I'm watching "Dance Moms" right now (just for background noise), and I can't believe what I'm seeing. These little girls are regularly decked out in more makeup than most women wear on a normal basis, and it just doesn't look right. The cast and crew are just setting things up for drama after drama, and these girls are caught in the cross fire. I feel so sorry for them. And there is just so much grumping, grousing, picking apart, and negativity. I would absolutely wither in such an environment, no matter what the situation. Those little girls are damn good dancers, though. I envy them their strength and vitality.

On February 6, we lost Cortes. I glanced outside just in time to see him looking up from lapping up a puddle of antifreeze that had leaked out of Corey's truck. I rushed him to the nearest vet that would take him, the first being too full and busy, but the second vet that took him in was amazing, so I'm glad we went there. They pumped his stomach and gave him charcoal, but the tests following that showed that he still had 3 times the fatal amount of antifreeze in his bloodstream, and what happens with antifreeze poisoning is that it mixes with the calcium in the cat's body and creates a kind of sticky, cloggy mess that clogs up their kidneys and induces kidney failure, which is a horribly painful and drawn out way to die. I couldn't let that happen to Cortes so I chose euthanasia, which was the right choice but horribly painful for me. I had time with him to hold him and say goodbye, I held him during the procedure, and then they gave me as much time as I needed afterward to hold him and just cry. I couldn't afford the cremation and urn and I didn't want his body to bring home and bury, so I opted for the "mass cremation" (cremated with whatever other animals and disposed of however they do it) and the clay plaque with an imprint of his forepaws with his name imprinted below the prints. They did a phenomenal job with the clay plaque, crimping the edges and making the prints and the words clear and legible. I was thrilled. I plan to paint it and hang it in the living room along with a favorite picture of Cortes in the frame given to me by a good friend specifically for that purpose. A week after Cortes's death, I received a card in the mail from the vet's office expressing their sympathy and signed by all the employees.

Corey and I are both bummed. Cortes was his favorite, and I, of course, love all of my animal babies fiercely. I don't have children, my womb refuses to house them, and the way things stand with my medications and diseases I won't bear children myself. This means that my maternal instinct is funneled into channels it might not otherwise be so present, and that means that my fur babies mean as much to me as anyone's human babies mean to me. Señor Drogo doesn't feel the same way that I do, but he cared for Cortes and misses him a lot.

About a week ago, we took in a new cat that needed a home. She's a calico, about 3 years old, such a love sponge and a purring machine. She will start purring, loudly, if I so much as start talking to her! I have a vet's appointment for her in a week because she has a really bad case of ear mites, one ear being entirely full of gross crusty brown stuff, the poor poor baby. Oh, her name is "Fancy". She was a pound kitty before the previous owners got her, and now she's in what appears to be her forever home. I have better pictures on my cell phone, but haven't been able to get them on the computer yet.

Things have calmed down, at least within me. I've had a lot of blows one after another for some time, but things seem to be slowing down and settling, at least temporarily. I have been beading more lately, trying to work up some sort of an inventory to start my Etsy store with. Just the prospect of doing something solid and with a purpose is exciting and fills me with giddiness. I miss that. Being in the house all day and frequently on the couch or in bed is really kind of dreary after a while. I want to go backpacking and antiquing and run errands and all the good old things I did before! I suppose I'll just have to think of ways to adapt them to my current physical abilities. Backpacking probably is out of the question, though, as I learned recently for a disability appeal form that I can only walk about 300 yards unassisted, and that's without carrying any weight at all. Hey, maybe someone will rig up a Bran and Hodor type situation and carry me on their back in a basket?! Hehehehe…

Besides beading, though, and being generally crafty, I'm working on another project to get my medical bills organized and keep track of how much I owe on each one. The idea is that I'll send in incremental amounts regularly rather than waiting until I have the whole amount at once, which will never happen. Ten dollars here, thirty bucks there… that much money can easily be spent on superfluous things, so why not put those bucks to good use? I'm going to use my old dry erase board calendar with the cork strip along the bottom to write out the company/office I owe money to, the balance owed, and at the bottom I'll pin the paper bills, to be discarded when the bill is paid off entirely. I think it's a good plan, one that will help me greatly. I'm more of a visual, touchy person and just having a stack of bills that I can't pay all at once has done me no good, and will continue to do me no good. (Guilty confession time: I've taken to throwing medical bills into a pile, unopened, because I just don't want to see the numbers that would simply ramp up my agitation. What I don't know can't hurt me… right? lol)

