Acupuncture Saved Me Again

It isn't like it hadn't been recommended before.
It had...come up...it had...been suggested.

You know, you are carrying an overwhelming burden. Self-care is important. You are doing a great job caring for the children. You need to take some measures to reduce this amount of stress for yourself while protecting them from it all.... It's too much. What has happened could put anyone on the edge, let alone someone with the cumulative amount of shit you have had to wade through recently. This hits it out of the ballpark. Do something. Here are some numbers.

Yes!! Thank you for the great suggestions. I will just reach into my overdrawn bank account and pay a practitioner to help me.

But then the fabulous suggestion turned into a strong recommendation. One might even call it an insistence. Which manifested as a high-five and a heartfelt agreement.

Fine, I agreed. I took the numbers and called.
And I couldn't believe it when I called....was this for real????
Acupuncture on a sliding scale for $25 low end????

It's been rough here.
We're up; we're down.
Up was feeling so good.
Then: Unimaginable Pitfall
Lately...downish.
Too much.
Piled on.
Too much to digest.
Too much.

So I realized I had no more excuses. I had to go and try it out.
I hadn't been to acupuncture in more than a year, and this was a new practitioner.

It was a slightly different treatment than I remembered with the previous LAC, whom I saw for nearly 10 years - this guy tapped the needles in a bit more...err...firmly? I felt it, but it wasn't exactly a definable pain... and then he gave them a distinct twist, which felt like an electrical charge, which made me jump only twice. Or cringe. Or twitch. Any one of those is acceptable.
I was skeptical.
Then I was left to relax with those needles. I was glad for the blanket I had first politely refused - the needles can make you cold! Warm enough, I started to actually relax.
I breathed.
I thought.
I tried not to think so I could relax.
I remembered how badly I suck at meditation.
I tried breathing and tried to not remember how badly I suck anymore.
I think it must have worked to relax me.
Then I cried.
I don't like this bit.
But it wasn't overwhelming snot-wracked sobs or anything.
Just some quiet streaming tears.
I didn't like it a bit.
But yeah, I cried.

And you know what?
IT FELT GREAT.


I am going back.

Apraxia in Action; Continued....

Tomorrow is Bubbles' first IEP at his new school. In fact, it will be his first IEP in elementary school. It's late October, and I still try and wrap my brain around the twisted fact that he ended up in kindergarten this year.

I've already been warned that he will lose services. The school, bless their budget-deficient little soul, set me up nicely by suggesting at first that he will no longer qualify for any speech services, as a result of having made so much progress in the past three years. Now, I love this school, and I get it that they have no money, but there is no way I am going to accept that he is cured of Apraxia merely because they don't have funding for speech therapy.
I had a blunt talk with the SLP and let her know that I do not like surprises, and would hope to not expect any at the upcoming IEP.
To her credit, she called me last week making her recommendations. I cringed at the number of times she ignored my 'motor planning' questions and cringed again each time she peppered her recommendations with the phrase 'articulation disorder'.
BECAUSE APRAXIA IS NOT AN ARTICULATION DISORDER!!!

(Sorry for shouting. But it's not.) (Inability to articulate is a SYMPTOM.)


Anyway....I don't expect to be surprised when they tell me they are cutting his services in half, down to 1/2 hour session per week.
Saying he is 'almost all better' would feel great.....if it were actually true.
But the truth is, California is broke, and the educational system is broken. I hope some administration employees in Sacramento are having a lovely lunch out today. I bet the tab could be close to $90! Which is EXACTLY what an hour of private speech therapy costs. The VERY SAME speech therapy which my child is about to lose.
Hmmmm.


With that said, I am able to push aside the doom and gloom and for a little while the oh-so-many-concerns I have about his future learning challenges.
Why? Because I am grateful to have this child beyond belief. I am grateful to be able to watch the layers of his intelligence be revealed as his expressive language capacity increases. It is the most amazing process. It's not developmental, technically, because he is being treated for something which would not correct itself with a delay. But it is developmental as I watch him achieve communication milestones and make the connections.
His brain appears to be working overtime as his capacity for intelligible speech increases.

