so tired

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Some Quick Bullets, Mainly About the Kitten

We have welcomed our new housemate!!!!!

By the way, it is Very Difficult to do anything at all when you have a kitten. He is quite darling and very distracting. Case in point: it has taken me three days to get this poor excuse for a post into WordPress.

He is what I consider to be the platonic ideal of a cat. He is playful and weird and does that thing where he will be walking sedately and then will suddenly take off for reasons known only to him. And yet he is also incredibly cuddly, and will sit on or beside his humans for hours, purring loudly. He has had no trouble identifying and using his litter box, he is already starting to come when we call him. He seems to prefer being in the same room as his humans, although he does enjoy exploring the house. He is friendly and cheerful and not easily startled. He loves to play with toys, especially these silly little crinkly mylar balls – two of which are already lost forever underneath our oven. He loves to look outside. He seems to prefer sleeping on his back, fluffy tummy bared.

When I called the vet to make our kitten’s first appointment, the (very kind and friendly) person I spoke to asked for his name, and then said, “Oh my god, my cat’s name is Leonardo, too!” And then he added, “We named him after ALL the Leonardos.” But then he could only think of two – DiCaprio and DaVinci. Are there other Leonardos? I mean, there’s the Ninja Turtle. But I’m pretty sure that’s a mononym in the spirit of Cher/Beyonce/Sting, right? Anyway, I’m trying to get the nickname Lenny to stick, but my husband and child are resisting with all their might and they might be wearing me down. I already have to scroll through my parents’ cat’s name and their dog’s name before I come up with Lenny, and with my kid saying her chosen nickname constantly… I don’t think I can keep it up. Lenny may end up being his blog name, which is a surprising benefit of having a blog. Perhaps I should have chosen a blog name for Carla instead of reserving them for potential future children.  (Edith and Eloise were my top contenders.) 

Pre- and now even peri- (intra-?) kitten, I have been sleeping pretty well – waking up only once-ish per night and falling back to sleep pretty quickly. Because sleep is normally a major challenge, I wanted to note for Future Me that sometimes it’s not. Is it because I am taking all the supplements right now? (Magnesium, B6, B12, iron, vitamin D – okay, so not all all but more than I was taking which was nothing.) The other thing I will note is that I am still tired. If I sit down, I will fall asleep. So either there’s something going on that we have not yet tested for (all my labs are totally normal, and my at-home sleep study showed no evidence of apnea), or – and this is my personal theory – being tired is just How It Is, and maybe I notice it more now because I am less busy.

 

My kid is still in school, but summertime is imminent and I Am Pumped. I am looking forward to more leisurely mornings, to spending time outside, to forcing encouraging my child to read through bribery the thrill of the vast literary canon.

On the cooking front, I am in one of those phases where I cannot think of a single food I want to eat, let alone make. We’re depending a lot on leftovers of the few things my husband suggests and/or takeout. To make matters more complicated, after such a long, damp, cool spring, we have suddenly been skyrocketed into the 80s and it’s too hot to turn on the oven. My air fryer makes a mean piece of salmon though.

Oh – okay, more about the kitten. 

So far, I have had itchy eyes but no other allergic reactions to the cat. And I could just as easily attribute my itchy eyes to the increase in pollen outside. 

Let’s see. Are there any negatives about having a cat? I mean, I can’t do anything unless I shut him away in his temporary room. But that’s not annoying as of yet. He does, of course, occasionally scratch the furniture which is not ideal. But I was expecting that, and we are also working on it. It took me all of two days to release my deeply-held conviction that I would never ever welcome a cat tree into my home; now we have a cat tree. He gets carsick, which is sad. Oh – he is obsessed with my houseplants, so I have temporarily relocated them to higher places and may need to re-home some of them. (Why are so many houseplants toxic???) He is also obsessed with climbing on the kitchen table, and then immediately shoving his entire head into whichever water glass is sitting there unattended. 

He has absolutely no grace. I thought cats were supposed to be agile and graceful and have good balance and land on their feet, but Lenny is unaware of these stereotypes. He leaps at things and misjudges the distance. He flops over on things with edges (cat tree, chair seat, ottoman) and falls off them. He trots along the back of the couch and slips off every few steps. I even asked the vet about it; she seemed unconcerned. Perhaps kittens are the equivalent of toddlers, lurching around drunkenly until they fully understand what it means to walk.  

One of my writing partners came over to meet Lenny and, ostensibly, to write. Focusing on our projects was… bordering on impossible. She suggested I get him his own computer. 

If it’s not entirely clear, I love him. He is perfection.

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Routine Doctors Appointments

Why have my insurance plan and my annual schedule conspired to make January the month when I have All the Appointments? I was trying to make plans to write with a writing friend and I looked at the calendar and it is PACKED. I feel like January is nearly over and it has only just begun. 

One of my upcoming appointments is with my OB/GYN, and I have been steeling myself to insist a little more forcefully that I believe I am in perimenopause. You will likely not recall that last year, my tentative questions about it were dismissed due to my age. The array of symptoms that seem to be perimenopause-related continues to grow, so I just want to confirm that a) yes, this is happening and b) there is nothing I can really DO about any of it, beyond what I am already doing. (TMI note: I take oral contraceptives which both prevent a period, so I don’t have that to clue me in as to actual menopause, and, according to the OB/GYN, oral contraceptives are supposedly the first line of defense against perimenopause symptoms anyway.) I had also been steeling myself to ask for a physical exam this year, should it be bewilderingly optional as it was last year, but I am pleased I am relieved I see from last year’s post that I should expect a pap test this year so that shouldn’t be an issue.