Oh yes, there's also the small matter of my oral surgery this Wednesday. I'll be put under and all three of my wisdom teeth will be removed at once because of serious impaction. (I am simply "missing" one wisdom tooth. Guess it never grew.) I'm going to have to eat nothing but soft, mushy foods for an unknown period of time, as I heal slower than the average person. The oral surgeon has seen many patients with chronic pain and autoimmune diseases, which is a relief to me, and he predicts that my healing time will probably be about double that of a normal person, which is to say three weeks to a month, possibly more. I wonder at what point I'll be able to switch from baby food type meals to a more solid diet? Well, if nothing else, at least I'll lose some more weight over this incident. I can almost guarantee it.

I'm reading The Swiss Family Robinson again, and I notice that every time I do my turns and phrases of speech alter slightly and become a little more old fashioned, as they are in the book. I'm still uncertain as to whether it's really a fictional account or true, but I don't have the heart to look it up because I'd liked to believe it's more of a survival manual than an interesting tale. Seriously, though, that family would break the bank if they played Jeopardy! It seems like they know every friggin' thing to do with nature or animals from all over the world. All. over. If I were stranded on a "desert" (I think they are using "desert" as an archaic term for "deserted", as it's really a subtropical island near the equator) I would rather have the father or the older brother with me than anyone else in the world because I believe that they would increase my chances of survival so greatly. Give the book a brief perusal; you'll see what I mean.

The next few days I intend to spend packing and preparing for a stay of a few days at my grandparent's home after my surgery, and I'd like to get some more beading done as well. I bought a bead/findings organizer last week and setting it up will be quite a chore but so worth it in the end. Lately it seems I've been doing nothing but sleeping or reading, sometimes crafting and all times petting and playing with the cats. It's not so bad of a life, what I've got going on, but still… it does get a bit monotonous and irritating after a while. I still don't know what to do with the fact that my pain is a life-long load I must bear, so for now I've tucked that thought away and out of sight. If I don't, it threatens to become overwhelming and drag me right back into the depression I have so recently escaped from.

For now though, it is, as my mom used to say, "bedtime for bonzos"! Or "Shadrach, Meshach, and Tobedwego!" (That's a joke based on the name of Daniel's companions in the Bible.)

Today is the 8th anniversary of The Accident. Back in 2006 I was attending a small Christian boarding academy (high school) about 4 hours away from home. There were several of us kids from Yuma there, so the parents had worked out a carpooling system for the occasions that we came home such as holidays or Home Leaves. This particular event was a home leave, and several of us piled into the Astrovan owned by a good friend of my family, whose son and granddaughter both went to school with me. The other Yuma kid declined to go with us because he had some other plans, but a Korean foreign exchange student that was good friends with the son and on the same Acro team as the son and I joined us for the trip. He was excited, because he wanted to see more of America before he graduated and went home at the end of that school year. He couldn't stay and tour afterwards, because apparently Korea has a law that mandates all young men to do a certain amount of military service once they are done with basic schooling, and I'm also pretty sure that he didn't have that kind of money.

The stretch between Phoenix and Yuma is pretty barren and empty, but there is a town almost exactly halfway between the two, and we stopped there for snacks, bathroom break, gas, and Fred, the dad, put air in the van's tires because he thought they looked a little low. (There are SO many details that I'm omitting, but I don't feel like typing that much, and it would be a small pamphlet at least if I did.) It was not too far underway from that town that the back left tire blew out, and the van swerved then rolled and flipped several times. I was hit in the head with something flying around the interior. (I think it was the old school portable tv, the heavy ones? Or maybe it was some sort of tack because Fred hadn't emptied out the van from the last time he had been at the stables to tend their horses. I don't know; I'll never know.) The blow to the head caused me to lose consciousness and go blind for a period of time I estimate to be about half an hour, 45 minutes maybe? I was very devastated because I thought I couldn't read anymore. (A famous line/joke from the experience is when I was led to Fred after being freed from the van and I told him I was blind. I was crying about how I wouldn't be able to read anymore, and Fred comforted me by saying that he would read to me. My response was to wail, "You don't understand-- I really like to read!!" LOL)

As far as injuries go, I was blind and had a severe concussion, was having an asthma attack, had an internally bleeding mushy spot on my skull from being hit, whiplash, of course, and there was some injury to my ribs as well. Oh, and I cracked a toe. The granddaughter, A, had unbuckled her seatbelt to lean forward and grab something just as the crash happened, so when the glass window from the sliding door popped out she was thrown through the opening during one of the flips or rolls and then the van rolled over top of her. She was Life Flighted out of there (as as I) and ended up in ICU for a week with a lacerated spleen and a fractured pelvis, along with the requisite whiplash and concussion.