This weekend he came running up to me.
"Mommy!!! Mommy!!!! LISTEN TO THIS!!!! 'Plane' you go somewhere! 'Playing' you have fun! 'Plain', with nothing on it. OH MY GOD!!!"

OMG indeed, little man. You managed to blow my mind yet again.

Unsilenced

I have been having these particularly disturbing recurring dreams. In these dreams, I am pulling sticky gum? or tar?, or gritty-pebbly putty out of my mouth.

Although I pull it out in clumps and strings, I can't get it all out; I wake up worrying about dental disasters (which is not a completely abstract concept, considering reality), although these dreams do not coincide with any Real Dental Disasters.


Everything I have researched about this type of dream has pointed to the fact that I am feeling or being silenced.
I may be allowing this, but I have been silenced. I have chosen to be allowed to be silenced.

Okay. I will investigate this.

These dreams are stifling me.
They are silencing me.

I have a problem with being silenced.
And yes, I have a problem with being controlled, after taking many careful steps to reclaim my own life.

I will not be silenced.

Which is why I am putting myself back online.

Why I took myself 'offline' is another story, and that will have to wait.

I'm Fractured

Today I found out that the doctor at the urgent care facility which I went to a week ago for a shoulder injury couldn't really read X-rays.
I was referred to an orthopedic PA, who pulled the X-rays up on the computer moments after I arrived in his office first thing this morning.
"Well, what you've got is a greater tuberosity fracture."

(.........................................there was a long pause..............................................)

And infused with the superpower of denial, I replied, "But it's not broken right?"

Oh yes I did.
Then I cracked up.
Oh - pardon the pun - I am not used to being fractured in this way.
He went on to say, "If you took a hard boiled egg and tapped it on the counter, it would crack the shell in different directions. That's the top of your humerus right now."
(please spare me those jokes which I do NOT find humorous)

My advice to you today is twofold:

• Do NOT slip on a broken muddy railroad tie when carrying a huge armload of firewood, thus falling directly onto your shoulder as your arms were too slow to release the wood, and,
• Do NOT live in a remote area 20-30 minutes from town if you are going to break something which renders you incapable of driving.

You're welcome.

