Deception

Zinc makes me nauseous. That’s the conclusion I’ve come to.

When I had covid this summer, a friend recommended Zinc (and some Selenium to help the Zinc get absorbed). And because I was so desperate to not get desperately sick, I took her advice – advice that seemed to work quite effectively, thank you, Marla.

Then a few weeks later, when I started getting a cold of the more typical variety, I remembered the Zinc regimen and pulled those bottles out again. And lo and behold, that cold took an atypically mild and short route through my body and left. I’m sold on the Zinc thing now.

Except for this: as my cold symptoms dissipated, I started finding that Zinc to be difficult to swallow. Literally. It got stuck in my throat, and I had to eat something to make it move. Then I started noticing that I felt a little nauseous right after I took that pill. So, I adjusted my habits and took it at mealtimes, which helped a little bit.

But a strange new door had now been opened.

All of a sudden, every time I had to take ANY pill (and I take a good number of daily pills, people), I started feeling nauseous. And this hacked me off because there was absolutely no reason or explanation for this. I’ve been popping these drugs for years, y’all – what up with this sudden rejection by my body? It was ridiculous! I had to be just psyching myself out; some switch in my brain had flipped and now swallowing a pill was supposed to be a terrible experience. My mind was messing with me. I was lying to myself.

Lying to myself. Have you ever thought about that concept? The fact that we can lie to ourselves? That we tell ourselves things that we know are not true . . . and we believe ourselves?? The level of neurosis behind that behavior is a bit unnerving.

This pill-taking nonsense (which eventually subsided, for the record) was different from my usual self-deception in that it was quite involuntary -- and it was relatively innocuous overall. But other episodes have been less innocent, more harmful. I have all sorts of ridiculous fictions I try to sell myself on.

“You’re tired. You need some sugar. Yeah – sugar. That’s it. That’ll give you some energy.”

“You may as well finish another chapter. You’re not going to be able to sleep anyway if you stop reading now. Sleep is for the weak. 6:30am isn’t that early. You’ll be fine.”

“You don’t need to grade those papers tonight. You’ll have time tomorrow. Between everything else you're doing. And you'll feel more like doing it tomorrow, right? Of course, you will.”

(Well, so these are relatively innocuous, too. Not gonna share the most destructive ones.)

I tell myself all sorts of things that I know are not true. And I believe myself. No, that’s a lie, too. I don’t really believe myself; I just want that thing to be true so badly that I willfully let go of what I know to be reality in favor of a bunch of hokum that gives me a bit of pleasure in the moment. (And I bet you do, too. Don’t try to tell me you don’t.)

Dang, I am a hot mess. 

I hope you haven’t read this far expecting me to give you a solution to this dilemma. Cuz I got nothin’, friends. I just find it to be a very valuable exercise to be reminded frequently of what a hot mess I really am. Keeps me humble and charitable and SO grateful for grace.