Fuck Cancer

It has been so long sine my computer did not need to be tethered to an outlet. It don't know what it is about that fact that is so special other than the fact that I have never blogged from my tablet or phone and I don't like to use my computer while it is attached to a cord.

So many things have changed in these last few years that I don't even know where to start. I look back at my previous posts and I don't even recognize the girl who wrote those anymore. Too much has changed since those posts and the woman that sits here typing this can't ever go back to the girl who didn't know anything. I now know the joy of success. After many long years I finally graduated with my BA in Psychology. It was a day I honestly didn't think would come and I am glad that my husband pushed me to make myself someone worthy of the world. Someone who can contribute. It's ironic in a sense that after all that time I spent in school to avoid working another retail job, I finally found the job I love; in retail. Took me long enough to find it only to have to leave it behind when my life took another crazy turn.

I have two beautiful children who are the yin and yang of health. My daughter is almost never sick. My son is almost never healthy. Okay, that second part is a but of an exaggeration, but Noah has always been my sickly child. Diagnosed with two blood disorders in as many years of life. Hospitalized for Swine flu before he was 60 days old. Various colds multiple times a year. The occasional flu. It almost seemed fitting when days before his 5th birthday, I sat in a doctors office hearing words like hospital admittance. Chemotherapy, Cancer. Noah's cancer story is already so long and he is only 20% of the way through his journey. We are so lucky in many ways. Noah's cancer is very treatable and he has the best cancer to have if you were to ever pick one, but it doesn't make it any easier.

Every day I am thankful that Noah is doing so well, but every day I am angry. I see the little things that cancer has taken from my life and I get angry. I want my life back. I want my happy and healthy son back. I want to see him sitting on the couch curled up with a blanket and not think that something is wrong. I want to see him play and get bruises and not worry that his cancer is returning. I took Noah in to the hairstylist today to get his hair cut for the first time in over 9 months. We have had his head shaved before at the hairstylist, but that was in reaction to him losing his hair. This was the first time that he has had his hair cut because it was getting long and he he wanted it trimmed up.

We sat in the salon and he looked through books for almost 30 minutes while he looked at all the different hairstyles for men and boys. He found a couple of cuts that he liked but then he would look in the mirror and shake his head and keep looking. 30 minutes before he finally found a hairstyle that he liked and the whole time I was beaming from ear to ear because he was finally getting something back that cancer had taken from him. He was pensive and you could see him seriously considering each and every cut he came across. He sat in the chair and didn't move a muscle while the stylist cut his hair and then he asked her if she could make it look like the picture. He was so happy and his happiness was contagious. But underneath all of my happiness, was anger. Why was I happy over a haircut? Why was I happy that he had a choice? It's a simple haircut. People get them all of the time and they don't think anything of it. It is no big deal to so many people. It only mattered because Cancer made it matter. Cancer has taken so much from us, but we are so lucky in many ways. I get happy over a small victory and then I get angry that I was happy over he victory and then I feel guilty that I felt angry and then I give in and feel happy...and the viscous cycle continues

Get up and move on

It has been so long since I had my surgery yet, when I look at the actual pages of the calendar it hasn’t been much time at all. 14 months to the day since I went under the knife and changed my life for the better. I was so tired of being a slave to my body. I understand that being a woman and going through the typical cycle a woman faces each month is part of life, but I did not face what they typical woman faces. I have heard from so many women that they deal with their visitor for 3-5 days and they are done. God how I so desperately wanted to be one of those girls. My visitor did not stay for a few days and gracefully bow out when her time was done. She came in a whirlwind and disrupted my entire life while sleeping on my couch so to speak until the springs molded to her form. 3-5 days? I mean what is that? The paper cut equivalent of a period? If my visitor stayed for only 3-5 weeks, it was a blessing. 

I have tried many times to explain it to people, but you just cannot understand unless you have lived through it. Baths were the only thing that gave me any comfort and I would make the water so boiling hot that the heat of the water would make me nauseous. While the hot water felt great, the scene that it left behind left something to be desired. I googled some photos to insert into this post to give you an idea of what my baths were like, but while those photos were scary accurate, they are just to graphic and close to the truth to use. Just imagine any horror movie where someone is gutted in the tub and you’ll get the idea. Didn’t want that image in your head? Yeah, well....imagine what it was like to actually be laying in it. 

My doctor and I tried many course of action in order to make my life easier and some of them worked for a couple of weeks and uterine ablation even lasted me a few months. Other than when I was pregnant, that was the most reprieve I’d had in 18 years. It was supposed to be a permanent solution, but I never was lucky when it came to that. Going in to my hysterectomy I was terrified. Hell, terrified is not a strong enough emotion for how scared I was. From the time I was 14 or 15 and learned what a hysterectomy was, I wanted one. No more cramping or bleeding. The ability to wear whatever you wanted whenever you wanted to wear it. Not having to feel like an infant wearing a diaper while you slept at night....who wouldn’t want that? 

At one point I had even asked my doctor about having one, but at the age of 20 without having any kids, I wasn’t getting it unless I was dying. 10 year later my visitor stayed for longer periods of time (pun intended) and she would come back more frequently than she had before. Yeah her visits were hell when I was younger but I usually got 4-5 weeks and sometimes 6 weeks between her visits. This just wasn’t the case at the end. My friend would camp out with me for the long haul and would stay for 2-2.5 months and then she would never move out. She would just go visit someone else for 3-5 days and then come back. I had no break. I was so desperately anemic I could barely make it through my day without a nap to help recharge my batteries. Life sucked. Upon my 10th time seeing my doctor for excessive hemorrhaging in as many months, my doctor said there was nothing left to do that would help me other than the hysterectomy. The one thing I had wanted for half my life was finally being offered to me, but when it was offered, I no longer wanted it. After all I had been through you would think I would be doing cartwheels to the operating table, but finality of the procedure, but that didn’t happen. I wanted to hide under the table and pretend that everything was fine and that I could suffer through it. 