USAir Hates Families

So, I went back east. The kids came too, since we go pretty much everywhere together.
I needed a(nother) root canal, and Supergirl had a cavity which needed to be filled. No dental insurance + a brother who is a dentist + three roundtrip tickets back east = less money than California dentistry.
Except it turned out that Supergirl actually had insurance. It's just that nobody tried to tell us that when it was relevant and she was covered. Under her father's job. Which he mysteriously lost just days after being ordered to pay child support (which he must have interpreted as one of those 'optional' court orders, as evidenced by my empty mailbox). Strange thing is, he only disclosed the information that the kids were insured when we were about to fly back east. Too bad it wasn't sooner, as in, when they were first covered, because then she probably would have avoided the extraction. Father of the year, I tell you.
When I arrived in the tundra known as Buffalo, NY, it was about -6 degrees. Yes, that is a minus sign before the 6. I would have cried about it, but it was cold enough to freeze saltwater, and tear-sicles are very uncomfortable.
I would like to announce that my children are star travelers. Seriously. People would get on the plane and stare me down when they realized they had been seated near children. But at the end of each flight, those same passengers would inevitably be the ones to praise my children and their good behavior.
In fact, they were better behaved than some of the adult passengers and USAir staff I encountered on my first attempts to fly across the country. When I purchased my tickets I saw that they had seated me rows away from each of my children, aged 8 and 4. I called right away and asked for a seat change but was told they could only help me when I arrived at the airport. I've heard that one before.
When I arrived at SFO, I headed for the nearest agent, even though I had already checked in online. She spent a good deal of time trying to get us seats together, so much time in fact, that I was starting to get nervous about getting through security. She finally said there was nothing she could do, but they would be able to help me at the gate. Again, heard that one before.
By the time we reached the gate, the plane was already boarding. I talked to the gate agent, showed him my tickets, and he replied, "Why did you come at the last minute if you wanted to switch seats?"
"Whhaaaaaat?" I stammered, explaining that I had been at the airport for over an hour! "Why didn't you seat me with my kids?" I fired back.
"I wasn't the one who did that." He snidely replied.
"Ummm.....okay?" I looked at him expectantly.
He shoved my tickets back at me, disgusted. "Those are all middle seats - nobody will want to switch with you and we can't legally force anyone to switch. Plus, there's another family trying to do what you are doing."
"Ummm....okay?" I repeated...."Trying to do what I'm doing? Like sit next to their kids? I can't let them sit 10 rows away from me!! What should I do?"
He waved me on to the jetway. "Good luck with that."
I made my way down the very crowded jetway and down to a flight attendant. She looked at my tickets and said, "There's another family ahead of you trying to do what you're doing."
"So I've heard," I muttered back at her. I felt as if I was being accused of trying to sell cookies and wrapping paper to strangers on the plane. Or worse, was being accused of trying to light my underwear on fire (a joke I could not make in the airport!) ....not just trying to secure seats next to my minor children.
The exasperated flight attendant disappeared and came back to the jetway moments later. "Nobody wants to move into middle seats, and we can't legally force anyone to move from their seat."
I laughed and said, "You have got to be kidding me, right? I mean, okay...I guess it would be fine...I mean I haven't had a six hour break in I don't know HOW long...I guess I can just hand his electronics to the complete strangers sitting next to my four year old and pick him up in Philadelphia (connecting city)." At this point I may or may not have cackled maniacally.
"That's really not that funny." She said, dryly.
"WHAT??" I exploded. I had used up all my patience and humor. "You wouldn't let me put this four year old on a plane without me unless I hired an escort for him but you don't think it's FUNNY that you want to seat him practically in the LAPS of complete STRANGERS?? I think it's fucking HILARIOUS!!"
She handed my tickets back to me.
"Not my policy. Just enforcing it. Sorry, but there's nothing I can tell you. Nobody wants to move."
"That's IT???"
"I'm afraid so." And she left me standing there among a throng of passengers who were relieved that THEY would not be asked to switch seats and therefore sympathetic.
I walked back up to the gate; two kids, three backpacks, one stroller.
"Now what?" I asked the anxiety-plagued gate agent, as I handed back my unused boarding passes.
"Well....we can get you through another city but I have to check and see if I am allowed to do that, since your bags are already on the other plane and it could be a security problem."
"Not MY policy...." I muttered.

And so I was re-routed on another plane, through Charlotte, NC. Where it was a balmy 30 degrees.

So what happened? Anybody else ever experience this?
I have some ideas....
Now that USAir and most other airlines are nickel and diming us to stay in business (pay for bad snack food, pay to check baggage) they have to come up with new and creative ways to make more money than the tickets we already purchased. So some marketing WIZARD came up with the brilliant new plan of charging passengers $5 per flight to reserve a 'premium seat'. 'Premium seat' actually just translates into: A NON- MIDDLE SEAT. So basically, the message is that they hate families. There, I said it. USAir is anti-family. On top of the three full price tickets I purchased, they wanted an extra $5 per family member to ensure we would be able to sit together, instead of placing my children in the virtual laps of strangers.

They call it marketing.
I call it child endangerment.

Verizon Disney App Adventure; Part 1

Remember that secret I may have leaked a teeny tiny bit once or twice?

Yeah, that one.

Well...I was actually working while I was there so don't tell anyone how much fun I really had. I didn't think I would personally enjoy going to Disneyland as much as I would enjoy watching my kids have fun in Disneyland, but well....okay. I liked the mouseland, ALRIGHT??? Can we just keep this between us? Okay, you, me and Verizon.

Verizon?
Yes, Verizon. I was offered the opportunity by my friend, David Hoffman to try out a new Verizon application for Disneyland, and put it to the Gwendomama challenge. I had no idea what I was doing with either the app or Disneyland, because I (shhhhh) am was a Disneyland virgin, and if you saw how many keys were missing from my laptop you would easily and correctly assume my lack of technical snobbery or expertise. But I do love to have fun, and so not only did I accept the challenge...I agreed to be filmed while trying it. (As long as I could say whatever I wanted, whenever.)



I may or may not have been drunk crazed when I agreed to the filming part, but my friends hid the evidence and held me to my agreement.
Okay, I totally made that last part up because I hate the sound of my own voice and can't believe I agreed to be filmed. Why on earth would I talk about getting drunk in the same paragraph I mention Disneyland? This is a family blog. And Disneyland is ALL about the family fun and NOT AT ALL about endorsing drinking heavily. Unless you count Goofy.

