the trick is to keep breathing

so mike and i are going to pittsburgh this weekend for my brother's birthday. i had a full list of things to get ready for today - get things settled for the catsitter, clean the kitchen, do some laundry so i have something to wear, pack, rig up my bike for the weekend, sort out my medications (this takes about a half hour every week to load them into my "morning" and "evening" weekly pill boxes, ugh) ... there was a lot.

the thing is, i have been tired as actual fuck this week. because i end up overcharging my energy credit card during the week, i usually try to save up and pay it off on weekends, meaning i need lots of sleep, relaxing, and a good amount of alone solo-time. because of the recent messes (previous posts), i haven't had a free weekend to myself since the middle of june. this means not only am i exhausted, and carrying around the static background-noise of someone who hasn't been able to ground herself and clear everything out*, but of course the house is a mess and i am behind on everything.

(*i am also suffering from not having my Vicodin at the moment; those four hours of reduced pain help me clear out the static noise and ground myself like fuck, but because i have to go back to formal pain management (which is a process) i don't even have that tool in the toolbox right now.)

so anyway, i am tired and pretty strung out at the moment, but it's jim's birthday and mary wants us to be a surprise, so we'll be a surprise :)

so last night, i come home tired from the pain-load on my circuits. i take two tramadol and a glass of wine, which i'm sure my liver is mad cool about but it helps shut the pain up when i don't have opiates. i crash on the couch for a bit, with cats, and then slowly start hitting my chores. i make a pact with myself because i'm watching Chopped on tv, so every commercial break i get up and do a thing. this continues on, laundry and litterboxes and drugs, via Chopped and Beat Bobby Flay commercials (look, i love BBF, it's all fancy cooking and trash talk, that's my jam), until the second wind wears off and i get tired. well, i say, i'll get up early in the morning to finish it.

the alarm goes off at 5:00.

1. i am having a dream where a group of people (no one i know, which is surprising for my dreams) and i are hosting some kind of event luncheon thing with food and wine for fucking Donald Trump and some Republicans, I guess trying to talk some sense into them or come to an accord or argue with them or spy on them or, i don't know, it seems reasonable in the dream. and i'm some kind of power hostess but i'm focusing mainly on the cooking (thanks, fucking Chopped and Beat Bobby Flay), and trying to make points and break up fights while making sure everyone has food?, i mean at one point i fucking leave an argument to go make more fried cornmeal balls (hushpuppies i guess)???? so like: i'm already pretty discombobulated.
2. i finally manage to get out of bed, after some snooze buttons, at about 6:00
3. i head downstairs, turn on the keurig, head to the basement. pull the dry laundry out of the dryer and put the wet laundry in the dryer. yes, i went to bed with laundry in the washing machine. it was literally only there for like 5 hours, it didn't smell or anything
4. i get my coffee and sit down on the floor to fold the laundry but i'm tired as fuck and end up playing out my stamina in FFBE
5. i fold the laundry, while finishing FFBE/FFRK stamina, with Iggy and Potato helping. this literally hakes maybe an hour? i'm so tired i feel heavy, like i'm moving slowly because everything weighs 500lb, including my thoughts
6. i finish the laundry and go to get the cats ready. write a note, set out food, fill their dishes, give them wet food breakfast, get everything set
7. my brain finally processes that i had a dream about catering donald fucking trump, where i made him bruschetta and fucking hushpuppies rather than punching him in the face, maybe with a knife. i spend a good 15 minutes severely disappointed in my subconscious
8. it's starting to get close to when i should be leaving for work, and i'm starting to unravel a bit here. i go upstairs to pack. weirdly i fucking gained back 9lb in the month of july, i do not know how, so i'm also trying on everything i want to pack to make sure it fits. a lot of random shit just goes in the bag
9. i spend a half hour sorting out my pills. i have 20 empty pill bottles and at least 2-3 refills of each type, which makes everything more confusing than it should be. i do not know how it happened and my brain really wants to know rather than focus on getting each med in its appropriate pill box. eventually the boxes are full
10. i scramble to get ready for work, throw some shit on, the jeans are actually still damp but honestly i ignore it bc they stretch out better that way after a wash. hair goes up in a braid, fucks not given
11. head down to start loading the car. checking my important list on my phone. get jim's gift in the back seat, bike pump in the trunk because once it had a spider on it. look around the garage, and i don't have my bike rack
12. it must be in fucking mike's garage
13. i legit spend 20 minutes attempting to cram my goddamn bicycle into the back seat of my fucking honda civic
14. i mean, maybe if i take the front wheel off
15. the front wheel isn't coming off, the brakes are in the way
16. how do i undo brakes
17. maybe if i wedge it this way
18. fuck it we're gonna have to stop by on the way out and get my bike
19. head back in to wash the oil and smudge off of my hands. i am sweaty, and extremely cranky at this point
20. hands clean, everything else in the car, head out to get in and go to work
21. the bike rack is hanging from one of my ceiling hooks
22. someone was helpful and "put it away"
23. at this point i am decidedly sweaty, cranky, and obscenely late for work. there's a constant stream of "fuck you, fuck this, fucking fuck, fuck this shit, fuck everything" coming out of my mouth like i'm reciting the world's worst rosary
24. while taking the rack down the straps get caught in my hair and pull half of it out. everything is terrible
25. the rack is on the fucking car. the bike is on the fucking rack. go wash my hands again.
26. get into the car. what's on my seat? oh, it's the post it note of my to-do list. let's check it. i forgot to leave the key for the fucking catsitter
27. fuck you, fuck this, fucking fuck, fuck this shit, fuck everything
28. the key is safely in a plastic bag in its place
29. i am stopping at starbucks if it fucking kills me
30. literally i do not care if i am fired for being late i'm getting a goddamn starbucks

