Can a person smile too much?

Should I be worried that I’m so freaking happy lately? Like the last several months, I feel just elated much of the time. I mean, I have my moments for sure, this isn’t perpetual, but …I’m generally happy a lot now  I went to my first Chem lab this past Thursday and had to walk a good distance from where I parked to where the building was. On my way over I was thinking “What if I can’t do it? What if I’m huffing and puffing by the time I get there?” Guess what? I wasn’t breathing hard, I hadn’t broken a sweat (it was FREEZING cold so no surprise there). I felt like a normal person by the time I got to the building.

We had to meet our professor in a classroom before heading up to the lab and I spent some time talking to some students outside as we waited for him to arrive. No worries about whether anyone was looking at me wondering what the circus freak was doing there…I didn’t even think about it until later; that I hadn’t been bothered about what anyone might have been thinking about me. I had Erik take a joke picture of me on my “first day of school” that I was going to share on the blog, but uggh, it was ugly lol so I chickened out so I guess I was worrying about what you guys would think.

When the professor got there, we walked in the classroom to see desks with the chairs attached; horrors! I was sure I wasn’t going to fit. I debated walking to the very back so that if I had trouble nobody would see, but for whatever reason I just bit the bullet and sat in one of the front desks and guess what? I fit. Granted, it was a somewhat snug fit, but not uncomfortable at all. I grinned like a stupid Cheshire through the whole class. I seriously had to remind myself to STOP SMILING LIKE A LOON! I’m sure the professor is bringing mace with him next time, I probably freaked him out.

I couldn’t help it though. I sat there, after walking across part of the campus, standing outside the room for half an hour talking to students and then sitting in the desk thinking “I am at school! I am doing this! I am living my life again” and that silly smile would pop back up on my face. I was giddy, it was ridiculous, but I tried to act as normal as I possibly could ;) I don’t think anyone caught on that I was on the verge of breaking into song and doing a little impromptu tap dance on the professor’s desk. I hide it well apparently.

How cute is this though? Before I leave, Erik gives me a 10 minute lecture on safety. He wants me to park in the parking garage and walk to the building and then walk back so I’m sure I know the way. When I’m walking, I need to be aware of my surroundings at all times. If possible, walk back with another student. Then he breaks out this flashlight thing on his keyring and illustrates that it is also a rape whistle. I mean, he actually puts the thing to his lips and blows it for me to demonstrate proper usage. I was also instructed that I was to call him when I was on my way to my car and then again after I got to the car and was on my way home. I’m surprised he didn’t teach me a few self defense moves while he was at it bless his heart. If he could have driven me, he probably would have. I just smiled my ever present goofy smile and said “Aww, are you worried about me?” He was a little put off that I wasn’t taking his lecture seriously lol *puts serious face on* “yes sir!”

Nahh, I’m not going to worry about being too happy. I have many reasons to smile these days.

What does Elvis have to do with anything?

Ok, so at least one person was fairly upset at my assertion yesterday that Elvis may have been gay. Another held up comments by other actresses who claimed he was a great lover, etc. I still say there is plenty of room to question his sexuality. I probably could have said the same thing about Erik until I discovered graphic examples of what he truly preferred sexually. I'm not going to debate the Elvis thing because it's really only my speculation.

One thing that I've been struggling with lately, and it actually is quite common in straight spouses, is almost a type of homophobia. You can ask anyone that knows me...I was probably the least homophobic person in their circle. As a matter of fact, in college, I wrote a speech arguing for Gay Marriage (back in the early 90's) and afterwards, I had some hard core texan good ol' boys come up to me to say that although they didn't agree with gay marriage, my speech had really gotten them thinking. What is ironic is I remember practicing my speech for Erik of all people. It is times like that I have to think "WHAT was going through his head at that time?" What was he thinking as he heard me give this speech knowing that he had this SSA? At this time, we were both about 22. God, I can't help wondering "what if he had just broken down and told me then?" How different our lives would have been.

So, back to being homophobic. I know it is irrational, but I guess some of my anger at this whole situation gets unfairly transferred to the entire gay population. Gay people I know, I'm alright with. It is the gay person I don't know...some friend in Erik's new circle of friends...some stranger I happen to interact with on the rare occasions I'm out. It is those people I feel myself directing some of my anger too. I KNOW it doesn't belong there which is why I try to be as aware of it as possible, but it is difficult to get past sometimes.

I joke now that "I SEE GAY PEOPLE." And I do, pretty much everyone is assumed to be gay unless proven otherwise now. I don't trust my own judgement which is probably another reason why I'm not in any hurry to get involved with anyone anytime soon. Someone commented that Erik wasn't the only one who could date...that I could too. I know this, but ...I don't know...I feel like I was so completely DELUDED about the sort of relationship Erik and I had. I knew something was wrong, but on the other hand, I romanticized SO much about our relationship....we were meant for each other, etc...maybe I was trying to find meaning or give meaning to some of the things that just didn't add up. Honestly, most gay people are just as appalled that someone would marry someone without being upfront about their SSA. What is really frustrating though is that whenever this sort of situation is addressed publicly...everybody feels all this empathy for the GAY spouse and I just don't get that at all. The GAY spouse was the coward, the liar, the person who defrauded an innocent woman or man and wasted the best years of their lives (for the most part) in a marriage they KNEW they had no business being in. The straight spouse is often an afterthought. I will never understand why people are so often inclined to feel all this compassion for the gay spouse.

Part of me wants Erik to find someone, fall in love and FEEL the attachment, connection, etc with another person. I want him to find some man that he can finally have that TRUE connection with,know true intimacy with and then I want him to feel the crushing heartache as the relationship unravels. I want him to know the devastation of having someone he loved as deeply as he's ever loved anyone reject him and toss him aside. And I hate myself for feeling this way.

This is where I find myself lately...vacillating between the relationship we have now and the detritus and fallout of what was. Simultaneously forgiving him and crucifying him over and over and over again. Maybe I need to see about talking this out with a therapist or something. Someone who can help me sort through all these feelings and put them behind me once and for all because I really really really do want to get on with my life.

Wow! I had NO intention of going HERE today. I've sat here for the last 5 minutes struggling with my finger hovered over the delete button, but I'm going to go ahead and just post it.

As a mini update on things: I didn't hear back from the doctor today so we'll see if she gets in touch with me before the end of the week.

TODAYS CHALLENGE: is from T.S. I walked circles around my kitchen island while dinner was cooking this evening. Granted, it wasn't for very long, but it beats sitting in a chair :) Thanks everyone for the challenges so far! Keep them coming. I'm off the next two days so I'm going to get an actual jar made up and will add your challenges as I get them.

CHALLENGE ME TODAY!!

I guess it's fitting...

since I'm counting on 2010 being the year of changes for me (it's either put up or shut up as far as I'm concerned), Erik is making changes of his own. Apparently tonight, on what would have been our 15th anniversary, he has his first date with a guy. He's trying to pass it off as a casual get together with an old friend, but I could just tell by the look on his face and the "casual" way he tried to make it sound that there is more to it than that. His friend is gay...he's gay...there will most likely be beer or some other hard(no pun intended) beverages involved, they are watching a movie together at this guy's house....how do you guys think this sounds?

