Life lately

I haven't blogged in a while because, well, not a whole lot was going on for a while. I decided to blog tonight with stuff that's happened lately.

Health update first, I suppose. I did hyperbaric treatment again for a total of only two weeks. The first week went fine. During the first day of the second week, I was having trouble popping my ears. They bring the pressure up so fast that you have to constantly clear your ears. It's like being in an airplane but the pressure sneaks up on you a lot faster. We go "down" about 40 feet below sea level (pressure-wise), and at 10 feet I couldn't clear my ears. We tried to go to about 12 feet and my ears started to hurt pretty bad. They sent me back to work and I didn't treat that day. I came back the next day and it was the same thing all over again. We decided to just re-schedule for the following week to give my ears a rest. Also, I was getting over a cold so that is what was most likely causing my ear problems. The next week I did a full 5 days of treatment. It gets pretty boring in there, but we do get to watch movies. This time I was in there with a few other old-ish people. One lady was really old and I generally let her use the bathroom first after we got out of the chamber, since I wasn't ever really in a hurry anyway. One day she thanked me for always letting her go first, whispering in my ear, "You know, I wear depends but I don't always count on them!" It's funny how much old people will share with you and with such little shame. :) Haha. She was really cute and had a tiny voice which I liked.

Following Hyperbaric treatment I have not really noticed much herxing for a long time. I'm still on the same meds as before. Last night my left shoulder blade hurt REALLY bad again. That was the same thing that happened last time I had a herx reaction. I'm hoping that it was also a herx reaction this time and not just that I tweaked my shoulder or something. Last night I put one of those stinky menthol patches on it that I got a while back from that acupuncturist that I was seeing. I didn't notice the pain today at all. I think I remember them saying that the patch is supposed to suck toxins out of the sore spot, but I'm not sure if that's accurate or not. It seemed to work either way. I'm hoping my leg or hip or knee or something will start hurting again, too. That way I'll know whether I'm reacting or not. I just want to KNOW that the lyme is being KILLED OFF!

So, last Wednesday my stomach hurt reallllyyy bad and I felt totally nauseous. I didn't eat dinner (which is quite weird for me) and I immediately stopped taking my meds cuz they already bug my stomach a lot and I knew I couldn't handle any more going on in there. I went to bed early with a barf bowl by my bed, but luckily I didn't have to use it. The following day was Thanksgiving. I felt better in the morning but still not 100%. I ate as much food at Thanksgiving that I would on any other day (PLUS pie). I did okay for most of the day but near the end of the celebration I felt like crap so we went home around 7:30-ish. I felt quite yucky again and went to bed early again. Each day after that I felt a little bit better, and I think I'm finally around like 90 - 95% today. YES! I didn't take my pills that whole time which is probably not that good, but I honestly couldn't handle anything else bugging my stomach. BLEH! I started them up again last night. (No, I'm not pregnant by the way.)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanksgiving was pretty good over all. Luckily, I didn't have any responsibility concerning the food or food preparation. YES! All I had to do was bring apple cider. It turned out yummy. I just heated it up in our slowcooker with a few cinnamon sticks on the bottom. Yum yum! James and Joey were so cute. Most of my relatives were there. We just hung out, ate, watched football, played with James, etc. I'm thankful for Grandma, Carl, my mom, and all of the others who helped pull it off this year. There are many things this year to be thankful for. I am so thankful for my Ryan. I just have so much fun with him even when we're just sitting around on the couch watching TV together. He takes good care of me when I need "pushes" (that's when he pushes on my back until it feels better), helping me remember to pay the bills, listening to me rant about work or whatever it may be. He's sweet and funny and handsome and I LOVE HIM! :) I am also so thankful for my family - Mom, Dad, Tammy, Lance, Nae & Seth and my favorite boys, James and Josiah. I can't get enough of my nephews and their cute smiles. I try to steal all of their kisses and snuggles. :) I am thankful for our jobs, even when we dislike them. We are blessed to be making money during this time. There are a hundred other things I could list, I'm sure.

_______________________________________________________

One thing I am very thankful for is the way that God works things out. And for new friends. Which brings me to my next story. So, some background first. Mitch (my lyme-dude that works along side of my doctor and also runs the hyperbaric center in Chico), is also our landlord. His daughter Brandee married a family friend, Mikey. (Is it Mike now? We're all grown up!). When we moved into the triplex that Mitch owns (where we live now), Brandee and Mike lived next door to us. They moved out about 2 months after we moved in so we didn't get to know them as well as we wanted to. They moved to Davis for school (med school for Mikey, eeeek!). Anyway, I decided to email Brandee via Facebook because I remember hearing that either she or her sister had lyme disease. I emailed her to ask her about how she was feeling now, what treatments she did, how long she had symptoms, what her symtpoms were like, etc. I just felt like it was a pretty easy and non-threatening way to reach out to someone else who might kind of have an idea of what I'm going through. She wrote back and told me about her symptoms and that she was on antibiotics for years, and that she is feeling a lot better than when she was in jr. high school when her symptoms were at their worst. THEN she told me that she was going to be in town for a doctors appointment that next week and asked me if I wanted to get together and talk. ACK! Way out of my comfort zone, right? But it was actually just what I needed. We chatted back and forth a little bit through facebook email, and decided we'd meet that Tuesday around 8:30 but didn't pin-point a place yet. Come Monday night I hadn't heard back from her and I wasn't sure what to do. She had given me her cell phone number so I decided to just text message her on Tuesday morning to see if she could still get together. I just said, "I didn't hear back from you, so I wasn't sure if we were meeting this morning. Let me know if another time would work better". She called me back a few minutes later. Her internet connection was down at her parents house so she couldn't write me back or retrieve my phone number from her email. She told me she was freaking out since she had no way to get ahold of me. She asked if I had just texted her a few minutes ago because she can almost NEVER recieve texts due to poor reception at her parents house. But, she got mine! :) We ended up going to Cafe Ricci accrossed the street from our place that morning. It all worked out, despite bad cell phone reception and no internet connection. WOO HOO! We could only meet for about 45 minutes because she had an appointment that morning. It was great to talk to her. She is really, really sweet and easy to talk to. So it wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. She was really encouraging. She told me that I could call her anytime if I need someone to talk to. She's like "just call me anytime! We can even pray over the phone! Whatever you want!". She is such a nice girl and I think she really had a soft spot in her heart for me and my lyme-issues. She has been well for several years but kind of had a "relapse" about a year ago. She shared with me that God has taught her a lot especially in this last year of getting sick again. I shared my fears with her about the future which are fears that she has also had. I'm scared of getting more and more sick each year and my husband having to take care of my like I'm an old lady. I'm scared that I won't have enough energy to be a parent, or that a pregnancy would be really hard on my body. I'm scared of passing on the lyme to my baby. I'm scared of the lyme spreading to my brain and having to deal with difficult cognitive issues (which is the case for a good number of lyme patients). These are all things that she has feared as well. She told me that God taught her this time that he is bigger than us and our Lyme. If he wants us to have children, we will have them and he will give us enough strength to care for them. We might be afflicted with Lyme, but it doesn't define us. The verse that kept coming up in her mind was the one in 2nd Corinth about taking every thought captive. She would have a fear/thought about the future and she'd have to realize that God is bigger than that fear. Then she'd "take the thought captive" and submit her fear to God. Pretty much repent for not having the faith that she should have. I agree with everything she says. I told her that I know all of that in my heart but sometimes it does overwhelm me. I know that she understands though. I am glad that she was open with me and also that I have another person praying for me now. I wish she lived here so that we could be closer friends. I need to email her soon to find out how her appointment went and to thank her again for reaching out to me (especially since it is so out of my comfort zone). I, of course, began to cry at one point (or two) because I'm wimpy or, "a big ball bag" as Allie's mom in The Notebook phrases it. I think I was also just emotional anyway, plus, it was too early for me! Sheesh! :)

________________________________________


I'm looking foward to Christmas. The holidays can be hard sometimes, but Ryan helps me find joy around this time of year. He kind of turns into a little kid around Christmas time and that makes me get more into the Christmas spirit. We went out on Black Friday and ordered a new TV for our Christmas gift to each other. It should arrive this Saturday. They're also going to haul away our old TV for free. YAY! We can't wait. Our old TV is dying fast. :-/ I'm working on Christmas shopping now, but it's hard this year! I think I'm pretty much done with James, Joey, and Nory, but I have no idea what to get for several people on my list. I just want to get everyone exactly what they want but it's hard to know what is going to give them that special feeling inside. Haha! I'm such a dork. We still need to put up our tree. I think every person we KNOW put their tree up right around Thanksgiving. We need to get on it before Christmas has come and gone.

