Hesitant, Hopeful

I wrote a while ago about what I'm trying to harvest: inner peace, education, and a career transition. You would not believe how powerful it is to put your ideas out into the universe and manifest what you truly want. I've never been good at that, you see. But, I'm starting to see how valuable it is and how valuable I can be, if I believe in myself and share my intentions with the universe. I cannot believe it's taken me 44 years to start believing in myself. 

I've been taking a certification program to learn to be an instructional designer. This last week, I started a new job as an instructional designer at a local tech college (I'll also still be teaching English as an adjunct at a community college). I've rarely been so excited for a job and, so far, this one seems like it'll be a great challenge and stretch me. I've already learned so much, in just one week, I know I'm going to love this job. My supervisors are both experienced instructional designers with some much to teach and share. 

This means that I've managed to manifest two of the three things I said I was striving toward. Now if I could only get that inner peace thing down, I'd be set.

The 23rd was my birthday and, honestly, it wasn't great. I don't mind getting older, I turned 44, and I'm okay with that. There are a lot of people who don't have the good fortune to make it this far. I'm blessed. But, emotionally, it was the hardest birthday I've had in years. I didn't have enough sleep (3 hours) and I felt completely emotionally raw because I've had a really trying summer. I cried, I talked with Matt for a while because he always makes me feel less awful, and after he went to work I slept most of the rest of the day away, only waking up long enough to see the fireworks at 10pm. It was over as quickly as it begun and I was fine with that. 

The fireworks were definitely a highlight, but you know I'll be really impressed when Apple makes an iPhone that can easily capture fireworks... I digress... Since then, I've gotten to thinking that I have plenty to feel great about, too. So I'm going to try to focus on that right now. 

This year, Matt got me the best gift!!! He wrote me a sonnet, then had it engraved on a pretty acrylic block. I won't lie, when he gave it to me (a week early), I bawled like a baby for like an hour. It was pretty emotional for me and even though he looked a little scared, he absolutely knew I loved it and those were happy tears. 

Trying to photograph this thing was rough and I know most people won't understand the references, but that's okay. I understand and love them. Particularly the reference to my fur-babies. Matt is an absolute King and I adore him! I may have even hugged this thing for like 6 hours after the bawling stopped. 😆

My sweet little sister got me a Jane Austen word games book, which is so much fun. That girl absolutely knows me and knows what I'd love. She's the best. And I cannot get over that book mark... it's so delicate and beautiful, I don't think I'll be able to put it in a book for fear I'll hurt it. 

My folks sent me a gift card for Amazon and I got myself a honeycomb pull apart cake pan which is so lovely!!! And the picture below is a honey cake I made and not the pan because the pan is dirty from, well, baking the cake! 

There were also my yearly birthday cupcakes from Temptation cupcake, which are so amazing. It took me a week to eat them and I shared them with Matt. Not only are they beautiful, they're delicious. And, there was my birthday Starbucks, of course. I also got some amazing birthday cards from a friend (thanks, Shayla!!) and my in-laws.

At the end of the day, I was happy it was over, but also very grateful for my blessings. I have a roof over my head, food in my mouth, and a family and friends who love me. What more could I ask for?

So much weirdness and mess lately, let's talk about something good. My parents and little sister came to visit us the second week of June and we had such a great time! They were here from June 6th - 10th and, since Matt smokes in the house and my parents and sister all have asthma, they stayed in a local hotel. Which really worked out because it was hot in my house because my AC was still out for the first few days they were here. So, that was nice because we got to spend a lot of time hanging out in their hotel room with the air conditioner.

We mostly spent the week chillin... ha, yeah, I didn't set out to make an air conditioner pun when I typed that, but it happened. *shrug* We enjoyed the days together, went to Center Street Market, went out to Logan Canyon and had a picnic. Overall, it was just so much fun to see them twice in one year (we went to see them earlier this year). Matt, Candi, and I went swimming in the hotel pool, which was fun and a nice reprieve from the heat we'd been having in our dang house.

The last day before they left mom, Candi, and I went antiquing at a local antique store where she got this amazing bowl for their coffee table. Then, my folks slept a bit while me and Candi went around to see a few of the local sites, like the visitors center in the old court house, the Pepperidge Farm factory shop, and the pajamas outlet (nothing in my size, boooo!!!), and we ended up in Idaho. I mean, it's only like a half an hour north of us, but yeah, we spent a little time cruising around just over the Utah/Idaho boarder, got a little bit lost, and had some fresh french fries in Idaho. They were so good and we're planning to take a trip to Boise together in the spring after I visit them in Arizona. 

