A Mother's Musings and Mumblings

I don’t have a lot of friends at work – not because everyone I work with is intolerable but because I seem to lack what you would consider normal regulation when it comes to sharing. Don’t believe me? Read my blog. IRL, I tend to be the same open book I am here – I just put it all out there. You can see where that would make work a bit uncomfortable, can’t you?

In any event, I do have a couple of friends at work with whom I share some common skeletons (or at least closet space for bones of various sorts). One of these friends, Marty, is someone that I have a lot more in common with than either of us would ever admit publicly. Marty is a great source of support for me particularly in the area of drugs. You heard me. Drugs. Marty is one of the few people I can talk to about drug use and be completely understood – he gets it. And when he stopped by for a quick chat and a hug today, I was reminded how much that means to me.

So here goes. I’m going to try to explain to the rest of you what it’s like to be more-or-less regularly reliant on narcotics.

First, notice that I didn’t say “addicted” to narcotics. I do not consider myself an addict and, luckily for me, neither does my doc. I’ll go days/weeks without even thinking about narcotics until I need them. If I don’t need them, I don’t take them. It’s really that simple. Where I behave like an addict, however, is that I *always* know where my drugs are and can get to them quickly. Even when I haven’t taken any in weeks, I still know where the bottle is. Why? Because I do.not.like.pain.

Pain is the driver here. Chronic, unrelenting pain. You know that scale of 1-10 that docs are always asking about (“Where 10 is the worst pain you can imagine”)? Our agreement is that I don’t even try to aim for a 1. In fact, 3 or 4 is the threshold for taking pain meds for me. So even when I’m NOT taking drugs but know exactly where they are, I’m still walking around in pain most of the time. I’m just waiting for the pain to be “bad enough” to do something.

When you talk to most people about narcotics, they think about being stoned or loopy or just plain passing out. This is because narcotics make you sleepy. They’re used as part of the drug protocol for conscious sedation for everything from dental work to outpatient surgery. That makes it hard to talk to people about narcotic use for those of us who rely on them to get through the day. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had someone ask if I was okay to drive after taking narcotics. Truth be told, I’m often better off with the narcotics than I was without. It’s easier to concentrate with 5mg of oxycodone in my system than it is with a Scale 6 headache. And that doesn’t even take into account that pulling my hair can obstruct my vision!

But there’s more to it than the difference between pain and narcosis. Anyone who has chronic pain can tell you, pain makes you tired. This week I slept 12 hours one night only to fall asleep on my desk the next day. I don’t know why, but pain wears you out.

If you’ve followed me so far, this is where it gets interesting.

Marty dropped in just in time to catch me mid-dilemma: What to do about the pain/fatigue issue. I’m in pain and I’m flat out exhausted. If I take drugs, the pain will get better. This generally would wake me up but if I’ve waited too long then all it will do is take the pain away enough that my body will collapse into the sleep it wants so badly. But if I don’t take something then I deal with pain-induced fatigue and brain fog. And I can take a half dose which might not do anything but might contribute to either of the above and if I get more tired/sleepy after half dose is that because I didn’t take enough or I took too much? Really, at that point is pulling one’s hair easier?

Marty didn’t tell me what to do. He just gave me a hug and told me he understood. And really? That was just what the doctor ordered.

So for my friends out there who suffer with me – and you know who you are – consider yourselves hugged. I understand this is a bitch. We’ll all get through it.

Help! I’ve fallen! And I can’t get up!

(That was for those of you who think I’m a drama queen and not a Pagan queen)

I am unspeakably tired. My huge project at work is beginning to roll out – slowly and clumsily – but it is rolling. Thing 2 has is currently out of town with WF. Of course, she’ll get home and head straight over here so he can get work done after his two WEEKS of vacation (I would KILL – literally – for two weeks of vacation) and that will leave me with shopping for school supplies and clothes as well as child care and transportation duty while things at work continue to slowly progress to full speed.

Thing 1 is NOT on vacation with WF, she’s home with me. Last week she was helping with a camp that had some of the most inconvenient hours I can imagine – cutting my work days short. This week she’s not in a camp so she’s hanging out in my office all day so I don’t have to drive the extra hour at the end of the day to get her to the club. Today we had to leave early to get to the orthodontist only to find that WF hadn’t paid his half of the bill this month.

So, cutting my hours last week, this week, paying ortho, school shopping and cutting hours again next week all during the busiest time of my professional life. Why? So that WF’s life works smoothly.

