A naughty schoolgirl?

Well, as I mentioned a few posts ago, I registered for classes this Spring term. Normally I do by-arrangement (independent study) coursework for my thesis because I haven't been able to handle making it to a classroom, and I've needed the student loan money to pay for medical treatment not covered by Medicaid (that’s a rant for another blog).

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However, I wanted to get to know some professors who might be useful for my thesis, and since I've felt a bit healthier since January, I registered for three classes this Spring term: American Cultural History -- a Monday/Wednesday/Friday class at 10 am, Israel/Palestine through Film -- Tuesdays and Thursdays from 4:40 to 6:30, and a one day class on John Wayne in June.

I was so excited. I was going to get to be around other people. I was going to get to wear something other than my pajamas.

But I also had my concerns. I didn't have quite the energy level that I had two years ago. I'm still averaging three medical appointments a week that I would have to attend in addition to class. I would be going somewhere EVERY day, which I haven't managed on a consistent basis in recent memory.

But...school!

The week before I bought my books and a spiral notebook for classes. New pens. Remembered the excitement I use to have about buying school supplies.

I forgot how much energy sitting in a classroom takes. The fluorescent lights. The uncomfortable chairs (though better than the wooden side desks of before). How being around large groups of people sucks the vitality from me like a kid with a pixie stick. How my short term memory is so slow now I struggle to remember what the professor said long enough to write it down in that new spiral notebook. And even with my swanky new $6 pen endorsed by the Arthritis Foundation, my hand aches if I take notes constantly throughout the class.

The fatigue set in pretty quickly. By Thursday of the first week I barely managed to stagger to class. Once I sat down, the professor announced he wanted us to get into small groups and talk about what we believed to be the cause of the Israel/Palestine conflict. You mean I have to actually *talk*? Afterwards I had that ache in my lungs that every since the pulmonary embolism I get when I'm really really tired. Friday I had to skip class and rest. By Tuesday of the second week I could barely make it from the bed to the bathroom and the kitchen. The next day I decided to drop my American Cultural History course. I can get to know that prof another time. The other classes are far more useful for my thesis. And these days, utilitarian is the key.

It's funny though because the minute I talk about skipping class, I think about being a naughty schoolgirl who needs a spanking. Of course, in that situation I think I would have gotten spanked if I hadn't skipped. My tendency is to push and push because I want my way, which in this case was to go to class and not drop any courses. In fact, my boyfriend is coming in a month or so (yay!!) and we're planning a holiday. At first he wanted to go midweek in May as it will be cheaper. When I said that I have class, he was the one to say "well, you can blow it off for one day can't you?"

And he's the one who's supposed to make sure I'm being a good girl...geesh. ;)

But it's made me think of how much my perspective has changed in the last few years. I'’ve hardly done any reading the last two weeks, but I know that I haven’'t because I've been too tired. A few years ago when I didn't understand yet that I had Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFIDS/ME), I just thought I was being lazy. Why the hell can'’t I get my work done? Why the hell am I spending so much time online that I should be using to read for class?

So, I constructed myself as a naughty girl who didn’'t do her homework because she was naughty. It was appealing being the naughty girl. In reality I’'m a very good girl because throughout my life being naughty meant either the rage of my abusive stepfather or fear of abandonment by people who liked me because I was a good girl. With other spankos, I can be a naughty girl and be liked for being naughty. Plus, the punishment I got would not be one of unfettered rage but controlled and consensual. It was safe. Like I could be that willful “"Natty"” part of me.

It was also a way of not having to face the more frightening reality that something was wrong with me. While I didn'’t understand that I had a chronic illness, I did understand, though not fully, that life was different than before surgery. But I didn'’t want it to be. I was certain that if I just told my body to be better already, if I just acted like it was better already, if I just thought that it was better already, then certainly it would be. I so have to laugh at those handful of doctors who still think that CFIDS/ME is psychosomatic. I’'m the poster child for how it’'s not but acted like it was and wanted so much for it to be just "all in my head". I have control over “"all in my head”" (unless I'm a lot sicker mentally than I thought...)

A naughty schoolgirl who thinks that if she's just pushed hard enough then everything will be better eventually finds a disciplinarian. Which I did. We'd set some goals and then I'd email him to say whether or not I'd met them and if I hadn't, we would meet and he'd spank me. I represented myself as the naughty schoolgirl doing half-assed work who just needed a good spanking as motivation. It’'s not like I intentionally misrepresented myself. I really believed that at the time. Though a part of me began to question why doing half-assed work was so bad, the part of me that understood that I couldn’'t possibly do what I was expecting myself to do.

Yet, I could never ask why I was questioning. Mostly because I didn'’t know how to do that yet. I really had that little self awareness then. But it would have also meant having to confront what my therapist finally made me confront a few months later: that I was too sick too much of the time to possibly be a grad student and a teacher. And that realization was so horrible for me to come to terms with that it’'s only been within the last year -- perhaps even the last several months -- that I'’ve finally accepted it and let go of having to be a grad student and academic.

And I suppose this term is sort of a test to see just how well I've let go. The Israel/Palestine class is in a building I've not been in much since my undergraduate days, so the inevitable contrast has occurred. As an undergraduate I worked there, as well as used the computer lab in the basement to write most of my papers. They were happy, busy days. When I could climb the stairs easily rather than struggle up them with a cane (not the fun, swishy kind but the metal, get-me-around-without-falling kind).

Now my days are a bit more leisurely by those earlier standards. Though in many respects more grueling. I mean, just walking to class is a major achievement for me.

In a warped sort of way, I’'m actually grateful for my illness. I get to appreciate so much that my peers take for granted. I get to see life in very different ways. Though I process information far slower than I used to, it'’s like it gets to simmer awhile in my brain so that what finally comes out has that rich complex taste of a sauce that has simmered for hours.

However, on days like today, when I shuffle along trying to get my stiff body to move and feel far older than my 32 years, being a naughty schoolgirl sounds so appealing. And the temptation to think that if I just got a good spanking I'’d get more done is still there, though has faded considerably. When I think back to that time with my disciplinarian friend, I wish I would have been kinder to myself. Not sought out someone to beat on me for expectations I couldn'’t possibly have met. It'’s funny how spanking can end up being an escape in more ways than one. And so very unhealthy if I'’m not careful.

The last time I took classes two years ago and started to feel overwhelmed with papers and bibliographies and Arabic courses I wanted to take in the summer, my godfather reminded me that first and foremost my job was to be the patient. I sat on the other end of the telephone line rolling my eyes, knowing the familiar lecture that was coming about pushing myself so much and doing everything all at once and how I had to take my illness seriously and use my profoundly finite amount of energy to go to doctor’'s appointments and rest and anything else gets whatever energy I have after that. But I HATE being the patient, I pouted to myself, though I knew he was right.

This time though, I haven'’t pouted. I went into the term knowing that my health came first, even if that meant (God forbid!) getting a B because I couldn'’t make it to class or keep up with the reading. I dropped a course as soon as I realized I couldn'’t do it rather than fighting on like I normally would (though the wiser course of action would have been to start with one class rather than three - I'm still working on channeling that enthusiasm). But that construct of the naughty school girl has still been there, calling me to think of my time spent websurfing as a dereliction of duty rather than an activity that rests my brain (you even see it in that earlier post when I talk about procrastinating). Yet now I realize how much I used the naughty school girl construct to live in denial. And though fake reality seems to be all the rage these days, I chose real reality. The reality in which I am a good girl who is finally learning to be a good patient.