First I was all, "Why do I need a special application on my phone to navigate Disneyland?" But nobody could hear me because they were all chatting away on their bluetooth devices. So I shouted, "WHY CAN'T I JUST USE THE PARK PROVIDED MAP?" and looked down to find my instantly discarded to the stroller map being mutilated by my small child. That was easy. Now I knew why, and also made a mental note to not allow the phone near said small child.

Turning on the phone, I found the 'Disney Mobile Magic' app and as soon as it loaded, it found me too! "Look!! It found us!!" I told Heidi, excitedly, "Look! That circle is us!!"
So yes, it knew where we were instantly. Which I find both awesome and creepy. I kept looking over my shoulder to see if someone was shining the circle on us and following us around with a laser dot. I told you, I am not very technical.
Despite my admonitions to 'go before we leave the hotel room', Heidi immediately needed a bathroom. We had just walked onto Main Street, USA, and the kids were overwhelmed with the dazzling Disney eye candy, so we could hardly see signs for a bathroom.
OH! The APP!!

'Mobile Magic' opened, I selected 'Guest Services' from the main menu and the first sub-option to pop up was 'restrooms'...which? Was awesome. Without moving from that spot, we located the subtly labeled and previously invisible bathroom directly behind us within about 40 seconds. Which means that Disney and Verizon are totally fine with you being too lazy to do it the old fashioned way by walking around and looking. And that? Again, awesome.

Right away, Bubbles wanted to meet Mickey. Since he is not a kid likely to be shy of giant masked friendly rodents (as his sister would have been) I was sort of excited to get him to Mickey ASAP. I went to the 'Characters' selection on the app, and just as I was telling Heidi that 'it says he should be right here in Main Street Plaza at 8:40' I looked up from my teeny tiny alluring screen to see a line forming directly in front of me. For Mickey. Right there, at Main Street Plaza.
Correct again, Mobile Magic!

Okay, with the bathroom stop and the meeting of Mickey under our mommy belts, we were ready to attack the meatier subjects at hand: Rides.
"WE WANT TO FIND NEMO!!"
Oh cool, now I was feeling useful! I whipped out the phone again, clicked on 'Attractions', looked for Finding Nemo's Submarine Voyage, and located it on the map to find how to get there from where we were.
Ready for the best part of all?
What's everyone's least favorite part of Disneyland?

.............(' -----take a moment--------')...............

Yes, we all agree.
Waiting in lines.
(That link, by the way has some great tips.)

This app updates every few minutes to tell you what the wait time is on any given ride.
There are other ways of finding out the wait times for rides; you can, alternatively walk to the kiosk in Main Street Plaza at any time and receive the updated wait times for any ride. And I encourage you to search ahead of time, which attractions you want to see and what you want to prioritize
But if you are roaming in the park nowhere near Main Street, and want to check the wait time of any ride at all in any area of the park, the app is going to save you some time.

While we were trying to find Nemo, we saw some rockets.
"WE WANT TO GO ON THE WOCKETS!!"
We were at Disneyland. Where world famous pirates and animatronic adorable small singing children abound, but our kids wanted wockets.
Whatever.
Wockets won.
And off to the wockets rockets we went.
And we were ready for more action.

We found Nemo just where the app said we would, but after our long and tiring submarine voyage, it was time for food.
Out came the phone, and since I was becoming pretty adept at using it, I bragged that I could find anything anyone wanted to eat. Which, with small children, translated into 'quick service and near- instant gratification'. Within a moment we had located a place to eat just yards away from us. My only complaint about this feature is that it showed me every kind of cuisine available from African to Thai food, but not one category was labeled 'coffee' or 'cafe'. If Disney wants me to chase my kids around in their park all day long, the coffee would help.

Something I didn't get to try out but found highly appealing was the 'set alerts' option for the 'Events' option. I tend to get distracted with my kids' involvement and may forget something in which they had earlier expressed interest. For instance, the parade. I could go to the 'Parade' label in 'Events' and set an alert on the phone so that, ten minutes before the parade (or whatever 'Event' I chose) the phone would ring and remind me.

