The Angry Typist

I like routines.

I am driven by goals.

I faithfully abide by my routines to reach my goals.

And you would think the having served in the Army for 11 years is where my love of routines, organization, and discipline were developed. But it wasn’t. Our motto in the Army was everything was ‘locked in Jello’ especially the CSS (Combat Service Support) arena. It was not uncommon for our mission plan to change completely within a few hours of the initial mission order.

What the Army taught me was to pivot. Those who were successful mastered pivoting & flexibility. Those who failed could not let go of their rigidity.

But now, no longer in the service, I like my routines.

Monday through Thursday evenings I am at the gym.

Friday, I play pickleball.

Saturday morning, I am at the gym.

Sunday I am on the treadmill getting in my 8,000 steps before the day gets away from me.

Yes, I am easy to stalk. Yes, I live a rather boring life. And also yes, this is what brings me internal peace and contentment.

I scheduled my tooth extraction for Friday so that at most I would only miss one WOD class on Saturday. However, as life would have it, my plan didn’t pan out as I had hoped.

Since I haven’t had any dental work outside of cleaning in years, I had no idea that tooth extraction comes with stitches. I also didn’t know that when one has stitches in the mouth, one cannot do any weight bearing exercises because it may ‘pop a stitch’, not even walking with a weighted vest!

The Periodontist said that at a minimum, the stiches need to be intact for at least 5 days. Additionally, I could not drink out of a straw (aka no water bottle), cannot rinse my mouth (no Listerine), and had to restrict eating to the opposite side of the mouth.

All these conditional mandates may seem minor, but they were disrupting almost every facet of my routine, and I felt completely out of sorts. Nothing was working for me, and it had a cascading effect.

My sleep routine was disrupted because I was physically uncomfortable. My nutrition was disrupted because I had to limit to eating only soft texture foods – no quinoa or rice in fear that the small particles may get stuck in the gaping hole in my mouth. My nutrition was further complicated when my gums on the side of my mouth doing all the chewing became inflamed, sore, and tender for pulling double duty which made me not wanting to eat. And then of course there was the disruption to my physical activities. I religiously go to the gym because I do not have the self-discipline to workout on my own for the long term. So, although I could have walked on my own at home, I didn’t.

I just muddled through my day feeling such incompleteness, unsatisfaction, and just itchy to get back to my precious routines.

Thankfully, by Thursday I was back in class, by Friday I was given all clear to drink & eat whatever I want by whatever medium, and it has taken an additional few days for me to settle back into my routine. But BOY does it feel good to get back to the groove.