hmmm

SPRING BREAK!


Jon and I will be in Ft Myers Beach Florida from Friday until Wednesday. :)


Ahhh... nothin like a beach front condo in 85 degree sunny weather to yourself.





I think our big plans include sleeping. And sleeping some more.



Oh, and guess what, I love being a Biology teacher!
A student sent me a picture of a bug that she found in her house and asked me if I could help identify it.

Fortunately for me, I happen to be very familiar with this one - it was actually a huge assassin bug!

Now not only do I feel moderately more like a real teacher, but now there is a student who thinks I am SMART. :) She was so excited because I sent her pictures of other assassins and shes like THAT IS IT!!!!! Hahaha very cool.

Eventually, I am thinking world domination could be within the realm of possibility.... maybe I could start some sort of pyramid scheme with my students this year... get them thinking I am smart and knowledgable about science (as if!) and then they will tell other people... and those people will tell other people. Eventually, all of the PA students will know of me.

I think it could work.






Or maybe I just REALLY need that trip to Florida.

editing

yeah I do not know why....


but I said Dave and Miryam are having a baby....


but its not...

Its John!

I get distracted easily.

mystefied

I do not think I spelled that right.

Oh well.


What mystefies me is that people read my blog.
I just don't get it.

I mean sure, I read people's blogs... and I comment them occassionally if I am able...


(is it just me, or does my spelling keep getting worse and worse?)


But still, it shocks me that people read mine.


And gosh darn it, I wanna know WHO.




But please, note, people, that reading my blog is NOT a substitute for talking / calling / spending time with me. Some people seem to have gotten the idea that just because they read my blog, they are exempt from actual personal contact with me.

Do I smell or something?

I do not think so!


So go ahead, read my blog, but I am way more desperate to just talk or spend time together instead. Plus it is totally unfair if I cannot cyber-stalk YOU. At least comment me or something so that there is some assemblance of give and take here. :)



Thanks!

news

I think overall, it has been a week of communication... which is good.

I have spoken to a lot of people that I have not talked to in awhile, and I always like that. Its good to catch up and be refreshed.

I even got a phone call from the mysterious long lost Matt N. :) Yay!




The week had several highlights, though the ice/sleet storm has NOT been one of them.


I guess I really do not have much to say, other than that there are a lot of people on my mind at the moment, people I miss, people I have not spoken to for awhile, people that I love... some people that are all three!!!


It is nice, though, to know that friends I am distant from are doing well.... and small updates make them not so far away, so I appreciate it.



Happy St. Patricks Day. (I am 1/4th Irish, ya know, so I guess I can tell you to kiss me?)

spring? not quite

Well, it was definitely gorgeous today.

I would have to say the best part of my day was tossing around my frisbee with Graham around lunchtime. I have not thrown a frisbee in a couple of months now, and it felt good to get out in the sun, trying out my arm, and trying to avoid the parked cars. It was just gorgeous.



In other news, I bought sea monkeys yesterday.

Sea monkeys are actually brine shrimp... which are not really shrimp at all... and the amazing part is that their eggs are very resistant to drying, so that is why they come in a magically packet of dust. I kinda wonder if you swallowed the sea monkey packet if sea monkeys would hatch in your stomach and then if you could make a meal out of it. Just wondering.

Anyway, I was all excited today to hatch my new class pets at work... I opened the box... and someone had kidnapped the sea monkey packet!!! Pfft. Real nice.

I think the funny thing is that someone really DID intentionally go into the box, open it, remove the sea monkeys, put EVERYTHING ELSE back, and tape the lid. No joke. Apparently sea monkeys are just that hot of a commodity.

I then called Toys R Us to make sure I could return it. The 16 yr old on the phone sounded as if breathing made her want to kill herself. Or maybe it was just working there... but anyway, they said it was fine, so I returned it, sadly, after school.

The good news is that I ordered a new kit online... and its even BETTER. It glows in the dark!!!! Woohoo! Talk about a stylish pad for the sea monkeys.



I also researched this week WHY they are called sea monkeys. And the reason is because their heads actually DO look like monkey heads. Seriously.



Sorry that there is nothing interesting or exciting to report... cept a little birdie told me that Brian is proposing to Suzanne... I do not think either of them read my blog, and it was supposed to happen on Monday, so no harm, no foul.
Also, for those of you who were not clued in yet, Dave and Miryam are expecting a baby in a couple of months.

Sigh.

They grow up so fast.