It's been rough around here, y'all. Things haven't been going according to plan (loooooooong story) and I'm a little frazzled lately, to say the least. I mentioned before that our AC was dead. Well, we got that fixed. Only to have it run for one week and die again, along with two surge bars inside the house. All my lights started to flicker and the "brand new meter" the city just installed without notifying me was making a buzzing, crackling racket. Let me tell you, that is NOT what you want to hear coming out of your meter.

So, since the AC wouldn't work... again, I called them back out here. Then I called for an electrician. Turns out the electricity overloaded the AC, which they fixed. The electricity problem turned out to be a loose ground wire in the meter base. The electrician our home warranty sent us told the home warranty that the problem was code upgrades, so they won't  pay for it to be replaced. Since it's $1,800 we won't be paying to replace it either, but since they were out here and tightened up those wires, everything is working fine again. Seems the city workers knocked the dang wire loose and caused us a bunch of problems. Seems like the city might be able to compel us to do it, but they haven't yet. Fingers crossed they don't. 

The other stuff is job application related and, well, I don't really want to talk about it. Oh, and my folks came to visit us earlier this month, which was awesome (more on that later), and I'm now on a diet that's supposed to fix my digestive issues (TMI, sorry). The one bit of good news is that I was able to go out and walk, alone, for the first time since my broken leg. I was only able to walk like 1.7 miles, but that feels like progress. So, life's just dandy.

I'm such a mess these days. Let's play a little catch up, shall we?

We went to Arizona at the end of February/beginning of March and had so much fun! Since my parents moved there a few years ago, this is only the second time I've been able to visit and this time I got to bring Matt with me, which made it even more fun. Everyone was so happy to see him and taking him meant I didn't have to fly alone. I am an absolutely awful flyer, so having him there made it a million percent better. I joke that he's my emotional support human, but it's kind of absolutely true.

It was a lot to fly there and run around as much as we did, so my ankle swelled up. But, I pushed through that and we went to the Biosphere 2 in Oracle, AZ and it was amazing. I cannot wait to go back some time. Otherwise, we went shopping, ran around, saw both my aunts, and generally had a good time. It was a short visit, but so nice to see my family. As an aside, they're actually coming here in June, so I'll get to see them twice in one year and I am stoked! 

The third week of March, my best friend of 17 years came to visit me for a couple of days. We hadn't seen one another in 7 years, since I moved to Utah and she later moved to Little Rock. We stayed in an amazing AirBnB loft in Salt Lake City. We spent the time enjoying downtown Salt Lake, chatting, and generally just hanging out. It was so nice to see her, we had some good food, and saw some of the sites. Salt Lake is a great city, so it was a lovely way to spend half of our spring break! We have definitely decided it won't be another 7 years, that is entirely too long.

Since then, I've just been working and going to school. I don't think I've mentioned it, but I started teaching college English again last fall and I absolutely love my job. I teach online at a small community college as an adjunct. Then, this spring, I started taking a certification program to become an instructional designer. It's challenging, and I was terrified, but it's going great so far. It is stretching our budget a little bit since I don't make as much as I used to, but I'm hoping the payoff will be worth the cost and effort. Fingers crossed! 

We had an amazing anniversary this year, even though it didn't go completely to plan. While that's not been the case every year, for this reason or that, this year was so lovely. We've been 22 years married this year and almost 23 years together. It's unbelievable that it's been so long, I have no idea where the years have gone. Our relationship has evolved so much and we're still happy together, and I'm grateful for that because it's so much more than many people get.

On Monday, Valentine's Day (and our actual anniversary), we put together a casual, sentimental day. We took a short day-trip while we listened to Verve Pipe's 'Freshman' and Cake's 'Fashion Nugget,' had In-N-Out for lunch, and went to Barnes & Noble. Then, we came home to watch Rocky Horror Picture Show and had Subway for dinner. While that may sound like a super low-key way to spend our anniversary, there is a sentimental reason behind each of those choices. It's a bit too much to explain, but all those things go back to the beginning of our relationship. We had a great time!

On Wednesday we had a more formal anniversary day planned. We were going to go to The Leonardo Museum of Creativity and Innovation in Salt Lake City and see two interactive exhibits: Van Gogh 360 and Monet to Kandinsky. Then we were going to go to City Creek Center, Le Madeleine (a French bakery), and then Red Lobster for dinner. It would have been amazing. But, it wasn't... because a snow storm made sure we couldn't go. In the middle of February, a pretty heavy snowstorm from Logan all the way to Lehi (south of SLC) made road conditions not worth chancing. And, we're out $120 for the museum tickets, because they're non-refundable (Grrr!!).

