Yesterday was my last day at work until September. It’s like a deep breath for my body and soul. However, I don’t really know why. I am trying to figure that out. I suppose the general environment. Working in a school these days is challenging to say the least. Yesterday my husband and I went on a jeep ride. Just around some back country roads. I like to search for rocks to add to the gardens and edges. I need to fresh air, the sun on my skin. To not think about anything. With the exception of- why is it always a left turn in the jeep! It’s an on going joke, because I hold on so tight and lean towards him…lol. So, we drove past the canal. It’s a lovely drive and view, but when I am near water my brain calculates how far I am from the edge. My first thoughts there were, “oh god, if I were to ever fall in there I would die of the grossness.” I mean the fluffy algae growing is soo gross and it fills the water. It’s like furry green wool in the water glaring at me. Nope. I tried to focus on something else, the trees, the leaves. Water is my favorite and my enemy at the same time. That’s for another post.

The ride was great. Found some rocks to go back and get. I slept in today which was the most wonderful thing. As I set up the table with my breakfast and my computer to begin this post I had this twinge. I should be doing a,b,c or x,y,z. I should be doing those things and not taking this moment for myself. No one is home, no one is making me feel that. I was making myself feel that way. Must work on that. The laundry the vacuuming the whatever will be there an 15 minutes or 40 minutes, it doesn’t matter. Must work on that. I put on youtube with bird videos for cats. A- the cats like it and B- its oddly soothing.

Where have I been? Not here in some time. It’s been busy at work and busy with keeping up with my class and I usually sleep when I come home from work if I don’t have school work to do. The class I am in is heavy and clouding my mind with frustration but I try to do it feel it and let it go. I do what I can. The place I am in right now is to honor my body. It’s both hard and rewarding at the same time. I always feel better but always feel guilty for taking the time for a break. I suppose another must work on. Sometimes I don’t have anything to say too. Odd, I know.

My body is still kind of angry. My feet hurt all the time. Sometimes they wake me up. My hand and elbows hurt. The past three weeks my feet and lower legs were swelling. Unsure as to why. So I have to keep an eye on that. I think I will go have my other bloodwork done this week. I have been taking the natural supplements for about a month now. I can do more, there are parts of me that feel better and for that I am grateful. I have an appointment to take care of my knee and all its issues. The fall in January exacerbated the arthritis I already had. I am hoping this week’s appointment goes well and the injection puts me back to where I was in December and January before I fell. I did find an alternative way to treat that I have to look into and see if it’s covered by insurance. I have hope for all of it. I always have hope. I sit hear and keep glancing at the katsura tree in the front yard. I love its green aqua colored leaves and how it’s always got new growth. I miss the old extra large red maple everyday, but that katsura is teaching me. Everyday there is room for a tiny new leaf. You’ve just got to sit and let it happen. What comes at the tree? The birds, the wildlife, the wind, the rain, the scorching sun. Yet, it stands tall and proud. It moves with the wind instead of against it. It lets the wildlife find refuge. I soaks up the rain and the sun. It resists nothing and from that I am in tears, because that is a huge lesson. Resist nothing, I am pretty sure this was a Buddhist teaching. Just sit with it, let it come in and let it go. Let nothing truly bother you because it will be gone momentarily. Very hard to do in these current times but one of the best times to practice this. So, I take a deep breath. I feel the dog at my feet, I see the tree in the window. I feel the promise of the sun on my skin once i get my arse outside.

Filled some of my bucket last week. I got front row sets to Bastille. It was wonderful. I felt the music in my chest like I mentioned in a previous post. I enjoyed it so much I told everyone I am quitting my job and following them around for the rest of my life. Hahahaha, yeah right. No, really, they played a song that was one they put out during the pandemic as a single. It’s not on any of their albums. I remember listening to it the first time and was thinking ohhhhh noooo you don’t, please do not go down the pop road with yourselves. It has a poppy sound. However Dan introduced the song and I re-though my feelings on it. It’s about a break up but the chorus speaks volumes. “I’m not gonna lie and say I’ve been alright, cuz it feels like I’ve been living upside down” Word- that’s me. Oooooooo Yeah. “What can I say, I’m survivin, crawling out these sheets to see another day”. They are musical geniuses. I love they words they use. This was the song that got me through the past week to and from work. I turned it up LOUD. Filling a bucket for yourself isn’t an easy thing. Although I see other people do it and it looks easy.