The two guys, J and the Korean S, had bad whiplash and S had a bloody nose. I'm not sure if they had any other injuries, but they didn't say so, and they still went to play in the tackle football game a day or two later that they had been planning on. They are both big guys-- tall, solid, lots of muscle, and sturdy-- so they were an important part of our school's team and they didn't want to let the team down by not playing. *smh* Men.

Fred threw off his lap belt when the van began to swerve and leapt into the space between front seats to help control the van, so he was unbuckled and tossed like a salad as we flipped to and fro. He also ended up in ICU for a week, but they didn't fly him out because he looked okay until after A and I flew away. He collapsed and they ambulanced him to the Phoenix hospital as fast as they could, and all I remember now of his injuries is that his spleen exploded into a bunch of pieces. SO not good. He went into emergency surgery, obviously.

When I came to after the crash itself, I was blind (blackness, everything blackness with purple lightning bolts shooting through and across in every direction) and disoriented and sooooo tired and sleepy. I tried to unbuckle my seatbelt for a minute or two but it was too hard and I couldn't do it, so I began to drift off to sleep. Turns out I was the only one in the van because A had been thrown from the vehicle, J and S jumped out as soon as the van stopped, and Fred jumped out to help as well. We landed on our side, with the driver's door on the ground, and the window beside me had broken but the blanket I was using as a pillow while I napped kept the broken glass from reaching my face or neck.

The van was steaming as it was resting and J thought it was smoke, that maybe the van was going to explode and I was still in it. Everything smelled like gas. I used to love the smell of gasoline, now I'm not so fond of it. J came in and kept me awake with talk, which annoyed me to an incredible degree, while he cut me out of my seat belts. What had happened is that Fred's lap belt got tangled up in my shoulder belt while everything was being shaken up, and I couldn't see to undo it and J felt that it would take too long. The van was about to explode, remember?! Because of my weakened state (concussion, asthma attack, shock, etc.) I was unable to lift myself out the hole above me that had been the sliding door's window, so J kicked out the windshield and took me out that way. I jokingly flutter my lashes at him and swooningly croon, "My hero!" when that story is told around him, hehehe.

There are a ton of funny and touching stories that go with all of this, and maybe I'll share a story every day or every other day this week in honor of Life and Second Chances. For right now, I'll sum up by saying that even though there were some scares and lots of camping out in the ICU waiting room, we all survived that harrowing experience with very little in the way of long term damage. It's practically unheard of! We were and are very fortunate, and that is why Fred and I like to Celebrate Life on our Anniversary, though the others (J and A) don't see the point or enjoyment of it and choose not to celebrate it. J feels very guilty because he was driving, but it could have happened to anyone. Really. A lives far away, and S is back in Korea, so… Actually, I think they are both in Korea, come to think of it! A married a military man, so…

Anyway, if nothing else at all I learned the value of every split second. We carry on as though life is assured, and rightly so I think or else we would be paralyzed by the thought of impending mortality, never enjoying a thing or being productive, but it is the realization that life and consciousness can be taken away in the space between two breaths that really gives context to the value and delicacy of life itself. For instance, yesterday was David S's birthday. My adopted dad who died of cancer last year. Yeah. The birthday of a dead man whom I loved dearly, and then the next day a Celebration of Life, another "birthday", if you will" with other people that I love dearly, who are all still here and kickin'. It's just so… puzzling. There doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to it, except the certainty that

Life will end. Yours, mine, your fish, the Pope, and certainly that pretty caterpillar you saw last week… our lives will inevitably cease at some point. Mine could have stopped on October 25th, 2006, but it didn't, and I'm very grateful for that. My essence, the core of who I am, my conscious soul or whatever, that could be snuffed out by any number of things even while I type this blog post. But I'm still here, so I'm gonna enjoy it and try to be a good person and make life as good as I can for those around me who are still going as well. It's as much of a goal as anything else, right?

Happy Anniversary, Life!