Verizon certainly has a cutting edge product for Disney fans and park goers, and, with any brand new product, there are many suggestions for how to improve it. Droid users will be disappointed to find out that the Mobile Magic Application is not yet available to them.

Personally, I was pretty happy with the features of the app, but the Chocolate phone I was using would shut the app down every time I closed the phone and put it in my pocket. Sadly, this is just the nature of flip phones or phones which close.
I suggested a 'kid tracking application' to Verizon - useful in any situation in the prevention of lost children. If I can have all the benefits of GPS, I want a tiny receiver which I can clip on to my four year old's shirt or pants, activate with my phone, and keep track of him should he stray from my side. I am sure they will get right on that. (HELLO? Really nice guy from Verizon- are you listening?)

All in all?
I had more fun than I thought I would at Disneyland, I am now far more technically savvy than I was before using this app (and phone, for that matter) - so savvy, in fact, that you should hire me to teach you really important technical colored things . My only complaint is that Disney did not control the weather, and we spent one full day of our 2-day pass, drying our soaked shoes and socks over the heater and huddled in the motel room watching cable Disney channel.

My very last tip to you? Choose a motel with a hot tub. Because then, even if you get caught in the only freezing, pouring rainstorm of the year, you can get warm and keep children who are entertained by warmth and water happy.





This post was created voluntarily to record the events which were filmed by David Hoffman. I was not paid to write this post, nor was any other party able to edit the final publication.

Bubbles' First Poem, (as dictated to me yesterday, randomly and all at once in the car)

smoke
fire
house
trees
water
sirens
glass
and hurt
and sad
and scratching
monkey
dogs
arrows.

Chickens Come and Chickens Go

So, yesterday Supergirl stayed home from school, with a slight cold (cough cough). She was spending more time running with the chickens than lying in bed sipping tea, so I kept threatening to take her to school. At around 11:30 I told her to put the chickens away, so we could go get Bubbles and head into town for some errands. The chickens usually spend a good portion of the day running free outside, happily scratching for bugs and terrorizing our cat.
She put the three she could find into the coop. We were late, so I demanded she get in the car. As I got into the car, I saw a pile of feathers in front of it.
Oh.
Umm, a big pile of feathers.
But no chicken.
"Ummm, honey? Which chicken did you say you couldn't find?"
"Tiny."
Oh. Tiny. The plumpest, waddliest, slowest chicken of all.
"Oh. Umm....honey? Come here and look at this..."
We determined that there was indeed, no Tiny to be found, and that the sheer volume of feathers did, in fact, indicate that there was probably no chance of recovering Tiny.
Personally, I was relieved at the absence of visible carnage.

But oh! The tears.....the sobbing and heaving and high pitched sadness. Oh!

With my own upcoming non-fun events, such as court with bad-vibe Xman on Monday, I knew we needed a solution.
New chicks!
I had to call around the county to find chicks at this time of year; used up the family fun budget on their accoutrement, but I think that, so far, it's worth it.

Meet Lilo and Stitch. Stitch is the wild one.



Now putting an emergency call in to the friend who promised months ago to build that damned chicken run. Because hell no I'd rather not go through this again, and whatever it was (bobcat, coyote, hawk?) will more than likely be back, looking for another chicken dinner.


Lilo checks out what she will look like when she grows up:

Definitely NOT Parent's Choice Toy Award Material...

I am in shock.

Bubbles loves his 'guys' more than any other toys. Sure, he loves his rescue heroes, and his trains, but not as much as his 'guys'. Guys are tiny and have many snippety-snappy accessories and come in blue boxes. Playmobil, with its attention to detail and lack of merchandise produced in China, has won our family over.

But today, while searching for 'guys' to go in the castle and boat he has requested for his birthday (he's not getting both, btw), I came across this.

And it is just so so very wrong.


Notice the mask and the scattered (obviously stolen) money.
It's a getaway car.

WTF?

I am not sure what to say about this.

I mean, it is disturbing, people throwing things at each other, and there is nothing funny about domestic violence.....but I can't get the vision of these two hurling cheetos at each other in a violent rage.
And then, how did the police make the decision to arrest them?
Was it based on the incriminating orange fingers?

Censorship IS a Bitch.

