Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Fibro: Fizz, Fizz, Fizz

After seeing my doctor about the....unbearable levels of pain I've been living with, he gave me a new (to me) drug to try: Lyrica. Lyrica is pretty huge in the Fibro world as it's a neuropathic pain management drug, and that's pretty much what's fucked up in our(aka fibro sufferers) brains. I take it twice a day, in 75mg doses. The only side effect so far is that it won't fucking let me sleep!

I'm hoping it will settle down in a few days, and it will let me sleep again. If it doesn't, I'm going to have to stop taking it. When I don't sleep, my body doesn't rest, doesn't heal, so I just get more and more sore, to the point that I'm curled up on the bed crying pitifully. I know, this is what happened when I tried to up my dose of cymbalta. It wouldn't let me sleep either. And we fibro sufferers need a lot of sleep.

Sleep is one of the few natural defenses the body has against chronic pain. Makes sense if you think about it: when you are in pain all the freaking time it takes a shit load of energy just to exist, just to endure the pain. If you don't sleep, then your body has less and less ability to endure, and everything hurts more. The pain will travel, it will multiply. Pain that would otherwise be bearable, overwhelms you, and brings you to your knees. Sleep is a break that your body and your psyche need to combat the pain. Without it, both are unarmed in the battle of chronic pain. And trust me on this one, it's a battle all right. A battle you fight every moment of every day.

I so want the Lyrica to work. I want it to not fuck with me. I need something to help me. The pain is not manageable most of the time. January and February sucked dish water: I was stuck in the apartment, and often, truthfully, bed-ridden with the pain and nausea. I don't want to live like that! March has been better, but I still spend at least 2 days a week in bed because I can't handle the pain. The other days I'm pushing myself to do simple things like get groceries, make a soup, go to the gym. Usually I can only do one of those a day. Once I've done it, I'm so tired my body is shutting down and I need to nap. It's rather pathetic. But at least I'm getting stuff done. At least I'm being useful, even if I do have very limited energy.

Every time I do something that takes a lot of energy, I think of it as 'kicking fibro's ass'. Getting groceries is no small task: carrying 40 lbs of groceries home on my back is no small task! Spending hours standing chopping veggies, and watching a soup takes a good bit of energy, damnit. Going the the gym...I spend 2 hours there usually, you know, it's more than I'm used to, and although it does make me feel good to go, and my brain wants to do more stuff when I leave, my body is usually so drained that I need a nap. If I don't nap, I'll get a fever, start shivering, become horribly nauseous, and get very very weak, it's bad news. So yeah, for me, doing these things, being able to do them, is fighting. I'm kicking fibro's ass by I'm living my life. It's my way of saying, fuck you fibro, I can do this. I really want to be able to say that more. I so so hope Lyrica will help. Please gods, let it help.

Monday, March 22, 2010

More Weird Dreams

I did a lot of stuff this weekend, more than I usually do - went out Friday night and thus stayed up late, got up early Saturday, went to the zoo with rambunctious 2 yr old & his parents, went to lunch with them, then to Shasta's in the evening, stayed up late again, and then went to Asy's bday dinner Sunday!

That's a way fuller weekend than I'm used to! No surprise I was exhausted today. I thought I was fine, until I washed Chris' sweater by hand (mostly just soaking & squeezing the water out). When I was done getting the water out, I need to rest for like 15 minutes just to get my heart to stop pounding. I took that as a bad sign and had a nap

While I napped, as you can guess from the title, I had some weird ass dreams.

In my first dream, I was out somewhere in an unfamiliar city, and the pope tried to kidnap me! Yes, the pope, in his popely garb, crazy hat and all! He had a needle, with I'm guessing something to put me out, and he kept grabbing at me, and trying to poke with with said needle! It was really scary! The pope was seriously creepy! And he kept poking me/grabbing me in the ribs and it really really hurt! I hate when dreams hurt like that.