Sure it sucked to be out to dinner with my husband and bleed all of the way through my clothes and into the seat with no warning. It absolutely put a damper on my sex life. Romantic weekend away just my husband and I? HA! Better book an extra room for my uninvited guest. Swimming at the lake with my family? Not unless I wanted to reenact scenes from the movie Jaws. There were so many things that I was not able to fully enjoy and the promise of the surgery would give me my life back yet it was still the last thing I wanted. There was something about removing the essential part of what makes me female that hurt all of the way down to my soul. I was done having kids so it shouldn’t have even mattered, but the thought of losing that ability permanently was almost more than I could bear. I had taken so many preventative measures to prevent pregnancy that it would have been impossible, but all of those things could be reversed if I so desired. I likely would not have survived a 3rd pregnancy because of my heart, but that didn’t stop me from mourning the loss of the children I could have had. I had so many doubts and fears, but I had a great network of supporters that helped me. 

Wifey’s mom helped me the most. She had been through the procedure really young like I was going to be and she came out happier and healthier in the end. If she could do it, couldn’t I? It was then that I began to look into the pros and cons. Let me just say that doing research did not ease my mind. I could find nothing but horror stories and bitter women who were left with the inability to ever enjoy sex again. Most women lost the ability to orgasm while many more lost all sensation and even more than that seemed to experience nothing but pain during intercourse. I was voluntarily signing myself up for that possibility? What was I thinking? I met with my doctor again and discussed any other option. We had done them all. Ablation, grew back in only months. Pills, made the periods never-ending and left me exhausted more than without them. The shot was the worst of them all. I bleed non stop for 7 solid months. I had no other roads available to me. I finally conceded defeat to the doctor and she told me the scheduler would be calling me in likely 60-90 days after the insurance reviewed and gave their approval. They almost always deny the first request and demand al other avenues be explored even if they have already been done. It was looking like surgery would be in 6-7 months once we waded through the red tape. Imagine my surprise when the scheduler called me only 2 days later and set my surgery for less than 3 weeks out. When the scheduler told me she was calling to set the date for my surgery, I could barely talk. A rush of emotion overwhelmed me and I begin shaking so hard the house should have fallen to rubble around me. When she told me I had been given emergency approval due to the seriousness of my situation, I began bawling. During my last visit I had a final pap done and it came back as cancer. It turned out that was a mistake and the actual results were pre-cancer, but the reality was there. No more hiding. No more cowering. it was time to get up and fight back. 

The surgery was there before I knew it and I was certain it would be canceled due to my nerves making my blood pressure so crazy. Apparently I was not getting out of it that easily and I was sedated instead. I went back, fell asleep, and came out as less of a woman. I hurt in places I didn’t know even existed before, but I felt lighter. Not just because some of me was missing, but the never ending pain I walked around with for years was no longer there. The dull aching cramp was gone. Granted it was replaced with sharp pains from the surgery, but those were easily subdued with drugs in the way that the cramping was never able to be relieved. I was up and walking within hours. I was out of the hospital in 3 days. I was grocery shopping on day 4 and made a huge Easter dinner for my family on day 5. I healed at an amazing rate and I was able to fully return to all aspects of my life after 3 weeks. Way sooner than the 6 weeks I was supposed to be on bed rest and a hell of a lot sooner than the 12 weeks I was supposed to wait to be intimate again. I look back now at how scared I was and all of the grief I put myself through and it is laughable. Why was I so scared? It was the best decision I have ever made in my life. I have experienced life in a way that I was never able to do before and I look back on all that I went though and all that I have ahead of me and I tell life to bring it on. Give me the best that you have got and I will face it and come out better for it. If my hysterectomy taught me anything, it taught me that. 

Ever had one of those days where the level of shit that you give is so far below zero that it should be comical, but because of said level, it isn't? That would be me today. The kid I work with doesn't do any of the things that I try to get him to do so I spend 4 hours just trying to get him to be a human being, which sooooo isn't going to happen, which just gets me all upset and frustrated because I bust my ass doing my job and it hurts that I put so much time and effort into what I do and it never matters. Then stupid asshole bosses have to show me that indeed the level of their assholeness can in fact go far above the maximum level even allowable. At least asshole boss actually admitted that he has no basis on any of the things that he is saying other than hearing things from people 3rd, 5th, and 10th hand....yeah way to do your fact checking. Asshole. I just hate dealing with all of this crap. I just want to crawl into either a bubble bath or a bottle of vodka and right now I just don't think bubbles are going to do it for me.

Inspired by a homework assignment...

Adaptation is also  known as healing or recovery and it is most simply put as the process of changing your life, emotions, or thoughts in order to handle the loss that the person experiences. This takes many different forms depending on the person and the situation. For myself personally, I will use the most recent occurrence of loss and that was when my grandmother died. She had been declining steadily in her health for a long time so it was not sudden and though I had years to come to terms with it, it seems as if it just came out of nowhere.