So, just so we all know, I am being censored by an angry 55 yr old woman.
I was the recipient of a spewing, scathing warning phoned in by yet another of his family members. I was warned that someone is just waiting for me to screw up illegally on my blog. Like I said, just so we all know.
Ironically, that someone is the same someone who stood there and watched things degrade before her wide eyes and calmly walked away with my child as my situation became more dangerous. The same someone who admitted to the police that she followed me as I was trying to walk away from the argument, and that she did not call 911 when begged. The same someone who went home with a new and improved story (I mean, what are the chances that they would see the police report, too?) and said I went 'nutso wutso' and that 'he had to restrain' me.
Just so we all know, this is the person who is waiting for me to 'blow it'. This is the person who thinks I should stop writing about all of this and calls it WRONG and INDECENT.

Fuck that.
I am sorry my writing includes dead baby material - it happened and I write about it, okay?
And I am sorry that my writing now includes domestic violence material, because really? I would much rather it didn't happen and I didn't have to write about it either.
But it did happen.

And those bastards are not going to silence me any more.

They all know it is wrong.
They just choose to pretend that it isn't.

So, it's May 11th again.

So, I went to court today.


Happy Dead Baby Anniversary Day to me!!!


::::::sigh:::::::




Nothing happened today.
Other than the fact that I had to see him.
It was shakey time.



Trial next week.

File This Under Clusterfreak

The envelope was quite thin; it indicated a problem.
It wasn't addressed to me, but it came to my house, and it is my electricity now.
I opened it.
My power will be shut off in 48 hours, because the bills he told me he had been paying, he had not. There are over $800 in past due utilities.

I called my friend, sobbing, "I was just feeling like I had it all balanced! (sniff)"

"You'll do it - you will balance it all out - you will figure it out and you will be fine!"

"I meant just for today." (sniff sniff)




UPDATE: Thanks for the comments but no, the electric company considers themselves a little special and they actually CAN demand that HIS bill be paid off BEFORE they will put it in my name. Go figure.

Dead Baby Cake

So, I have to write this. I am also going to remind a certain someone that she is not being made fun of here, rather, has given me some comedic relief material in a dry period.

I was having a 'chat' with my innernet friend and one of the things I love about this particular innernet friend, is her dark humor and ability to climb into my brain from across the country. This time of year is, plainly, DARK for me. To cope with this season, I have often resorted to what some might call inappropriate humor.

So, I happen to mention to innernet friend (IFriend) that someone had suggested that I celebrate Elijah's birthday by making a cake and having a little birthday party.
Did that suggestion make me mad?, that someone had wanted to know.
No, I said, certainly not mad! I had definitely heard of people doing that....it just wasn't.....for me.
Of course I couldn't get it out of my head, and morbidly kept imagining just how that would take shape, this birthday party for my dead child. I suppressed some inappropriate giggles from some friends who I know are challenged by my annual bout with morbid humor....but of course I can't be kept down. I am a VIRGO.

So, I had to share with IFriend.

me: so, the idea was that i would have a party for him make a cake, get the children involved, have a birthday party.!!!!!

IFriend: WHAT! MAD?

me: oh no i am not mad

IFriend: a CAKE?

me: i have heard some people do that
IFriend: I would freak out making a cake

me: just NOT FOR ME

can you imagine?

IFriend: no, I honestly can't

me: MAKING A FUCKING CAKE

IFriend: it's macabre - I mean, you know, not that there's anything WRONG with it, but...not something I would do
me: there's the issue of putting the baby inside the cake, or just what to write on it...

i mean...okay....happy 6th birthday elijah....no that's not right....happy 1st birthday AGAIN elijah....no still not right.....ummmm....happy birthday in heaven my little angel?

IFriend: pukes - personally I would just fall the fuck apart making the thing and hate the whole process

me: has to maintain sense of humor right now

IFriend: yeah
me: a cake. yeah, i mean a lasagna maybe...but a CAKE? heh

IFriend: like "we're HAPPY our kid is dead"

me: i KNOW

IFriend: "see look, a CAKE"

me: HAPPPY DEAD BABY CAKE!!!

IFriend: keels over... lord

me: that isn't right either - you see the problem.

