I was always told "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." That being said, this blog is going against that. If you don't want to hear me bellyache, my blog post ends here.
I have a knee issue. I've had it now for almost three months. Here is the "official" description...
Pes anserine bursitis is an inflammation of the bursa located between the shinbone (tibia) and three tendons of the hamstring muscle at the inside of the knee. It occurs when the bursa becomes irritated and produces too much fluid, which causes it to swell and put pressure on the adjacent parts of the knee.
To sum it up in three simple words? IT SUCKS BIGTIME.
There isn't much that can be done. I had my shots, I ice it religiously and stay off it. I haven't done squat all weekend. And it feels...OK. Til I pivot wrong or hyperflex it. Or walk too much. Then it's back to it being angry. I have pain meds for the night time...that's about it.
Could it be worse? Absolutely! I could have a torn ACL or have to have my knee replaced or any other number of horrible diseases. I get that...I do.
I've had a hysterectomy, I've got ten tattoos. Hell, I gave birth to two big babies naturally. But this? This is so different from all of that. It's chronic...it fucking hurts 24/7. It's changing my personality. I'm trying so hard to not let it get to me, 'cause face it, everyone has their own problems. I'm not going to be THAT person.
So this is my one bitch session. If you got this far? Thanks for listening.
Saturday, October 25, 2014
Monday, September 29, 2014
Roll with it...
Today is Monday. Thankfully its over. Honestly? It wasn't that bad. I just wish there was a more subtle way to shut one's brain off other than tripping a circuit. Today was that kinda day. And it's not big stuff. It's an accumulation of little shit...like playing with emotional blocks. How high can you build the tower before it falls?
Like I said in my status yesterday...falling into my "hole" is familiar and oddly comforting, but it's like a bad habit. That one cigarette long after you quit, that one drink because you're stressed and can handle it. Depression is like that. It's subtle. Keep saying "I'm fine." and watch how fast you aren't.
I'm out. I can't hide behind the "I'm fines" anymore. It's liberating. I'm not afraid to admit when I have a bad day or two. It was when I couldn't that a bad day would turn into a bad week...then a bad month.
Talking about your feelings isn't easy. Sometimes there are no words to express what's banging around in your head. It's acknowledging the feeling, telling someone you care about, "Hey, I'm having a day. Bear with me." that helps you feel better. Think of it as emptying a stinky pile of garbage into a dumpster.
My inner cheerleader assures me that everything will be OK. And if it's you having a rotten, crappy, all around bad day? Tomorrow's a new day. Get some sleep. It will be OK.
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Goodbye Summer...
Today is the first day of autumn.
Damn.
Has anyone noticed all the trees changing already? I drive the back roads to work and there are shots of reds, yellows and oranges everywhere. It's only September!
Fall is my favorite time of the year. What's not to like?
Warm days, cool nights. Apples and pumpkins. Cider with carmel vodka (Try it. Trust me.). It's dragging out the hoodies and jeans, the Bearpaws and fleecies. It's Saturday night firepits and friends. It's the ending of NASCAR and baseball and the start of football. It's crock pots and soups. It's baking, baking and more baking. It's Halloween and costumes and candy. And romance. I was married Halloween night in 1997.
I'm glad it's only three months of the year. It's counting down to Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's closing out another year. I try to enjoy it and not think of what comes after.
WINTER.
Enjoy this while it's here. :-)
Damn.
Has anyone noticed all the trees changing already? I drive the back roads to work and there are shots of reds, yellows and oranges everywhere. It's only September!
Fall is my favorite time of the year. What's not to like?
Warm days, cool nights. Apples and pumpkins. Cider with carmel vodka (Try it. Trust me.). It's dragging out the hoodies and jeans, the Bearpaws and fleecies. It's Saturday night firepits and friends. It's the ending of NASCAR and baseball and the start of football. It's crock pots and soups. It's baking, baking and more baking. It's Halloween and costumes and candy. And romance. I was married Halloween night in 1997.
I'm glad it's only three months of the year. It's counting down to Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's closing out another year. I try to enjoy it and not think of what comes after.
WINTER.
Enjoy this while it's here. :-)
Monday, September 8, 2014
Tempus Fugit
Latin for "Time Flies"
With summer waning, it seems more true than ever. Time is flying. Maybe it's this BS with getting older. I try not to dwell on the fact my life is more that half over (unless God willing I live into my nineties).
Even this year...I left Lowes six months ago. I'm no longer new at my job. Tim has been gone six months, Mikey has been gone eighteen. My mom has been gone almost thirteen years.
Tempus Fugit.
How do we make time slow down? Our babies are growing up...starting school, becoming teens, starting jobs. Everyday they're an inch taller it seems. One second you're carrying them...the next they're looking down at you. It's surreal.