The second dream was way more cool. I was a student at a high school for, like, super heroes. It was President's Day at the school, and so myself and a group of my friends were trying to convince the school council president (who was this really sweet, naive, painfully pretty young man) to stay indoors and let us protect him. You see, our school had a history/tradition that on President's Day, basically the entire student body would try to kill the council president. They'd succeeded many times too! This practice was considered 'good practice for future life' by the school authorities, so it was really up to us to keep our friend alive. He was new there, his first year, he couldn't believe anyone would try to kill him, bless his little heart. So we spent the day trying to keep him indoors, beating up fellow students, and generally saving his ass.

The next thing I remember my group of friends were out and about in the city for the day, having 'escaped' the school grounds (I think it might have been a sanctioned trip). We saw something going down that looks highly suspicious - our spy radar went off - so we investigated. I started following the young blond that looked like she was trying to make a drop off of some kind, and the gang split up to see if we could find her target/figure out what she had. I followed the blond around a street market. Things were.. fishy. I tried to buy some rice from a vendor, and he said he wasn't open for business, even though he had all kinds of food set out. He said I could just have the rice... I got the impression he was doing illegal business, or that he'd poisoned the rice, as the blond had just bought some. I dropped the rice and ran after the blond. I literally bumped into her coming out of a shop - oops!

I was more than a little worried at that point and asked her what she had in her bag, while I was opening it - not a good subtle sky me. o.0 I realied she had some kind of a list. She was even worse at the spy thing than I was, because she started babbling about having to get the list to [the american's possibly? some group I was actually affiliated with]. I said I could get it to them, that they were my superiors, and she said no, the woman who gave it to her said not to trust the ones inside the boarder, she had to get it to the foreign contingency. That someone was coming to get it but she couldn't trust me. I told her the streets weren't safe, she should stay with me, and my friends would find who she needed. I radioed the group, telling them who to look for (the blond told me - I think this is how it went anyway), but when I turned around the blond was gone again.

I ran after her, or where I thought she'd gone, into this tough ass neighbourhood. There was this gang of black men in front of a Jamaican restaurant. This craggy old guy told me I didn't want to go into the restaurant as I tried to pass, thinking the blond might have hid there. The other men laughed/jeered threateningly, and I agreed with the old man. I tried to get out of there, but the old guy pulled me to him with more strength than I thought he'd have. He started to dance with me. At first I fought him, wanting to go, then I went with it, pulling him with me, he went willingly when I was dancing with him. Finally we got far enough away from the gang, that they couldn't just grab me and I made a run for it. One of the gang members started following me, into the open market. I jumped up on a fish counter, and started jumping/running as fast and as far as I could. I could jump about 12 feet in one go, and as I jumped to another counter, I saw the gang member matching me! This is when I thought "wtf, regular people just cannot jump like that. This is not normal... what is going on here." I was also worried that I'd not heard back from my team. This just wasn't good, but I kept running...

As I turned the corner heading towards the market exit, wondering where the hell the blond had got to, I see one of our instructors... possibly the vice-princapal. Pointy, sharp woman, I did not like her. I liked her less to see her here now, with that look on her face. She started yelling at me, saying I'd screwed everything up, and how dare I take matters into my own hands, blah, blah, blah. Apparently we'd interrupted a deal she was trying to make, though she'd found the blond - no thanks to me - and taken the information from her. The blond was standing there looking guilty, and unhappy. I don't think she wanted to make a deal with the evil bitch... I didn't back down, maybe I should have, but she just pushed my buttons. I yelled back, "What kind of fool tries to plan a spy meeting when she knows her students are going to be all over the area and are going to realise in two seconds flat that something shady is going on?? The girl kept looking over her shoulder! The vendors were more than shady, hell, they'd poisoned the food! You of all people should know some of us can smell that even! The 'gang member' was no normal human, and jumped just like me! He blew his own damn cover, not my fault!"

