but school is no problem at all. My friends all seem to be pretty much happy for me, though…it’s cute. One of my friends even gave me a big hug when I told him about it.

what’s your favorite food?

Peanut butter all the way. No matter what form it’s in, I love peanut butter. Cookies, cakes, candies, ice cream, pies, soup, main dish, sandwiches…I love peanut butter!

I’ve been thinking more about identity and stuff, with regard to the hearing loss. One person asked me if I was sad or excited, a hearing friend said they would be excited, and another person was surprised I wasn’t excited.

I guess the reason I am on the fence about my feelings is because of my “other life.” I’m pretty sure I’ve talked before about feeling a separation between the person I am at school and the one I am at home and at work. It’s really hard to put into words, but I know it has to do with going home every night…that period of “sorry, I have to leave” is what makes things weird for me.

Anyway, I’m totally fine with having a mild hearing loss, I’m not super-worried about it. But I do want to have it corrected, mostly because it does affect my job. There are plenty of hard of hearing interpreters, so it’s not that strange, but it would be bad if I didn’t get it corrected and still tried to work. It would also make things easier with my family if I didn’t have to keep asking them to repeat themselves. Especially my wife, because she speaks softly as it is, and when she speaks more loudly it sounds like she’s mad. She says that’s just the way she yells, it just comes out that way, but I can’t help feeling worried that she’s annoyed by having to repeat herself multiple times…it DOES sound like she’s annoyed, I’m not imagining that part, but the intent behind it is what’s hard to figure out. I don’t think she would be the type to get mad that I couldn’t hear her, but it’s hard to tell because it does sound like she’s yelling.

So I do have a hearing loss, and as long as it can be corrected for work and family situations, I’m not worried about it. If I had no
familiarity with deafness I might be freaked out, but I know what can be done and I know how to handle it. Come to think of it, I’m not so different from classmates and friends who are perfectly happy being deaf but still wear hearing aids or cochlear implants for visiting their families or going to work. People say “aren’t you excited to have a hearing loss?” Well, yes I am, but I still want to be able to hear adequately in some situations. I think that’s what it is. Yay, I have a hearing loss, great! But can it please be correctable? That’s what I want the answer to.

I have to admit that I felt a little different today in my Deaf Studies class, where the teacher doesn’t know I’m “hearing” – I felt like, if she asked, what would I call myself? Am I still hearing? Am I hard of hearing? Am I late-deafened? (A catch-all term that doesn’t necessarily relate to the amount of hearing loss.) Am I just “losing my hearing?” I don’t feel like I can just say “I’m hearing” anymore, because I am having the experiences of a person with mild hearing loss, I have been told I have a mild hearing loss, etc. So does taking away the phrase “I’m hearing” lend street cred in a similar way that using the phrase “I’m a CODA” does? I’m talking about identity within the Deaf community, not just self-identity or medical identification. I mean, I haven’t felt like a fully hearing person for months now.

A friend of mine compared it to being gay…trying to find one’s identity that way. I guess I can see that as a valid comparison. I
wish I didn’t have to wait so long for my next appointment…it’s only three weeks away, but I want answers now. One thing I know for sure, is that if I get a hearing aid, I am totally getting a hot pink earmold for it. Maybe even with glitter.

Today I finally had my audiogram. It’s really been bothering me that I’m not hearing as well as I used to, so I was very excited about the test. The answer was “hey, you do have a mild hearing loss, but we don’t know why – come back in a few weeks, we’ll stick electrodes on your head, and then figure out where to go from there.”

They’re not sure how much it had to do with the scuba accident. Apparently my eardrums are still flaccid (they used the word “hypermobile”), but oddly enough my middle ear muscle refuses to respond to even very loud sounds. Nearly all my levels are now below normal, and my hearing has dropped a fair bit at 4000Hz. So apparently there is a mild loss, but they don’t know why, it could be several things. In three weeks I will have an Auditory Brainstem Response test. I hope they can help me somehow.

They did suggest that the reason I’m so sensitive to a mild loss is because of my profession. I have no idea…if I weren’t an interpreter, would it still bother me that I can’t hear the TV or my wife? It does bother me that I don’t hear as well as I used to. I want help for that. I don’t care how well I do or don’t hear right now, and I don’t care how they help me. I want to hear like I used to.

Let’s just clarify this a little.
Meredith is the #434 most common female first name
0.033% of females in the US are named Meredith.
Around 40425 US females are named Meredith!

Meridith is the #2776 most common female first name
0.002% of females in the US are named Meridith.
Around 2450 US females are named Meridith!

Merideth is the #3699 most common female first name
0.001% of females in the US are named Merideth.
Around 1225 US females are named Merideth!

That’s right, it’s the four hundred and thirty-fourth most common name. There are more than 40,000 American women with my name. Variants are exceedingly uncommon. So why does everybody get it wrong?! (Thanks to NameStatistics.com for the numbers.)

There’s nothing to make a girl feel old like reading the mindset of most of her classmates. It totally shocks me that kids I attend class with don’t remember the Berlin Wall coming down, or the Soviet Union being a secret superpower that we were scared of, or Nelson Mandela being released from prison, or the Tiananmen Square massacre, or Burma! How can I possibly be that much older than half the people I know? I mean, I was only eight when a lot of that stuff happened, but I remember all of it! Of course I didn’t go see the Silence of the Lambs movie when I was a kid, but I definitely remember being grossed out by the poster and seeing it on the theater marquee. And I remember when I’d never even heard of Wal-Mart! I’m only 27, why am I so old?!?!

As much fun as I’m having in school, as many friends as I have right now, I’m still afraid. It’s not self-esteem this time. My good grades have done wonders for my self-esteem. It’s plain old insecurity.

Maybe part of this stems from not living on campus, but I’m afraid of losing my friends. What’s going to happen next semester? Next year? Will I find myself back in the land of having books as my only friends? Will I study hard and get good grades but find myself alone?

It almost makes me want to run away from school so I forget about the friends before they forget about me. But really, did I come to school for a social life, or for a degree? Shouldn’t I be happy getting A’s even without the friends? Is it just that I have something now that I’ve never had before (ie, friends) and I’m afraid of losing them?

School is my job now. I haven’t had a lot of friends in my previous jobs. Can’t I get by without them? Secretly eating my lunch in the Deaf Stacks of the library, hoping nobody catches me with the food? Or will I just work a lot more hours so I forget about it all?

Why am I so scared, dammit? Maybe I am worth keeping as a friend. I’m smart and I can give advice sometimes and I try to be nice to everybody. So why do I worry like this?

I wrote this on April 5, 2007. Just wanted to look back on it now.

I am so fucking scared. Today I got notification of my raise for passing the CI, which is retroactive to the date I took the test (they didn’t do that for my CT, which was 9 months before I got the results). I am making $51,500/yr. And I’m leaving it to go back to school full time.

Am I fucking insane? I must be crazy. There can be no other explanation.

I’ve agonized over this, I’ve cried over this. I’ve bawled over this. There have been honest-to-goodness real GOVERNMENT jobs for interpreters coming up on USAjobs.gov, and what am I doing? I’m going back to school. I am making $51,500/yr and I am 26 years old. And what am I doing? I’m going back to school.

In-fucking-sane. God DAMN.

And yet this is still the best decision I’ve made in my life. I am so happy now. I am elated to be in school and have friends and learn things. I’m thrilled that I might actually get my degree this time. Seeing how much I was making is still a little shocking, but all that money still couldn’t have bought me happiness. And now I am happy.