He knows I've been somewhat depressed over our "anniversary" coming up, I really can't tell you why. I did fairly well last year...I almost forgot it was our anniversary (which is hard to do when you do something stupid like get married on new year's eve), but this year has been hard. Maybe because it was always kind of a milestone in our heads. We used to talk in terms of how far from 40 we were....we'd be married 15 years, Tanner would be almost 15 years old...etc. It was always so hard to fathom what our life would look like at 40. I can guarantee you I never thought it would look like this.

Anyway, him having his first date shouldn't really matter much. It isn't as if I would have wanted this marriage anymore if he stayed celibate for the rest of his life. Why then do I feel physically ill every time I think about him taking this next step?

I just talked to him about it and supposedly it isn't a date. Just two gay guys getting together for a movie and an introduction to World of Warcraft. A friend of mine on the SSN list I'm on said the following which got me laughing:

"2 gay guys, alone, watching a movie over NYE? No party? No Celebration? No Dancing? Sounds like a damn date to me. Either that or an incredibly sad night."

Hehe, thanks Kev. Whatever this is...it is what it is. I guess it is better than having us two home together trying to avoid the elephant in the room (and I don't mean ME for once ;)

Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

It's a Wonderful Life?

Ok, I just had a God moment I think. I’ve been mulling things over since my last post. If you read my blog with any regularity, you have probably noticed a few patterns. First, I’ve had some crappy things happen to me. Second, I’m sometimes willing to take an honest look at myself and how I’ve managed to get to where I am today. Third, I just LOVE to pull out the violin every couple of posts and whine and complain and throw a grand ol’ pity party for myself. It is kind of a warped little dance I’ve been doing all year. I think the great thing about my blogging is that there is PROOF out there now; proof that I can’t ignore when it’s convenient. Proof that shows me that yes, while I have made some progress in some areas over the last decade or two…I still have a lot to learn. There is still a LOT of room for growth…and I’m not just talking about my weight. We all know that my weight is a symptom of much BIGGER struggle I have going on in my head.

The other day, I read a friend’s blog. She never fails to put a smile on my face, whether I’m reading her blog or chatting with her via msn. It is kind of ironic honestly, because as funny as she is…there have been many times in the time I’ve known her that she hasn’t always told me what I wanted to hear. We work together and when things between Erik and I started to go south, she was the one that really helped strip my blinders off. She helped me see all the excuses I was making for him and for myself and was relentless in forcing me to see things as they really WERE and not the way I was trying to imagine them to be. Until recently (when I gave her a link to my blog) I don’t think she had ANY idea about the extent of my weight problem and I was really ashamed to share the link with her. I even asked her not to read it until I was ready and as far as I know, she honored that request (I gave her the ok a few months ago). She hasn’t really said anything about the blog or about the realization that I am a ginormous fatty(we don’t work together as often as we used to so maybe it’s because of that…I find it hard to believe she would hold back if she truly had something to say ;) . To be honest, I wasn’t so embarrassed about her learning how much I weighed, seeing actual pictures, or reviewing my gargantuan measurements. I was ashamed because she was going to see my overwhelming and pathetic penchant for wallowing in my problems. Now I say she hasn’t really said anything about my blog, but today I think she told me just what I needed to hear…more on this later.

As ashamed as I am about my weight, I am truly probably more ashamed that I will turn 40 next year and while I may have moments where I can recognize my own part or responsibility in where I am at today, I haven’t quite figured out how to USE these realizations to move me PAST my problems; which brings me to this recent post of hers. I would encourage you to go read it for yourself, but here’s a little synopsis: Basically, she wrote about “It’s a Wonderful Life” and how she’s always had a problem watching it; not because it was sappy and at times saccharine, but mainly because, in typical Tammy fashion, she saw things in it that many other people missed: the fact that George had an awful lot to do with his current situation. George made decisions and choices throughout his life and those choices set him, as much as any circumstances outside of his control, on the path that led him to where we see him at the beginning of the movie. I read that and immediately felt the bright glaring spotlight of shame focused on my own glaring culpability in my current situation.

The weight is easy. I’m fat because ultimately, I make choices about what I’m going to or not going to put in my mouth and most of the time, I choose poorly. I also choose to not go to the gym or even do little things around the house that might slowly begin to build my strength up. Granted, I have a lot of crap in my head that often defeats me, but ultimately…the responsibility is on me. I choose to give into it all. I allow it to overwhelm me and defeat me. Even that is a decision I make.

Let’s talk about some other decisions I’ve made that have gotten me to where I am. First, I fell in love with Erik. I knew from the beginning that something wasn’t quite right. It took us two years (as good friends) with subtle and most times not so subtle chasing on my part to land him. That probably should have been my first clue. Once we were together, there were plenty of other signs that I chose to ignore. Regardless of anything Erik did in this situation, I made many decisions and really almost “forced” our relationship in a direction it wasn’t going in naturally. I didn’t get pregnant on purpose, but since we all know Tanner wasn’t immaculately conceived, I think we can agree that I should accept my part in creating him.

The financial problems we have encountered have also largely been due to our own choices. Yes, we have had oodles and oodles of medical bills and other unexpected things come up, I’m fairly certain that if we hadn’t been living way beyond our means for quite some time, things wouldn’t be quite as desperate as they are now. We would have been in trouble, but I think we could have dug our way out by now.

So yes, in many ways, my life sucks, but ultimately I think the thing that sucks the most is that I have to cope with the fact that I am the biggest reason it sucks; not erik, or Tanner, or my mom dying or whatever else I latch on to periodically to distract myself from the reality of my situation.

So these are things I’ve been mulling over since reading Tammy’s post. Flash forward to today…I get a call from my grandfather (hi papa :). He called to tell me he was sending money for Tanner’s Christmas, we talked about his upcoming wedding next March and how I was going to try to get Tanner and I up there around that time and somehow we ended up talking about my blog. Basically, he mentioned that he had read my last pity party (my words, not his) and felt like he needed to remark on some common threads or patterns he’s seen in the weave of my blog over the last year. I’m sure you can guess what they were. He acknowledged that while I can at times have moments of crystal clear self realization where I am open to accepting my part in the way my life has turned out…I also have many moments where I slip back into these periods of stagnation which keeps me stuck in this warped little static cha-cha you’ve watched me do all year. There can’t be any real growth because every time I take one step forward, I lose ground again. I set goals and then almost immediately lose sight of them and fall back into old patterns…the same old patterns that got me right to where I am today. Here is where I could come up with a bunch of excuses WHY I lose ground, but come on…you’ve heard them all before and in the end, you and I both know they are irrelevant. If I want to change my circumstances, I am the only one with the power to do that.

In the end, I thanked my grandfather for his advice, we said our goodbyes and, pondering the last bit of our conversation, went to check my email and there…like a period at the end of that conversation with my grandfather was Tammy’s comment on my last blog. You can go read it for yourself, but once again…I had to smile. I don’t know if it is God or fate or what, but someone or something is definitely trying to slap me upside the head this morning. Thanks Papa and Tammy for giving me the swift kick I needed. Here’s hoping I can keep my eye on the prize this next year and actually make some progress towards my goals.

Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

The scale is calling me

It's been calling me for a week. I know where it is. It isn't difficult to get to, but somehow I keep forgetting to pull it out and step on it. Part of me is worried I'm going to get the big "E" which means "EEEEEK you are too damn fat for this scale, please exit the platform." I have a feeling I may have gained some weight in the last few weeks. I feel like I have. I've been fighting a depression the last month or so and while I've made some gains emotionally, I think I've been resorting to old habits to cope with the depression.

The holidays pretty much suck for me nowdays. I lost my mom on Thanksgiving back in 2002 so every year I have to cope with that anniversary. Add to that the fact that I have NO family around me (outside of Tanner and Erik's family) and the holidays overall just seem like a non-event anymore. I feel bad, because Tanner gets shortchanged too. Our house is too small for a real tree so we have this sad little charlie brown Christmas tree on a coffee table downstairs. We haven't even bothered decorating it. I also have my 15th wedding anniversary coming up this New Years Eve. Both Erik and I really stopped counting our anniversaries back in 2008 since that is when we officially decided we were splitting up. The only reason we are still married really is because we are too poor to get a divorce.

I was talking to a friend yesterday about my grief over my marriage resurfacing and how difficult it was to understand it because I knew that I would never take Erik back and ...just for the record...I'm pretty sure Erik has NO plans on trying to come back (to the marriage...he lives with us, but you know...it's complicated lol) 20 years of wondering why I was never enough for him was quite enough for me thanks. We have a much better relationship now that all that pressure is off to keep a fake marriage going while ignoring the elephant (which wasn't ME btw!) in the room.

In talking to my friend yesterday, I realized that what I think I was grieving most about was that I really didn't have a chance to fight for my marriage. The fact that he is gay means there is absolutely nothing I could have done to save my marriage (short of growing a new appendage and taking steroids to get the kind of physique he is apparently attracted to). When I was thinner, I just thought I wasn't good enough of a person for him...and even though I was in fairly good shape, I always felt like the "fat girl" so I guess I probably still blamed how I looked even then. As I gained weight, our relationship actually improved; probably because I wasn't pressing him for sex or getting upset at the lack of physical affection he failed to show or initiate.

I don't want you to think that Erik was a jerk. He wasn't and he isn't. He is a really great guy who made all the wrong decisions for the right reasons. He was trying to live the life he felt was moral. The life his family wanted for him. He got me pregnant trying to convince himself he was straight and then married me because it was the right thing to do. He was always a great father and a great friend, but I realize he was never really a husband to me. Not in the way that separates a great friend from a great husband. I'm not just talking sex here...I'm talking about the fact that I realized the other day that I have never had a man look in my eyes, tell me he loves me, and MEAN it the same way I MEAN it. I've never had a man be just as happy to be with me as I was to be with him. I've never known THAT kind of love and I sometimes wonder if I ever will.

Of course it could be a lot worse. For the time that we were married, I had a man that I enjoyed being around, was a great father, good provider for the most part and yes....he did love me, still loves me...just more of the brother/sister kind of love and not the passionate sort. I know many other couples who have that passion, but every other aspect of their marriage sucks! All in all, if I had to chose between the two, I'd probably choose Erik all over again even knowing what I know now. Of course, if I had ever had the choice between Erik and a happy and healthy relationship with a straight man, I would have chosen the straight man hands down and kept Erik as my fabulous gay best friend.

Tanner, in his uncanny ability to pick up on my emotional state, broke my heart the other day. Erik calls him from work on his lunch break and out of absolutely NOWHERE, Tanner gets on the phone with him and says "I don't want you to break up." Not knowing what he was referring to, Erik said "What do you mean you don't want what to break?" Tanner said "I don't want you to break up with mommy" and started to cry :( Wahhhhh I have no idea where it came from, we haven't talked about anything like this recently and hadn't prior to him talking to Erik that evening. Erik did a great job of reassuring Tanner that we would always be there for him no matter what happened between Erik and I, that he would never have to choose between us, etc. In the end, Tanner was somewhat satisfied, but I think it was hard for both Erik and I to see him struggling with the concept.

Ok, well guess this is proof that blogging helps because I think I'm in a much better frame of mind at the end of this post than I was at the beginning. Someone recently told me to count my blessings when I asked how to get through a rough holiday season. It seems so obvious doesn't it? Almost cliche, but when I read her suggestion it really did help. Instead of focusing on what I don't have this holiday season, count my blessings...Tanner is doing great in his new placement at school, Erik has a new job he loves, I have good friends around me and great blogging buddies who put up with my sporadic posting style.

Btw, I am very grateful to those of you who still read and comment despite my obvious neglect (both in posting and commenting and reading your blogs). In the past week, just getting a comment now and then actually helped me pull my but out of bed on my days off so that I could get a few things accomplished around the house.

One more update: the craft fair didn't happen. I spent weeks upon weeks preparing for it then the morning of, Erik got sick and the friend that was going with me had a domestic issue and I couldn't manage getting there and setting up on my own. I probably should have tried, but to be honest....I was scared....scared because I didn't know how far I was going to have to walk, could I unload the car by myself without having a heart attack. If I did manage it, was I going to be in any shape at the end of the day to pack everything back up, etc. For some reason, the person that could muster up the courage to carry a folding chair through Hobby Lobby took a holiday that morning. I stayed home rather than expose myself to some embarrassment at not being able to manage it on my own. This probably triggered the following week's depression to because it is yet another time my weight has limited my independence :(

Ok, enough of that! I was on my way to ending this on a positive note and I still am dammit! There is a Christmas party at Tanner's big brother's church tonight and he invited all of us. As usual, part of me doesn't want to go for all the reasons I didn't go to the craft fair, but I may force myself to go anyway. I'm sure it will be fine and I'll enjoy spending some time with Tanner OUTSIDE the darn house.

I'll let you know if courage wins out over cowardice tomorrow.

Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

I'm still here

I know I've been a very bad blogger. I'm definitely not going to be on Santa's good list of bloggers this year. Only coal in the cyber stocking for me :( I apologize though. I have just been very busy trying to get ready for this craft fair while working two jobs. Believe it or not, I am *just* now getting over the problem I had with the cyst that took forever to heal. I seriously never thought it would finally close completely but this past week it did. I am going to get back into the doctor just to make sure it is all ok, but it feels 100% better so I'm optimistic.

I meant to get on yesterday, but I actually ended up out shopping with my friend Shannon. YES! I actually got out of this house for the third or fourth time this month can you believe it? I wore makeup and everything see

We had to go to hobby lobby to get some stuff so that I could finish a twilight calendar I've been working on. I'll post some pictures when I get it done...so far, I really love how it's turning out and I'm not even a big fan of twilight.

You can see a few other things I've been working on at my etsy shop. I haven't uploaded much because I want to take most of it with me to the craft fair. Even with all I've finished, I still won't have much to actually sell, but I'm going to have some examples of my work, so at least I'll get my name out there a bit.

I'm still working on my website, but feel free to take a look and let me know what you think.

