Choice swear words...

I have been trying to adjust to the New Year. Not much has changed, but it still feels different. I have been sick again..damn hernias. I feel much better right now though. It comes on in waves and I will be okay for a while and then it hits. I am saying choice swear words. I may call my ex-surgeon tomorrow to see if he suggests anyone. I am so tired of fighting this.

My kids, are incredible. I am going to say that again. My kids are incredible. They do drive me to the edge and back again. Then they amaze me. Max is working on his own New Year goals. He decided he wants to improve his grades, spend less time on-line and be a nicer person. Wow, he came up with all of this on his own. Renee isn't doing as well. She is still very depressed, but we are talking more. One problem is she makes no sense at times, even to herself. I am working very hard at just listening and NOT commenting or starting to lecture. It is helping. The one bonus is her music just keeps getting better and better.

I am learning to move on. I wish I was doing more, but then I get overwhelmed and/or burnt out. Baby steps, one at a time..learning to fall forward enough and then catch myself. I keep being reminded of balance. I was talking with my kids about moderation, in drinking, in everything. They "got" it. Then of course they have to get goofy. I was saying it is easy to dehydrate especially in the summer heat in Arizona. I then mentioned while not impossible, it is hard to over-hydrate. Your body will try to refuse to let you drink too much H2O. My daughter's comment, "unless you are drowning."  LOLOL..she does have her moments. I know that shouldn't be funny but, it is.

I do not understand why I am wide awake at 4AM. I didn't even take a nap yesterday. I went to physical therapy. I admit I cheated out of some of my exercises. I just felt awful. I went grocery shopping and didn't use my coupons either. Gasp! I know, it is terrible. I am so living on the outer edge. Serious? You know your life is sad when you get excited that your brand of toilet paper is on sale. I have become my mom. I did marry a nicer guy though. That was a bit of a wicked comment. Whatever, I don't really think I am heading straight for heaven anyway.

My honey will be home again this weekend. Thank God! Praise Hallelujah, Amen. Winter break was horrific to me. It had a few shiny happy moments, but for the most part..blcch. I survived it as did my kids and the dog. My house could use some major TLC. I am trying to talk my internal self into liking housework. If I am going to be addicted to something why not make it useful like cleaning, cooking, and exercising? So far I have not been successful with this. I think my subconscious is too smart for that. More choice swear words..

Yes, I am still addicted to Facebook, though I am no longer a stalker. Yeah for me! The time I spend is less than you might think as I read fast and do other things as well. Denial is so lovely. I am still working on this. My  prescription medications are finally straight. I am not sure if I mentioned it, I had added an extra anti-depressant I wasn't supposed to be taking. Oh my. Plus I figured out I double-dosed on my others a few times. I was wondering why I was so dizzy? duh..there are also a few things I have spaced out too. I had a few people make some comments to me about this or that. Huh? I went back and read stuff I wrote. I was impressed that for the most part I was really nice. It is disturbing that I don't remember writing it at all. I probably shouldn't be admitting that.

Levels, I still have some goals in mind but I need to get some physical things working better first. Focus and then commitment will be next and a specific action plan that can be tweaked as needed. Change is hard. Staying the distance is even harder. Ugh. I will not let the lizard win! ?? I will explain that another time.

Thanks for listening. I am hoping you are having a lovely winter day where ever you are. My blog tracker says I have readers from all over the globe. I find this incredibly sweet. TTYAL.

“Never miss an opportunity to make others happy, even if you have to leave them alone in order to do it.”—Unknown 

Yeah, afraid so.

Knowing

Simply Positive
" Staying positive & optimistic despite constant chaos, busy life, drama, sickness, pain, & issues is mental WORK! The tougher your life at the moment, the MORE you need to make it a daily priority to constantly focus on controlling your thoughts AND creating constant new positive ones to deflect the negative ones. You need to outweigh EACH negative thought w/ a positive one. EACH one. Balance thoughts. :)"

yeah, okay.

I am laughing here. I know I am not the only one. My thoughts are constantly swirling. Some surface and can be very negative, others are extremely positive. Most of them, can go one way or the other. As an addict, the goal was to drug, drown or kill this chaos of thought and emotion. Let the good times out, sometimes, and feel no pain or ecstasy and then numbness. Losing all control of mind, body and spirit so you didn't have to be accountable for anything you said or did.

