Friday, February 18, 2011

Carob as a substitute for chocolate?

Um, not really.  It looks like chocolate.  And that's where the similarities end.  Whoever decided that carob is a substitute for chocolate has obviously not had chocolate in a long time.  As I wrote before, I have been trying the Bladder Friendly Diet to see if it helps with my burning.  Chocolate is a no-no in this diet so I bought some carob chips and made oatmeal carob chip cookies to try and get my chocolate fix.  Not so much.  It's hard to describe what carob tastes like - kind of fruity I think; not chocolaty at all.  And another thing - it doesn't melt.  I baked the cookies in a 350 degree oven and the carob did not melt.  It was disappointing.

The good news (or is it?) is that it seems that the Bladder Friendly Diet really had no effect on me one way or the other.  I thought it was working, but then I had all this burning and itching while I was still strictly following the diet.  It's good news because I cannot live without chocolate, tomatoes and vinegar.  But it would have been nice to pinpoint a specific trigger for the burning.  Oh well.  It's still a mystery.

In other news I've been pretty down lately.   I just feel like my life is stagnant.  There is no moving forward.  My best friends live far away from me so we usually talk on the phone to keep each other updated on our lives.  I've been avoiding calling them because I have nothing to say.  Or at least, nothing good to say.  And I know they are my friends and they love me and they want to be supportive, but really, who wants to hear my pity party?  I don't.  Who wants to hear about how I still can't have sex and I still have no desire and my vagina is still burning and it's still all a mystery?  They're all getting pregnant and decorating their houses and living normal lives.  I don't want to talk to anybody because I don't want to have to answer the question: How are you?  What have you been up to lately?  How's life?  Answers: depressed.  nothing.  stagnant.  Lately whenever I talk to people I do everything I can to steer the conversation towards them.  Nothing new over here.  Nothing's changed.

5 comments:

Purpose of Pain said...

All my closest friends live away too. I can't have much of a social life because I can't sit. It's so hard having something that you can't really talk about publically and that no one understands. People don't ask me how I am doing very much anymore and I am glad because I too don't know what to say. Hang in there. Even though I don't know you personally, I'll be praying for you.

Living with Vaginismus said...

I'm so sorry you've been so down. I have totally been there... hang in there.

Anonymous said...

After my demon UTI that gave me vulvodynia, I followed the bladder friendly diet for a couple months. I still get flare ups on PMS and my period but I eat chocolate and drink pop. I need soda to function lol!

MSG is a bad trigger for me...so I try to avoid that.

Taking a Tums after acidic food helps my pee not burn my inflamed tissues so that's that I've gleamed from the diet really.

I understand about the whole friends thing, thank God for online friends because I can't hang out with people. Vulvodynia has made me even more socially ackward.

Everyone I used to know has kids and I can't even think of doing the "process" to make them.

Life feels like I'm stuck in neutral while everyone else is in 5th gear having a high-ho time.

Just want to say I understand.

Sarah said...

Thanks for all the support. At least I know that other people feel this social awkwardness too. It's like an avalanche - one problems builds bigger and bigger and then it brings in new problems along with it. And then you're stuck at the bottom and you can't move anywhere.

Becca said...

I can totally relate to this. My closest friends know about my vaginismus but they definitely cannot relate and they are all having babies too. :-/ It makes it so hard that this is something I don't feel like I can talk publicly about because I would LOVE to. My husband and I have been married for almost 5 years and everyone keeps asking us when the babies are coming, I finally just announced on my blog that we aren't able to have babies and we're getting help for it, because what am I gonna say? Oh yeah, we've never been able to have sex? *sigh* Its hard to deal with. I'm sorry you've had to struggle with this for so long, I know its definitely exhausting. :(