In the years previous to her death, she developed and suffered greatly from advanced stages of Alzheimers. It was heartbreaking for me to go see her knowing that she did not recognize me, but the hardest part was trying to remind her of who I was because you could see the war that raged on within her as she tried to remember what everyone told her she already knew. I cannot imagine how difficult that must have been for her. To see her first granddaughter grown up and married with children of her own when all she could remember was the 5 year old that followed her every movement and wanted to be just like her. I guess my grieving really began when she stopped recognizing me. It felt like I had lost a part of my childhood. Sure my grandma drove me nuts sometimes, okay a good deal of the time, but I loved her and being with her was like being a little girl again. It hurt deeply when I could no longer share those memories with her without seeing a look of frustration and pain when she realized she did not remember. I slowly stopped visiting my grandmother because it was just too hard. I look back now and regret doing that to her. It was not her fault and I feel as though I was punishing her for things that were beyond her control. I see now that I was adapting to the situation by trying to lessen my pain, but I never thought about the pain it caused her.

When I got the call that she was very sick and may die, it felt like I was stabbed in the chest. Here I was this little girl all over again scared and afraid of the world outside. Though at the time I was very sick, I went to the hospital to await some news. It’s funny, or not, but almost everything bad that has happened to one of my family members takes place at that hospital. I hate that place. Well, maybe not the entire hospital, but certainly the second floor. It is where people go to die. That is another adaption I have made in my life. If something happens to myself or one of my children that would result in one of us going to the second floor, I will drive out of my way to go to a different hospital. I cannot take the pain of seeing another family member admitted to the second floor. They almost never come back from that place. But on that day, I sat with my family on the second floor and waited. Discussions on what the family wanted took place all around me and medicines were given and then stopped and then given again. The air was thick with hurt and anger and I felt as though I couldn’t breathe. It was a crappy way to spend a birthday that was for sure.

I didn’t think of it until just this second, but that was the second year in a row I spent my birthday in a hospital. The year after that was spent there too. Maybe I will be skipping birthdays from now on as another method of adaptation….The next 2 days were a blur of hospitals and driving back and forth between it and my home. I rarely saw my husband or my children. The stress of the situation made my illness worse and I decided to go home for a couple of hours and rest as my grandmother’s was on the mend. It was a 30 minute drive home. When I walked into my house, my phone was ringing, but I ignored it and went straight into the bedroom and flopped down on the bed. My husband knocked and brought me the phone and said “It’s Jessica….and she’s crying…hard”. I knew what she would say before I even touched the phone. In the 30 minutes I had been gone, grandma took a turn for the worse and died. I immediately grabbed my keys and flew back to the hospital. In no time I was outside of her room with my family. I was angry at myself for leaving and made a change that day that no matter what happened in the future, I would never leave another hospital while a family member was fighting to live. No matter how well they appeared to be doing, I would never leave again.

I have adapted my life in many ways to deal with the pain that event caused me and the grief that came with it. I believe most of these changes will be permanent and deeply rooted inside of me to help protect myself from the same kind of pain again. We cannot change our past, but we can make changes to make our future different and that is exactly what I have done.

I have decided that the Internet is a terrifying place whenever you try to get helpful information from it. I want to know as much as I can sight I feel prepared for my surgery and may have some sort of sense of what to expect in the coming weeks. Maybe being prepare will help to ease this cripple apprehension I seen to be suffering from. Of course, all the research I am doing is making me more nervous. Leave the ovaries and still e hormonal an crazy or take them and go into menopause and have a greater risk of having a heart attack? Leave the cervix and risk still having pain and. Lessing every month or take it and risk losing pleasure from sex. Most people tell me there is no right or wrong answer to these question a each person and case is unique, but I really wish there was some sort of concrete answer so that I did not have to agonize over making the right choice. I sure hope this all gets easier to figure out because the stress of making this choice may very well make me crazy. White padded room, here I come.

Eviction notice served, now get the hell out.

I have had a week to wrap my head around this and now I feel I am okay enough to share with the world. I am having a hysterectomy in 18 days. Kind of blunt, I know, but I just had to throw that out there that way any whiny babies who get freaked out about this kind of thing could just leave. I am not sure how I feel about this. When I was younger, I thought the whole idea of a hysterectomy sounded awesome, but now I think it feels terrifying. There are times like now that I am in so much pain I want to count the seconds down, but even hidden in there, I am scared that I am making the wrong choice. I have tried lots of other options and it seems like my symptoms are not only not getting better, but that they are deteriorating faster. I wake up every night since the decision was made in a panic about the surgery and I lay in bed for hours questioning whether my reasons are good enough. I knew I was apprehensive, but I didn't understand how scared I was until my doctor called to book my appointment. I thought maybe she was calling with more test results. As soon as she said she was calling to book my surgery, I began bawling.

Crying? I was actually crying over booking my surgery? I was scared and at the same time I was angry. Angry at myself for crying over something so stupid. Did I not just have surgery 6 months ago and come out perfectly fine? Am I not aware of how severely anemic I am because I cannot control the bleeding that comes with my periods? Do I not hurt so bad that I have to take narcotic pain medication-which I loathe-just to make it through my day? Why on Earth was I crying? I felt like I was one of those silly cartoon characters with the angel and devil debating on her shoulders with the warring that was going on in my head. I have not rectified the two sides, but I am trying to comes to terms with this surgery and as I get closer, you can bet the emotions will get stronger and even more confusing, For now, I just sit here and worry endlessly about what it will be like before, during, and after and I turn to my new amazing friends over at Hystersisters. I honestly do not know if I would be able to breathe in and out without their amazing support and advice.

Accident Prone doesn't even begin to cover it...

I don’t think in any of the posts that I made about myself that I shared the most fundamental aspects of who I am. I am a magnet for accidents. You know when they make new products they have people who test them to see if they can be hurt on them and they pass and then a few months later some schumck gets hurt on it and there is some mass recall? You can bet that 9 out of 10 times, that schmuck was me. If it is even remotely possible to be hurt on something, I can do it.