Still...time marches on. Old friends are getting older. Two of my friends just turned forty six. I met them when they were my daughter's age. Now they have kids of their own. It's just crazy.
Slow down. I know...it's hard. We have responsibilities. We have kids. We have jobs. Blah blah blah. It's beautiful night. Go outside...listen to the crickets chirp. Five minutes is all I ask. Breathe deep and clear your mind. Close your eyes and remember what is was like to be outside when the street lights came on. hell, go dance under a street light if the urge strikes. :)
Tempus Fugit.
With summer waning, it seems more true than ever. Time is flying. Maybe it's this BS with getting older. I try not to dwell on the fact my life is more that half over (unless God willing I live into my nineties).
Even this year...I left Lowes six months ago. I'm no longer new at my job. Tim has been gone six months, Mikey has been gone eighteen. My mom has been gone almost thirteen years.
Tempus Fugit.
How do we make time slow down? Our babies are growing up...starting school, becoming teens, starting jobs. Everyday they're an inch taller it seems. One second you're carrying them...the next they're looking down at you. It's surreal.
Still...time marches on. Old friends are getting older. Two of my friends just turned forty six. I met them when they were my daughter's age. Now they have kids of their own. It's just crazy.
Slow down. I know...it's hard. We have responsibilities. We have kids. We have jobs. Blah blah blah. It's beautiful night. Go outside...listen to the crickets chirp. Five minutes is all I ask. Breathe deep and clear your mind. Close your eyes and remember what is was like to be outside when the street lights came on. hell, go dance under a street light if the urge strikes. :)
Tempus Fugit.
Friday, August 15, 2014
Who I Am...Who I'm Not
I've been on this planet almost five decades and never really told my story. Granted...I haven't traveled the world or won any awards (except for "Most Enthusiastic Vocal" in chorus senior year...but hey...it's something). I have however dealt with depression and suicide ideations for as long as I can remember. Maybe my story will resonate with one of you, maybe it won't, but it will put a face on what mental illness looks like.
My first memory of depression was at twelve years old. I was a sixth grader and still pretty much the new kid (I had only moved there the year before). We were doing a play called "The Pied Piper of Hamlin". My LA teacher had handed out our lines and I had a small paragraph to memorize. I was painfully insecure and knew I couldn't learn it, so I asked for a smaller part. Instead of "Sure, I understand." I got "What do you mean it's too big a part to learn?" loud enough for the entire class to hear. And they laughed. That was the first time I felt mortified...and all these years later I still feel sad for that kid. That was also the first time I wanted to die. At twelve years old. I took a bunch of aspirin at bedtime and was crushed when I woke up the next morning.
Junior high was no easier. I was horribly bullied, my "friends" were all into partying and peer pressure was brutal. I had my male and female friends who got me...and most are still my friends to this day. I really didn't fit in anywhere and had no idea who I was. It sucked. Once I got to high school, my closest friend in junior high became my steady boyfriend and I discovered chorus. I think those two things kept me sane throughout my teen years.
I can't tell you how many times growing up I thought of suicide. Too many. When my parents divorced, when everyone but me left for college, the night my roommate made me vomit because I took pills. Nobody knew what to do back then. The attitude was "Snap out of it". There were no pills, no protocol in the eighties. You just suffered.
I can honestly say the nineties were OK. My son was born in 1991 and I met my husband in 1995. I was raising a child and had found the man of my dreams. And was working full time and making a paycheck. Was I perfect? Hell no. But I survived.
My mom got sick a few months after I had met my husband, which knocked us for a loop. Stage 4 Lung Cancer. I never got "depressed" while she was sick. I was too busy planning our wedding and raising my son and helping her. When you deal with depression, helping others takes your mind off of your own problems. Which is what I did.
The new millennium started off with a bang. I found out in September of 2000 I was pregnant. In January, when I was 27 weeks along, my husband became sick. He was hospitalized for a week and bedridden for the last trimester of my pregnancy. My daughter was born in May, was diagnosed with a congenital heart defect in October, was hospitalized for a week with double pneumonia in February and had open heart surgery in April. All the while my mother was in the end stages of her cancer battle. She died in December of 2001 just before Christmas.
Through all that was going on, there was no time to fall. At every setback it was pick yourself and keep going. After awhile even the strongest can't be strong anymore.
I can't tell you when I broke for the first time...2004? 2005? It's all a blur to me. I remember the first time I was hospitalized. It had to be 2004 because my daughter was little. I have no idea now why I had to go inpatient. I know I was crushingly depressed. I only remember the terror of being dropped off and watching my husband leave. I was there for almost three weeks and he came to see me every night after working all day. I came home and lasted half a day. I ended up back in for another ten days. And the cycle repeated itself over and over for four years. Again...I don't remember much. Pills in the morning. Classes all day. Pills at bedtime. I saw things I never want to see again. I'll never forget the "faces" in the ward with me.
