House

Well, it looks like we are buying a house.

We found a townhome in Morgantown, right off the turnpike, that seems to suit our needs. Its a 3 bed, 2.5 bath, finished walk out basement, ginormous finished loft that has WAY more room than we actually need. Its going to be rather amusing to move our ONE couch and TWO armchairs and then realize that we still have a bazillion square feet to fill. However, I think we will try to be as minimalistic as possible.

Anyway, we like the house and it seems like a really good place to start. Its cheap, first of all, which is the most fabulous thing. Quite honestly, its only a couple hundred more than we are paying for our rent right now, so we feel its very managable. We have asked about their utility bills, and they seem to be reasonable as well. Our home inspection was last week and that went swimmingly. We asked them to fix a bit of electrical work, some flash collars on the roof (no, I dont know what that means! ha!), and fix a window that was not locking and was letting water in because of it.

We hope Lily likes it.

There are really only two major improvements that need to happen:
1) the deck... its 7 years old and warping like the dickens. It has obviously not been taken care of or stained consistently or anything like that. We forsee us rebuilding the deck within the next year or two if we have the dinero. I also want to put in a spiral staircase if the HOA lets us.
2) the carpet... you basically walk in on the first floor which has a powder room to the left, living room to the right, then closer to the back of the house, the dining room on the left with kitchen on the right. Both the kitchen and the entryway are nice hard wood floors. But the rest.... and up the stairs... is forest green carpet. Now, I love me some forest green carpet. In fact, I chose it for my bedroom at home. But the ENTIRE living room and ENTIRE dining room? EEP! Its just a lot of green. So we are going to rip it out and put down floors. We may even attempt to install it ourselves, depending on what type we go for. Should be a learning experience (gulp) but I think we can swing it. Jon is so anal retentive that I am not worried about the measuring and cutting. And I am good at seeing how things fit together.

Other than that, the house is in phenomenal shape. The carpets are a little funky upstairs with some pulls and whatnot. But the walls are all white. The upstairs and basement carpets are neutral. I guess I will include some pictures here at the end for you, if you are interested.

Overall, I am getting kinda excited about decorating. I already know what I want to do with our master bedroom (light blue accent wall) and the basement (floor to ceiling bookshelves from ikea droooooool) and the smallest bedroom (Jon's giant white desk from when he was in jr high will go there for our office).

I think the nicest thing about it all is that we are going to be able to put down 10% of the house and still have money left over to do these things. Its a good feeling and a pleasure to know that Jon and I have actually done a good job of managing our dinero over the past few years. 'Course it helps when your parents let you live at home forever.

We settle Sept 10th and we have until Sept 30th on our lease here at the apartments, so we will have almost 3 weeks to move in and get the painting and floors done. THAT I feel really good about. School will be starting up and getting into gear, which makes me nervous... but hopefully I can buckle down and put in some time there to get things ready before school begins so that I will have a few weeks of lessons prepared for all of my classes. That is the plan anyway. We will see what actually happens.

So... yay.

Hopefully we can slow down on the major life changes, though I am not sure if that will happen either.... Remember, Sept 14th of last year we got married. Sept 10th of this year we will own a townhome. Sept next year... let's just say we do not have any plans yet. :P

kitchen

living room (dining room to the l, kitchen straight ahead)

giant 3rd floor loft room (aka Project Rehearsal Room)

finished basement (hard to see bc they got a lot of STUFF down there!)
living room (note green carpet and weird pseudo bird cage rack thing)

It has been awhile

I feel like I have slacked off a bit on my blogging, so here is a bit of a catch up...

1) School is out. Thank goodness. At the end of the year, we get evaluations from our department coordinators and mine was kind enough to tell me, basically, that I have looked like hell since December and that I really needed summer break. Okay, he did not use those words, but that is what his inflection said. And he is right. But is it my fault, necessarily? I started out the school year getting married and going on my honeymoon and teaching three courses and finishing up my Masters. It sort of set the tone for the whole year as "always one step behind where you want to be". Plus, the politics at school this year were absolutely ridiculous. For my own mental sanity, I needed to get away.

2) Stupid me signed up for EYP this summer. Basically, I have 35 students who failed the school year who are working (or, in most cases, not) to catch up and pass the courses they should have passed during the year. I guess it is good, because it is extra money, but it does not give me as much of a mental break from school as perhaps I needed.

3) I am back working at the hospital every other weekend, Sat and Sun. Again, money is good... but I guess if I had a choice, it would have been nice to not do it this summer. The hospital budget is not doing so hot, so I cannot fill in as many (or any) hours like I have in previous summers, so I am glad that I have the EYP program to get me a bit extra.