There are products that are made to help keep people safe. Take for example those rubber texturized mats that are made to go on the bottom of bath tubs and showers.

Those are there to help prevent people from slipping and falling. I used to slip and slid all of the time in my bath tub so I invested in a huge bath mat that covered the entire bottom. There was no way I was going to slip in the tub anymore. WRONG. Not a week after purchasing the mat I was taking a shower and went to turn around and then all of the sudden I was on my back on the floor of the tub and my left elbow felt like it had EXPLODED. I knew as soon as I hit the tub that I had broken my arm. I fell on a no slip shower mat and broke my arm. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? The pain was at least a 11 on the pain scale. 

Unfortunately for me, it was a Sunday night. Not only a Sunday night, but a Sunday night on a holiday weekend and I just happened to work for a company that had a policy that you had to work a full 8 hours before the holiday and a full 8 hour after the holiday weekend in order to receive the holiday pay. Doubly unfortunate was that it was the Thanksgiving holiday and I would have lost pay for Thanksgiving day and the day after as the company was going to pay us for both days. If I went to the doctor, they would have made me miss the following day and even if they didn’t, the cast would have made my boss send me packing. Not to mention that my boss would have been pissed if I called in for a broken arm. She did not like it when someone was gone from work regardless of the reason. So, I made the decision to just suck it up and go to work. 

Let me just tell you that if you work a job that uses your hands and your arms exclusively and the job CANNOT be performed in any way without the full use and range of your arms, do not try to suck it up and go to work. The pain was unbelievable. As soon as I finished my 8 hour shift, I drove myself to the doctor and got my arm put in a cast. To add insult to injury in the most literal sense, my doctor did not believe me when I told him that I slipped and fell on a no slip shower pad and he brought his female nurse in to confront me in a domestic violence intervention. The humiliation was priceless, but that was nothing compared to the orange beam incident. Perhaps I will share that story tomorrow.  

I can be right too

It does not happen often that I am able to say that I am right about something and that my husband was wrong. When it does happen, I relish in it. It is those rare moments that make me feel like I may actually be a little bit smart because I know something that Mr. I Know Everything does not know. Mr. I Know Everything was born and raised in the south. He has not been around snow very much and he thinks his driving skills are amazing and when you add the two together, you just know there is going to be a problem.

So, knowing that there was a storm on the way, I tell Mr. I Know Everything that he needs to not go to work today because it is an hour away in this really crappy weather, but he knows everything (remember the name) and says that he is going to go. So I tell him to at least take my car as it has full coverage and will cover everything in the event of an accident. Mr. I Know Everything says no because he wasn’t going to get in an accident. Uh huh. Can you imagine the surprise when the phone rings not long after he heads out to work and he tells me he has been in an accident? Actually, there was no surprise. I knew it would happen because I saw his reckless abandon driving in the snow only 2 days prior. Flying down the freeway doing 75 in a 60 mile an hour zone when they snow was just falling out of the sky. Yeah, I was not a little bit surprised.

I am glad that my husband is okay and that his vehicle is not too badly damaged, but I can’t help feeling that if he had only listened to me, this would not have happened. The accident is not what bugs me, it is the fact that he felt my suggestions were meaningless when it turns out that sometimes, I am not as dumb as people believe. 

Live like you are dying

It is interesting how much a person changes their perceptions of people and life in general as hey grow up. When I was a kid I never had a second’s hesitation about riding my bike from one end of Yakima to the other. As an adult I look back and think that it was a miracle I was not taken by some sicko. I believed in Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and the Tooth Fairy whole heartedly when I was younger. Now I play those roles for my children. I used to see family as a value that had more worth than gold. Now I see the hypocrisy and the barely hidden animosity that family brings.

I used to love staying with various extended family members when I was younger. I loved watching my dad’s family get together and drink themselves silly while us kids played poker for Ritz crackers and tried to steal sips of alcohol when the adults were not looking. We used to go swimming in the Willamette River (YUCK), riding on my uncle’s boat, and playing on the wave runners. I loved hanging out with my dad’s family because they were so much FUN! I still love hanging out with them I just don’t quite fit in because I cannot hold my liquor at all. That is an unforgivable sin to the Sanchez’! 

My mom’s side of the family was never the "fun" side with the exception of just one of my aunts. Whenever the rest of the family got into a room with one another they always came off as fake. No one really seemed to like each other and no one valued anyone else. I never really liked going to see my mom’s side of the family except to see my cousins and the one “fun” aunt. This aunt was always loving and generous and I enjoyed spending time with her and her kids. She had a house by a lake that was surrounded by woods which everyone knows is the greatest place ever for Washington brats like me. We kids would spend hours at the lake swimming to the dock and diving off, digging our way through the Lilly pads to go fishing, and trying to catch dragonflies. We would lose ourselves in the woods surrounding her house. We searched every bush and plant for edible items such as blackberries and huckleberries and tried not to eat too many of them so that there was enough for my Aunt to make them into a pie.  She would take us to the local rivers and show us how to look for agate stones, coprolite, and craw dads. She was the first person who tried to teach me to cook and she always listened to anything I had to say.