So, we went out to breakfast and then spent the day at home, watching the snow out the windows until it cleared up around early evening. You know, just in time for our days plans to be too little, too late. I was so bummed. I really wanted that day, to go do something fun together, and we didn't get that because of the stupid weather. But, we were safe and together, and I couldn't really ask for more than that. And, on Friday we went down to Layton (about a 45 minute drive) and had Red Lobster to make up for our missed dinner on Wednesday. That was so nice and a great way to just spend a little time together. We really enjoyed it.

All in all, this year's anniversary was a success, hiccups and all!

I wrote a few days ago about about being in a rut I can't seem to escape from. After writing, I lay in my bed, unable to go to sleep and thinking about what I could do to fix it. It turns out writing it down had exactly the effect I had hoped it would, it made me contemplate how I could make it better and that led me to making a plan. For the first time, I'm seeing a problem and making a plan to fix it. That's not my usual way, so I feel good about it. 

The plan is pretty simple, but I think I want to share it here. It's really all the things normal people do, but that I've struggled with because of anxiety and depression. So, if it seems easy or like a duh, try to remember that people with depression struggle with easy.

1. Establish a consistent sleep schedule, stop over-sleeping
2. Cook and eat at home, stop ordering DoorDash so much
3. Drink more water and stop drinking so much soda
4. Go out and try to walk, even if I can't much, accept trying as success
5. Be more proactive about mental health, including regulating meds and going back to meditation
6. Do my at home PT exercises every single day
7. Spend at least 30 minutes a day cleaning up (on non-gaming days)
8. Do something to make me feel better about my appearance
9. Focus on reconnecting with gaming (tabletop RPG)
10. Spend some time on hobbies, like diamond painting, and read a book

There's an old adage that blogging and journaling are cheaper than therapy. Lord knows that's the truth, but I've learned from my experiences with therapy that writing can also be a part of the process. So, I'm sitting here at midnight thinking about where I am right now and feeling the pull to write it down. Maybe seeing it in black and white will help me work it out. I am trying so hard to feel grateful this year, to be more optimistic, but I'm running into some roadblocks. 

Before breaking my leg in October 2021, I spent a lot of time feeling like I was under water. While there've been ups and downs, the downs have been powerful. Losing Chewbacca, my job, and then Anakin within five months really tore me down and I've felt, since then, like I can't get traction. Nothing seems to be going completely right, except that I did get a part-time, contract job that I really enjoy. Everything else has been an uphill struggle. Then, I fell down the stairs and made the struggle exponentially harder.

It's been a challenge to my mental health, even on the Fluoxetine, to have had surgery and been unable to do anything for myself for almost two months. But, I healed and did so pretty damn well. In most ways, it's been a pretty textbook process. Hell, I was fully weight bearing again just 6 days after I was released to partially weight bear. I thought, once I could walk again, my life would go back to normal, but it hasn't. This is where I'm really at right now, struggling to feel anything even close to normal.

I can't seem to find interest, let alone joy, in any of the things I've always enjoyed. I don't particularly feel like diamond painting most of the time, I struggle to connect with gaming, I'm can't seem to figure out how to get my house back to normal. No matter how much I clean, it doesn't seem to be getting cleaned up and it's so frustrating that I've begun only doing the bare minimum to keep it relatively picked up. So, on top of feeling lost, I feel disgusted with myself for not being able to actually get done the things I need to do. And, I'm sleeping either too much or too little, and having all sorts of weird dreams.

So now, when Matt leaves for work, I lay in the bed and watch TV, rather than reading, cleaning, or diamond painting. I can't seem to find motivation to do anything. I want to go out and walk again, but I don't think I can walk far before I run out of steam and start to be in pain, so I'm avoiding going to do it at all for fear that I'll drive over there and get started, only to have to turn around and come back before I get it done. And, not getting it done might actually make me feel worse and less motivated. It's a vicious cycle.

I'm trying to make some changes to my schedule and find the motivation again, but I don't know how to get my energy and drive back. I'm trying, though, and I think that's what matters. Might be that I need to break the cycle of hiding out from my anxiety in my bed, which has somehow become my safe zone after spending so much time there while I was healing. Maybe finding a good sleep schedule and routine would help me find some normalcy. Again, I don't know, but as I said before I'm trying and I'm taking the fact that I even want to try as a good sign. As a sign that I'll eventually find my way back from the murk. One day at a time.

