Tomorrow

Tomorrow is a busy day.

First, i am finally getting my bathroom floor fixed, after 4 years of waiting. The contractor came and told me himself. Dad is going to be here because....

Second, i have a meeting at the MIT's school. i am meeting with His 5th period teacher and His resource teacher. We are going to go over with the teacher, what was decided at the I.E.P. meeting. This is a job the resource teacher could and should do on her own, but i need to be there for some reasons.

Third, i have my ultrasound. Yes the ultrasound of my boob. The lump is still there, and is still growing. i will have to wait about a week for the results.

Fourth, i am going shopping for undies with my Mom. It is going to be my Christmas pressent from her and my Dad. i hate surprises.

Fifth, i am going home to look after the MIT until the nurse arrives.

Yes a busy day. A day of being out of the house. my iPod is coming with me. It is the only way for me to survive right now. i refuse to take adivan. i don't want to be doped up all the time. So, iPod it is.

Panic and Anxiety

i know what panic and anxiety are. i experience both quite often. Right now, and for the last few weeks, i have been experiencing them every day. i don't know why. i know how i am dealing with it. i know how i am comforting myself. The problem is, at the moment, it is counter productive.

The panic and anxiety revolve around leaving the house. It isn't safe. It doesn't feel safe. i don't want to. i get a tightness in my chest with the idea. i start to sweat when i know it is a must. i avoid it to the point of finding reasons to stay in the house. i avoid it to the point of asking others to do my running around. A new "symptom" is that i don't feel comfortable driving the speed limit. It is too fast. It isn't safe. It doesn't feel safe.

One technique is to find a way to comfort myself when i am feeling this way. i am doing that. i am cleaning. i am cooking. i am organizing. my place has never been so clean. my kitchen has never been so tidy. Laundry is all done. Dishes are constantly being washed. Vacuuming is a daily occurrence. Even making my bed is a comfort. i feel safe here at home. i feel secure here at home. i feel at home here at home. Even still, it is counter productive.

i need to remember the ways i handled going out before. i know taking my iPod with me, and blocking out noise is one i can do. i know that self talk is another. Going out with someone out is another. i know that making myself go out is a way of breaking the thinking that it isn't safe, because i will be safe when i get back home.

Knowing all this isn't helping. Knowing that it is illogical isn't helping. Knowing i have lived through this before isn't helping. Knowing i will get through this again isn't helping. Talking about it isn't helping. Making myself go out isn't helping. Taking my meds isn't helping. Nothing has helped. i even carried it to camping.

i feel like i am rambling. i feel like i am trying to fix this, but am getting no where. i don't get why this is happening. Nothing bad happened. Nothing unsafe happened. i don't even know when it really started. i know one day i didn't want to leave. The next was fine. So was the next. Then another day when i didn't want to leave. Then another. Now it has snowballed. i don't know how to fix it.

The First Snow...while camping!!!!

So this past week has been difficult. i have been having panic attacks every day. i can't seem to make it out of the house. i have been finding excuses to not go out. i have been cooking, cleaning, making things "perfect" here, so i feel safe and in control. i am needing the feeling of control. Without it i just plain brake down. i didn't really know how i would handle camping, but i did ok.

We arrived Friday. No rain while we set-up camp. i was able to have a fire and get the stew warming up in the dutch oven. After dinner, i started to prepare to do dishes, and we hit a bump in our plans. We found out there was no water at the site. We had to come up with some quick solutions. We figured it out, and then the rain started. Quick get into the tent. We had a nice quiet night hanging out in the tent. The MIT and Dad watched DVD's and i read my book. We ended up settling for the night around 7:00. At 1:30am, we were woken up to loud music. i took a walk to the offending site and asked them to turn it down. They were very polite. We all returned to the tent and went back to sleep.


Saturday morning we found the second bump in our camping adventure. We found out the tent was leaking. The floor of the tent was soaking wet. The picture is of Dad building a trench around the tent, in the hopes of shifting the water from around the it. i lifted the sleeping bags and kept the heater going so they could try and dry out. i sealed the seam in the bottom of the tent. That we could live with. Then we hit the third bump. Dad had forgotten to tell me to bring my grill from my BBQ. Off to Hamilton i drove. Then the fourth bump, my period started. Ok, not that great a weekend so far. i returned to the site and i made chicken noodle soup from scratch for lunch. First cooking experience for me again. It turned out really nicely. Especially since it was raining. The MIT spent the day watching DVD's under the awning of the tent, and i kept watch on the tent and sleeping bags drying. By the time Dad made dinner (Smokey bacon wrapped shrimp) i thought the tent was dry enough for us all to be able to climb back in and settle where it was dry and warm. i was wrong.