She said she was going to punish me for my rudeness and teach me my place. I told her to do her worst, I didn't give a flying fuck, she's the one that screwed up, not me. She pulled out an electric shaver, like out of her purse! And she shaved the very front/top of my head where my bangs were! The bitch!! Then she said she would expel me, though she didn't have the power to alone, she'd have to get the principal to agree. I was so livid, I just stormed off.

My dream ended with me going back to the school, to see if I was kicked out I think, some time later. I had a shaved head, and cherry red doc martens on. I looked so cute! lol. And then I woke up.

Crazy dreams eh?

Friday, March 19, 2010

Chronic Pain Sucks Big hairy Goat Balls.

I'm so tired. I'm so tired of not being able to sleep because of the pain. I'm so tired of waking up sore, exhausted, and knowing the long guarantee for my day is that there will be more pain, and it will be worse than when I wake up.

I just want a break. I want to not hurt for while. I want to not be so fucking exhausted that taking a shower looks like a daunting chore.

Living with Fibro really fucking sucks, and I want some better drugs, damnit.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Pagan Party in the Woods?

I had this crazy dream last night. So crazy I just had to write it down. Chris says I should write my dreams down because they'd make good stories/books. I never see the point because they are usually just moments in time and not full on stories, but he's probably right. If I combined all my dreams I would get one very random story!

My dream started out with myself, Neda, and Chris being invited to a party, I think by a gay former co-worker. We saw him on the way there, he was bringing his bf, and some other people... The party was at a camp ground, closed to the public for winter, though it was fall.

When we got to the camp ground main building/gates whatever, I can't really remember the surroundings, we met the owner of the grounds, and his daughter, both aboriginal, though the daughter looked very familiar, like I might have been in school with her. Apparently the best man (I think) of the coming wedding had gone to HS with the daughter, and maybe I had too. She had helped him find his spirit guide and he had fallen in love with her. The Daughter had not. The owner thought this was all terribly amusing. The young man was so very enamoured in a most harmless way, and his daughter was obviously just kinda annoyed. lol.

The best man (again, I think), asked the daughter to commune with his spirit guide, and then she would know exactly what kind of party to create for him. I thought it was going to be his birthday party...

When we got to our first destination, the event was actually a wedding! The couple and their wedding party were wearing wellingtons! Even the bride hiked up her dress and splashed through the shallow water to get to this HUGE flat rock about 10-15 ft out from the shore. They were married at the peek of sunset. It was gorgeous. I totally had wedding envy! All the leaves were red, yellow, and orange, they lit up in the setting sun. It was so magical!

After the ceremony they a band with bongo drums and such playing music on the rock, and as the sun disappeared behind the trees, they had fire blowers (people that light liquid from their mouths on fire) all over the side of the hill near the edge of the lake. There was like 7-8 of them spitting fire and juggling torches. Everyone was sitting on blanket on the side of the hill watching the show, talking, laughing, cuddling. In fact, everyone was cuddling. It was such a friendly, positive atmosphere. Really, very cool. They even had people coming around with free beer, including the best man who was glowing with pride. It was such a wonderful celebration!

Then we went for a walk in the woods - along a path to a clearing up the hill. No one wanted to leave the lake, but I guess you can only spit fire for so long. The owner's daughter met us at the clearing and told us we were going to all find our spirit guides. She said it could take anywhere from 20 minutes to 3 hours. She told us to go look a the board to see what our spirit animal could be, then to walk out into the woods for 20 minutes, but to be sure to be back by then as she was going to be putting on a show.

As she said this used the big ceremonial knife and cut two holes in the skin on the side of her abdomen. She worked her fingers into the hole, lifting the skin from her body. Very bloody! She implied, I think that she was going to do something with her spirit animal for the show, and immediately I had an image in my head of her wrapping a snake around her body and into the hole in her skin. *Shivers*

I think is when my brain decided to distance myself from what was going on, and the dream became more like a movie that Chris and I were watching, and the girl that I was identifying with/the main character of the movie we were watching, was this 17-18-ish yr old girl with long dark blonde wavy hair, and an asshole for a boyfriend. She freaked out when the woman started pushing her fingers into the hole she'd made in her skin - rightfully so. Everyone else was either already half way to the woods to find their spirit animal, or was in the "cool! blood!' group.