And then there is me, 25, and my brother, 24, still living at home mooching off the parents with no marriage / family / kids in sight. I guess it is just as well.... I have enough going on. My mom keeps telling me to wait to get married and get all the things I want to get done accomplished... because after that, its all over.
I do not really follow this logic. How could getting married prevent me from pursuing my masters and doctorate? How could getting married prevent me from traveling in the summer?? I mean, kids, yeah, I can understand... but I mean, if you make school a priority, you can make it happen.... Especially when your job is paying for it.

Oh, by the way, more travel plans might be in order.... I have been asked to take a group of 14 yr olds to Germany for a week this summer.... depending on the date, I may just do it!!! Can you imagine... Australia, Germany, and Montana in one summer. I may need a larger travel journal if it all pans out.

I might also have to brush up on my Deutsche. I do not think "ich liebe diche" will make it very far over there. Or maybe it will.... but in ways that I am NOT interested in. :/

hahahaha

My students crack me up daily


8) Lastly, ask me any question about any animal that you are curious about and I will try to answer it during our study of zoology! I’m very curios what other food do pandas eat besides bamboo. I always loved pandas they’re just so cute looking like you Ms. Samuels.

they forgot to tell me this part

I feel like crap.

Utter, total poop.



And although the doctors forgot to mention this part, I was lucky enough to read it online... apparently your first two periods after you have a laparoscopy are pretty awful.

Now, I tried to think positively and all....


But I would agree, this has been close to how it was about a year and a half ago, right before I went into the hospital.


That being said, I am GLAD that I read it online, because although I suppose there was a chance for a self-fulfilling prophesy, it has calmed me slightly to realize that this, too, shall pass. It is a byproduct of having surgery, and it will go away, it is just going to suck. A lot.




Now the real unfortunate part is that like all of my periods, they have a pattern - really bad in the morning and night, sufferable in the afternoon. Well, I was supposed to be picked up at 12:30 (which still counts as morning in my book) to drive 6 hours to Warren, PA, to proctor PSSA testing tomorrow and Tuesday.

Mark showed up at 12:30 as promised... and here I am, completely red and sniffly from crying for the past hour and a half. I had calmed down a bit before he showed up, but as soon as he did, everything came flooding back, I could barely talk. It just totally sucks because the last thing I want my job to think is that I am a slacker or that I am trying to get out of my duties. I know its a HUGE pain for someone to take my place.... but the thought of 6 hours in the car sounds like torture to me.

And I feel incredibly guilty. I have this stupid sense of responsibility that often outweighs my sense of self-preservation.

So he said don't worry about it, stay home, take care of myself... and I feel even MORE guilty because he is being so nice about it... plus I know that tomorrow, although I still still feel like crap, I will be able to manage it with whopping doses of advil and starvation. But perhaps I will be farmed out to a more local PSSA testing site and help them out instead. I have to call my "boss" and ask him.


I think the hardest thing is that I have this overwhelming fear that people are not going to believe me.



This morning, I woke up at 8:19 to find out it was really 9:19 and I was going to be late meeting Megan for church. I called her and told her as much... I knew last night that I shouldve just skipped church today, I had a feeling.... but I thought no, I can make it. I spent most of church breathing slowly and trying not to pass out. I ran out of there and came home.... I started crying in the car and I mostly didnt stop.

Jon met me at my house. He was going to come to church, but he forgot about daylight savings time also... so he just came to see me off... and he was really nice.... I took a shower while he started packing my things to go away. I think he felt rather helpless... but there really is nothing anyone can do. I need to be distracted, and thats the best thing for me. It reminds me of what Paige said about giving birth... that the pain was so much less when she was walking around actually DOING something... and I agree. I kept telling him the best thing was just for him to BE there....

Before he left, I asked him if he believed me. He said of course. Then I told him that I felt like he never really believed me before that it was this bad. I don't know whether he did or not....


And thats the thing I worry about with work. If you have not experienced the way I feel, how can you know? How can you trust that someone is accurately portraying their feelings? Because of course there ARE people out there who WOULD take advantage.... And it scares me that someone would think that of me... that I am just acting or something.

As I have said before, it is almost like with migraines... if you have never had one, you do not understand... you can relate so much as a headache, but not really anything more.




And I wonder, now, if it is like that with feelings in general. You can only understand someone loves you as much as you have the ability to love. If you have never been in love before, and someone says that they love you.... how much can you really understand it? Like how there is no way that I can really understand parental love... I know my parents love me, but do I know what that fierce parent-child love is like??? No. Not until I have my own.

