tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-301852832024-03-13T23:19:11.129-07:00The BarrenessUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger587125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-13094142241771477672024-01-25T14:59:00.000-08:002024-01-25T14:59:01.345-08:00Grief<p style="text-align: center;"> I have found that my recent doctors visits are causing a wake. I am spun for a couple days after the visit or test. It seems to be more obvious to me now. Maybe it was always like that, but I wasn't as tuned into myself before...but it is like a neon sign to me now.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I can mask fairly well during the visit, but afterwards, it is like a crash. I want to cry and hide and be taken care of. None of which are realistic anymore.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Having to receive monthly infusions now has challenged my sense of self and belief in my strength.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Am I really a strong woman or have I just made myself into a character in my mind? A woman that can handle anything thrown at her. A woman that can balance all the dishes and dance steps. A woman that can smile no matter what is being said about her. A woman that can walk into any room with confidence and poise and carry on a conversation with anyone there regardless of the topic.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Now I feel like a shell, I feel broken and covered in duct tape to hold it together and no one seems to notice because I have enchanted them for so long, they can't see me any other way.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When I saw my doctor last I broke down on the exam table telling her I was overwhelmed and she told me to be thankful of all I have. It felt like a slap in the face.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When I started getting my infusions over a year ago, and all the tests prior to that, I had drawn a line in the sand, that I don't want needles in my hands. I had a horrible experience many years ago from an ER hospital visit where I got a series of small hard lumps in my left arm that took months to resolve. I was in so much pain from them that I told The Barren that I NEVER want an IV in my hand ever again. My line was upheld with one exception, my endo surgery back in 2012.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Yesterday I had to cross it again at my infusion with a new nurse.*</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1800" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4DfCnKvKSnMpOdSKxOo2NOTGsS8XKrUR4cG14qgZ_EZunchuA7GjLj034Xy_80FKgzZyHCW0OEVsQKeFH14NKuBccv57WrqJaUbP6xcu2YGUg3q1CEcW1xVkxg8TIQnz1k362MlFtG_ZHrvg2jG2lIK7Ms0d7T8EbTyW3RC9kGW30IU4m0A4N/s320/mrent1.jpg" width="320" /></div><p style="text-align: center;">Tuesday<i> (the day before)</i> I went for an MR enterography. For mine, you have to drink two and half bottles of thick fluid that lights up your gut, and then they give you medicine to slow your gut down, and then inject you with contrast, and take a bunch of photos face down in a MRI machine. The nurse tried multiple times to get a line started in my arm, before declaring it done, all the while my left arm, was left sore, swollen, bruised and an unviable option for my infusion the next day. </p><p style="text-align: center;">*Hence the need to seek new veins.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When the infusion nurse said she'd be gentle and not leave a mark, I had to fold...I had to get my long fought for medicine. My self advocacy tank was empty, what choice did I have?</p><p style="text-align: center;">I quickly set into play a weighing of the options in my mind and thought, </p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>Ideally this decision will not land me in the ER again. </i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>A phrase I use far more often these days.</i></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1691" data-original-width="1509" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsqRSZB1xfEHS-CJZiwI2hYeDIX0AZZ7kCGSdoMPCFMwiVmdXrftZw8cOSkuhOVwhHNeujy1aX8fHI7U-dqdx0jKg3JYmMju9iSRm9y0eVmhBaaJq-oUpmjn1MegQTURoVJx6yugc3QpaipZ4c-Dm9vvr2DfbiD3phj32-ra4Ai7bqdTnebOqG/s320/IMG_6485.jpg" width="286" /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;">After she placed the IV she stepped away to attend to other matters and I shed a couple tears...I told myself to hold it together until we were somewhere else. Somewhere softer than an artificially lit room, with artificial plants devoid of images, and filled with the scent of rubbing alcohol. I think I was able to wipe the teardrops without being seen. The Barren sent me a text message shortly after that promised I could cry it all away that night when he got home. That idea gave me some extra bravery and I sat a little taller.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Two hours later I was back in my car, and driving to the hardware store to pick up some plants to put into the soil on my patio before the wave of fatigue hit. I went home, ate some rice and tofu and sat in silence. Then around 5pm, The Barren called and said he could not make any more choices for the day and so I called in an order to the local Vietnamese restaurant and The Barren picked it up on the way home. He then told me about how horrible his day was and I listened and told him I was sorry he had a rough day, ideally things will be less stressful now that he was home. My arm was itching and aching from the day before and I think I hid that from him too.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I ended up falling asleep on the couch while he watched something on YouTube and then crawled into bed, asking him before falling back to sleep if he thought I was strong.</p><p style="text-align: center;">He said: you are a warrior, you have had to fight for so much.</p><p style="text-align: center;">This made me sadder than I thought it would. </p><p style="text-align: center;">Infertility has taught me a lot about grief, and sadness appearing in new and unexpected places. It has taught me how to speak up in medical spaces and ask questions, but also fortify myself for the answers as they are often ones you don't want. It has marked me in ways seen and unseen.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The new infusion nurse told me that I had such a calm serene energy about me. I thanked her and realized that my outward self was on display and that my inner dialog of tears, duct tape and sadness was hidden from sight, thankfully.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-51335102596308187052024-01-19T11:25:00.000-08:002024-01-19T11:25:29.510-08:00Fatigue and the new year<div style="text-align: center;"><b>Stream of conscience writing-and reflecting</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I am here, still here.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Thankfully less frightened than my last post.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">******below written at the end of last year******</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I gave my artist talk and three people came; well three besides my DH and the social media person that was recording it for the guild.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">There were marches all over the city that day, so it was a tough day to get around. The three who came were a guy I went to high school with and his daughter and a friend who were interested in art. It was a nice audience and made for an intimate experience for his daughter to learn about the art making practice.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I had too much chocolate and carbonated water, but it is better to be over prepared than under.</div><div style="text-align: center;">My hubby recorded the talk, as it was requested.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So far 10 people have watched it, and two told me they had a hard time hearing what I was saying.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So it was a learning lesson and an act of presence. </div><div style="text-align: center;">I did enjoy the act, but the build up was A LOT.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Afterwards we went to a middle eastern restaurant, and quickly realized we were a minority, as the place filled with protesters and we were watched quite closely the whole time. I think I asked hubby a couple times if food was on my face as I was getting so many stares.</div><div style="text-align: center;">It was tough, and heartbreaking and only a few days after the kidnapping and so my Jewishness was obvious to many.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I returned home to focus on my next task, make new work for my annual submission for the next big event. No pressure, no stress....no terror.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Hubby got a cold, and I had had my infusion coming up so I slept on the couch for a couple nights so I would not get breathed on all night. I added it to my internal dialogue of "suffering artist" narrative in my mind and after several months of struggling, and working and crying and wanting to burn the whole place down...I created some new work.</div><div style="text-align: center;">It was the most challenging experience to date.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I submitted work a day before the deadline and walked away knowing that I had tried everything in my power and wheelhouse to create something new, unique and that I loved.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The Barren planned an anniversary getaway for us...and it was 10000000% needed and a complete surprise. We celebrated 21 years married and 31 together this year. We went to the desert and a very nice hotel...there was a soaking tub on our private patio where we took turns soaking by a fire, we got a massage and had a fancy dinner out. Mostly we got quiet, a reprieve from our own thoughts and reality.</div><div style="text-align: center;">*****</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">After the return from the desert, I was faced with another wall of stress...</div><div style="text-align: center;">which had me dealing with the logistics of switching pharmacies that </div><div style="text-align: center;"> supply my infusion medicine. I spent a month trying to get one office to submit a signed document. The delay was so prolonged, it delayed my medicine for an additional 10 days, which doesn't sound like a lot until you factor in that I get this medicine monthly. I ended up going to the office personally, twice with a copy of the document, the line highlighted in hopes to get it resolved. The second trip was the keystone, and I broke down into a waterfall of tears when I had the signed/faxed document in my hands. 10 days after my medicine was due, I got a needle in my arm.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was so absolutely spent from the process, I had broken down multiple times with people on the phone. I lost my shit, I apologized for it and then grabbed my bootstraps and took care of business.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I sat in disbelief for a couple days afterwards, not really saying anything and just staring into space.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The new year opened with a rescheduled MRI after The Barren had taken the day off to support me, and showing up at 7am to have it. Someone changed he date and location and neglected to inform me. I showed the front desk person the confirmation, but told them I understood that didn't change anything, so please just tell me where and when I am supposed to show up fasted and ready to drink insane amounts of contrast fluid. I go Tuesday now...3 weeks later.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The December art show was well attended and my work sold in the first two hours of the opening. Another of the works I had submitted for the show was selected for a <a href="https://www.sullivangoss.com/exhibitions/the-sublime" target="_blank">separate exhibition </a>which is open now. That was a lovely happy response to all the stress and sorrow of the prior month.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Now I am in a holding pattern again, trying to refill my energy reserves and start making work again. In the meantime, life has laughed at me over and over, delivering tasty tidbits of stress and worry. </div><div style="text-align: center;">I start to wonder, is this what my 50's will be,? </div><div style="text-align: center;">I know the world is an absolutely chaotic place and there is so much horrible outside my door; it sometimes feels like I am being a glutton for punishment when I wake up everyday...greeting the day and thinking of all the best for the time ahead....and even if I am beaten down over and over again, I still greet the next day with hope for something better. Does this qualify as insanity?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">A woman I have meditated with for these past pandemic years just found out that she has breast cancer...and when she told me, I was numb. This woman is a peer, she adopted her kids, she is an artist and she had an ultrasound because she was told she had dense breasts and they found over half her breast had cancer growths in it. I was flattened by the similarities.</div><div style="text-align: center;"> I told her that I have been on infusion therapy for the last year and when I started I didn't want to be seen as a sick person. So, in an effort to not say <i>"you are in my thoughts"</i> I told her that <i>I will focus on her making all the best choices for herself, and being given many options and strength to do what aligns best for her goals.</i> I rethought about that encounter many times over, and feared that I had diminished her experience. </div><div style="text-align: center;">I am finding myself at a loss for many of life's most difficult moments.</div><div style="text-align: center;">What is wrong with me?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-80992406280235223412023-10-13T11:15:00.001-07:002023-10-13T11:15:36.203-07:00Fear and sadness<p style="text-align: center;">***trigger warning-FEAR HATE****</p><p style="text-align: center;">Stream of consciousness writing</p><p><br /></p><p>I am trying really hard to keep my shit together. I feel like it is harder than normal.</p><p>I am shocked and terrified, <i>these are the closest words to wrap around the unthinkable</i>... by what has happened in Israel...and the response that will continue to punish the innocent people of Palestine.</p><p>I ingested too much news, a thing I haven't done since the election.</p><p>I can't read accounts, I am dizzy and sick to my stomach and scared...I haven't been scared in a long time about being Jewish. The anti-Semitic chants, and behavior and actions and silence in the face of it all is a lot to try and process. </p><p>I used to have nightmares on the regular as a teenager of SS soldiers busting down my bedroom door while I slept, while I hid, while I shook...I'd awake in a sweat and was too afraid to share what haunted me. Maybe it was generational trauma...but it changed me. </p><p>I have that same fear today, I read something about a day of death to all Jews tomorrow. I told The Barren that I am frightened and that our door is marked so we are extra easy to find. I sound insane, but it is a real fear...</p><p>I have my first real artist talk in a major city Saturday, and I am trying to prepare for it, but I am frightened...I want to be professional and brush aside fear, so I am writing here in hopes to unload some thoughts and clear my mind to think more clearly.</p><p>I feel lost, and confused and scared and unsettled.</p><p>I went through my jewelry this morning and found my childhood star of David, I used to wear it a lot when I was younger until I got comments and questions about my Jewishness. I am far from a practicing Jew, but have always been proud and aware of my Jewishness and how complex that was.</p><p>Today while making a medical appointment, the person asked where I was from to have such an unusual name...I said Eastern Europe. It hit hard.</p><p>Today I am simply a human, a person trying to make sense of the upcoming senseless killing, the senseless hate, the senseless pain for so many people.