The girl was really upset, and wanted to leave. She asked her boyfriend if they could leave now, and he was so cruel! omg! He told her he thought it was cool, and what was her problem anyway, and he wasn't going anywhere. The girl said she was going to walk home, and her boyfriend laughed in her face, asking if she was going to walk for two days, she said yes. No one else was willing to help her, or even give the poor girl a ride into town!

So she started walking. At this point I thought/said to Chris, "uh oh, she's never going to get home. She's going to come to some horrible end on the road home, just watch".

Well she walked, and walked, until the sun came up, and she was still walking by the side of the road, so tired so almost fell into traffic! The fact she wasn't dead yet was rather impressive. Though why she didn't just walk to the nearest town and see if she could bum a ride to the nearest bus stop I don't know.... I guess it wouldn't be a movie if people did the smart thing, this is what Chris is always telling me anyway.

So we fast forward to the next night I think. She's found a pay phone. We can see her breath in the streetlight. She calls her dad whom she lives with. She knows he's not happy taking her in after she left her mom - I think her mother was abusive, I got the feeling her mom was not fun to live with and her father had taken her in sort of against his will. Anyway, she calls. She's almost in tears. You can see the desperation in her face/eyes. She doesn't think she'll ever make it back home, not that it was much of a home to begin with for her. She asks her dad if there's anything he wanted to tell her. He doesn't understand. She says, about the time she's been gone, is there anything...different. I think she wants to hear that he misses her, that he wants her home, where has she been? She was only out on a date, and now she's been gone days. But instead he says "it's been nice without you here." She starts crying, her hand over the phone so he can't hear her gasp in pain. Her voice strangled, she tells him she'll just go back to living with mom if that's the case. Oblivious, and callous, he says okay and asks her if there was anything else she wanted. No she says and hangs up. Now utterly lost.

The next thing we jump to, is a bunch of young people sitting in the seats of a old-looking theatre. The stage lights are on, but there is no one on the stage. A tall, thin, elegant woman, with black hair pulled back in a severe bun is standing talking with them. She is most definitely in charge. She's wearing a dancer's outfit, come to that so are all the young people. She's telling them that part of their job is to come to shows while they are not dancing and to work the room, making sure guests are having a good time, and to liven up the parties before and after shows. She tells them their goal is not to dance well but to dance tolerably. She makes them all repeat this. As the 'camera' pans, we see our girl! Her face looks older/harder. Her hair is back in a bun like the instructor woman's. She's wearing a LOT of make-up with bright peacock blue eyeshadow that matches the blue leather of her dance shoes. You can tell her life is hard, but she's surviving, somewhere in the time lapse something innocent in her died, but she learned what it meant to really stand for herself and to survive. You could see it in here eyes. Come hell or high water, she was going to survive.

This is where the dream ends...

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Wedding Industrial Complex: The Vagina Tax

Like it's not bad enough the WIC tries to make brides (aka ME) crazy, whether they listen to what the Wedding Industry and Societal Expectations deem they should do or not, but now, now even as a guest at a wedding I'm paying a freaking tax for having a vagina!

When will this insanity end?!

What am I talking about, you ask? Bridal Showers. You're one of the 50 women on my guest list, so you must come to my mother's house, make nice, drink tea, and eat tiny sandwiches, oh and buy me another gift, just because.

Yeah. Fucking Wedding Hoopla! I hate hoopla. I really do. I think part of it is I had way more than my fill of it with my best friends weddings. I love them and all, but come fucking on. Engagement Party, Bridal Shower, Stag & Doe, Lingerie Party, separate Bachelorette/Bachelor Parties, a gift for the bride just because, and THEN the actual wedding gift. I've done the math, and I spent about $1,000 on each of their weddings. Thank the gods I was just a bridesmaid and not the maid of honour! She spent way more than the rest of us.

