Bargaining for My Autonomy, End of the Chocolate Streak ("50 First Weeks")

A new week, a new opportunity to set intentions for the best. Still snow everywhere, but more thaw than freeze, and some brilliant sunshine. Made it down to the beach for a sunset hike, and there's very little snow down there...but worrying amounts of erosion.  

This week brings a very serious and challenging resolution imperative. I mentioned an ultimatum from my Naturopath in my last post. What's at stake is nothing short of my own autonomy and ability to be out in the world. This is a bald and alarming threat to face. When a person is overextended and under a lot of stress, it's not that abnormal for her to pull several all-nighters consecutively, use a lot of caffeine, and fail to eat adequately or take prescribed medication, is it?


What my ND told me was that my doing so, given my health conditions, is creating a potentially dangerous and life-threatening situation, and I had to admit that he wasn't sensationalizing or exaggerating: it was the simple truth. So, I have a contract with him agreeing to a prescribed bedtime, agreeing to abstain from caffeine, agreeing to take medications. (There's probably something about food on there too, but I don't listen to anyone else when it comes to food.) 
And I still have to get all my work done without staying up all night!


I feel torn between recognition that this agreement is going to save my life and health, and irritation that I have to agree to go to bed like a little kid and not just do as I please! But since I recognize that what's at stake is my autonomy, my ability to live my own life in my own home, and the alternative is so distasteful, I have given up a little of my autonomy in order to preserve the major part of it. And I realize that really, as momentous as all this might sound, it's just like any other part of life. Not one of us is truly autonomous. I write this blog because you will read it. Even my most independent actions, like solo hikes in the wilderness, are having or will have an effect on someone at some time. Most people work at a job that makes demands on their freedom, so that they're free to do what they want with the rest of their lives.
This week I intend to examine the ways in which I am dependent and interdependent with everything and everyone else in my life.


This post is also an explanation of why there probably won't be many more "chocolate" recipes on here for a while. Speaking of which, if you enjoyed the brownie bite recipe I just posted, please check back, because I edited to add an ingredient I'd forgotten from the list! I've written so many times before about not being able to have chocolate, and have posted all kinds of chocolate alternative recipes. But on my recent caffeine kick, I've eased up on the ban, hence the brownie bites recipe; a typical recent lunch has looked like this: 

An apple, a carrot, and a smoothie made out of fresh local snow, spinach, spirulina, stevia, and cacao powder, with cacao nibs on top. My Naturopath says a tiny piece of chocolate occasionally is ok, but throwing cacao powder into smoothies made of nothing else but ice and greens every day is not.


So, time to make some changes here--I love my freedom, so I'll trade a little freedom to keep it, right?

How do you trade your autonomy in order to have your freedom?