Category: Firsts

I Felt Like My Head Was Going To Explode.

I almost asked Jon to pull over onto the side of the road so that I could get out of the car and lie down on the pavement.

I hurt so bad, and all I could think was, “If I could just not move then the pain might go away.” All the while, the van was jerking violently over every crack and bump in the road and swerving wildly around every hairpin corner. The continual lurching to a stop, combined with the lights pulsing from shadow to glare 10 times per second just about sent me over the edge. I wanted to throw up and was desperatly trying to keep myself from throwing up and the tension of those two acts countering each other was about more than I could take.

I finally did make Jon pull over at a gas station to pick me up some Tylenol and Advil and I pounded the combination down faster than a drowning man gasps for air. I wished I could just cut my head off – not to die, but just to be rid of the pain…..it was absolutely overwhelming and we still had 15-20 minutes left until we made it home, but it felt like it was a billion days. I couldn’t even fathom continuing on like I was. (In reality he was driving normally – this is what it felt like to me)

About 2 minutes after we pulled back onto the road, I made Jon pull over and I unloaded onto the side of the road…..which totally sucked because I watched some of the medication that I was so desperately craving now sitting on the side of the highway…….and then I don’t remember anything more until we pulled into our driveway and I somehow made it out of the car, up the stairs and face first onto my bed in the darkness.

My mom asked how what wrong and I’m not even sure what I said to her. I layed on the bed and hurt so bad that I started crying, but that made it all hurt even worse and so as bad as I was feeling, I forced myself to stop. I must have fallen asleep then.

Jon said that I slept for about 45 minutes and in that time, the combination of the Tylenol and Advil kicked in and when I woke up, I was still in pain, but it had eased up so that the pain wasn’t the ONLY thing that I could focus on.

I can’t believe how horrid it felt or how quickly it seemed to come on. I had a bit of a headache when we left work, and by the time we made it to Surrey, it was bad enough that I probably would have taken a few Tylenol when I got home. Somewhere between Surrey and Langley, it had morphed into the kind of monster that took over my life.

I took something stronger last night and slept peacefully – albiet drugged – from 11:30pm until 4am. Then I had a hard time sleeping until about 6am, but slept from 6am-8am. I still hurt today, but no where near like what I felt yesterday.

I’m not loving this.

It hurts. I hope that it doesn’t happen again sanytime soon. This was seriously the Mother of All Headaches. I used to get headaches ALL THE TIME, and then I didn’t have any for FOREVER. This one kicked any ol’ migraine that I’ve ever had. I’ve felt like throwing up before, but never actually threw up. Now I can check that one off my list of things to do. I’ve seen the spots and done the whole fuzzy thing, but to feel like I just blanked out because of the pain……WOW! I’m hoping that this was a fluke one off thing.

Do any of you suffer from migraines on a regular basis? Do they wreck you for a day or so? What do you do?

Un-Official Snow Day

I went to work yesterday in sandals and didn’t wear or even take a jacket. Now, I was wearing this scarf (in a dark red), but……as lovely as it is, it’s not quite the same as a coat.

So, as I was saying….I left the house dressed for spring. It was a raining just a little, but reallly not too bad. I didn’t even put a coat on Siah as I figured that we wouldn’t be outside (underground parking) and so, if I didn’t have to drag more stuff around……BONUS!

During the afternoon, it started snowing. By the time I was ready to leave work, it was FREEZING COLD! To walk across the breezeway was BRUTAL! It was SO COLD!

I headed home and it took me over an hour and half. One car had made it into the ditch, but mostly the delay was due to all the people TERRIFIED by the skiff of snow on the ground. Now, I will admit that by the time I made it out to Abbotsford, even I was slipping a little – but I did make it home safetly.

This morning, the kids were desperatly hoping for a snow day, and I was desperatly hopinig that there wouldn’t be one, and when the first child pulled up the district website and read the news….there was cheering from the mom and dad’s bedroom the disappointment was so think you could almost taste it.

The kids did manage to pull themselves together and get themselves ready for school, and at the last minute, Jon turns to me and whispers if we shouldn’t just keep them home today. I just about sucker punched him then and there because what it sounded like he was saying was,

“How about if I tell the kids they can stay home all day and get into everything that you are trying to do with your day at home? They will create more mess than a bunch of stay cats, and I will go down into my hole of an office and leave you to deal with all the hassle of everything, but I will look like the good guy and they will love me because I suggested that they get the day off? What do you think?”

I gave him the “one raised eyebrow look” that says more than words could say and he said that he would in fact help out with the kids and not just leave it all on me.

And so……..the kids got a snow day today!

They are so excited and it’s some exta special time that we are getting to spend with them which I think is awesome because we’ve been SOOOOO busy with my working and all the travel and with our Sunday’s being a work day instead of a family day and so……today is a nice bonus in the middle of everything. Not something planned, but something appreciated and treasured and just grabbed a hold of and enjoyed.

We even took some pictures, as it was Siah’s official first time out playing in the snow.

Just click on the picture to go through to Flickr to see the whole set.

Day Number One

Well, Here is it actually into Day 2 of the 30 Days of Nothing and of the Official Store Opening….I still get a kick about that..I’m chuckling to myself over here, and I’m not sure if it’s just that funny to me, or if I’m just overtired.

It’s 12:07am, and I’mm going to bed.

I was out at the grocery store today and I picked up a few things – of which I’ll talk about tomorrow; AND….I’ve been frantically adding some new product to the store, and I still have another dozen items to add, BUT….

I’m going to bed.

It’s been an awesome day.

I have more thoughts and musings – that may or may not be funny to anyone else but me, but seeing as I’m not sure if it’s really funny or just the sleep depravation talking…I’ll just hold onto it all until tomorrow.

I Could Hardly Wait

I was so excited that today was the first day of school, and now that it’s finally here……I really, really, REALLY can’t wait for tomorrow.

See, today is just a teaser. I had kids that couldn’t sleep last night, they were so excited that they were going to go to school tomorrow, and when I woke up to feed the baby at 4am – I found a middle sized child alseep in the floor in the hallway. Lovely, eh?

No, it wasn’t sleep walking or sleeping or whatever you want to call it. She had a whole bed of blankets and pillows all laid out. Whatever she did obviously took some planning and effort on her part, and she must have done it AFTER we went to bed around 10:30pm or so…little goof ball!

I am SO excited that it’s fall. This always seems like the beginning of a year. It’s like I get two new years…one in the fall, and the normal one in January. Do you feel like that, too?

Anyway, I was talking about today, and how I was so excited, but really it’s just a joke, because the kids are all home before lunch time. SERIOUSLY! Who planned this? Not a parent, obviously! Mind you, I don’t deal with separation anxiety and so I have no crying children wanting to be with me and no crying parents wanting to be with the children.

So, I am thrilled with my quiet moments this morning, and then will be even MORE thrilled with my quiet day tomorrow.

I think Siah is thrilled for the quiet too. It’s been a bit of a “maulled” summer. Siah has been a GIANT DOLL, and while that can be fun for the older kids….yah…not so much for the baby or the mom.

Well, I’m off to make the most of my “quiet time” They’ll be ready for pick up, WAY TOO SOON!

And then I BARFED…..Yes! I really did!

I’ve been wanting to get physical for a while now…..NO! Not that kind of physical, but I’ve been an absolute SLOB for FAR. TOO. LONG!

Tim – my brother – has been doing Bikram’s Yoga for a while now, and I told him that I wanted to join him, so I’ve signed up for the introductory week offer, and TODAY WAS MY FIRST DAY!

I was a little nervous. So nervous, in fact, that when I tried to go to sleep last night at 10:30pm…..well, I couldn’t sleep.

I keot thinking ALL. THESE. THOUGHTS. – like….. How hot will it be? and Will I fall over? and Will everyone be perfect and beautiful? and Will I even be able to stick it out for the 90 minutes class? and What if I sleep through my 5am alarm clock? (the class started at 6am, but I needed to be there – in Langley – at 5:45am to register) and What if the baby was awake ALL. NIGHT. LONG? and how would he handle me not being there in the morning?

And then………..I started to wonder if the downstairs people were going to have their 4X a week party complete with loud, bass-filled music, alcohol, cigarettes and sometimes even pot….It makes for a good time at 4:30 – 5am.

Now imagine all of that, competing with a nagging voice chanting,

“Go to sleep, go to sleep, Rah, Rah, Rah”
“Go to sleep, go to sleep, Ha Ha Ha”

It was AWESOME! and then…….then one of my girls started talking in their sleep and they called out for me, but when I got up to see what they wanted…they were both sound asleep and I was WIDE AWAKE, and it was 11:30pm, and it was even AWESOMER!

So anyway, I did get up at 5am and aside from one little freak out because I couldn’t find my water bottle and I was stressing about being late – I did make it out the door and on the road all in good time.

The class got started and I was feeling all cocky and sure of myself. You know, aside from the wobbly jello legs and arms, and I was desperately trying to hold my body from shaking so wildly that the sweat that was gushing in rivers….no oceans….off my body wouldn’t fling around the room and shower the rest of the people with my “toxicity” and…it was all going good…..until about an hour into it all…then we did this one pose and the blood all rushed to my head and when we relaxed after it, I felt all light headed and like I was going to pass out…so I just layed around for a bit (in the relaxing laying on the floor “healing” pose – yah I’m going with that) until I felt not so woozy. I did make it the 90 minutes in the freaking hot-ness and then after it all I went and grabbed my stuff from the change room and then I started to feel funny. Like I was going to barf…but because I am an expert barf-er (see all previous pregnancies), I figured that I could tough it out.

So, Tim and I went outside on the deck, and I figured that if I had some fresh air and just stayed VERY STILL that I’d be able to fight it off…..NOPE!

I had to make the mad dash into the bathroom, and of course…I’m trying to be all cool about it, and not slam into the bathroom door and run into anyone and then it looked like I was going to be using the garbage can, because I thought that both stalls were in use, and all this time, I’m barfing and ……swallowing…CAN YOU BELIEVE IT? All because I was trying to be SOOOOOOO cool.

Yah! I rock!

I guess I still need to work on the whole “pride” issue.

So, two retches and some water and stomach bile later….I’m ALL GOOD!

I go back outside, collect all my stuff and head on out to my van.

I’ll be back again tomorrow, only I think I should eat something as soon as I wake up….although I’m a little concerned about barfing anything other than water….I HATE BARFING.

But, I LOVE stretching, and although I know that I didn’t do the poses and stretches and exercises all correctly….it was still more work than I thought it was going to be – I can imagine that, done correctly and by someone who hasn’t done NOTHING for the past 10 years that it could be quite the work out.

So, I go again tomorrow for the 6am class…..that’s really early.

Oh, and just for accountability’s sake….I’m 180 lbs right now, and I want to get down to 170, at least….well see how that goes. I might be able to sweat that off by Friday at this rate.

ps….I just added a category for exercise….that seems SOOOO weird to me, but I’m hoping that this is the start of a good thing.

Running Around..

Guess What?

It’s Siah’s FIRST BIRTHDAY……..TODAY!

I can hardly believe that it’s been a WHOLE year since he was born…although technically he wasn’t born yet. He didn’t decide to make an appearance until around 3pm….I think?

So Cute

To be certain, I’d have to go back and check, but We’re headed out because some of our longest standing and dearest friends have moved closer and we are going to help them unpack.

I’m so excited.

I have pictures to post and thoughts to expound upon and endless drivel to blah, blah blah about and it will all be good – BUT….right now, I am in my pyjamas and we have to go in 40 minutes and I gotta do something about myself.

We are going to have a first Birthday party next Saturday, but we’re just trying to nail down a time….so, if you are family or close friends, please consider yourself invited. It’s more a time to celebrate “LIFE” and to get together and just be happy than an actual birthday party, but whatever it takes to call a party, eh???

Gotta go and get ready!

Happy Birthday, my son!

This day, like every day with you, is another day to celebrate life and to be so thankful…..so, so thankful.

I heard it “tick”

Well, I think that FINALLY…..after almost 11 months, ‘Siah has his first tooth.

I don’t have a picture for you of his adorable toothy grin….but I’m hoping soon.

I actually can’t even see a tooth yet. So, can I really count that he has his first tooth. I think I can.

See, he’s been working on this tooth for a while now, and he’s been UNBELIEVABLY MISERABLE the past week. Up in the middle of the night crying and crying and crying and it’s not a mad “pick me up I’m so angry” cry. It’s been more of a I’m hurting cry.

Today when he woke up, we noticed that it looked like he had a nasty blister on his bottom gums, and sure enough, if you felt right there – he would flip out and cry.

I wondered when it might finally cut through, and tonight when I was feeding him some food with a metal spoon, I heard a “clink” or a “tick” as the metal hit the tooth. I wondered if if was just my imagination, but it happened again and again, and I highly doubt that he’s got a cricket loose in his belly that just happenes to be chirpping at the same time that I tap on his lower front gums.

I’m so excited. His first tooth….

It seems so silly to be so excited over something so insignificant, but still I’ve been waiting a long time for some of these “firsts” to happen, and I’m so thrilled to be able to say that this one is finally here.