4) Jon and I are going on a cruise to Alaska in August. I cannot wait. We debated over it for awhile because we are house hunting and looking to bid this summer... but honestly, we have other plans in the works for the next few years and I do not really forsee us having the opportunity to travel much. My parents are coming on the cruise as well, and we think Jon's parents will join us too. We have already picked our excursions - in Ketchikan we are zip lining in a temperate rainforest, in Victoria we are going to visit Butchart Gardens, and in Juneau we are going DOGSLEDDING and taking a HELICOPTER RIDE! Hello, cool!

5) House hunting. Going okay. I suspect the market is picking up a bit, I am seeing less online. We are probably bidding on a townhome that we like, though today we are going to go see another that I suspect we will also like and will be a good investment property for us. :) I guess we are getting closer and closer to making that a reality. We are in a pretty good position to buy now, so hopefully we will find the right place!

6) I have been reading a LOT. Nothing all that earth-shattering. My friend gave me the Mortal Instruments trilogy by Cassandra Clare. It was REALLY good - especially if you liked House of Night or the Twilight series. It is along the same vein. I recently ordered the Sookie Stackhouse series (what True Blood is based on) and started reading that. It is pretty darn good. :)

7) This summer is pretty empty wedding-wise. We have Jon's cousin Jeremy on July 11th in NY. In Oct we have Les and Ben. Then, on New Years, we have Mike and Mary. Quite a difference from the 14 weddings last summer. It is kinda nice to have just a few special weddings to go to.... but it is definitely not as busy!

8) Project is up and in full swing. I am the membership manager, so I was working hard on that over the past few months since it was my job to send out invites and track people down. www.projectphilly.com is our newly launched website. Our concert is Friday, August 7th, and I hope you come!

9) Lupron...

Lupron has been the singular biggest change in my life in the past few months. I got the shot early May and it has been an interesting journey since.

Lupron is a three month shot that basically throws your body into false menopause. It shuts down your estrogen production to a very low level, taking away menstruation, though you can still ovulate. (In other words, this is not birth control, you can still get pregnant!) In the first two weeks after the shot, your estrogen actually skyrockets before it shuts down to a low level. As I said, its been interesting.

During the first week of the shot, I was in pain. It felt like I had run a marathon - all of the muscles in my legs and butt ached from the shot. It is sort of like how a tetanus shot will make your arm sore. Except worse. During that time, I was also fighting off a pretty wicked cold which had me grounded for a full week. It was a scary time because I had no idea if my symptoms (aches, pains, nausea, general unhappiness) were a result of the shot or just getting over the stupid cold.

Well, I am not sure I will ever find out. It took another week or so after that to really start feeling better. So into week 2 of the shot, I knew my estrogen was riding high (Jon did not mind that so much, if you catch my meaning) and I started to feel better. My birthday came and went. We went to NY for the weekend with Sus and Dave and unborn baby Van. Very fun times. That threw my body off quite a bit because we were eating dinner at like 9:30 at night. So it was a few days for me to recover from that, and then my estrogen started going down.

So this brings us to the end of May/beginning of June. Again, I was scared. The most common side effects of Lupron are hot flashes, night sweats, migraines, and some acne. I was freaked because I am prone to migraines after my period ends (when my estrogen is lowest). I really had no idea what was going to happen, but I knew I would have to live with it for three months.

I am happy to say that migraines are NOT one of the symptoms I got. So so so happy about that. I do have the hot flashes, which is a bizarre experience. I am taking progesterone add-back therapy (oh yeah, Lupron causes bone loss as well) and that has kept the hot flashes pretty low. Its more like I get really warm very easily. For those of you who know me, I am cold nearly all the time. But with Lupron, all of a sudden, I will see the veins popping out on my hands and wrists, and just get super warm. I do not sweat, but its just this internal heat. Kind of like when you wake up in the middle of the night all snuggled under your covers and you realize that you are REALLY really warm.

Sadly, my skin is definitely worse. That is frustrating, but its all hormonally linked, so try as I may, there is not much I can do about that.

I am also sleeping pretty awfully. Fortunately it is summer, so I have the luxury of attempting to sleep in... but at 10 pm I am not tired, even if I have been tired all day, and it takes me awhile to fall asleep. After that, I wake up many times, mostly being too warm. So I assume this is what is meant by "night sweats". I have always been an oven while sleeping (I think my circulation is best lying down, which is why I am actually warm) and now im like... an autoclave. So that sucks. Sleep is elusive, but between 10pm and 8am I am getting enough to be functional.