</p><p>I have woken up multiple times this week and looked at the outside of my building fearing there would be hate graffiti on it...it makes me feel insane...it is like all my hairs are on end...</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-6633823041425409212023-09-13T15:20:00.002-07:002023-09-14T10:44:03.418-07:00Published<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjXNnN6mkGRnyVp7zL3hXTQ75lkJ3l6mnxZGPYT_U4pYpQzkeMSrY8tRRWHTAYABJxoPVuw90EC_Zjvm30LdMMqxJTyxD6okHkQBVEBeudHK5rwtDtap4fB7kfXBJMRpY9rvqzJEZdPQOd_CxkB2q0SrDUXHtG9jQWHXgCuLgCa7IPux49mazoK" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="958" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjXNnN6mkGRnyVp7zL3hXTQ75lkJ3l6mnxZGPYT_U4pYpQzkeMSrY8tRRWHTAYABJxoPVuw90EC_Zjvm30LdMMqxJTyxD6okHkQBVEBeudHK5rwtDtap4fB7kfXBJMRpY9rvqzJEZdPQOd_CxkB2q0SrDUXHtG9jQWHXgCuLgCa7IPux49mazoK=w400-h268" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>Many years ago I had some work in an art of infertility exhibition, it was far from me so I sent my work and got to see photos of it on display with other artists work about the same theme.</p><p>A couple of years ago I was approached by a research group about my art project and my experience with infertility. I answered some research questions and thought that was that. </p><p>Then last year I was approached by that same group and asked if I could share some art and a statement from my show. </p><p>I did that as well, seems that their research, PHD paper was going to be published and created into a book and would I like to be part of that.</p><p>Thinking about my mark in the world I was cautious but open to the idea and wanted to hear more. Then about 8 months ago, I got paperwork from a university publisher, it had some bad wording in it, and I told the project I needed to decline on the opportunity. Turns out standing up for my self and my work had a positive effect, as other people in the project objected too and so the contract was rewritten and there was a green light.</p><p>Well, here I am sharing with you that the book has come to reality and has been made and is releasing later this month! All the artists/contributors involved retained their copyright and were "paid" in a single copy of the publication. </p><p>The book is a beautiful collection of stories of infertility from a myriad of perspectives and it is heartbreaking and beautiful, and my artwork and words are collected in it.</p><p>It is quite surreal, and a deep wonderful thing from so much loss.</p><p>There will be publicity events all across the US, and I have agreed to be available if there is something that sits okay with me.</p><p>You can read more about the book: <a href="https://www.artofinfertility.org/about-3" target="_blank">HERE</a></p><p>Book name: <b><u>Infertilities: a curation</u></b></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-71428464009036315682023-08-16T16:38:00.001-07:002023-08-16T16:38:08.306-07:00Memory of loss, and a little growth<p style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #e06666;"><b>**trigger warning: miscarriage** </b></span></i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #e06666;"><b><br /></b></span></i></p><p style="text-align: center;">Today marks the anniversary of my final miscarriage.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I wrote about it <a href="https://the-barreness.blogspot.com/2018/08/dazed.html" target="_blank"><b>HERE</b></a> when it was happening.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I was alone, and one of my old-man cats sat on me or sat with me the whole time. It was unlike him, and now I am thankful he sensed that I was very alone, and losing my final attempt of motherhood. He is woven into the memory of the days.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Since then, when this day arrives I remember that final loss as the end of the pavement. A path I was familiar with that was now suddenly, unpaved and new and unknown. I took a self portrait that day, strangely I had a slight smirk. Maybe it was reflex to smile, and then at the same moment, I realized it was not happy or sad...but just was. That is the lingering feeling now.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>It just was</b></p><p style="text-align: center;">I think of my star child often; sometimes they come to me in visions or dreams....other times I suddenly feel like I have forgotten to pick someone up or that the person I want to turn to has walked away, and I am left standing alone, staring into the ether.</p><p style="text-align: center;">They never got big enough to ever know completely. </p><p style="text-align: center;">Now several years later, it is a day like others, except there are pauses along the way that I take to reflect and send love out. Much like days of loss for my grandparents and friends and companions that have left this plane of existence.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I think that is growth...I have learned how to carry the sorrow in a manageable way. Does that mean I have forgotten it or moved on....not really. The Barren has been pointing out and gazing at small humans much more often these days and I think that has been a revisited heartbreak for me and him. We are emotional and empathic people, so this is natural for us...but with a bitter twist of our own loss folded in.</p><p style="text-align: center;">So I send extra gentle hugs out to you all, as you remember your losses after reading this.</p><p style="text-align: center;">We are the broken but not lost</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ_4xvEwDQIbC7OoCHv9cibF4sOu0Eh7sTaBPdwuPh8c0yf8BJvFoQu1m2Eh8oxY8eXmydtjWXwTsW7Wyg5l2KvEuLeDJ7oTVJkiTdIcspCTVkT81Oj5sP4QTAwrg2HbxqwHAr-1CT5AnaPnRzO3UxdvT2ybF3k-T_MZCiL1g30J2LLkNAqt9V/s640/chinatown1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="574" data-original-width="640" height="287" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ_4xvEwDQIbC7OoCHv9cibF4sOu0Eh7sTaBPdwuPh8c0yf8BJvFoQu1m2Eh8oxY8eXmydtjWXwTsW7Wyg5l2KvEuLeDJ7oTVJkiTdIcspCTVkT81Oj5sP4QTAwrg2HbxqwHAr-1CT5AnaPnRzO3UxdvT2ybF3k-T_MZCiL1g30J2LLkNAqt9V/s320/chinatown1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-10918512452590633702023-08-10T11:09:00.000-07:002023-08-10T11:09:04.902-07:00Bread was my life<p style="text-align: center;">I was reading posts this last week, well I read them on almost a daily basis and read this one by Mel of <a href="https://www.stirrup-queens.com/2023/08/954th-friday-blog-roundup/" target="_blank">Stirrup Queens during her weekly Roundup</a>, and it seemed to trigger me. </p><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The question was: <i><b>Which favorite food would you never eat again if you were told you had to give it up? You couldn’t cheat and name something you didn’t really love. You had to take one of your favorites and say goodbye forever.</b></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Sadly, this isn't a hypothetical question for me anymore.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">For me it is Bread: toast, sandwiches...there are many others, but this one seems to always float back to the top of the puddle of tears.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">In fact even reading the question brought back memories from the schoolyard of who you'd rescue from a sinking ship, your mom, dad or brother...and I could never answer the question, as it always sent me into a spiral of sadness and despair trying to figure out how I could save them all...</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have found my list to be extensive and at times VERY HEAVY. Laden with sadness and restrictions and constant thinking how to make situations work.</div><div style="text-align: center;">This is not a foreign landscape for me, but as of the last almost year, my trek has become almost vertical in its scale. Becoming vegetarian at 16 was new territory, then vegan at 42, then, vegan, gluten-free and anti-inflammatory/no nightshades at 52 has definitely been the hardest.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have always been a person who isn't comfortable at ALL with people making a fuss over MY food choices. I will agree to go anywhere when dining with family or friends. Always navigating the menu to not make it a big deal and remind myself that I am there for the company not the food.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The Barren and I have worked hard on finding something in many of our favorite locations, so that he can on a whim bring home something or we can have a date out out. He is BEYOND graceful at always trying to find someplace new when we go on adventures to make sure I can fill my belly with something.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">But I miss many foods: I miss summer tomatoes and grilled eggplant and bell peppers. I miss not being afraid of being in pain over a simple food choice. I miss the culture that is food...</div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>*I am having a small pity party*</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">At my last infusion my nurse asked me if I would like any snacks while I sat and waited for my IV to finish, and I smiled and said no thank you. She then realized that I couldn't, and said I was so strong.</div><div style="text-align: center;">This made me feel uncomfortable, it seemed like she picked the wrong words.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am a rule follower, my doctor laughed at the idea that my vice is a meal with white rice or a white potato in a soup.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Sometimes I feel the weight of having to make all these choices every day.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So my pick to the question is bread....I have tried A LOT of the varieties available.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have even been known to go to other cities to find a loaf of vegan gluten free bread, </div><div style="text-align: center;">so see if it tastes okay.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Only one bakery<i> (about an hour away)</i> made one I liked, but sadly, they just shuttered their store because of increasing costs.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Most of the commercially produced bread has eggs or leaves a bitter after taste from sorghum maybe?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">So I am left without cinnamon toast as a comfort food.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Mind you, I am a creative woman, and </div><div style="text-align: center;">I have started making a stack of new recipes...but frankly it is becoming exhausting.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I think I foreshadowed this happening when my Mama needed to find soy milk when I stopped breastfeeding and it was nearly impossible. So they just gave me regular milk and I had a constant stuffy nose and tummy aches pretty much until I went vegan! </div><div style="text-align: center;">So I am creating a new lifestyle, a new fussy way of eating/living.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I don't have to like it, I just have to eventually accept it.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">In many ways this question is very much like infertility. What would you give up even though you loved the idea of it....sigh</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">What would you pick?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-71326042643067344072023-07-26T14:15:00.000-07:002023-07-26T14:15:05.882-07:00Gigglemug<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVxTfuhlVnocPCVv9F53nfXtSGYn4Hp6ek5qIGLhSFGx7db10bFjN7vABFPPXeR5WMMqfQYYN6zRFzVcw6Bamp37cfcf0EYqiyzMJR2vKgpw6wmdj1IYUEeseOPWExuX-qcQash-nn1Nn6niK70a3kdaoG3akETt6E-BWPolP-B3PuZAU5zS1a/s2048/blogIMG_1298.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVxTfuhlVnocPCVv9F53nfXtSGYn4Hp6ek5qIGLhSFGx7db10bFjN7vABFPPXeR5WMMqfQYYN6zRFzVcw6Bamp37cfcf0EYqiyzMJR2vKgpw6wmdj1IYUEeseOPWExuX-qcQash-nn1Nn6niK70a3kdaoG3akETt6E-BWPolP-B3PuZAU5zS1a/w300-h400/blogIMG_1298.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><i>Talking about process in gallery</i><br /> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">So the Exhibition opened and I attended the artist reception</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>(Typically, the reception that the artists attend, so people can ask questions directly of the artists)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The gallery was full, much more full than I was really mentally prepared for.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It felt like I had entered a speed dating event. I was immediately greeted with hellos and questions, and as the night wore on I had explained the process and meaning and motivation for making the work more that 25 times, but really I lost count. At one point I got a real kick out of my father commanding an audience, and doing his best to explain what I made to onlookers; he made stuff up and explained a totally different kind of art, but it made my heart flutter before I stepped in with the actual information.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It was also the first artist reception I attended without a mask, which made it quite easy to see that I had quite the gigglemug*</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">My work was well received, and before I left I was informed that it had sold.</div><div style="text-align: center;">The Curator was kind enough to share the news in front of my parents and in-laws, so I got a gold star from everyone that evening.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am very thankful that my parents attended and that my MIL and FIL make a night of it too.</div><div style="text-align: center;">It is a real gift of time and validation.</div><h2 class="tagStyle_1saq61g-o_O-style_a7x3hw-o_O-style_1pinbx1-o_O-style_48hmcm" data-mm-id="_zh3x5r4rs" id="_zh3x5r4rs" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #26323e; font-family: soleil; line-height: 28px; margin: 20px auto 0px; max-width: 100%; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 20px; scroll-margin-top: 100px; width: 740px;"><span style="font-size: small;">*Gigglemug</span></h2><p class="tagStyle_18h2erd-o_O-style_a7x3hw-o_O-style_1pinbx1-o_O-style_48hmcm" data-mm-id="_j25vm8c5n" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #26323e; font-family: freight-text-pro; line-height: 30px; margin: 20px auto 0px; max-width: 100%; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 20px; scroll-margin-top: 100px; width: 740px;"><i>“An habitually smiling face.”</i></p><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Since the exhibition I have been floating in a sea of "<i>I don't know what to dos</i>"</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have found that tasks around, and in the home, seem to fill my mind; maybe it is my ADHD or my fear of failure or just a true and complete sense of not knowing what to do next. I have built quite an arsenal of tools and taken so many classes on new and different techniques, </div><div style="text-align: center;">I am paralyzed with choices...</div><div style="text-align: center;"><u>so many choices.</u></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have taken to my cameras, yet have not formed a project.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have prepared to the make a couple baby gifts and have left the washed pile of onesies on my work table for weeks. I have gone to a ballet, art exhibitions, live music concerts, adventures to nearby cities, and made phone calls to friends. I have cooked and baked and gardened and cleaned and ironed and done everything all around artmaking thinking it would land me smack in the middle of a new idea...but so far no dice.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have been taking yoga and meditation classes four to five times a week, I have delivered meals to my parents, and cookies to neighbors, had tea with a friend, watched movies and horrible TV shows...</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have tried so so many things and still I sit here wondering what do I do now!?