I remember trying to make her dinner once when I was 11 or 12. My sister Melissa, and my Aunt’s future step-daughter got the idea in our heads that we were going to cook for my aunt and her boyfriend so that they could share a romantic dinner. None of us had any idea how to cook, but I thought I could work my way through making spaghetti since I had seen my mom make it a million times. You just add tomato sauce to a pan with a packet of spaghetti seasoning and then boil noodles. How hard could it be?  I don’t know what it tasted like, but I do know that my aunt did not have the special seasoning packet that my mom had so I just opened up spices at random and threw them in with the tomato sauce. I bet it was the worst meal they had ever had, but they ate it up like it was created by a 5 star chef. That was just how my aunt was and I think it is why I was always so drawn to her.

As I got older, I learned that she was no different from the other members of my mom’s family, she was just better at hiding it from the kids. My cousin once told me that she had overheard my aunt telling my uncle that I was such a horrible child for my parents because I had a drug problem and I was an unbelievable slut. When my cousin told me this, I cried. How could she have said these things about me? I had never done drugs and I had never done anything with a boy other than kiss one. Why would she say that about me?  That conversation changed the way I viewed my aunt and it colored every single happy memory I had of her. It was like my mother had said it about me. She was the one person outside of my mom and dad whose opinion I truly valued and that was what she thought of me. So I did what I have always done when I get hurt and I put up walls and pushed her away.

I have never really spoken to my aunt in the 13 years since I was told her true opinion of me. I see her very rarely at family functions when I am forced to go by my mother and I try to pretend to be nice to her though I am sure she can see right through it. That is how our relationship is now. We are fake to one another and ask questions about the other’s life so we can put up this pretense of being civil to one another so that we can pretend that we are a loving and close family. Actually I don’t pretend for those reasons. I pretend to keep my mom happy. I could care less about her or anyone else in that family and I only put up the façade for the sake of my grandmother when she was alive. Now that she has passed I have no trouble letting them know what I truly think of them and the way they treat one another.

It wouldn’t bother me in the slightest to never see or speak to any of them again so imagine my surprise when my mom called 2 days ago to tell me that my aunt has cancer and that it is very advanced and she will be lucky to see Christmas. Initially, I tried to be supportive for my mom who’s last year has been so rough on her I am amazed she gets out of bed every day, but the longer I talked to her the more I found that I was upset. I figured it must because my mom was upset and I have always been WAY TOO empathetic for my own good. The more I thought about it the more I realized I was not upset because my mother was; I was upset because I felt like a piece of my childhood was being taken away from me. I have not hardly spoken to this aunt in more than a decade yet I hear she is dying and I feel like that 15 year old girl whose cousin told her that her aunt cannot stand her and thinks she is a drug addicted slut. I felt all of the pain of that come back like it was happening again. I may not care about the person she is now, but I still care about the person I thought she was back then and it taught me that life is too short to hold on to grudges and anger. I let one of the best relationships I had turn to hate because of her gossip. I should have confronted her about it and set the record straight. I should have forgiven her long ago instead of waiting to hear that she was dying to do so because now it seems empty and fake just like we have been to one another.

From this day one I will try to live my life like I was dying. I want to love more, hate less, anger slower, forgive quickly and live my life every single day like it may be my last because you never know when it will be. I don’t want to find myself in this situation again where someone is dying and it takes the reality of that fact to shine light on my hardheaded stubbornness and to see that it was nothing but a waste. I do not do many things well or for long periods of time with the exception of holding a grudge. I think it is time to change that from a grudge to forgiveness.

The power of positive thinking

Growing up my mom always told me to have a positive outlook about things. Whenever I was sick she would tell me to tell myself I was not sick and that I would get better soon. To be honest, she irritated me every time she said things like that because no one could get better simply because they believed they would. It was a complete waste of time to even try, but I indulged her. Kinda. I never felt any better after my foo-foo I feel great sessions so I never put any stock into the idea, but then again I never really tried to believe in it. I had my mind made up before I even started. I was recently introduced to a new way of thinking that if you think good and happy things, good and happy things will happen to you. I am going to put myself into this idea and give it a go and see if it makes a difference in my life. The first thing I intend to do is remember the things I have in my life rather than what I don’t have. I have an amazing husband who loves me. 4 kids who are beautiful, healthy, and full of life, a beautiful car that I absolutely love that my wonderful husband bought me, and I am about to move in to a gorgeous house that is going to be my first home. When I take a look back at things I do not understand why I am negative about so many things because my life is pretty darn great when I think about it. 

It's all about me

I have given small bits of insight into my world through the blogs I have shared, but there are a few things that I have been told “define” the real me and I thought I would share them with everyone.

I love drinking Pepsi. I don’t care for any other pop with the very occasional Coke-a-Cola thrown in. I probably drink 2, sometimes 3 cans of Pepsi every single day.

I have a very freaky obsession with numbers and I always look for patterns in them. I do it with every single number I come across and I cannot move on to anything else until I have found a pattern or have been able to reduce the number to a single digit by adding each number up until there is only one. 8789=32=5. If for some reason I cannot do it, it literally can ruin my entire day.

I am an absolute slob. If it was not for my husband, I could very possibly see myself being one of those people on Hoarders.

I LOVE strawberry Skittles. I like all the rest of them (except grape, BLEH), but I love the red ones. I wish they made bags of only red. When I eat my Skittles they can under no circumstances (JESSICA!!!!) be mixed with other colors and they can only be eaten in reverse rainbow order. Purple, green, yellow, orange, and then red.

I love reduced fat original Pringles. I currently have 5 jars in my cabinet and that is only because I finished off a jar yesterday or there would have been 6.

Almost every single day, I eat a burned Totinos Combination flavor pizza. Yes the burning is intentional. I like it burned and yes it is unbelievably disgusting that I eat one almost every day. Well more like half of one. Trouble always eats about 1/4 – 1/2 and Pooka eats what is left of the half Trouble didn’t finish.

