just a heads up... this post ain't pretty.

there's a thing called contact dermatitis. and i guess if you don't treat it quickly enough, it can create another problem called a staph infection.

it's like a combination of a thousand ants marching across my body paired with a game of whack-a-mole. i get little patches of nastiness, and they itch like the dickens. and then... they go away, and a new one crops up somewhere else.

i don't like it. i don't like it one bit. what's worse is the amount of time it's taken me to learn that the dermatitis thing is the issue, which can be caused by allergens and irritants and such.

flashback to february of last year, the week before valentine's day and the douchebag i was dating.

prior to this, i'd had a handful of encounters with guys, but--pardon the baseball analogy--none crossed home plate. none of them had been able to soften me up enough to get it done. but that guy could.

and the next day, some lovely marks showed up on my face. i couldn't figure out what the hell they were. i knew they weren't zits because i never get zits. i'd had a well-woman exam weeks before which came back clean.

i changed skin care products and invested in some seabreeze and some cortizone ten, but all that did was zilch, of course.

april: gynecologist for another well-woman exam and std testing, the results of which i never received. the gyno said they were zits.

may: general practitioner said they weren't zits and prescribed acyclovir, which freaked me the hell out because that's what's used to treat herpes. this caused me to plummet into what's been some pretty nasty depression. i sought a second opinion from the general practitioner who'd been treating me since i was a child but had retired. he didn't seem to think much of the blisters and called in a prescription for a cream. every time i thought, okay, i can handle this... more spots would appear on my body. more spots that seemed to completely disregard the pills but would respond to the cream.

july: i learned of all of the wonderful services offered by an organization called pregnancy assistance center north, which is a blessing, yall. that business is pretty damned phenomenal. the women at that facility are the best example of godsends i've ever seen. ever. EVER. i got tested for three diseases, the results of which were all negative. it was recommended i visit another clinic and get two other tests done for syphilis and herpes, and both of those tests came back negative, too. thank, christ. i'd truly begun to think that i was going to have to tell my parents i'd made a horrible, horrible choice with godawful consequences.

months go by... more spots. some of them change from pink to purple and increase in size, similar to that of a mole.

they are ugly. they sometimes itch. and it's usually worse right before my cycle begins. i started thinking that perhaps it had something to do with hormonal changes in my body, like i was approaching that stage of pre-menopause or something. that the arrival of this is just coincidental to the interactions i'd had with that man.

january. yesterday. sometime around three a.m. i awoke because my body was itching horribly on my legs and arms. i figured it's cause it's been a little over a week since i'd changed my sheets--i'm lazy, okay? i showered and slathered lotion and calamine and cortizone cream pretty much everywhere. it'd worked in the past. it wasn't working at this point.

so i go back to the clinic i'd gone to in july and regale the physician's assistant with the plight from the past year and get that diagnosis. eleven... almost twelve months later. such an ordeal. all because i was allergic to that irritating jackass.

. . .

clinic again today (friday). apparently i'm also allergic to sulpha. so i'm to cease taking the antibiotic for the staph infection. and the woman with whom i spoke said it's not the guy... it's something in the house that's causing the irritation, and the guy is just a coincidental thing.

i wish these people would make up their damned minds. it's the guy... it's not the guy... it's the guy... it's not the guy. how the hell am i ever to close this despicable chapter if i can't get a resolute conclusion?

i think... therefore i'm single

yesterday was the wonder twins' seventh birthday. SEVEN. how the hell did that happen? why, WHY can't they stay little for a little while longer? gah.

i had two errands to run before the party (which was at little beakers in oak ridge north, which is pretty danged nifty, yall... you local folks should totally check them out): snag two papers to send to some folks and pick up some shampoo. real exciting stuff, i know. but first, i needed food. so i headed for market street to potbelly's for a skinny turkey (i'd meant to get a strawberry banana smoothie but got sidetracked).

sidetracked because i snuck through zulee's first. i love that place. i got distracted by the quotes wall. and the books, five of which caught my eye enough that i forked over some fifty bucks to take them home. but the thing that really made an impression was a little black and white foam coaster at cashwrap: i think, therefore i'm single.

i bought that, too, because at first i was amused. god forbid a woman have more brain power than a man. and my brain is pretty danged powerful, yall.

but the more i've thought about it, the more troubled i am by the thing.

because THAT'S the damned problem. it's not that i'm smart. it's that i have to think and think and think and think... i think so much and so hard and so often about a thing... can't see anything but that thing. can't care about anything but that thing. i worry over whether i should've said this or shouldn't've said that--more the latter than the former, of course, because i never know the right things to say.

it's fucking exhausting, and there's a stretch of months that exhaustion tends to whammy me: from thanksgiving to my birthday... the end of november to the end of march.

ten more weeks 'til my birthday. ten more weeks of valentine's crap followed by my brother's death day and my birthday and the calendar--thank god--goes easy on me again.

the only saving grace for this torturous stretch is football. it'd be nice to have a guy to watch the games with--i've never been involved with a guy during this time of year, save for that jackass i'd dated last spring who couldn't even be bothered to TEXT me happy birthday--but i can't shut my brain up long enough to get one to think of me in that way.

one of those quotes on the wall was positive attracts positive. yes, i know. i'm positive i've got a lot to offer. i'm positive i'm worth knowing.

i'm positive i don't know how to market myself so the many gifts i possess can be seen in the best light. i'm positive that the majority of my experiences with men have been negative, and that part of the blame for that falls on me. i'm positive being in a relationship with a guy terrifies the ever-living hell out of me.

i want to be distracted.

i want--so much--for a guy to say to me i'm not going to let you fuck this up.