Erik recently got another job so that is the BIG news at our house lately. I've been begging him to get a second job for a while, but for various reasons, it just kept getting put off. I had a mini nervous breakdown the day he was contacted about this most recent job. He hadn't been good about changing out the filters in our A/C so when it stopped working, we called the landlord to fix it. Landlord realized it wasn't working because of the clogged filters. Landlord sends us a bill for $125.00. I was going through quite a bit at work and when he came in to tell me about the bill we got, I told him that I was done. I can't handle shouldering a majority of our financial needs anymore. I was tired of never being able to save any money because I was the only one that ever had the money to pay for tanner's school clothes or hearing aid repairs, etc. I literally packed up shop in the middle of the day and crawled back into bed. The next day, he got this incredible new job working as a Deaf Support Specialist (lucky for him lol...I finally told him that if he didn't get it, he was going to have to flip burgers somewhere, find something!!) So far, he loves it. I can't wait until we have more money rolling in though.

It will be nice to not have to live paycheck to paycheck. Honestly... it was getting to the point where our paychecks (due to various things) weren't even enough to pay our bills. He had missed a bunch of work at his main job due to stuff going on with Tanner, me being sick, etc so we had at least two pay periods where he didn't really bring home anything. My job has slowed way down and since most of my pay is commission, it meant that my paychecks were almost half what they should have been. It has been a looooooooooooooooooooong time since we've really had something good happen for us I almost forgot what it was like to be optimistic lol. Now, I'm budgeting and trying to prioritize how we are going to get ourselves out of this financial mess we are currently in. Keep your fingers crossed for us :)

Tanner is doing SO well at school. He's enjoying himself, making new friends, loves his teachers. That is some pretty awesome news for us too considering how the year started off. We were able to cancel our contract with the lawyers (which they were nice enough to do for us) which saved us $750.00.

I haven't weighed myself, but I don't feel like I've gained. I probably haven't lost, but I'm definitely getting more active lately. It is just what most would consider ADL's, but for me, it is activity that I haven't incorporated into my routine for quite some time. Believe me, if you aren't used to standing on your feet for periods of time, a trip to the store is quite an outing for you. I'm also working on strengthening right now, doing squats a few times a day and other exercises to strengthen my legs. I'm working on standing for longer periods when I do stuff around the house (cooking, cleaning). If we can take care of a few things financially, we hope to take Tanner to Disneyland some time next year and if I can't go on the rides because of my weight, I want to at least be able to walk as much as I want without the problems I have to endure now. So, that is my motivation at the moment...long term that is. Right now, I'd like to just be able to take over other stuff Erik's been doing like grocery shopping. It's probably crazy, but I really miss going to the grocery store. I love to cook and I really miss not being able to pick out everything myself. I guess we'll see...I've said this (or something like it) before. I guess I just need to keep plugging away...maybe eventually I'll get my butt in gear and make some progress.

How is everyone else doing? I need to catch up on my blog reading, I'm way behind!

If you don't have something nice to say...

NOTE: most of this is bitchy and depressing Michelle. If you come for the laughs, skip to the bottom :)
---------------------
So I kept saying I’d blog when I had something nice to say. Today I figured I better just blog. This is probably going to be one long rambling vent, but what’s new?

Let’s start with the fact that I am back up to 440 after finally making it back town to 436. Why? No clue. Outside of about 4 tortilla chips I had when we went with Tanner’s lawyer to lunch after the hearing, I have not gone off the diet at all. The Mexican place we go to often has whole grain tortillas that I’ve probably been enjoying a little too often, but I called them today after weighing myself to see what the carb count was; Supposedly its 3g. I don’t know if that is before or after fiber or if it’s even accurate. Let’s face it, they can tell me whatever they want really. Outside of that and a few low carb beers now and then, I honestly can’t tell you what might be doing me in. I haven’t felt like I’m in ketosis though since making the tortillas more of a staple in my diet so I’m going to just discard those and see how I do.

Erik and Tanner made a concerted effort to support me in low carbing by actually eating low carb, but then erik got sick a few days ago and I think it was maybe easier for him to throw in the towel. I can’t blame him really, I’ve thrown in the towel on a diet for less. Tanner hasn’t been especially pleasant to be around and he can be difficult to handle on a good day. When you are not feeling good, the last thing you want to do is argue with him about what he’s going to eat. I just told Erik that we can’t have him low carbing with one regular/low fat meal a day or his body will never get into ketosis which will mean him eating low carb occasionally is really just feeding him a high fat diet. He will gain weight unless we have him on a low carb diet all the time.

We’ll see what he does when he’s feeling better though…I really don’t think Erik wants to be on a low carb diet. He still acts completely puzzled about what he can and can’t eat and honestly, sometimes it just irritates me because I know he hasn’t googled “low carb” or tried to figure it out on his own. I’ve sent him direct LINKS to information and based on his questions and other things he “thinks” it’s ok to eat, he hasn’t read them. This is the first time he’s put this much effort into changing over to a low carb eating plan so I’m going to give him the credit and hope that he gets back on the wagon with me when he’s feeling better. I really do think he wants to support me as much as he can.

We had the hearing on Monday and will meet again in a month to see how the new options go with Tanner. We basically moved him into the AI classes (where most of the deaf kids are) to see if that helps. I’m kind of excited for him because I know he will pick up more signing and I think it’s important for him to be around other kids with hearing loss. I can’t tell you how glad I was when I walked into that hearing with our advocate. I’ve been to many many many ARDs in his educational life, but something about this one was intimidating. The man who was running the disciplinary hearing was an ass. It wasn’t so much what he said, but how he said it. He definitely didn’t care what was in Tanner’s medical file and had already decided that whatever was in there didn’t matter. He pronounced Tanner guilty and recommended 30 days in the alternative school which is basically the school equivalent to “jail.” I was very glad to have the advocate with us even if it meant we had to pull $300 out of our ass.

See, this is a dirty little secret I’ll clue you in on. Eventually, most of these kids wind up in jail. They spend their childhood ignoring them, passing them around in school, putting band-aids on things until the kid moves on and becomes somebody else’s problem. There is very little help for you when your child has mental illness or brain injury. If they were visibly sick and miserable, maybe we could make a commercial to solicit the help they and we, as parents, need. You know, something along the lines of St Jude’s or one of those “Feed the Children” ads; the sort of ads that reach into your gut and stay with you unless you pick up the phone to give a few bucks. We all know that’s really the only way we can get back on with our lives…give and forget.

Unfortunately, I don’t think our children would elicit the same response. If we invited a film crew into our home, they wouldn’t see a child who was weak and lethargic, fighting for survival. They would see children completely out of control through no fault of their own; trying to cope in a world that is inexplicably 100 times harder for them to live in than it is for anyone else, but of course it wouldn’t LOOK like that. They might see the parents struggling to hang on to their own sanity, struggling to make it through one . more . day…sometimes just trying to make it to the next hour. They’d probably shut off their televisions around the time they saw my son banging his head into our ceramic tiled entry way as hard as he possibly could after what had already been a full-day meltdown. If they weren’t around to witness that, they sure wouldn’t see me crying my heart out in the shower and dreaming about a myriad of ways I could just end it all. When you have all your hopes and dreams crushed and then the world continues to heap more shit on you, it’s very hard to “keep on keepin’ on”; especially when you know you really just have more of the same to look forward to tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, and the day after…

Oh no, people turn off their TV’s for stuff like this; either that, or they tune in in droves, but only if it’s billed as “reality” programming. Then they can point fingers and wince and thank their lucky stars their kids are “normal.” They don’t like it if we try to get them to sympathize with us; oh no, because mental illness and these types of behavior disorders are one of the last great taboos. It’s why most of our children are filling the juvenile detention centers and prisons of the nation and the other half are walking the streets lost and homeless.