Well the cat is currently on the piano face to face with the TV. She wants the birds. good thing she is a skinny cat. This week I also got myself back into my therapist. To sit there and say I was angry and had been angry for some time but I couldn’t figure out why felt so good. It doesn’t even matter, I don’t want to feel that way anymore because that is not how I am. All of this, whatever is going on with my cannot define me. I recen;ty found a version of Springsteen’s Dancin in the Dark by Bastille. I love the line about being tired and bored with myself. It fits like a puzzle piece.

Yard work calls. Sun call. Fresh air calls. And…maybe Marshalls. hahahahaa.

The other day when I was driving I was thankful for the ability to feel things in different way. No, I am not talking about emotions. The instance I was feeling something that made this come to mind I was driving. I turned the corner and stepped on the gas. I felt my back press against the seat of the car, I rested my head on the head rest and watched the road disappear under my car. I could feel the pressure of the car moving along. this made me think of the times I have flown. My favorite part of flying is the cusp when the plane is off the ground and is climbing to reach the altitude to flatten out and we are pushed back against our seats. You really can’t resist it. You have to surrender to the feeling. You have to agree to feel it, there is no other way. It’s been raining here, which is fine that means I don’t have to water the gardens. I love the smell of the rain, the fresh earthy smell. I love the gray days when it rains. I love the feeling of the rain on my skin, it feels silky yet sometimes stings. I have to find these little things that have meaning because those are important. I need to be grateful for these things that make me feel human. These actually help me deal with the feelings I am having. Now we are talking about emotions. So, the last post mentioned a health diagnosis. Bloodwork and more needed bloodwork, being sick for months before getting an answer. Wanting to not be in my own body because it seems angry. All of this. I was in all these stages, frustration, sadness, confusion, and anger. I have been stuck in anger for a bit. I have little patience some days. For myself and others. Honestly though, what the fuck am I am I mad at? I cam here today to write it all down and hopefully move upwards. Acknowledge it, acknowledge my feelings and move forward.

Back at the end of January I was going out the door to my car to go to work. I leave at like 645 am and it’s dark. I didn’t realize I was approaching ice in the driveway. I wasn’t in a hurry, I was just walking to my car. Then…there goes my feet…I can feel myself losing balance and slipping, my brain switches on to help me orientate my body, it lasted all of 3 seconds probably but seems like IK was falling for like a good five minutes. It was like the cartoons where they play the whoop whoop whoop noise and the characters feet just keep slipping…I didn’t want to hurt my knee that has arthritis in it because It had been doing wonderful. I didn’t want to injure my hip from an old car accident. I braced my self, extra extra hard. If I have one piece of advice to give you, do not do that. I should have stayed home that day, I went to work, I ended up coming home. I felt like a train hit me. For a few days. Then I tried nursing my knee with my meds and ice and gel and cbd oil. Finally in March I couldn’t take it anymore, nothing was helping. I had an xray and a cortisone shot. That lessened it but not like it typically does. However, I started not feeling well a month before. I was not feeling well in February. I was feeling sluggish and tired and achy. I remember thinking do I have a sinus infection? It burned to breathe in. I felt like the inside of my head was on fire. So, I thought I went to urgent care for this, but I did go to the dr. Got me an antibiotic and away I went. February…March, shot. Apirl…feeling gross. Feel sick. I am tired, I hurt all over, the hurt goes from joints to muscles and circles around. I hadn’t been sleeping well at all during these months. I didn’t get any answers form the GYN when I explained how I was feeling, I didn’t get any answers from my doctor when I had to get bloodwork for my reversed diabetes. Instead I got more medication since my c-peptide was elevated, but not my A1C. NO other bloodwork. I kept thinking this whole time ( since February) it was peri-menopause, because my cycle was off and different. In April I was feeling so terrible I began to look for a functional medical person. Something was wrong with me, I could see it in the mirror. I would put my make up on in the mornings and sometimes begin to cry because my eyes didn’t look right. I looked fucking tired. My skin did not look resilient. It looked flat, I felt flat. I wanted to stay in bed when the alarm would go off. By the time the month of April came around I was so angry, what was wrong with me. Why wasn’t anyone listening to me. I also wasn’t my perky annoying self, I had zero energy, I typically raise raucous if people don’t listen. I didn’t have it in me. So I searched for someone who could tie all the pieces together, because we are human and we have systems that work together not individually. Our body is a fine tuned machine and when one thing goes out of gear it can trigger a bunch of other things.

