Jen's Mental Scribblings

It really doesn't.

I thought since it's been a month since my Essure installation, I'd give an update.

The prep classes all stressed that the installation itself is relatively painless. Which is was.  The aftermath?

Jesus Christ on a Pogo Stick! Fuck me!

The cramps were awful. I was aware of my Fallopian tubes...its not normal. Let me tell you something. Fallopian tubes are NOT something you want to be aware of, it sucks. I was on Vicodin every 4 hours for the first 48 hours...then I switched to 800 mg advil....another 24 hours and I switched to 600mg and stayed there for a few days. Each day the cramping and pain got better. But I started every morning waking up super early with cramps and needing a pain killer for it for 2 weeks after the procedure. The rest of the day was fine...but those early morning cramps? Awful.

Oh. And did I mention that my period started 4 days post procedure??? Which they didn't warn me about because it showed up super early and was caused by those lovely hormones that played havoc on my guts? I've never been a bad menstrual cramp person. I'd have twinges now and then, but never really needed anything for it. This time? Oh yea! The cramping continued to my back. Never had that outside of labor before. Ut.

After two weeks, no more pain. I'm still aware of my Fallopian tubes on occasion, like when I'm suffering from lower abdominal distress and Montezuma's got me good. Not pleasant, but not bad either.

For awhile there I thought I made a HUGE mistake and wondered how I was going to convince my OBGYN to rip those fuckers out. But after the daily pain subsided. It's fine. I'm interested in seeing how it affects my cycle. Might make it more regular...might change the flow (GYN warned me about that AFTER I emailed her asking what was up and why did I have my period again so soon???)

All in all, if by the end of three months I'm sterile? I'm happy.

I hate this time of year.

This is when the dolrums of depression really start smacking me around.

It's not as bad as other years, but it's bad enough to be ANNOYING. I don't want to knit, I don't want to read. I just want to spend my time lying down being entertained and even then, I'm not that interested. I'm going through the motions. I get up, shower, dress. Care for children. Attempt to educate them. I do laundry and clean the house enough to keep it orderly. Which I know is a good thing. Just moving every day helps.

I'm trying to sit under my lamp every day. I'm trying to get outside and work in the garden every day. I can't really exercise 'cause of the damn boot, but it's my own damn fault it's there again, so oh well. I know that eating better will help immensely since oh...80% of how I feel is created by how I feed my body. I feed it crap...I feel like crap. Every day I do it a little bit better. I added 3 lbs over the Holidays (which is an immense improvement since last years 12 lb gain.), but I'm not adding any more so go me! The bingeing is slowing, every day it's a bit easier to stop. Every day, its easier to say "Nah, I don't want that." Every day, there's a step in the right direction...and if there's a slide, I'm kind to myself....I know it will be better tomorrow.

But still. I'm dragging. I have class tonight. I've done the reading, but I've not finished the paper. I've done the drawings. So...essentially half my homework is done. I'm struggling with how to write what I understand and do so succinctly. It's hard to do Steiner with brevity. Goodness knows he couldn't do it! There are times I yell at the book...Okay! Get to the point and say it already! I'm working on the next assignment's reading and I'm still waiting for it to get good. Parzival is not coming across as a sympathetic character to me (spoiled little brat), so the story is dragging. I can grind through it...but, bleh. There's a reason I'm not a Medievalist. These stories just go on and on and I swear to god they are paid by the word....bleh.

Ike is driving me crazy and I'm tired of pushing him through bullshit homework. I can see bringing home the work on his MLB he didn't finish in class, but damn. These math and grammar assignments are driving us crazy. Especially since he's already done the grammar ones already. I just want to go to his teacher and say enough with the bullshit. You have EXTRA main lesson slots daily...finish this bullshit stuff then, don't send it home! But...it still comes home. He worked for 90 minutes this morning struggling through his fractions and grammar. Normal kid probably would have taken 20...*sigh* Not sure how to deal with this. We are all tired of him struggling.

Just keepin' on keepin' on.

Friday was the last day of school for the kids.