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have made all my doctors appointments and the appointments for The Barren, I have gotten myself a new pair of cross trainer shoes for walking in nature, but we have no plans for a trip yet. I have helped organize The Barrens closet yet mine remains like an overstuffed closet of hopes...I did give four of my dresses to a friend, as although they are beautiful they no longer fit me.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have been the playmate for the three kitties and then find myself lost in a daze holding a fuzzy mouse toy. I am lost in a sea of unknows and quiet.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I don't mind the quiet, but after all this time it is starting to scare me a little.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">When visiting with my parents yesterday, I found them older and more fragile, more forgetful, nothing dangerous, but just this side of vulnerable.</div><div style="text-align: center;">My brother is managing our parents rental unit, and I am his backup, but this morning my bestie asked if I would consider managing her moms two properties <i>(as I live closer to them</i>) as her mother was thinking of moving to a senior living situation, as she missed having people around her.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am gonna talk to The Barren about that, bounce ideas off of him.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>I am thankful for choices and options, as I know that comes from my privilege. </i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: center;">My question is this: how do you chose which way to travel when at a crossroad?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Have you ever been unable to choose because you have so many choices?</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-55566918500447216692023-05-30T10:31:00.001-07:002023-05-30T10:31:13.608-07:00ALOT- yep I meant it like that<p><i>TW **pregnancy talk towards the end**</i></p><p><br /></p><p>I have begun taking HRT (hormone replacement therapy), to me this is another milestone in life...</p><p>I went to a second doctor to get a second opinion about an ultrasound result and was given the all clear for treatment. It was a 1 hour wait to see him, also my first male GYN doctor. He came into the room with a resident in tow also a man, and sat down, apologized for the wait and asked why I had come in. I said, <i>get ready for an earful</i>, and then I recounted the history with my uterus & ovaries, why I get yearly pelvic ultrasounds, recent tests and results and my concern about the most recent ultrasound results*. Once I was done, he asked if I was in gynecology, as my descriptions and knowledge was similar to his...I said, <i>well I've had to be my own advocate for a long time and this is the result. </i>He said he only had one question, and it was a simple yes or no. My assumption about the current situation was true and he agreed with the prior midwife and the result was that I did not need the procedure the ultrasound tech suggested.</p><p>After that was cleared up, I asked if he could recommend a menopause care doctor in town, to which he explained that we could take care of it there....I could get onto HRT, as my breast lump is benign, and I am early into menopause. I told him I had been reading about all the benefits of starting early into menopause and that I was tired of feeling like a zombie. I wasn't sleeping, I was having a hard time focusing, I was more and more concerned about my overall health, my libido had dropped, and although my hot flashes are mild, my night sweats for the last 10 years were getting REALLY old. </p><p>He reassured me of the benefits, and after suggesting that I start a patch. I told him that although that was a great option, I have an allergy to adhesives and so we needed to find another mechanism for delivery. I asked my questions and voiced concerns about my endo, and fibroids and cysts; which he answered and then I left with a prescription and knowledge in what I was choosing.</p><p>I sat in the car and felt..........SEEN, HEARD, and scared but EXCITED. A new milestone.</p><p>When I picked up the drugs from the pharmacy, I asked the pharmacist what to expect and was given another pep talk and left feeling good about my choices.</p><p>My bestie and I have had conversations about HRT and when she went into the doc to have her IUD removed and to ask about HRT the doctor was far from helpful, instead delivered the phrase " it is just something we need to deal with" She is now on the hunt for a doctor that specializes in menopausal care too.</p><p>This is not something we should have to "deal with" she is miserable, I am feeling less miserable (even after a week, even if it is psychosomatic at this point) and we deserve better care.</p><p>All this after a span of two months of constant stress trying to make something for the newest exhibition that the gallery invited me for. After too many sleepless nights, failed attempts and tears I turned in four options, that I had created with the theme, knowing that I had literally tried everything I could to make the art. Thankfully, and with a kind nod from the universe, I was invited to submit a selected work. So I am in the exhibition. It is a fundraiser, but 50% of the sale goes to me, and the rest is split between the gallery and <a href="https://www.lotusland.org/" target="_blank">the garden</a>. I am quite proud that all the work manifested into a positive reality.</p><p>I have been "resting" my creative self since the submission. I had tea with some longtime friends who are painters and preparing for their solo exhibitions. I told them that I was flattened creatively from what seems like a constant sprint. They told me about the post exhibition breakdown, I was still running on my treadmill in an effort to make something else, capture that spark...grab for the stars...be everything and everyone! </p><p>It was reassuring to hear it is real and needed. We are all feeling and looking haggard, wanting to make beautiful, meaningful work while still being everything to everyone and trying to take care of ourselves too...it is <b>alot</b>, a big furry, alot, just there waiting to see what we step in next.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ8tU8-0yF2Yvix47_XMGTdSev9HJVKOldbz7F6n6kOnNoSSnYPVgOxvwYvRtMtmsjeLMLvk2hzRABKKJ3bt9uc6TuDCSEP1a-Lcwv6qPqhrGEv-vttEgdm4Lf37IBYtbzuRj_ZxvijxevH7Pm588YdLxusWR_D7xF_kW9vVqMDUgKpjJPpQ/s800/ALOT2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ8tU8-0yF2Yvix47_XMGTdSev9HJVKOldbz7F6n6kOnNoSSnYPVgOxvwYvRtMtmsjeLMLvk2hzRABKKJ3bt9uc6TuDCSEP1a-Lcwv6qPqhrGEv-vttEgdm4Lf37IBYtbzuRj_ZxvijxevH7Pm588YdLxusWR_D7xF_kW9vVqMDUgKpjJPpQ/s320/ALOT2.png" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #555555; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">from <a href="http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html" target="_blank">Allie Brosh</a></span></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>Does the world seem to be spinning strangely? Is time whipping by like a top?</p><p>It is graduation time again, maybe that is why the alot appeared, time markers, reminders of how old my star child is...</p><p>Why are all of my yoga classes filled with visibly pregnant women, so so many of them and so many more that are newly pregnant women talking about how newly pregnant they are...</p><p>I thought all the dudes got vasectomies' when Roe was overturned...I guess not.</p><p>I guess it is another alot.</p><p><br /></p><p><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">*my ultrasound result said that I should get an endometrial biopsy, as my endometrium is too thick for a woman my age. I got two opinions from two doctors who looked at my past ultrasound results and agreed it was not needed. Plus, with my closed cervix, I would require a D&C just to access my uterus...</span></i></p><p><i><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></i></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-31273051608036138592023-04-28T16:44:00.000-07:002023-04-28T16:44:26.488-07:00Birthday day<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4a9HC8hKDH1ZxOWWoBdAghgJonzIk7gG5-jqBGi1hgMjTWVaPL5iqLYzcQOZf51OHCuuG53nXgr1fzhuxU7vY5XpgP2t2pfHxyCdUtcwIYA5Yve5nBDKFf77d6eIxZaINRKT8xocudO6G6hA3U6zhD9wd1k6bLq9DaPI01qTPVSJnTqZ1jg/s1514/IMG_1161-12.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1514" data-original-width="1134" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4a9HC8hKDH1ZxOWWoBdAghgJonzIk7gG5-jqBGi1hgMjTWVaPL5iqLYzcQOZf51OHCuuG53nXgr1fzhuxU7vY5XpgP2t2pfHxyCdUtcwIYA5Yve5nBDKFf77d6eIxZaINRKT8xocudO6G6hA3U6zhD9wd1k6bLq9DaPI01qTPVSJnTqZ1jg/s320/IMG_1161-12.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I made myself a cake and took it to my parents place the night before my birthday.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The four of us shared slices and I left most of it with them, so they could continue to enjoy it for the next couple days. It was a nice quiet time, but it highlighted my parents changes in cognition and socialization. I focused on being present as best I could, but when we left I was clearly overwhelmed and overstimulated from the visit. The following day The Barren and I went to a museum and ate some ramen...then we came home. He is still fighting a cold and was tired, so I made myself birthday tacos, got in my PJs and watched Indian Matchmaker on Netflix while he played video games.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I think it has become clear that birthdays are not going to be big deals anymore. For The Barrens birthday I planned a whole week of things he loved...we went on an overnight and to his favorite breweries and places. For my birthday, it felt like he kinda got overwhelmed with work and chose to not do anything. So that was that.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Part of me wants to let it ride, another part of me felt disappointed.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>If I am going to be honest, and it is my blog, so I can say that.</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I felt kind of forgotten, and it didn't feel celebratory.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: x-small;"><b>Lesson: no one is going to celebrate your birthday like you celebrate other people</b></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The art exhibition ended the day before my birthday and was a personal success in many ways, there were a lot of bumps with it as well, and I learned a lot about the experimental process along the way. Four of the six pieces exhibited sold and that is a big personal record for me.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">That exhibition has folded over into the next opportunity that I am currently working on...and stressing about.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I am not sleeping well, and I need cannabis gummies most nights to help me stay asleep, but I am eating clean, and exercising and taking my vitamins. I am being a responsible adult, and that seems to be taking more and more effort.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The number on the cake is not phasing me, at least not yet...</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">so that is a plus 😀</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><u>I made a list of things I wanted to do for my bday:</u></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>Take annual nude selfie ✔</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>buy myself flowers ✔</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>make a yummy cake ✔**</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>enjoy a cuppa tea and a sweet ✔</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>paint nails</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: georgia;">shoot some film </span><span style="font-family: georgia;">✔</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: georgia;">wear something that makes me feel good about myself </span><span style="font-family: georgia;">✔</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: georgia;">laugh </span><span style="font-family: georgia;">✔</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I have also decided to break form this year and attend a baby shower. I have not gone to any in a looooooooooonnnng time, but a darling woman who I used to nanny for is expecting and has invited me to attend, and I without much thought, said yes. I was shocked at how easy it was to plan to go. I guess I am growing in many ways.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">So here is to 53, a total shock, a real leap of growth, a change from the norm...</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">it was my birthday Tuesday and I survived. </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><a href="https://minimalistbaker.com/1-bowl-vegan-gluten-free-vanilla-cake/" target="_blank"><b>**cake recipe**</b></a></span></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-77769494916055560252023-03-22T15:59:00.001-07:002023-03-22T15:59:20.379-07:00Real estate<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDcKz-AHx_klR4Z1Ke-SnVi_W_ZKQaeyncmL_0QHNvSoeFxdvrrOTP-FtEzgwcYBCdoGVCOdUIvUZVtGxrCFD2gjueG2Esa2boJEY0P-2VWMJGaQGiYF9MqDK3b8ms9WUgTfCKVPHAZ8Igl62GrLQ6scFXTAk6dIdHb6aw1dJ1ye3Da2fiOA/s640/line-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="518" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDcKz-AHx_klR4Z1Ke-SnVi_W_ZKQaeyncmL_0QHNvSoeFxdvrrOTP-FtEzgwcYBCdoGVCOdUIvUZVtGxrCFD2gjueG2Esa2boJEY0P-2VWMJGaQGiYF9MqDK3b8ms9WUgTfCKVPHAZ8Igl62GrLQ6scFXTAk6dIdHb6aw1dJ1ye3Da2fiOA/s320/line-1.jpg" width="259" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">© The Barreness<br />A crowd gathered around my work on display</span></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;">There is nothing to complain about...</p><p style="text-align: left;">Isn't amazing how the one bad thing can ruin the month of good things. It frustrates me, as it gets too much real estate in my mind and then I have to spend so much energy trying to not let it have so much space. It is exhausting.</p><p style="text-align: left;">My work has received so many kind, generous words. Unprompted from strangers and friends alike. </p><p style="text-align: left;">Many of which as surprised by my capabilities, or creativity.</p><p style="text-align: left;">I spend three hours answering questions, and repeating information to visitors during the artists reception. I wore a mask and only got guff from one visitor, to which I responded that I wanted to remain healthy after the evening was over <i>(it was a man, and a figure model at that...)</i></p><p style="text-align: left;">I was hoarse and overstimulated when the night was over, I spent the following day quiet and writing thank you notes to all who came out the night before.</p><p style="text-align: left;">A success in many ways. My art sold, I was the first sale of the show, and remain to the most sold artist in the exhibition so far. I am hoping that a review will be made my the local paper...I have learned how to make reels of my images on social media. I have been publishing new bits about the work online on a regular basis to keep people engaged and interested in the work...I am soaring with humble pride from months of focused work and it landing well. </p>The night of the artists reception, I was chatting with a well known painter, and she looked at me in my shimmer and pride and said: " well, how are you going to top this?!" It landed like a javelin, I feared that question. I feared I would have to face my next step instead of enjoying where I had landed....I just smiled and said, I am brainstorming that now.<div><br /></div><div>Two days later I submitted the work to a magazine for hopeful publication, a hope to continue to move the images forward...and this morning (weeks later) I was awoken to a little ping of an incoming email. It was a rejection notice. I stayed in bed longer than normal, feeling the weight of my failure.</div><div><br /></div><div>I should be happy...and in many ways I am. I am still very proud of the work and hopeful it will grant me more opportunities but in many ways I can't sit and enjoy the moment; I need to think of new things to do, places to email, exhibitions to apply to...it is a frantic pace. I often feel as though, I am in the slow lane of the freeway trying to not get hit by passing cars.</div><div>It is exhausting.