I once was a Muppet....

I'm hooking up to Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop once again, this time taking on the topic of telling the story of a talent or hobby that I tried to learn that I pursued only briefly.

Well, if you must know, I once was a Muppet. 

I was a McLeansville Muppet - I was a 6 year old soccer player for a team called.....and say it with me, the McLeansville Muppets. 

Now, you guys have no idea about this little secret about me but I'll share this with you - I have absolutely no athletic prowess whatsoever, and I have 2 left feet which are useless in the sport of soccer.  I was the little girl in the long pigtails running away from the ball.  In addition, even with shin-guards, getting kicked in the shins hurt like freakin hell and I was highly averse to pain even in sacrifice to the Soccer Gods. 

I played 2 years as a Muppet, then was old enough to be a Blue Devil.  (yes, I realize they named us after Duke and as a UNC fan that irks me to this day).  I was slightly older, but in a ponytail and still running away from the ball....and begging my parents to let me quit because I FREAKING HATED IT!!!!  I played one year as a Devil, and my parents finally put me out of my misery and allowed my soccer career to come to an end.  I burned my shin guards, chucked my cleats out forever and NEVER PLAYED AGAIN. 

I felt so badly for my teammates to have such a sucky player like me.  They were so frustrated with me, but when you suck as bad as I did....it's really not my fault!  It's like  a deficiency or something with me, lol! 

A huge shoutout tho to we former Muppets:  Tiffany, Mechelle "Howdie", Joanna, Laura Jo (aka, "Red"), Allison, Julie, JJ, Shannon, Tonya, Mandy, Karen, and Alecia.  I know I'm leaving some out....going by an old picture (and no you guys are not seeing it)!  I love my Muppeteers, we were all in school together until the end for the most part so you guys are special ladies!

Monday Listicles with NW Mommy

Today I decided to hook up with Northwest Mommy and her weekly Monday Listicles! This week's list is on 10 THINGS YOU THOUGHT AS A CHILD YOU WOULD DO or BE. Wow, I had a pretty big imagination as a child and I read adventure books A LOT as a very shy and introverted child (grew out of that now didn't I?) LOL! I wanted very much to crawl into the adventures of many of the books I was reading and live out those characters lives, but here is my master list of who I wanted to be when I grew up:

10. WONDER WOMAN - Okay, I grew up in the 70's and I had Wonder Woman Underoos, and totally idolized Linda Carter. What girl didn't want to be Wonder Woman for God's sake?

9. Barbie - Yes I had a townhouse (with an elevator thank you very much!). Who didn't want to be Barbie? Oh, except when my brother took my dolls and threw them over the railing onto the garage floor and made their limbs all pop off. Poor poor abused Barbie....forshadowing for my life perhaps?

8. A famous singer! I had some piano talent, but when I discovered my singing voice I was like, "YEAH!" Totally wanted to be Debbie Gibson or Tiffany (this was the 80's people...perspective please). Madonna was a little scary, so I stayed with the cleancut singers.

7. A contemporary christian singer/songwriter. I changed gears a little when I started singing with my church group and I did start writing music. I fancied myself the next Amy Grant at the time.

6. Okay, reality had to step in a little bit, so I decided I might want to teach, perhaps music or history. This was dashed after I worked at an afterschool program with some behaviorally challenged kids. I decided children were the devil at that point of my life, and teaching was OUT.

5. Nurse - I started in nursing school, truly felt this was a passion for me. I was already working as a nursing assistant with the elderly and had a love for it. Unfortunately, the program was way too much for me and I had to withdraw.

4. Possible Psychologist, or researcher in psychology. Nixed that, was tired of college and to do anything with a psychology degree required at least 2 more years...I didn't have 2 more years in me.

3. A wonderful wife and mother, with a decent job. Doesn't exactly work when your husband is a drug addict, divorced him. I did love being a stepmother, I loved my daughter very much and I think I was a great mother to her. Only chance I have had in my life to be a mother.

2. A wonderful wife and mother, with a decent job, part 2. I have a great job that I do love most days as an account manager/customer service rep. The mother thing never happened, pretty much due to the same reasons as #3 and other issues in our marriage. This bit the dust as well.

1. Dammit, I am not giving up! I don't care if I get married again, or have children...I'm at the age where that might not happen, but to find the RIGHT man and have a great partnership with someone, along with a great job is really all I want out of life. This is a work in progress, I will have to keep you posted but I want to be happy being me and happy with someone who loves me FOR ME.

Well, you got sort of a mini biography out of my list, you know me guys....I lay it all out on the table. For better or for worse, it is what it is! Hope you enjoyed my list, link up and write your own! I'd love to read it!

New Year's Reflections

Yeah, I know I'm a litle late on my New Year's post, but as you guys learned in the first post I ever wrote on my tiny little blog....I am a Master Procrastinator! I did get my Christmas tree and decorations taken down last weekend, can you believe that??? Last year it was what....March before I took it all down? I call that improvement people....give me some love y'all!

Anyhoo, I wanted to share my thoughts about the happenings in my life in 2012 and what my hopes and dreams are for 2013. 2012 started out a complete suckfest for me, I'll just be honest. If you'll recall (if not, I probably wrote about it so see my past posts), I was in the hospital for a pretty serious illness for a week in December 2011, was let out on the 17th. Christmas kinda sucked for me, I was still feeling like crap, on antibiotics that made me sick as a freakin dog and pain meds for terrible pain I was still in.

January was spent at home....almost the whole freakin month on medical leave. I couldn't go back around people until I was healed up enough not to get any additional infection so I got cabin fever so bad! Terrible depression ensued and my stupid husband was no freakin help. More on him later. Got back to work finally only to find out that there were going to be massive layoffs throughout the year. Great. A group would go each quarter, the majority in September and guess who was to go in September? You betcha! So that was fun news. More on this later too.

The spring and summer go by pretty uneventfully, work and home...spent lots of time with friends. Home life is not happy, although I didn't really realize it at the time. August I start sending out resumes like gangbusters, and get no response whatsoever. Nada, bupkis, nothing. There was just nothing there.

September rolls around, I know that my job ends on the 28th. I have no prospects, although I was getting a severance and payment on at least 2 weeks worth of unused vacay. Still, the stress was major for me. Then, husband dropped a bomb....he's leaving. I was shocked, upset by it. Learned there was someone else he wanted to go see (aka, sleep with) and he wanted a legal separation as soon as possible. So we got separated and he moved out. I stayed in the house, which I am thankful for. About mid-month, I am asked by my manager to stay at work through November, or even longer...of course I stayed!

October, Karen turned 40! I did not spend my birthday alone either. I have the most amazeball group of friends who came to a great birthday dinner for me, bringing flowers, cards, and small tokens of their love for me. My house was full of flowers and their love for a couple of weeks after and I can never repay them for that feeling. I really love my friends so much.

Early November rolls around and my manager calls me in again and tells me they are no longer going to be letting me go, I get to stay on permanently! I almost did a little dance there in her office! I start to realize that I am truly starting to feel happy with my life, without husband in it. I feel okay about moving on. We had a good relationship for awhile, but the last 2 or 3 years we were little more than roommates, hardly even friends and he used to be my best friend. I opened myself up to going out with my friends instead of staying home alone. I started realizing the holidays were coming up and know that they will be hard, but my family is so supportive I know I'll be fine.

December rolls around, I know Christmas is right around the corner, and I stay very busy this month! It seems I'm going to Christmas parties and out with friends, and spending time with my family that I have no time to be sad about anything! Christmas was amazing, spending time with my parents, brother, and grandpa was just a great gift. I love them all so much, and they love me so unconditionally it's amazing!

2013...okay I am superstitious, so I don't like the number 13 at all, so I'm calling this year 20newlife. I feel like this year is a time for a fresh start, new beginnings and new experiences. I continue to work hard at my job and try to do better at it every day. I am doing some small things in my house to make it mine, one of the spare bedrooms that is now cleaned out of husband's stash and hoardings of computer crap is now going to be my exercise room with my WII, and also a meditation room. It has a bed, so it will also serve as a guest room. The other spare bedroom, I don't know what I'm doing there, but that is ok! I'm planning to spend more time with my friends this year, having some girl time is always fun. Lastly, God willing I would like to start dating and if it is in His will, find love again one day. We will have to see how that goes and let things happen naturally. Well, that's it kids. Hope you enjoyed my little trip down memory lane. What do you hope for in 2013?

Breast Cancer claims another....a tribute to my friend

 

 

Fibro Friday is Back! - A Letter to "Normals"

Hello to my lovely readers!  I'm BAAACCCKKK!!!  I thought I would start off with a Fibro Friday post that I really felt was apropos to my life right now. I wanted to share with all of you fibromites and normals alike "A Love Letter to Normals" written by Claudia Marek.  The letter is reproduced from her book, "Fibromyalgia: The First Year" where the proceeds go to a fibromyalgia treatment center.  I hope you enjoy the letter and perhaps learn a little something about what we with fibromyalgia and their related conditions go through every day.

Fibromyalgia isn't all in my head, and it isn't contagious. It doesn't turn into anything serious and nobody ever died from fibromyalgia (thought they might have wished they could on really awful days!!)  If you want to read articles or books about fibromyalgia I can show you some that I think are good. If you just want to learn as we go along, that's fine too. This is definitely going to be a process. The first step is for you to believe that there is an illness called fibromyalgia and that I have it. This may sound simple, but when you hear about my symptoms I don't want you to think I'm making this all up as I go along.

Fibromyalgia is a high maintenance condition with lots and lots of different kinds of symptoms. There's no way to just take a pill to make it go away, even for a little while. Sometimes a certain medication can make some of my symptoms more bearable. That's about the best I can hope for. Other times I may take a lot of medication and still won't feel any better. That's just the way it goes. I can't control how often I feel good or when I'm going to feel terrible. Lots of people have been cutting new drugs advertisements out of magazines for me and I appreciate the thought, but I've seen them too.  Look at the list of side effects and the few symptoms they help in return.  Even in the best studies those expensive compounds didn't help over half the people who tried them.  No matter how happy the people in the pictures look, there's still no miracle drug available.

There's no cure for fibromyalgia and it won't go away. If I am functioning normally, I am having a good day. This doesn't mean I'm getting better -- I suffer from chronic pain and fatigue for which there is no cure. I can have good days, several good weeks or even months. But a good morning can suddenly turn into a terrible afternoon. I get a feeling like someone has pulled out a plug and all my energy has just run out of my body. I might get more irritable before these flares, and suddenly get more sensitive to noise or just collapse from deadening fatigue. Weather changes can have a big effect on how I feel.  Other times there may be no warning, I may just suddenly feel awful. I can't warn you when this is likely to happen because there isn't any way for me to know. Sometimes this is a real spoiler and I'm sorry. The sadness I feel for what my illness does to those around me is more than I can easily describe.  You may remember me as a light-hearted fun loving person -- and it hurts me that I am no longer what I was.

Fibromyalgics have a different kind of pain that is hard to treat. It is not caused by inflammation like an injury. It is not a constant ache in one place like a broken bone. It moves around my body daily and hourly and changes in severity and type. Sometimes it is dull and sometimes it is cramping or prickly. Sometimes it's jabbing and excruciating. If Eskimos have a hundred words for snow, fibromyalgics should have a hundred words for pain. Sometimes I just hurt all over like I've been beaten up or run over by a truck.  Sometimes I feel too tired to lift up my arm.

Besides pain, I have muscle stiffness which is worse in the morning and evenings. Sometimes when I get up out of a chair I feel like I am ninety years old. I may have to ask you to help me up. I'm creaky and I'm klutzy. I trip over things no one can see, and I bump into the person I am walking with and I drop things and spill things because my fingers are stiff and my coordination is off. I just don't seem to connect the way I should. Hand-eye, foot-eye coordination, it's all off. I walk slowly up and down stairs because I'm stiff and I'm afraid I might fall. When there's no railing to hold on to, it's terrifying.

Because I feel bad most of the time, I am always pushing myself, and sometimes I just push myself too hard. When I do this, I pay the price. Sometimes I can summon the strength to do something special but I will usually have to rest for a few days afterwards because my body can only make so much energy. I pay a big price for overdoing it, but sometimes I have to. I know it's hard for you to understand why I can do one thing and not another. It's important for you to believe me, and trust me about this. My limitations, like my pain and my other symptoms are invisible, but they are real.

Another symptom I have is problems with memory and concentration which is called fibrofog. Short-term memory is the worst! I am constantly looking for things. I have no idea where I put down my purse, and I walk into rooms and have no idea why. Casualties are my keys which are always lost, my list of errands, which I write up and leave on the counter when I go out. Even if I put notes around to remind myself of important things, I'm still liable to forget them. Don't worry, this is normal for fibromyalgics. Most of us are frightened that we are getting Alzheimer's. New kinds of brain scans have actually documented differences in our brains.

I mentioned my sensitivities earlier and I need to talk about them again. It's more like an intolerance to everything. Noise, especially certain noises like the television or shrill noises can make me jittery and anxious. Smells like fish or some chemicals, or fragrances or perfume can give me headaches and nausea. I also have a problem with heat and cold. It sounds like I'm never happy but that isn't it. These things make me physically ill. They stress me out and make my pain worse and I get exhausted. Sometimes I just need to get away from something, I just don't know how else to say it. I know sometimes this means I will have to go outside, or out to the car, or go home to sit alone and that's really all right. I don't want or need you to give up doing what's important to you. That would only make me feel worse.  Sometimes when I feel lousy I just want to be by myself. When I'm like this there's nothing you can do to make me feel better, so it's just better to let me be.

I have problems sleeping. Sometimes I get really restless and wake up and can't get back to sleep. Other times I fall into bed and sleep for fourteen hours and still be tired. Some nights I'll toss and turn and not be able to sleep at all. Every little thing will keep me awake.  I'm sure that's confusing to be around, and I know there are times when my tossing and turning and getting up and down to go to the bathroom disturbs you. We can talk about solutions to this.

All these symptoms and the chemical changes in my brain from pain and fatigue can make me depressed as you'd imagine. I get angry and frustrated and I have mood swings. Sometimes I know I'm being unreasonable but I can't admit it. Sometimes I just want to pull the covers over my head and stay in bed. These emotions are all very strong and powerful. I know this is a very hard thing about being with me. Every time you put up with me when I'm in one of my moods, secretly I'm grateful. I can't always admit it at the time, but I'm admitting it now. One thing I can tell you is it won't help to tell me I'm irrational.  I know I am, but I can't help it when it's happening.

I have other symptoms like irritable bowel, muscle spasms and pelvic pain that will take their toll on our intimacies. Some of these symptoms are embarrassing and hard to talk about but I promise to try. I hope that you will have the patience to see me through these things. It's very hard for me too because I love you and I want to be with you, and it makes everything worse when you are upset and tired of dealing with all my problems. I have made a promise to myself and now I am making it to you: I will set aside time for us to be close. During that time we will not talk about my illness. We both need time to get away from its demands. Though I may not always show it I love you a million times more for standing by me. Having to slow down physically and having to get rid of unnecessary stresses will make our relationship stronger.

When You're a Jet You're a Jet all the Way: Part 3

Well you're not going to believe this.  My kitteh gang is back, and I think I am now da boss! 

You sees, I gots dem kittehs workin for me guarding the house.

Since my husband and I split up I've been seeing them coming around more. 

Almost every day when I come home, I see at least one if not more of them sitting on my front stoop standing guard.  Then I might see another on the other side of the yard, or walking down at the edge of the street.

Today, they had it goin on.  2 posted at my front porch, one on each side, one pacing up and down the sidewalk....I guess guarding from weeds from my non-existent flower beds, and one taking the perimeter of the front yard.  They have got it down to a military-like precision, I'm tellin you.  When I went inside, I could almost swear I got a little kitteh military salute.

So am I a kitteh gang leader, or are they a little kitteh army?  Now I'm confused because I don't know if I''m the Don or the General of this ragtag band of thieves.

Might have to give this some thought.  What do you guys think?

10 Random Thoughts on a Tuesday

I'm trying to get back in the swing of blogging again, so I'm giving a shot to Linny's Vault of 10 on Tuesday - 10 random thoughts on a Tuesday.


And away we go!

1.  The new Mumford and Sons CD, Babel is freakin AWESOME!!!  If you do not own it, you are insane or possibly just dumb because you hate good music.  It is even better than their first album if that is even possible.  GO BUY IT NOW!

2.  My dog is driving me insane.  Ever since my husband and I separated, she is like the neediest dog ever.  I love her to pieces, but she follows me around the house like a stalker.  Last week we had a thunderstorm and she went ultra-psycho (she hates storms).  She is getting better as time goes on.  The last week or two have been better.
3.  I am SOOOOOOO grateful for the support of my friends.  A couple of weeks ago I would have spent my 40th birthday alone with the dog, Ramen noodles and reality tv all in pj's.  That did not happen.  Instead, I had dinner with 15 friends at my favorite restaurant, several friends brought cards and gifts and flowers that I am still enjoying around my house.  How can I possibly feel alone with friends like this around me?

4.  How freakin excited am I that there was a Walking Dead marathon on ALL LAST WEEKEND!!!!  It was a ZOMBIEPALOOZA!  I loved every minute of it!

5.  Speaking of zombies, how awesome is it that the Walking Dead is BACK!  The premiere episode on Sunday was zombiefreakinfantastic!!!! (yes that is a real word, I just made it up!).  They got back to their roots...killing zombies in ever grosser ways.  There were eyeballs popping out, blood spurting all over the place, heads flying around, it was epic! 

6.  Almost done getting my ex moved all the way out of the house.  I'll be glad to get that part out of the way, make the house MY house and not our house. 

7.  I have not watched any of the debates....does that make me a bad person?  Hell no!

8.  Damn you Linny, now I want Chik-Fil-A too.  Nuggets and fries....oh and sweet tea of course!

9.  Did I mention.......ZOMBIES????

10.  Why are ppl so stupid?  I want to tell them to go see the wizard and get themselves a brain.