I don't exactly begrudge them the money. I know they didn't exactly do it to get more money out of their guests. Well they, did, to an extent, but I've known them all my life, they are my closest friends, how could I say no?

I can and did say NO for my own wedding though. I do not want my friends spending that kind of money on me. Or having to spend that much time and effort. I just want them to show up, see me get married, and enjoy the afternoon. And, well, I want really nice wedding gifts from them. They owe me (I know it sounds horrible and selfish, but that's how I feel, so oh well). But then, they would never think of giving me anything but nice gifts as that is just how they were raised, that and they love me too.

Now, back to the Bridal Shower Issue.

I really don't like bridal showers. In terms of wedding events, I think it's my least favourite. To me, they feel like nothing more than a money grab. They also make me uncomfortable; I never know anyone there; and the atmosphere is so full of the traditional societal expectations of women (get married, make a home for your man, raise his babies and spend your life taking care of him), that it makes my skin crawl and my head nearly explode.

I may be unemployed and essentially a housewife, but I was educated as a civil engineer, and my mother taught me to be way more than some man's lackey, damnit.

Bridal showers are all about feeding the traditional role of women - gifts for the bride are meant to be things to help start her new home with her husband.

Now, there are a couple things wrong/no longer true in this statement. The most obvious to me, perhaps since I've spent the last year and a half living in sin with my fiance, is the expectation that the couple is starting a new home. In most cases these days, the couple have been living together for some time, often years. They've already established a home for themselves, if they need something, they've already got it for themselves.

The second thing that pops out at me, is the implication that the husband has no interest in anything relating to the home. Now, Chris isn't likely to get excited about some kitchen gadget, but that's not to say other men wouldn't. I know lots of men that cook, and would totally be the ones putting special pans, immersion blenders, and the like on their gift registry while their women couldn't care less. I also know some brides that would be way more excited about a tool set than say, matching china, like me. You never get cool gifts like that at a Bridal Shower though.

So, aside from being a sexist event that makes me uncomfortable, I just don't see the point, except to dig deeper into the pockets of your female guests, which is just totally uncool, for the record.

Oh! But that reminds me, my future-mother-in-law pointed out another purpose for Bridal Showers that had never occurred to me -- showing off the bride to the mother/mother-in-laws friends. Seriously. Apparently the bride is some kind of show dog to be, well, shown off?! WTF. Seeing as I'm getting married next fall, and am 'the bride', this really creeps me out. Perhaps I should be more offended, but honestly I'm just really weirded out by the idea that I'm some kind of object to be shown off, like my future-mother-in-law won me as a prize at the carnival or something? I don't know, I just find it very weird.

This has all come up because, as you might have guessed way back at the beginning of this post, I've been invited to a Bridal Shower. I really, really don't want to go, but I feel obligated. Ugh. Maybe part of it is I'm bitter? Mommy and Daddy are paying for their wedding, they've recently moved into a house.... The house I would love, but the wedding? No, I'm thrilled with our little wedding, totally under our control. All in all I'd rather be here than than there. Yet this Bridal Shower fills me with anger. Perhaps because it really just feels like another money grab to me. They have a house, they've been living on their own (separately or together I don't know) for some time, so they have to have furniture/housewares of some kind. It's not my freaking problem if they don't fit the style they want. Gr.

Money Grab. Sexist, money grab. That's what it comes down to for me, and I just can't like it. It doesn't sit well and that's all there is to it.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

I just had an epiphany!

So, yesterday I bought myself some flowers to cheer myself up. In going to the flower shops - I say shops as there are three in a row on the corner of Avenue Rd & Davenport, I think it is. Anyway, many shops in a row, full of flower basics, wonderful spring flowers, and amazing tropical flowers too. So much to choose from! I had the hardest time picking, I really did! Hell, I came home with more flowers than reasonably fits in my vase.