I get a month break until classes start for me. RSC ran out of rooms in the dorms on campus, but I was able to snag a room at Sac State for the three weeks. It will be something like a 15-20 minute commute (I think), getting to the freeway will be the worst bit (I think), and the drive will be reverse commute (I think). I am really looking forward to it. I think as exhausting it will be, it will be AWESOME!!!

Ike and I calculated that we have 94 days of vacation. It seems like so much time, and yet not enough time at all.

Ike starts therapy tomorrow. Two weeks of intensive, non-invasive in home therapy. I hope this helps him as the $10k we will shell out for the 2 weeks is really going to hurt. But I'm pretty confident it will.

Elli and Gwen leave with my mom for a week tomorrow. They are off to go and visit Joe's parents and sister. I'm really going to miss my girls!

I have ideas of the things I want to accomplish this summer, tasks to clear off my to-do list, skills to work on with Ike (multiplication tables, handwriting, reading) and fun things to do with the kids. And I'm not sure how in the hell I'm going to fit it all in.

I want time to rest and recover, in some ways I feel so, so drained....and I want to become a gym rat. I want to hit the gym 3 days a week.

I want to know what in the hell I'll be teaching in the fall (if anything besides Handwork)...so I can prep for that.

I want to spend time with my husband.

I want to spend time with my extended family and my family of choice. I want to surround myself with those who love me and my family.

I want this to be a good, recharge time. And a time to purge! (and here I just bought more yarn! =))

So many goals, so many ideas, not a plan in sight.

Ut.

I meant to write this last week....I got busy. Sue me. =)

On May 10, 2011 I woke up determined to make a change. There are things I want to do. There are things I want to accomplish. There are places I want to go. I can't do that in this sized body. In one year I lost 35 lbs. Officially kept of over 20 (i.e. never bounced above a 20 lb loss) and on the one year anniversary I was 29 lbs lighter than I had been the year before. As of this morning, its 30 lbs.

Part of me goes "Dammit! Only 30 lbs in a freaking year? Why can't you do better than that you fat slob? Slacker!"
Another part of me goes "Hey. Not bad. Slow and steady wins the race. That's over a 1/2 a lb a week. The weight that comes down slow, stays off. Its working. Just keep at it."

I'm trying to listen to the second part more.

But it's hard. The first part is louder, and really? Its a chorus.

What did I learn in a year?
-I am seriously addicted to sugar. I can tolerate small amounts at a time (a single cookie, a small serving of ice cream, a single truffle) and not trigger the binge cycle. I also need to wait 2-3 days before having another bit or else I trigger the cycle. But overall, sugar makes me feel awful.
-Calorie loading in the morning with a nutrient dense smoothie at Breakfast works awesome.
-A really light dinner makes me feel good too. (Especially if I eat before I feed the children. When I'm fed, I can deal with Dinnertime with them much easier. Makes it a more pleasant experience for everyone.)
-So does not eating after 8PM.
-Movement and strength training, while it sucks while doing them, I like the results.
-Sleep is seriously important. If I'm tired, I crave comfort food.
-a liter of water in the morning is difficult to drink...but creates a great foundation for the day.
-Going Grain free is a serious pain in the ass! I thought Gluten Free was bad. Sheesh! But....I do feel better when I avoid them...all of them. Grains are a treat now. Oh...and I can no longer tolerate whole grain rice...its what sent me to the ER back in December. (Subsequent exposure has confirmed this) Rice turned into flour? No problem!
-Potato free is beyond insane. And I don't feel any different when I avoid them.
-I can choose to say no thanks. (this one is huge)

So, my goal from May 10, 2012 to May 10, 2013 is to repeat the exercise. I'll take another 30 lb drop. It gets me closer to where I want to be.