IFriend: yes - I mean, what to WRITE on it alone is a blog entry...

me: oooo - and we could SING TO HIS ASHES OF COURSE!

IFriend: put a party hat on the urn

me: that would rock, but....who blows out the candles?

IFriend: just take it outside and wait for the wind to blow the candle out...and be like "look kids, your brother made a wish!"

kids are gullible, they'd totally buy it

me: HAR! they TOTALLY WOULD!

End of Conversation Advice:

IFriend: I think doing some kind of non-deadbaby-activity would be much better than making it a Deadbaby Day...too tempting to wallow that way.


Indeed. Thank you, IFriend. You know who you are.

This Drama is Brought to You by My Girlie Bits

Let's just start with some simple facts today. You can put them together in a story however you wish.

• This time of year is always, in some form, anxiety-provoking for Gwendomama. This is in contrast to me the rest of the time; though some would consider me high-strung, there isn't too much that rattles me to the core. Other than this time of year sometimes, I guess.
• I almost always put off going to the doctor for anything, unless it is for my children, and this is compounded by my high pain threshold.
• I do not have a companion who shows his concern for me through outward gestures. Or emotional displays of support. Left to my own devices, I am capable of taking a weak moment and turning it into impending doom.
• I do have a companion who believes that all illness and pain is caused by stress and/or weakness.
  
• I have spent the past three weeks worrying about my symptoms, which are the exact same symptoms of ovarian cancer. Oh DAMN YOU, Dr. Google! In case you didn't know, ovarian cancer is known as a 'silent killer' because of its vague symptoms.
• It has been four months since I had a period. Oh shuddup, who wouldn't feel like they were having a secret vacation (for the first two....)?
• No, I am not pregnant. I know how to pee on a stick.
  
• I was told I would have to wait over a month for an appointment at Women's Health Center, where the cost would be minimal. (Cooter card)
  
• Of course my symptoms became worse. Waiting is not my strength. But, not being a wussy, I did recognize that I was having real pain. On my freaking ovaries. And it wasn't going away by my sheer will alone.
• I read too many pieces of misinformation about non-cancerous ovarian cysts not causing any pain or symptoms.
  
• I convinced myself that I could only have one thing: Terminal Cancer.
• Who the fuck isn't afraid of that? But I cried myself awake each insomnia-filled night with pain and the impending doom that would befall my children. Surely Supergirl's childhood didn't deserve to include the loss both a brother and mother?
• When I completely break down, I will then sometimes ask for a favor.
• I asked Ob-Gyn friend (from other office in other town) to HELP me PLEASE because I could not wait another 2 weeks for the appointment which would be covered.
• She, being about 62% saintly, offered to squeeze me in (past billing) on a busy day to monkey wand me and check it all out.
• I freaked out some more, having convinced myself that I have cancer, and sure that I am about to find out some horrible prognosis.
• Maybe if I would spend some more time reading the blogs of PEOPLE I KNOW and less time reading DR. GOOGLE I would have had an easier time....
• The BOS proved herself to be a great friend yet again, by not only driving three hours (each way!) to accompany me to my monkey wand appointment, but also by asking Ob-Gyn friend distracting questions such as, "So, I was wondering....how do you spell pus-y? I mean it can't be p-u-s-s-y, because that just isn't right." ...so I wouldn't concentrate so much on the condom-covered camera getting all friendly with my ovaries.
• My parts look almost good but not quite.
• My ovaries appear to be the host to some cysts who are ornery and causing me grief and pain.
  
• Apparently, non-cancerous cysts CAN cause pain.
  
• I think anything foreign on my ovaries sounds painful.
• We do not know for sure that everything is okay.
• I need another, higher-resolution ultrasound (hopefully the tech won't ask me to umm....'put it in myself' because in that case I may just bring dh) (awkward).
• BUT the cysts appeared (on the low-res ultrasound) to be simple, which is better than complex.
  
• This does not necessarily explain the hormonal imbalance, but the battery of blood tests ordered yesterday should help shed some light on that mystery.
• Hormone therapy and/ or laparascopy if the cysts are benign.
  
• So much to look forward to.....
• I think I need an annual springtime prescription to Ativan.

If You Still Think I Am Genteel In Any Way....Avert Your Eyes.