In April I found an office that has an Integrative/ Functional medical Nurse Practitioner. I could get an appointment but not for a month or more. BUT…someone cancelled and they called me. The Universe was listening, all those mornings I would open the bathroom window when getting ready for work I would take a deep breath and let it out the window…pulling the air into myself, letting the feelings of being sick escape my mouth and go out into the atmosphere. I got in at the end of April. Went for a shit ton of blood tests. Holy moly…was I about to find out some wild information about my body.

One of the tests would take up to two weeks. That was a long wait, but what the hell, I’d been sick for months at this point anyways…I had reactivated EBV, I had low estrogen and high progesterone and testosterone. I have trouble with my adrenal function, like almost none. YIKES. So, I wasn’t losing my mind, I really was sick. I felt relief. There is no pill for this, there is no special treatment, although people have ozone treatments and that sounds freakishly scary. Apparently the ozone kills the EBV. My directives were nine days off from work and do nothing but sleep/ rest. I am a woman, mother, wife, do-er, get shit done person. This basically pulled the rug out form under me. I was being forced to take a deep look at what was important to me, and what fills my cup. I was being told to focus on myself. The ohnly time I focused on myself was back when we were removed from work in early 2020 for Covid. I was diagnosed with diabetes so I had time to focus on myself. I worked out, I changed my diet and I decided to go back to school at the end of 2020. I lost almost 50 pounds back then. I was proud of myself. I felt good. I liked my body. 2021 began school, I didn’t have a lot of time to work out, I stuck to my way of eating for the most part. I walked the dogs almost everyday with my husband about 2 miles. At the end of 2021, like the fall time…I felt my cycle shifting. I began to gain weight. Gotta remind you my knee at the end of 2021 was FABULOUS! I hadn’t seen ,y knee look that good in so long. I had a new med, it worked great. I was squatting! I hadn’t squatted in years! I could squat and get back up. It was a Christmas miracle were the exact words I sent to the doctor in my portal. Then we are back to the end of January.

So, today…I have been taking some all natural supplements to help curb the EBV. I stimulate my Thalamus daily by tapping on it. I rest, somedays coming right home to bed after work for one to two hours. I hate that, but I need to listen to my body so this doesn’t move further into something else like an autoimmune disease. Yesterday I kept thinking about how angry I am. By the end of the day I was like why and what am I angry at? My body? But it gave me signs to seek help. I told me to keep trying.

The headaches are much less than they used to be. The nausea is much less that it used to be. Thank god, those were rough. I caught a cold a week ago and feel like poo. I notice the past two weeks my feet don’t look right. My toes look angry. Well, if they look angry I guess I need to stop being angry…no really… They are swollen, and sometimes red. My feet hurt. They hurt like those days I would be stuck working in the OR for 12 hours. The weighted blanket feels good one them, but something more heavy would feel better, a cement block maybe. I am not sure what’s going on with them. I try my best to not worry and remind myself daily I was sick for awhile it’s going to take a bit to return to myself. The only way to return to myself is to take care of myself. No one else can do this for me.

