Rambling...

Hhhhmmm…. Where to start I’m asking myself… I guess I should ask, where did I leave off? Ah yes, getting my tattoo!! So Saturday night I got my tattoo… Sunday we had our fellow “race friends” over to watch the NASCAR race…. Our “race friends” are km and her husband, and then km’s sister and her husband… we watched the race, ate Mexican food, and then birthday cake (with buttercream frosting!!)!!! it’s so yummy!!! Monday r and I went to momma and daddy’s house for my birthday… we grilled hamburgers and hot links… and then had more buttercream frosted birthday cake with tons of roses made out of icing!!! I was (ok, still am) in heaven!!! I love frosting!!! Does it really get any better?!?! nope!!! But I’m not a sweets junkie or anything (ha!!)… R and I came home and he mowed…. I worked on some restaurant stuff that I hadn’t done yet…. Then we just sat back, relaxed, and enjoyed the rest of our day off…. Another excellent bonus, that night Run’s House had two new episodes on… back to back… R and I love that show!!! Ah, Tuesday, dreading going back to work after a nice long very good (for the most part) 3 day weekend… but at least it is a short week…. 4 day work weeks are so awesome!!! Tuesday I had an appointment with my psychiatrist but when I got up Tuesday morning I was way emotional…. Tuesday was a rough day for me… anyways, I called my head shrinker and we had an “over the phone” appointment… very nice, saved me my co-pay! I told him that I wasn’t really “feeling” my back dr. anymore… I felt like things had changed since he got a new dr. in his office… it’s a super long story about what happened to his old partner… anyways, since the new dr. has been there I feel like my dr. has changed… my head shrinker told me that I wasn’t the first person he had heard this from… the only reason for me bringing all this up is to lead to here: I have been contemplating going down to the Texas Back Institute to maybe have something more permanent done to my back instead of having to get the cortisone shots however often I would need them… the only reservation I had was leaving my back dr… up until this year I loved him… he was awesome… he always made me feel like he really cared and wasn’t just kinda rushing me thru like cattle in a shoot just to make his money… lately though, that’s how I’ve felt… anyways, when my psychiatrist told me that my mind was made up… I was going to call my back dr. and ask for a referral down to the Back Institute… I had talked to my back dr. before about maybe going down there and he said if that was what I wanted to do he had no problem referring me down there… Wednesday morning I got a call from my back dr.s office… I have an appointment Tuesday!!! That is unbelievable that they got me in that fast!!! So next Tuesday I’m going to see a back surgeon… see what my options are so we can get this thing fixed… the pain is getting worse and it’s not so much my back hurting now as it is my legs… the nerves in my legs… I have no idea how to describe it except it feels like a burning, pinching, on fire feeling down my butt and down the back of both legs into my feet… whew.. I mean… I didn’t talk much Tuesday at work because I could tell I was going to just bust out crying if I did because the pain was so bad… I had to go to the store after work that night, there was no getting out of it… I had put it off as long as I could… anyways, I get thru at the store, load my junk in the car, and then I started bawling… I cried the whole way home, while I was unloading the groceries and feeding the kitties… I called momma, still bawling, and talked to her… then I went to bed… it’s not odd for me to nap but for me to actually get into bed, not just lay on it or on the couch, is very odd… r got home from work and I was in bed… I got up, did the register sheet, and went back to bed… the pain is still as bad but my attitude is getting better… and that helps…
On a very cute note, last night I was walking around the house and decided to see what the kitties were up too out on the back porch… I looked outside and there are 3 baby kittens out there!!! They’re not ewok’s kittens, I still haven’t seen hers, but they are adorable!!!!! They are so tiny you can hold them in one hand!!! I’d guess they are maybe 6 weeks old… there is a “smoke” gray one, another smoke gray one with white socks, and then a tabby with a white face and white socks…. They were out there playing with each other… running (well, sorta), tumbling, and just having so much fun!!! They had the prettiest green eyes too!!! ah, now I have “baby” fever…. Anyways, I guess I need to quit rambling and get to work… I need to pay some bills and take care of a few other things… then I’m going to see if I can split out of here to go get my mri & x-ray film for Tuesday….