______________________________________

We got new neighbors on Saturday. We got quite the announcement that they were here last night. Well, technically really early this morning. Around 5:15 we both woke up from a knocking on our neighbors back door. The pounding went on for a few minutes. We then heard her go to the front door and try there. She came back to the back sliding glass door and continued to pound on it. Somehow she got locked out at 5:15am?! She continued to pound and to scream "JONATHAN!!!!?" pound! pound! pound! "JONATHAN!!!" Um, yeah. The pounding and yelling went on for about 30 minutes, which at that point we were completely awake. By the time I fell asleep again Ryan's alarm was going off at 6:30. ugggghhh. was JONATHAN in a freakin' COMA or something?! I really hope they made like 7 copies of their keys today. I'm also glad I didn't see her this morning cuz I might've just ran up to her face and screamed "JONATHAAAN!" at her. UGH!
_____________________________________________

Well, it's 10:40 now so I suppose I should go brush my teeth and get ready for bed. Ryan demolished my Typing Maniac score, so I need to rest up tonight so that I can maybe try to beat it tomorrow. :) I honestly didn't think he could beat me. But he did. I am ashamed. Goodnight!

Hey, that looks familiar!

So, I love NatalieDee.com and her comics. Some of them are sooo funny and they're pretty much all off the wall. Her husband does toothpastefordinner.com which is another great one. They're obviously a pretty hilarious couple. Anyway, I check Natalie Dee pretty much every day to see the new comic of the day. Some of them are lame but the ones that are good are really great. Anyway, I went to check today and yesterday's was up, too:

And I was thinking.. hmmm.. That looks familiar!

Then I realized what it reminded me of. Like a year ago, maybe more, Rachel showed me how to knit. We just started with some cheapy yarn that she had and i was going to make a "wash cloth" (aka SQUARE), just to practice. That way it would be an easy pattern and wouldn't use up much yarn at all. I practiced and didn't really get addicted like the girls did, so it stayed at home for a long time. They never taught me how to bind it off so I never finished. It looks almost EXACTLY like the comic, even the nice blue needles. hahaha! Awesome.

I just need to add a sad face to it! HAHA!

If you go to her site, just start hitting "Random Comic" and you're bound to find something funny (or offensive!) :)

PS. Mondays suck. I hate football.

Weekend

We slept wayyy in yesterday and then we stayed up really late last night (2:45am?) so we skipped church today, too. I slept in today as well. Somehow I was still tired this evening so I laid on the floor. "Ryan, don't let me fall asleep for an hour and a half again" (like I had last weekend). That was around 5:30. Around 7 I woke up to Ryan with a plate of cookies in my face "YOU WANT A COOKIE?! I know I wasn't supposed to let you sleep for long. Sorry". hahaha. Apparently he made cookies (pre-made dough) and I slept through the sound and the SMELL. hmmm. What can I say? Football ALL FREAKING DAY lulled me straight into a boredom coma.

Anyway, we were home basically all day so I got a loootttt of laundry done. So that's good. As for the rest of the house, I can't say much for it. It pretty much looks like a tornato went through it. I did manage to do all of our laundry (load finished in the dryer waiting for me right now), and our dishes, too. I finished up my pumpkin for work, too. I made a witch. She turned out cute. I'll post it along with the website so you can go VOTE FOR ME so I can win a nice prize. :) After I woke up from my nap Lynae called so that I could Skype with them and see my boys in their matching jammies that I found at Target for them. They were really cute and cheap and matching so I HAAAD to get them. :) We watched an ep of Lost - Flashes Before Your Eyes - a classic. :)

I love my boys so much. I'm glad I got to see them on Skype today since I didn't get to see them at church. Last night I went with Lynae to Erika's house for a girl's night. It was fun. We made pumpkins and watched the office, mostly. I finally got to hold my Joey-pie for a good chunk of the evening and James joined us later, too. He's so cute and funny. He is so cute with Jordan. They have really funny conversations and they're really sweet together. Jordan is so cute and likes to be very helpful with everything. What a sweetie. Welp, all that's left to do today is pay all of our bills and get those out of the way and then we will go to BED!

Doc appt update

I just got back from the doctor about 15 mins ago. Now I am about to enjoy an episode of Ellen. :) I had an appointment with Mitch and then with Dr. Johnson right afterward so I just took the 2nd half of the day off. It also gave me about an hour in the afternoon to rest and unwind! (it's 4-ish now instead of 5-ish when I'd normally be getting home).

So, basically after I stopped doing hyperbaric I started on a new med, amoxicillin. They told me that for about a month after stopping hyperbaric treatment that I could still benefit from it. Within a few days of starting the amox, I got a reaction that could indicate lyme. As the bacteria dies off, it dies off at a fast rate and your body can't process it very fast. In turn, you can notice an intensification in your symptoms and that's exactly what happened to me. BUT, it only happened for about two weeks or so. I have a feeling it was the combination of the benefits of hyperbaric and the amoxicillin.

So, after meeting with Mitch and Dr. Johnson, this is what the new plan is! First they're going to take me off of clarithromycin and put me on I think Flagyl? Now I can't remember. Anyway, I'm not sure exactly why they're changing it but if they think it's the right move I'm fine with that. I think the amoxicillin is working well so I'm glad they didn't take me off of that. I think flagyl is just another antibiotic but I think it works a little bit differently. AND it can penetrate tissues and cells which is where the lyme bacteria (or "buggies" as I like to say) like to hide out sometimes. So it will probably be a good change.

They're also going to let me do hyperbaric for two weeks (maybe more if it's working, I hope!). I really, really hope that this finally going to be the "trick". :) Pray, pray, and pray some more that it'll work! I will do hyperbaric 5 days a week and then 3 days a week they're going to keep me there 20 mins longer and do something called light therapy. They'll do it on my hands first but if it works they'll do my feet, ankles, knees, etc. It basically is a localized treatment that blocks inflammation. So we'll see how that goes. He seems pretty excited about it.

He told me something else interesting. I asked him if I'd have to take my wedding and engagement rings off for the light therapy because basically, they're STUCK on my finger. He asked me if it was due to swelling and I told him I didn't think it was swelling - I've just gained a lot of weight since we got married 3 1/2 years ago. He told me that weight gain is something they often see in Lyme patients. (Whaaat??) I told him that I think a lot of it is due to me not doing much movement or exercise during the day because I tend to be really sore afterward (and my fatigue factors in, too). He told me that there might be a possiblity of an actual SLOW DOWN in my metabolism from the lyme. Another thought is that the toxins actually hang out in the fat cells which can cause the extra weight. Sometimes when people lose weight, as the fat cells shrink down the toxins are released and their symptoms can intensify. Pretty crazy!

So, I'm trying to be hopeful with the new stuff we'll be trying. I am really thankful that I get to go into the hyperbaric chamber for a weeks, too. I want this to work!

Rayms

I've been thinking about how funny James is now that he's talking a whole bunch. I thought I'd share a few funny stories / conversations.
_____________________________________

James: ouch!
Me: Oh, sorry hun. I scratched you with my ring.
James: Your ring?
Me: Yeah, see? Uncle Ryan gave this to me when we got married.
James: I want you to get married!
Me: We are already married, silly! Do you want to get married someday?
James: YEAH!
Me: Who do you want to marry?
James: Ummmm... DADDY!
Me: haha! I don't think you can marry daddy. You need to pick a girl to marry. What about Jordan?
James: YEAHHHH!
Me: Who should Josiah marry?
James: JORDAN!
Me: He can't marry Jordan if YOU'RE marrying her. How about Norah?
James: YEAH! NORAH! Where's my ring??? (looking and his tiny cute fingers) :)
__________________________

We went out for pizza with the Condits after church on Sunday.

We sit down, immediately James says,

"where's my pizza?"
Us: They're still cooking it, James.
James: Where?
Me: back there in those big ovens
James: I can't hear it!!! (hand by his ear, leaning over toward the kitchen)
Me: Can you smell it?
James: Yeah. Where's my pizza?

James also introduced his new impression of The Count to me while we were eating. It's SOOOOO cute! "a-one, a-two, ah ah ah!" I love it.

