Kat’s Musings

Tag: lonliness

  • In My Marilyn Monroe Era.

    In My Marilyn Monroe Era.

    Sophomore year of college, I finally felt like I was finding my groove.

    I had made a new friend I planned to live with the following year, and I was starting to get ahead academically after a rocky freshman year. That year, I roomed with a Russian girl from the university’s swim team. We clicked almost immediately and became genuinely close friends. 

    I was slowly gaining confidence in my new, more voluptuous body, even if I still struggled with it. We had a surprising amount in common, and she helped me adjust to living on my own while everything back home continued to unravel. We met in a Russian language class. I signed up thinking it would be an easy A. Even though, I was basically fluent in Spanish in high school. But, I was burned out and did not want anything too demanding. Because she was still very new to the U.S., I got to play guide, showing her the ropes of American college life.

    She only lived with me for one semester. When the swim team at Syracuse was cut, she moved out. But I kept thriving (*exaggerating*) and it was all thanks to that Russian class. Through it, I met another girl — an American — who quickly became one of my closest friends. She lived off-campus in a chaotic house full of eccentric roommates. The place was straight out of *Fight Club*. It was filthy. Everything seemed to be broken. I vividly  remember waking up on the couch one morning to see a rat-size cockroach scurrying across the coffee table.

    Every weekend, I would take the bus and then hike up the snowy hills just to get there. I loved it. I loved the weird mix of characters who lived in that house. Looking back, I know they were mostly low-class, pot-smoking losers, but at the time, I finally felt needed. And God, I needed that feeling more than anything.

    One weekend, they threw a Valentine’s Day house party. That’s where I met him.

    He was very attractive, and he gave me real attention. We ended up spending the entire night together. No, we did not sleep together, but… we did everything else.

    At that point in my life, I was still deeply disgusted with myself. My new friends were helping rebuild my self-esteem, but I still could not stand looking at myself in the mirror. Every time I saw the size on my clothes tags, a wave of shame came over me. 

    I always struggled to understand how overweight people can genuinely seem happy and confident. I see it all the time. There are plus-size celebrities and popular friends of skinny people. These individuals are living their lives without apparent shame. 

    Even now, I sometimes feel bloated or insecure about my body. I tell my boyfriend he can cheat on me. He always reassures me that he would never and says I am just being a silly little girl. 

    — —

    Now, back to the guy I met over Valentine’s weekend in 2009.

    Through my new chaotic houseful of misfits, I quickly learned the truth. The guy I had holed up with was in a very serious relationship. His girlfriend was just out of town that weekend.

    But he kept texting me. Kept reaching out.

    So I made a decision. If I could not be the one someone chose, I would settle for being the other woman. My experience with love was limited. Up to that point, it had already convinced me I was unlovable. I felt unworthy of anything real. Being the secret side piece felt like the best I could hope for. I felt like a modern, broken version of Marilyn Monroe. I was the girl you have fun with, but never marry.

    I leaned hard into the role. I started dressing more provocatively—low-cut shirts, fishnet tights stretched over my thick thighs. We made plans to keep sneaking around behind her back. I even stalked his girlfriend on social media, studying her life, picking apart what I thought I was missing.

    Sexualized Me (3rd from the right )

    It did not take long to realize he was just another loser misfit with a habit of cheating. But the thrill was still there. The secrecy. The danger. I went home and bragged to everyone that I was “the other woman” (okay, I may have white-lied about actually sleeping with him). I even made plans to finally give in to him during junior year.

    Fate, however, had other plans.

    I never made it back to Syracuse University. I never got that apartment with my new friend. And thankfully—thankfully—I never became the other woman.

    (I still love Marilyn Monroe, though.)

  • Losing Friends and Achieving Goals Through Physical Therapy

    Losing Friends and Achieving Goals Through Physical Therapy

    I have been through a lot of physical therapy throughout the years. One thing that I noticed was that many people treat their patients as a protocol and not just a person. 

    It can definitely be life changing. Still, you may need to wade through a series of therapists. I will admit that— at first— I used my physical therapy as a way to indulge my social cravings. I did not speak coherently. It was not easy for me to speak. But, I felt great pride and took immense pleasure in being capable of speaking. (I was mute from June thirtieth- August thirteenth, twenty-ten).  

     I became absolutely starved of social interaction. Even my friends faded away from me once I got ill and became unable to go out. My body betrayed me, and doctors only shrugged. It felt like a life on pause type of sickness. It started small. Texts went unanswered. Group chats dried up until it became absolutely nothing. Not even a heart emoji. Like I had vanished. At first I blamed the timing. People are busy, right? Work, kids, their own drama. But then weeks turned into months. The invites stopped. Just silence. 

    For the first few years, a few hung around but they eventually had to live their own lives. They finished school. Got jobs. They got married. Had babies.   All while I was drooling every time I went out in public and spent years in adult diapers.  I get it. Illness is not sexy. It is not funny. It is not a vibe. It is just… heavy. And nobody wants to carry that. But here was the part that stung: they did not leave because I changed. They left because I cannot keep up. Could not laugh at their jokes. Not pretend everything was fine. So they ghosted—not out of malice, but out of convenience— people vanish when it becomes too hard to stay. 

    At this point in my life, I needed someone to gossip with about the shows I was watching. I also wanted to discuss current events with them. Thus, I used physical therapy to cure my newly found loneliness.

    All the while I was desperate to recover but the many therapists I saw did not care about my recovery. They gave me false hope and promised to fix me. 

    Essentially, physical therapy only appeased my craving to chat. No tweaks to the recovery plan. No follow-up questions. They simply saw me as a paycheck. Someone who they could put through cookie-cutter exercise routines while they were on the clock. It seemed like a scam. 

    Now I have a physical therapist who actually watches how I move. He sees that I am compensating for my lack of strength in my left side. We both love sport. I no longer desire to talk about television or popular culture. So, I still get a good battery recharge from the quick recap we do during our sessions. But he also applies sports knowledge to the exercise program that he designs for me. It is crucial for me to understand the why behind my actions. I don’t want to be treated like a robot on a conveyor belt. 

    I also love getting to walk and I absolutely adore that he acknowledges it. He allows me to explore walking around without any cane or walker. I get teary-eyed when I am allowed to operate like a regular human being. It seems silly. Stupid. But it means so much. No one else did this for me. I find that odd because it is the point of my ultimate goal in physical therapy. My goal in physical therapy is walking around by myself on my own. 

    Good physical therapists exist. They are the ones who treat you like a person, not a protocol. And they will stay— not dismiss you because you do not fit conveniently into their narrative.