He’s not alone. There are others who I feel I’m keeping afloat. To avoid a fight, I’ll avoid details. The bottom line is that I feel very much like somehow at some point it became my role to keep other peoples’ lives running smoothly.

Really, this might just be a case of teaching an old dog new tricks (this is where I sound like PMS depression but it’s totally off cycle). I’m not accustomed to being rescued. This goes back to, well, let’s see, birth? It was made clear to me then that I was a burden and should be grateful for anything that I received. I wasn’t helped emotionally or financially or logistically with getting my life rolling. School, social events, college from testing to moving in – none of that was supported. And yet, here I am at 43 wishing that for once in my pathetic life someone would actually want to help me manage things. At 43 I have had a full lifetime of watching other people come home and disappear into their own heads while I sort out what needs to be done.

So here I am tonight. I’m home, I’m in pain and I’ve been crying on and off all day. There are dishes and trash to be dealt with as well as sorting out how to scare up the money to pay for the new air conditioner. That’s what it’s going to take to make my life work tonight. But instead I’m going to take something for this pain and cry myself to sleep. Princess Charming is taking the night off. Everyone is on their own for making life work.

I think I’ve discovered the female version of the “midlife crisis.” Men, so the stereotype goes, have a midlife crisis and chase after younger women and faster cars in an effort to relive their youth. I’m beginning to question that. If it were a matter of reliving one’s youth, why wouldn’t women be equally afflicted?

I think it’s something a bit different. Maybe it’s not reliving but a grieving for the road not taken. I understand that, but still question why women wouldn’t have similar reactions to similar feelings. And while I’m sure there are women out there who do, my circle of friends and I are having a different sort of midlife crisis.

Career women all, we’re getting to that age and beginning to question what we want to do when we grow up. Not because we don’t love our jobs – we uniformly do – but because we’ve all learned that our jobs don’t love us. We’ve slaved and sacrificed only to discover that we can go no further – in many cases because we lack penises. We’re underpaid, overworked, and unappreciated. And across the board we’re toying with ideas as drastic as catering, writing and coffee shops as good uses of our advanced degrees.

I think this is the female version of the midlife crisis. Men feel unappreciated at home and seek the attention of younger women to give their egos a much needed boost. Women feel unappreciated at work and find themselves floundering to figure out what comes next.  If anyone figures it out – let me know.

I’m officially “that” age. That age when a woman wears Spanx not because she wants to look hawt but because it’s less conspicuous than ACE wrap and still fills the need to squeeze all the aching spots that need to be squeezed. At least until the Advil kicks in.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go shop for support hose.

I’m back in school this week. For those of you who care to split hairs with me I’ll gladly confess that I’ve never really left school (actually) at least not in any sort of lasting way. Sure, I’ll graduate. But I always relapse.

So this week is a summer course. You read that correctly. This week. One week, one course, three semester hours. AND it’s on a topic that is mentioned frequently at work. It seemed like a good way to get some course credit toward my Ph.D. and learn something that might be helpful at work all while not burning too much precious time. So far, so good.

The class has 13 people in it – a nice, comfortable number for dancing in the moonlight. Being a summer course the demographic is just exactly what you would predict. Twelve public school teachers of everything from grade-school math to high school Spanish all working toward a Master’s or Ed.D. in Administration. And me.

Adult learning theory figures into this course and as an adult learner I’ll take responsibility for my own experience. I’ll also take a moment to acknowledge individual differences and say that I’m an introvert. <insert “Duh”>¬† I don’t like to participate in group discussions (15% of our grade) but I will. The trouble is, how?

Other student comments sound like I’ve found my way into a foreign language immersion course. K-12 education administration is not my forte. I’ve talked to the Witchlets’ school Principal. Does that count? Not so much.

Then there’s the self-consciousness factor. There’s a phenomenon that I’ve seen in the last two classes I’ve taken and it’s heavily at play here today. Education is being compared to Medicine. Education delivery is compared to Health care Delivery. It’s all standards, it’s all evidence-based, it’s all professional practice. And I have to wonder: Are these comparisons made when I’m not in the room? Does health care get mentioned this much in classes where the professor doesn’t have one particular student’s name to associate with it? Introverted minds want to know.

Because if this comparison is made in all the classes that I’m not sitting in but these other 12 students are, then why do I feel a pause after my comments? I’m required to participate in the discussions and yet, 12 people can play off of each others stories and I chime in with my favorite story and the discussion stalls. If I give context, I sound like I’m bragging. If I don’t give context, my comments make no sense. Either way, my comments always leave me sitting here feeling like the odd man out.

