My Horrible Anus...

Or why 2023 sucked. Big time...

It’s been a while since I wrote anything new here, and even this post has taken longer than it should have - I had planned to post it, or a version of it, about a month ago. But life, as they say, is what happens when you’re busy making other plans, and for various reasons I just never got around to writing it.

I want to say that this is because I was really busy with more important things, but the reality is that I have so little work these days that I have way more time on my hands than I would ever want, and this has somehow created a dreadful state of entropy where I find a distinct lack of motivation to do anything.

Which is a problem, as I REALLY need to get a proper job - the depression from not being able to pay my way and having to rely on my partner to cover bills has been causing an almost crippling level of anxiety, which of course I try to hide because “I’m a man and must be big and strong at all times.”

And this, of course, just makes things worse. I’m actively looking for work, and am trying to stay hopeful that the situation will change sooner rather than later. But as this post is meant to be a review of LAST year, talking about my issues in the last month isn’t really going to help with that. So let’s get back to the originally scheduled program.

A very rich and famous British woman once went on television to talk about her Annus Horribilis...

As I'm not ever going to be pretentious enough to use Latin to prove how superior I am, today I’m going to simplify things and just talk about how last year was all about my horrible anus. Okay, not ALL about, but it was definitely more of an issue than I would have liked.

So, 2023. Was it the worst year of my life? No. The Covid years, the year my mother died, and the last year I was in the UK before I managed to escape were definitely worse than last year. Because last year DID have some good points. So maybe I’ll start with those.

The first good thing about last year was my birthday. It was my 50th birthday, so I decided I had to do something special and picked a town at random, found a hotel and agreed a price with them, spoke to a few restaurants, and worked out an all inclusive price, then invited everyone I knew to come and join me.

And was honestly shocked at the response.

I’ve talked her before about my issues with self-worth and complete inability to believe anyone out there really likes or cares about me. There are reasons I have these issues, good reasons, but on my birthday weekend I was given SO MANY REASONS to doubt myself less than I do.

I truly hope that at some point I can actually take something positive from things like this, and from actually managing to host an event for almost 500 people from around the world in the middle of a pandemic, and the other impressive things I have done in my life, and learn to doubt myself less than I do.

I’ll be honest, I’m not there yet - not even close. But the response for my birthday weekend was incredible.

People came from so many places - USA, Pakistan, Denmark, Germany, Norway, Austria, the UK, and I’m sure other places I can’t remember right not. They came, even though I didn’t tell them where we were going - just told them we’d meet in Prague then take a train somewhere.

Some of these people I had never even met, some I’d only met once before, and at least one person who came was someone who I have never particularly gotten on well with. Yet they were ALL willing to let me take complete control of their life for 72 hours to celebrate my birthday and show that they appreciate me.

And we had a fantastic weekend, which included getting shouted at for making too much noise on a train - the complaints stopped once we started sharing our booze with everyone around us, an incredible near vertical hike in nature, lots of drinking, some dancing for those that are into that kind of thing, and the awesome sight of the people in a small town night club being completely and utterly befuddled by one of the men in our group dancing in a red dress.

It also included a mini-breakdown, where I quite literally started crying at the realisation that so many people actually cared about me enough to take time out of their busy lives to come to a random place they’d never heard of until the moment we all got off the train, and celebrate my birthday with me.

The breakdown didn’t last long, as I had too many things to organise as I was the only person with any idea of where we were going or what we were doing for the weekend, but it was kind of cathartic, and was also the first time in my life that I can recall being able to openly cry in front of people other than my girlfriend.

Of course, I hated myself for showing that weakness, but I’m also aware that the ability to do so is actually a good thing - who knows, maybe at some point I might actually finally be able to cry about my dead mother and dead brother. Or at least be able to feel SOMETHING about them other than the numbness I feel now.

There was also my annual rafting trip, which is ALWAYS fun, and a few weeks teaching in Germany - something that happened at super short notice, and something that was desperately needed as it gave me enough money to survive the summer.

There was also my monthly trip to Brno, without which I honestly don’t know if I would have survived the year. It was one day a month where I got to spend time in nature, be around other people instead of just wallowing in my depression at home, and that one day was always enough to give me the will to carry on.

