One Bite at a Time

 Fucking COVID.

I suppose all new blog launches should begin with profanity when it matters, or maybe it's just my jaded view when it comes to the pandemic.  Heading into the pandemic I had so many great things in my life.  I had finally left my lifelong obesity behind for good.  I was in top physical condition for a 50 year old.  I ran Spartans of every distance like a badass and even completed the Dopey Challenge, 48 miles in four days just before the world shut down.  I had a successful online support group, I ran a charity that was growing by leaps and bounds, with my professional life as a nurse practitioner taking off in ways I never dreamed possible.  Yes, I was taking on the world like a proverbial great white shark with a no excuses mentality when it came to tackling issues.  I even had, dare I say it myself, a fairly inspirational blog that drew from popular song lyrics to teach valuable life lessons I myself had learned throughout that journey.

Then, it happened.  COVID happened.  The world shut down and for a brief time I was the heath care hero, bravely working the front lines.  People gifted my clinics food and hand sewn masks.  We got greeting cards and were told thank you for all that we are doing.  To be honest?  That lasted until May of 2020.  The urgent care where I worked at the time secured COVID testing where nobody else had it in upstate NY.  Suddenly, I found  myself seeing 70 patients a day wearing a glorified trash bag for PPE, as well as a mask so tight I pulled the staples holding the elastic bands in place out of the skin of my cheeks every day.  The skin on my nose  broke down and oozed when I worked too many days in a row, and I suddenly was no longer the health care hero, rather the asshole who made you wait hours for a COVID test because 35 other people signed in before you.  Patients became abusive, breaks to eat or pee no longer existed, and the days seemed endless.  I no sooner learned to navigate that, when I actually got COVID myself.  It would be what became known as the COVID Thanksgiving of 2020.  The Thanksgiving half of my house couldn't smell the food and two of us could only taste salt.  Nonetheless, I felt lucky.  My symptoms were mild.  I wasn't short of breath or on a ventilator like some patients at that time. However, what started a month later would turn me into what we now call a long COVID patient.  My blood pressure skyrocketed despite my usual 6-7 hours a week of cardio and healthy eating.  I suddenly had my very own cardiologist and a counter full of prescription pills.  After my second round of COVID in Jan of 2022 I would compile my blood pressure issues with  shingles that reared its ugly head every three weeks for nine solid months leaving me with waxing and waning neuralgia to this day, and then came the food allergies I am still trying to navigate. So there it is, I have gone from a great white to a health care hero, to an asshole to a professional patient.  Thank you pandemic.  

As far as my online group, yes, it still exists but in a dialed back fashion.  As far as my 1DOS Foundation, we have spent a lot of time working on new fundraising methods so we can continue to sponsor people who want to get healthy and cannot afford it, but certainly COVID has slowed our trajectory.

Professionally, as with most healthcare organizations, the COVID funds dried up, staff was cut, patient volumes remained high and we had reorg after reorg until  my professional life no longer resembled what it was prepandemic, and the feelings of burnout became quite real, causing me to find a new job just to protect my mental health. 

Despite being in a new role, which has been much better for my mental health, for the last year and no COVID for the last 22 months, as it turns out the pandemic was not quite done with me yet. At the end of September, my beloved father, who was 91, came down with COVID.  I sat at his hospital bedside for seven days until the ugly monster finally took his life.  My father was a very kind and giving man.  He was a Catholic Deacon in his retirement years and he did great things for so many people.  During his final days I had a chance to ask him if it was worth it.  I shared the struggle of my own journey of putting good into the world that was ultimately stunted by COVID in some cases, and in others didn't end as I would have expected.  

He told me one simple thing,"Honey, it's always worth it."  I was then given the charge to continue his good work going forward, which I nervously agreed to, as it was one of my father's final wishes.  This was met with a simple,"Good.  It's settled.  The Daddy-Daughter Pact has officially begun." Inside I thought Dad baptized babies, he married people, taught Catechism, he did all these great big things.  I'm not clergy, I can't do all of those things, so what did he mean?  How was I going to live up to my promise to my dying father?

This simple conversation became the proverbial elephant in the room of my psyche.  How was I to carry this out?  What did this even mean?  He did these great big things.   I was at a loss as to where to even begin after losing so much of myself to COVID and now lost in the grief due to my father's passing.  So, I do what I always do.  I consulted my long time accountability partner. The answer?  

"There is only one way to eat an elephant.  One bite at a time."  

Yes, I knew the phrase, but not its origin.  I also had no idea how to apply it in that moment so I do what everyone does.  I stalled and did a Google search of the phrase.  I learned this phrase came from Anglican Priest Desmond Tutu as he talked about taking on Apartheid.  Apartheid?  Apartheid in small bites?  That was hardly a small thing.  As I thought it through, maybe post COVID it's OK to let go of my no holds barred badass great white take no prisoners approach, and settle into claiming my post pandemic self one small bite at a time.  One small change, one small act, one tiny victory because Desmond Tutu also said, "Do your little bit of good where you are.  It's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world."

Going forward, you're probably not going to see much of me swimming with the sharks on a Spartan course or a marathon, as I have traded running for my new passion, my Peloton, but if you look closely, you will find me in a quiet corner, working hard to put good out into to the world to honor my father's legacy, just like we agreed in the Daddy-Daughter Pact.  It's time to start snacking on the elephant.