I can't help myself.

Sharing this story is a sure sign that I've lost all remaining shreds of decency.
But let's just stop pretending shall we?

California Unified Nether Temple Society

The BOS was extolling the virtues of the California Womens Health program, how great the doctors she saw were, blahblablah. Which reminded me that I am way overdue for a girlybits exam. Not to mention the girlybits have been causing me some insomnia-inducing, cancerfearing shuddering terrified thoughts concern. So, to share in her new love of stirrup visits for a mere $15, the BOS began her campaign to get me to the cooter doc.

"Dude. They give you a card. A card that you can use just for your cooter! A cooter card!"
"Oooh wow....do they swipe it?"
"They surely do!"
"Oh! So that would make it like a credit cunt?"
"Exactly!"

So forgive me, dear Marisol, the very nice receptionist from the Womens Health Center, for giggling during our phone conversation when you told me today that I qualified for 'the card'. And that it would cover all my reproductive organ goodies. Because I really was working hard to suppress the nervous gutwrenching fears question that was begging to be answered: And where are you going to swipe that card?


I warned you.

Anthropologetic

Well, it's a sad thing for me to announce, but this recession depression has gotten the best of us, and we have to move back to Grammie's farm.

It's tragic, because we can't fit too much in the truck, and we'll have to get rid of most of our belongings. We did buy a lot of crap absolutely necessary indulgences while caught up in the California housing and credit boom re-mortgaging out our home, and most of it will have to go. But we will make do, and somehow make our new digs look like home again.

I mean sure, we'll have to sleep in the slaughter house dairy barn, but since the dust storms, the milk done all dried up and the cows is all gone to live with Grampie Up There.



We sure do like our privacy, so the kids have their own bedroom out on Grammie's front porch. It's been months since any drop of rain has fallen, so we'll hang that tarp when we come to it.



If y'all want to come visit, we've set up a lovely guest room in the ol' chicken coop (only $250/night for friends and family!)(we gotta buy our crack grits, you know).



We didn't have any room for the tricycles or learnin' books, but I couldn't bear to get rid of my $5000 couch, so we did manage to squeeze it into our quilt-filled pick-up truck when we left the state.

(Whaddya mean there aren't any toys? See those papier mache birds? If those kids so much as drool on them they are dead meat. Toys!)









(Disclaimer of reality: Every photo here is lifted from the most recent Anthropol*gie catalog. Their art director is apparently giving us a vision of things to come...)

How Much Mercury Is The FDA's RDA?

Here's some FOOD for thought.

1. How much mercury would you feed your child before you decided it was enough?
2. How much mercury is safe for your child to consume?

The answers are,

1. Zero.
2. Zero.

Archer Daniels Midland, poisoners of your kitchen and body, have decided to challenge scientific facts and feed mercury to the general public, via High Fructose Corn Syrup.
And you thought it just created Diabetes!!

No, now you can poison the entire family with a lunchbox full of 'juice' and 'fruit' gummies. Toss in a little Jello and you've got a delicious buffet of brain cell and pancreas killers!

Why isn't anyone talking about this? Only Huffpo? Why isn't this being picked up by any other news sources? And why is Huffpo pretending that they don't know who makes the HFCS?

ADM makes it, that's who.

And the FDA - do not for a minute think that they are protecting you.
They know all about it.

What Did She MEAN to Say?

Michelle and Barack Obama do WHAT together?




(thanks, Van)


(still laughing)

Dromedary Desperado

You know that camel with all that shit on its back? The great big pile of crap on top and the camel staggers along and some village idiot tosses a straw on the camel's back because entertainment is hard to come by in the desert I suppose, and *SPLAT* the camel just splays out (I imagine this part) on the ground, all brokeny back because of that one last damn straw.
That camel? Has nothing on my freaking camel.

My camel is carrying not only a load of crap on it's back, but also another camel. With crap on it's back. A Big Load of It.

So you would never guess, after surviving a blessed Christmas holiday practically pulled out of your ass, and doling out generosity in the form of near human sacrifice (how much did you spend mailing things this year?) - all amidst a stark grey backdrop called my personal life - that the people trying to toss straws on your camel on your camel, would be your family.

Then again, maybe you would.