What is your spirit animal?
Ha! Hah! Hee! HaHa! Oh, you’re serious?
I have thought about this over the years. The animal I can closely relate to is The Taz. Yes, the obnoxious, drooling, grunting tornado in Looney Tunes cartoons. This might surprise you depending on how well you know me.
When I watched Bugs Bunny and his friends, I could hardly wait for Taz to show up. I loved watching him be self-ish, pigging out, and completely out of control. I yearned to be able to do that – let it all go. Express and not repress. To throw a tantrum because things were just not my way.
I can only explain it like this:
Since the age of 8 and a half, our family dynamic has changed drastically. My little sister (aged 5) was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes. She was the fragile one with a frightening condition.
My mom now had to become the family nurse. My dad worked full-time and was also working on his college and Masters degrees. Sis needed constant monitoring and care. Back then, there were no blood test strips or meters. No pumps. One had to pee in a cup and dip a ketone strip to determine if ketones were present in the urine. If they were, your glucose was too high, and dosages needed to be changed. The ketone test would not tell you if you were too low. Lows were determined by symptoms of insulin shock.
Fun times. Not.
I was promoted to “the healthy child,” even though I was prone to pneumonia and had serious asthma. Diabetes trumped all other illnesses combined. I understood that this meant I would be second in line. For attention, help with homework, and many things I had not thought of – yet.
I resented that they expected perfect behavior from me. I was always a disappointment. Yet, I kept striving to be their perfect daughter. I recognize this behavior now, thanks to my therapist. She told me that I was the queen of self-abuse. I needed to learn from my behavior and quit running full force into that brick wall. I exhausted myself trying to please the unpleasable.
Okay, how did I get from talking about Taz to my therapist? If you are still “with me,” I will wrap up this spirit animal thing by saying that I hope to have better manners than Taz when my jaw and teeth finally get fixed and I can chew again. But, just in case I’m a whirling dervish, keep your limbs out of the aisle.
TTFN
Jodi Lea's Place 