But I also will never forget those who helped me. I had one case worker the first time I was admitted inpatient. Her name was Nancy and she was wonderful. When I ended back at the same facility two years later, she saw my file and took it so I wouldn't have to start all over again. When you're in the system, there is nothing more frustrating then explaining your story over and over and over again to new people. It's like you become a number. It's why so many people give up.
My battle almost came to its end in June of 2008. This is where if you've never been you will will never ever understand. I was tired of being depressed, tired of being medicated. I felt unloved and just a total burden to my family. And it's true...you honestly believe the world would be better off without you. So I bought two packs of sleeping pills and left a simple note..."I'M SORRY". A police officer found me semiconscious in my car. I have blurbs of that night...a flashlight...red and blue lights...someone saying "Oh my God there's a note."...charcoal...and hallucinating. I saw clocks. Dozens of them.
This is how fucked up our mental health system is...they sent me home the next day with a number for the crisis hotline to call everyday at 6pm. WTF? I just took pills and you send me home? After that I ended up doing outpatient for three months. And guess what?
I got better.
Do I still struggle? Of course I do. I lost one of my closest friends to suicide this year. He was good at hiding his pain. He was always telling me to smile...it was a running joke we had. I suspected he was down, but never to extent I would ask him he was thinking of hurting himself. When his last words to me were "The world would be better off without me." I knew he was serious. He shot himself ten minutes after he said goodbye to me.
As much as his death broke my heart, it brought me to my new therapist. He was booked solid, but when he heard my situation he made an exception and took me on. Turns out he lost his sister to suicide. He understood. He is just a wonderful human being. Every week he peels another layer off of me and every week I heal a little more.
So that's my story. Depression is real. I am not healed...I will never be healed. But I have learned to cope, and ask for help when I need it. Life is difficult...just don't give up. People love you and will help if you ask. Thanks for reading. :)
My first memory of depression was at twelve years old. I was a sixth grader and still pretty much the new kid (I had only moved there the year before). We were doing a play called "The Pied Piper of Hamlin". My LA teacher had handed out our lines and I had a small paragraph to memorize. I was painfully insecure and knew I couldn't learn it, so I asked for a smaller part. Instead of "Sure, I understand." I got "What do you mean it's too big a part to learn?" loud enough for the entire class to hear. And they laughed. That was the first time I felt mortified...and all these years later I still feel sad for that kid. That was also the first time I wanted to die. At twelve years old. I took a bunch of aspirin at bedtime and was crushed when I woke up the next morning.
Junior high was no easier. I was horribly bullied, my "friends" were all into partying and peer pressure was brutal. I had my male and female friends who got me...and most are still my friends to this day. I really didn't fit in anywhere and had no idea who I was. It sucked. Once I got to high school, my closest friend in junior high became my steady boyfriend and I discovered chorus. I think those two things kept me sane throughout my teen years.
I can't tell you how many times growing up I thought of suicide. Too many. When my parents divorced, when everyone but me left for college, the night my roommate made me vomit because I took pills. Nobody knew what to do back then. The attitude was "Snap out of it". There were no pills, no protocol in the eighties. You just suffered.
I can honestly say the nineties were OK. My son was born in 1991 and I met my husband in 1995. I was raising a child and had found the man of my dreams. And was working full time and making a paycheck. Was I perfect? Hell no. But I survived.
My mom got sick a few months after I had met my husband, which knocked us for a loop. Stage 4 Lung Cancer. I never got "depressed" while she was sick. I was too busy planning our wedding and raising my son and helping her. When you deal with depression, helping others takes your mind off of your own problems. Which is what I did.
The new millennium started off with a bang. I found out in September of 2000 I was pregnant. In January, when I was 27 weeks along, my husband became sick. He was hospitalized for a week and bedridden for the last trimester of my pregnancy. My daughter was born in May, was diagnosed with a congenital heart defect in October, was hospitalized for a week with double pneumonia in February and had open heart surgery in April. All the while my mother was in the end stages of her cancer battle. She died in December of 2001 just before Christmas.
Through all that was going on, there was no time to fall. At every setback it was pick yourself and keep going. After awhile even the strongest can't be strong anymore.
I can't tell you when I broke for the first time...2004? 2005? It's all a blur to me. I remember the first time I was hospitalized. It had to be 2004 because my daughter was little. I have no idea now why I had to go inpatient. I know I was crushingly depressed. I only remember the terror of being dropped off and watching my husband leave. I was there for almost three weeks and he came to see me every night after working all day. I came home and lasted half a day. I ended up back in for another ten days. And the cycle repeated itself over and over for four years. Again...I don't remember much. Pills in the morning. Classes all day. Pills at bedtime. I saw things I never want to see again. I'll never forget the "faces" in the ward with me.
