Valentine's Day 2010

We had to kind of skip Valentine's Day last year because I was being discharged from the hospital. I did get flowers and a funny card though.

And yes I realize it is an overly commercialized day. It is also the day Josh and I started "dating" 8 years ago - or as I like to say it "the day we decided to stop having sex with any other people." Lol.

All I asked for this year was a bacon, egg and cheese mcgriddle (I even had a coupon!)

This is what I woke up to!

Yum! I hadn't had McDonald's in well over a month or more!

When I went downstairs I was surprised to find these.

Even though I said no card or flowers. They are beautiful though!

Later that day we did our usual celebration type thing - a mom and pop sub place.

This time we placed our order at Jim and Nena's in Hallam, ran down to Mack's ice cream for some of their amazing cookies and cream ice cream, picked up our food that was ready and headed home to snuggle, watch movies and eat.

I love spending any day like that.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

February 11, 2010 Dr. P Follow up

More playing catch up!

Thoughts still all over the place.

Thursday February 11th I had my one month follow up with Dr. P. It went ok. Basically I have to lose weight or at least maintain what I have, but be more active. Supposedly I will be in pain for a while and I just have to work through it. If I don't do something because it is painful, I'll just keep moving backwards and not forwards. (Glad I'd already seen SK who helped me out with the pain issue. She really is my FAVORITE doctor EVER!!)

They also couldn't schedule my follow up 3 month CAT scan because of the snow the two days before. I did get a phone call the following Monday that my CAT scan will be Monday April 5th. Super. Can't wait. Metallic taste and feeling like I am peeing myself. Awesome right?

Then another follow up with Dr. P after that. If they don't see anything then I'll have another follow up CAT scan 3 months from the first one. Thank you insurance. Thank you a whole lot. I am awfully expensive!

Here are a few photos of the doctor's office parking lot.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

February 13, 2010

I realize this is a little late. Well only 10 days really. I've started a whole slew of posts about topics I WANT to write about, but I just don't have the brain energy to complete my thoughts. Even now I'm struggling to get my mind to convey to my fingers what to exactly type out.

So... whatever. You get the point. I've got a lot going on in my brain and it's just too congested to get out. Back to topic though.

This post goes along with why I blog in the first place. I used to write in journals a long time ago, and I enjoyed going back and reading what was going on in my life, how I was dealing with these things, what I was thinking while going though them, etc.

Most of the following was written the day it happened. I just cleaned it up a little and expressed some feelings better.

One year ago on February 13, 2009 I went in for my first surgery ever. I was excited and nervous. I was unemployed and looking forward to moving forward with my physical health. I was thankful that all those years I suffered I wasn't actually crazy and there was something wrong, but fixable. In other words, one year ago I was in a totally different mindset - hopeful and positive.

Now though. Oh now. Now, I am 1 month post op of my THIRD surgery. My attitude has changed dramatically. I am not nearly as positive. I think I've expressed what is going on in my head quite well so far. My motivation is kind of nil. I know it sounds pessimistic, but I really do feel like this isn't over. Something still feels... wrong.

Part of this probably has something to do with the fact I didn't realize anything was wrong in the first place. Like how I didn't realize a whole organ was hanging out in the WRONG area of my body. Every doctor, nurse, secretary and technician were amazed that I had NO symptoms and wasn't aware something was amiss. That's frustrating to realize that I really don't know my body as well as I thought.

In conclusion of my post 1 year - things are up in the air. Hopefully I'm not too hypochondrial and can move past this. I am not much of a past dweller and this should get me through these feelings of being downtrodden much faster.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

Seriously?? WARNING: BATHROOM RELATED

AGAIN.

Remember I keep saying this blog contains Too Much Information. And here is another little tidbit to attest to that.

So for about 4 days now I have had diarrhea. Yes it hurts again at this point. No I don't know why besides MY DIGESTIVE SYSTEM HATES ME. Hates. A lot. Hates. Anyway, I am just setting you up for another fun public restroom story.

Josh and I decided to go to dinner tonight. We did. Then we went to Bed Bath and Beyond because for the first time in those 4 days I didn't feel like I had to hit the bathroom IMMEDIATELY after eating. I was excited! Whatever. Josh then mentions how he would like to look at some iPhone paraphernalia at Best Buy since he gets his in MARCH. Countdown is somewhere around T-20 days. Work is paying for it, hence the waiting.