I never complete anything I start.

I have about a million trains of thought in my head and the damn trains always jump track and very rarely ever find their way back to their original track.  

I LOVE socks. LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE them. I currently have 73 pairs of socks and that is only because I threw out about 25 pairs a month or two ago.

My nose is chronically cold, as are my fingers, toes, and behind. I have circulation problems. (THANKS DAD!)

I love Grey’s Anatomy and other than the complete whoring around she did, I identify with the lead character more than any other character on any TV show ever.  

And…

Whenever I listen to music or the TV, the volume must be set to an even number unless the even number is immediately before or after a number ending in 5 an then it can only be set to the 5. For example, radio volume can only be set to 2 5 8 10 12 15 18 20 22 25. Above 25, however, volume numbers can only be divisible by 5. 25, 30, 35, 40…. I would rather turn the radio off than lesten to the volume set to a number that is not one listed above.  

Get over it!

I am neurotic. There is no need to sugar coat it or pretend otherwise. I am not trying to get people to jump on here and pump up my confidence by saying I am not neurotic or anything like that I am just making a blunt statement so that I can make people see what it is like to be me. I have been cover to cover on the DSM IV (diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders) and I cannot find any that fit me exactly. There are several of them that come close, but none that I meet all of the diagnostic criteria on. Well I take that back, I do meet the criteria for ADHD, but that has nothing to do with the crazy that I feel I live with. I wish there was a definable diagnosis so that when people say to me that I need to let things go or stop stressing all of the time, I could just tell them that I have blah blah blah and it makes it very hard to just stop worrying or obsessing.

Trust me; I do not want to do the things I do. I would love to get upsetting news and be plagued by it for an hour and then move on. It would be a gift to handle stress the way normal people do, but I am not normal. I can take normal levels of stress and be okay for the most part depending on what the stressful situation is. If I feel I have the slightest sense of control over the issue, I do not take it into me like a poison. If, however, I cannot control the outcome of whatever I am stressed about, the stress fills me with a dread so crippling, it takes all of my energy to function.

When the stress gets bad there is a process that I go through. The very first thing is that my heart speeds up and my heart is not the strongest. Then the worrying sets in. I obsess over every single tiny detail of something until I am entirely consumed with it. I have no control over this and it is the one aspect of dealing with stress that I hate the most. From there, the nerves kick in and every little thing sets me on edge. After that the nausea takes over and I get so worked up and so sick that I am unable to eat or drink. If the stress is severe enough I can go for days with only a few teaspoons of something to drink and I can go for days and weeks with only eating a bite of food a day. It usually isn’t until the dehydration has gotten so bad that I am disoriented that I usually realize that it has been 2-3 days without more than a sip or two of water. It is about that point I realize that I am so tense; I am in danger of snapping.

As I said earlier, I am not saying these things for sympathy. I am saying them in hopes that people may understand just a tiny bit what it is like to be me. When I get stressed out it is okay to tell me to take a deep breath and try to relax, but telling me to get over it, let it go, move on, forget about it, stop obsessing, etc. does not help me, it makes it worse. I know people are just trying to help, but you can help me more by saying you support me and are here for me. Telling me I am overreacting only makes me feel bad which starts the cycle all over again. 

Dear 16 year old me

One of the best public service announcements I have seen in a long time and one that I think every person should watch.

It is okay to ask for help.

We were talking about this in class today and some jerk made a rude comment and it prompted me to not only jump his shit, but to share my story with others so that they may know PPD is not anything to be ashamed of.

People say that having a baby is the most joyous time in a person’s life and while that may be true, there is a darker side to having a baby that many people don’t consider and a whole lot of people don’t talk about. While a mom should feel joy over having a baby, it is not uncommon for her to also feel despair and overwhelming sadness. I know this personally because this is how I felt after having both of my children.

With Pooka, I did not realize anything was wrong with me. I was so scared all of the time and I felt as though I couldn’t do anything right. Every time she made the smallest sound while she slept I was certain something was wrong with her and not only that, but I was sure I was the cause of whatever it was. I remember when she was 4 or 5 days old she had the worst gas and she was not crying, but screaming out in pain. After 4-5 hours I had exhausted everything I had read about in every parenting book and magazine I had and I called the advice nurse for her pediatrician and tried their remedies as well. Nothing was helping and her screaming was becoming desperate. My mother in law took her from me, rocked her in the chair just I had been doing, and patted her bottom just I had been doing. Pooka stopped crying and soon she was expelling the gas that was hurting her so much. I felt like my heart was going to break watching Dot with my daughter. Don’t get me wrong I am so glad she was there and able to help Pooka, but I was her mommy. Why couldn’t it have been me? After that I went in the bathroom, laid on the floor, and cried. I remember thinking she would have been better off if she had been born to a different mother. It was with that thought that I began to think something was not right with me, though I didn’t know what it was.

A couple of days after that I was feeding Pooka and she was frantic. Those of you who have babies know that when they get real hungry there is an urgent feel to them when they first start feeding and they calm the longer they feed. This was not the case with Pooka and the longer she fed, the more frantic she became. I had been feeding her for almost 3 full hours out of the last 5 and I could no longer get any milk out of me because she had taken it all. What was I going to do? Her crying was heartbreaking and I knew she needed more food, but I had no more to give. I did, however, have some formula samples that the hospital had given me, but I did not want formula. I wanted to feed my daughter myself. After arguing for more than an hour I was told it didn’t matter what I wanted, it mattered what she needed and that was more food and since I still was unable to get anymore, I would have to give her a bottle. It felt like defeat to go to the kitchen and make those couple of ounces. I sat in front of the stove with tears streaming down my face as I waited for the bottle to heat up. What was wrong with me? I gave her the bottle, she drank it down so fast I thought it was leaking out somewhere and then I realized she was just that hungry, but I didn’t know why. The rest of the night she would feed from me and then from a bottle because I was not enough to satisfy her.