</div><div><br /></div><div>So it came as no surprise, that I caught The Barrens cold on the return from his business trip. I nursed him for a week, thinking I was safer than safe...I wiped every surface, wouldn't let him in the kitchen, washed all the blankets...but still I got it. I managed to keep it at bay until after receiving my infusion...and then I crashed. My first cold in over three years! The Barren was stressed from his cold and travel, so I needed to fend for myself and I did my best to not be grumpy or ask for anything while I nursed myself back. Last night was the first real night back to a more normal sense of things...and I am back into the rapids, the fast lane on the freeway, the craziness that is normal for me.</div><div><br /></div><div>So I am like a surfer, riding waves of joy and sadness. </div><div>Thankful in many ways for it all<br /><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-73436458377589985062023-01-17T11:15:00.005-08:002023-01-17T11:15:46.440-08:00Self-awareness<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjThhFOAtb0m_L48yGH5A2s61mB_TpwTw-SXrcQdUA22UdSPpCYhSKZe0htCMwWwqqmrLKx-PLdq3wL5hpHHsa3wqYkZ4BHtJN_4DrmeidhUNR04X-qI9O1KLM2c3Av0srocercz5T91AfzKABZ-QScXQRAnIU9BrI470Y8JC1W_dUZiCDb_w/s1440/IMG_8274.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="1080" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjThhFOAtb0m_L48yGH5A2s61mB_TpwTw-SXrcQdUA22UdSPpCYhSKZe0htCMwWwqqmrLKx-PLdq3wL5hpHHsa3wqYkZ4BHtJN_4DrmeidhUNR04X-qI9O1KLM2c3Av0srocercz5T91AfzKABZ-QScXQRAnIU9BrI470Y8JC1W_dUZiCDb_w/s320/IMG_8274.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"> <a href="https://www.sfmoma.org/exhibition/joan-brown/" target="_blank"> Joan Brown Painting</a></div><p style="text-align: center;"> I took my first solo trip in well over a decade to spend two days with my bestie.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I left The Barren behind to care for the cats, himself and the house while I flew away to have a girls weekend. It wasn't the girls weekend of movie types, there was no spa, or wine country or even a road trip. It was a cheap easy airplane ticket purchased back in September, on a whim with hopes of having some time with a friend.</p><p style="text-align: center;">It worked. My bestie put me up in her newly built studio in the backyard. I arrived between "bomb cyclone" storms hammering my state. I am a nervous flyer, so the idea of flying in storms was not ideal, but I love my bestie and I realllllllllly wanted to girl time, some me time. I lucked out, and the rain and wind had stopped for an hour while I flew there and an hour while I flew home. </p><p style="text-align: center;">We spent the time walking the dog, chatting and squeezed in one museum visit 💓</p><p style="text-align: center;">There was also shuttling her hubby and kiddo to practices and grocery shopping.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Most of our time was chatting; bemoaning marriage challenges and life roadblocks. There is something unique and beautiful about a friend that knows you, and has known you for decades. They spot when you are bull-shiting yourself, and when you are downplaying something. We both are vacillating with extreme creative joy and feelings of self doubt. Struggling to find time to sit with ourselves and accepting our new bodies as we walk this new menopause path. She is facing an empty nest this summer and how dramatically that will change her life and how much of her current life has been taken over with others schedules and expectations.</p><p style="text-align: center;">It was a gift to listen to her and her concerns for her kid and pre-college. I found myself in a rare position, I was able to offer help with things that are just too much to add to her plate. When I shared this with The Barren I was greeted with a huge smile and I think the two of us felt empowered in a small way. A way that would really matter to this kiddo.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>When she was pregnant with this human, I was trying and failing to stay pregnant. In many ways her child is another time marker, both The Barren and I adore this human and we are overjoyed to be a person they call with questions and someone they can count on. My bestie and I were the same age her kiddo is when we first met...and that magic is not overlooked.</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">We walked the dog in large open parks in the mist and drizzle, around neighborhoods and chatted, never finding a moment without a topic to muse about. We shared meals and caffeine and window shopped in places near her home, but she never had time to explore. It was an amazing two days, we were both left exhausted and partially healed from the time we had lost over the last years in isolation. It was bitter sweet to say goodbye in the pre-dawn airport drop-off. </p><p style="text-align: center;">We hope to meet somewhere between our two homes in the next 6months or so...life is riding us both hard these days and so it is fun to place a marker for another weekend out into the universe. <i>(we chat almost daily via text, but spending time together is hard to come by)</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">When I lined up to board the plane, I got a weird feeling, I couldn't really place it but something was strange. Something was off...I brushed it aside and got my seat. It was announced that it was a full plane, so I moved from the aisle to the middle seat in my row. Someone was already at the window, when another person asked if the aisle seat was taken I said "nope, it is all yours".</p><p style="text-align: center;">After seeing everyone file onto the plane, and hear that it was full I realized what was off...</p><p style="text-align: center;">the <b>WHOLE</b> plane, aside from me and a disabled couple at the front row, was students.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I found myself sitting between two people that were clearly in college, and I sat there with nothing in my hands but my own hands. No phone, no tablet, no book or magazine...no distraction just my own hand to hold. My mind started to do math, I could be either of these peoples mother, I was old enough and they were the right age. I was flying in a live action reminder of an alternative timeline. The plane cabin was silent, everyone was plugged into something...meanwhile, I pretended to sleep, I pretended to make mental notes, mostly I was trying to distract myself for the hour long flight home and not collapse into a puddle of tears thinking about all the what-ifs.... <i>Yep, it is an hour long flight, what a luxury. </i></p><p style="text-align: center;">It was a long weekend, The Barren picked me up and we got breakfast. As we were sipping tea while it drizzled he asked me what my favorite part of the trip was, did something create a core memory?</p><p style="text-align: center;"> I started to laugh and told him that it was <b>AMAZING</b> to have a hot flash with my bestie.</p><p style="text-align: center;">We were walking in the museum gallery, both of us doing our own looking. Then I realized I was warm, then warmer, then dripping sweat, each stage removing more and more layers of clothing. Meanwhile my bestie was experiencing a similar thing on the opposite side of the room. We met on a viewing bench, to both dig into our purses to grab a hair tie and pull our hair off our necks. giggling about how we were carrying our coats in our arms and it looked like we were dragging blankets from gallery to gallery. That, that will stay with me forever....not feeling alone, laughing and feeling vulnerable together, we understood each other perfectly without saying a word.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-34895128247875888712022-12-09T12:01:00.000-08:002022-12-09T12:01:02.631-08:00Krampus<p style="text-align: center;"> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOQ2IUfO7lMVd4Xbpj87iNXd634sce3ziEOoIEEK8jK8BdIls8plGBxsdt_79BIuaAmfgNgpsvRcU6v8Cwufqq6_ILUGchmC3dXQ1yvk41u8IScPAbnzfX5L9WpVeW-NX4HVLKx64bgFYZWBWV9wM0HjM5ALiHt4F3EZLWQC-yotmjSOhB7w/s1200/ricnwaus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1068" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOQ2IUfO7lMVd4Xbpj87iNXd634sce3ziEOoIEEK8jK8BdIls8plGBxsdt_79BIuaAmfgNgpsvRcU6v8Cwufqq6_ILUGchmC3dXQ1yvk41u8IScPAbnzfX5L9WpVeW-NX4HVLKx64bgFYZWBWV9wM0HjM5ALiHt4F3EZLWQC-yotmjSOhB7w/s320/ricnwaus.jpg" width="285" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>In order to make my latest adventure to the ER more manageable and less scary...I thought about what this flare might have looked like, what kind of personality did it have and I came up with this.<p></p><p style="text-align: center;">Big Flamboyance</p><p style="text-align: center;">I was up at 1:30am awoken with stomach tightening, that turned into a 12 hour saga of regular contractions and wave of nausea making all fuel leave my body, and leave me unable to form thoughts, drink water or even cry. That alone wouldn't get me to the ER, it was the pain in my lower abdomen that got me there fearing it was my appendix. Thinking the worse of the worst scenarios. </p><p style="text-align: center;">Well, lucky for me, there was a lonnnnnnnnng wait to get a room in the ER. Our local hospital only allows the patients in the ER waiting room, having their companions wait in a separate section of the hospital until a room is assigned. The Barren was near but not with me while we waited for 3 hours to get a room. During that time, the ER filled with sick babies, lots of sick babies that sounded like seals barking. People having seizures and others puddled moaning in the chairs. I meanwhile was seating curled into a in fetal ball trying to not think about how much I was feeling past trauma, how I just wanted to go home, hold The Barren's hand and how silly I felt being there.<i> (reduce yourself to make space for others much?) </i></p><p style="text-align: center;">The Barren meanwhile was in the perfect spot to see all the new parents leaving the hospital with their babies in tow. So he was having just as much fun.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I think it was hour two, when I remembered I was just learning a healing mantra in my meditation class. I started trying to remember the words, I forgot some, then remembered them, then jostled the order, but I figured if I got any of them wrong it was still a good thing...I was focusing my breathing and mind on something that wasn't my pain, fear, or embarrassment.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Om tare tuttare ture mama ayru punye janana pushtim kuru soha</i></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>White Tara healing mantra</i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>*****</i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;">At the three hour mark, I was called into a room and The Barren was ushered in separately. I met the doctor for a hot second, he determined that based off my blood and urine, it was not a blockage, rip or my appendix. I was given a cup of water to see if I could drink water again, anti-nausea drugs and IV fluids. The nurse, who was a totally cool dude with pink on the ends of his long hair, said that he believed what I was experiencing was p<span style="background-color: white; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #202124;">eristalsis and because I was slightly dehydrated, I most likely could feel it more than normal. Then he unloaded some other cool facts like, the smell and taste I experience when the line is flushed before I get my infusions is actually genetic, and not everyone has that ability, and it is actually the blood flowing through my olfactory...anyways it was pretty cool. I got a call from my GI doctor right after the IV of fluids was placed and he called in a prescription for more anti nausea medication. (I was super thankful he was a rockstar like that).....this new diagnosis has a steep learning curve, and what I was experiencing was a flare. There is really no known causes for them, and it takes practice to learn the cues of one coming. So ideally I'll be fortified knowing mine tend to last for 24 hours and then subside, but can hurt like a mother when they are here.</span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: white; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #202124;">When the IV was done, I felt re-booted and went home to shower and eat two tablespoons of sweet potato and go to bed. </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #202124; font-family: times;">As I was eating said sweet potato, I asked what the date was and it was the 5th! The 5th of</span><span style="color: #202124; font-family: georgia;"> </span><span style="color: #202124; font-family: times;">December....and I realized just then, that </span><span style="color: #202124; font-family: courier;"><u>I had been battling the KRAMPUS</u></span><span style="color: #202124; font-family: times;">....and I won.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgbIAE8ZR2JhmVAFElZ4r49tVDzCcJ9RPJxM5gxGxzwgUw_2P6cHeccwShf-XHOl9-Vh8C-R39H_HjMeoVAHl6MrVORucaHhJ1xnlpcfCjV5DfvIBw4VCrjX-W6luw3T-56dayiTGhnDZZumDqxPenkYHYLv0vCvAJbG4-iU8CM-IZD0Yq-LQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="2495" data-original-width="1588" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgbIAE8ZR2JhmVAFElZ4r49tVDzCcJ9RPJxM5gxGxzwgUw_2P6cHeccwShf-XHOl9-Vh8C-R39H_HjMeoVAHl6MrVORucaHhJ1xnlpcfCjV5DfvIBw4VCrjX-W6luw3T-56dayiTGhnDZZumDqxPenkYHYLv0vCvAJbG4-iU8CM-IZD0Yq-LQ=w255-h400" width="255" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-25639481768587695692022-11-12T15:29:00.004-08:002022-11-12T15:29:49.248-08:00Forked<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiFo9kzal8dxKIB9pMYFFT7UAO37uWTHnZ5s3Sf_BD83IBMi3jUechiAB9xvJj0jEyi7-ubtyHcZOvR_YzQ84TBi66Zg8AMkJNxoIOcZ-QeRdlz5C_f1ObR-JSTK2jnYXBDojgqjvEPV9pmrpEGdRB-phwBUo7HR67MsG206JIHiA1ySdyVAw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1356" data-original-width="1210" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiFo9kzal8dxKIB9pMYFFT7UAO37uWTHnZ5s3Sf_BD83IBMi3jUechiAB9xvJj0jEyi7-ubtyHcZOvR_YzQ84TBi66Zg8AMkJNxoIOcZ-QeRdlz5C_f1ObR-JSTK2jnYXBDojgqjvEPV9pmrpEGdRB-phwBUo7HR67MsG206JIHiA1ySdyVAw=w357-h400" width="357" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I'm exhausted</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have made it to the other side of the constant testing, I think.</div><div style="text-align: center;">The harrowing MRI turned out fine, nothing bad found, no new information.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So for the record, these MRI's are crappy ways to spend $100 at a time.</div><div style="text-align: center;">anyways, that part seems to be done.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I had my annual check in with my GP physician yesterday, I was assigned a new one.</div><div style="text-align: center;">When she entered the room she had a long list of notes on me as she had reviewed my record...kind of.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I spent most of the appointment watching her chart my current situation.</div><div style="text-align: center;">She asked a couple questions, I didn't have to have a pelvic because another department does those now and when she started telling me about my dense breasts, I told her I pay outta pocket for those ultrasounds too. I was overwhelmed...</div><div style="text-align: center;">I do know that at one point I said that "this was easier than my decade of infertility"</div><div style="text-align: center;"> Between you and me, I was still quite overwhelmed and feeling traumatized.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">She stopped everything, looked at me, dead in the eyes and said:</div><div style="text-align: center;">Are you feeling underwater, do you feel like medication would help?</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was sort of taken aback, I think mostly by how close she was to my face, and the unblinking eye contact....but I said I don't think I am there yet.</div><div style="text-align: center;">She said things like: <i>manage <u style="font-weight: bold;">chronic illness </u>and you are a menopausal woman </i></div><div style="text-align: center;">If those weren't enough lovely gems from the visit she went on to tell me that she believes I have a secondary disease with my UC/Crohn's </div><div style="text-align: center;">Hyperthyroidism.</div><div style="text-align: center;">She scheduled me for a bone density exam, I got a breast exam and then it was done.