And, finally, there was Eurohash, an event I was certain I wasn’t going to be able to go to, because of money, which I wasn’t given any choice over as the organisers quite literally paid for me to go there. It was great to be around so many people and have almost no responsibility, but even while I was there I was stuck in my head feeling guilty about enjoying myself.

The organisers of Eurohash also sent me some money after the event which helped me pay off some of my debts, a gesture which I will be eternally grateful for. Yet at the same time I despise myself for being in the position where I needed that help in the first place.

And now the negatives - the first of which is the lack of time my girlfriend got to spend together outside the flat. We had a tough year, really tough, due to a combination of the stresses and stuggles she has with work, and, much worse, the stress I cause her by not being in a position to help out financially.

Of course, my depression and anxiety induced entropy did nothing to fix this problem, and in fact just made things worse. What she wants and needs is to see me fighting every day to change my situation, and what she mostly saw is me sitting in my chair being miserable.

This in turn led to her, understandably, finding it hard to be motivated to do fun things together. Especially as most fun things cost money, which my job situation made impossible. So our relationship stagnated a lot last year - I’m hopeful that we can both find a way to enjoy ourselves more this year, but in reality I know that this is very much dependent on me being able to change my situation.

If I’m not earning enough money to pay my way, I’m going to be depressed and anxious and generally feel terrible and hate myself. And why the hell would she want to spend time with someone who is so negative all the time? Fingers crossed, therefore, that my work situation can get better as soon as possible.

The other biggest issue I had last year, and in reality the whole reason for the title of this rambling attempt at prose, was becoming sick. This started in Germany when I was teaching there for two weeks, and when I got home I had a cough that felt simlar to one I had previously where I developed pneumonia.

I ignored it that time, because “I never get sick”, until my girlfriend literally dragged me to the hospital - which is a five minute walk from our flat, where I was promptly diagnosed and treated. After this, and other issues I’ve tried to ignore, I made a promise that I wouldn’t ignore symptoms in future, so when I came back from Germany I went to my doctor and was promptly diagnosed with Covid.

This, honestly, didn’t bother me too much, but a side effect I was having did cause me some concern. There isn’t a nice way to write this, but I can’t tell the story without doing so. So I will just say that at the same time as I found I had Covid, I was also going through a period where everything I ate fell out of my other end in liquid form about ten minutes later.

The doctor thought this was just a side effect of the Covid, and then after I was cleared of that it was probably a side effect of the pills I was taking to combat that. Another month later and I was referred to another doctor, who did some tests and found nothing to worry about.

But I was still unable to keep anything I ate inside me for more than twenty minutes, and although I definitely wasn’t going to suffer much from losing weight, there was going to come a time where I really needed to find the cause and treat it before it got too late.

So from the end of July last year until November I was at the doctors every few weeks, having blood tests, EKG tests, ultrasounds, and anything else they could think of. I was honestly starting to believe that I was just doing this to myself with my anxiety and depression, but I finally got an answer.

My second bout of Covid had somehow turned into Celiac disease. This was discovered after a miscommunication between my doctor and I which led to him attempting to stick a camera up my butt without me having pre-taken the enema he wanted me to take.

He had, in fairness, mentioned that I would need one before the procedure, but I had mistakenly assumed that this meant it would be administered when I got there. So the first attempt to explore my innermost passages was a failure, and between that attempt and the next one (I definitely didn’t make the same mistake twice) the blood tests had finally revealed the real issue.

This didn’t mean I was able to avoid the second probing - no, because I’m over 50 years old now, so at risk of nasty things happening down there, so in the camera went, for an initial inspection, before they did the full inspection at the start of January.

These inspections revealed good news - nothing to worry about in that part of my body. Or, seemingly, the rest of my body, despite my best attempts to destroy it over the decades. And once I knew I couldn’t eat certain things I instantly managed to close the emergency escape chute for anything and everything that went inside me - and this only took 5 months!

Another advantage is that for the first time in a VERY long time, my weight is officially below 90 kilos. Because I lost a LOT of weight. I’m sure I’ll find it again soon enough, but I will be aiming to exercise more this year to try to keep as much of it gone as possible.

So there we have it, 2023, the year of my horrible anus. Surely this year has to be better. Right? Please tell me I’m right…