Inked

this picture is my 29th b-day present from r... i have wanted to get a tattoo for ever!!! and of course, i finally thought of the most perfect thing... kitty paw prints!! what could be more perfect?!?!? absolutely nothing!!! when i take the kitties to the vet for their check-up in july i'm going to get them paw printed so i can get their actual paw prints tattooed on me!!!! i am really excited about that!!! let me say though, i LOVE my tattoo!!!! more soon!!! it's late and i'm SO tired!!!

Deep in Thought

So I just thought I’d update on my last blog… km took me out to eat last night at the olive garden for my birthday… dinner was really nice… it’s been a long time since km and I have just gotten to hang out and talk… after dinner I went home and when I walked in the front door I thought, silly r, why did he turn the lights off? Then I realized that the electricity was off… we had some storms yesterday but nothing that “severe” I thought… so I got to hang out on the back porch with the kitties… we watched the BYK’s (back-yard kitties) for a while… I would let Ewok in on the back porch for a bit off and on…. I was sitting there thinking, this sure is a waste of my time, when it suddenly occurred to me, you know, instead of looking at it like I’m wasting time I should look at it like, I get to spend QT time with the kitties… with hardly any distractions! My cell phone was down to half of my last bar so I couldn’t call anyone to chat… the house was a little on the warm side all closed up so I felt bad leaving the kitties in there so I could go to mom’s or something… it was nice outside though!! the electricity came back on a little before 9 though…. I don’t really want the electricity to go back out but I will make a big effort to spend more QT with the kitties…
Last night at dinner, km and I talked… we talked a lot about r- his attitude and what is going on with him… he’s been acting “crazy” for about a month… km listened and let me vent and then we worked on coming up with a “solution”… when r got home last night, and after he showered, we kinda started talking… I say kinda because it was a hesitant talk… like he didn’t really want to talk but he could tell that I wasn’t going to drop it… anyways, thanks to km, I have a few ideas that I’m going to put out there for r… so he doesn’t sit there and think about “how stressful tomorrow’s going to be” or “how shitty my life is”…. And I’m not blaming him by any means…. Right now he is going thru a stressful time, and he seems to deal with being overly stressed like I do… not very well… and this could be a “learning experience” for me… thinking back about the past month and r’s attitude, well, it reminds me of myself (not all the time though)… but the way he’s acting reminds me of the way I act… maybe this is an attempt for the universe to show me how he feels when I act like this… so that I can understand where he’s coming from and how he feels… I don’t think he developed bi-polar disorder over-night (but I could be wrong)…. I understand his whole, I hate the world/I am angry at the world attitude…. And it’s so easy to fall into the negative rut and not get out… getting out of the negative hole is much harder than getting into it….
One more thing… so I was blogging about my pills and patches…. That I need them right now to basically function… they both help keep the pain away (at least a little bit) and for sure keep the withdrawals away…. Which, right now, I’m not even sure that the pills and patches are working for me but from experience, I do not want to go thru withdrawals at work… no way, no how… but thanks to my punk-ass doctor that looks like what’s going to happen!! I am very upset about this, very upset… it’s probably very hard for some to understand unless you’ve been an addict before or have experienced withdrawals with someone close… depending on what you’re addicted too kinda depends on how severe and long the withdrawals will be… I’ve been on the pain pills for oh, only almost 4 years (so that shouldn’t be bad- HA!!) and the patches I haven’t been on that long but I can already tell that my body is physically addicted to the patches... I ordered a refill on my pills online Monday morning so that I could pick them up after work yesterday… I called the pharmacy to see if my prescription was ready, they said yes (they even sent me an email telling me my prescription was ready!)… excellent!! R went by after work to pick up my meds and he was told that they couldn’t be released until the 25th… which leaves me in a sticky situation…. I have no pills… absolutely none…. And I took my last one before I left work yesterday thinking I was getting more… the withdrawals have already started… maybe I should just say funk it and take the patch off, not get them filled, and just go cold turkey everything… I’m going to be sick… for the rest of the week… oh boy!! My only hope is that I can “borrow” some off a friend and then I can pay them back on Friday…
Anyways, you probably can’t tell but I really am working on trying to stay positive… to see the positive in things (like sitting outside with the kitties) and different life situations… Ironically, here is my horoscope today:
Build up the strengths in your life rather than tearing yourself down. It's easy to get caught up in the negative, but it's not inevitable. Focus on your strengths rather than your perceived weaknesses.