...

1. get to work. no one is here. half the group is traveling or on vacation, and the other half is off for 9/80 fridays. all my brain can come up with is "9/11" and i sit staring into space for 20 mins trying to figure out what the 9/11 schedule is
2. it is surreal
3. i don't know what i'm doing

so now i really just want a nap. and another starbucks

Turns out I've got a herniated disc in my neck. My C5-C6 has been janked out of alignment with the rest of my spine. Because it's herniated/bulged, it's pinching the nerves around it, which accounts for the pain radiating out of the spot (into my neck/back/shoulders).

I'm oddly--- relieved? about the whole thing. It's not that a herniated C5-C6 is great - it's not - especially when you're 30 and arthritic it's really not - but it's an actual diagnosis. Based on data, rather than "I think it's this" or "from the way you describe the pain, this" (who knows if I'm saying the right things?). Based on data. I'm a research engineer to the core.

I actually don't have a lot more information than that. I've been referred to a neurosurgeon who will take a look at the MRI and give me some more detail (my GP basically said the neuro could give me far more understanding of what was going on than he could) (also, of course, there's some kind of weirdness in the MRI (can anything about me ever be normal please), because the report said "herniated disc versus a bulged disc", which will need to be clarified with a neurosurgeon specifically). After that I'll have more details and the beginnings of a path forward.

Also I fucking passed out in the doctor's office because I don't know why. This has already kind of been an emotionally stressful week (month) (year) due to some assorted 'other stuff' and maybe I'm just more worked up about my body than I realized? Or just general stress/relief/shock...? I don't even fucking know. I felt totally fine. Then I was standing at the check out station waiting for my referral and I started to feel all flushed and skitty, started to feel that awful head rush coming on like I do when I black out (this has, unfortunately, happened enough that I'm 'used to it' and can recognize the signs); so I said to the nurse, I need to sit down like right now and she gave me her chair and I sort of made my way into it (had blacked out at this point but fumbled my way over there with some help) and apparently just passed out in her chair? Came up a couple [moments?] later, and of course when you KO in the doctor's office, holy shit. They took me over to another room to lie down and I had a blood sugar test and an EKG and a bunch of other shit and they gave me a lollipop and eventually pronounced I was fine (I kept saying, this happens enough that I'm pretty sure I'm okay, and the looks the nurses gave me like, uh, what? were awful and hilarious).

I don't even fucking know; I took the rest of the day off too and sulked in bed and accidentally a 2 hour nap with Marzy to ward off the splitting headaches I usually get when I pass out.

I. D. E. F. K.

So yeah, that's that. It's really gross right now in my head -- usually I do a ton of research on medical stuff (when I am on a prescription I always look it up in detail, even if it's a fucking antibiotic) but I can't even bring myself to read a lot of the stuff about herniated discs because I'm just like, ew, oh god that's in my neck. I swear I feel it more - like, it hurts more - now that I know what it is, which is great. Vicodin already doesn't really work; just what I need, more body weirdness. I'm so fucking depressed I'm at the point where it's easy to pretend I'm not depressed because I don't have any feelings right now, I'm a big blank empty sack, so it's pretty easy to fill it up with fake "I'm okay"s. askdja;lsdk;alskd;alsk;;;;;;;;;

So we'll go from there. The doctor said I don't have to limit any of my activity - he basically said, "The damage is already done; activity is up to your discretion; if it doesn't hurt, and you feel okay, you can do it" - so maybe I can just move forward here.

- without comment headers, a lot of DOINK / ff_exchange history becomes wonky. Thinking about what we can do to save our comment subject lines, for people who might not have a layout where it shows up. More on that tomorrow.

- Becky beat FFX! More on THAT tomorrow too.

- it has been bad fanart night over here. My iPad seems to think "fanart" should be autocorrected to "canary"

- I have been suck at posting and emailing and responds and yeah. Snort coke like a man.

Edit: I am Seventhe on DW! friend me.