The other interesting side effect has to do with my excretory/digestive system. I pee a LOT. Like a whole lot. No matter how much I do or do not drink. It is silly. I have no idea why this is happening because I have not changed my diet all that much. I guess it is good for me because before I did not pee very much, but it is definitely strange.

One of my other fears with Lupron is that it would kick up my IBS. Hormonal therapies usually make me REALLY stressed out and crazy... which then causes my IBS to flare up... which leads to a lot of bowel issues. THAT has not happened, which is totally awesome... and instead the opposite has happened. They have actually slowed down. This is bizarre to me because the one thing I could always count on is "going" every day. But now I dont. And I am sorry if that is too much information, but when I was looking for information on Lupron and how people were taking it, no one told me this stuff.

So, overall, I have been really pleased with the Lupron. The side effects have been very managable and I did not turn into the psychotic monster I was worried about becoming. The skin, the hot flashes, and even the sucky sleep has all been worth it because I LOVE NOT HAVING MY PERIOD! Dear Lord. You have no idea. It is such a relief to not have to plan my life around the fact that I am ridiculously ill a few days every month. I love that I am not scared to travel or to go away. My body and it's issues have been more of a psychological hinderance than most people realize.

Last year, I had my period at all the worst possible times. I had it over my bachelorette/shower weekend. I had it during my wedding. I had it during our honeymoon. I had it during a friend's shower. Every time I had something important, I could not 100% enjoy it or I canceled because I was in pain and felt like throwing up. I always hated planning events or trips because I never knew if I would be sick. I always hesitated before making any kind of commitment. I hated being involved in something where I did not have an escape route. That includes dinner with friends (what if my ibs flares up?), going to see a movie (what if I feel sick in the middle of it?), and even just hanging out. The last time my ibs flared up, I was supposed to go to a game night with friends. I ended up canceling, and I know that they thought I was just flaking out - that I am bad with keeping commitments. But people do not understand. Its like having this disability that I cannot control, no matter how positively I think, no matter what meds I try, no matter how I try to deal with it.

But now, I am free.

It is such an amazing feeling.

This weekend, I am going up to PSU for the Pennharmonics 15th anniversary. Jon and Josh were both surprised I wanted to go. Heck, I was surprised too. I went to the 10th anniversary, but I have not been to any other concerts or events. But thinking it over I realized... it was not lack of desire to see the Penns or anything... but the fact that I did not want to be "stuck" in state college with the potential of getting sick. But I do not have to worry anymore.

On Monday or Tuesday, I am going to drive to the beach for a day to see my cousins. I could not have done that before.

Over the fourth of July, we are going up to Boston with Les and Ben to see the fireworks and the Pops. Jon has wanted to go for years, but I have always hesitated. I do not have to now.

Lupron has been a God-send. Not only has it helped me feel better (granted, there are still issues), but it has helped me be free to do the things that I have always wanted to do but was too scared to do before. Granted, I have always pushed myself to do stuff, even if I was sick, but I still turned down a lot of things. Now, I can do what I want. Its a beautiful beautiful thing.




So I know this is pretty long. But that is kinda what has been going on and how things are. I plan on making this summer a great one!

house hunting blues

Really, house hunting sucks. Don't let anyone tell you anything different. It is stressful, exhausting, and annoying. And it means commitment and the loss of flexibility AND most of your savings. Fantastic!

We have spent 3 sats now looking at houses all day. We have been all over the place.

The house we loved in Honeybrook was taken off of the market because the pregnant wife was advised that moving in the 8th or 9th month of her pregnancy would be a bad idea. Duh.

The log cabin we really loved needed maintenance... but the owners are now begging us to put an offer in. They are getting divorced and just waiting to get rid of the thing. Its tempting - we really do love it.

We have looked into a few new constructions, but, like the log cabin, they are all out in coatesville, which we really hesitate about. I guess on the whole that this is not something that causes us to pause or hesitate.

Will we find the house? I don't know. In the meantime, its very stressful for me... and probably makes Jon feel stressed as a result. He puts up with me well, but I have been a monster this week in particular. Sigh.




In other news, I have a sore throat and a fever and bad cramps.

In further news still, I will be going on Lupron very soon. What does this do? Well, it basically stops my body from making Estrogen. You know, that crazy hormone that enables you to have a period? Yup. The good news is that this is one of the top treatments for Endometriosis. The bad news is that it can cause a lowered sex drive, acne, headaches, hot flashes, and general stress.

Truthfully, I am really nervous about it. The first shot is just one month, then I can do two treatments of 3 months. I think that is how it goes. It causes your bones to lose calcium too, so if I did anymore, I would have to take hormone replacement therapy.