(MIT eating Smokey Bacon Wrapped Shrimp)

Turned out, while we ate dinner, and while we watched DVD's, the bottom of the tent was still leaking, and all the sleeping bags were soaking wet again. We did piles of blankets and sheets to sleep on, and we did the best we could. i had a mini break down at that point, because i kept feeling that if either Dad or the MIT complained, i had to fix it. And then, because i couldn't fix it, no one would enjoy the time we had together. i voiced this and was told (well sort of, we ended up joking about it quickly) that i was not Mother Nature, and the little bumps added to the adventure. We bedded down around 7:00 again, and slept on and off during the night.

When we woke up on Sunday, we were greeted with snow covering our stuff. (Yes bump number 5). i truly lost it. i couldn't figure out how to do dishes (the propane stove had gotten wet during all the rain, and wouldn't light properly), how to pack things up, how to make dinner, and was completely lost and panicky. We fixed this with me telling my Dad that i wanted to just pack everything up, and head to my place for breakfast and the rest of the camping day. Dad agreed (since He was huddling around the fire for any form of warmth)........

and the MIT huddled in the wet tent, trying to keep warm.
The MIT agreed, and we packed up everything in less than 1 hour. We were out of there. It was just snowing so much. Yeah, the weather report said it was possible, but we had avoided the predicted weather so many times, i just didn't count on it actually happening. All the dirt dishes went into one bin, all the other stuff went into the other. Sopping wet sleeping bags laid on the tops of the wet and frozen bins. Mud tracked in and out of the van. It was a mad dash. As we were leaving, we were hit with a flurry.
We got to my place and started to unpack stuff. We had our traditional pancakes for breakfast, with coffee for the boys. i hung the sleeping bags in my shower. i did dishes and unpacking. The boys watched TV. After we had all dried off, and everything was basically out of the van, i drove Dad and the MIT to Dad's house. They were to spend the rest of the day there. It gave me a break. Once the van was unloaded with all of Dad's stuff, plus the wet and muddy tent, i headed back to my place and tried to warm up and dry out. This was hard, considering i didn't have the use of my shower or tub because of the sleeping bags.

Overall, it was a good weekend. i made it harder on myself than i should have. i didn't have to fix everything, but i needed that feeling of being in control. It took 3 days to figure out i can't compete with Mother Nature, and can't control everything. This doesn't mean i am over my panic. i still only feel safe here, in my home.

Here where i can control things. i don't know how i am going to "get over it" but i will have to figure something out. i can't just stay in the house all day, every day. There are things i have to do in life. There are things that are essential to being able to live. There is Yule and then Christmas to prepare for.

A Week from today

the MIT, my Dad and i will be camping. We will be out in the "wild", hiding out in a tent. It is currently 3C outside. Yes, we will be camping in a tent. Yes we will have the heater with us. Yes i will be packing enough blankets to supply an entire family of 7. Yes we will be having fun.

Things have been weird around here. The MIT has been getting angry at a lot of different things. He even got in trouble at school over it. He has been having more and more episodes with no muscles. He has been having more and more absent seizures. He did do something new. He lied to me. Straight faced, full lied. i am so proud. It is a stage He has missed up until now. He actually did it twice. i kept my wits about me. i didn't fall for the lies. He did learn that i wouldn't put up with lying. We will be going to the seating clinic this week. He desperately needs a new wheelchair. Heck, he is using it more and more, it should at least fit His butt.

i have been spending some time with D. E asked if D was getting any worse, in my eyes. i did tell her what i truly thought. E looked like she needed to hear my truthful observations. i hope i didn't hurt her with them. i did say that D was declining physically, but cognitively, she was still there. Yes it would take her a while to get to where her thoughts really were, but she still got there. D and i have secret plans. It will take a couple weeks to fulfill them, but we will do it. It is kind of my present to her and to E. i wish i could help E more. i know i can't. She is in a yucky space. A space where people are invading her living space and her safe place. A space where her mind and emotions need to hide. A space where she is watching someone she loves decline before her eyes. She is hitting the guilt phase. The feeling like she isn't strong enough to handle what she is going through. The feeling of being tired all the time. The feeling that she doesn't have her grown-up support there for her. i know those feelings. i just can't fix them for her. She needs to feel them and she will. Slowly. There is no way to prepare for what is to come.

On my front, the lump is bigger. You can now see it if i take my shirt off. i can feel it when i brush crumbs off my shirt. i did call the doctor about it, and she is going to look at it again when i see her at my normal appointment on Thursday. It is probably a cyst, just not one that they could read right on the mammogram or ultrasound. i am going to ask for either a biopsy or a fluid needle test. i need to know what this is, or what this isn't so i can just keep going forward with life. i need to know if this is going to be something else to beat. i just need to know.