I guess really the more you know, the more you learn and grow and experience things... the greater capacity you have to really understand the people around you.

I have always said if I were ever a doctor, I would be a gynocologist. :P




Anyway, I am home for today and I guess the next few days... the only happy thing about it right now is that it means I will not get my period when I am in Florida, which is a blessing. And I also got to attend church this morning... hopefully Megan will be able to start coming regularly too. :)

Flower Show

Last night Jon and I went down to the Philadelphia flower show. It was definitely a good time... we even bought some baby bonsai trees that we are going to attempt to keep alive. I guess it MUST be official if we have joint ownership and responsibility for a living thing. ;)








New Goal: Research and save up enough money to buy a GOOD camera before I go to Australia and Montana this summer. My camera does an okay job for unimportant things... but I love macro shots without the flash, and mine just cannot do it. I guess my hands are not as steady as I would like them to be.



In other news, my belly button is getting better, but its really itchy and still bruised. I am still not ready to exercise, but I am on the road to recovery. Unfortunately, I do not think I can "milk" (ahem) another day of wearing sweat pants to work.


Here is what is on the schedule for the next week plus...
Thursday ~ dinner with Matt before he moves, maybe seeing Les and Josh
Friday ~ chillaxin
Sat ~ Turkey Wow 2
Sun ~ church and leaving for Warren, PA
Monday ~ proctoring pssa testing from Warren
Tuesday ~ maybe proctoring more, but definitely leaving and getting home that night
Wednesday ~ school and class at night
Thursday ~ tv night with Jon, Les, and Josh
Friday ~ dunnatno
Sat ~ working at the hospital
Sun ~ I think camp worship team???


So it looks like March is going to be as busy as Feb... but unlike Feb, the end of the month will contain a very lovely and nice vacation. :) Yay Florida!

Monday (day 5)

Oh my gosh, I feel soooooo much better. My belly button is REALLY bruised now and still fairly nasty to look at... and I am still puffed up... but I really am feeling better. Sleep ROCKS.

And a thanks goes out to my cat Lily, who seemed to know I was in a time of need, and slept with me all week despite my tossing and turning.... and despite the fact that she did not sleep with me ALL WINTER. I love my cat.


Anyway, Jon is forcing me to stay home today, though I have lots of none-school things I wish to accomplish today, including getting my oil changed. Fortunately I cannot seem to sleep longer than 8 for some reason, so I have lots of time to get things done.

Last night was also very productive - I cleaned out my closet and filled two GIANT carry-all bags with clothes for goodwill. I still have too many clothes.

I guess I am going to get rolling here... this is my list of what I want to do today:

1. schoolwork for PALCS
2. get oil changed
3. schoolwork for grad class (I have to write my own obituary)
4. bible study for tonight
5. mail bills
6. stop by the natural health food store and talk to the guy about natural remedies for endo
7. get more cat food

So I guess I am going to make some breakfast and start making some of that stuff happen.


Thanks for everyone's support with the endometriosis stuff, I really appreciate it. I am taking it in stride because I am tired of being scared and upset, I think I have done enough of that. I think one of the keys to getting over a feeling is to acknowledge it, let it wash over you, and then accept it. So Zen of me, I know.


:P

Road trippin and other updates

Feeling better today, less oozing nastiness, but still reasonably sore. I ventured out last night to the Nicol house to see the whole crew, and I am glad I got to go.

Today my mom and I went to a local craft show and talked this lady into giving me a shirt for free because the last two I bought are now "belly" shirts. :)


Other than that, travel plans are in the works!!!

Jon and I are looking at a trip to Ft. Myers over spring break, if we can find a cheap enough flight. So far the rates are around 400 for the times we need. He needs to check into work and see if he can have the days off, and I also need to maybe take one day off. But we both figure it is kinda worth it considering our other costs would be slim to none.

So hopefully things will fall into place for the first week in April. I love being in Ft. Myers, and it will be so nice to have the condo to ourselves and be able to lay on the beach, swim in the ocean, and just relax.


Plans are also being made for a "sisters" trip to Montana!!! So far, aunt Pat, aunt Terry, and my mom are on board... and me and my cousin Pam are probably going to go too!!! This is GREAT news because Pam and I are going to make plans to visit Glacier National Park, which is about 45 miles from where my aunt Gloria and uncle John have a house (on Flathead Lake). I have always wanted to go to Glacier, and I think a trip with Pam will be SO much fun. We have a blast together and we both like outdoors and hiking and things like that, so I think we could make a pretty sweet trip out of it. That is going to be the 2nd week in August, we think.