The class I am in now is over my head. It’s my second statistics class and it’s killing my brain cells. I am heading into week five of eight weeks. I have resided to just passing the class. I have a 4.0 average, so this class will no doubt bring it down unless I maintain an A. I currently have an A in the class one project I got an F on. The whole thing is not ideal, but life isn’t ideal now is it…sometimes things are hard, sometimes things suck, or suck the life out of us. We must find gratitude to get through it. I am grateful for the ability to go back to school and the people that support me and inspire me to do so. So, I simply do the best I can. I need to get a D to pass. That sounds terrible, but I am ok with it, mostly. I keep doing the drop in tutor for help with the graphing and feel like I am bullshitting my way through the writing. It doesn’t matter, the only thing that matters to get through it and pass. I can do it. Every time I log on, I tell myself, you got this, it’s going to be okay. See, EBV can affect your cognition. I could feel that back in March and April. I can feel it now a lot somedays. It’s frustrating. Be your own cheerleader…you got this.

Today I am going to try to get my nails done. I might wash my car, but it’s still raining. I recall when I worked in the OR walking down the corridor to the big window to see the weather one day. It was by the dictation phones. There was a doctor finishing up there and I was just looking out the window. He asked what I was looking at. I said just the rain. I love rainy days. It was spring time probably April or May. He said, really you like rainy days? So do I. I said they are just pretty, he thought there was a sadness about them, I said no, they just give everything a break, a time to breathe, a time to look within, a time to appreciate the sunny days. We stood there looking out across the parking lot, watching the rain hit the windows, looking at the puddles and the green abounding in the background. Told each other to have a good day and went on. I like rainy days. Sun is great and it warms the soul, but to me rain is a cleanser and promotes growth and thought. It seems to make us slow down. So, today since my family is out and about, I will do things that fill my bucket. I will take my time, I will rest and I will try so hard not be be angry. It’s toxic and I need to stop. Today will be better. Today will be kind and feel good. I will probably start a crochet project later today, I just want decide which one I want to start.

Here’s to recognition, gratitude, the universe, and our intuition. I will try to take some photos of the gardens that bring me joy and share them here. Other eyes must see the beauty I see.

Be kind to yourselves, be kind to others, this world needs it right now.

At the end of this month it will mark a milestone of one month for me that I went and had some significant bloodwork done to find out what was wrong with me. I would find out that I have re-activated Epstein Barr Virus. It’s crazy, I was shocked, I was scared, I was asking why and how…Next month I will have some more bloodwork. This is my que to learn to be still….

What happened today…the day was ok. I saw the bloodwork in my portal and went down a million rabbit holes as I do with anything. I was waiting for some responses from people at school, I got one, but not the one I was waiting for. Every celebration at work is with food that I can’t eat. Do you sense the annoyance in my tone. I left for the day…regular time. The day was fine I guess…I knew it was Wednesday, I knew I had an appointment later when I got home, however as soon as I walked through the door, the day and the appointment left my damn brain. I didn’t realize it until like almost two hours after…sigh, eye roll, disappointment with myself.

In other news, I played the piano and I can’t remember the last time I did that. I walk by it everyday, I touch it, I thank it for it’s presence. It was like a refreshing rain on a spring morning. I felt the notes go through my finger tips to my arms, right into my chest. Later after my shower and letting myself know how disappointed I was about the appointment I decided to go cut some lilacs to take to work for my desk. Check. And… here we are typing. Listening to Bastille again…I love their song Pompeii. I love how Dan changes the music. This particular song asks if we close our eyes does it seem like we have been here before…lol, sure does. Sometimes every fucking day. Especially the past three years. The other line is about how we could be optimistic about the situation. Then it asks if should start in the rubble or our sin…I am trying to let the day go and have hope for tomorrow. Again, not a bad day, just done with it.

The thing is that the days are flawed no matter how we look at them. If we choose to move past the things we find irritating or disheartening do we miss things? We miss the opportunity to be grateful for the challenges. We miss the opportunity the share or ask for help. We miss a lot. So, I will sit with my heating pad tonight and just be, just let the thoughts ebb and flow as if it were a tide washing up on a sandy beach and back out into the abyss of the wide ocean. I will rest my head and my body to recharge for whatever adventures tomorrow might bring. I am however looking forward to the summer off, so much so that I might make a paper chain tomorrow, I just need my dogs and my yard and quiet.