I'm so stressed, you guys. I have prescriptions I need to pick up tomorrow, but I can't afford the $15 to get them. I have a massage scheduled for tomorrow as well, which is one of the only things keeping me able to still walk right now, but there's no way in hell I can afford that. I could get my scripts, but then I wouldn't be able to pay my phone bill… and somehow I still have to make it to Phoenix twice and LA once this coming month for important doctor's appointments. Oh yeah, and the pharmacy in LA I got my pain meds filled at shorted me (and some other patients), and I've been trying to get it straightened out since Monday, but I'm running out today and I'm afraid I'm going to end up back in the hospital again… Damnit. I just don't know what to do. What can I possibly do that I'm not already doing? 

The worst thing is how unfair this is to Drogo. He has always worked hard, saved as much as he can, been responsible with his money, and the present is no exception. He just can't seem to catch a break, though. When it seems we're about to come even and he might be able to get a handle on his bills again and even sock away a hundred or two dollars, something breaks or is more expensive than anticipated, or some new bill crops up. Without fail. He is such a trooper, but how long can he last under such a strain? The poor man feels like a failure, but he is one of the most valiant men I know. How unfair is that? And it kills me that I am the source of this pain and stress. I hate it. I hate myself sometimes for being the instigator of bills that I am.

It's no wonder Drogo and I are having relationship problems from stress. We're both freaking the fuck out, trying to figure out how to just SURVIVE. I hate this. I hate this so much. Being sick is stupid. I have to believe that it will work out somehow, someway… but I really do not see it happening at this point, and it terrifies me.

I've done what I can-- created the fund raiser, sent links/pleas to every single person on my Facebook friend list, even sent the link and an appeal to some pages and businesses that I know… asking them to at least repost the link so that someone, somewhere might see it and have pity on us. I'm working on the inventory and production for my craft booth I've got planned for this winter. I haven't even put any money into supplies-- I'm just using what I've accumulated over the years. I applied for disability and we're just waiting, waiting, waiting… what else can I do? Seriously, what else can I do???

I'm stressed, scared, sick, and generally distraught… but I still have to believe that it will work out. We're doing the best we can. Life rewards that, right? Hard work, sacrifice, integrity… those all pay off in the end, yeah? I hope so. I genuinely, sincerely hope so. 

So after 2+ years of being on gabapentin ("Neurontin"), which is a psychoactive drug used to treat epilepsy and neuropathic pain, I finally decided that I wanted off. I mean, my dose had been increased several times throughout the years with still no help for the pain and too many negative side effects for me to want to take it any longer, especially if there are no benefits to outweigh the risks or negatives.

I tapered down after telling my neon pain doc that I wanted off, which she instructed me on how to do, but I was already not doing well because I had yet another instance where I was forced off of pain meds for a few days. It was a crappy week +, but then the night that I took my last dose I started feeling really, really awful. I thought it was just a bad bout of "fibro flu" at first, but as my symptoms continued to worsen and I was the sickest I could remember being in recent memory, even worse than when I had just been going through pain killer withdrawals. I told Drogo the second night when he got home from work how awful I was feeling, and how it just felt like really bad withdrawals and… then I kind of got an idea. I did some research online real quick (thinking that it may have been something to do with seratonin toxicity, which can be SO dangerous), but the only real change had been quitting gabapentin. My symptoms lined up perfectly, and I thought that I might be able to persevere at home now that I knew what I was up against. You know what I mean? It's just easier to fight a known enemy, even though I still felt increasingly worse. (And really? Going off of this med with no warning whatsoever that withdrawal symptoms were coming, much less that they'd be so virulent?! It was a very nasty surprise… but in retrospect, I should have totally seen it coming. Oh well.)

I had a doctor's appointment with my GP the next morning, and she was concerned. She wanted me to go to the ER for monitoring just because of the severity and concern connected with many of the symptoms, most importantly bad chest pain and very low (for me) blood pressure with severe and consistent near syncope upon movement. (I actually collapsed/passed out in front of CVS right after the appointment, but Drogo was there to catch me and lower me to the ground. I really gotta stop collapsing in pharmacies.

We decided not to take me into the Emergency Room because, even though insurance covers a lot of the expenses… the hospital is NOT a cheap place, not by any stretch of the imagination. Khal Drogo was stuck in a hard place, seeing me so sick and knowing that I really ought to go in, but looking at the long-term of our financial situation and just feeling that, well, we can't swing it. Ever watch Cinderella Man with Russell Crowe? He finds himself in similar situations as he struggles to feed, clothe, house, and keep his family healthy in the midst of the Depression. It was not easy to watch Drogo wrestle with the decision… it hurt me to watch him have to make such a terrible choice.