The last plans, of course, are Australia... which I am still on board with. Hopefully things will continue on the right track there, which reminds me I have some things to do for People 2 People. But yeah, that final date is June 20th to July 10th.


After THAT (July 14th!) is uncle Jim and Maureen's wedding... which should be a total blow out party. I can't WAIT! There are so many awesome things to look foward to this year!!!


You know, some people say that your lucky year is the year that you turn the age of your birthday. Yeah, I know, that does not make sense. But I am turning 26 on the 26th this year... and so far, it is feeling like a really good one. There are a lot of things to smile about!


Also, my brother and I have been chatting about moving out. We both hope to move out by the end of the summer, which seems a perfectly good idea to me. By the end of the summer, I will have gotten all that travel out of the way, and I will have money from working at the hospital all summer and whatnot... so I should be ready to roll. I have begun making a good dent in my savings account (errr, maybe not dent?, I am saving money, finally!) and this summer I will be getting a significant amount of money from a bonus at work, and money back from the class I am taking, and all that good stuff. :)


So, yes, today things are looking up, despite the depressing outcome of my laparoscopy.... as I said, lots of awesome things to look forward to!



:)

laparoscopy

It is day 3 after my surgery... guess I should start at the beginning.... But before I do, my thanks, love, and appreciation go out to my family, Jon, Les, Josh, Kelly, Mrs. M, and Chris K for checking up on me and offering their help. Thank you for your support!!!!

Let's start with the day before the surgery, so last Wednesday. The only reason I want to start here is because I had to do something particularly unpleasant... but I will try not to scare you with the details. I went to see Tuesdays with Morrie at the People's Light that night for class. That was not scary, it was wonderful, actually... but after I came home, I had to give myself a fleet enema to clean out my bowels.

Basically a fleet enema is a bottle of liquid with a rather imposing-looking tip on it that you are supposed to insert into your bum and squeeze the liquid through. After that, you are supposed to hold it in for 2 to 5 minutes, until you have a "strong urge to evacuate". Well believe me, I barely made it two minutes, I had quite the strong urge. After that, it was pretty unpleasant and left me feeling kinda ill, but it was fast... and thats about all the good I can say for it.


Day 1

Let me start off by saying how scared I was. I am not sure why I was scared, but I was. I was scared of what they would find, scared of the pain, scared of going under, scared of waking up.... Just scared. And I think that is okay. There was nothing wrong with being freaked out in this situation, it is kind of a big deal to me.

So they took me in, I put on some gowns, booties, and a lovely hair net, and then waited. And waited. And waited.

Finally around 9 (I got there at 7!) they took me up, put the iv in (kudos to the wierdo anasthesiologist who did a phenomenal job with my itty bitty dehydrated veins), and then began to joke around that they would take good care of me bc I have great insurenece.

How reassuring! :P

The last thing I remember is my team gathering (which included a resident and a med student... sure, I have no problem with someone who is YOUNGER THAN ME by 3 years looking at my private parts. Fantastic!) and as they wheeled me in, I went off into slumber.

Waking up was much harder than expected. I cant believe how bad I felt... basically like someone hit me with a truck. I could hardly stay awake, but I was in so much pain that I could hardly sleep. Unfortunately, this meant some middle ground and I could not leave until I was awake enough to pee. So several times I woke up and said I wanted to leave, and promptly passed out again before getting up to go. When I did finally manage it, I stooped over like a 90 yr old woman... I was actually worried I would fall asleep on the toilet. I didnt.

The most relief I had that day was peeing.... Because I could lean my elbows on my thighs and let my belly hang down with no pressure on it, and gravity would take care of my full bladder.

Anyway, we came home in the middle of the afternoon and I proceeded to spend the day semi-comatose. Jon came over after work with beautiful flowers (my mom gave me beautiful flowers also) and sat with me while I felt like poop. I did not even want to THINK about what they found or talk about the surg. In fact, every time it was brought up, I would start crying. I was just a total mess and there is not much more I can say about it.

Also, while under, they stuck a tube down my throat so that I could breathe. Those things are NASTY. I need to cough soooo badly (even today, day 3) and I cant because mya bs hurt so badly. Ugh. It amazes me that people go under for surgery all the time.

That night around 9, the doc called. She gave me the basic results, which I guess I will detail in the end. After that I started crying, I just did not want to deal with it at all.