The other upcoming appointment is with a new-to-me internist. I have been mildly fretting about the appointment for, oh, several months now. I am eager to have a primary care physician again; my last PCP, whom I adored, prescribed me a new medication two Decembers ago, then went on leave until March, then left her practice to become a concierge physician. I love her enough that I strongly considered following her to her new practice, but I did not. Anyway, I have ostensibly been without a PCP since December of 2023. The old practice has been kindly refilling my prescription all this time, but I will be relieved to have a regular doctor again. (Yes, it has taken me since approximately March of 2024 to get in to see a new physician. This is both because I wanted a doctor whose office is closer to where I live now and because I wanted the specific provider my husband recommended.)

The thing I am fretting about is that this appointment is about establishing me as a patient… but I also have A List of things to discuss with the doctor. So I am worrying both about coming across as someone the new doc wants to have as a patient… and about addressing my concerns. 

Is the first fret ridiculous? Yes, yes it is. I can acknowledge that without being able to eliminate it from my worry database. I am sure this doctor sees a thousand middle-aged women just like me; I am not going to be any more or less desirable as a patient. Plus, physician’s job is to deal with the patient in front of them, not reject them based on some sort of Simon Cowellian checklist. (Is Simon Cowell still a contemporary reference?) And in any case, physicians treat patients all the time that they might not otherwise hang out with or befriend; we do not need to be besties. 

STILL. I want to make a good first impression. That’s weird, right? And yet, there it is. 

Let’s move on to the less-ridiculous portion of my frets, which is how to address all the things I want to address without overwhelming the doctor or myself, and without doing that thing where I make a careful list and then get to item three and suddenly feel like I’m overstaying my welcome or talking too much or whatever. I cannot tell you how many times I have gone to see a doctor with Very Specific Things To Discuss, and have decided in the moment that they are silly and I won’t bother the doctor with them. Even when I bring a written list with me, I still do this. 

(You might think that having grown up with a physician for a parent, and then marrying a physician would negate some of the awkwardness I feel when at the doctor. But no.) 

Since three seems to be the magic number, I think I have narrowed my Must Discuss List to three topics: 

  1. Fatigue. I am tired all the time. Like, more tired than in years past. (I feel like I’ve been chronically tired since at least 2012.) So tired that I see the effects of the tiredness in other areas of my life. Is this… The result of a medication I’m taking? A symptom of perimenopause? A deficiency of iron or vitamin D or something else? Because I am terrible at sleeping? Subset of the previous: it is because of my horrifically restless legs? Is the terrible sleeping a result of poor sleep hygiene? Or perimenopause? Or some lifestyle choice I am making? Is the tiredness (and/or terrible sleeping and/or restless legs) fixable? Or is this just my current phase of life (The Tired Phase) and I need to accept and lean into it? 
  2. Medication. I started taking anxiety medication in December 2023 after a series of escalating panic attacks. The medication has been very helpful. I think I am in a less anxious state now than I was then; is it time to try to discontinue the medication? If so, how do I do that? And what happens if I decide it was a terrible plan to discontinue it? Yes, 2023 was a wildly exciting and action-packed year which ended spiking my anxiety to new heights, but it’s not like I was NOT anxious before that. I am not opposed to taking medication when it is helpful, but I also don’t really want to take medication if I don’t need to.
  3. Weight. Due to some fairly significant weight gain over the past year, I am heavier than I have ever been in my life. Aside from not being pleasant in a variety of ways for a variety of reasons, I am wondering if I need to Be Worried. Is my weight gain a side effect of the aforementioned anxiety medication? A symptom of perimenopause? The result of too many nachos? Something else? Is it causing any problems I should be aware of, aside from the expected and unwelcome not-fitting-into-my-clothing and poor-self-esteem issues? (Like perhaps my extreme tiredness?) Beyond trying to eat less and move my body more, is there anything I should be doing?

You may notice that this very tidy list of three contains many, many subtopics. That feels a little like cheating. (I imagine myself telling the new doctor, “I want to discuss three health concerns with you!” and then bombarding her with restless legs! and perimenopause symptoms! and anxiety! and insomnia! as she crumples to the floor under the weight of my hypochondria.) (Yes, I do realize this is not how doctors work.)

You may also notice that “weight” is at the bottom of the list, in case three topics ends up feeling like too many topics with which to burden the doctor. (I know; I cannot stop thinking this way.) I put it at the bottom because it is the topic that, to me, seems to have the most obvious solution (eat less and move your body more), and also because it is the topic that I feel least comfortable bringing up. It’s such an uncomfortable topic! And possibly the doctor will bring it up anyway, without me having to say anything. 

I have a new, third fret: that I will inadvertently turn my New Patient Appointment into a Sick Visit. Why yes, this fret IS brought to you by two weeks of my family being sick plus waking up at four o’clock this morning with a terrible headache and a sore throat that feels worse than yesterday’s mildly scratchy throat and ear pain and a low-grade fever. 

What happens if I AM sick for my appointment? Is that… allowed? I feel like the “rules,” insofar as I (don’t) understand them are that you can’t be treated by a new physician until you have established with them as a patient. This is why I have been scrupulously healthy this year, because I would much rather go see my PCP than visit urgent care. 

If I AM sick for my appointment, then identifying/treating that illness probably jumps to the top of my list of concerns… but can I also address the other less-urgent topics?

Should I perhaps be badgering my husband with these questions instead of fretting about them on the internet? I mean, yes, but what is the internet for if not for airing ridiculous worries.