When we were leaving after pizza, we were all getting in our cars and saying Bye. James says, "Byyye! We should do it again sometime!" Love it.
_______________________________________

So, I Skyped (web cam) with James for the first time last week. He was so cute. The main part of your screen is the other person and then there's a little "Me-Cam" in the corner and it shows yourself so that you can see if you're on screen and stuff. James was obsessed with the little picture of himself. "Is that Rayms?" (He can't quite say his J sound yet so he calls himself Rayms). We'd ask him "are you talking to Aunt Lee Lee on the computer?" and he'd say "I want to talk to Rayms!" Every once in a while I'd just see his forehead in front of the camera which meant he was looking closely at the picture of himself. Later he was spacing out on his picture and demanded, "Rayms! Talk to me!" I don't think he understood that there weren't TWO James', but it was just himself on camera. HAHA! Joey woke up and Nae put the computer and James in Josiah's crib with him so I got to see both of them. The only downside was that I couldn't hug and kiss them. :( Luckily on Sunday I got to spend a good chunk of the day with them while Ryan and Seth played frisbee golf with Tones. It was so fun!

Self-discipline

I have put no "structure" into my life besides my work schedule. I think I wouldn't go so crazy and I wouldn't have such a mess around all the time if I structured my week better. It just needs to be small things. I was thinking of making one night "clean the bathroom" night and a few days a week "do the dang laundry" day. I'd also need a "put away the dang laundry" day, because I'm SO bad about that. I just have a pile for EVER sitting in the laundry basket, in front of the couch, or upstairs on our bedroom floor. If I had a chore system then maybe I wouldn't get behind on stuff. It's just hard to tell what we'll be doing each night (although our weeknights are usually pretty open), or how I will be feeling each day.

I decided to start a not-very-strict diet/exercise plan this past Monday. I can't go crazy or I will not stick with it. Also, with exercise, I just have to do what I can because I get sore and tired from basically NOTHING! So I kind of just have to take baby steps toward better health and hopefully losing some weight. My weight has skyrocketed and I'm sure it's contributed to worsened symptoms and also not so great of a self-image. So I made a calendar for this week and the next 3 weeks of my lunches, Ryan's dinners and my dinners. Some of our dinners are the same but Ryan is really picky so often times if I want to eat healthy I have to make two separate dinners. I generally choose easy stuff for both dinners if I make two meals or else I'd go crazy. Anyway, with a food schedule/outline it helps me stick to the plan more easily and I get the groceries ahead of time which makes it much easier! I think I should definitely plan a weeks worth of groceries ahead of time no matter what. It makes it easier if I don't have to run to the grocery store after work for just a few things and it will probably also help me to make healthy choices and not just resort to the most convenient thing (which sometimes means driving through Taco Bell).

I've also been setting my alarm earlier to go on a walk before work. I only walk about a mile but I think the "structure" of starting the day the same each morning will help the other plans during the day fall into place. It'll hopefully put me in a more self-disciplined mindset. So far this week I walked Tues, Wed, and today. 3 out of 5 is okay with me. I'd like to do 4 - 5 though. I want to try to talk Ryan into taking a walk with me in the evening before it gets too rainy. My walks have been good so far. I used to listen to my ipod but I haven't updated it forever so I've just been walking, listening to my brain instead. Haha. It's good though because it gives me time to think before the day starts and it also gives me time to pray and reflect on Gods will. If I don't make time for things like that it doesn't happen. I don't know why I can make time for sleep, watching TV, cooking, etc, but not for God. Why does it seem harder than the other things? I don't know. But that is another - and the most important thing - that I need to have more self-discipline about.

So, besides exercise, food, and chores I would like to schedule in quiet time. I want at least once a week to set aside time before bed to read the bible and pray WITH Ryan. Soon I would also like to get up earlier and read the bible before I take my morning walk. I'm sick of just being a "Sunday Christian" with that being the only time that I read the bible. And if I just pray all the time but never pick up the bible (aka GOD'S WORD!), that's kind of a one-sided conversation, right?

Anyway, I neeeeeeeeed to set up more structure in my life and have more self-discipline when it comes to pretty much all aspects of my life. It's going to begin with being clear on what God wants for me, so I suppose I need to start there.

___________________________________________

Anyway, tonight I'm watching Jamesie from after work til around bed-time. He's sooo cute! Nae's going to an art reception tonight where she has some of her art pieces submitted. James is at preschool and then he'll ride his lil bus over to Playcare. I'm picking him up from Playcare after work and then he'll hang out with me and go night night at my house. Robin lent me Finding Nemo and Over the Hedge in case Jamesie wants to watch something. The only kid movie we have is Shrek and that's what we watched last time he came over. I can't wait to hang out with him! :) He's sooo cute these days and he says the funniest stuff.

Ryan is leaving for Reno tomorrow morning for a bowling tournament with his mom. They'll just be gone overnight. Hopefully I will get some stuff done while he's gone. I tend to do better at attacking the chores and cleaning the house when he's gone for some reason. At the same time, the time will probably go by pretty fast. I hope Ryan and Tammy have fun and do well in their tournament! They'll be squeezing in some gambling, too, I'm sure. :) I love my Ry-ry sooo much. He's always willing to listen to me and he's really sweet with me. He's also really funny and fun to spend time with. :) He's the best!

Quick health update

I had some intensification with my symptoms for about two weeks which would indicate that the meds and/or effects of the hyperbaric chamber were killing off the lyme bacteria. I haven't had the same type of intensification for several weeks now, although I have been sore (as usual), more tired than usual, and I've had some headaches here and there as well. I emailed Mitch and Joanne about possibly going in the hyperbaric chamber again. I think that the combination of hyperbaric and the 2 antibiotics that I am now on could really attack the bacteria better. They told me that the effects of hyperbaric can still help me for about a month after I stop the hyperbaric treatments. During that month I started the second, more powerful (and higher dose) antibiotic and that is when I experience the herxing. That's why I want to do hyperbaric treamtent AND antibiotics at the same time this time. I have an appointment with Mitch and then Mitch and my doctor together in two weeks from today. Hopefully they will be open to me going into the hyperbaric chamber again. In the last week I've felt really yucky but it's not the same as before. I'm not sure if it's my meds or if I'd just feel this way anyway. BLEH. It sucks though because I have NO energy or motivation.

Anyway, it's time for Flash Forward so I must be going!!!!!!!!!!

Aunt and Uncle Robot :)

Nae, I promised James he could see these pictures. Wanna show them to him? HAHAHA!

Just some fun at the toy store in Mendocino!

Wicked

I forgot to blog about our little day trip to San Francisco! Two weekends ago Ryan, Tammy and I went to San Francisco to see the broadway musical Wicked. It is described as the "untold story of the witches of Oz". It was really good! I didn't grow up seeing musicals, and I still don't like watching musical movies, but I enjoyed Wicked very much. They kind of portray the wicked witch of the west and GOOD, and Glenda as sort of mean/stuck up. It starts from school age - like maybe highschool age, until their "current" adult age. The girl who played the green witch was the main girls understudy, but you never would have known it! I wouldn't have realized that if we hadn't read the insert in the brochure. She was a very good singer. She was a bit of an "over actor" when she wasn't singing but I think that's how broadway is supposed to be. It didn't bother me too much. She was REALLY good. Glinda was WAY funny and I liked her big, beautiful dress at the beginning and end, too.

After the play we took the bart back to the Concord area where we started and went to dinner at Black Angus steakhouse. It was REALLY good and we were dang hungry because we didn't grab lunch before the play. eek!

Anyway, it was the day after Tammy's birthday, and her friend Debbie had the restaurant people sing her a birthday song which she HATES. But, we did get a free delish dessert which was amazing. I hope she had a good time - I think she did. It was a long trip for one day but we had a BLAST! :) I didn't get any pictures, but Tammy wouldn't have allowed me to get any of her anyway. wink

Vacay, houses, work, oh my!

Last weekend we went to Mendocino with the Condit fam, the Lefebvres and another couple who are friends with the Lefebvres. We had a great time! We spent a lot of time at the beach and around the shops in downtown Mendocino. We visited the infamous chocolate shop where we ordered a chocolate & mint hunk of chocolate which was AMAZING, and of course the hunk of white chocolate with real, fresh raspberries in it. At the beach we relaxed, played with James, held the babies, saw a doggie on a surf board, got a good amount of sunshine, and lots of sand in my purse & cell phone (and James' diaper).