We look at iPhone stuff, we look at LED tv's (OMG I totally want one. The color is so BRIGHT and pretty!), we looked at cameras, we looked at printers and then it hit. Ugh. Seriously?? Of COURSE I am on the other side of the store.

So I do my poop waddle to the bathrooms. I look at the one directly in front of me and it says "men" (this is important - trust me), so I duck in the one to my left NOT looking at the sign. For the second public restroom issue, the bathroom is CLEAR!! No one in it. Yay!!

I'll spare you the super gross details, but suffice it to say someone comes in before I'm finished. Singing. It's a DUDE!! Like a male dude. Like with a penis (I assume).

Holy SH!T literally!! I totally freeze. Did I walk into the wrong restroom?? Did I totally not pay attention to the sign?? There aren't urinals in here. This shouldn't be a guys restroom, but is it?? What is going on??

Dude sings his way into the handicapped stall, locks the door, sits down and starts farting. Then pooping. Again? AGAIN?? HOW does this keep happening?

I finish up very quickly, grab my stuff, spring out of the stall, and try to wash my hands while keeping an eye on that handicap stall door praying to a MUCH higher power not to let it open. While doing so another WOMAN walks in. What do I say? "Ummmm, there is a dude in the end stall, watch out?" Then he would hear me. Then we would both be embarrassed. Nope, I just ran.

I find Josh and tell him the whole story and he proceeds to laugh at me. We tried waiting and watching to see the guy (I saw his shoes), but after 5 minutes I decided it was better to just leave.

I am done shopping after eating. Done. *sigh*

*hugs and kisses*

mj

Another life break

I went to my parent's house to visit my mom for the week while my dad and brother were away for the week.

Yay for some much needed girl time. I guess it should be "mother/daughter" time, but we aren't too mother/dautherly.

I'll be back on Monday. Maybe sooner.

I have Valentine's photos, photos of my SURPRISE from the husband (I LOVE PAINT!!), and other stuff. Something to look forward to.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

SNOW Ice Cream

We have somewhere around 40+" of snow. It is seriously crazy around here. There isn't enough room to put it all!

Thanks to a lovely neighbor who watched a newscast, then posted on facebook, which then reminded me of something I did in childhood.

Snow Ice Cream. You will need clean snow.

Now I realize "clean" can be a relative term. You see when I was little my mom made me snow ice cream. Then in 5th grade my science teacher taught us all about ACID RAIN. OMG. NO more snow ice cream for me!! Never! It would KILL me!!

This many years later and I've learned that what doesn't kill me consumption wise only preserves my organs for my plan to live forever.

So BRING ON the ACID!!

Back to my original "recipe."

You'll need milk, sugar and vanilla on hand.

Mix 1 cup milk, 1/2 cup sugar and 1 tsp of vanilla. Whisk.

Send your husband out into the cold to collect your snow. Good husband. *kisses*

Fresh "clean" snow. Up to the door so he didn't have to really go anywhere for it.

All the ingredients.

Start mixing the snow in with the other stuff.

Keep adding snow (they say 5-6 cups, we probably ended up with 8 or more) until it becomes a mashed potato consistency.

Scoop and serve!

Josh added chocolate syrup to his to make chocolate ice cream!

Voila! Vanilla and chocolate (with caramel sauce) snow ice cream!

Problem though. It melts SUPER fast and gets all soupy. It was also WAY sweet.

I ended up freezing half mine. It was really good frozen. Kind of like a vanilla italian ice. I actually enjoyed it more than when it was fresh. Again though, super sweet.

I don't have any pictures, but I did make more again tonight.

This time I mixed 1 cup of milk, 1/4 cup sugar, 1 tsp vanilla and then put it in the freezer for 45 minutes or so.

When the snow was mixed in the whole thing didn't get soupy. We froze most of it, but did end up having some too. This mix was MUCH better and I even have a sweet tooth. It also didn't soupify immediately.

Now what to do with the other millions of cups of snow out there...

*hugs and kisses*

mj

The second large snowstorm of 2010

This storm didn't start so late. The first snow flakes started around 3:30-4PM on Tuesday Feb 9, 2010.
This was taken at 5:30PM. Yeah... lots of snow already.

SNOWFLAKES!!

This next photo was taken for Josh.

This is an NSX. It was all OVER the road.

Do NOT drive a car like this in the snow if A. you aren't familiar with driving this in this type of weather and B. if it's snowing. Lol.

On the other hand we were out in it too...

This was 83. Kind of a mess. Thank goodness for our subaru AWD!

Another shot of 83. It was pretty dead on our side. Going the other way it was lots of traffic.

