"On Statin Island"

             About fifteen years ago, my cholesterol levels jumped overnight from normal ranges to extremely high levels. My doctor quipped that she thought I had the highest “scores” of any patient in her practice. Of course, such a dramatic change meant I started taking medication right away.

           Lipitor and I became friends. I faithfully took my pill every night and chose this relationship over my love for grapefruit juice. At the six month checkpoint, my test results showed a successful marriage between my system and this tiny pill.

            Our relationship hit troubled waters soon. I changed schools to a campus that required that I not only think quickly on my feet, but that I literally stand for hour after hour. My feet ached all the time. I experimented with different heel heights, discovering that wearing flats crippled my feet by the end of the day. An inch to three inch pitch took care of the problem for a few months.

            Then my legs began to cramp, too. During the nights, I’d awaken in screaming agony as my calf muscled twisted and knotted. In the mornings, I hobbled. It felt like I walked on gravel as I slowly moved from bed to bathroom. After about fifteen minutes, the pain always subsided.

            Within another year, my body aches and pains had shifted from my feet and legs to my entire body. I often felt as though I’d gone to sleep on a high, concrete platform—and that sometime during the night, I’d rolled off this perch and splatted like Wile E. Coyote onto the desert floor. My morning hobbling became an excruciating exercise.

            Naturally, it never occurred to me to mention this pain to my doctor. I kept thinking it would get better and rationalized that the long hours I spent standing caused the soreness.

            One weekend, my sister observed my crawl from bed.

            “How long have you been like this?” concern laced her voice.

            “I don’t know. It started with just my feet, but now even the tip of my fingers hurt,” I admitted.

            “It’s your cholesterol medication. Stop taking it today and call your doctor on Monday.”

            And she was right!

            My doctor pulled me off the medication and within six months, all of my aching and throbbing vanished. But my cholesterol levels skyrocketed again.

            My journey to “Statin Island” began at that point. When we tried a different drug, one of two things would happen. I’d react quickly with severe muscle pain (Crestor flattened me within three doses); or the drug would only lower my levels for the first six months, and then we’d have to adjust the medication to a higher dosage, which always resulted in side effects. My doctor tired non-statin options, but they weren’t strong enough to cut my scores.   

         

   For the last year, I’ve taken Livalo, and followed my usual pattern. For the first six months my lower levels made us optimistic, and I didn’t have any adverse reactions. Then my cholesterol climbed, so we increased the dosage. This time, instead of the pain going to my feet or legs, it seeped into my left hand. The gradual process tricked me into thinking that I needed to discuss the possibility of arthritis with my doctor at my next check-up. Then the discomfort began in my right hand, and grew from ache to agony.

             So, another drug bites the dust!

            I have six months to focus on getting my levels as low as possible through diet and exercise. If I can get below 300, it may open up options for different drugs that aren’t as strong. Ever the optimist, I know that at least this time around, I have no one to take care of but myself. I can spend an hour a day at Gold's Gym. I can eat a lazy breakfast of Irish oatmeal with fruit every morning. I can modify my diet because I have time to cook different recipes and experiment.

            I know that some kind of medication lurks in my future, but I’ll be prepared for my next visit to Statin Island.  

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

 

"The Waiting Game"

            Waiting.

            Waiting for a delivery takes a special kind of patience that I don’t have anymore. In the past, I would fill the hours by reading a book or watching something on television. Perhaps I’d do a few easily interrupted household chores to help pass the time.

  

          Today, I await our new Amana refrigerator. The Home Depot called last night and gave us a four hour window. I’ll receive a more specific time within an hour of delivery. At that point, I can shift all of the food into the sparkling clean and dutifully awaiting cooler.

            In the meantime, I linger around the house. I haven’t gone outside to water the gardens, as is my usual routine, in case I miss the phone call. I’ve tried playing Bejeweled Blitz and Zuma’s Revenge to keep me busy, but in the back of my mind, I listen for the truck’s sighing brakes.

            With my luck, the refrigerator will arrive late this afternoon, making me miss my workout at the gym and preventing me from picking up something to eat for lunch.

            With my luck, I’ll be the last delivery before the driver heads into his home base. That means an extra late start on chilling the new fridge and a delay in getting some groceries (which I haven’t bought for this week, of course).

            And so Impatience chats with me as I wait. Her ADHD keeps me on edge, though, and emphasizes that waiting just isn’t my game.

    

 

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"Going to Seed"

 

            We don’t mow our yard every week, and when we do cut the grass, we have our mower set to the highest level possible. Unlike our neighbors who labor continually in their yards, we take a careless approach to the lawn itself.
            We let our grass go to seed.
            All of the negative connotations of neglect seem insignificant because we’ve learned that grasses need to reseed. The long drought we’ve seen over these last couple of years means patches of our lawns have shriveled up. With this year’s rain comes relief, and the only way to reestablish section of our yard is to let it go to seed.
            I love walking through dew drenched grass in the mornings as I check the gardens and pond. The gossamer fibers tickle my feet. Later in the day, sunlight polarizes the hue of the grass, crisping the greens into sharpness. By evening, a slight breeze kicks up, and the seedy fingers of grass hula dance.
 
Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman
           

 
 

"Cardinal Flirtation"

 

 

            We have a pair of cardinals nesting in our yard each year. I suspect that the pair we have this year remembers us from last year since they ignore the dogs, barely avoid the squirrels, and linger within sight when I stretch out comfortably in a lounge chair.