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I got dressed, got three shots and went to my car to cry, again!</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am spun...I am in a land I know, but all my markers are not familiar to me.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I go to all my appointments alone...I am not sure if a parent, lover or friend would have made this any better...but I know I am not okay.</div><div style="text-align: center;">In fact:</div><div style="text-align: center;">Stick a fork in me, I'm done.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgO8hd2H_D97eVsPGqFYwxtUJTyH9ADPggJbHhv_cqPc2psRySZ5Clp_bqunZrhoADTz79zKo2tlo37TakTOXz5Femf1VrycJHpPBLs9U1tQ9bM-QtkVVFQyjYyb5px4kCT_CdYAk-pISveaMcFkQNTSwLare6zhZgUscSMZp2fUa2Kbodqxw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="513" data-original-width="460" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgO8hd2H_D97eVsPGqFYwxtUJTyH9ADPggJbHhv_cqPc2psRySZ5Clp_bqunZrhoADTz79zKo2tlo37TakTOXz5Femf1VrycJHpPBLs9U1tQ9bM-QtkVVFQyjYyb5px4kCT_CdYAk-pISveaMcFkQNTSwLare6zhZgUscSMZp2fUa2Kbodqxw" width="215" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">So here I am a leftover, emotional mess.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Not knowing which direction to turn first.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I did have a good start to the week. </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I am not going to leave this post without sharing good things too.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I met with a curator for the yearly exhibition I am thankful for being invited to for the last 13 years. </div><div style="text-align: center;">I was juried into it once again, and over the moon about that.</div><div style="text-align: center;">If that wasn't enough, the best part was that I got to show some work in person to the gallery and I will be in another exhibition in March! </div><div style="text-align: center;">I am scrambling to make a lot more work between now and then.</div><div style="text-align: center;">That was a good thing.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So in between battling some serious self doubt, creative blocks and just straight up sadness I made something of interest. Something unique.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Now, if I can only stop making new diseases for my body!</div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-27675291118939433332022-10-30T14:33:00.002-07:002022-10-30T14:33:42.597-07:00Bound<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfdEdRm459diQON2Gqpl2s3ORDEycX78v4mzaOllV8MePLImAMBL6GddFgxjiRlR4IvOQvdQ7_4_LQTtUrig2UNlMAssmpQbGaNr33Z0TSBX5QrjyLLNdEw4eKwCDbDkddeYbwcOSDxHU_WieQWolx36M3e6Fr4mhYhYDxSc-Wf-cwl88rpQ/s320/sm17739_MR_07.jpg" width="320" /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>You have got to be kidding me...</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I went for an MRI this morning, the doctor is wanting to knock something else of the horrible list.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have had MRIs before, more times than I'd like, but all seemingly necessary.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Today though, today I had a problem.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I arrived ahead of time, got in right away...and in a great shift, was not required to drink strange "juices" or volunteer a vein for glowing fluids.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Instead it was a strait "let the magnets take the photos" kind of MRI.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I went in, relaxed and un-phased and was in my double gown situation (<i>one put on forward and one backwards to avoid any peep show</i>) and sat on the MRI bench and was then told that I'd be heading into the machine head first and backwards....I was strapped in, arms bound at my side and elevated and inserted into the machine....one of the techs said..." <b>are you okay</b>" and I said "<i>NO, No I am NOT okay...</i>."</div><div style="text-align: center;">to which I was pulled out of the machine, and had to catch my breath.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was having a FULL BLOWN PANIC attack</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I asked to look back at the machine, so I could<i> "confirm I was not going into a sarcophagus" </i></div><div style="text-align: center;">I did a quick scan of what was triggering me and asked...<i>.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;">"Can I release my arms?"...it was allowed and one of the techs asked if maybe a towel over my eyes would help, I agreed to that.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was very thankful for the kindness and I apologized a million times, to which they said all was fine.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was asked if it was better, I said yes and back into the machine I went to complete the test.</div><div style="text-align: center;">It was a half hour of booming an clanking noises...breathing exercises and then I was done.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I thanked them again...got dressed and left. </div><div style="text-align: center;">Shuffled off to my car and cried.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was mortified, embarrassed and suddenly understood why horses are given blinders.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img alt="" data-original-height="538" data-original-width="468" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEicuubVrmKNIpV4Jz06JUZtw9bxSSAWa-gpDi0Xm9L27r6kMC2o7HEQEXSp89e3a282c1cwJhAeHUJHRuqAWU0DTFHjOhFs6e0JQWAWluY-OVnhK-KRco9yjmwupt29l9CtxmL9ORIzdiYbFEnengT4icb6kAIDRnykWnWRgRug7-J0OrJ6sw" width="209" /></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The less I could see, the safer I felt.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Counter intuitive to my years of meditation, I needed to <u>massively disassociate</u>.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Ostrich myself to not feel bound and threatened.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I had my second infusion this week, I had a breakthrough pain episode this week, I had a massive deadline this week and then this MRI.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Maybe I really needed to just hide, maybe all of this is overwhelming...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">maybe I do need to escape.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">My 20th wedding anniversary is Tuesday</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">We have a night at a local boutique hotel booked, but we are both at a loss.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">We can't travel right now, we can't break away just yet, it is all in the air.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">BUT, we are gonna have time together and in a different bed.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It is also the anniversary of our first miscarriage and a death anniversary of a beloved pet.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">We were social yesterday, going to a family event to carve pumpkins, and then follow it with a Halloween adults only party...but everyone was talking about their kids and how it is having teenagers or younger kiddos.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The Barren and I just exchanged looks most of the time and </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">nodded and said "oh my, yeah that sounds difficult"</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">These days have me mentally bound too.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I reminisce on the days that we had hoped for, the times that were supposed to happen.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Our G-daughter is the age of our star child, she is a physical reminder of passing time.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I adore this time of year, the wind down with joyful punctuations of celebration. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Building our memory space for Dia De Los Muertos today, I placed a doll amongst the photos of family long gone. Marigolds line the edge of the space, a figurine of a black dog to guide the spirits, candles to light the way. Joyful calaveras to help with the celebration. I made a space to remember our beloved animal companions who are no longer with us.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">After everything is in place...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Something magical happens in the quiet of the house, after we put out drinks and food for the spirits...the house feels full, a place of calm and filled with love.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">There is no sadness, our minds fill with happy memories of those visiting.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Maybe I'll hide <i>(stick my head in the clouds)</i> for a few days with my sweetie, forget all that is required of me, forget all the doctors appointments, the state of the world, the general malaise and </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">simply float in those unbound moments of what if.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Wishing you all an unbound hallows eve</div><div style="text-align: center;">celebrate your personal magic</div><div style="text-align: center;">because you ARE magical<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-35418358847164510782022-10-12T16:06:00.009-07:002022-10-12T16:11:26.416-07:00Loading dose<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2400" data-original-width="2072" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB8IrZX6TEnTlbN5ps78tdAR51YPpiGdKP_iJWlJEUOOZvAqWQzxOc1YH3l_HFb0VEYZEdaUykbSEuouqHOdkcpA4ZhTMT-S189ijlKCeb7-L5usYrRIi1r1gncSz69ODTsVj4yt_OwyN5rPZ90O9MSRC921nYIT8uOsd1UFeX_TNCXi1YrQ/s320/Infusion%20day%200.jpg" width="276" /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Today I started my first dose of colitis/crohns medication.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I went to meditation this morning and wore a purple bra</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(I am a firm believer that purple is a good luck color, well for me it is)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;">The nurse is nice and will be my nurse from here on out. </div><div style="text-align: center;">We got the baby question out of the way right at the start with, </div><div style="text-align: center;">"do you have any children"</div><div style="text-align: center;">to which I said, "no we don't, we just have each other"</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The infusion center is in an allergy clinic, so there was a large group of people there to get allergy meds, crying babies and a lot of commotion.</div><div style="text-align: center;">The Barren came with me, and although he looked away when the needle stuff happened </div><div style="text-align: center;">he was my solid dude 💓</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Todays dose is called a loading dose, as they are loading a smaller dose today and then in two weeks I get another dose. I will be monitored for a bit afterwards to make sure I don't have any reactions. The another dose in 6weeks and then 8 weeks...and then I am on the schedule of every 8 weeks.</div><div style="text-align: center;">In between I will be having blood, stool and scans to monitor progress.</div><div style="text-align: center;">The medicine is designed to specifically target my gut, but it still makes me immunocompromised.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I will continue my vegan gluten free lifestyle, for life.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">After the infusion we raced home, because The Barren had a work call and then the doorbell rang...</div><div style="text-align: center;">outside my front door was a man holding a huge arrangement of flowers.</div><div style="text-align: center;">My sweet Barren had a bouquet delivered.</div><div style="text-align: center;">The message read:</div><div style="text-align: center;">"this is one crazy ride, but I am glad I am on it with you"</div><div style="text-align: center;">💓💓💓</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">more tears, but also smiles</div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-3105947471032443112022-10-11T11:14:00.000-07:002022-10-11T11:14:06.985-07:00We close our eyes<p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpEtM9TkvB5xsRFZPo5J0O8X9fPPYux29BRupiMhe6nfMDBp7UZt1OEP2781QKigRTzjdeBqpp_gtFdnhW7a-O4O5T5mPVVbHtgFmV-WwXzRMRFfIuN4mu8eBsmdPupYi_MYlOJ0MvMLksEXe8E8he6V1kd1YyRUJi8iRnU9LcwY2N-F1WNw/s800/211883fg.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="612" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpEtM9TkvB5xsRFZPo5J0O8X9fPPYux29BRupiMhe6nfMDBp7UZt1OEP2781QKigRTzjdeBqpp_gtFdnhW7a-O4O5T5mPVVbHtgFmV-WwXzRMRFfIuN4mu8eBsmdPupYi_MYlOJ0MvMLksEXe8E8he6V1kd1YyRUJi8iRnU9LcwY2N-F1WNw/w245-h320/211883fg.jpg" width="245" /></a></div></div><p></p><h3 style="backface-visibility: hidden; border-radius: 0px; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">A Woman is Supporting Another Woman, Who has fainted upon Reading a Letter (1807)</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><a href="https://artvee.com/artist/christoffer-wilhelm-eckersberg/" style="backface-visibility: hidden; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #3f3f3f; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; touch-action: manipulation; transition: all 0.25s ease 0s; vertical-align: baseline;">Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg</a><span style="font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-weight: inherit;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">(Danish, 1783 – 1853)</span></span></div></h3><p style="text-align: center;"><br /> I start my infusions tomorrow.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Last Wednesday I got the call that all was set into motion. Since that call, the date has been changed the location has been changed and I have learned the name of my nurse. Plus made appointments for several other appointments and tests that need to be completed.</p><h1 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">I have also rushed a friend to the ER <br />and dealt with many stressful situations that comprise a life.</span></h1><p style="text-align: center;">I have shared the information with my bestie, my brother, my meditation teacher, my massage therapist <i>(boy I sound quite affluent) </i>but not my parents.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am having concerns with sharing it with them until after my first session so I can answer all the abstract questions my mother will ask and that way I can still feel a micron of control until then. Also my father is having some memory issues and the last thing I need is a daily call asking in a childlike voice " <i>how I am feeling</i>" when all I want to is to feel strong and powerful and capable.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I told my bestie that I don't want:</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">" the last thing I want is to be a willowy Victorian woman <br />wasting away in the corner who everyone treats with caution"</span></h4><div style="text-align: center;">I am now trying to get used to the day being peppered with medical calls...all of which seem to send a wave of chaos and panic through me and my instinctual reaction is to run....</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>leave the house, do anything else than what I have to do.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have managed to make a couple things, and although it feels like pulling taffy, and that it is a steep, steep incline; I am seriously determined to keep on keeping on. </div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho3zS5qr8_vCI3qu_kbQQrg_7H9QniZqntj-hO-2o7tUBvAM4-OSkjVq_eThu9GeYUa_rwljvAugLtTHjHdx52cOczlqvGCQFPnOrz3V01H_7A8EAAi7oWIp5CFOT5lK6b7NBQi8A45KTs4mobD1GeHQoCLu1Hehg53r-yj5afZTdGpyCI_A/s500/408711_10151437143008776_1658640365_n.