-Allergies suck.
-Peanut has fleas. And he keeps crapping on the floor at night. I crated him last night and got a bad night sleep due to the crying from the crate.
-I've been up late every night this week despite efforts to go to bed early.
-Ike is not sleeping due to allergy attack and is cranky as hell. Gray keeps taking naps late in the afternoon and is up all night (which is why I'm up late.)
-One class done as of last night (Final grade of B. I just don't give a damn about this program anymore. I just want my units. As long as I pass, I'm happy).
-One class yet to go, but I only have 2 projects due for it left. (I figured I could still get a B in the class without reading the textbook. Awesome. I'll have to skim it for content to write the final reflection paper.)
-One more weekend of Foundation Studies.
-Four weeks left of school and I still have to teach 3rd grade how to crochet.
-I've had a RSI flare for the last 2 weeks. OW.
-I need to figure out how to pay for Teacher Training.

Other than that...all is pretty good.

From the Tales of Mu, Dee to Mack:

“Where I come from, anger is numbered among the comforting emotions,” Dee said. “That is, one of the emotions that is deserving of and in need of comfort.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because one who is deeply angry has been wronged, and one who has been wronged has been hurt,” Dee said. “And because anger hurts, whether it is expressed or nursed within. It can be a healing pain, but it is pain nonetheless.”

• I was extremely lucky that I never got infested as a child.
• Its a growing epidemic in the US, especially in CA with 25% of the child population in the state having an infestation right this second
• It takes a head louse 3 days to starve to death
• The head lice that are running around today are almost completely immune to the regular products available at the pharmacy (makes sense, we've got super bacteria...why not super head lice?)
• Head lice can be killed by hot and/or boiling water or shoving the infected item in the dryer on hot for about 20 minutes
• Head lice are species specific (you can neither give it to or get it from your pets) and blood type specific (if you get a head lice from an O+ person and you are A- if they try to drink your blood, they explode. How cool is that? The problem comes from that louse if its female and managed to lay eggs on you before she goes boom!)
• The more rare your blood type, the lower your chances of infestation is.
• A female louse can lay over 2000 eggs in her lifetime and they are nomadic. Meaning that they go to different spots on your head each day to lay eggs.
• Lice are more active at night
• Your child can have an infestation for 6 months before you notice. (And yes, I brush their hair...I just didn't notice it. I've also never had it before...I didn't know what to look for.)
• The teachers at Supercuts (where I took the kids for free haircuts this morning) are awesome, they spotted it. Unlike the haircutters at the kid salon who have cut their hair at least twice, if not three times in the last six months.
• When you wash your hair or swim, they just hibernate for 4-5 hours.
• The non-pesticide lice removal stuff (enzymatic action) literally dissolves the louses exoskeleton. Cool!
• Head lice HATE essential peppermint and tea tree oil
• For prevention: add peppermint essential oil to your shampoo and conditier
• Better effect: put two drops of peppermint essential oil in your hands, rub onto your hair on the way out the door (start in the back before bringing it near your eyes. Stingy otherwise)
• Ponytails are good. Braids are better
• Spending too much money to have 5 people deloused is a good way of spending money.
• Sitting down for an hour having someone fine comb your hair is actually really, really relaxing.

So for anyone in the South Bay or the greater Bay Area, if you need a service, Nitbusterz is totally awesome. Expensive, but worth not having to fight with your kids. Especially when you have four of them. It took her nearly 5 hours to get through all of us and there's no way in hell I'd of been patient enough to do it. And as Joe pointed out later...there's no way my hands would have put up with it either.

So a couple of weeks back, mollygm  came by and spent some time with her little girl at our house. At one point we were talking about the different therapies for Ike I was looking into. One of the approaches I rejected because it is glorified dog training. I have a child, not a dog. In one of my book posts mollygm  commented that "Kids won't wash their hands unless you train (yes, TRAIN them to do it)." And that rubbed me wrong for some reason. So I let it sit because I wasn't sure how to articulate what I was feeling or how to say what I wanted to say. And I'm not wanting to pick on mollygm  either. The concept of training children bothers me....partially because of that insane book on how to abuse your child and get away with it "To Train Up a Child" by Michael and Debi Pearl. (The book has been implicated in several deaths of children) and partially because, well, training is something you do do to your animals or your tomato plants.  But anyways....