            The male teased me mercilessly last night. I saw his brilliant crimson against the green lawn as he cocked his head this way and that. Determined to finally capture him on film, I grabbed my camera and quietly slid outside. I tried to sit off to the side, but soon realized that he kept a distance too far for my camera’s reach. Slowly, I crept under the Live Oak, stopping under the arch our bushes create next to the fish pond.
 

 

            I know, without a doubt, that the cardinal spied me. He flitted flirtatiously from branch to branch, following a pattern of perch, hop, perch, hop, swoop, perch and hop. He circled around me in a predictable display of cockiness. He’d linger along the rooftop, grace the back of one of the wrought iron chairs, and play hide-n-seek among the leaves. His head peeked around leaves and small branches as he challenged me to capture his arrogant pose.

 

            Always just a little behind a branch. Always just a little too fast for my shutter. Always just a tease away from the perfect pose.

 

 

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

 

"Daring Changes"

          A few years ago, I decided to go back to my “roots” by cutting all of the color out of my hair and resisting the urge to cover the gray. I wanted to see just how silver or white my tresses had become after I hit fifty.

          I thought my silver/brown looked fine until I caught a good look at it in several different pictures. When several friends suggested I add a little color to my hair, I took their advice to heart.

          Remembering the guideline of coloring your hair to a lighter shade as you age, I experimented with various shades of light brown, ashes, and champagnes until I finally settled on something that drew more compliments than criticism.

          And I slipped into a comfort zone fairly rapidly, settling into changing my hair style instead of my color. I clipped my long hair into short layers, and I’ve slowly progressed to bangs and one layer over the last couple of years.

          Some nights, I believe my hair grows an inch. My color, presentable one day, turns into a mess of grayish-brown roots so suddenly that I never have my brand of color handy. Usually, I browse through the hair aisle on my own, but the other day my son accompanied me to the store.

          “It’s time for you to try a new color, Mom,” he dared.

          I stood looking at the wall of smiling models with a rainbow assortment of choices. We ruled out the pink and purple, shied away from the greens, and barely glanced at the dark blacks.

          The reds, though, drew my son’s attention. “You’ve never colored your hair red.”

          “It has so many red highlights in it already, I’ve always been afraid to go with red,” I explained.

          Before I knew it, I held a couple of auburn shades in my hand.

          “Go for it, Mom!”

          I didn’t need much encouragement.

          Sometimes, we get into ruts. We put ourselves into predictable boxes. We follow our set patterns. We bore even ourselves.

          So, I put a totally different color into the grocery cart, went home, and became a redhead within an hour.

          The color screamed, “RED!”

          I glanced into the mirror several times and wondered what David would say when he came home from work.

          “You look like my grandmother,” he piped when he took in my new shade.

          Now, no woman wants to hear that she looks like her husband’s grandmother!

          I immediately realized, though, that it the tint did closely match the shade of red that Grandmother had used.

          Deciding to “tone it down” a notch, I rushed back to the store, selected a shade of brown that I could apply, and created a totally different hue that’s uniquely my own.

          I don’t know how long I will stay with this latest tone, but I love that I can still take on a dare and not be afraid of changes.

 

No dare! 2024

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

         

"Sitting 101"

             A normal person wouldn’t need lessons in relaxation. A normal person wouldn’t have to practice the art of sitting still. A normal person wouldn’t have to hear reminders from loved ones to “take it easy” or to “just sit and do nothing.”

            I am famous for my reputation of being unable to sit and do absolutely nothing. I’ll find a rerun on television, listen to music, or grab a book as I head to the couch. I’ll find myself itching to run a dust cloth over the furniture if the TV show doesn’t capture my attention enough. I may set down the book to get a drink in the kitchen and find myself wiping down the counters one-more-time. And music? Well, sometimes I just have to get up and dance!
            So this morning I practiced sitting still. Intentionally, I headed out back without pen and journal in hand. And although I have just finished reading one novel, but I didn’t snatch the next volume from my summer reading pile. I didn’t turn on the television for background, and I didn’t switch on the stereo.
            I sat outside in one of the lounge chairs and listened to the rise and fall of child voices coming over the back fence. Their high pitched squeals mixed with the coos of doves. The breeze felt cool and the morning sun gentle.
            I lasted about fifteen minutes.
            Then the dogs wanted outside, and my foot itched, and my neck needed popping.
            Needless to say, I will have to practice this new skill daily.   
 

Where I plan on conducting my morning "class" each day!

 

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"Burying Dead Bodies"

             My warped mind exercises itself by plotting murders.

            I’ve burned, poisoned, bludgeoned, and strangled. I’ve “run through with a sword” and run over with a car. I’ve frozen and thawed. I’ve sliced-n-diced.

            I don’t know when playing these mind games started, and I’m glad my sociopathic side stays strongly secure within make-believe.

            Imagine my pleasure when I stumbled upon the knowledge that iPhone’s Siri recites a list of where to hide dead bodies! I delighted in learning that someone “out there” thinks in the same murky waters that I find my own mind trolling.

            Siri’s list contains, however, the obvious places:  reservoirs, metal foundries, mines, dumps, and swamps. So I’m spending my downtime during spring break generating a new and unique list of disposal of my victims.

            Of course, I definitely won’t share this list with my readers. Because, you know—I may need to use it one day!

Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman