Recently I haven’t been posting very frequently. There are probably a few reasons. One, to which I just alluded, is that I’ve been maintaining several other “quicklinks” blogs in addition to this primary one, and on those I’ve remained reasonably active (they don’t require much thought, really, since they’re primarily just pointers to resources, with fairly minimal analysis), taking away some of the time and energy I normally would spend here.

I must confess, though, also to having been in something of a funk, a particularly introverted mindspace, or both; and “having been” may not be the most accurate verb tense, since I’m still at least partly in that state of mind. There are several potential contributing factors to this, one being that I’m in a bit of a hypochrondriacal, anxious place right now, experiencing a range of distressing and physically very uncomfortable symptoms most likely indicating some problem with my prostate. Most likely it’s just a benign prostatitis of some sort, but now that I’m in my 40s, and given that my dad experienced a number of prostate-related problems before (though ultimately unrelated to) his death, including one potential (the lab results were never conclusive one way or the other) course of prostate cancer and a partial prostatectomy, I’m stressed and worried, which obviously aren’t at all helpful. As a result, I’m sleeping fitfully, and then falling asleep on the couch early; I’m not eating much or well; and I suspect I’m coming across to others as distracted, cranky and/or (more than usually) self-absorbed.

And I’d been putting off making an appointment with a doctor. I never completely connected with the doctor I was seeing a few years ago, up to the point I was laid off; I felt that while she wasn’t openly judgmental or critical, she didn’t seem completely comfortable with my sexual orientation, and there was also sometimes a language barrier, or at least an understanding barrier, with English not being her first or best language. I truly believe she’s a perfectly competent physician, but I just never developed the kind of rapport and comfort I’d have preferred. Especially when it comes to dealing with urogenital issues.

Since late 2001, I hadn’t seen any doctor with the exception of those who examined and cleared me as a likely kidney donor for my father in late 2002 (though that turned out not to be necessary, as a cadaveric match almost miraculously was located two weeks before our surgery was scheduled in January 2003) and hadn’t yet identified a new primary care physician.

So today I finally went ahead and made an appointment with my previous doctor anyway; she is, at least, a known quantity, and she accepts my current insurance plan. And, amazingly, she had an appointment slot available tomorrow afternoon, so I don’t have to wait as long as I thought I might to find out what’s wrong, and start addressing the uncomfortable symptoms as well as the underlying cause, whatever it may be.

Sigh.