The babies got up VERY early so we came back a bit tired, but it was worth it. James woke us all up the first morning at about 20 mins til 7. I didn't want to be up that early but at the same time, I had fun listening to James' cute little voice for 20 mins before I got up. He's so funny lately and he's talking A LOT. I love that little guy so much! Waking up early also got as a good, early start which meant more time during the day to hang out. I was tired though and gave having more than just 1 kid a second thought for a moment. :)

Here's James in his sand "chair"

Here's Joey bundled up at the beach :)



James' SAND sock line from the first day playing on the beach

We saw some horses while we were at the beach. When we pointed them out to James he said "I WANT TO PLAY WITH THEM!" Haha. I pictured him playing fetch with them or something. Seth took him over there and he got to sit on one of them. He was so cute! He kept leaning down and hugging them. It was so sweet.





The Lefebvres & Co. caught up with us at the beach after they went on a hike. Here are their cutie's. Lucy Lefebvre, and Cason who is the son of Ashley's friend Robin.


Aw, what a sweet couple. Orrr, wait... is Lucy already betrothed to Josiah? Or is that Nory? I always lose track.

Joey and James both got to take their naps at the beach. Ryan said that James' legs looked like when the wicked witch of the east got killed by the flying house (see the striped "socks).




We stayed in the Garden Cabin which features a big garden behind it. Lynae took James out there for a photo shoot and he loved exploring. Here he is being a sweet, curious little boy wondering, "what's in here??"

________________________________________


So, we got a letter in the mail today stating that we did NOT qualify for the CHIP home that we applied for. :( It's kind of a let down since it's something we were looking foward to, and it wouldn't mean house hunting and all that stuff. But if it wasn't meant to be, then it wasn't. We were disappointed but at the same time, we both felt comfortable with the outcome. They denied us based on income. We don't make enough to qualify. I'm guessing that means they compared our income to what our payments would've been and we couldn't quite cut it. I thought that if the houses ended up being more than 200,000 that the payments would be a little bit too high for us. Maybe not if we got the first time buyers loan but I guess they wouldn't take that in to account if they weren't sure that we'd apply. I suppose we'll keep our eye on the mls listings and pray about our options. :)

So, at work we've been looking for a new office to move into and OUT of our tiny, non-creative, crap-fest of an office that we're in now. It's not as bad as I'm making it out to be, but it's definitely not a "creative atmosphere" which I believe is what our designers need. ANYWAY! A few days ago we looked at an office that is up for lease in downtown Chico. It has pretty much EVERYTHING we want in it. We wanted somewhere downtown for convenience sake, we wanted a more creative atmosphere, we wanted something bigger with a few offices within the space for my boss to have her own office and to use the additional offices as meeting rooms. This one has one big area where desks can go, another small area (lounge area?), two private offices in the middle, two private offices in the back, one big area that can be closed off for meetings in the front, and a place for our servers. It's way bigger, and it's SOOO BEAUTIFUL in there! I would MOVE there if I could afford it. :) It's in one of the upstairs buildings in downtown and it has windows that open up toward the street. It has tall ceilings, partial brick walls inside, small back patio, and SKY LIGHTS! It's pretty much amazing. It's also cheaper than most of the other places we've looked at and it's WAY nicer. All of us are in love with it except, of course, my boss. I can't really pinpoint what her problem is with it except for really small, minor details. You have to climb stairs and she buys a couple of bags of groceries each monday that she'd have to lug up there. We'd have to get three additional parking spaces in the parking structure. She said she felt like it was hot in there. There is a thermostat in there so no matter how hot it was we could make it comfy, first of all. Secondly, I saw that it was set to 76 whereas it's usually anywhere between 78 - 80 degrees in our office because apparently she has weird temperature issues or something. Anyway, I'm just bummed that she doesn't like it but luckily she doesn't make the final decision - the owners of the company do. Mark, one of the owners came to Chico today from Mt. View to see the building and take some measurements. I'll have to see what he thinks of it later because I left while they were still over there today. I hope we get it. It's SUH-WEET!

Well, that's about it. I'll leave you with a funny little James story. My mom told me that she sometimes calls my dad "honey". James is over there once a week while Nae & Seth have date night. James was over there the other night and right now he's in that stage where he repeats EVERYTHING! It's also almost like he hears everything, too. Anyway, he started saying "come on, Honey" to my DAD! BAHAHAHA! Hilarious. It's so cute to picture tiny Jamesie calling my dad "honey". :) Kids are sooooo cute!

Here and There

My Blog entry doesn't deserve a "themed" title because I'm not sure what I'm going to talk about yet. :) I just wanted to blog about what's been going on and what's coming up.



We just had a 3 day weekend which was pretty cool. I like having an extra day off but especially if Ryan gets that day off, too. Friday evening I went to Lynae's house to watch James and Josiah for a couple of hours while she helped Seth clean up outside and work on the house. They're putting in new siding and just working on fixing up their house. It's going to look pretty good when it's done! It's kinda fun to watch the process. Seth is pretty proud of his work. :) As he should be - I think he's been working really hard at work all day and then really hard on the house all evening. The inside has looked good for a while now, so they're moving to the outside stuff now. Watching the boys was fun! It wasn't stressful at all since it was only a couple of hours and I knew that both parents were there in case something went awry. Josiah slept for a little while so I played with James in his room. He always says funny things and he's quite entertaining. After Joey woke up James decided he wanted to watch a movie so we hung out in their spare room watching sesame street movies. He told me he wanted to watch "The Healthy One" which is what he calls one of the Elmo movies that talk about eating your veggies & being active. For some reason he loves that one. He wasn't exactly pronouncing his words very clearly so for about 5 mins I was trying to figure out what he was saying. Luckily it was the first one I picked up so I finally figured out what he meant. We watched it 3 times. Yeahhh. Even Joey got into the movie a little bit. When he started getting cranky I'd turn him around and he was pretty happy watching Elmo. Oh no. It begins.


Saturday was our lazy day. We went out to lunch, or more like "Linner" at Applebees. We went when all of the oldsters go at like 4:00. We sat around saying "what should we do today" but didn't end up doing much. We watched some Lost and went for a walk... did stuff around the house. Yeah.



Sunday after church Nae went to a winery with my parents. She took Joey with her and I watched James at my house. He thinks my house is pretty exciting - mostly because it's something different and he doesn't come here very often (we're usually at his house instead). The whole way here he asked "where are we going???" He's sucha cutie. He LOVES Uncle Ryan. Ryan entertained him in the car the whole way home. They're pretty cute together. :)

Yesterday we slept WAY in and figured we would probably have another lazy day. But in the afternoon Lynae called us and invited us over for a BBQ at their house. Dustin and Uncle Paul were helping Seth on the house so they were going to BBQ after they finished up for the day. They decided to make it a "party" and invite everyone. It was fun just socializing and seeing all of the babies. I'm glad we didn't just sit around all day again.

Since we slept in pretty late and I also had a mountain dew around 4-ish, I TOTALLY didn't sleep well last night. I don't do well if I have caffeine after, say, noon-ish. I try to cut it off by 2:00pm. If I don't I generally don't sleep well. And it definitely affected me last night. I also caught a cold. My eyes have been burning all day! Today I've been pretty tired and I have a big fat headache right now. Over all the weekend was fun, and going back to work is kinda BLEH. The weekend went by too fast, of course. But at least this work week will only be 4 days long!

Anyway, we have a few little fun things coming up. Next Friday is Tammy's birthday and we're going to San Francisco from Saturday til Sunday. We're going to see Wicked (it's the "untold story of the witches of Oz.") It's a broadway musical and I've heard it's pretty good. That will be exciting. Ryan probably won't let us go shopping. :( UGH. Jerkface.

The following weekend we're taking Friday off and heading to Mendocino with Lynae and Seth (and the boys!), Adam & Ash (and Lucy!), and another couple who are friends with the Lefebvres. They also have a little boy I think. Yep, we'll be the only ones without kids. Haha! But that's okay. I don't know how pumped Ryan is about being around babies all weekend but I am! He is excited though because he doesn't see Adam as much as he'd like and I know that he's missed him being around a lot since he moved away from town a few years back. Also, hopefully having a second pair of fresh hands around (who don't have to care for their own kids yet) will be a big help to everyone. It'll be a fun little vacation. We're staying at The Lords Land.








It used to be a little hippie commune back in the day. Haha! It's kind of a funny place. But it's also really pretty around there and the cabins are cozy. I can't wait to see the ocean and go to the chocolate shop and spend time with our friends and the babies.



A couple of weeks after we get back from Mendocino, Ryan is going to a bowling tournament in Reno with Tammy. I think I'll stay home since watching bowling and then gambling sounds a little bit boring to me. :) But I'm glad they'll get some time to spend together and time to have some FUN! And maybe they'll even win some money like last time. They're both pretty good bowlers!


Ryan has been talking about possibly taking a week of in November just to get a good break from work. He's thinking November because that's when it will slow down for a little while at work. I might take some time off too to be with him. I'd like to go on a little vacation during that time but I can't think of something that we'll both like. Lately he's been kind of hating some aspects of work. He's been dealing with petty little fights between his employees. I don't think he likes the "babysitting" part of his new job title. I think he's hoping for a change - either be promoted to Supervisor (possibility - but not 100% counting on that), and what I think he prefers even more is for them to hire a supervisor, and then he can stay the Asst. Supervisor, still get experience and some say, but not necessarily have to deal with every single problem that goes on. That would be pretty ideal and we've been keeping one of those situations in our prayers lately. He has been really blessed in his job and we don't want to take that for granted AT ALL. I also just want him to be happy in whatever position he's in and not just go for the highest paying option.



So far we haven't heard anything from the CHIP home people yet. I wish we knew at least WHEN we'd know, you know? Haha! Seriously - I hate waiting. Also, not much "herxing" going on lately. My migrating specific spots of pain kinda subsided. I feel pretty much like my "normal" (not-so-normal) self with the exception of more frequent headaches and I've also been more tired than normal lately. I really hope that the meds are still working. I'm waiting to hear back from Mitch to see if he wants to make any changes to my treatment or if we should keep on going with my current dosage and stuff. I don't think they will up the dose or anything, but I have wondered if he might want me to go back into the hyperbaric chamber for another round. I wouldn't mind doing that because in my mind, anything helps. I'd rather attack it and get rid of it even if it means I'm sick for a little while. I just want it to be GONE!



So, that's what's been up with us lately. I'm looking forward to Autumn in some ways, but in other ways I'm sad to lose the summer days. Apple Chai at Starbucks, scarves, and sweaters will be a nice change but I will sure miss doing BBQ's and going swimming and things like that.


That's it. I'll leave you with some cutie pie pictures of my favorite beh-behs.

Cutie-pie Joey at Grandma's Birthday Party



James' pizza-face :) Yummm.




Josiah laughing! :)


Little Nory-pie smiling! :)

Art

I have this yearning for an artistic outlet. I kinda have a split personality (but not in the crazy freak sort of way). The job I have now is completely the furthest from "artistic" as you can get. I spend MOST of my day typing - mostly numbers, and some words. I look at a paper and translate it into a database. I enter the info from the paper into the database. Wow. Lame. It's weird because I work for a graphic design company and everyone around me has an "artistic" mindset. Even though my job is completely boring and far from that mindset, I still KNOW for a fact that I have an artistic person inside of me.

I wish that I could find the specific type of "art" that I'm supposed to do. In highschool I considered graphic design as a potential future occupation. I don't know now that I would like it very much. I do think I would be good at it because I have the "technical" mindset squared away and I also have an artistic yearning inside of me. I've always thought that being a pastry chef or even ANY kind of chef would be SO FUN. I would love to paint and wish that I had ANY skill involving painting or drawing. I really really really do NOT have any skill in that area. Making jewelry has been something I've really wanted to do for the past couple of years. I bought a bunch of beads and some books but I've only made a few pieces of jewelry. I think what it comes down to is that my logical side convinces my artistic side that it's not "good enough" to succeed. It's because making good art takes RISK and part of me won't let myself do that. (It also takes lots of MONEY sometimes!) I love to watch So You Think You Can Dance and I always loved going to my friend's dance recitals as a kid. I love going to Glazed Creations and painting pottery!!! I look at Etsy.com (my favie website - all handmade stuff for sale), and dream of making beautiful things like the things that are on there. I love shopping and looking at clothes. I feel like when I see a really nice print on a shirt or a well structured dress or a beautiful blouse it's like looking at a beautiful painting for me. (Now if it only looked as good as I'd like it to look ON me.) :) I have an artistic person STUCK inside of me and I have no idea how to let it out. I like it all - yet I only have a tiny big of skill. Somehow I need to figure out how to hone in on whatever skills I have and just as importantly, learn how to develop them. I need that outlet!

Sometimes I just want to take out a piece of paper and some paint and paint something. It ends up being the same rainbow with the clouds on either side or "happy tree" that I used to paint as a kid. Either that or I just streak a bunch of colors across the page. Sometimes the color ones turn out nice... but what am I going to do with it? I mean, seriously, we're talking like... a piece of computer paper and some WATERCOLORS.

Last time I busted out the paper & paint for some art "outlet" time, this is what came of it... a beautiful portrait of me and Ryan:

Ryan loved my painting so much that he hung it on our refrigerator

(using the strategically place magnets, as you can see).

He's a doll.

As you can see, I probably shouldn't pursue painting as a long-term career choice or even as a hobby. :)

Muahahaaa (evil laugh)

For those of you who have husbands who are addicted to sports, you will enjoy this. I suppose I'm mostly talking to Teryn.

Anyway, tonight my feet started to hurt pretty bad. Somewhere at the "top" (I learned that's actually the BEGINNING, not the END) of the 13 inning of today's Giants game, I decided to ask Ryan for a foot massage. Yes - I said 13th as in thirteenth inning. I know - you're thinking, "there are only supposed to be what, 9-ish, right??" WELLLL. This game has made it to at least the THIRTEENTH INNING!!! So, he says "will the Giants win if I give you a foot massage?" and I say "Only if you do a reallllyyy good job". Yes, ladies, I have found a way to get a GOOD foot massage with some passion behind it! Haha! He would get all worked up and excited about the pitch and say "c'mon! c'mon! You can dooo it!!" Meanwhile, he'd be crushing my foot in anticipation - hoping and dreaming that the harder he massages my feet the more it will push his players into hitting home runs. And THEN, if they suck and make a terrible hit, he would get all worked up and upset and he'd massage my foot out of ANGER. Hahaha! WIN-WIN! :)

I thought I'd share because it made me laugh. Maybe pointless to you but I thought it was pretty funny. And I'll definitely try to use it to my advantage in the future.

Oh - btw - we've just moved into the 14th inning. YAY FOR ME.

Watching Jamesie tonight :)

Tonight I watched James over at Nae's house and Lance was there, too. First, I must say that Lance is really growing up and maturing. He just kind of does his own thing. He's got his dinner routine down, he knows how to entertain himself, etc. I also don't know if I mentioned this already but I saw him change James' diaper a couple of months ago and he's a PRO! And he stepped right up to do it without complaints. Luckily, the one I saw wasn't too yucky of a diaper but he still did a really good job of cleaning up Jamesie. It was pretty sweet - despite the poo poo. I still get nervous changing diapers and I never know if I did it right. I suppose they stay on well enough to do their job, but I always wonder if they're too tight? Too lose? Lopsided? Either way they never seem right. I can at least now tell the front from the back. That was until I came across the Swim Diaper which apparently has no back or front - it just goes on either way. Thanks for confusing me right when I sorta get it down, Diapers!

Anyway, I also told my mom recently when she had a few days in a row of not feeling well, that she could let me know if she needed help with Lance. She said "he's so good". It's just nice to know that at least lately she's had some peace with him. It was hard growing up with him and I know it was hard on my mom and and the rest of us, too. There's not really a way to explain it until you've lived it. There are good and bad sides to having a family member with a disability. And I still don't think that my parents' days with Lance are "easy" but I'm just pretty proud to hear that he's matured a lot over the years. He's really sweet with the boys (James and Joey) and just likes to be helpful. It's funny - I was going to go online a few days ago, and I opened up internet explorer and it defaults to like a Yahoo homepage. It has news and different stuff on it. Well, there was a story about a girl on there - I think the headline was something like "Always hungry, all the time". I clicked on it and it was a little glimpse of this girl's life with Prader-Willi Syndrome and a little bit of a look into her daily life. That being, her parents locking the cabinets at home, her having to live in a group home most of the time to control her diet, and her gaining 25 pounds on her week long visit home. Yeah, yeah, stuff I've heard before, right? The news lady that was kind of interviewing her and her family said to the other news woman "I spent the day with a woman who is always - and this is no exaggeration, this is not a metaphor - ALWAYS HUNGRY." and later "some people say the have an 'insatiable appetite' but what if it was literally true??" She later talked about how there are some meds available that help things like obsessive compulsive habits such but - the words she used - "the hunger remains". It's just SO WEIRD because I've grown up with Lance all of my life. I've known that he is always hungry, never full. The "need" for food never goes away. But for some reason, somehow, I didn't REALIZE what that meant until I heard someone else's story and the words coming from someone else's mouth. It's so weird. I just kind of caught me off guard I guess. I mean, I think I grew up at times thinking "We have it so hard as siblings of a person with Prader-Willi Syndrome" or "oh, my mom and dad have it so hard having to care for Lance day in and day out". Those things are true - it's very hard sometimes and I know that is/was especially true for my mom. But I guess I've rarely thought about it from LANCE'S point of view. How hard it is for HIM to constantly have the struggle going on in his mind. He has the tendencies to want (or even NEED) to eat, eat, eat, must... find... food. But another side of him, I'm sure, wishes to be RID of that need. I think it's probably a constant battle for him. It's not something he can control - maybe he can control 10% of it, I don't know, I don't want to put a number on it. But it's not really something he can "teach" himself to stop doing/wanting/needing. I just wanted to say publicly that I'm proud of him. I never thought Lance would "grow up" but in a lot of ways he has.