You know when there will be “no more bad days”…yep. So take it all in, todays renovations are brought to you by gratitude no matter how hard or small it may be or feel, find it.

Surely water fills you cup right…bbwwhahahaha…ok, let’s get a bit serious. Sun fills my cup. I got some sun today. Slept in, took my time this morning. I slept a lot yesterday too. I guess I didn’t explain that I have been sick for a few months, well what I thought was the end of the lady thing, but kept getting worse. So, I am waiting for some tests and trying to follow orders. I have tried to write a post here for the last two days. I had ideas, they didn’t seem worthy or important enough, at least to me so I couldn’t make the words work. Today I cleaned some trash out of my car, I cleaned the dashboard and console. It literally took me forever, I told you in a previous post, everything with intention…My intention here was to not exhaust myself. I finished, actually got told to wind it up and go rest by my dear husband. Okay, okay…I went inside and bid farewell to the falling rays. drew the shades and pulled a blanket over myself and one of the dogs. Genevieve is our Carolina Dog. She has been amazing for the past week plus with me. She will not leave my side. When I go rest, so does she. They other day she laid on top of me because the other dogs were barking and she doesn’t like it and knows I don’t either. She’s just the best dingo.

This past week I kept in contact with my best friends since sixth grade. She checked on me a few days. We spoke about trauma, we spoke about healing. We spoke about stress and healing from that, and the work it takes. I told her I had started and audio book and when I told her what it was about she was like-No. Find something else. I told her I was watching abandoned videos on youtube. I have such a love affair with old architecture. I would take my kids to the areas in my city that is rich in large architectural homes and we would admire them and talk about the different designs. My son got into watching stores about abandoned malls for a while and we would talk about that. So, since I was tied up this past week…I started watching abandoned home videos, but they had to be old and big. My favorite one so far has been this big old brick house in the south built 235 years ago. It had such a beautiful solarium room! The whole things had green glass on the top, it has the most beautiful curves and hardware. My friend thought I shouldn’t be watching them either. She’s like, those houses are dead and decaying, that’s not a very positive thing. So, I thought about it. They don’t evoke sadness in my really, I see the beauty. These are houses made with extravagant wood carved staircases and amazing fireplaces. While I type this there is en explorer on in the background showing me a castle in France that has been left, with furniture and chandeliers and pianos and trinkets. At first you see this beautiful home when you enter. It looks all intact, maybe a bit dusty, but the paint looks ok, the windows are still ok. As he walked up the stairs into a room there is was. The mold…spreading across this beautiful sea-foam colored room as if it was the tide of mold taking over. The staircase is marble and has tiny crumbles, it has the sexiest curves leading up to the second floor. It’s interesting to see how some rooms decay quicker than others, it seems as thought the rooms higher up in these houses decay faster.

The guys went off to a car show…wish I was there. In the end these videos make my eyes happy. I love seeing these things that we don’t have in our homes now. Lost art, lost craftsmanship, but it fills my eyes. and not with tears.

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day.