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho3zS5qr8_vCI3qu_kbQQrg_7H9QniZqntj-hO-2o7tUBvAM4-OSkjVq_eThu9GeYUa_rwljvAugLtTHjHdx52cOczlqvGCQFPnOrz3V01H_7A8EAAi7oWIp5CFOT5lK6b7NBQi8A45KTs4mobD1GeHQoCLu1Hehg53r-yj5afZTdGpyCI_A/w200-h200/408711_10151437143008776_1658640365_n.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I have to see the lifestyle I want, instead of the life that someone else thinks I should have.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>I sound like a verbal vision board...</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I clearly am doing anything and everything in my power to normalize this <b>WHOLE</b> experience.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The Barren is coming with me to the first infusion, because after asking, the nurse said he could come to the <u>first one</u>. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I have also started a visual for my mantras:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b>I am a boat on the water, bobbing on the surface.</b></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b>No water can get into me or sink me</b></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b> I can ride out each wave with curiosity and calm.</b></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>This is a whole new world...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I am really just guessing at shit now<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/xF2F88q0YDc" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-54099781238638914182022-09-29T15:06:00.000-07:002022-09-29T15:06:09.056-07:00Call Me<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="437" data-original-width="612" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3qCh6-WoavEHFOusqDCaAwULzgpQDuo39ZL20zPM330Wf7XqX-kpgARNoG-MqedLxnU0sCl6fneV_G-UZfE0bMUouCP7bc9bwFIEb1i54dHWBoZLH6bFq2DJRxd29T6CrDyJp9XopvM5_fAbCkkKnYMXWiCHIRuhCXtc_5MsWZT00hqMftg/s320/istockphoto-1337793914-612x612.jpg" width="320" /></div><p style="text-align: center;"> So I had another phone call with the Gut doctor.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The Barren sat in on this one and asked questions and together as a trio of overeducated people, we made a decision for moving forward.</p><p style="text-align: center;">My diagnosis was laid out before me, and three options (<i>with some variances</i>) and I made the best decision I could with the information available to me and my physician.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I have another MRI ahead of me, this is to confirm that another horrible is not lying in wait.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Meanwhile, at the same time, there are people working on getting insurance approvals for my medicine. I will be having infusions on a regular basis to stop my white blood cells from attacking my body any further and therefore reduce the inflammation of my intestines and further endanger my appendix.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>If I get a problem with my appendix it would be an emergency situation because I have an inflamed intestine and surgery threatens my colitis from spreading further. You can't attach damaged sections to damaged sections....I'm like a human Jenga tower. </i></p><p style="text-align: center;">I also have Crohn's disease</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am really really really struggling to process all this.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am trying to put a happy face on, but I am finding that I am missing that overused mask.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am stressed, scared and really have no idea what to expect. My nature is to find the silver lining of things, like....I am glad this was discovered before an emergency situation. I am hopeful I will feel better and not worse. I am thankful that my already augmented diet will be easy to maintain....</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am also trying really hard to not think of this as an hourglass...</p><p style="text-align: center;">I need to talk to someone about this, as I have not yet shared this with my bestie and brother. My therapist would be scolding me, but I guess in many ways I am not ready to say the words out loud yet. I am still too scared. I am meditating and trying to get more sleep, and get my yoga practice back in line...as I know all these these help manage stress, but I am finding, that even they are coming up lacking.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I want to run, run far away</p><p style="text-align: center;">run back in time, run away to have fun...run away from all this adulting. I want to run away from fear and anger and the ideas of being weak or fragile or unable to be seen as a normal person.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I don't know how to do that yet. I am not able to focus on artmaking as deadline and opportunities are speeding past and I need to grab them...I need to feel pieces of me that don't feel broken or wrong or out of line.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When I was saying my thank you's to the doctor, he said " Don't pin it on your heritage or your past NSAIDs use....your immune system simply got it wrong..... We are going to try and fix that" </p><p style="text-align: center;">I feel so much, all at the same time...</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-36194137447189491242022-09-21T22:36:00.004-07:002022-09-21T22:36:57.573-07:00Wild Stallion<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="368" data-original-width="235" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU1_rtZci5jweQVET-44SsZvMbFPYbqXHpNZQ_n6eEzrAQwEqljJq6C1Js3KVWadxfhJQP93j5Nt1m7a-5noi-DkDz3gm7LqCZjXZrfYMuThxDh4O5WgVIw5RZHGqiy6eviJ8f8sXmlVejXK9KgK3F8k13rxxVL6HMOsf2Wd_va2q6ChlMnA/s320/f04d3b0c99755f6bf78337acf1469394--vintage-woman-vintage-ladies.jpg" width="204" /></div><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">This might be a case of "the horse that has already left the barn" </span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">to close the stable door after the horse has bolted</span></strong></p><em style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: inherit; color: #525960; font-size: 15px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div style="text-align: center;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">to have tried to prevent something happening, but to have done so too late to prevent damage being done</span></em></div></em><br /><div style="text-align: center;">It appears that my body is resisting.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have massively altered my diet since my last ER visit back in April and June. </div><div style="text-align: center;">To date I have lost close to 20 pounds.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have been poked, prodded, illuminated from the inside out. Photographed, x-rayed, CT scanned, looked at via magnets. I have given blood and poop and tears; testing everything that could be imagined and all signs point to the same place.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Although I don't like the answer, it appears that everyone that has seen my stuff all agree, it is the same.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I have Colitis.</div><div style="text-align: center;">it is only a very small section of my intestines, but my gut doctor wants to put me on medicine, as the small portion of my intestine that is inflamed is very very near my appendix and if one imposes anymore on it, it could be bad bad bad.</div><div style="text-align: center;">So now I am faced with a lifetime of immunosuppressant drugs.</div><div style="text-align: center;">As you can imagine, I have a billion questions about them.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I prize my immune system, it is like my <b>superpower</b>, so the idea that I will need to suppress it for the rest of my life is nothing short of terrifying.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Once again, the news was delivered via a casual phone call.</div><div style="text-align: center;">When I mentioned that I wanted to continue the watch and wait method is when he mentioned that even with all my work <i>"we are most likely dealing with a horse that has already left the stable." </i></div><div style="text-align: center;">My decades of pain killers for my endo and migraines most likely played a role in my immune system attacking my intestine and so in an effort to battle one auto immune disease I created another.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">What an epiphany about all this horrible.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-65800737847712271702022-08-29T16:53:00.001-07:002022-08-29T16:53:10.326-07:00Sleep Interrupted<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="660" data-original-width="640" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTxFVPMrM_ShtEcWjZyQIE2eUA78B0YQ_LqjVReVr41yDFMVQkH9uUbh26d7K4QmCegeCIDbgQ_dF0KkNWcpbz1drnJRusp0xS8LSgM4rqVjYPiOI8QOzz9i8Rg8JU7DyJ6p6GEh-sVO9lz1395OpWCTfbhzRkjz125Ht1yQ0KWGg8A9N7vg/s320/boogeymanphotographs07.jpg" width="310" /></div><p style="text-align: center;"> I have night terrors.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I have had some sort of interrupted sleep since my earliest memories. As a child I remember there was a figure in the hallway that I could see from my bed, calling me out of bed and to them. I never got out of bed for it; once they left I would run to my parents bed, shaking and scared. My mother soothed me and lulled me back to sleep next to her. My father had less patience for it, and so I always ran to her side of the bed, or crawled to her side of the bed and slept on the floor next to her.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I have always had conversations with those who are no longer here, in my dreams they would come and bring messages and I welcome those encounters. I sometimes wake in tears from the beautiful feelings that wash over me after those encounters.</p><p style="text-align: center;">My grandmothers and grandfather amongst many others have visited me multiple times. </p><p style="text-align: center;">I get great comfort from those dreams and encounters.</p><p style="text-align: center;">My therapist always mentioned that my veil between sleep and wake is thin and I travel effortless between them. I agree. I often visit people or places right after falling asleep...</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>but sometimes things go sideways.</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">My visits can become nightmares, looping frustrating situations over and over, or scaring me with harm to those I love....and then there are terrors.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Last night I had a whopper.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The scenario is almost always the same, I fall asleep and then...in the darkness I am suddenly aware of someone leaning over me, or approaching the bedside. A robber or a threat of some other nature...</p><p style="text-align: center;">in response I scream, a full lung-filled scream, through the veils, through the layers of sleep and into the darkened room. Shooting my poor darling Barren out of his peaceful slumber and into shear panic.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am asleep and am often startled awake by the sound of my own voice or The Barren exploding in fear with words or my name.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Last night was a memory of taking a deep breath and screaming...I saw a man in a plaid shirt in our room, on The Barrens side of the bed, terrified that we were in danger I screamed, loud and according to The Barren in a bloodcurdling manner.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I awoke from the sound of my voice and The Barren saying my name.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When I am startled awake, I am shaking, my heart is beating almost too fast for me to process and I am confused, like I have been ripped across time and space. I am left feeling deeply mortified. </p><p style="text-align: center;">The Barren soothes me and reminds me that I am safe. </p><p style="text-align: center;">We have done everything we can to resolve this, we have moved the furniture around in the whole house to change the Feng Shui. We have burned sage to clear the energy, The Barren even got hex remover when in New Orleans and we've used that. I have spray to clear the energy I got from an energy worker, I have done meditation breathing, I repeat mantras out loud throughout the day to remind myself "<i>no one in my dreams can harm me or The Barren or our cats or home</i>" </p><p style="text-align: center;">Sometimes I get a feeling during the day, like darkness is trying to creep in, and I have learned to sense it and say out loud that it is not welcome or allowed in my home or my mind. I have also tried to focus on more of a lucid sleep, where when dreaming I recognize when things are starting to go astray and take control of it so it doesn't scare or frustrate me. I don't watch scary movies, I don't read scary books...this is adding to my stress. I am afraid of falling asleep or scaring my beloved again.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am still quite shaken from last nights event, and The Barren is currently taking a nap as it took a while for us to relax, I think The Barren was also expecting a knock on the door from the police or a worried neighbor. Thankfully neither happened.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Do you have nightmares, or terrors? What do you do to make things better?</p><p style="text-align: center;">I'll write about other things, but this is taking the most real estate in my mind right now and I wanted to get it out and say my mantras in type and aloud in another dimension.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-53949932452190805332022-08-06T18:01:00.009-07:002022-08-06T18:01:59.484-07:00Myopic<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hA8SIVjXffMH6YPmGdOnQMCSWBn_BrQH2MXN0ai8XCcvMBVnFdzr2kOYuOC6MN7l2dI9O6uj-iJWpL_I5joBG2iKlKYrMYpRO-1W3VmN2a0amkWH5s1KGSLkMdXtlTY7IBsgZ96sVmqpO26ySHJOSyYRSejxvUOtNr3syBMsQNPbU-md5g/s2048/IMG_3638.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hA8SIVjXffMH6YPmGdOnQMCSWBn_BrQH2MXN0ai8XCcvMBVnFdzr2kOYuOC6MN7l2dI9O6uj-iJWpL_I5joBG2iKlKYrMYpRO-1W3VmN2a0amkWH5s1KGSLkMdXtlTY7IBsgZ96sVmqpO26ySHJOSyYRSejxvUOtNr3syBMsQNPbU-md5g/w300-h400/IMG_3638.jpeg" width="300" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;">I made the mistake of leaving this at the thrift store.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I thrift. I have been a thrift store shopper since High School. </div><div style="text-align: center;">One of my recent goals is to not buy new clothes, but to thrift as much as I can. </div><div style="text-align: center;">Fast Fashion/ Clothing is a large polluter so this seemed like an easy life shift.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I thrift shop for The Barren too, as he is in between sizes now and it is cheaper than buying new clothes.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>He is cool enough about it.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;">I was going through the racks and came on this, I even stopped and took a photo of it, </div><div style="text-align: center;">then put it back on the rack and continued my myopic search of particular sizes...</div><div style="text-align: center;">When I got home I did a quick search and then put my palm to head and just about cried.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>this $8 shirt can get up to $200 on the used market!</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I am finding that my sights are set to a myopic level as of late.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am having a hard time seeing past the present, and although my meditation teacher would be glad to hear that, it is not really a good way to view a career or a way to set long term goals.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am trying to set goals again, as I tend to respond well to them.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have been rejected from EVERYTHING I have applied to this year...</div><div style="text-align: center;">the streak remains, and the most recent rejection hit hard...harder than I thought it would.