I do miss it sometimes, crave it at others. I have enough experience now to know I don't always like the beast that emerges. I hate losing my control or balance now. I don't care for the aftereffects, I hold myself accountable for my own self. I like sober, straight me way better...for the most part. It gets boring and tedious too, work. LOL, that is when I know I am brooding again. Humor is a kind of gravy through this whole mix. Friends and family add spice, insights and glue. They help me hold myself together.

I am exhausted. I am trying to convince myself that I'm not. Mind over matter, but I am really really tired. (yawn). I have an hour to kill before my daughter's piano lesson. I don't think I can stay for the 1/2 hour. The teacher has two litters of beagle puppies. They are beyond cute, but with the temps in the 100+ range, they can't stay outside. The house reeks of bleach, throw-up, dog doo and pee. She has them in two plastic wading pools that she cleans three times a day. Way, way too much work for me. Times are hard, you do what you have to do. She sells them to good homes and makes a small profit.

I have to feed the kids then, we will be going out. I should have gone grocery shopping on Tues, Wed or today. Now I have my CT tomorrow morning.

I am not excited about this, this will be my fourth one in the last 10 years. Some people get claustrophobic, I just hate the cost and time of it. It takes forever. I'll be there, I am figuring about 5 hours or so. The medical staff will have me fill out paperwork that I have filled out a 100 times and then don't read it. I swear. Or they find one thing to repeat over and over again...the one time was about allergies. I had 7-10 different nurses ask me what my allergies were once while waiting for a surgery. I got grumpy and then got yelled at. I think if  just one of them had listened to my answer, and wrote it down it would have been cool.

I am being a whiny butt. LOL. I know I am a bit of a hypochondriac. Really, I do.  I  also think I have had more than my fair share of misdiagnosis errors, medical mistakes, and weird diseases or syndromes. I busted the pharmacy tonight, I went for my re-fill they called me for. Which one is it? The one I don't take anymore. When I informed him of that, he realized that they have been issuing two anti-depressants that don't mix. "You realize you can't take those together?" He was shaken and should be. I worked in a pharmacy, you are liable for stupid errors like that. I am so glad I can read and question things.

I had one of my fb friends call a girl a whore tonight for admitting to using birth control. Wow, I am still stunned and I shouldn't be. I did point out that birth control is prescribed to girls for reasons other than to prevent pregnancy from having sex. It really isn't the point though. I have been there and done that and been called that and a few other not-so-nice judgemental labels. I have to say that the people, guys and girls who called me this were either worse than me..or somewhere in their mind wanted to be. They had at some point in their life labeled that kind of behavior as taboo or a sin, and judged. Jesus didn't. He wept. I don't think it was because of promiscuity. It was because people were closed off to his message and his sacrifice.

I admit here I am not a true Christian and most likely never will be. I am one he weeps for or hopes for. I honor a lot of his teaching. I read the New Testament and a lot of the old. Is he the Son of God? Hmm..maybe, is that what is important? Who his dad was? He did change the world for good and evil. I have quite a few friends who are true Christians and devout, they are awesome people that I respect. Their faith inspires them to be better people, and they live it. I love them. Some other folks use their religion as a shield or wall to hide behind. They profess, and preach and are almost complete a-holes to everyone around them except the few who agree with everything they say. The holier-than-thou types, you know who I mean. Ugh. I avoid them, and try not to judge, really.

My one friend laughed at me and said,"Laura, you really can't start a religion of one." Sure I can, it is what it is. I found my God and continually work on this relationship. I am still more of a sinner than a saint, but I do have my moments. I have doubts, not that God is, but what his plan for me is. I know he is laughing. I laugh, sometimes, when I get the joke, too.

I am more worried about my kids tomorrow then me. I wish my hubby was home. I have been through all my CT's before, not quite alone, but never with someone. I have also had temper tantrums and took out my own IV's twice. Yuk, they are longer than you think. I also have had four IV's..um, don't know the technical term, swell my whole arm or hand vein up and explode all over the place. I have been overdosed with the wrong medicine, a whole bag of Magnesium, that one was awful. I almost had the wrong hand operated on. LOLOL. There is more. Another time perhaps?

