Tag Archives: Post op WLS

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I’m feeling over-whelmed

I dont do good in the winter, I suffer Seasonal Affective Disorder and it makes me tired and grumpy and unmotivated.  This is why when Alex and I first got engaged I rushed to get as much done as I could since I knew that as the weather changed my motivation to so all the DIY stuff would go to hell.

now things I have put off and things that I have convinced myself to do have ganged up on me and I feel a little like I a drowning.

I need to finish handing out the Save the Dates, I need to finish making the invitations and send the ones that are going out in the mail out and the ones that I have decided to hand out in person need to get where they need to go ASAP… but first I need to print the inserts for reception picnic.

I promised to make decorations for a valentines dance this weekend and have to make 50 large tetris pieces in 4 days, I am cutting 100 pieces of 8.5×11 inch astrobright paper into 11×5.5 in sheets and then outlining 200 5.x5.5 squares then piecing the shapes together.  It is proving to take longer than I expected but then just about everything does.

I love the One World One Heart art blog event but I only have til the 17th to work my way through over 850 blogs.  I feel bad because I want to really look at the blogs and leave good comments but the fact is I am just racing through them with the intent to go back and look more later.  I also want to book mark a bunch of them on my art blog (which I am trying to make look better) and I have to send 4 gifts out sometime before the 17th and the 20th of Feb.  Part of the problem I am facing is it seems like 3/4 of the blogs and easily 2/3rds of the art kicks me ass.  I want to be a good artist and to have a great blog, yes I am competitive, and I wish I wasn’t.  This is an amazing event and it shouldn’t be making me feel down about my own art but I do.

I also planned to do an art challenge of doing 14 valentines in 14 days, I had visions of doing great stuff and yet I dont have time or the motivation but mostly the time to do really good valentines.  I only have 3 more to go because I kind of cheated and whipped out some Art Trading Cards (2.5×3.5in) but I would like to do some better ones but I doubt I will get it done this year the way I want.

Speaking of art I haven’t been able to really get into any of it for the last few weeks because I am so busy trying to get stuff done for other things and on top of that I am feeling like my art is not up to my own standards, which means I need to really sit down and dork on improving what I want to improve but I have no time or energy.

I am working again part time and my assignment this week is to go through 250 or so videos for this one account on youtube and make sure they all work and download properly and check that the compliments are not spam.  It is easy work just time consuming and I am SOOOOOOO sick of captcha codes to confirm I am not a bot, between the 500+ blogs I have looked at (200+) I have commented on and the videos I am starting to dream mixed up letters and Youtube has the worst ones I have ever seen.

My art/computer room needs to be sorted desperately and I just can’t get the motivation to do so.  On top of that I host two coffee meet ups one for crafters on Weds and a goth coffee meet up on thursdays and it has been extra hard because all I want to do around 5 in the afternoon is SLEEP.

I got a fitbit pedometer and I am thrilled with it, I am tracking my food intake and my walking and found out I am eating more than I should (still usually under 1800 cals a day but a good 300 to 400 over the drs recommendation) I also discovered that on an average day when I dont push myself I walk less than 1000 steps.  So now I am also making time to walk, and since it is winter I have been walking in stores.  I use to use a Motor-cart but I no longer do unless I have no choice though that seldom happens.  I know 2800 steps is not much but for me it means I am walking 3x as much as I was AND it sadly also means my knees have started to ache again.  I am thinking of asking my dr if I can go back on Metformin, a mild diet pill, at least until May to see if it helps and if I can get my SAD eating under control

I get cold so easily now that we have not been able to go to the pool to work out (that and Alex is working very late recently) which is just as well since it usually takes hours to get there, get dressed, get in and get showered and the time we usually go is when the cleaning guys want to do the ladies shower room so half the time I have to come home and take a shower here instead after waiting for Alex to get his done.

Listen I KNOW these are unimportant things in the grand scheme of things, I realize that and it just makes it worse, it makes me feel guilty and worthless but the fact is it is my life, the only one I have to lead and right now I feel like I am drowning and I just want to get through February with my mind in tact

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Really over did it Sunday

I so overdid it yesterday, I went to a live action roleplay game (yeah NERDS) and then afters with friends and then the club for a bit before I got faint and had to have my BF, Alex, take me home,
I was out from 4:30pm to 12:45am.
I took plenty of Nectar with me and drank the whole time and kept up as much as I could with my pain meds… having found out a 10 mg pill lasts no longer than 5 with not much more benefit.

I have noticed that when I worry about how I am healing, if I am taking good enough care or getting enough exercise I tend to channel that worry into obsessing about something stupid like the fact that I could not wash my hair for over 4 days. The edge of my bathtub is very low and sitting on it leaned way over right now to wash my hair is just not happening, as it is I have been taking half a shower in the morning and half a shower at night to cut down on time per sitting.

Suddenly the fact that I was going to go out in public with messy hair made me so stressed I started to cry on the phone with my grandmother and since she was totally wiped out and my mom broke her own car I could not get a ride to the salon from either of them. I can’t drive til about the 10th and just riding in cars hurts my stomach very much so I ride with a coat bundled up and held over my stomach most of the time.

The problem is thanks to Vicadin and laparoscopic surgery I feel fine for 2 or 3 hours and wiped out for about an hour and a half then the cycle starts again. I HATE being confined to home, I am super social and not having my car makes me crazy. (I made my BF take it to his house so I would not be tempted and because mine is more comfortable for me to ride in than his so when he takes me places he drives it instead of the van)

I called Alex at 4 to see if there was any way they could get me a bit early and take me by the Great Clips near my house. While we talked it was clear that they were rushing to get ready and I remembered that the salon closed at 5 and it was not fair to rush not just Alex but his sisters despite the fact that they were willing.