So, what happens to these kids when they are too old for the schools? We incarcerate them of course. It is supposedly much more cost effective to funnel them into the criminal justice system than actually PAY for the mental health care they need or the ongoing support they need. If you don’t believe me, read this .

In Texas, something like 75% of children in the Juvenile Justice system have special needs. If you really want to know what life is like when you are struggling to survive every day with a child like this (not to mention the actual child who is simply struggling to live their life the best they can with the very crappy hand they were dealt), read this too . The first paragraph basically sums up our lives for the last decade or more:

“The tragedies of school violence around the nation have alerted all of us to the risks our children face. While national consciousness of the pressures our kids confront has been raised, I worry that the enormous difficulties that children with serious mental illnesses and their families confront day in and day out, year in and year out, are being overlooked. The results of this survey of families with youngsters with disabling mental disorders show without question the barriers these families face just to obtain basic and necessary medical treatment. NAMI's survey reveals the struggles these families must endure to get essential education for their children and much-needed supports for the whole family. As the title rightly states, so many of these families are on the brink of survival. The suffering that this report gives voice to deeply saddens and outrages me, not only because these are the voices of mothers and fathers who must try to comprehend why their loved one, their child, has a brain disorder, but because they find themselves all too often having to fight for every shred of medical attention, school system support, and acceptance from their neighbors and friends. In the face of this struggle, they confront the unimaginable but all-too-real risks of family dissolution, financial bankruptcy,
wrongful imprisonment of their child, and even the prospect of having to give up custody of their child just to get him or her treatment.”

I’m sorry to be going on and on about this. I really hadn’t planned on getting on my soapbox. Believe me I had LOADS more I was going to bitch about in this blog. Perhaps it was having a creditor who is calling me every 15 minutes, all day long for God knows what bill immediately following the week my car is repossessed sprinkled with bits from the email I just got from our educational lawyers saying that they’d be happy to go on representing us; we just have to pay them $750.00 on top of the $300.00 we already owe them which effectively exhausts all money I had set aside to file bankruptcy. Sometimes, I honestly feel like I’m the ONLY person that even thinks about where all this money is going to come from and I am about to freaking SNAP. Of course we are going to find a way to pay them. This is our child we are talking about. This is his futureand unfortunately the government only cares about helping you out financially if you squeeze out a few more kids. If you are sensible and stop when it's obvious the one child you have birthed is going to be quite enough to keep you busy for one lifetime….well then you have to sort it out yourself. So, yes…I will work more hours, take on another job. Put off that trip to my grandfather’s, forget about taking the vacation I hoped I’d be able to take for my 40th. Once again, anything I might have been looking forward to will die a rather slow death and I’ll find a way to keep on, keepin’ on…because what choice do I have?

Needless to say, I went back on my regular dosage of crazy meds today. I don’t know if the way I’m feeling is the normal reaction to all of this CRAP (lord knows I should honestly be immune…this IS my NORMAL for the last 15 years), the dieting, or the reduction in my depression meds. All I know is that the meds are the ONLY thing I can do anything about.

And here I am apologizing because my life sucks. Apologizing for inflicting it on whomever might read this. WHY? I guess I may be guilty of some of the same prejudice I assume is in the rest of the population when it comes to mental illness. Somewhere deep inside I am ashamed of my own battles with depression and my son’s battle with ….well EVERYTHING really.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to use this as an excuse to fall off the wagon; even though I’m not losing a darn thing. At least not today. I DO have a few things going on at the moment that are positive and maybe I’ll feel like posting about them later in the week. For now, let me cheer you up with this humorous exchange between Tanner and Erik upon Tanner’s arrival from school yesterday. Hopefully it will help tide you over until I can work on the next Tales from the Scale.

Tanner gets home: “Hi dad! What are you doing home?”
Erik: “Oh, I’m not feeling good, how was school?”
Tanner digging in his backpack for something: “Oh ok, a girl gave me this today…” handing Erik a piece of paper that’s been folded over and over again. Looking at it, he sees that it says “Boyfrined” (sic)
Erik: hmm, “Who is this from Tanner?”
Tanner: “I don’t know, some girl at school.”
Opening it up, erik sees that it says the following:

Name: Tanner
I love you. Give Hug?
Yes or No

(For the record, “yes” was circled for him.)

Erik: “you don’t know her name?”
Tanner: I think it was “lisa?”
Erik: The note says “Jennifer”
Tanner: “yeah, that’s it. She wants me to be her boyfriend. I told her I’d be her friend, but she said ‘NO BOYFRIEND.’”
Erik: “So what did you say?”
Tanner: Shrugging, “I said sure.”
Erik: under his breath so only I can hear “Sounds like our love story ;)”

I would have smacked him if I hadn’t been thinking the SAME DAMN THING right at that moment LOL! No matter how shitty life is for us, I’m very thankful that we can make each other laugh; even if we are laughing at ourselves. I seriously think we would have lost our damn minds long ago if not for that. Maybe that’s why we ended up together.


Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

I've got a case of the grumpies

Note: This was Written last night. My apologies for not getting up. For the record, we had our hearing today and things were sorted for now. We just have to see what Tanner is going to do.
---------------------------
I’ve been super-extra-mega grumpy all week :(. I can’t tell what is causing it though; lowering my depression meds, all the crap going on in my life, or low-carbing. Really any one of those things could cause a mild case of the grumpies at the very least, but the three of them really is quite the triumvirate isn’t it?

I’ve blogged recently about how I’ve lowered my dosage on the depression medication I have been taking for years now. Previously, I was on a rather low dose to begin with; about half what doctor’s consider a “therapeutic level.” In the last month, I’ve cut that even further by half, so I suppose now I’m on a fourth of the therapeutic dose. Some positive effects of decreasing my meds are listed below:

• More energy
• More motivated to exercise and stay on my diet regime
• More “emotional” overall; yes this is a positive, much better than the same flat affect all the time.
• I feel the DESIRE to get my life back again as opposed to being frustrated with it, yet having no desire to really change anything.

Possible negative effects of reducing my meds:

• I’m grumpy/shorter fuse/less patience
• Sleeping less and not sleeping as good as I did before

I suppose listing them out like that, it doesn’t seem like that bad of a trade off, but then you guys haven’t had the pleasure of living with me over the last few weeks. Poor Tanner has asked me at least 4 times this week why I’m mad so it is obviously apparent to him as well. Of course, he’s one of the reasons I’m grumpy too :/ darn kid!

