I have a face I cannot show, I make the rules up as I go...

So much has changed since last spring.

Obvious things first, I had a breast reduction.  That's right, I have little boobs now.  I look very different, but I'm much more comfortable with myself and my back feels the best it has since I was a kid. So woo surgery!

The recovery has been kind of hard on me (and probably harder on Rich, who has had to deal with me fairly full-time).  For the past three weeks, not only have I not been myself, I have forgotten who she is.  I've been moody, and antisocial, and strange.

I guess I panicked a little bit.  So much about me can change in just one day (I know it was just my chest, but I feel like it was much more than that).  I haven't quite known how to handle that.  I also have been letting go of being the "social butterfly" I am accustomed to being.  Time alone has become a precious thing to me again.  Time with Rich, who was there in the hospital and knows what's going on more than most people, has also become kind of a sanctuary.  I don't have to act like I'm having fun or pretend I want to be supersocialgirl when I'm with him.  I can just be Rachel, and since for now I am not even sure who she is, that's pretty important.  It was very hard for me to come back and have most of my friends expect me to just pick up as usual.  I mean, physically they knew I was not myself.  But the social things, the constant activity and hanging out three times a day.  I am usually totally game for that, but I haven't been lately and I'm probably not going to be for a while.  If you girls are reading this and are offended, don't be.  It's not you, it's me.  I understand that it must be weird for you all that I suddenly don't want to rock and roll all night and party every day :)  I hope to be back soon <3

I have also realized that, once I'm in tip-top-shape again, not being topheavy is going to open up some long-locked doors.  Last night, I spent a little too much money on new crosstrainers.  By Christmas, I want to be able to go running, outside, for five miles.  I understand that I might not quite meet that deadline, my boobs are going to be the deciding factor in all of this, ironically (little boobs are tyrants, as it happens) but I'm sure going to try.  I'm now equipped with special tights for running in the cold (thank you G-ba, bet you didn't know I'd do anything but wear them under jeans!) and, for the first time since junior high, sports bras.  I gotta say, I'm totally stoked to give this a try.  Before the giant boobs, I used to go running on the back roads by the house where  I grew up.  Sometimes I'd bring Shadow and make him burn off some of the excess calories he was being fed by the neighbors.  I've never been fast or talented or even effective at running, but I sure did love it.  By the end of the week, I hope to be back at the gym doing very low-impact things.  I feel like such a slug, having spent most of the past three weeks lying down.

Well, looks like class time.

Wish me luck, this professor is out to get me :)

<3
Rach 

“I hope people realize that there is a brain underneath the hair and a heart underneath the boobs.”

-Dolly Parton