But I also will never forget those who helped me. I had one case worker the first time I was admitted inpatient. Her name was Nancy and she was wonderful. When I ended back at the same facility two years later, she saw my file and took it so I wouldn't have to start all over again. When you're in the system, there is nothing more frustrating then explaining your story over and over and over again to new people. It's like you become a number. It's why so many people give up.
My battle almost came to its end in June of 2008. This is where if you've never been you will will never ever understand. I was tired of being depressed, tired of being medicated. I felt unloved and just a total burden to my family. And it's true...you honestly believe the world would be better off without you. So I bought two packs of sleeping pills and left a simple note..."I'M SORRY". A police officer found me semiconscious in my car. I have blurbs of that night...a flashlight...red and blue lights...someone saying "Oh my God there's a note."...charcoal...and hallucinating. I saw clocks. Dozens of them.
This is how fucked up our mental health system is...they sent me home the next day with a number for the crisis hotline to call everyday at 6pm. WTF? I just took pills and you send me home? After that I ended up doing outpatient for three months. And guess what?
I got better.
Do I still struggle? Of course I do. I lost one of my closest friends to suicide this year. He was good at hiding his pain. He was always telling me to smile...it was a running joke we had. I suspected he was down, but never to extent I would ask him he was thinking of hurting himself. When his last words to me were "The world would be better off without me." I knew he was serious. He shot himself ten minutes after he said goodbye to me.
As much as his death broke my heart, it brought me to my new therapist. He was booked solid, but when he heard my situation he made an exception and took me on. Turns out he lost his sister to suicide. He understood. He is just a wonderful human being. Every week he peels another layer off of me and every week I heal a little more.
So that's my story. Depression is real. I am not healed...I will never be healed. But I have learned to cope, and ask for help when I need it. Life is difficult...just don't give up. People love you and will help if you ask. Thanks for reading. :)
Tuesday, August 12, 2014
Time to write again
I realized tonight I haven't written a blog post in three years. Whoops. Not quite sure how that happened. Life just gets in the way and you simply forget. Of course, my old blog is defunct, so this one will be born. I guess with the events of the past day, maybe writing will help. Also, my therapist thinks I should too!
Robin Williams is dead. Hung himself with a belt. His entire adult life was a struggle with addiction. I thought at first he had had a heart attack...that after all the abuse it simply couldn't function anymore. Instead, his soul gave up. Simple as that.
It hurts me deeply that someone like him, who was adored by millions, couldn't be saved. It hurts more because I've already lost someone this year and almost lost myself at one point. It opens wounds that were healing.
Depression is as much a disease as diabetes or cancer. You are never "cured" in the truest sense...you learn coping skills to keep the beast at bay. But it's there, every day, lurking. Best analogy?
Most days it sleeps. Days like today...you hear the growl and cage rattling.
When you have dealt with depression like I have all this armchair diagnosing makes me want to scream! If you have never been to the bottom and made your way back, you just don't know. There's being blue, being down and then there's being DEPRESSED.
Everyone is different. For me, I felt nothing. I could smile and laugh, but inside I was dead. It is an awful feeling. You aren't living as much as you are functioning. I was like that for four years. I pray I never go back there again. Could it happen? Absolutely. I am not cured...but I have learned to ask for help when I need it, to be honest with my family and friends when I am down and believe in tomorrow.
I am not ashamed of my past, of my depression or my suicide attempt. It has made me who I am today...a good wife, mother and friend. And maybe an example to someone who is struggling tonight.
There is hope...you can get better. I promise.
Robin Williams is dead. Hung himself with a belt. His entire adult life was a struggle with addiction. I thought at first he had had a heart attack...that after all the abuse it simply couldn't function anymore. Instead, his soul gave up. Simple as that.
It hurts me deeply that someone like him, who was adored by millions, couldn't be saved. It hurts more because I've already lost someone this year and almost lost myself at one point. It opens wounds that were healing.
Depression is as much a disease as diabetes or cancer. You are never "cured" in the truest sense...you learn coping skills to keep the beast at bay. But it's there, every day, lurking. Best analogy?
Most days it sleeps. Days like today...you hear the growl and cage rattling.
When you have dealt with depression like I have all this armchair diagnosing makes me want to scream! If you have never been to the bottom and made your way back, you just don't know. There's being blue, being down and then there's being DEPRESSED.
Everyone is different. For me, I felt nothing. I could smile and laugh, but inside I was dead. It is an awful feeling. You aren't living as much as you are functioning. I was like that for four years. I pray I never go back there again. Could it happen? Absolutely. I am not cured...but I have learned to ask for help when I need it, to be honest with my family and friends when I am down and believe in tomorrow.
I am not ashamed of my past, of my depression or my suicide attempt. It has made me who I am today...a good wife, mother and friend. And maybe an example to someone who is struggling tonight.
There is hope...you can get better. I promise.
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