Why were we out though?? So Josh could go snowboarding at Roundtop! Lol. I can't ski or board due to my stupid surgery thing... BUT I play an amazing lodge bunny. You should see me!

These next few pictures are what happened when we got home from Roundtop. It took forever in the car to get there and back. Everyone else got plenty of snow play time. Suddenly I felt the urge.
"Josh, grab the camera. Yes the camera. TAKE A PICTURE OF ME IN THE SNOW"

*jump*

"tee hee hee I am making a SNOW angel!!"

"Look at my cold wet butt! It's cold... and WET!!"

My masterpiece snow angel -->

Doing this made me so happy and excited. I can't describe how good it feels to feel NORMAL and not want to sulk on the couch and cry all the time. So anyways...

I took this photo on the morning of the 10th. It was STILL coming down.

Looking out back.

The black at the bottom of this photo is the bottom of the sliding glass doors.

They are 18" off the ground. The mound of snow was well over that.

More of the backyard.
Buried suby... again. Poor Josh keeps having to dig out the car!

Obviously you can't tell from this photo, but the plow truck was stuck. Really stuck. Over 20 minutes it took him to get himself unstuck. Ugh.

This was all the better the road looked when he was done.

I also want to note I am taking more photos again. YAY!

This is a good thing obviously.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

A brief lull in the snow

Brought a lot of relief for me.

This will get wordy so be prepared. Sorry.

The roads started clearing up on Monday, but I was feeling worse. Lack of sleep, still in pain, emotionally drained.

After another freak out Monday afternoon with lots of crying I finally made the phone call. I called SK's office anticipating them not having an appointment until later in the week if at all. I did have an appointment with her next Tuesday, but I really hated to wait.

Miraculously there was an appointment at 8:45 Tuesday morning. It was meant to be!

I made a list of my concerns to discuss with SK on my iPhone. Yes I like to talk about my phone. I love it so.

First and foremost was the crying and depression. Then it was followed by the lack of sleep, the pain in my stomach, my chest, my shoulders. My shortness of breath, my racing heart.

I got up early Tuesday morning, got dressed and got behind the wheel of the car for the first time for almost a month. Josh let me have suby since the roads were still a little messy and suby drives much better.

I hate driving. I hate people that are on the roads. I almost rear ended a stupid older lady who STOPPED at a yield sign that I almost didn't see because of the snow on the curve of the road. Okay, I didn't almost rear end her, but I COULD have. Apparently I'm well known for my road issues. I just hate stupid drivers. *sigh* And what was stressing me out even more was the loads and loads and loads of traffic. I couldn't even get down the hill.

Apparently 83N was closed due to weather and a tractor trailer that tipped over spilling roofing nails, tar and shingles *slaps forehead*. Really?

So what normally takes me 10 mins to get to, took me well over 45 mins. Thankfully I am a freak of nature and had left 45 mins early. I am smart. Or crazy. Whatever. And let me tell you, driving after this surgery is rough. Everything feels tight and it is hard to turn the wheel of the car.

I get there, I sign in, they take me back to a room and THEN. Oh, and then. THEN they tell me SK is running late due to the traffic and I may have to see the other doctor. *gasp* Oh no. No nonononono. I totally panic. Oh gosh I guess my anxiety is worse than I thought. I frantically text my mom and Josh.

Then I get a brilliant idea. I step out of my room and tell the nurse I have to use the bathroom. I proceeded to lock myself in there for 10 minutes to stall. Again with my iPhone. YES I AM CRAZY. I'd rather people think I was destroying a toilet (obviously if you are a regular blog visitor, you'll know I've already done it) than not see SK.

I get back to my room and I hear them say she is almost there. Oh sweet relief.

When she comes in I almost cry when I see her. Ten seconds later when she says "oh honey how are you?" I really do burst into tears. I tell her everything. EVERYTHING that is going on. My list, things going on with my family, my skin issues. The flood gates are open and I'm spilling my guts.

I am talking frantically, my hands are shaking and apparently I turned ghost white (she asked if I was going to pass out) at one point as well. I have never trusted a medical professional as much as her. She always understands me, always listens to me and has never failed me.

After about a 45 minute session we have a plan.

First is to deal with the pain. Second get me some sleep. Third deal with my anxiety. Then we'll talk about maybe doing physical therapy for my shoulders if they are still bothering me.

She wrote me some prescriptions, hugged me, told me to call her today and made an appointment in March for a follow up.