Now to put this into context for those who would read into this that my head is in some awful space, it isn’t. I’m outside my zone of comfort but it never lasts for long.¬† I wouldn’t have made it this far as a student if I let my introversion shut me down. I’ll chime in, I’ll let the conversation stall and while I sit in my discomfort I’ll reflect on the fact that the other 12 are reflecting on their own discomfort. We all have our own unique experiences, some of us just end up in situations where we’re more unique than others.

Kinda like being a Pagan in Virginia.

You may have noticed that my ramblings aren’t where they used to be. If you haven’t noticed that then you’re more disoriented than I am or you’re new here. Either way, allow me to introduce you to my new blogspace. I’ve moved over to WordPress and migrated to a different server and while I’m sure that there are still kinks to work out, the blog is up and running in a new location.

Your comments, however, are not. They went into full-scale mutany and refused to be moved from their very comfortable surroundings on the old site. Telling them that the site was going to the Digital Summerlands did nothing to sway them, they stayed. May they long be remembered. Further, may I take this opportunity to implore each of you not to take this personally and to please continue to give me the rich and wonderful feedback that I’ve come to rely on you for.

Trust me, I have no intention of migrating this blog again anytime soon!

It began with a three-hour car drive followed by a leisurely couple of hours hanging out in Washington National Airport listening to the news. Farrah was dead; Michael was working hard to catch up. Iran might as well not have existed.

A short flight north left us sitting at another airport for a bit while the crew waited for a plane to arrive. It would seem that the rate-limiting step in getting a flight off the ground is to have a aircraft. Not to worry, only 90 minutes late and we were en route to Amsterdam. The fellow in the seat ahead of me bore more than a faint resemblance to the southern end of a northbound horse but once I was asleep that didn’t seem to bother me much.

Neither did Iggy’s snoring. He wanted to sleep on the plane and so I’d given him a little pharmacological support. It worked. Well. So well, in fact, that he didn’t take me up on the offer to trade him seats half way through the flight. Both flights Iggy sat in the middle seat and both flights he had ~ahem~ large men in the aisle seat next to him. Not only is he a trooper, he’s a gentleman.

In Amsterdam I was stunned by the airport security. Seriously, I allowed an hour to get through security at National and we waltzed on through. I had similar expectations for Amsterdam – customs and immigration questions, having to look through the bag – and we walked on through. The things that could have been in my bag! But no one looked. The pity is the worst thing we were smuggling was a bag of peanut M&Ms. More on those later.

From the airport in Amsterdam to Leiden city center is 10 minutes by train. We stood, which was a good thing because despite sleeping on the plane I’m not sure I could have stayed awake. It was a pleasant enough trip ending at the city center. Iggy and I had no idea where our hotel was at so I set off in search of a taxi. Of course, I did this out of nature – strange city, don’t know where I’m at, have luggage, need to get somewhere AND learn a bit of the layout – OH! It must be time to find a cab! Iggy followed but didn’t realize what I was up to until I was talking to the driver already. Right about then I realized that we were tired, hungry, and most of all, cranky.

So what is the first thing that a Pagan Queen does when visiting Holland for the very first time? Anyone?

Yup. Eats M&Ms and takes a nap.

After all, we have two weeks and it’s important to pace yourself.

I never noticed how often I fiddle with my ring until it is no longer on my finger. This afternoon I went to the jeweler today and ended up leaving my ring there to have the prongs fixed because the main stone was starting to get a little loose. Now, I’m finding that my ring finger feels naked, my hands don’t look like my hands anymore. There’s something missing.

This ring has been on my finger since I was 16 years old. It was my great-grandmother’s diamond ring and was given to me by my maternal grandmother for my birthday that year. It’s taken vacations from my hand before, but always short ones and it has always been missed. It is somehow my tie to the history of me, my family, and some distant past. And without it I feel vaguely ungrounded.

Now anyone who knows me well at all knows that my family history reads a bit like a Psychiatry textbook. At least a Psychiatry textbook where Substance Abuse and Pedophiles get more air time than your everyday run-of-the-mill neurosis. Heck, at this point in my life, neurosis doesn’t even blip on my radar. With the possible exception of a particular Drama Princess. Then again, when I think about it I have to wonder if she doesn’t actually have a summer sand castle in the Cluster B sandbox. Or at least visits there often enough to have a bad case of fleas. I think I just hijacked my own blog post.