And It All Falls Down....

you know when there are times in your life when everything, and i mean everything, that could possibly go wrong, goes wrong... that would be where i am at right now... i know that there are many many things that i have going for me (and in my life) that i am grateful for but right now these things are not on my mind... all i can think about is all the crap that's going on... my work, the restaurant, r, r and i, family issues, my back, everything... and it seems like there is so much going on... i feel like i am "stuck" right now and i don't like it... and i feel like i have so much to blog, that i need to blog, but just don't have the desire or energy.... i sure wish i did... everything that is going on in my life right now is a challenge.... and i know that the universe will never give us more than we can handle... but me feeling this way, being so negative, and getting so caught up in all the "bad" things that are going on (and not being able to let the negativity go) i'm not allowing myself to use any of the knowledge that i've been learning over the past 2 years... anyways, i was trying so hard to stay positive, and i'm still trying, i just feel overwhelmed right now...

• both momma and daddy called me today and asked me to call my grandma... not momma's mom but daddy's mom... i blogged about her occasionally and it was probably not ever anythng very nice... anyways, i know that she's in the hospital, and has been in the hospital, and doesn't seem to be doing very good so they called my brother and i both to see if we would call her... to those who don't know how i feel about my grandma this is probably going to sound pretty harsh but for them both to call both of us, i think/wonder if she's about to die... i think i have blogged about something along these lines recently, dunno for sure though, i can't remember, which ties in quite nice with this next little blurp...


• my back hurting so bad has led to my physical addiction to my morphine patches and pain pills... my tolerance is growing and for me to feel "good"/"normal" enough or to have enough energy to do anything i have to take the pills and wear the patches... slowly increasing the number of pills because of my tolerance rising... otherwise, the withdrawals start to set in and life sucks... right now i'm sitting here sweating my ass off (among other things) because i'm trying to cut down on the pill consumption... this is a double whammy though because not only am i sweating my ass off, i'm in pain because i'm not taking as many pills... what do you do though?!?! i was supposed to have an appointment on may 29th to see how things were going (and so i could talk about getting a referral down to the back institute) but he had to cancel his appointments that day and he scheduled injections all day long... so now i don't get in until june 28th!!! nice!!! one more note on this, all the opiods i'm taking make me extremely irritable... which brings me to my next blurp....


• r and i... things have been not so good for/between us lately.... ok, fine, pretty really not-so-good is more like it... we can't even hold a conversation.... he is so defensive... (this couldn't be partly because of me being a mega-bitch from the note above)... but in my defense i can say that people have been asking me about him for about the past three weeks if he's ok... because he's been acting "different" and has had an attitude, not like normal though... on my side, i can't seem to do anything right.... anything... this whole situation frustrates me because we can't even hold a conversation of any length without him instantly getting defensive and mad... kinda hard to "talk things out"...


• things had been going good at my work, for once!, and then with the onset of all the not-so-good things that have been happening lately my positive attitude has gone to hell in a handbasket and that has greatly affected my attitude, at work too... also, this could be because of the patches and pills too... i'm telling you, i get extremely irritable which usually leads to me getting extremely pissed, and it seems like there is no being nice to my idiotic co-worker....

re-eading this, i am so amazed at how my attitude at one point in time affects my thoughts, emotions, actions, basically my life... and actually writing this out made me think, you know, a good attitude really is important, otherwise i'll continue to go thru life the way i have been, pissed off, angry, and mad at the world... and i don't want to be like dad's mom....

True....

Alice came to a fork in the road.
"Which road do I take?" she asked.
"Where do you want to go?" responded the Cheshire cat.
"I don't know," Alice answered.
"Then," said the cat, "it doesn't matter."