I immediately headed to Target to get everything filled. I also asked them to fill my prenatal vitamins. Yes I take prenatal vitamins. My hair looks FABULOUS!! That's the only reason.

After my 45 minute wait I picked up all my drugs.

So I had my prenatals, but then there was the Tramadol (generic for Ultram), Lorazepam (generic for Ativan) and Lexapro.

And of course I got the one pharm lady that knows me because of our street name. So she probably thinks I'm a pain junky who is trying to get knocked up, and who is depressed and anxious. Whoa.

In reality. The prenatals really are for my hair. When I went off hormonal birth control my body went a little crazy so I needed a little something to get my body back into shape.

Tramadol (generic for Ultram) is a pain medication. It is not a narcotic. It can not be used in conjunction with any SSRI's or the like because of how it works. So I can't take the Lexapro.

Lexapro will be for when I am no longer taking the Tramadol. I've taken it before. It does wonders for my depression and anxiety. I went off it because I was "feeling better." You shouldn't do this. I was fine for 3 years though. Ugh. Depression is complicated. Don't follow my example.

Lorazepam (generic for Ativan) is the final drug I picked up yesterday. It is for an immediate anxiety reduction (Lexapro is long term depression and anxiety reduction). I took Lorazepam when we flew to CO. It makes me super sleepy and calms me down.

When I got home last night I took the Tramadol at 1PM and then again at 7:30PM. It was such a relief. It didn't make me woozy, it didn't take all the pain away, but it took the edge off and made me relaxed for the first time in almost a month. I couldn't believe the difference between this and the Vicodin I was taking before.

At bedtime I took a whole Lorazepam and promptly fell all the way asleep. It was AMAZING. I slept the whole night, I woke up feeling rested. I didn't lay awake for hours with my brain on full throttle.

If I felt good last night I felt GREAT today. Yeah, maybe it was the placebo effect. Maybe it was just having a doctor say to me that I wasn't crazy and we could work through this (no offense to Dr. P or his staff, but they don't KNOW me like SK knows me). Maybe SK really can work magic and knew exactly what I needed to get to a better place. Whatever it was I am so thankful for the sleep, the lack of pain, the lack of crying.

These are all the medications I've picked up at the pharmacy since all this went down (minus another bottle of Vicodin that I've already consumed and threw out).

This is all the medication I've taken BECAUSE of the surgery.

Boy this has been a rough road. I appreciate the support everyone.

Tomorrow is another follow up appointment with Dr. P, my surgeon.

*hugs and kisses*

mj

The first large snowstorm of 2010

The storm started late on the 5th of February. Continued into late on the 6th.

This is our back yard. Zuki is the second car from the right.

Snow up to my "snow" window clings!

What happened when we opened the front door! The stoop is like 6 inches below this.

I just think the solid snow pack looks neat.

There is a subaru car under there!

The view from the garage.

Back of our neighbor's house. You can see the drifting from the wind. Yikes!

Josh being silly.

What a great husband shoveling (even though we PAY someone to do that).

I brought him beer to go with his shovel. It made it more enjoyable for him!

It's like a winter wonderland.

If you have an AWD car it's like MANDATORY to drive in the snow.

Until you get stuck like we did here. It's okay, we are experienced and got it out.

(Although we were passed by two plow trucks and then OMG a police car and I was afraid he would stop and yell at us. Dude didn't even stop to HELP us. Whatever.)

It looks so funny with all the SNOW in our yards.

Thankfully we enjoy driving in the snow and made a trip out on Saturday night and found frozen bread. Although I totally wussed out on trying it - a big thanks to my awesome cooking blog friend Uncanny and her bread making loveliness. I linked her blog in my previous post. I do want to make the bread, but I got scared I would totally screw it up and then have nothing to take to the SUPER BOWL parties we attended. Another thanks to my friend RockThis who gave me the idea for the pizza bites - which I did use.

We did end up at two Super Bowl parties. I had a great time. I tried to have a little alcohol at the first one. It made me sick. One of my friend's sons asked everyone who went to the bathroom if they pooped. It made me laugh until I hurt (which doesn't take tooo much). We also taught him to fist bump. WITH fireworks. SCORE!!

Then we almost got into an accident when Zuki came out of 4 wheel drive. Weeeee... Josh is a good driver though, so almost just means he lost a little traction, but we were fine.

I was really tired at the second one. So we left early. *sigh*

Guess what is happening right now?

MORE SNOW on it's way.

Awesome. I STILL can't sled ride. Boo.

Oh well.

*hugs and kisses*

mj