ANYWAY! The post was supposed to be about my time with Jamesie tonight and turned into a Lance post. Oh well. :) So, tonight I got to watch Jamesie because Lynae and Seth were going to Lynae's 10 year highschool reunion tonight (eekkk!). Josiah went over to my Grandma's house so that I wouldn't have to have Lance, Joey, AND James. I suppose I could've handled it but I'm sure "great-grams" loved some Josiah time. :) When Nae first told me Joey would be with Grandma I kind of thought to myself "aww, dang." I love Jamesie with all of my heart, but I'll just say it - Josiah snuggles more these days - yes, kind of because he has to since he doesn't have the strength to pull away from me yet. But still, I get to hug him the WHOLE TIME! James used to be my little snuggle bug but now that he's getting older he likes to have his personal space. Ugh. :) Still, I was happy to watch James because I love him sooo much. It turned out to be WONDERFUL! I asked him what he wanted to do. "Watch ELMO in the moobie woom!" (movie room). "Okay!!!" James watched Elmo while I went on Facebook and checked my email and all of my various portals. He would get so excited if I sang along with a song on the movie or danced or clapped my hands. I LOVE how easily entertained he is and also how much he loves music. (BTW, I really think he has a good natural beat and probably some sort of musical gift in his future). The couch was folded out into a bed in the "movie room" (the guest bedroom) so that's what we were laying on while watching Elmo. James actual SNUGGLED with me and let me rub his hair and give him kisses. Lately he's been saying "NO AUNT LEE LEE!" when I try to snuggle him. But for some reason tonight he let me. And we just had such a blast together watching Elmo. I know that sounds really funny but it was quality time with JUST James that I hadn't had in a while. I had so much fun lovin' him and being his aunt Leelee. :)

A little while before I put him to bed I decided to see if he wanted some yogurt since he had barfed up some of his dinner. It sucks when that happens because I'm sure he gets hungry again like 30 mins later. So I fed him some yogurt - should've stopped there. I figured he was still hungry and asked him if he wanted some "okey sticks" (aka "turkey sticks" aka rolled up pieces of lunch meat). He did. He didn't throw up. Yayy! Since we had watched several Elmo movies, I thought maybe it'd be fun to give him a bath and let him splash around and play with his bath toys. I brought him into his room and put him on his bed to finish drying him off and to put his diaper and jammies on. For some reason he started gagging and barfing. Aaahhhh! I caught what I could with the towel but some of it got on his bed. Then he just kept going! I brought him off of his bed onto the floor. I caught some more of it in the towel but some got on his little ikea rug. Dang it! Several more hurls later the towel was full and his tummy was covered in vomit. :( Back into the bath!!! I screamed for Lance so that he could get his sippy cup which sometimes helps him stop vomiting. Lance wasn't responding and I was guessing that he was just ignoring me. Turns out he was on the potty. "LAAANNNCCEEE!" He comes in a couple of minutes later. "What?! I had to cut myself off!" HAHAHA! wow. TMI. He watched James in the tub while I cleaned up. I came back and I thought James was crying but it turns out he was cracking up and him and "Adu Ubby" (uncle Lance) were having a blast. So cute. :) I got James to bed after that and he fell asleep pretty quickly. But not until after he played with my ears and poked my face. Sounds weird, but it's something he's been doing forever. So cute. :)

I love my James and I had so much fun with him!!! Dealing with the mess was hard but he's worth it. Plus, Nae and Seth deal with it on a daily basis. I was glad that they had even just one less mess to deal with. It sounds like they had a fun time out without the kiddos!

Herxing

I think I'm HERXING! :)

"Herx" or "Herximer Reaction": occurs when large quantaties of toxins are released into the body as bacteria (typically spirochetal bacteria -- That's what LYME is!) die due to antibiotic treatment or rapid detoxification. Typically the death of these bacteria occurs faster than the body can remove the toxins via the kidneys and liver. It's manifested by fever, chills, headache, and myalgia (muscle pain).

My doctor basically explained that for me I would probably just have an intensification of my symptoms (which would definitely include muscle pain).

For the last few weeks I've had pain in my left shoulder blade that is more intense than my regular pain. I thought that maybe I tweaked it or slept on it funny (I didn't want to get my hopes up!) but now it's lasted for a few weeks. I started a 2nd antibiotic (amoxicillin) on Friday. On Saturday the pain kind of flared up again in my left shoulder. A few hours before we went to bed, the pain kind of migrated over to the right side of my back, just under my shoulder blade (sorta like the back of my rib area). I also got a pretty bad headache for all of the evening and night. Saturday was the same story - headache all evening and pain in the same spot on the right side. Then I had a few days of "normal" - meaning MY normal, not normal-normal, with the exception of slightly more pain than usual in my left shoulderblade. Last night after work my left knee and the area right above my knee was hurting. It would kind of go from a little bit sore to quite painful. By the time we went to bed my leg was hurting pretty bad but not like "CHOP IT OFF!". During the night my leg continued to hurt and pretty much radiated to my whole left leg - enough for it to wake me up several times during the night (I kind of wanted to chop it off at that point). But I am HAPPY because I believe now that I'm truly herxing which should mean that my meds are WORKING!!! YAYYY! I'm yet to have a "good" day so we'll see. I'm waiting for that day.

So, now that I'm taking like - a bazillion pills a day - I got one of those super-dorky old lady daily pill separators/holders with "am" and "pm" slots. AHHH! But mine is actually pretty cool! You can detach each day from the rest of the days and JUST take "Monday" with you or whichever day it is. That way I don't have to lug around a huge old lady pill box in my purse. Love it! :)

Anyway, I just thought I'd give an update on my health status since there has been a change, finally. This is the first change I've had in many, many years. Yayy! Pray that this is TRULY a herx reaction and that I will soon be better.

My husband is THE BEST!

I'm not sure if it was Ryan or not... It looked like him.. sounded like him... but didn't exactly ACT like him. ;-) wink wink.

Last week he had to go to a work meeting in at their Sacramento office. I figured he'd be tired and I'd have to figure out something for dinner since usually when he's tired he doesn't want to go anywhere. When I got home from work he had gotten home about 10 mins before me. He gave me a big hug which is normal, and then asked what I wanted for dinner. He said "What do you want for dinner?" I said, "I don't know, what do you want?" (normal so far... now the weird part...) "I don't know, but you pick what you want and I'll cook it tonight". WHAAAAATTT????? I wasn't sure what he wanted or what he felt confident cooking so we tried something easy - tacos. But he wanted chicken tacos instead of beef ones. Sounded good to me but we didn't have chicken. He said he'd go to the grocery store to get what we needed. He never really likes grocery shopping. He didn't even make me go WITH him! While he was at the store getting our dinner ingredients he spotted some pretty pink flowers and thought "heck, I think I'll get those for Lyndsey". When he came home with flowers after offering to cook dinner I almost died and started to question if it was really him. Or maybe he had accidentally burned my shoe collection or something and was trying to butter me up before he told me?! Haha. I always tell him that flowers are simple, cheap and make me realllyyyyy happy. So if he ever wants to "suprise" me he just has to buy like 5 dollar flowers and I'll be stoked! Somehow, he doesn't really ever think of it unless it's a special occassion... birthday, anniversary, valentines day, etc. This time, dinner, grocery shopping AND flowers for no reason! Who was this guy? I still don't know exactly what got into him that day! He said that his work day was easy because most of it was just sitting in the car and he thought he'd try to cook dinner for once since he wasn't tired. He spotted the flowers at the store and thought to himself "She's going to think I'm crazy but I'm going to get those, too". :) It made me soooo happy! I'm blessed to have such a sweetie pie for a husband. Thanks for a special, out of nowhere type of day Ryan!!!