I know some cab drivers so I called Boise Taxi and got a cab to my house in 20 mins and it was only about $5 to get there in time to get my hair washed. It only cost me $3 to get my hair nice and clean and to relax while someone scrubbed my hair, so with tip it was the best $12 I have spent all week. I walked around a bit and got a little exercise and bought a 4LBs container of strawberries for people to eat at game and got myself a small steamed 1% milk with Sugar free caramel to sip then wandered around and got some makeup.

They came and got me at 5:40 and we got to the SUB in time for game which thankfully for me was slower than usual but ended up being a lot of fun. It was great to see my friends and be out and about and I was able to rest a bit on the love seats there and Spend time with Alex (Always a Plus) I had brought two bottles with protein drink in them and also brought 1 SF pudding cup and two 3oz servings of Yoplait light. I had the two yogurts at game along with most of the Nectar Protein drinks while saving the pudding cup, which I could not finish, for Denny’s where I ate with friends and joked about which of their foods would kill me (put me back in the hospital or make me wish I was dead). Pretty much everything peopled ordered would mess me up right now and will make me miserable (or miserable to be around) for a long time.

The funny thing is the item on the table that was most tempting was a side salad, it will be a LONG time before my body can handle a bunch of veggies well even when it is mostly lettuce. I also spent a little time looking at the menu and trying to figure out for the future what I would be able to eat in the future… looks like sides of cottage cheese, ala cart chicken breasts and fish, (maybe in a year I can have a few different items as long as they are not fried or battered) not really much else now but they were cool about bringing me a dessert spoon for my little Jell-o cup..lol
We stopped by Club Sin for Goth night where I was very careful about giving many hugs to people (I have great friends) and was fine for an hour until 12:30 when I suddenly felt as if someone had pulled my plug and taken my energy, attention and balance all while smacking me on the head.
When I told Alex he did not hesitate to take me home though I told him to leave Izzie and Meg at the club and come back for them since I don’t live too far away.

Alex had to help me walk out of the club and get to the car because I felt as if I was somewhat drunk, but not the fun kind, more the “where are my damn keys…Ummph” (fall down and drop the keys you were holding all the time) kind

When we got to my place Alex walked me in to make sure I was ok and asked me to text him as soon as I made it to bed after I showered off real quick and changed bandages. I seldom sleep more than 3 hours at a time and I feel fine but intend to take a light day with regular small walks and some reading.

I am hoping by next week to be feeling MUCH better and not get so wiped out by taking more rests at game and getting much more rest before game. Also by then hopefully I will have the drain out of my chest and have gotten my medicine adjusted from 3 slow acting pills to 4 regular acting pills to take throughout the day. Either of those is going to end up helping me a lot.

　

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Post Surgery, pain, no one can tell you what will be too much or too little for you to handle

 The annoying thing is no one can tell you ahead of time how much pain you will really feel since everyone is different, everyone experiences pain differently and there is no way to show you the pain for a moment in advance so you can say OH I don’t think I want that.

I have been doing really really well but now I am starting to face pain, the thing is I know it is most likely not nearly as bad as some people face with this same thing face from what I have read. But this is MY pain and I am the only judge of it. I realize my pain tolerance is odd, having suffered through horrible arthritis for over 5 years I have a slightly different pain scale than other people, where BAD starts is in a different place and where UNBEARABLE starts is probably dangerous in that I should have called someone or done something about it by then.

Also there is the fact I hate calling my Dr. or going to the ER for pretty much anything, either I am wrong and look like a wimp in my own eyes OR worse something is wrong and they have to do something serious to me.

Weird things hurt and other things that it seems should hurt don’t much at all, sleep is a release from pain and a gate way into it. When I sleep now it is on my back, not something I am use to at all but the pain and drugs have made it pretty easy actually though it is hurting my back a lot. I sleep on my back on a heating pad on low and if I sleep more than an hour or two I feel a lot of pain in my abdomen and lower stomach, from gas, from settling, from whatever and I have to get up and move around for a while before I can even think of laying down.

Not being able to lay on my side is painful in and of itself, I can’t watch TV in bed, I can’t cuddle the boyfriend the way I want and I can’t sleep how I like and more annoying for someone like me is no one can give me an exact answer as to when that wont hurt anymore or hurt just that little bit too much. People can’t tell me because everyone’s pain is different, everyone’s surgery is a bit different as are their bodies, someone might be good for laying on their side in 14 days or 30 or more so I am the only one who can define that.

There are times when I read about people who hate what they went through, who suffer odd pains or deficiencies YEARS later that I wonder did I do the right thing. The thing is I know that a lot of the out come of this depends on me, on me for once in my life REALLY towing the line, really doing the diet AND the exercise though I hate it. I can only hope it all gets easier in time, that I will actually develop a habit for it all, if not a passion. I have to hope that my interest and dedication for this lasts more than 6 months, my usual burnout point for anything, this is not a hobby, it is not a job, it is my life.

Anyway I haven’t weighed yet, I do that at the doctors office (I was retaining mass amounts of IV fluid before leaving the hospital 3 days ago) I weigh Tuesday and hope that I see a big difference or any for that matter to justify what I am going through.