So, on to the next reason I might have a terminal case of the grumpies: Tanner. We went to have our hearing on Monday, but when they heard we were bringing our lawyers, they rescheduled for tomorrow. So, Erik and I have had another entire week to look forward to whatever is going to happen. Since then, Tanner had another meltdown at school. Luckily nobody was hurt, but he did almost destroy a computer after pushing it off the table and we were asked to pick him up. They suspended him again and he resumed his role as house slave until we can sort this out.

At this point, Erik wants to send him back to his old setting (he went half day to a school for ED kids and half day to a school for severely mentally challenged kids.) Neither one is probably that appropriate for him, but as always….nobody knows what the heck to do with him. He has so many different issues going on (PDD, hearing loss, static developmental encephalopathy, etc.) that he doesn’t really “fit” anywhere. I don’t necessarily want to send him back to the school for mentally challenged kids because he is a smart kid and functions at a much higher level than most of the kids that were in his classes there. He is having a hard enough time accepting his deafness at his age, being in a school where he can tell everyone is mentally challenged only affects his self image even more.

On the other hand, I’m not all that excited about sending him back to the school for the ED kids (emotionally disturbed) because he isn’t necessarily ED (although they’ve hung that label on him for lack of something else). Tanner isn’t the way he is because he’s had traumatic experiences in his life that have affected his mood stability or ability to interact with other people. He has BRAIN DAMAGE that causes his low frustration tolerance and meltdowns. Before he started going to this ED school, we hardly EVER had a problem with him cursing. Now, he has a whole lovely repertoire of words and gestures he employs when he gets upset. He hardly ever uses them at home, but apparently they hear them all day long at school. I just honestly don’t know what to suggest. I guess we will see what happens at the meeting tomorrow as that is something everyone in the ARD committee has to decide on.

So, we move on to the final thing giving me a horrid case of the grumpies….life in general. Getting my car repossessed was no fun that’s for sure. I’m upset because I had been paying on it and would have been happy to continue paying for it, but ultimately they said the only way I’d ever see the pink slip was if I paid off my car AND any other debt I have with them (a mastercard.) I am not proud of the fact that we are in the sort of situation we are financially, but I struggled for as long as I could while Erik tried to find himself and then it just got ridiculous. I’m not completely blaming Erik; a lot of our debt was due to circumstances beyond our control…having a kid in and out of a hospital, not being able to work, selling our house at a huge loss, etc, but it was also due to the fact that we lived beyond our means. It always felt like feast or famine with us. We’d have months where times were very lean and we were paycheck to paycheck and then when we got a little bit of extra money, we’d “treat” ourselves.

We had actually paid our debt completely off several times, it was only the last few years before all hell broke loose with Tanner that we allowed the debt to get out of control. As I mentioned, I was putting Erik through school and we counted on him having a decent job that would allow us to pay everything off once he was done. Of course that never happened so we found ourselves with a mountain of debt. I really think that if Erik had gotten a better job or at least a second job, the extra money would have allowed us to pay everything off, but he didn’t and working 80 hours a week started to wreak havoc on my health. Whatever…..excuses excuses. We all have them I suppose. All I can say is that I will NEVER get myself into this position again! Lesson learned.

I am grateful that at least we still have a car; even if it is a 2000 Toyota Echo that sometimes locks you in and makes me feel like a huge behemoth. I swear, I feel like I’m wearing the darn thing when I get in, but even that is a blessing I think. I’m not comfortable driving the car so it will be even more motivation to continue working towards my goals where my weight is concerned. It still makes me grumpy when I have to shoehorn my behind in the darn thing though. Did I mention it doesn’t have A/C either? Good times…

Lots going on this week, I hope to share some of it as we move along. Let’s just get through tomorrow and see where we wind up. As always, thanks for the support and thanks for reading!

Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

Doggie Diarrhea: The gift that keeps on giving (and other delightful moments in the last 24 hrs)

The crapfest that was yet another 24 hours in the live of the V household started late last night. Getting ready for bed, I remembered that I had to sort out my vpn access for work to ensure that I could login for work the next morning. They are implementing this super secret 007 security something or other that scans our computer every time we try to login. It looks for viruses and ensures that our computer has all the most up to date security updates as well as all kinds of anti-virus software. If one teeny tiny thing is out of place, you are DENIED and then have to spend hours of unpaid time (unless they decide the problem is on their end) trying to figure out why your computer is being shut out. Sometimes there are legitimate reasons for the denial, but 9 times out of every 10, you are DENIED for God knows what freaking reason. This is the boring part of my post so lets suffice it to say that I couldn’t get in last night OR this morning and wasted about half an hour trying to figure out why. Ultimately I logged in through another VPN and started to work.

Tanner woke up shortly thereafter and unbeknownst to Erik, started playing a video game. We had decided that this was a definite no-no and Tanner knew it as well because he left the sound off…sneaky kid. Erik wakes up late and notices what he’s doing and tells him to turn off the video game. Of course he’s like 9 levels in and needs to get to the next level or he loses his progress. Do we care; not in the slightest. He orders him to shut the game down, trying for a gentle approach to begin with (we’ll discuss repercussions for playing the video game when he was told it was off limits in the morning later…after he gets home from school). To say Tanner wasn’t happy about turning off the video game would be a gross understatement. Things devolved into a full out throw down with yelling and screaming, hitting walls, pummeling his head with his fists…good times. GREAT way to start the morning when you’ve about three hours sleep.

Why three hours sleep? Oh, I forgot to mention that Thunder also had another poo party in the kitchen right after midnight. Once again, I smelled the lovely aroma wafting up the stairs and came out to find Erik cleaning it up at 1:30AM. There wasn’t much I could do to help him and when he’s pissed off, it’s best just to stay out of his way, but the tremendous guilt I felt about heading back to bed kept me awake until at least 3:00AM.

We finally managed to get Tanner in the shower, dressed and calmed down enough to take him to school. By the time they left, he had lost video game privileges through Monday, but we explained that he could try and earn them back if he changed his attitude and had a good day at school. Sometimes our optimism knows no bounds.

Erik goes to leave to take Tanner to school and comes upstairs asking me where the keys to my car are. I have no clue and I’m working so I’m not much help. He eventually locates the keys…in the ignition of my car… which is now completely dead. He takes the time to send me AN EMAIL IN ALL CAPS TELLING ME THAT I KILLED THE CAR and sets off for Tanner’s school in his car. You can imagine my joy at receiving the email and the subtle emphasis his capitalization afforded. I send off a quick reply reminding him that the life he’s currently living? Yeah! I get to live it right along with him so if he’s having a crappy morning, chances are I AM TOO! Cut me some slack since the day before I was trying to make it in the house, in the pouring rain with Tanner who acts like he melts in any sort of precipitation; forgive me if I had a brain fart with the keys.

I bet you think the awesomeness stops there don’t you? Well I can assure you it doesn’t! Erik gets home and sees a phone call from the school. Picking up the phone, he finds the Asst. Principal on the line with good news! We ARE going to have a hearing about the incident last week and it’s on Friday!! Yay, we have two days to touch base with our lawyers to see if they feel like providing their services free of charge or in exchange for some really awesome cupcakes as we currently are broke. Guess I know what I’ll be using my bankruptcy money for this time.