Is that RYAN cooking?!?!?!?!

My prettiful flowers. :) :) :)

Tonight we're going on a "date" to see The Time Traveler's Wife. I can't wait!

Amoxicillin & Probenecid

I started two new meds today. Amoxicillin (the penicillin, finally) & Probenecid. I'm not quite sure exactly what probenecid is, but from what I've heard and read it basically just helps that amoxicillin work better and prolongs its effects. They had me sit in the hyperbaric office today for 45 mins when I took the meds for the first time. The guy who runs the hyperbaric chamber is also an EMT or something like that, so they wanted me to be there when he was there in case I did have any sort of allergic reaction to the meds such as respitory problems or anything like that. It all went well, and now it's been about 2 hours since I took it and I'm still feeling fine. No breathing issues, itchiness or rashes. YAYYYY!

When Ryan and I picked up the meds I kind of started laughing almost hysterically at the SIZE and dosage of the meds. WOW. I'm supposed to take two capsules of the amoxicillin three times a day (6 pills total) plus one capsule 3 times daily of the probenecid (3 more pills). INSANE! Plus, I took a picture of the bottle (right) compared to a NORMAL sized bottle (left) to show you why it made me laugh so hard. I think Ryan thought I was a little bit looney. But it's seriously like a flippin' flash light or something!

DANGGG!

Anyway, I'm hoping they work and make me all better. That would be sweet. :)

Testing, Appointments, Waiting Rooms... Left and Right!

So, I'll update you on my stuff first since I'm self-centered and the world revolves around me. Haha! Just kidding! Just to get it out of the way, I guess, since it's a bit boring but still exciting for ME. We finalllllyyyyy got my penicillin test done. Results were supposed to be back Monday, MAYBE Tuesday, but no one called me. So yesterday I called them to see what was up. She checked on it and called me back to tell me that the test came back NEGATIVE! So, I'm not allergic to penicillin which is great because now they can put me on a 2nd antibiotic. I believe that penicillins work slightly better than than the alternatives so hopefully it WILL work this time. She said that they'll clear it with the doc today and get it called into the pharmacy. So, I'm hoping I can start it on Friday buuuut... usually stuff takes forever so it might be next week. :( Oh well! It's been 10+ years so I think I can handle a few more days.

Anyway, there are health issues in my family left and right and it's pretty much NUTS. The last few conversations I've had with my family members are basically updates on my health, updates on their health, updates on this or that blood test, or "I have a _____ appointment next Tuesday and a ____ appointment in 2 weeks". Blah Blah BLAHHHH! I just have to keep remining myself OVER AND OVER:

2nd Corinthians 4:16-18

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

As well as the verse that my Blog title is based on:

James 4:14b

What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

In other words, the WORST thing that's ever happened to us here on earth will eventually be a blip on the radar... a mist that vanishes after a few seconds. It's hard to think of it that way since some things are so meaningful and some things even CHANGE the course of our lives here on earth forever. It's not that we're meant to forget these things or categorize them as "meaningless". It just means that when we meet God face to face, the troubles of this earth will not compare to the blessings he has for us, ETERNALLY. No more tears, no more pain, no more losing loved ones, no more surgeries, no more brokeness.

The downside... we're left waiting. Here on the scum (earth). I know there are instructions in the bible for us while we wait, but sometimes I forget about those. My heart just wants to be done with it and on to the good stuff, ya know? But I guess that is the battle I'm faced with that will eventually make me stronger and NOT tear me down no matter how much it feels like it will.

Jamesie had some weird symptoms going on a couple of days ago. Really bad instant migraine-like headaches and his eyes looked strange. Lynae got worried and figured it was shunt failure. The best thing to do was to get it checked out IMMEDIATELY, because if it was shunt failure he'd have to get into surgery as soon as possible to avoid too much water on the brain (which could actually cause brain damage if it's not taken care of). After a couple of days at Sutter Memorial hospital in Sacramento, they're releasing James today. He started acting normal again for at least 24 hours, and his fever went away for good. He didn't experience any more "episodes" of the headaches and googily eyes. They did a couple of tests on him including a 3 hour MRI last night. Everything looks normal and since he's feeling better, too, they're going to release him today. I'm glad he's all better! Lynae will be watching him closely after they get home to make sure he really IS all better. They've gone in before convinced it was shunt failure, got turned away and sent home, and was back two days later for surgery for shunt failure. Sooo, needless to say, it was definitely the right choice to get him thoroughly checked out at Sutter. They're going to see the doctor next Tuesday sort of as a follow up to all of this stuff, as well as his last surgery he had earlier this year.

My mom has also been feeling pretty yucky for several weeks now. It mostly started with "dizzy spells" here and there, eventually becoming more frequent. In the last few weeks she's had an MRI and some other testing done. They're still not quite sure what's going on with her. We don't know if it's stress/anxiety related, hormone related, or something more serious (hopefully NOT!). I've been worried about her, mostly because she worries about everyone else and I think it makes her symptoms worse sometimes. Luckily a few days here and there in the last week she's been able to take a break and get some much needed rest. I just really, really hope she gets better soon and that she doesn't end up with a "mystery disease" like me that takes 10+ years to figure out! My parents also both have some sort of cold/throat thing going on. My dad has been really stuffed up and coughing and my mom has had a really red sore throat.

Anyway, it's been quite tiring keeping up with everyone's latest "health status" and sitting here worrying about everyone, and worrying about myself. I realize that it COULD be worse and we need to be thankful for the health that we DO still have. Just seeing some of the other Lyme patients that I did hyperbaric treatment with made me realize that there are other people suffering from Lyme that have been hit much harder with it than I have.

Anyway, that's enough about that for now. We're still waiting on word about our CHIP home application. We actually have no idea when we find out whether we've been selected or not, when they're planning on building the houses, or really ANY info regarding any of that. The one thing we know is that we'll get something in the mail telling us one way or the other if they've accepted our application. I can't wait to just KNOW! :) I hope we get it.

C.H.I.P. house & test...

A few weeks ago we got all of our paperwork together and sent in our application to hopefully recieve a chance to get a CHIP home. CHIP stands for Community Housing Improvement Program. Basically, they're building 6 homes this time in Chico. If we get the opportunity and get chosen for a house, we'll spend a certain number of hours a week (with help from friends/family, too! please!) helping to build the home. In turn, our "work" will go toward the down payment of the house, and the house will end up being much cheaper than a normal brand new house. I still have NO idea how much it will cost in the end, but I guess if we're approved then we'll find out all of the details. Hopefully if they're built before the year ends we might even qualify for the tax credit next year ($8000 bucks or something). We'll also probably end up applying for a first time buyers loan. We can probably get about 30,000 toward the home which would be payed back whenever we end up selling the house. That's pretty much how it works. Again, i don't know all of the details yet. It'd be pretty exciting to be chosen. Basically, a buunnnccchhh of people applied, and then they took out any applications that were incomplete/missing info. Ours was done correctly so we got put into the "lottery" style drawing along with all of the other people who had complete & correct applications. Then what they do is pull your application at random, and that is the order they review the applications. They then go through and toss people who don't qualify (I don't really know what makes you qualify and what doesn't), and move on through the line until they qualify 6 applicants. Our number is #20. The lady on the phone said that #20 isn't too bad. I've also heard that a TONNNN of people can be turned down so #20 isn't looking too bad. Still, ya never know! I really want to get it if it's going to be what's right for us. And I know it will happen if it's meant to be. It's going to definitely be in our prayers until we find out. I hope we find out SOON! :)

The other thing I'm waiting on is my penicillin allergy test. We FINALLY got it done. They ended up sending me to get a blood test instead of a skin test since I guess they don't perform those tests anymore at the allergists office in Chico. So I just went over to Quest to get more blood taken. The results were possibly going to be back today, but maybe not until tomorrow. If we find out I'm allergic to penicillin then they'll probably put me on an additional non-penicillin antibiotic for my possible Lyme. If I'm not allergic, they'll put me on a penicillin since I believe it works the best. I'm anxious to hear back about that so we can get started on more treatment. I REALLY want this to work. Looking toward the future with a house and good health seems realllyyyy nice. But I have no idea what is in store for us. I know that whatever happens is going to be okay whether I choose to believe that at first or not. The easy way would sure be a blessing though. :)

We're watching Lost over starting with Season 1. I love it! We actually just finished Season 1 yesterday so we'll be moving onto Season 2 sometime this week. It's addicting! But there are a lot of things I've forgotten so it's nice to watch it over again. It's making me not able to WAIT for season 6! But it's also a good time-filler (Lost "fix") until season 6 starts next YEAR. I'm mucho looking foward to it. I hope it's not a let down. The show has been SO good that you never know if they can make the ending match the rest of the show. But I think it has potential to be awesome.