It turns out learning to be comfortable walking again is kind of a big deal. I mentioned before that I'm back in my own shoes, for which I am still amazingly grateful. Not having to wear that CAM Walker boot is so fantastic. But, the brace I have to wear on my foot right now isn't the most comfortable, even though I've given up wearing it with ACE wraps and started wearing a compression sock. My right shoe is so dang tight, but it's still better than the boot. 

The best thing right now is that Matt took me out driving and it turns out that I can absolutely drive again. I got the husband seal of approval, so I've been driving myself to do errands and to my physical therapy, which I started last week Tuesday. The physical therapist did a little evaluation and gave me some exercises to do at home. Our medical group even has an app specifically for physical therapy so the therapist can assign me exercises and see my progress. It's pretty neat. 

I've also been doing aquatic physical therapy, which has been so great and so exhausting. Not gonna lie, y'all, I was honestly a little uncomfortable when I found out I would be doing aquatic therapy because wearing a bathing suit is a big old no go. But, my mom told me about swim leggings (I got them on Amazon) and that has helped tremendously. I can wear them in the pool and feel comfortable to do my exercises, rather than feeling self-conscious about my fat legs.

The aquatic therapy is about 50 minutes per session and while I'm in the pool I feel fine. They have individual pools with a treadmill, which is pretty dang cool and means I have the whole little pool to myself. One really neat thing about it is that there are cameras in the pool, so I can see my legs and so can the therapy assistant helping with my therapy. So, I still have to look at my fat legs, but I'm getting used to it. Afterwards, I can feel that I worked out and I am soooo tired. I've done just two sessions and it's been pretty helpful so far. I have three more sessions to go, at the least, which I think will continue to be a huge help as I learn to move my foot naturally again. It's even inspired me to maybe look into doing water aerobics in the summer... maybe.

For now, I'm walking again, even if I'm limping a bit. It's getting better every day and I can start to go back to living my life without much pain. I can't stand very long without getting tired and I can't completely step without a little bit of discomfort, but I'm getting there. I think it's going pretty dang well, especially knowing that it will probably be the end of October before I'm completely back to normal. I'm crushing it!

Today, I'm grateful for standing on my own two feet, for the care of Dr. Rigby, the great doctor who put me back together, and for being mobile enough to finally get my COVID booster. Being whole and mobile is truly a blessing I won't take for granted anymore, however painful the process of getting there has been.

I went to my 10 week surgical follow-up today. They took 3 standing x-rays and my doctor was so happy with how I'm healing. I've been limping around with the boot for almost a month, using my walker for balance on occasion, even when I was full weight bearing, and trying to make progress. Today, that work paid off. I'm in a soft ankle brace and my own shoes! 

The brace only barely fits in my shoes, but I got it done and squeezed my foot into the damn tennis shoe. I walked out of the hospital today, after visiting rehabilitation to set up physical therapy and be fitted for a brace, on my own. I felt wobbly but I did it, and what's better is that I can drive again as soon as Matt is comfortable that I can do so. I am tired from the COVID booster, but I'm stoked!

In the spirit of my New Year's resolution (take every day with gratitude and not take the small things for granted), I got to thinking about the things I was thankful for in 2021. I wrote briefly about the year and what a dumpster fire it was, but there were several really high points that I don't want to take for granted as we embark on 2022. Especially because, by in large, the year was really hard and I don't want to carry all that negative energy into the new year.

1. Eilistraee and Selune came into our lives in February. They're so skittish, but also so sweet.
2. We had our 21st wedding anniversary in February.
3. We've been lucky enough not to contract COVID, though Matt has been exposed several times.
4. We were fortunate enough to get our COVID-19 vaccines, and Matt was able to be boosted in November. I'm going for mine tomorrow.
5. I got a new job adjunct teaching comp at a community college in Arkansas (online).
6. I broke my leg, but I learned so much about my own strength. I learned how strong I can really be.
7. Breaking my leg has brought me and Matt closer. He's taken such good, loving care of me though this whole ordeal. He's an amazing husband who has shown me so much love and support.
8. My sister came to visit. That was so lovely, she really lifted my spirits after having surgery.
9. I read more than 50 books this year, before the broken leg derailed me.
10. Other than a broken leg, I'm in great health.