Stopping By

I don’t remember the last time I blogged when I was at work… but, on the other hand, my memory has been really bad lately, worse than normal… anyways, I finished with payroll early, getting it submitted anyways, and I’m just waiting for it to come back so I can check it… I need to pay some bills but they’re not going anywhere… I’ll probably just get them ready to pay today…. I’ve got two months of bank statements to reconcile… sometimes reconciling the checking account is smooth, other times, it’s a challenge and I get to hunt and hunt for something… I tried to reconcile it yesterday and I think is going to be one of those challenging times…. Work is going really good though…. J has helped me out so much… just by being here so that it’s not just rrll and I and by setting up our Access database… thanks to J, I don’t have to use my typewriter for anything except printing out mailing labels… that’s awesome!!! I’ve really been watching my attitude up here too… it hasn’t been easy but it’s getting easier, I think!!
My back… is still here… it’s feeling better though… I think the steroids kicked in and have made a difference… I think mary made a difference too… I think she massaged some of the irritation out… ok, maybe not, I have no idea what she did but it feels better… better than it has in 3 weeks!!! It’s still hurting but not near as bad…
My attitude…. Is good… it has its ups and downs but for the most part I’m working really hard on keeping it positive…. In the middle of re-reading The Secret I decided to get another book to read…. This one, Your Destiny Switch, by Peggy McColl, is much like The Secret (and the other books I’ve been reading) except this one, from my understanding, actually teaches you how to take action…. In my reading I’ve been hearing about the “Sedona Method”, also known as the Release Technique, so I decided to do a little research on that… I only started my new book last night but so far from what I can tell, this book will teach me a “version” of those techniques… I think… it sounds really interesting… I’m not sure how I’m going to do this either… I’ve been giving it some thought… The Secret along with Your Destiny Switch both have exercises that you can do… that are recommended… I am thinking about working on my exercises on my blog… and posting bits and pieces of the books that I find useful or thoughtful… it seems like right now there is so much I want to share with everyone!! Anyways, Your Destiny Switch, should explain to me how I need to go about taking action which is required… you can’t just learn and retain the knowledge… you must apply it… so, that’s where I’m at with that…
Lately I’ve been eating everything in sight… especially at home… I mean!!! Everything!!! It’s like I’m a bottom-less pit… but, I think it’s a hormonal thing right now…
I don’t know much…. I’ve just been working… Saturday night we watched the race over at a friend’s house… it was so much fun… we hadn’t hung out with clint in forever!!! Just like old times!!! I said we watched the race, we tried too, but it got rained out so we ended up just hanging out with clint and friends and then Sunday we watched the race… that was about it… work has been good… r is doing good… we are doing good… just rocking along… I need to print/fill out our mortgage loan papers so we can start looking at houses… nothing “major” is going on right now and I’m very much fine with that!!!
And our positive thought for today is:
You are not responsible for everyone's happiness.
I am responsible for my own happiness and I trust that others can take care of themselves.

Week in Review

Since I’ve been very blog delinquent lately I decided to post a week in review (which seems to be very long!!)… overall, it was a really good week… and my attitude has had a major part in that…

Sunday- r and I watched the race… carl’s engine failed way early in the race and he finished 42nd (out of 43).. he dropped from 8th to 12th in the points… the last 10 races only the top 12 drivers in points are in “the chase”…. It’s still early in the season though….
I didn’t work on inventory or our weekly expense/income report for the restaurant but oh well, I’ll get it done… the back was hurting bad…. Other than that I didn’t really do much else…

Monday- I worked… called the doctor and waited for his nurse to call me back… momma and I talked on the phone that night for over 2 hours and after we were done my attitude had totally changed… I felt better than I have in a long time, emotionally… the past two weeks I have been receiving things… things that I needed… pushes that I need to take “action”… momma made the comment that taking action is the hardest part of making changes… I had also read that recently somewhere else… I keep receiving the same “messages”/thoughts… I know what I need to do now I just need to do it… I’m working on that…