After hanging up with the lawyers, I put in an emergency phone call to my doctor explaining that I need some Xanax STAT! I give them a one minute update on what we were coping with TODAY and tell them that if I don’t get something to help me calm down, I’m fairly certain my head will explode. They take pity on me and say they’ll call it in as soon as they can. I hang up the phone and turn to Erik and say “Guess I chose the wrong time to titrate down on the old anti-depressants hmm?” He looks back and yells, “THAT’S WHAT IT IS! YOU ARE COMPLETELY F’ING WITH THE UNIVERSE TRYING TO REDUCE YOUR MEDS AND GOING ON A DIET AT THE SAME TIME! IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!” I calmly remind him that I am also on my period which makes it the ultimate universe f’ing trifecta.

I wound up developing a migraine and slept until about 4:00P, more goodness during a conversation with the VP at the school which resulted in me informing him that Tanner would NOT be returning to school until said hearing and ARD. Tanner gets home from school, erik heads off to the store for some low carb beer and xanax so we can survive the evening. While he’s gone, Thunder takes a huge dump on the berber carpeting next to my bed…Good times. For those of you wanting more rainbows and hearts in my post…I’m pretty sure that’s how rainbows get borned…a nice hearty doggie dump bedside.

Through all this, I’m sure you guys are wondering…did she stay on her diet? You will be happy to know that I did, I also stepped on the scale and saw that I’ve gone from 447.5 to 442.2 since Monday so not much further to go before we can move past my last official weigh in of 438. Taking it second by second at the moment and hoping for the best.

Want to leave a comment? Click on the word "comment" below.

Caught Blue Handed!

Yep, it happened. Why Blue handed? Mostly because Erik and I (me after making it through an entire day and morning on program) resorted to our typical crutch when fate gives us another knee to the groin…FOOD! Just before we got the phone call from the school to pick Tanner up, I had shown Erik a picture of one of those cookie cakes someone had just posted in my feed on FB. I remarked that I felt posting of said picture by a supposed “friend” mandated immediate removal from my friend’s list because they obviously could care less that I was in sugar withdrawals and resisting the urge to cheat when every fiber of my being was crying out for a sugar fix. Then I realized that said “friend” was just innocently posting a picture of her nephew’s birthday “cake” and I should probably cut her a break since she probably had no idea I was back “on the wagon” for the eleventyith-hundredth time this year. Let’s just blame it on low blood sugar shall we?

So, we get this phone call from the school, Erik dashes off to bring our happy wanna-be-felon home, and I sit there in a daze reliving our last tussle with the law. The prospects were not at all humorous at the time, but I’ve had a few days and as we always seem to do, struggle to find humor wherever I can. No matter how inappropriate it might be for a parent to find humor in something so serious, if it keeps us from retreating to our beds for the next month it has to be worthwhile right?

Erik gets home with Tanner, we have a short talk with him where we try to discuss what happened but can see by the glazed look in his eyes that he is comprehending NONE of what we are trying to get across which is pretty typical. Seeing that isn’t working, we decide to restrict him for the rest of his life to the dog crate and tell him we hope he likes bunking with Thunder from here on out. That’ll learn him!

No….of course we didn’t, but it is honestly what I wanted to do with him when he got home…put him somewhere to keep other people safe, but also somewhere I can keep HIM safe as well. *sigh* This kid is going to be the death of me I’m tellin’ ya.

What we did do is take away all his earthly possessions and tell him he was going to be our slave for the next three days. He’s actually done fairly well and helped with all kinds of household projects including cleaning the kitchen, his room, organizing his closet and more. He did most of it with very little arguing even though he knew he wasn’t making a dime off any of the extra chores. One thing we both noticed is how much calmer he is when he doesn’t have video games and TV. This realization also prompted us to drastically limit his time on both once the restriction is lifted.

I’m sure you are wondering where the blue-handed thing comes in aren’t you? Well, once we got him home and up in his room, we were ready for lunch. At that point, I wasn’t feeling any kinds of humorous about the situation. I flat out didn’t care about my diet so I told Erik to go get BBQ for lunch. He came home with BBQ AND two of these HUGE cookie monster cookies (oh yeah, side story: erik read the blog from yesterday and said “Thanks for making me look like a lush! I EAT TOO!” so there you have it folks, Erik is a lush AND a glutton…so sorry to have given you a false impression that he only had one vice…he has two. Is that better Erik?). They were made out of TWO chocolate chip cookies, filled with icing and then topped with more icing in the bluest blue so that it looked like cookie monster’s face. They were probably full of way more trans fats than anyone should eat in a year, much less at one sitting, but WE DIDN’T CARE…I’m tellin’ ya..could care less!

After lunch, like two true addicts, we whip out the cookies and hearing Tanner getting restless upstairs, start to eat them as quickly as we can. Erik finishes first and runs to the bathroom to wash his hands (there was no way to eat this thing carefully ya’ll).
From the bathroom I hear

Erik: “Oh Shit”
Me: “Wha wrng?” I ask with a mouth stuffed with cookie monster cookie.
Erik: “My lips and teeth are BLUE! And it’s NOT COMING OFF!”
Looking at my hands caked in blue icing I utter some kind of non-verbal ???
Tanner from upstairs: Mom? Dad? What’s going on down there, you ok?”
Erik: “Holy fuckballs! He’s coming down, put that somewhere!!”
Sitting there with blue hands and I’m assuming a blue mouth and bright blue teeth
Me: “Where?”
Erik: “Forget it! I’ll go up and stop him and brush my teeth. Hurry up and finish and then take care of your face because you are one hot mess!”

We both start laughing hysterically as he races up the stairs and I try to destroy the evidence as quickly as I can (not before pausing to take pics for the blog though…always thinking about you guys :) I get my pics and then finish it off (you didn’t think I was being literal about destroying it did you?) and head to the bathroom to see what damage it did. Un..real. I looked like a freaking toddler having their first piece of birthday cake instead of the almost 40 year old adult I am. After brushing my teeth and scrubbing my face and hands, I still wasn’t able to get it all off. Luckily Tanner wasn’t being all the incredibly observant and we got away blue-handed! We just won’t talk about the rainbows our toilet saw for the next two days. That would just be gross.

Well shoot: I was going to insert a pic of my blue fingers here, but it's uploading HUGE! It isn't as impressive as I thought it would be anyway. You get the idea though ;) thanks for reading!

A "funny" thing happened on the way to this blog...

I was actually getting a head start on today’s blog last night. I was sitting in my office, sipping a diet coke, working the last few minutes of my shift at my second job and putting the finishing touches on what would have been today’s blog. Erik had just come upstairs to watch a little TV with me before bed when I took another sip of my drink.

For as long as I can remember, I have had intermittent swallowing problems. As much food as I’ve swallowed over the years, you would think that if I was going to choke it was going to be on a twinkie…maybe a big bite of steak, you know…the stuff normal people choke on. Nope, not me..I never choke on food….only on liquids. Erik has made fun of me in the past for inhaling my own saliva and we’ve both joked that I’m going to be the first person to die from saliva aspiration. Last night, I went to swallow and a small bit of coke went “down the wrong pipe” and before I knew it, I was coughing like crazy. I still had coke in my mouth so I remember grabbing my cup, spitting the last bit back into the glass so that I didn’t inhale any more and then …that’s it. The next thing I remember, Erik is standing over me, gripping my hand and calling my name with the most horrified expression on his face.