In going there I realised, or rather remembered, just how much I love flowers. I'm thinking about the wedding, and how flower-free my current plan is. It doesn't sit so well with me anymore. Not after seeing all those beautiful flowers! If I had my choice there would be flowers everywhere!

Frankly, the flowers aren't the expensive part. I can buy oodles of flowers for a fraction of the cost a florist would charge me on avenue road, and I can do them up myself. Hell, part of the fun for me is choosing them myself and arranging them. I love doing that! I should have been a florist. Really.

The expensive part is the extras. The vases for one. OMG are vases ever like ridiculously expensive! Especially if I had to buy 10-20. That alone would double my flower costs. Most flower arrangements involve stand or stone, and ribbon as well. More cost.

I was just doing the dishes, and I had a primavera sauce mason jar to wash. I began to wonder what I should do with them all - I have at least ten now, and every time I get sauce, I get another jar. They are way too nice to just throw out, but I don't really have a use for them. And then it hit me! What if I use them for flowers at the wedding? It would certainly solve my vase issue!

I'm not sure how well it will work though. =/ Our venue is pretty damn shnazy. I think if I went with mason jars I'd have to dress them up at the very least to make them work at all.

Our tables are going to be covered in white linen with a black square thrown on diagonally. So I was thinking maybe black ribbon. I could get a spool for under $5 at FabricLand and that would do for all of them. I was thinking just wrapping the ribbon around the top and tying a bow. But I'm not sure if that will dress them up enough.

Another option would be to do that cool vase corset thing I saw on the Hostess with the Mostess blog.



It would also be a lot of work, and would require me to buy not only fabric, but grommets, and a grommet tool, oh and I'd still need the ribbon. I might be able to get some cheap fabric at MAC FAB if I do it like now as they are moving and selling off as much of their stock as they can currently. But that's very iffy as I have no idea when they are moving or what they have.

I dunno. I really like the idea of having flowers at my wedding. I freaking love flowers. I also do really love the corset vase thing. God that's gorgeous. I could totally do that with the mason jars! But I have no idea if that's actually in our budget. I mean, I don't even have a set budget, but I'm trying to spend as little as I can on just about everything.

For me, my dress, the food, Chris' suit, these were all things I was willing to spend good money on. They mattered. Not everything is supposed to matter damnit.

But I love flowers so very much. How can I have a wedding and have no flowers there other than my bouquet? Me. ReallyM? Flowerless? I'm not sure I'm actually cool with that. I'm worried, that after I go to the flower shops the day before my wedding to get the stuff to make my bouquet and possibly some button-holes, I'm going to be depressed that there just isn't going to be more flowers at the wedding. Maybe I won't care. I'm sure everything will look nice enough, and really, it's about the people not the dressings. But... hrm... I just don't know....

I'm such a spoiled brat! But.. but... I love flowers damnit!

Monday, March 8, 2010

Exotic Flowers

So, even though the weather today has been amazing, sunshine and 14˚C, I've been feeling not only grumpy/angry but also like I was hit by a mack truck. Fucking fibro.

So I decided, I needed to get out. I had no desire to go do something productive, like get a steamer, so not fun. I had to get out, so to convince myself, I thought, why not do something to cheer myself up? So I decided to get myself flowers. Flowers was something I'd totally leave the house for. So I did. :D

Exotic flowers

Aren't they pretty?? They barely all fit in my vase! Ha. I think I might need a bigger vase. So lovely. And worth every penny of the $30 I spent on them! $30 of flowers for immeasurable happiness? Oh yeah, so very worth it. I love, love love them.

Close Up

I just can't get over the colours! So bright. Exotic flowers rock. I threw in some easter lily's too, 'cause well, I wanted to add some white and they work perfectly.