Tuesday- the dr. called and I went in at 10:20… he said that when they do the injection they first “wash” the area with a solution of some sort and then they inject the medicine… they watch the whole procedure on x-ray and he said that there was nothing abnormal about mine, it went just as it was supposed too… he said that on very rare occasions though, during the washing process, the washing of the area can actually become more irritated and then when the medicine is injected it doesn’t really work because it was pretty much just severely irritated again… that makes sense… I just don’t understand why it just happened on shot #10… but then again, it’s like I blogged the other day, I’ve been considering going down to the metroplex area to the back institute to see about a more permanent option… so… what to do?!?! My dr. said he would refer me down there if I wanted to go and that they refer a lot of their patients there… plus, I’ve heard and read good things about the back institute… so back to my dr. visit… he explained what he thought was the reason behind the pain… he put me on a 6 day dose of oral steroids… today is my second to last day… day 5 of 6 I suppose… my back is still killing me… it doesn’t feel like it is getting any better…
I have been reading the secret again, slowly and really reading it… at the first part of the book this one guy suggests doing some “exercises” so I jotted them down with the intention of doing them but haven’t had a chance yet…
Also, I get this email… some newsletter I subscribe to but hardly ever read anything out of it but I always look to see what’s in it… n-e-ways, an article caught my eye, I read the blurb and decided to download what turned out to be an e-book… I saved it and then promptly forgot about it…

Wednesday- I worked… my back hurt all damn day…. But when I got off work momma and I went and did a little retail therapy… we went to eat at a chinese food buffet… I had some sushi and fried donuts… yummy, yummy, yummy!!! Then we went to old navy and I was going to buy some new clothes with some of my money from working with km and fam during tax season but momma treated me!! I was so excited… plus, I got some cute shirts!!! You know those clothes that fit good and make you feel good… one of them is already my favorite polo I know… I love it… it’s one of my “it makes me feel good” shirts… while momma and I were at the mall we walked down to one of my favorite stores… I wanted to go down there to see if I could find a gift… I found two good gifts…

Thursday- I worked… once again, my back hurt all day long… after work I went to walmart… it was “cleaning night” but that didn’t happen… I couldn’t tackle the house after walmart… I got home from walmart and kinda pre-cleaned the house… wrapped a gift so I could mail it Friday morning…. And here’s what I was thinking while I was wrapping the gift (this is the continuation of the gift buying from Wednesday)… I am one of those people who normally doesn’t like to buy presents for people unless they tell me exactly what they want… this time thought, I found two smaller gifts that I think my friend will really like… ironically this time, the gift buying wasn’t the problem… the wrapping of the present was… well, the presents had to be shipped and I am not a shipper.. r is the one who packs and gets the box and stuff all ready to ship and I take care of the label and the actual shipping… the box had to go out Friday morning and r wasn’t home from work yet… I looked and looked for a box and could one find one that worked but I wasn’t overly thrilled with it… then I tried to wrap the box in brown paper, I tried to use a paper bag, ghetto I know, but that didn’t work… I had no brown paper at home and finally was just like forget it… normally the wrapping of the present is the easiest part for me… this not this was not the case but that’s ok because I am really excited about the gifts!!!

Friday- I knew it was going to be a low-key day at work … it was.. and it was long… my back hurt and I tried not to put a patch on because I had a massage that night but I had to give in and put a patch on…. The back was bad!!
At work a thought had jumped into my head that I should print out that e-book that I had downloaded the other day… so I did… along with 2 other e-books I’ve had downloaded forever… it is so nuts, the universe is giving me what I need… the tools I need to take action and change what I need to change!! I am so exited… my attitude, for the most part, has been really good…
I went and got my massage last night… it was nice… mary put an ice pack on my lower back and later lightly worked it… it felt so good and last night it felt great!!!

Saturday- today is my cousin’s baby shower but I’m not going because it’s out of town and I don’t know if it would be such a good idea if made the drive because of my back… it hurts… still… I wish it felt like it did last night…. So today is here… I’m going to take it easy… relax… use my ice pack…

I have been trying to be really super conscious of my thoughts… at the dr. on Tuesday I made a list of “secret shifters” that will/can shift my attitude from negative to positive… I’ve already “used” my secret shifters list twice this week… it works… I’m loving the good attitude… your attitude really does make a difference in how you feel… I guess I’ve always know this but never really gave it much thought… more on all this later though….