My real concerns stem from taking birth control before... namely 3 things: migraines (which, for me, are precipitated by the pill), IBS (stems from feeling stressful and anxious while on the pill), and being a general psycho.

I am pretty freaked out, and I apologize in advance if I turn into a monster. Still, doing this has helped a LOT of people have non-painful periods. When the estrogen stops, the endometrial growths stop growing and actually shrink... this means when I get back to my normal cycle, the growths are gone or are tiny so they do not bleed and make me miserable. Hopefully.

So... 6 months. I would like to try to do a 6 month treatment. This I am currently menstrual for the last time until November.

And honestly, I cannot tell you how amazing it is to think about making plans this summer.



Making plans in advance has always been very difficult for me. The reason is that I never know if I am going to feel terrible. I never know if it will be "that time" or whether I will be suffering an ibs attack or what. I just dont know.

But now... finally... a glimmer of hope. The thought that I can plan to go away this summer without worrying that I will be sick is amazing. Jon and I hope to meet up with Les and Ben in Boston this year for the 4th of July. My first thought, as usual, is: what if I am sick? What if I have my period? And then I realize..... but I wont! How wonderful is that?!

Endo is something only a person with endo can really understand. Sadly, most women think it is "normal" to feel pain when they have their period. It isn't. Remember, your body has a reason for pain ~ something is being hurt or torn or generally messed up. Pain is your body's way of being like YO! Something is WRONG!

And so it is with a lot of doctors.... oh? you feel sick with your period? so does every other girl! just try this pill or that pill or this drug or that drug. It makes someone with a true problem feel so alone. It actually makes you question your sanity.



With this new doctor, I actually broke down when telling her my history. She asked what I had tried... so I started detailing what I was doing freshman year of college... and I realized... I have been like this for 10 years. 10 years! 10 years I have been in pain every month. 10 years I have been talking to doctors and finding no response. My original doctor had me on a slew of birth control pills. When I started getting migraines, I went off of them, and she put me on a slew of pain killers. Nothing worked except for one drug that was taken off the market. All of the other ones killed my intestines and kicked up my IBS. If it wasnt one thing, it was another. She was always very - well, pain is normal. ITS NOT!
I had to go through several nurse practictioners before I got to my last doctor. I thought she was different... but she was more interested in telling me to get pregnant. Even before I was married. She wanted me to do the birth control thing again. I gave it a try. Stress. I gave the mini pill a try... well hello 20 lbs of water weight! The most I have ever weighed in my life was 140. 140 on a 5ft4 frame was not so great for me. Finally, I convinced her to check my hormones... she said they were "fine". Then, I had a laparoscopy 2 years ago last month. I was finally diagnosed with moderate endometriosis.

I hated the diagnosis... but at least I can be like SEE - its not just cramping. Its not just me being a wussy little girl. I have a condition.

Sadly, its a condition that no one really understands.

So anyway, I was telling all of this to my new doctor and couldnt help but spring tears. Its been10 years of doctors not taking me seriously. Of me calling out of work two days every month. Of me feeling helpless and alone. Of me not wanting to make plans, not wanting to go out, not wanting to do things because of the possibilities of feeling awful. Certainly, no way to live.


Lupron makes me feel scared and excited. A glimmer of hope, but afraid of hope at the same time. I am very worried about the side effects. What if it makes me stressed, and that kicks my IBS into full gear again? In some ways, that is worse than the once a month pain. What if I start getting migraines again? I usually get headaches at the end of my period, when my estrogen is lo2w anyway. What if? What if?

But I think I am at the point that I am willing to try almost anything. I dont care what it costs. I dont care if it causes more pain in the short term. The only thing I am not willing to do is get pregnant before we are ready. What a stupid idea! Yes, I am fully aware that when we go to have kids, I may not be able to. I might be scarred. I might be blocked. Every day it gets worse, and I realize its just a game with time and my mutinous body. But I will not bring a child into the world to alleviate my pain. How idiotic!



I am soap boxing, I think, and I did not mean to... its just on my mind a lot right now.

I guess I will just go back to vegging, which is what I have done best today, and taking advil.

the floral decorating gene

We saw 4 houses on Friday and 11 on Sat. We saw nice houses and we saw awful houses... but here are some of the details...