I felt strange…part of my face almost felt paralyzed and for a second I couldn’t move. I remember looking at him and saying “What?” Part of me remembered coughing and having trouble getting my breath and that crazy part of yourself that is almost embarrassed when you have one of those ugly coughing fits was like “What? Why are you freaking out, I’m just coughing!” but as I came out of it, I knew that something else had happened. Erik kept asking me if I was ok and then said “Michelle, have you had all your meds today? You just had a seizure.” I looked at him for a moment and said “I was just coughing Erik…” he interrupted me and said “Michelle, you dropped your glass, balled your fists up and were kicking your legs and moaning...you had a seizure are you sure you are ok?” Apart from feeling a bit sick to my stomach and being drenched in diet coke, I felt fine. I got up to go change, ended up taking a shower and came back to find Erik sitting in silence in my office. I asked him if he was ok and of course he said “No.” He added that HE felt like he wanted to throw up.

I tried to reassure him and told him that I think the seizure happened because of the lack of oxygen due to the coughing fit. I’ve never had that happen to me before, but when I googled “seizures and lack of oxygen” we learned that you can, in fact, have a one time seizure due to lack of oxygen. I don’t think this helped ease his mind though and part of me felt awful. I realized that he probably thought I was having a stroke or heart attack or something. He said when he saw my hands clench up, all he could think about was Tanner when he had meningitis. Many times when the neurological system is assaulted in some way, the body will posture depending on the part of the brain affected. The arms may flex up towards the body with fists made my tucking the thumbs under the fingers…you probably are most familiar with posturing in people with neuromuscular disorders. With Tanner, his thumbs were tucked into his fists and when Erik saw my hands clench up, I’m sure he had a flashback to when Tanner was sick. I am also aware that Erik probably spends quite a bit of time just “waiting” for something bad to happen to me because of my weight. I felt and still feel like crap because I saw how shaken he was by the experience. I tried to joke it off, because that is what we do in our family…crack jokes about things that just aren’t funny…but he wasn’t having any of it.

This morning he is unnaturally quiet. He said he didn’t really sleep and I actually saw him walk past my office back to bed. *sigh* I realize the seizure wasn’t my fault, and even if I was a size 8, it probably still would have freaked him out, but for about 10 seconds last night, I think he thought he was watching me die. I still can’t wrap my brain around how that must have been for him. I can only imagine how horrified I would have been if the tables had been turned and it had been me standing over him mid-seizure.

I called my doctor this morning and he seems to think that I was right in my diagnosis (what do I need him for when I have the internets lol?). I’ll just see how I do this weekend. If I have any more problems, I’ll either go to the ER or call him on Monday. Poor Erik though…I think I owe him a six pack or something. Was I lying when I said someone should write a sitcom about my life? I can’t even have a normal coughing fit without major drama lol.

Another Rambling Entry..........

I can’t tell you guys how helpful it was to get that monster of a post out the other day. It turns out that I was a bit hormonal which is probably why I was feeling so very low, but I have many days like that and I think even on days when I’m more up, there is a part of me inside somewhere whispering “Yeah, put on that happy face, It may fool others, but it will never fool YOU.”

I also had a crazy thought about trying out for the Biggest Loser….apparently they are having a casting call in my city this Saturday and I had almost jazzed myself up about going. I called a friend who would have probably canceled on me anyway, but I had said that even if she did I was going. And then Erik gave me that look… and said “Are you really going to do that Michelle?” in this tone of voice that was just like it was the most ridiculous thing he ever heard. I guess it is though. I can’t even stand long enough to cook a complete meal right now. I’d probably be their first fatality! In the back of my mind, I was thinking that I would have some time to really try to get myself into decent enough shape if I was selected so that I wouldn’t be so weak. I mean jeez, I used to do kickboxing at 419 lbs just a few years ago…GOD I wish I never stopped going to that gym. I was so strong then and I felt so good about myself.

Part of me was pissed at Erik for taking the wind out of my sails but who could blame him? You guys hear how hard it is for me. I can’t even really do the treadmill right now. Taking a shower wipes me out. He sees me on a daily basis, he knows. Ok, I talked myself out of being pissed at Erik lol.

I am taking Tanner to a hip hop dance class tomorrow. He has become a HUGE Michael Jackson fan in the last week. Seriously, he has been youtubing him and the Jackson 5, he watched the memorial (which was very hard for him btw, he also has a very hard time with death…he’s very sensitive like his mom). As always I’m on the hunt to find some things that will not only get him off the damn couch, but something that he might be able to do and feel good about himself! Some of the things we are considering are hip hop dance class, fencing, drum lessons. Not ALL of those things, probably just one to be honest…I’m not made of money quite frankly.

I’m dreading going to the dance place though. Uggh, I am just anticipating that look on their face when I walk in. I always feel like I have to go into hyperdrive and be super extra likeable so that they don’t continue to look at me with veiled disgust; I hate that. It will actually be the first time I’ve left my house for something other than fast food in…hmm, I seriously can’t remember the last time I left my house. Geez, could it have been as long ago as april? I think it was  Girl needs to get out!

Erik doesn’t want to go with us. I suspect its because he’s slightly embarrassed of Tanner’s weight issues and HUGELY embarrassed of mine. He doesn’t want to be embarrassed, but I know that he is. Erik rarely ever wants to go anywhere in public with me. For the last several years of our marriage and since, he talks his way out of going anywhere he might be seen with this ugly behemoth he married. Even if I just suggest a dinner out, he usually will complain that he’s tired or not up to going out, but I know… All those old feelings of not being good enough just hit me like a ton of bricks every time I suggest we do something together, even a family something, and he finds a way out of it. Sometimes, I feign a migraine or some other malady because I know how he feels and I don’t want to cringe inside the whole time I’m out with him; watching him out the corner of my eye to see if he has that tight lipped expression that says “is there enough distance between us? God, nobody think she’s my wife, nobody think she’s my wife.” He’s always been way more concerned about other people’s perception of him than I have been. I think I had to lose some of that parenting Tanner. I may have mentioned here in this blog somewhere, but I soon learned that when he had a public meltdown, I just couldn’t WORRY about what other people were thinking or I couldn’t do what needed to be done to handle the meltdown appropriately. So maybe my experience with Tanner helped me let go to some degree, my own worries about how I’m perceived. If only it could generalize that a bit more to ME and not just my parenting. All in all, I’m a lot better where this is concerned now than I was in my 20’s, but Id’ be lying if I said I didn’t still care about how I’m perceived because of my weight.

This post kinda seems all over the place tonight lol. Maybe it’s the late hour I don’t know. Thanks again to everyone that has been leaving comments. Please know that while I may not always work up the energy to comment back, your support means so much to me right now and I read EVERY SINGLE COMMENT that comes through. Let me get back on my feet emotionally and hopefully I can start supporting your amazing efforts as well.