An entry from a week ago, that I'll move on from to post other things, rather than ever "finishing"

Monday, February 11:

This has been a pretty intense, surreal couple of weeks for me. I've become as used to constant back pain and abdominal discomfort as a person really can be, over the past 5 years, but now I'm dealing with waking up in some kind of horrific all over joint pain every morning, and having it fade away fairly quickly but then gradually build back up until it's terrible again by evening in a way that lasts until I fall asleep. My fingers tingle and fall asleep throughout the day in bizarre positions that make no sense (example: with my arms hanging by my sides as I stand or walk). Sometimes my hands have almost no strength in them, and I have to ask the kids to do things like cut up tomatoes or open jars and I feel small achy twinges from nonsense (scrolling with the mouse). I stand up and school my face and stumble-limp a few steps and them I'm alright and can walk normally. I crack my ankles and toes and knees dozens of times as I fall asleep at night.

I have some small information from a hospital visit (the lump on one wrist could be a ganglyonic cyst; my inflammation levels are up on blood tests, but no infection) and a doctor's appt scheduled for the 27th with someone I have some moderate hopes for (doctors are really not my favorite people much of the time). She's young, and female, and serves as a GP though she also specializes in (gulp) rheumatology.

I find myself checking out, dissociating, a lot - and then slamming myself back into reality. By confessing to my sister that I've been avoiding her; by shrieking along with Amanda Palmer; once by smashing a wine bottle against the alley side of the house... somehow I managed to shake the glass out of my hair and GO nonstop for hours of marathon cleaning several days in a row after that.

I don't really like taking more naps than I ever have and always feeling so tired.
I love Grant taking a three day weekend truly being present, taking bubble baths together, hosting dinner guests, watching movies with the kids on the deck on furniture we moved out.
It was nice to get my diploma in the mail from Miami Dade College.
I'm very much enjoying my unusually clean house.

I gave Ananda a pretty wild and radical haircut that she is psyched about. She's bitter and awful about household help these days (and I'm very careful not to overburden her...if anything it's the opposite), and we had some tense moments when I realized she was lying to me about Virtual School submissions, in an ongoing way. That system has been overhauled and now includes a lot more accountability. She spends a lot of time drawing in secret, reading Xanth books on her Kindle, and cooking and eating with me. Ever since we watched Whip It the same week that we met a roller derby team at the Florence concert, she has been really into the idea of roller derby. I happened to find her $500 Riedell derby skates - THAT FIT PERFECTLY - in great condition, for $30 at a yard sale. Now she's dreaming about being on a junior roller derby team, and going outside with Aaron a lot for the first time in a long time. He rides any one of a number of things, and she skates.

She got to play with wolves and hold their 3 day old cubs, the other day, when another homeschooling family invited us to a place in the Redlands where they volunteer. She texts friends about books and skypes friends about obscure artists' Soundclouds and had her second big Haircut Reveal today, at GMYS....the first being when she took webcam shots of herself and put them on her facebook.

Aaron spends a ridiculous amount of time using his USB keyboard and FL Studios program to make music, sitting at the piano playing, skating outside with Annie, hanging out on the roof (which seems to be where he does all his schoolwork and eats most of his snacks), and begging for time on Minecraft. He's been back in hip hop but is only just about to ease back into all his other dance classes. He wants ludicrous amounts of affection again and sometimes I think I'll lose my mind from trying to keep him just barely satisfied with life.

Isaac excitedly counts down until his birthday daily, and tallies up how good or bad each school day was based mostly on what was for (packed) lunch and what was going on in PE. His latest report card featured all the grades up from last time. I had to get a lot of paperwork together to excuse all his absences (in-patient hospital stay, out-patient procedures and tests, doctor and specialist appointments) because apparently my letters of explanation were not good enough on their own O_o Things that make the homeschooling parent twitch... His science project was well received. He's doing so, so well and is generally very happy, albeit with anxiety thrown in here and there. He sleeps with a bed full of cats every night. He's obsessively jumping rope and pogo-sticking.

Jake ends up in our bed every night, after falling asleep in his own, and he wakes up cheerful most mornings. He's quiet and devotes whole afternoons to legos, k'nex, dominoes and magnets. He also loves the computer game Plants Vs Zombies and is the only person my sister's newest baby, Isabelle, will joyfully allow to carry her around. He's bonded a lot with Ananda in recent times, over their shared tendencies to observe with raised eyebrows, interject sarcastically, and savor foods nobody else in the house but me will eat. He can pick Annie up (she weighs literally twice as much as him). He gives Elise piggy back rides that involves sprinting circles around the front yard O_o

Elise has a little sore throat that is adorable to experience together...she just wanted to cuddle under blankets and drink hot tea with honey and lemon all evening, in a fleece nightgown. Her whole weekend was passed in dress up clothes, burning through stacks of printer paper with her new fashion plates. The "snaggletooth" that had driven us all nuts for MONTHS finally fell out, this past week, yielding her $3 and a bed full of fairy dust.

(In addition to my family) I served a friend-couple dinner and dessert Friday night, my father in law coffee Saturday morning, and Shaun dinner tonight. It makes it sweet and simple, that Grant was talking this evening about the two of us running a bed and breakfast when the kids are grown.

It's kind of an enchanting idea. We really love overnight guests and hosting parties and doing elaborate things for holidays. We're always cooking (pretty damn well). It would be an endless stream of people; at least some of them would have to be interesting, right? I could have tea every afternoon, and buy unnecessarily awesome amounts of linens and fresh flowers. There would always be stories.



I find myself thinking of people I know who I know experience chronic pain, often....I keep wanting to drop them messages, and say things I've never thought to say before, like, "What is UP with how badly you want people to understand it sucks, and that desire for affirmation conflicting so terribly with how much you DON'T want them to see you as some kind of suffering invalid?!?!" It's a hard line to walk! You really have to prioritize and craft your bitching! And then there are the times when you find yourself trying really hard to not show any pain or discomfort just because you don't want someone to ask how you're doing AGAIN because there are only so many times in one day you can stand to hear yourself say, "Well...IT HURTS." For me, when I finally do crack and get irritable and grumpy about it, it tends to be at times when the pain isn't even that bad...but my tolerance for it is just gone.

For instance, I had these GREAT days on Thursday and Friday, and I realized pretty quickly that it was because I woke up not really hurting and barely hurt any as the day progressed. Which is awesome! But that made me sort of feel, emotionally, even though I was mentally braced for other things, that the weird episode in my life of "pain all the time" had ended. And was over. So then when it started back up again Saturday, I was having a much harder time dealing with it then I'd been on, say, Wednesday, when I'd been in a "the show must go on" sort of mode.