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.)

I'll admit it-- sometimes I get really angry at how "easy" other people have it in their lives. I mean, yeah, okay, everyone has their stress and troubles and hard times but some people just seem to have a charmed life, you know? Yes, my incredibly troubled and grueling life is definitely the source of some good points, such as the personal strength, insight, and empathy that I have honed, but sometimes it'd be nice to just have it kinda easy for a while you know? And it hasn't been. My whole life, without exaggeration, has been one fight or another for sustenance, sanity, survival… what's up with that?

And then, just when everything was finally going my way… my health tanks. I was so happy. I was in school, pursuing my dream career, I was planning my wedding, working hard for a cause that I loved with a boss that adored me, I'd paid off my school debt, made huge headway in counseling… I had it made, man. I was good. Things were looking up. But then, then, everything fell apart around me and life is harder than it's ever been. Maybe. Life was really hard during the decade plus of abuse too, though. It's hard to say.

It's just not fair, man. And it pisses me off.

However…

There is good news. I have finally found a doctor that is both willing and able to help me with my pain! I'm diagnosed with "intractable pain" which, according to Wikipedia, is "a severe, constant pain that is not curable by any known means and which causes a bed or house-bound state and early death if not adequately treated, usually with opioids and/or interventional procedures. It is not relieved by ordinary medical, surgical, nursing, or pharmaceutical measures. Unlike the more common chronic pain, it causes adverse biologic affects on the body's cardiovascular, hormone, and neurologic systems." (emphasis mine) Doctors kept getting hung up on "fibromyalgia" and "chronic pain", missing the bigger picture of my pain, but this doctor gets it, and he wants to help me very much. I could cry. It was seriously everything that I had hoped for.

This is the dr's website, Dr. Porcelli. I have to drive 4 hours to get there, but to get my life back? SO worth it.

I was incredibly nervous, because I was afraid that I was just going to get shut down again and I have nowhere else to turn for help but the emergency room, and that is horrendously expensive. (Seriously… I have no idea how I'm going to pay all of the ER bills. *sigh*) He was very cheerful, funny, and engaging right from the get-go, though, and we chatted and joked back and forth the whole time. He looked at my chart and symptom list and was immediately like, "Yes, you definitely suffer from intractable pain! You've got one foot in the grave, huh? Just one banana peel away from packing it in!" (I thought that was funny. This was after he saw the "draw these shapes on this outline of a body to describe what kind of pain you have and where" chart that I filled out. It was pretty well covered in scribbles.) He thinks that with proper pain management I can actually go back to work part time in the future! Also, after a physical examination he discovered that my eyes have been damaged some from the pain, but they will heal when my body calms down.

The plan is to do a long acting opioid with a lower dose one for breakthrough pain. The ones he gave me this month aren't working very well and I'm still spending about 5 or 6 hours a day soaking in the tub, but we can address that at my next appointment. I'm working on getting physical therapy started, trying to do regular massages, and I'm also starting a few supplements (vitamin C, sublingual b12, omega 3 fatty acid, etc.) to boost my general health. I really want to start eating healthier again now that I'm more capable, but really, I'm basically just happy to have meds at all and to know that things are only going to get better from here! I mean, today my friend the Artist came over and helped me clean the house, and I was able to do quite a bit! The house is so tidy now. Ahhhh… we got to things that I've been wanting done for months, or at the very least since I got out of the hospital. It feels good to see my home in order again.

Also, I applied for disability this past Monday, and it was actually a really fun experience thanks to the lady who did my interview. I should get word in about 3 to 6 months, and she says that it's about a 50-50 chance as to whether I'm approved or denied. We'll see. I'm definitely going to appeal if I'm denied, no worries about that.

Oh, and I'm going to make an appointment with a geneticist this next week. Still pursuing further diagnosis, especially since Dr. Porcelli agreed adamantly that while fibro is part of my problem, it is definitely not the entire issue that is causing me to be so sick and in so much pain. So… we shall see. I've got my money on hEDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, hypermobility type). I fit the criteria so, so, so well, and a large majority of EDSers are either misdiagnosed or not diagnosed at all. The most common misdiagnosis is fibromyalgia, from what I understand.

I'm learning to live with this broken body, even as I try to figure out in what ways exactly it's broken, but it's not easy. I'm pretty resentful at times, especially when I can't get the help or answers I need or when I see my peers traipsing around and fulfilling dreams and stuff that I wanted to do and cannot join in on and will possibly never recover enough to achieve.

Like pregnancy. Due to the nature of my pain, I will probably be on strong pain medication for the rest of my life. That's just a fact of my life. (Ugh, my poor organs…) The implications of that, however, mean that I would have to stop my pain meds (and a couple others) in order to carry a baby, and that's not something that is feasible for me at all. Remember how I ended up in the hospital and ER a ton last month? Yeah. Just like that. And do you think that the stress of being so sick and in so much pain would be good for a developing fetus at all? Not a chance. Either way, my baby is at a distinct disadvantage while residing in my womb.

I'm never going to be able to carry a baby of my own, and that grieves me something awful.

People don't understand. I've shared with a couple of friends, and with Drogo, but the response I get is "Don't worry, you can adopt! There are other options. Have you thought of surrogacy?"

You guys. That's not the point, not the point at ALL! I know I can adopt or do a surrogate pregnancy. Creating offspring is not the issue here, the issue is that I am never going to be able to carry a baby or give birth, and that's something I've wanted for a long, long time. It's just another precious dream ripped callously from my heart and tossed carelessly on the midden. I don't care if I can adopt; I care that the vaunted experience of childbearing, one that I've already had bitter experiences with, is now beyond my grasp, through no fault of my own, and there's nothing I can do about it.

But folks don't seem to catch that, even after I explain, so… I just let it go. Whatever. Who cares if Cassie's world and future is shrinking and dulling, hope and happiness sloughing off like dried up scabs?

It's the strangest thing... I was minding my own business, making a bowl of oatmeal, when I was suddenly hit with a very strong and vivid wave of grief for the babies that I lost.

I don't know why I thought of them. But I'm very sad.

I suppose in the grand scheme of things it's "better" that I don't have any chilluns right now, because life is challenging enough with just myself to take care of at this point. It would be hard on the little one, having a sick mother, and it would be hard on C, trying to provide for all 3 of us. (Or 4?)

That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt, though. Even after all these months, it still hurts.