Her 2 week checkup was the next day and I explained to her doctor the situation. After weighing her, feeding her, and weighing her again the doctor determined I was not making enough milk and that Pooka was developing failure to thrive (growing at a rate that is too slow for healthy development). They then gave me a contraption to wear around my neck that would hold formula and I would tape to myself and allow Pokka to feed from me thereby stimulating me to make milk, while also getting formula at the same time. 

It was humiliating. I also was given an electrical pump and was told to pump for 10 minutes at the end of each feeding and I was given a medication that would hopefully increase my milk production. I was scheduled a follow up to see how things were going a week later and while Pooka had gained a little bit of weight, it was still not enough. They then had me wait for 4 hours while feeding Pooka only formula and then they hooked me up to some fancy-schmancy machine to pump my milk and see how much I was making. The lactation consultant and doctor said I should be able to pump 4-5 ounces from each side after waiting for 4 hours. I pumped a total of just less than an ounce. How was that possible. I was doing everything they said and I was drying up after only a couple of weeks. I was devastated. I was a failure. What kind of mother could not feed her own child? That was what we were made to do and I was failing on the most basic levels of being a mommy. I had no hope after that. I wore the device for another month and pumped at the same time. Eventually it was all gone and she moved on to formula.

Slowly, but surely I got out of my funk. It took about 6-8 months, but the depression went away and I began to not feel so worthless. When I got pregnant with Trouble I did not think of the depression I had with Pooka and it was not until I was 8 months pregnant with him, that I knew it even was Post-Partum Depression. This time I was going to go at it with all the gusto I could manage, but I had the mindset that if breastfeeding didn’t work I would use a bottle and all would be fine. Things were going very well and in order to make LOTS of milk I fed him every hour and I pumped after each feeding. The day we went to check out, they weighed and measured him. All babies lose a bit of weight, but they tend to get concerned if they lose 10% or more of their birth weight in the first 2 days. I was confident we would not have that problem since I was feeding him even when he was not hungry just to make doubly sure he was getting enough to eat and I was being stimulated enough to make plenty of milk. It turns out I was right. He did not lose 10% of his weight. He lost 13%. The doctors put me through the entire process like they did with Pooka. Weigh, feed, weigh again and sure enough he was getting very little from me. A new prescription was given for the milk production along with strict instructions to come back in 2 days for another weigh, feed, weigh session.

I had said it would not matter if things came out the same way, but here I was again in the same situation only I felt even worse. I could almost literally see the black wave of despair build up and then shallow me. This time it was worse. I could not enjoy my little boy and feedings became so stressful I would gag and sometimes get sick (my reaction to stress). I stopped eating and it became unbearable to even smell food much less eat it. One bite of pizza, which I love more than any other food, would make me so full I thought I would get sick. After 3 more days of that, I began to resent my baby. I was so consumed over my failure to make milk and feed my child that I could not appreciate him.

Then one day I thought he and I would both be better off if I had never had him. The shock of those feelings was like ice water in my veins. I was terrified. How could I think that? I made Mack take me to the hospital and though he didn’t know it, I had every intention of making them commit me. I feared I was a danger to my child. I had to be locked away. I talked with a nurse at the hospital for a long time and she sent me over to my OB who I also talked with for a long time. New medications were prescribed, but this time they were antipsychotics rather than milk makers. I was also told to stop breastfeeding Trouble and use only the bottle with formula. The first feeding using my new Prescription and feeding instructions was eventful to say the least. I think it may have been the first time I really bonded with him. I watched his every single movement while he ate and he watched me right back. I did not gag, I did not get sick, and I finally felt like I was his mommy instead of someone who gave birth to him.

It took a couple of days, but my emotions settled down and I was able to appreciate my baby. I lived for feeding him and received joy from it I had not known. I look back now and can see the wide variety of warning signs that were hidden or misinterpreted, but they are not what is important. What is important is that when it really mattered, I asked for help. Any woman out there reading this needs to know that being a mom is hard, but it is more rewarding. Do not do you or your child a disservice by keeping your head down and muddling through it as I did with my daughter. Look up and meet depression in the eye and tell it you will not lie down for it. There is never any shame ever in asking for help and anyone who tells you otherwise is not worth your time. 

Being a mommy ROCKS!!!

Before I had kids I always thought it was cheesy to hear someone say that the best gift they had ever received was their children. Now that I am a mom I understand the sentiment. Yesterday made me reflect on my kids and how much joy they bring into my life and I started thinking about how they came to be.

Growing up I never wanted kids. I wasn’t the little girl who planned her wedding down to the place cards or had names picked out for 2.3 kids I planned on having. I just wasn’t that kind of girl. I was the kind that enjoyed playing in the mud and searching for bugs out in the woods. I remember people telling me I would change my mind when I got older and I also remember being irritated that they didn’t know me very well if they believed that.

What irritates me now is that they must have known me better than I knew myself because they were right. All through school and even through my first major relationship, I detested the idea of having a kid. Why would I want something that never sleeps and demands all of my time? I took great precautions to not have children including using a birth control method that made me gain 40 pounds and lose 2 cup sizes in my bra, but neither of those mattered to me nearly as much as not having a kid. I would have given my arm at that point to not have a child especially not with that person.