It’s only Monday and I was going to start this off by saying I was rewarded with an epiphany this week but it dawned on me before typing that would be all wrong. I think the epiphany was over the weekend. I cannot recall…nothing new there. So, I saw this post or blog or something…”you’re problem isn’t motivation, it’s discipline.” It was like a freaking slap in the face, similar to the one Sunday night at the awards that the whole world witnessed. I sat there and let it sink in. What the fuck is wrong with me, I was shouting at myself inside my head. The statement was dead on. I want to get on the nordic track, I want to do a cardio work out, I want to hang pictures on the wall. Hahaha, we painted last year? I never hung the pictures back up in the living room. Yeah…I need to do a little work everywhere. So, back to the point. I want to do things…I want to get back on track with my eating sooooo bad. The discipline is the issue. Right now I am thinking I need to go and do a little research on discipline and then cite my sources because that is literally all the typing I have been doing. If you look up the meaning it references practice. For the love of God, I should have known it was one of those practice things. Jeesh. Okay so if I do a quick search it mentions knowing your strengths and weaknesses, remove temptations, set goals, practice daily, create new rituals. Abort, overload…did you hear the explosion? It was all inherently my problem. I was mad, I felt duped. This whole time I thought I wasn’t motivated to hang up a picture, or go workout, or not eat the carbs. Ha, well the universe had me fooled. Well guess what mother fucker, I am finding the discipline I had waaay back somewhere else and bringing it back to myself. I cannot go back to the way I was. I need to keep moving forward and in a positive direction with my health and weight. I make excuses like oh it’s the holiday, oh it’s my birthday, oh it’s friday, oh it’s the weekend, oh I will only have one bite. None of that is acceptable. If I want change I have to be my own soldier for it. I have to create it. The only way that will happen is if I make it happen. Discipline is simple, it comes from another word…choice. Whaaatt…can we get an amen for that? Yeah, okay, so for real though, C.H.O.I.C.E. Ugh, why can’t we just eat cake and be thin and healthy? Whhhhyyy? Ok, so now that we played with words and the dictionary we can move on to the real work…Today I tried and I am here to commend myself. I need to get back to the roots of one meal a day. Today was day one. I fasted until dinner, I ate a keto dinner and no fucking junk. I need to get control of whatever is in my brain telling me that I am not worthy of this change that I so strongly desire. What order should these terms go in? Discipline, choice, thoughts…I have no idea, I feel as though the order could change. I’ll tell you this, you matter, you are worthy of the hard work. You can do the hard work, why, because you have done it before!

Words of wisdom for this revisited renovation? Haha, yeah….don’t beat yourself up, pick yourself up. Move forward. Don’t make excuses, be devoted to your choices. Be devoted to the discipline. Be devoted to yourself.

The title is simple…I started this blog a few years back…the last time I posted to it was in 2020. It was before Covid, BC. Isn’t it interesting we live our lives time referencing things that happen. I had two posts that were unpublished. One was worth publishing because I needed to hear it again. Interested or committed? So, how’s this for a renovation…I went back to school. Yep, finishing my BA, possibly my Master’s. To make it more interesting my first class was Statistics, bbwwaahhhaahhhaa….I do not have a math brain. The last math class I took was 9th grade algebra. And that was twenty plus years ago. Don’t ya know, I got a freaking A! The story goes that I kept on keeping on and there is a number at the top of each class page and I am competitive, even with myself. I need all the points, lol. I am always trying to get an A. Another secret, I freak out when I have to submit an assignment, thinking each time this will be the one that I fail. I gotta work on that, a little harder than I have been. There was a time when I was taking two classes at once because I got some great financial aid, but that burned me out, I had no time for myself or family. My husband said to me one day, why are you in such a hurry, you don’t need to be. Smart man, but all I saw was this free money so I wanted to make the most of it. I had to drop back down to one class after taking a couple of months off, that is how burned out I was. We need to look, step back and look in on ourselves. If something isn’t working what can we do to make it better, or make it work. Sometimes we just get wrapped up in the going when we really need to take a deep breath and move in a lightly different direction. Life is about ebb and flow. I was working on an assignment for the end of a class and decided maybe I would put in a link to the blog. This is work, this is therapy, this is where I clear my head, and maybe help someone else. We are not in any of this alone, we need to be there for others. This was how I healed and continue to heal, so if my ultimate goal is to be a mental health counselor perhaps I should include the blog I created. I will better to visit more often and post the happenings and the renovations. in the mean time, be kind, love hard, take a deep breath daily, and look around when you go outside and find something to be grateful for. Find the birds, find the trees, find the shapes in the clouds and the sun warming your cheeks. Listen to the air slowly float past your ears carrying the sounds of nature, look for the things you might be missing.

It’s been way too long once again. I need to remember to come here when I am feeling lost or sad or happy and productive. This is a space I created to share and to feel like I am giving someone something, even if it’s one reader who’s getting something, even if it’s just me, that gets the satisfaction out of getting it out of my head. Ive got to remember that this is here on those days, every day…

Today I saw something that resonated with me…someone posed a question about weight-loss… “Are you interested or committed?” How awesome is that? Words are so powerful.

This post was from July of 2020, I forgot to publish it…