The question of validation

After my last post and crying for four days straight, I finally picked myself up and got back on track both emotionally and nutritionally. There wasn't a real clarity, but at least my thinking capacity was slightly better.

As you know from my last post, I have been pretty worried about Baxter, my oldest dog. It was heart-wrenching to watch him suffer 3 grand mal seizures within a period of 28 hours. By Monday, he had a few petit mal seizures, tremors, and many falling down episodes. On Tuesday, I took him to the vet to get labs drawn. The labs were within normal limits with only a slight elevation of lipase which wasn't significant. While we were there, Baxter who was already stressed, had a number of tremors and episodes of falling down. Since I had a keen eye for what was happening, I tried to catch Baxter's every fall. I pointed out to the vet that this was what was happening. Since he was not sure the reasons for the seizures and these episodes, he referred Baxter to a canine neurologist in TN.

The earliest appointment I could get was Monday, so that is where I will be all day. Since Tuesday, Baxter's tremors and episodes have decreased in frequency and duration. Today was the first day in almost a week where he did not fall uncontrollably or have tremors. This is of course good news, and I almost thought about cancelling the appointment. I already contacted the vet via e-mail, so he is expecting me.

The feeling I can't shake about all this is the whole validation aspect. Though I hated to see poor Baxter have tremors and fall down at the vet, I was kind of glad too. This way the vet saw exactly what I was talking about. He knew I wasn't somehow making it up or that he was really okay, etc. So now, I worry that this neurologist will think there isn't a problem since he doesn't appear to be having seizures or tremors at the moment (This is obviously not my intelligent side of my brain talking here)

This thinking correlates with my eating disorder validation analysis of myself too. I've never truly fit the criteria nor physically looked the part of an eating disorder person (yes, I'm well aware you can have an eating disorder at any weight), but at the same time, the majority of professionals who've treated me have never doubted me either. Therefore, it doesn't make sense to me where I even get this thinking from. At this point, I know it doesn't matter, it's just that this aspect of validation keeps reappearing in my life in a variety of ways that are not conducive to my health. And I tend to have such a hard time letting it go or accepting it.

I guess the question boils down to why do I need such validation? What do I hope to gain from it? I don't know the answers to either honestly, but for whatever reason this question keeps me up at night.

Question: do you have validation issues? Do you have questions/thoughts that keep you up at night?

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