Digression aside, if that’s the kind of family and history I have then why would leaving it behind at the jewelry store be so disturbing to me? Besides, it’s a thing. A material artifact of my life. So not only am I strangely nostalgic for a dysfunctional past but I’m placing value on something that that can be measured and quantified.

This is the thought that has been nagging at me every time I go to straighten out the ring that isn’t there. Everything I’ve done, everything that has been done to me, is part of who I am today. As much as I would never wish any of these things on anyone, I can’t wish them away from myself. Each and every one of these events, each and every one of these people have carved some part of me and shaped me into who I am.

And I’ve said that before. But why should a ring hold such significance?

My great-grandmother had a diamond ring. She didn’t get it when she got married – she and my great-grandfather were young and poor and a diamond was a luxury. She had a plain gold wedding band with no stone in it. But she always wanted a diamond. It took decades for her to get it – if memory serves, my grandmother was married and had her diamond ring before her mother did. But great-grandma finally got what she wanted for all those long years. She got the symbol of love that she desired.

So when I wear that ring, I’m not holding on to the history of my family and their dysfunction. I’m holding onto decades of holding out for something better. I’m looking down at a symbol of love that one very strong woman knew that she deserved and waited the better part of a lifetime to have. That ring is my medal of honor for making it through the rough times and it is my promise of better things to come.

My eyes are so dry. Sure, the pollen count has been high and I could blame allergies if I’d like. But I have another explanation.

I’ve had my eyes pried open and looking up at all the balls I’m trying to keep in the air – terrified of blinking for fear of dropping something. Now, I’m pretty fair at multitasking if I do say so myself, but I’m feeling a bit stretched. Maybe I’m getting old and tired. But I have this feeling of dread that if one more person adds one more thing to the mix I’m going to lose my grip on everything. So I’m keeping my eyes glued on all the bits up in the air and trying to keep them all moving.

But just for a moment, just here and now, I’d like to play a little pretend game. Let’s pretend that I just walked away. *POOF* What’s the worst thing that would happen? A lot of folks would be pretty upset. A lot of things wouldn’t get done. But all the critical ones would get done eventually and people are upset now so that part is a wash.

So if that’s the case, then perhaps it’s time for me to start looking at exactly what is up in the air right now. Because from where I’m standing it is beginning to feel like some of these things could be dropped – by me – and left for someone else to pick up the pieces.

Maybe, just maybe, this is why both ACOA and CoDA have been mentioned to me in the last two weeks in different settings? A little subliminal advertising from the Goddess?

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Just in case you thought the fact had escaped my notice, what with all the balls in the air, I am aware of the fact that it has been three months since the last entry. It has also been pointed out to me that an update on the health issues mentioned last time might be in order. So, running through the body systems in question:

Boob: The surgeon wasn’t impressed by what he saw on the ultrasound and wanted to see me again in July for a repeat ultrasound. Basically, he thought it looked benign and that was good enough for me.

Butt: I slept through the garden hose and the biopsy was negative. We’ve modified my diet and that seems to have solved things. I’ve done the appropriate controls and added back in the removed items one at a time to confirm that, yes, my body does in fact HATE certain things that badly.

Girlie Bits: I know. Not part of the original post. The Pap came back abnormal. Colposcopy showed an area too large to take a little biopsy of so I went in for a LEEP last week. At this point I’m waiting impatiently for the pathology report. I was told 7-10 days and it has now been 10. OK, I counted calendar days, they may have meant something else. But I’M NOT PATIENT! I’ll post something when I have the results. My guess it will be after the point where I am allowed to lift 15# again (Thursday) but before I’m allowed to go swimming (a month). Argh.

I have a new mantra with Thing 2: “Shut up and go to law school.” Seriously. We went out today for a girls’ day out and I just stood back and watched. My favorite came at the end of the day. All I could do was to watch the floor and try not to laugh as Thing 2 had this conversation with her unsuspecting victim:

UV: Are you in school?
T2: Technically no because it’s Saturday.
UV: Technically you are because you’re still enrolled.
T2: I guess that’s right. Actually I go to TinySchool.
UV: What is your favorite class?
T2: I can only tell you what my favorite has been so far. They have lots better classes as you get older so I think it will change.

Small talk really is an art form. Do you think it can be taught or should I just give up now?