1) We saw a house owned by a Mennonite family. Nice big beautiful yard. Nice location. However, the entire house was like a big doily. Very lacy. Also, it had bizarre closets. Most of you reading this by now probably know of my "thing" about opening closets - I always think there will be a dead body in there. Well, looking at houses brings that thought to the forefront of my mind because EVERY house has a bunch of closed doors. Anyway, the master bedroom had this tall but thin door to storage space and Jon goes, "You probably don't want to open this." I say, "Why, is there a dead body in there?" And he says, "No, but if I had one, that is where I would put it." Needless to say, they will not be getting a bid from us.

2) We saw a house that was owned by a Vietnamese couple. They lived in a perfectly average middle class planned development... and they put cement lions on cement pillars to guard the driveway. Not only that, but they were both male. Come on! Everyone knows you have to have the male and the female to create balance. Anyway, the property was really nice and the house was not bad aside from the BRIGHT blue paint. The problem was the smell. I walked in and my jaw dropped. I dont mean to be culturally insensitive, but I thought people of Indian descent were known for the curry-type smell permeating everything. Nope. Apparently Vietnamese food does the same thing. Or at least it did at their house. I have never experienced that smell before. We left quickly.

3) Another house we went to reeked of smoke. Obviously one or both of the parents and, who knows, maybe even the kids were smokers. That alone made it awful for me. But the house was not terrible, so I decided to venture upstairs just to check it out... and it was dark... and all of the doors were closed. I opened door number one and found a tart burner. But the owner of said tart burner did not put a wax tart in the burner... oh no! She put vanilla OIL in the top of the tart burner. Brilliant! Let's put oil within 3 inches of a lit tea light. The whole room was filled with smoke. Enough so that the 2 seconds it took me to walk in, blow out the candle, and close the door again left me coughing and coated with a vanilla scent. Idiots! We did not bother with the other rooms, though looking back I wish we had. Who knows what other fire hazards they had left around. Good thing all of the fire alarms had no batteries!

4) We went into a split level house that made me think if I was an out of work stoner musician, this would be a good place to get high and play my guitar in the middle of the night and talk about philosophy. In other words, not that it was bad, but it did seem more fitting to commune type living. Oh, and there was a boar's head mounted on the wall.

5) One house we went to was decked out in "country chic". Flowered wallpaper everywhere. In every room, including all of the bedrooms, were giant floral prints. Now, she did a very nice job coordinating it all... but DEAR LORD! There has to be a floral decorating gene, because that kinda stuff gets passed down from generation to generation. And, I really hope it is, because it would make me sad to know people decorate like that on purpose. Truth be told, the house was nice and well kept... but they totally had a water issue. Jon and I walked around the yard and were pretty much squishing all over the place.

6) We got to a house that clearly had not been maintained... things were sort of cruddy and falling apart, even though it probably once was a nice house. The problem was that the people were there. Their realtor did not tell them anyone was coming to see the house... and when were got there, another realtor showed up with a couple about our age. The woman was clearly upset as they were packing up their things. Our realtor (Paul - he is awesome, if you need someone, you must call him) was pretty confident that they were being foreclosed on and the realtor was working with the bank, so did not really know or care that the home owners were still there. The other realtor who showed up actually said that she was told the house was vacant. :(

7) The most interesting house we went to see was one where they had covered over the front of the house to make a "covered porch". The problem is that now the front windows of the house are utterly useless because the roof of the porch slants over them and lets no light in. Brilliant idea. :P They also covered over the garage... so the garage is still there... but you cannot use it now, and they sort of use it for storage. Also, the back porch is reachable from.... the master bedroom. But nowhere else. It was just totally bizarre. The property was really nice but... come on! Whywould you cover up the useable parts of your house?!



So yes, we saw a lot of strange things and a lot of duds. We have 2 on our "A" list right now... and so we keep looking. We will see what happens!

What is new?

So what is new?

I would say, overall, not too much... so this will probably be brief.

• I have been looking for various jobs, both summer and otherwise.
  
• Jon is sort of doing the same.
  
• We signed a realtor, he is awesome... so hopefully a house will be in our near future.
  
• I am growing plants in our apartment but so far, only the sugar snap peas and onions are proliferating. I think. I probably should have labeled the pots, huh?
• Spring break was extraordinarily restful, thankfully
• We got a new bed a few weeks ago - so far, so good... between that and the breathe right strips, I am actually getting some sleep
• We are hoping to plan a vacation... I have kind of narrowed it down to an Alaskan cruise, but my dad is being reluctant. He is a spoilsport... but I am going to go speak with the travel agency today and see what we can accomplish for our budget and time frame

That is about it. I really ought to make use of my last day of vacation before going back to that place. I start working at the hospital again next weekend (depressing!) so this will be my last day off for about 2 weeks. Awesome.