That night, sleep was difficult. Actually, sleep has been difficult every night, but particularly so that night. Fortunately I was still kinda out of it from the anasthesia and I guess that helped... because out of the past three nights, I slept the best that night.


Day 2
My belly was (is!) super bloated. I look like I am a few months pregnant, honestly. Or like I have an old man beer gut. When you get a laparoscopy, they can pump up to 3L of CO2 in your abdomen to pull your muscles away from your organs so that they can get a peek down there.

So day 2 basically felt like someone jumped me and kicked me in the gut several times... or like I did way too many sit ups. And I mean, like hundreds too many, its definitely worse than a hard work out. More like stabbing pains when I try to use my abdominal muscles.

That being said,I felt better, less groggy, but still was having trouble typing and things. Jon was awesome enough to take the day off and to spend most of it by my side. We basically just watched tv and hung out. It was really nice.

Last night I got a call from Aunt Pat, who had a laparoscopy herself. Thankfully, she waited until AFTERWARDS to tell me it was the worst surgery shes ever had -worse than having kids, and worse than a hysterectomy. Lovely. Basically because I am female, undergoing anesthesia, and the laparoscopy is in your gut area,that puts you at really high risk of nausea. Fortunately they pumped me full of anti nausea stuff, so that was the least of my problems.

I got to take a shower too and remove some of my bandages. My belly button is kind of an oozing massacre.... but there is not much I can do about that. There is also a "poke hole" by my right ovary. Lovely! fortunately the stitches will spontaneously dissolve, and hopefully I will not scar. But I am pretty sure I will. It was nice, anyway, to get a shower and "refreshen up" as our China tourguide Emily would say.


Day 3
Today I am still incredibly bloated, but the gases are starting to move out... painfully... and I sneezed... bad bad bad bad and VERY PAINFUL idea. I am having more trouble sleeping now.... do yourself a favor, if you can learn to sleep on your back, do it NOW before you have no other option.

So I woke up around 7:30. It is now 8:30... I had some wicked CRAZY dreams last night too.... Anyway, I am feeling even better today (at least less groggy and nasty from the anasthesia) but still like I was kicked in the belly. Using my abs is torturous, so I am doing everything to avoid that. We will see how today goes, I suppose.




The results:

I have endometriosis. My Doc said the best thing to do is to get pregnant within the next year. HA. Theres this little thing called getting married and being married that I would like to do first. So that really is not an option.

They found a small spot on the back of my uterus, and quite a bit more on my rectum. They burned some of that off apparently. But it is there, and with it, you can never tell how much pain you will have. A little endo might cause a lot of pain... or a lot might cause no pain... but the good news is that despite the lots of pain and little endo, my fallopian tubes are clear and my ovaries are perfectly healthy. In other words, I can at least HAVE kids... for the time being.

The problem is that endometriosis will keep getting worse. And here are my options:
1) Throw myself into false menopause using Lupron or Depro (I am not a big fan of this option, it means mood swings, night sweats, hot flashes, and all the loveliness of actual menopause, plus it shuts down ALL of my hormones, also meaning less of a sex drive, and possibly bizarre hair growth - ew.)

2) nothing (the pain will continue to get worse and worse and possibly block up the works, meaning a harder time having kids later)

3) back to birth control (this option scares me, because I know messing with my hormones makes me NUTS, but this is probably the best option right now... I have a slight hope that perhaps my psychoticness from being on the Nuevoring over a year ago was perhaps in part due to other situations in my life, like working at Renacad and E moving to Florida and me being miserable in general... if that is the case, perhaps I can go back on and handle it now that I am a bit happier... good job, more stable personal relationships, etc)



I have pictures.... maybe I will put them up after I scan them at school. I dont know... the whole thing sucks, but at least it validates things- my pain is more than just cramping or a bad period. It is actually REAL and it is not just "in my head" as some people tend to say. Ahem.

So I have a follow up with the doc in two weeks, and we will talk it over. I know she is really pushing Lupron, but everything feels wrong about it. And I am not just scared, but my (over inflated) gut is saying NO, WRONG, BAD IDEA... and I usually have good instinct.

So that is how things are.... I was supposed to work tonight, thank the LORD that I took off from work, I am so incredibly happy that I had the foresight to do that instead of push through it. I also have Monday off from school, which is nice... though I definitely will have a huge mound of work to do when I get back. Sigh!


Anyway, please comment this post, let me know what you think.