"You Have Died of Dysentery"

January did not go according to plan.

I was all set to work on restoring nurturing rhythms around food + eating. I was getting back to planning meals for the week, setting aside blocks of time for food prep, and making it to the grocery store regularly (as in before the only things left in the house were tater tots, rolled oats, and ketchup).

And then suddenly I was back in my Oregon Trail days…

“You have died of dysentery.”

Heads up: bathroom talk incoming.

Y’all.

I have never, in my 40 years of life, experienced anything like what I went through over the last few weeks.

Every speck of material in my digestive tract exited my body (tremendously violently) over the course of 72 hours. At one point — as I rocked back and forth, crumpled in a heap on the bathroom rug, moaning “please please please” like a mantra — my husband strongly advocated for a visit to the ER. “Babe, I feel like once we’ve reached the sobbing-and-bargaining stage, it’s time to seek medical attention.”

Thankfully, the pooping eventually stopped (only after I decided that if the fall of civilization is going to involve a lot of butt stuff, I’d like to just tap out early, please).

Despite my diligence in pounding liquids like it was my job, I ended up severely dehydrated + weak and needed to spend another 3 or 4 days “recovering” post-illness. I had almost no appetite and struggled to manage anything more complex than Mrs. Grass instant noodle soup and cream of rice.

My plan to restore supportive rhythms surrounding food, sleep, breath, and movement had gone completely off the rails.

Oh, and just in case I hadn’t gotten the message that I am not in charge of how my wintering goes, the universe sent me a slightly redundant bout of garden-variety food poisoning 10 days after poop-mageddon began.

I get it, I get it — Softness and surrender instead of rigidity and a clenched fist.

The truth is that even in the midst of whatever plague knocked me on my ass in mid January (turns out it was most likely norovirus), I was still finding threads of gold woven through the misery. I noticed the way that my physical experience mirrored the pain, panic, and forced release that was happening in my life emotionally + relationally and how all of it was oddly congruent with dissolution — the second stage in the alchemical process.

So I’m doing my best to be kind to myself. To be fluid. To allow life to unfold as it will. To respond to discomfort, fear, and loss with openness and curiosity.