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have enrolled in remote classes to learn new techniques/processes </div><div style="text-align: center;">and take free courses when and where I can.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I have signed up for free courses offered to artists to refine and update skills.</div><div style="text-align: center;"> My last two pursuits turned out to be much like a timeshare talk...</div><div style="text-align: center;">I lost a couple hours of time and was fed a sales pitch with pressure to buy into a program.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I was more disappointed in myself for not seeing it sooner:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPqq3FfWot-tf5DKkpVKxrYndQ7W1WRt3jlX2foZL2udabTen7sLkNW4d2Ho_KM5ZJ5j8yZo4AiSimwHe73yN6hjpeReka3GfB5mH7cTRdnmYgQc9hqHdPTufIfazNDNsM4Grj7KqmG5htJuDYPxJbpS0HorSxWSDSsySxsKTaoT3dCgDgjg/s1272/Untitled-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1272" data-original-width="562" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPqq3FfWot-tf5DKkpVKxrYndQ7W1WRt3jlX2foZL2udabTen7sLkNW4d2Ho_KM5ZJ5j8yZo4AiSimwHe73yN6hjpeReka3GfB5mH7cTRdnmYgQc9hqHdPTufIfazNDNsM4Grj7KqmG5htJuDYPxJbpS0HorSxWSDSsySxsKTaoT3dCgDgjg/w282-h640/Untitled-2.jpg" width="282" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The first was to "teach" you how to successfully apply to residencies. Artists residencies are spaces offered to make work uninterrupted, all require detailed applications and essays. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The course was supposed to help you refine your documents and increase your chances of acceptance. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The presenter, spoke slowly for an hour plus on how great all her residences were and what kind of perks, amenities and processes were involved. Some she paid large sums of money to attend and others were juried and she paid less for. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The people attending were all rejected for all of the ones they had applied to and the lecturers words of advice was: <span style="font-family: courier;">keep applying, keep paying the application fees, and increase the number you are applying to.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I was beyond frustrated and I don't think I was the only one who felt cheated of the time.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The "low cost" ones recommended were a minimum of 3K at reduced rates, plus travel and art supply costs. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Frustrated, I finally asked:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i>" being an artist with an inconsistent income, what advice do you have to applying as often as you are recommending?"</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The response was: <span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i>"don't apply to as many"</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">SIGH</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">My second attempt was an one hour talk about how to land more shows.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> An artist coach was leading the conversation. Pre-prepared lecture notes were sent ahead of the talk; and once logged in, I was greeted with a pre-recorded talk that ended up being a sales pitch</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>(see the actual screen shots above)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">SIGH</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I have had some success, as I took a couple photo classes via zoom and have had fun with the new techniques...but boy oh boy...the admin stuff have been total flops!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It has left me feeling quite defeated and sorry for myself.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Here I am trying to pull myself up from my bootstraps and I just feel fed to the lions of consumerism.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Mind you, I am trying to play in the deep end of the pool, and I am trying to update skills so that I am more consumable...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I was also supposed to be in an academic book about infertility, two of my artworks were selected, this has been in the works for over a year...and the authors are in the home stretch...and sent out forms from the publisher for all the contributors to sign. I read them over, and then had The Barren read them, and then a friend read them because....in them the publisher wanted all rights to the work for all eternity!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">So I had to send a letter saying I needed to be removed from the upcoming publication, as I was not ready to hand over <u>all my rights</u>.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>(it felt really horrible, especially after Roe v Wade)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">My bestie was in town for a couple days, and it was nice to have tea with her before she returned home. We talked about everything including our aging parents. I told her how I feel pushed away by mine. My daily calls are now twice a week and they only talk about my brother when I call. I offer time and cooking and I am turned down. I told her how I've changed my tone, theme, and frequency of conversations...all in an effort to connect more, but nothing seems to work. So I am confused and hurt.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">She understood and we both know that the moment anything goes amuck, we both just jump into gear to fix things...zero hesitation. In the meantime, her mother eats food that is mis-delivered to her home, and my parents have long talks with phone solicitors and send group texts of puppy photos.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">So this little engine is feeling pretty low, and lost and sad.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">But I am trying to see past that...ideally my myopic vision will turn into something else soon.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Until then, I'll just keep my eyes on the railroad line.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-29617404324269124442022-06-27T11:06:00.002-07:002022-06-27T11:06:47.575-07:00Gone<p style="text-align: center;"> Let me start with this....</p><p style="text-align: center;">FUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKK</p><p style="text-align: center;">I had a CT scan scheduled for 9am on Friday morning, I had drunk a container of barium the night before and was staying away from social media to try and calm my growing list of fears, as I drank the second container.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I had been in my in doctors office on Thursday morning with The Barren </p><p style="text-align: center;">because I was on the floor, folded over in pain. </p><p style="text-align: center;">I had STAT bloodwork done, a STAT ultrasound done </p><p style="text-align: center;">because they didn't know what was causing the pain. </p><p style="text-align: center;"><u>Things I feared were causing the pain</u></p><p style="text-align: center;">impending DEATH</p><p style="text-align: center;">ectopic pregnancy <i>(even though I haven't bled since December of 2020)</i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>infertility trauma has trained me well</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">bleeding ulcer</p><p style="text-align: center;">ruptured appendix</p><p style="text-align: center;">At the hospital, I was trying to calm myself while I waited for CT tech and I heard the receptionist say</p><p style="text-align: center;"> " did you hear? they overturned Roe V Wade"</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>(she mentioned it quite casually, like, hey I brought a sandwich from home for lunch today)</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">My mind begun to spin, I went totally numb.</p><p style="text-align: center;">As I laid on the CT bed, and the nurse tried MULTIPLE times to feed an IV into my arm I thought, what the hell is happening right now?!</p><p style="text-align: center;">The scan went on and I was syrup sweet to everyone because they have all lived through years of trauma treating stupid non mask wearing people.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHf_Q8PqkSZLYp4mOXpyJsQewzB4MlLikELN-8RXIMpKBWJiHZ9jZ3jcNseRCjV-L6WfbtWx2re61s8MUNg1LndyW9h04aZ7W-uhCnSrdBF98T4B0U8G5-PpOzP7wF1j8I7Da72Yr3uYAysb2huNEIrDtP-2wjw_WC2cgVIB97tyV2gJNmHg/s1260/IMG_2882%5B30236%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1260" data-original-width="947" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHf_Q8PqkSZLYp4mOXpyJsQewzB4MlLikELN-8RXIMpKBWJiHZ9jZ3jcNseRCjV-L6WfbtWx2re61s8MUNg1LndyW9h04aZ7W-uhCnSrdBF98T4B0U8G5-PpOzP7wF1j8I7Da72Yr3uYAysb2huNEIrDtP-2wjw_WC2cgVIB97tyV2gJNmHg/s320/IMG_2882%5B30236%5D.jpg" width="241" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;">I got dressed, took a selfie in the bathroom and made it back to my car to collapse into a puddle of tears.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I was too scared to move really...I felt lost under water and unable to see where the bubbles were going.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I texted The Barren that the test was done, and I was headed home.</p><p style="text-align: center;">There was road work and delays and as I sat in waiting lines, I screamed.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Screamed deep, guttural, primal screams.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I wanted the men in the work tractors outside my car to hear my rage</p><p style="text-align: center;">I wanted birds to fly off course</p><p style="text-align: center;">I wanted to be free </p><p style="text-align: center;">I was terrified for the women suddenly stuck in line, suddenly without options suddenly trapped. I screamed in hopes to blast open walls, I screamed and screamed and screamed to empty my lungs of all air, I screamed until I thought I would pass out. </p><p style="text-align: center;">Then the line of cars began to move and I sat silent in my car the remainder of the trip like I had pulled all the air out of the space... until parking at home.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I had lost my voice; literally and physically.</p><p style="text-align: center;">My arm hurt, my throat hurt, I was scared to eat, I was scared to move.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I drank a glass of water and then I don't remember what I did....</p><p style="text-align: center;">I had visions of people shooting the justices <i>(there is a new open carry law)</i> in restaurants out of grief, because their partners died unable to get an abortion for their ectopic pregnancy.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I went DARK DARK DARK and that scared me.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I got text messages from a couple friends, I sent a couple text messages telling friends I loved them.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I skipped out on a night out watching The Barren play music, and instead stayed home and cried.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The result of this has left the men in my life confused and feeling useless. I love them but I don't think they understand the depth this radiates in my sense of self.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I live in a state that has protected the right to abortions and is aiming to add it to our constitution:</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: var(--color-content-secondary,#363636); font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; max-width: 100%; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px;"><i><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;">"On Friday, Mr. Newsom signed a bill to shield California abortion providers from liability or prosecution related to out-of-state bans on abortions. He also announced an agreement with Gov. Kate Brown of Oregon and Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington to establish a West Coast abortion firewall that would protect providers and patients from the legal reach of other states.</span></i></p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: var(--color-content-secondary,#363636); font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; max-width: 100%; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px;"><i><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;">Pending bills would authorize experienced nurse practitioners to perform first-trimester abortions without a physician’s supervision and create a state-administered fund to help underwrite travel expenses for the many women from abortion-ban states expected to come to California for an abortion."</span></i></p><p style="text-align: center;">THIS DOES NOT CHANGE MY RAGE</p><p style="text-align: center;">I made donations to abortion aid funds on Saturday and plan to sell some recent photographs as limited editions to raise more funds for Abortion help for people nationwide.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I did a series of self-portraits that I posted on social media and disturbed some friends with their rawness, I was not afraid to be raw, I feel stripped of something...it is a feeling that I can not really put words around, although I am trying here.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I seem to be explaining myself to a lot of men in my life, and hand holding to help them understand why I am acting the way I am. What I am doing is frustrating and I am trying to keep myself from lashing out at the wrong people for the right reasons. </p><p style="text-align: center;">Has my place in society and my worth changed or shifted now...I know it has for many others over these years and it is painfully punctuated for women of color and trans people. </p><p style="text-align: center;">What or how are you coping? The WHOLE world sees us and how super fucked up this country is.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I can't form any more thoughts right now...</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></p><p style="text-align: center;">I wish you strength for your conversations and peace for your quiet moments</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-83970959146205055392022-06-16T13:39:00.004-07:002022-06-16T13:39:56.522-07:00Feeling, nothing more than feelings<p style="text-align: center;"> I have been feeling a lot.</p><p style="text-align: center;">There is so much going on in the world and around where I live and with the people I have in my life...</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am overwhelmed and have shifted to staring into the ether a lot these days.</p><p style="text-align: center;">We attended the "bans off our bodies" rally locally, I was proud that The Barren had ZERO hesitation about going, knew what he wanted his sign to say and was next to me the whole time while I was overstimulated by simply being outside in public.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyhYgFLdPGeUJRolsQKagCCuT2DJSqZYg8tS5_FfLs3OH6nO-URUhcIwdhW0_NVnCe6rFy0xU_JZU4BjIYb_Vz4FR-urHIpA3dis-sxXjOIHxd5K97nGN-sPhqWYQg94Qspyj6aP-AI0ApHILiXFqY9Vp0pnf-DUziBYPKnth-2O-hH5QVSQ/s1080/DSC_0582-1111.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="723" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyhYgFLdPGeUJRolsQKagCCuT2DJSqZYg8tS5_FfLs3OH6nO-URUhcIwdhW0_NVnCe6rFy0xU_JZU4BjIYb_Vz4FR-urHIpA3dis-sxXjOIHxd5K97nGN-sPhqWYQg94Qspyj6aP-AI0ApHILiXFqY9Vp0pnf-DUziBYPKnth-2O-hH5QVSQ/s320/DSC_0582-1111.jpg" width="214" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">There were about 600ish people there and we marched through the downtown corridor.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It seemed like the right thing to do, sitting at home was not what I wanted to reflect on when I thought of how I lived my life.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Ironically, one of The Barren and my first dates was a pro-choice rally nearly 30years ago!! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I wanted to photograph the protestors and he said, I'll go with you. Then in the middle of it all, he walked up and tried to reason with one of the sign holders screaming how it was murdering babies.