A few hours after my appointment, however, I was still worsening, and fast. I texted mom and RDad to tell them what was going on, mom called RDad, and Rdad called Drogo to tell him that finances weren't a concern. Get me to the hospital. The timing was great, because I had just texted Drogo from the bedroom saying that "I am getting worse, and I don't know how much more I can take." I broke down crying about that point, because while I deal with a great amount of pain on a regular basis I am also worn down from doing that for so long without any significant relief at all. The "regular" pain combined with the awful withdrawal symptoms and pain was just too much for me, and so on the 3rd day of withdrawals I ended up in the Emergency Room. I hadn't been able to eat hardly anything the past few days, and that morning I'd only had a small applesauce snack cup, so I started getting pretty ill from not being able to eat while in my ER room in the back. In addition to that, I wasn't allowed to take my own meds and so the time for pain killers came and went… and my pain (a 9.75 when I came in to begin with), skyrocketed. I finally fell apart after a few hours, especially after having to get up and move around for x-rays, and I started sobbing and wailing uncontrollably which lasted for an hour or two before I was given something that took the pain back down to manageable (about 9.5 again).

Yesterday was kind of a blur, but I know I was eventually admitted and I haven't broken down crying since. The pain has been bad, don't get me wrong, but below a 10, and I am okay with that!! LOL. During initial triage, the nurse that was trying to take my blood and put an IV in just wasn't doing a good job somehow. The tourniquet hurt like nobody's business, driving my already high pain up, and then she was digging around with the needle and tapping on it for over a minute before I told her to just use the other arm. I couldn't handle the tourniquet pain any longer. She hit a nerve (twice!) as she pulled out and I couldn't help but scream and start sobbing again. I actually blacked out for a split second because it hurt so badly. It startled me.

I've had some great nurses, though, and the doctor who saw me was good. Professional. Friendly, but genuine. He's keeping me overnight again, since I'm still so symptomatic and not doing well… sending me home would not be a good idea right now. I feel much safer and way more comfortable here, with regular medicine application, constant saline drip in my IV, nausea meds, and a type of synthetic opioid, methadone, that is actually used in detox programs for opioid addicts. My pain is still hanging out in the 8-9 level, but that's "normal" for me anyway, and my pain is being aggravated by all the other stuff so it's not a big surprise. I'm getting the methadone and tramadol, as well as IV solu-cortef, which is what's in the "stabby stabby" that I have to administer when I get into an accident or whatever to avoid adrenal crisis. It is more potent than the tablets I normally take, and I can feel it keeping my body more relaxed and stable. It's nice. I thin that was part of why I "collapsed" in the ER as well, because my adrenals were shorting out or whatever on top of everything else. I wasn't allowed to take my meds, remember? It was a nightmarish afternoon. I can legitimately say that I have not been in that much pain before in my life, except maybe in small, short bursts. I was waiting to pass out from the incredibly high pain levels and my utter fatigue (especially after sobbing uncontrollably for a prolonged period of time, and being so weak to begin with when I was brought in-- couldn't walk, could hardly sit up at all).

So… it's been a fun adventure. I feel awful, yes, but not as awful as I would if I had just tried to make it at home. I mean, I did try, and I made it as long as I could, but I just kept worsening instead of stabilizing or improving, and there's only so much a person can take, ya know? I'm so grateful for the intervention of Mom and Rdad on my behalf. I'm honestly and genuinely glad that I was admitted and that I'm being taken care of. This has actually done a fair deal toward improving my totally bleak perception of medical care here in my town, and in the hospital/ER in particular.

I haven't been able to sleep more than 2 or 3 hours since I've been here (or even the day before), and I keep waking myself up with dry heaving when I do manage to fall asleep, but I'm going to maintain a valiant effort to crash the heck out. I'm SO. TIRED. Hah.

Before I go tho, let me take a selfie… LOL. I figured I had to commemorate such a momentous event. Plus my hair looks freaking fantastic, rolling around in the hospital bed this whole time :D

How's my pain? It's over 9,000! LOL

Look! I'm a fall risk! First time for that… means I'm not allowed to stand up on my own.

A whole breakfast tray of… nothing I can eat. I learned how to order whatever "safe" food there was before my tray gets brought up pretty quick, and Drogo has been bringing me safe food from home so I can eat little bits when I'm hungry. Still can't eat much yet, abdominal cramps and nausea too bad.

But they gave me Sprite! Rock on, nurses.

Peace out, homies and fellow Spoonies. May your spoons be plentiful, and take care of yourselves, yeah? I'll stick to doing the same over here.