I had to cut a part here for reasons out of my control...if you did read this before Thank You! Another time and place, it is still good and forever in my heart..knowing that you don't appreciate what you have in life until it is either threatened or somebody else shows you how by example.

First rule: Never let 'em change you. Rule 2: Do you. To the fullest. And never be ashamed to.

From my friend Tommy V, not sure where he got it. Thanks! Working on rule #2. The only person who can truly change you is you. Live, love, and be loved. It is out there.

Thanks for listening, ttyal.

Balance is more than just not falling over

I guess I am writing every day. I have too much on my mind to post on FB..that is face book...for anyone who doesn't know me. LOL I had somebody ask me once to list all my addictions, past and present. Besides the ususals(drugs, sex, alchol) I still ended up with at least 10 e-mails, with multiple lists...yeah. I am an addict.

We are all addicts or at least born that way. WHAT? You disagree..you may be right but just hang on for a while. We are born as humans, completely helpless..we need food/water, shelter/clothing, and human care/love. The first two pairs are obvious, the last ? It has been proven over and over again that human touch is a need, not just a want. Babies need to be cuddled.

There are a few exceptions to this, autistic babies have the need, it is just too overwhelming for them. My daughter has Asperger's, so I do know a bit about that. She had severe colic and allergies for 6 months, plus she started teething at 3 months. She also had multiple ear infections, and was given amoxicillin, a lot. She reacted to everything, ibuprofen, tylenol, amoxicillin, ora-gel. One very unhappy baby and new parents that went a bit cuckoo. She did not want to be held, though she loved attention, but the only real relief was an electric bouncing chair, a swing, white noise, car rides at times, and benadryl, plus trial and error finding a formula she wasn't allergic too. Finding out at age 5 that she was allergic to the dye they put in the meds and not the meds themselves. Priceless.

So we all start out as addicts, and we find other things we like, not just need but like/love. Candy/sweets, toys, games, etc..and we stop at nothing to get what we desire..terrible 2's LOL. It is me..me..me ...I want...want...want. By 3-5 we have learned how to manipulate, bargain, and lie. We also hopefully start learning that there are other people in this world, sharing, love, consequences. Finally, we get that we can't always get what we want when we want it. There are people who know a hell of a lot more about this than I do.

Nicotine actually rewires your brain pathways, forever. I think for certain people, other chemicals do  the same thing for them..this is why  recovered alcoholics can't drink, or etc. for all those other "pleasure" drugs. They say marijuana isn't addictive, LOLOL for certain people it damn sure is..ask any pothead. I was one, still miss it. Alchol gets me drunk, I have no tolerance for it now. But I never know how I am going to react to it. I can get violently physically ill from a few sips or a whole bottle, blinding headaches, nausea, vomiting... or just get buzzed. In my 30's it started if I way indulged...OMG my hangovers started lasting 3 to 7 days, that's not just feeling bad, with extreme prejudice I used to call it. I finally gave up! I drink maybe once or twice a year at most, now and it has to taste good. I only have 1 or maybe 2 glasses..of whatever...and no desire to push it.

 I drank alcohol in my later 20's every day, and got high too if I could. The more wasted the better, I actually craved the taste of beer, or rum, or tequila knowing that at some point while I was drinking I would go throw up.. go eat something..and drink more. I never turned down getting high or a free drink..that was what I wanted. I was wasted every day on something for about 5 years...never got a DUI, or arrested, or any STD's. I had a lot of crazy fun, and met friends that I still love with my whole heart always. I also worked 2 jobs, UPS and Denny's and went to school full-time at DeVry..where I met my present husband...near the end of this...when life became such a hell that I couldn't escape from it no matter how much I "used".

Now, I am fighting some of those cravings and addictions full-force, again... on-and-off and the emotional high/ lows..the meds I am on help. The people I talk to, my husband, number 1 and other friends... plus my kids, and now just 1 paid therapist. Every day is a challenge to keep my balance and recover it when I do fall over..which I do. Every day I seem to get back more of myself.  Yey, "we can make it better, stronger, faster.." OMG-LOL.

The next level, I am not to sure about..caffeine, nicotine, facebook..my present addictions plus a few others..chocolate! Living in reality, dealing with laundry, groceries, housework, cooking, a puppy, kids and being alone with very little money to play with...and nowhere to go. I need a job! Anyone hiring? LOLOL..have a great day and thanks for listening.