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>I have a photo of that too</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjDS8UWYk5hMbXgEHSuVF9oLx22POZV9eEfh9dw1ZLdBuGMyof5tu1YVQj1_F01_0CaY6GSg4n919fTZAEv_59WItEKqOwSfse0RI1hqYjOswaKnpPf-axI9enjaEdp0W1caDR6EpZZjOjyZD1CXDY8CwqjJ5R2GsMdnctuk7N4mEDreMutQ/s460/IMG_1980-11111.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="288" data-original-width="460" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjDS8UWYk5hMbXgEHSuVF9oLx22POZV9eEfh9dw1ZLdBuGMyof5tu1YVQj1_F01_0CaY6GSg4n919fTZAEv_59WItEKqOwSfse0RI1hqYjOswaKnpPf-axI9enjaEdp0W1caDR6EpZZjOjyZD1CXDY8CwqjJ5R2GsMdnctuk7N4mEDreMutQ/s320/IMG_1980-11111.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">It feels like a Goliath task to try and change things...</div><div><div style="text-align: center;">every vote seems wrong, every law seems aligned to attack people.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I am scared, like seriously concerned that things have slid and now I am chasing the car as it drives out of sight down the road. </div><div style="text-align: center;">****</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Our neighborhood is under the influence of a Chevron effort to secure more drilling and potentially pollute our water and Edison (power company) is set to put a new compressor station not even two miles away and put us into harms way from leaks and damaging noise.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Then there is the war against Ukraine and hunger and a million dead from Covid-19.</div><div style="text-align: center;">My parents seem to be rapidly aging before my eyes and my mother in law went out for a drink last week and when she got up in the middle of the night to get a drink passed out and split her head open and fractured a bone in her back....but she didn't tell us until she was home from the hospital.</div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: center;">EVERYTHING I have submitted this year I have been rejected from, which has really made me reassess my life and also our eldest niece has graduated high school and I feel a million years old.</div><div style="text-align: center;">My darling husband is so stressed he is considering quitting his job on a daily and I have learned to not react to that...as talking about it or working through alternatives seems to amplify things and makes him even more upset...and it doesn't help the situation for him. </div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(I have mentioned again him getting some professional help to manage stress)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>SOoooooooo </i></div><div style="text-align: center;">I am having lots of feelings with no place to take them</div><div style="text-align: center;">We got boosted again (second boost) and I have been trying to go to the least congested yoga classes in studio with a KN95 mask on...<i>I am the woman in the mask in the back of the room!!</i></div><div style="text-align: center;">I thought that maybe my mood would be boosted if I did some social yoga instead of impressing the cats with my bedroom yoga.</div><div style="text-align: center;">We are still out on the results on that one.</div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: center;">I also got The Barren to help me shift the garage around and cull many things we are feeling weighed down by...so the thrift store picked up a heavy load.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I gave my darkroom enlarger and assorted trinkets to a local guy who was setting up his first darkroom, my meditation teacher helped arrange that match. It was bittersweet when he drove away...I only cried a little. It seemed like a perfect example of time passing and aging.</div><div style="text-align: center;">I decided to focus on what I could do, and </div><div style="text-align: center;">I signed up for some alternative process classes, using less toxic elements and I am looking forward to learning new things.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I am <u>feeling</u> time more these days than normal...I feel myself becoming another person. I am not sure who she is yet, but she is learning to navigate a lot of life on her own, weighing situations out. </div><div style="text-align: center;">On the outside that mostly mostly looks like, watching and listening more....</div><div style="text-align: center;">I feel more like an adult, I never wanted to feel like a grownup, and suddenly here I am feeling just that.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja4kFI8hOcNP3pGs_DVedZPSs5a-7kvAFucUU-0nboGRN8JHAD5FHQq11cL_RXY3l6rDGV1Yya43l8cxPHLUx5X4emN6gKKSL9hM7FUBPavmhl0xU774MDgapaEjlLf3KPcj-BHCYsOdI_Fr7YsB-_FUCLcQycjjzpp03XqYxkzq3_8rxW5A/s432/Q3zHl7YM-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="432" data-original-width="387" height="411" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja4kFI8hOcNP3pGs_DVedZPSs5a-7kvAFucUU-0nboGRN8JHAD5FHQq11cL_RXY3l6rDGV1Yya43l8cxPHLUx5X4emN6gKKSL9hM7FUBPavmhl0xU774MDgapaEjlLf3KPcj-BHCYsOdI_Fr7YsB-_FUCLcQycjjzpp03XqYxkzq3_8rxW5A/w369-h411/Q3zHl7YM-1.jpg" width="369" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Here is a photo of me doing what I love best. My friend produced this image.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">We have not been able to visit as often as gasoline prices are between 6.50-7.00 dollars a gallon now and it has factored into my budget now.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I am looking forward to some good changes...there has got to be some good changes around the corner... right?!?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Sigh</div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-11577502801222970372022-05-25T16:03:00.001-07:002022-05-25T16:03:05.108-07:00no words<p style="text-align: center;"> There is no words</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am without a path to navigate this</p><p style="text-align: center;">This is just nightmare on top of nightmare, and then another nightmare.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I wrote about babies dying in school in 2012</p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://the-barreness.blogspot.com/2012/12/silence.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></p><p style="text-align: center;">I am not able to write about it again.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am too overwhelmed and too shattered.</p><p style="text-align: center;">My youngest niece awoke at 3am this morning, feeling out of sorts.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Her mother did what she could to comfort her, then when she woke up for school later today, she proclaimed that she was "sad" and just wanted to be with her Omi (her grandmother)</p><p style="text-align: center;">so her mom called the school and said that my niece was taking a mental health day.</p><p style="text-align: center;">This child has not had two solid years of school yet...</p><p style="text-align: center;">she is just learning how to make friends and play with others.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am like a string in the wind...totally untethered and lost searching for any connection at this point.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-15352146768786583122022-05-03T13:13:00.002-07:002022-05-03T13:13:28.167-07:0052 like a deck of cards<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTBoalINTwa3BqqC9SP8Q7Sv7iu1T5daTzVNvv3fJ52TaU8_8UhUIjNCLZHiwU7aT8r81nEM4nhC8gCJEZuaJe9fuh-CtD9q1SpIu5f6RzHuEMhCGGDfr0_vHf6BbBwebii-yxukCMv1SGjc1SEIUhfCFt54Xk5QM7uoDGP9afQsMM9gYfMQ/s1080/IMG_1513.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="811" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTBoalINTwa3BqqC9SP8Q7Sv7iu1T5daTzVNvv3fJ52TaU8_8UhUIjNCLZHiwU7aT8r81nEM4nhC8gCJEZuaJe9fuh-CtD9q1SpIu5f6RzHuEMhCGGDfr0_vHf6BbBwebii-yxukCMv1SGjc1SEIUhfCFt54Xk5QM7uoDGP9afQsMM9gYfMQ/s320/IMG_1513.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;">How my birthday weekend started.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I thought I had simply overate, but my stomach thought differently and proceeded to make the next 24hours living hell for me. It was when I started to vomit blood that The Barren started panicking.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>(it was not a lot of blood according to the doctor, so the level of terror The Barren displayed was misdirected and I was not bleeding out)</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">He started screaming that we needed to go to the ER, I meanwhile was hunched over a toilet discarding whatever was below my toenails was unable to stand. <br />YET I was still convinced I didn't need the ER, anything but a DOCTOR or an emergency room or any medical person for that matter... but we got to the ER and as soon as I walked into the door, I felt fine.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The Barren was shocked, I in turn was not. I was terrified of what lay before me and I think went into total trauma mode. We got in quick and of course the nurses were amazing, the doctor was confused why I was asking so many questions and asked if I was in the medical field...and I told him that I was familiar with pain, and emergency rooms and I was someone with stage 4 endo.</p><p style="text-align: center;">He offered pain meds and I refused. Then I sat there for a moment with the nurse and said, I should give my body the option to be comfortable, and not just sit with discomfort.*</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>* I later reflected on this concept of being uncomfortable and sitting with it and dismissing aides to medically make things better. I felt like my mother taught me to "buck up" and manage it alone, in solitude and you'll get past it, eventually. I am glad I recognized this while in the ER and able to make those elements dissipate.</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">So I got some light drug to mostly numb my stomach and all my blood tests were good so it was diagnosed as acute gastritis.</p><p style="text-align: center;">No spicy, oily food. No alcohol or caffeine.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Happy birthday!</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am on stomach drugs for two weeks and a bland diet.</p><p style="text-align: center;">The next day I was back to normal actives and when my birthday rolled around a couple days later I was my normal emotional self. I made myself some birthday cupcakes, and headed to the family home. I had loaded up my camera and I shot photos of my immediate family.</p><p style="text-align: center;">It was a relaxing quiet time, simple food and I had a bite of birthday cupcake.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><i>okay, I ate a whole cupcake</i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNkk3U2nXNy2QAfBDesC6naRiwbPhhTtgvdlrtxmIeJj9At08uFwA-slMdsNdjtRSfWvm1OdwQgTSvB_PtiMqT9VmEiqfEOew_UQg7UAdl0A5Dqr38qxtOwto5QYB3UD3Ntu9TkqQmsH8UTfngrG8zrUxhMylQOGWjs1llG-zClMa2sUhvtg/s960/IMG_1600.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="960" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNkk3U2nXNy2QAfBDesC6naRiwbPhhTtgvdlrtxmIeJj9At08uFwA-slMdsNdjtRSfWvm1OdwQgTSvB_PtiMqT9VmEiqfEOew_UQg7UAdl0A5Dqr38qxtOwto5QYB3UD3Ntu9TkqQmsH8UTfngrG8zrUxhMylQOGWjs1llG-zClMa2sUhvtg/s320/IMG_1600.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;">Vanilla cake, lemon curd filling and topping.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;">The Barren had taken time off work so we could celebrate my birthday together....</p><p style="text-align: center;">but he neglected to make any plans, so after he berated himself for being bad at birthdays...I told him that we could freeform the days off.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><u>I also had another epiphany:</u></p><p style="text-align: center;">When you are younger, you have elaborate birthday parties with friends and big Ta-dos, and as you age those sorts of moments become harder and harder. All we are trying to do is capture that same level of joy from childhood...recently when I thought about my birthday I cry. I realized that for me, it highlights my loneliness and lack of social circle. So birthdays have to become something else for me.</p><p style="text-align: center;">So I found a botanical garden, and took my cameras and photos and walked near trees and forgot all about my sadness, and about being lonely. I forgot about the ER and the pain, I just was away from it all with The Barren.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When the days off had past, I got a text from my bestie that she was coming into town for a hot 36hrs to pick up a HUGE plant from her mother and then was going back home. Then asked if I had an hour or so to hang out...I of course said yes and with The Barren in tow we met for a meal and a chat and it ended up being longer than an hour and it was like my birthday extended for another day. We took photos and she jumped back into her car and drove home 6+ hours away.</p><p style="text-align: center;">When I was with bestie, she mentioned that 52 was like a deck of cards....</p><p style="text-align: center;">I thought about that, mostly that I hadn't thought about a deck of cards being 52, but then how that relates to me. 52 options, some similar to others but each unique. </p><p style="text-align: center;">I guess the theme of my newest circle around the sun is reframing.</p><p style="text-align: center;">I am reframing how I relate to myself, the world around me and others in my life. I mean what birthday would be complete without a little existential meandering, right?!</p><p style="text-align: center;">Which card will I pull for this week?</p><p style="text-align: center;">52 cards, 52 weeks in a year...</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30185283.post-56775843222507859332022-02-28T21:19:00.002-08:002022-02-28T21:19:22.764-08:00The Barren's birthday<p style="text-align: center;"> After weeks of planning, The Barren's birthday arrived and we drove to a town about two hours away. We stopped in the downtown area, ate some diner food <i>(that later gave us both indigestion, because we are 50 years old)</i> and then checked into a hotel that overlooked the sea.</p><p style="text-align: center;">Like was 20feet from the ocean</p><p style="text-align: center;">After taking three deep lung filling breaths of the ocean air The Barren turned around and fell onto the bed and took a multiple hour nap. </p><p style="text-align: center;">I sat next to him, listening to the ocean and his snores.</p><p style="text-align: center;">After some time had past and I my level of boredom had peaked, I woke him up we walked to see the sunset on the private beach footsteps from our room...The Barren gathered stones for a hopeful future inlay project and I took photos. We then returned to the room to sleep some more.</p><p style="text-align: center;">We woke up in time to watch the sunrise from our private patio, listen to the sea birds awake from their nights slumber and begin search for food.</p><p style="text-align: center;">It was quiet, it was peaceful and it was prefect.</p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiXu4s9WQe2SeC-1eSircL4tWxKqgTZkOH8VdMiUYWrzaKSPj9V2v-bePXfA7AcM3TscD1V3jMaVSAd6IzXdKdMvNUI0mXk37uVd9oDXvrfXLg3YprhAVhVZzR9ET5Fw30pqzvOSAR7GMek-DTaH1a7A65coGPr71F5VeSjzcU5YwhGQUS81w=s1440" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="1080" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiXu4s9WQe2SeC-1eSircL4tWxKqgTZkOH8VdMiUYWrzaKSPj9V2v-bePXfA7AcM3TscD1V3jMaVSAd6IzXdKdMvNUI0mXk37uVd9oDXvrfXLg3YprhAVhVZzR9ET5Fw30pqzvOSAR7GMek-DTaH1a7A65coGPr71F5VeSjzcU5YwhGQUS81w=s320" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Here is a photo of me, in a tee, a sweatshirt and a thin puffer jacket </div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(because that is how you dress when it is cold here on the west coast)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;">on our sunset walk before falling back to sleep.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">It was a moment in time where nothing was wrong, </div><div style="text-align: center;">we were adulting like real adults </div><div style="text-align: center;">and the world was quiet so The Barren could turn 50.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2