After my relationship ended, I began to think about things in my life ditfferently, but I still held true to not wanting kids. I had moved on and met someone new and we were enjoying the beginning stages of our relationship. He had two children already and for the first time it didn’t send me into a panic to think about being a mom to a child even if it was only as a stepmom to his kids.

About a year after we moved in together I went to my lady doctor to have everything checked out. He was updating some missing info on my chart and asked me how long I had been using the birth control I was on. It turns out I had been on it for just over 6 years. After telling him this, he left the room and then came back a few minutes later with several large books. He would look in one and then turn to a section in one of the others and go back and forth. This went on for about 10 minutes before he said that he wanted to take me off of the medication because this particular birth control could make it difficult to get pregnant if you take it for more than three years. He said the damage may have already been done given that I had been on it for 6 years, but he felt it was best to try something else and see how things went. I was about to tell him that I didn’t care if the medication made me lose the ability to have kids because I had no intention of having them and then I felt all the air whoosh out of me. In that moment I realized that my fiancée’s kids were not enough for me. I wanted to have kids myself.

The doctor and I decided that the shot I had been given just 2 weeks ago would be my last one and since he wanted to run some tests after the birth control wore off, my fiancée and I would use condoms to prevent pregnancy. After doing the math, my doctor told me I should start using the alternate form of birth control at the beginning of November and we would begin testing after the new year. In January I was having some blood work done for something else and they asked me if I could be pregnant. I said I doubt it, but since they needed to know for whatever it was they were doing, they ran a test. Then I got excited because I figured out I was a week late. I knew I shouldn’t have because my cycles would be very irregular for the first 6 months or more, but I couldn’t help it. The nurse who drew my blood said they would know by 10am and she would call me and let me know. By 10:05 I had not heard from her. At 10:10am I couldn’t take it and I called the lab result phone number. The lady looked it up and said they never ran a pregnancy test so she couldn’t tell me if it was positive or not. I was crushed and began babbling about how they said they had to know so they were going to add it to my labs and then I just kind of trailed off and I think I may have said thanks for your help. I was about to hang up the phone when I realized she was saying something about added labs being in a different part of the screen so she would check and yep there it was and “oh honey, I am sorry. Your test came back positive.” I don’t remember my exact reaction, but I know I was crying and I think I may have done a double back flip triple axel combo. I could hardly wait to tell Mack and considered leaving work right then and there to tell him, but I settled for a phone call during my lunch break.

It seems so silly now to think that I was ever worried about it since we didn’t even know if there was a problem and there apparently wasn’t seeing how my doctor figured I got pregnant about a month after the birth control was out of my system. In fact, when I got pregnant with my second child it was very soon after stopping birth control. Maybe I was meant to have these kids or maybe the chemistry between my husband and I works very well. Whatever it was, I have two perfect and beautiful children to show for it. Sure they have their moments when I am so desperate to sell them to first gypsy I find I cannot see straight, but they are my babies. I wouldn’t trade them for anything in the world and they are THE BEST gift I have ever received.

 My daughter and her first diaper change

My son right before we left for the hospital

I don't even know what to say...

While waiting to see Trouble’s doctor in Vancouver today, I had quite possibly the strangest conversation with someone. I was sitting there waiting to be seen, but I was about 25 minutes early for the appointment. I was trying to compare Harry Sullivan’s theory with Sigmund Freud’s in my head so that I could do this week’s homework assignment when I got home. While I was waiting, a teenage girl came up to me. It is so hard to tell nowadays, but I would say that she was 16 or 17. She was fiercly whispering to the two girls with her and finally she came over and stood in front of me. When I looked up at her, she opened her mouth and the words just fell out of her mouth.

Girl: OMG! I just have to tell you that you are so great and I loved your husband. He was so great and I cannot believe he is dead. What are you doing in Washington? Are you filming a movie? Can I have your autograph? Is this your daughter? She looks just like her dad. Is that your son? I didn’t know you had another kid.

Me: Um, I think you have me confused with someone else.

Girl: I bet you say that to all of your fans just so that they don’t know who you are, right?

Me: No. My name is Katie, who do you think I am?

Girl: (High pitch painful laughing) Hi, Katie (she winked at me and then whispered) Can I have your autograph?

(Insert this same round and round where I said I was not famous and she didn't believe me at least 3 more times.)

Me: (A little pissy now) Really, I am not whoever it is that you think I am. My name is Katie and I am a student. I do not make movies. My husband is not dead, he is a teacher.

Girl: So, you aren’t Michelle Williams?

Me: No.

The girl then left and went back over to her friends and told them the news. One of her friends then looked over at me and said “Of course she isn’t Michelle Williams. She is way too fat to be her"

Me. O.O 

FML

So I leave it up to you. Do I resemble Michelle Williams?

Today was a good day

Today got much better after I vented my little tirade earlier. Mack and I got to talk with the boys and we had a good video chat. Stitch, Trouble, and I went outside and played with some bubbles on this beautiful day and then we packed up and went to the park. We let the kids play and chased Noah around the playground for a bit and then got some amazing burgers from 5 Guys Burgers and Fries. I do not care for their fries at all, but their burgers are so good. Probably have 1000 calories in them, but I don't are. After that we did some shopping and hung out with my man of honor. From there we went to look at a house that we may get if all of the stars line up perfectly.  There are only 3 things that could make this day better. In reverse order they are: Reduced fat Original Pringles, a ICE cold Pepsi, and my laying in bed with my hubby.The pringles and pepsi will have to wait, but I think I am going to go see what I can do about last one.