A few days later I started reading Parenting for a Healthy Future by Dotty Coplen. In chapter 5 "Punishment or Discipline" and found words that fulfilled what I was/am feeling

"When a parent only focuses on obedience, compliance, power and control, they risk losing the humanness of the child and instead are responding to the child as a machine or animal. We do need to control machines, we train animals, but we want to teach children." [Authors Emphasis]

She goes on to explain:
"Animals are not expected to make ethical choices or to have a social consciousness and we train them to meet our social expectations. Mans ability to control animals risks giving him an unhealthy sense of power and control...It is worthwhile wondering about the value of animal obedience training when it is extended beyond socializing the animal. It is important to think about how this fits into our goals of being healthy human beings. We need to be very careful about how we use power. We also need to differentiate between training animals and teaching children.

The parent has the task of helping the child learn what is expected in our world and also helping the child develop an inner sense of self as the first step of self control...Learning only to surrender to power and control through obedience and compliance stifles the qualities needed to become a responsible adult."

And I know that some would agrue that we are talking about semantics. But its not really. The inner gesture or inner attitude about the two words (train and teach) is very different. When a parent (or other adult) approaches a child from a position of power with the attitude that they are going to train a child its as if they are saying "I've decided that you are going to do X,Y and Z...because I want you to" To approach a child with a teach attitude its...well, softer. Its "I want to show you how to do X, Y, and Z. I'll be here to help you while you figure it out."

I don't know if this makes a lot of sense to anybody else...but this has sure helped me!

194. A Nest for Celeste by Henry Cole
Saw this one at the used bookstore and the drawings inside caught my eye. Chapter book level reading, simple, but nice story. Illustrations are awesome

195. Bunny tales:Behind closed doors at the Playboy Mansion by Izabella St. James
Story of one of the Party Posse. Hef's set of 7 girlfriends. No surprises, but still interesting.

196. Teach your own by John Holt.
Old book on homeschooling, but considered one of the classics. As a nearly 30 year old book its legal information was quite dated, but some of the other bits were still applicable. Enjoyable read. One statement that made me really think. At one point the author points out that most people not only neither trust nor respect children, they don't like them either. And I'm going "Wait....what?" I thought about it and realized its true. We don't trust children...we weren't trusted as children (I'm sure we can all point to incidents we when we were children and adults didn't trust us) and in turn we don't trust the children around us. We are trained by society to believe that children are out to do bad, make messes, do the wrong thing on purpose to irritate us, etc, etc. Its making me think about how I think about my children.

And I also pondered the not liking children. I realized that's true too. Most people will say they like children. And what they mean is they like well behaved, quiet, non-intrusive, instantly obedient children. Hence ross_teneyck 's comment that truly the best thing in the world is holding a sleeping baby...who upon waking up screaming and puking which you can hand back to its mother. As long as the baby was quiet and sleeping...its a good baby and you like it. Once it wakes up, hand it off to someone else to deal with, its not such a pleasant baby anymore. So go away baby! (Sorry to pick on you Ross). And most adult views of children follow this same path. As long as children are quiet and not bothering me...they are good kids and likable. Once they start acting like active children...they are a menace and need a good beating disciplining so they stop acting up. Maybe I'm a little sensitive about this. Not too long ago someone told me that I have the worst behaved children they've ever seen. Maybe that's true...but I think I need to work on continuing to like them when they do act like little beasts brats heathens terrors monsters children. Loving children is easy...liking them...especially when there are a lot of them, and are not easy children, is a lot harder.

Can't sleep. I want to lay down with Gray, but if I do, I'll get a too short nap making me even more cranky than I already am. Poor boy is teething, so I'm getting up every 2 hours or so. Blargh. I'll try going to be early again tonight. I went to bed at 9:15 last night and then Joe walked in the front door setting off Charlie and I got up to say Hi.

I miss my husband.  I'm really looking forward to his vacation starting next week. We have a babysitter scheduled to take all 4 kids on Tuesday while we go into the City to see the Impressionist exhibit in SF. It will be nice to spend some time with just him.

Want sleep.

Maybe I can get a few naps tucked in next week.

HA!!!