I went to Upper Crust today to get a delish chicken ceaser salad that I got last week. They said it was just a "special" and they don't have it any more. :( It was sooo good! Dang it! I got a delicious sandwich instead, but STILL! :)

I need to not eat out every single day for lunch, so I'm thinking of just buying some turkey, wheat bread, and some other sandwich fixings and bringing them to work so that I can have sandwiches most days. And then if i get sick of it i'll let myself go get mexican food or salad or something else. I'm also going to try to stock up on some smart ones since some of them aren't too bad and it's a more controlled way to eat. We'll see what happens. I keep putting off losing weight until I feel better but I really shouldn't do that. I might not get better (and I'm STILL coming to terms with that). So I shouldn't put it off. I should do what I can do while I'm sick (which might not be WAY significant, but it's SOMETHING), and hopefully if I get better I can kick it into high gear. :) I need to concentrate on diet now with some exercise, and then diet AND exercise if/when I get better. I just need to be more diciplined all together.

Ugh, anyway. I best be going now. :) OH! But first, I must say, Carrisa's party was pretty fun even though I did totally BAD at Settlers this time. :( Ryan and Tammy each won. 'Twas a Bryson Bonanza. Anyway, I got to hold Nory a whole bunch and then Nae & Seth came with the boys so I got to hold Joey, too. He's my little guyyyyy! We got to play with James, too. He was in a pretty good mood until he found out they were leaving later in the evening. He's been going through a phase right now where he doesn't want hugs or kisses from me (or anyone I'm told). But I still tricked him into a few kisses. I hate that he's growing up! Dustin and Seth had fun messing with him, and he had fun too. :) "ah-din! ah-din!" (again! again!)

I forgot...

I forgot to mention that I'm not doing hyperbaric anymore for now. I met with Mitch last Friday after my last session of Hyperbaric. He decided to take me off of it for a while. I guess it's common for people to get better in the following weeks after they quit hyperbaric. (Like a month later or so). We're also TRYING to get me on another antibiotic but we're STILL having trouble getting me set up with the allergist for some reason! (The need to see if I'm allergic to penicillin before they put me on high doses of it). I really wish I could've been on both antibiotics at the same time AND hyperbaric treatment. But whatever. It'll work out. (I HOPE!) So, that's the latest news on my health so far... no more hyperbaric for now, hopefully on 2 antibiotics soon, waiting it out. (So far no changes, but praying for big changes soon).

Chillin' out maxin', relaxin' all cool...

I'm just hanginging out, fartin' around on the internet while Ryan plays a video game. For once he's not hogging the computer playing his precious new game or checking his Mafia Wars. :)

This week has been pretty slow. Yesterday (Monday) felt like Friday. Ryan had a baseball game & stuff, and it just made it feel like the weekend. Today feels more like a Thursday or somewhere near the end of the week. Sadly, we still have 3 more (long) work days until the weekend. BLEH! Today went by semi-fast, but I think that's because I had a meeting at work and I had to prep for it, too. I had a job ticket training meeting with two new employees. It was a bit different than my normal meetings (I won't go into WHY because you'd fall asleep), so it took a bit longer and was a little stressful. Mostly I just HATE any form of public speaking. Especially to strangers. I had to meet with them over the TV conference since they work at the Mountain View office. The TV froze up and wouldn't re-connect so we had to meet over the phone for the 2nd half of the meeting. The server also went down for a minute which caused two of my programs to close - programs I was using for the training. It sucked! Despite all of that, it still went better than my last meeting. I had major brain fog for some reason and I kept forgetting words and losing my train of thought. It SUCKED!

Anyway, boring work stuff. Blah blah blah. I'm lucky though, to have a fairly easy job, a pretty flexible schedule, a couple of friends at work, and a low-stress job. I like my job. There will always be stuff I'll want to change about my job no matter what it is, but over all I'm pretty happy.

Tonight we had "Brinner" (breakfast for dinner). I made pancakes. We didn't want to go ANYWHERE, including the grocery store. We had some left over lasagna but pancakes sounded good. The rest of the evening was spent doing lots of laundry and watching Big Brother with Ryan. I love my Rynie sooo much. He's the best husband ever. He gets me. We just fit well together. He loves me a lot and does a good job of showing me that he loves me. I love him too, lots and lots.

I've been in a weird mood the last few days. I get quite pessimistic from time to time. Ryan is the opposite - an Optimist. (grossimist. tee hee). I told him that I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. He's not buying it. It's nice though to always have his point of view, that being an "up" side to every "down" side I come up with. Sometimes it's just plain annoying though. :) I've just been worried about everyone. I'm not getting better so far even though I'm being "treated". I'm worried about my mom's health (she's had a few dizzy spells and is just feeling kind of yucky all-together). I'm worried about Jamesie and his doctor appointments this week. Worried about Nae and her enduring this week with James AND the baby. And then on top of the bigger things I worry about smaller things like "is Ryan happy at work?" and "I hope Carla had a good bday even though it didn't work out for all of her friends to be there" or "I hope Carrisa and Norah travel home safely"... things like that. Ryan asked me why everything was so bad and I said "we live on EARTH, therefore, pretty much everything sucks". He said, "EARTH is not in control of us. God is." I guess I should listen to him sometimes. He's kinda smart.

Even though this week has been slow, and I've been kind of in a LAME mood (as far as my pessimistic-ness coming through), there are a few things to look foward to. Well, first off, the week will be half way over tomorrow, right? Also, tomorrow I think we're having dinner with my parents. It's something we've been meaning to do for a while and I think it's finally happening. :) This weekend we're celebrating Carrisa's birthday. I finally get to see her and Nory. I miss them both - they've been gone for about 10 days but they're home now. Also, besides Carrisa's bday celebration there's not much going on this weekend so we'll hopefully have some down time.

I should go now and get ready for beddy.

Week 3

It's week 3 of hyperbaric therapy. I'm kind of getting used to getting up early again. That doesn't mean I like it though. At least when I go back to my normal schedule it will feel like I'm sleeping in. I have a feeling he will stop the treatments after 4 weeks (20 "dives"). We'll have to wait and see. I'm sick of movies and picking movies, but I'm glad there's something to do in there. We had a new guy today and he started to feel nauseous. Later he said he thinks it's the meds they have him on right now. I'm not sure why he's there (in other words, what's wrong with him). Luckily they have barf bags in there (better than the ones on the planes, too). He did end up throwing up and I felt so bad for him. I was a little bit grossed out, but I mostly just felt terrible that he wasn't feeling well, especially being TRAPPED in there. Because we're literally trapped in there at least until they could get the pressure back down to release the door. I'm not sure how fast they do it in an emergency. Anyway, I'm sure it was pretty awful for him. :(

So far I've been feeling the same. At least as far as I can tell. I don't think I'd notice subtle changes since I have good days and bad. (and even good hours and bad ones). That's why even if it means I get really sick, I want it to be obvious whether it's working or not. I want to be able to tell Mitch that there HAS been a change, whether it's bad or good. Either way it will eventually be good. Sometimes ya get sick before ya get better. I really just want to get better. It would be amazing. If you pray for me, pray for clarity and healing. I'm also very thankful; my bill was a lot lower than I expected it to be which is good news.

Tonight we were supposed to go out to dinner with my parents since Lance is still gone at camp, but my mom isn't feeling very good. :( The flu bug has been going around and that's what she might have. But it's okay because we just went out last night with my grandparents so we prob shouldn't eat out two days in a row anyway! Plus, we will have something to look forward to when she's feeling better. I hope she feels better soon. :-/ It sucks being sick!

Ugh, I better go. I'll post again soon, and hopefully because I'm feeling all better. :)