Year 5, Day 82: Turns out the local blackbirds like goldfish crackers and dog treats, but they do not like cinnamon cookies.
For six days we’ve been experimenting with Smol Acrobat’s sleep arrangements. They wake up yelling no no no! in fear and terror almost every night so PiC started staying with them overnight months ago. It hasn’t stopped. This isn’t night terrors, though, they’re responsive to us. Angry but responsive. When they’re sleeping with both of us: still hollering in terror. When they’re sleeping with just me: minor disturbances, or sleeps quietly. What is this about and also this is not great for me! They like to sleep on my ribs and dig their toes into my ribs now and again. Reminiscent of pregnancy but now with child on the outside! It’s a bit less disruptive than the waking up screaming, but not much since I can never really get to REM sleep with a squirming critter at my side, so… sigh.
It’s been a hectic several days trying to get back on our feet and I have to: schedule our signing with the notary, shop for kid birthday gifts, pay bills, deal with three times more work nonsense than usual, deal with a flood of community donations I wasn’t expecting.
Year 5, Day 83: We’re not experiencing the same heat that the East Coast and Midwest are, but it’s hot enough that my fingers are swelling up like sausage while I’m working. It used to happen a lot more often, not really a FOND memory I have.
This, plus a big changeover in our software at work, means I’m working at about 50% efficiency and I hate this so much. I FEEL slow.
I was so proud of myself for going out for a long brisk walk today, my first since Sera died, until I stopped. Then, OMG, the heat set in. I forgot how much harder it is to cool down after getting my heart rate up when it’s warmer than “nice” outside.
Year 5, Day 84: I’ve been watching a baby hummingbird perch atop its nest and it is like one of those living statues you see in the cities. It finds a position and just stays there. No changes, even with a stiff wind blowing, not even pointing its tiny little beak in a different direction or anything. It’s weird and fascinating.
Water definitely has a taste, but I didn’t realize how picky I’d become. Visiting family, I tried to force myself to drink their filtered water but it was just so disgusting I started avoiding drinking water entirely. This makes me feel like such a brat.
Body acne in your 40s is such crap! Also ingrown hairs is crap at any age. Mostly I don’t seem to grow much leg hair anymore but every so often a large swatch of my legs itch unbearably and after I scratch it a little, large bumps rise up and sting like the dickens. Looks like ingrown hairs trying to get out but why randomly and all at once? Anyway, I declare this nonsense.
Year 5, Day 85: I think about the heart of this line from Madam Secretary every time I think about the Republicans and their agendas to strip rights from everyone right, left, and center. I don’t understand why much of the Democratic party is so ready to concede defeat at the first sign of resistance, and why they give up concessions so fast. They need a spine, it’s so frustrating: “If you want to do good, you’ve got to be prepared to do bad. Okay? To be canny and watchful and mean, so when the bad guys come, you know just where to stick the knife. ’cause it is a fight to the death and that is the only language they understand.”
Like this thing with the Ten Commandments in school in Louisiana – they know it’s unconstitutional and that we’re going to have to fight them in court. I think that’s the point. They win either way. If we don’t waste that money fighting it, they’re going to run roughshod all over us. If we do spend the money fighting it, that’s money we can’t spend elsewhere on needs, and they can bleed us dry. It’s so frustrating.
Year 5, Day 86: Smol Acrobat has been yelling I NEED A SNACK a lot lately, even shortly after a meal and I finally figured it out today. “Are you asking for a snack because you feel sad?”
Yes.
“Oh! Well when we’re feeling sad, we don’t have to eat a snack, we could hug or cuddle a soft friend. How about that?”
Thankfully they were amenable to the redirects. It’s been a rough few weeks with their tantrums, lots of screaming “I need a hug” followed immediately by “do not wook at me! I don’t NEED you!” lasting 15-30 minutes at a time. I don’t know if it’s just a phase or if we’re doing something particularly wrong, often it feels like the steam must have been accumulating unbeknown to us and then the avalanche is set off by some minor disappointment.
Year 5, Day 75: Triple Monday! Half my work day was spent sitting and waiting for tech support to figure out their problems.
Half my emotional reserves were used up comforting JB because their visiting uncle had to go back home and they were very very sad about it. We were very lucky to have him over for the weekend, it’s such a gift to have the company of someone who’s so easy to get on with and who the kids adore so thoroughly.
I don’t feel as drained as I expected to with a social thing we had to do for PiC’s work as well as the family visit on the weekend and I’m pretty sure that’s because the visit was a “filling the bucket” sort of visit. I’m grateful.
Year 5, Day 76: Oh boy. I don’t feel great, I’ve been taking my antivirals since last week and still don’t feel great. Of course it could be the combination of an unexpectedly warm day and only sleeping 1 out of the past 7 nights, I told myself, but then JB’s headache wouldn’t go away by the mid afternoon and then they clocked 101 temperature. PiC, on coming home from work, said he didn’t feel so good and Smol Acrobat was a roaring furnace in human skin again. None of this is good!
We just navigated a very confusing few days where Smol Acrobat tested medium positive once but negative on all subsequent tests last week. I would appreciate getting off this fever merry go round.
On another note, we had a lovely five minute visit with the bright neighbor’s dog and I scattered more seeds in the flower patch evening and watered it a little more. My diligence has been rewarded with a handful of new seedlings today. Yay!
Year 5, Day 77: FINALLY four of my therapy FSA claims have been approved. It’s truly like pulling teeth with these people. Zero communications for weeks and months and then when they do get in contact, it’s all useless. It sure does feel like a tactic to try to get us to give up. Or maybe they’re using “AI” (NOT intelligence!) to process the claims and that’s why they’re all rejected six or more times.
Only one of three green bean #2 had come up a few days ago. I went out to check them in the morning, wanted to confirm the watering system was working intended, and it was still a loner. I went out for a few minutes in the evening to “visit” the plants and lo! A seedling fully one inch tall had emerged! This is still nowhere as satisfying as a bond with a dog but it brings its own quiet satisfaction. Now, I whisper to them, turn into bushes and grow beans to harvest. That would be exciting.
Year 5, Day 78: I felt better more than not today but the weird temperature disregulation is still bonkers. I woke up several times because I was sweating profusely, but also chilled? Makes no sense!
I have an off and on again sore throat but that does tend to happen when I’m stressed and overtired. Go, antivirals, go!
Year 5, Day 79: Whoops, forgot to save this day’s entry!
Things were super hectic, on top of trying valiantly to recover from the Persistent Bug that’s been plaguing the four of us, and what sounds like the entire daycare.
We’ve got Commitments this weekend and we attended masked since not attending wasn’t an option. Smol Acrobat has been insisting on bunking with me this week, an unwelcome development because I’m the one who struggles to get back to sleep when disrupted, but weirdly when it’s just the two of us, their screaming fits are reduced to grumbles. Also an unwelcome development! I don’t want to be held hostage to their sleeping well! I hope we can figure this out because it’s getting old.
Year 5, Day 68: I woke up to a very swollen hook finger (swollen so much it can neither bend nor be straightened out. Hook!) and that set the tone of the day. Smol Acrobat was very clingy all through breakfast. I couldn’t shake the looming doomsies feeling from the moment I sat down to work, I also couldn’t quite focus without being hyper aware that I’d overdone it over the weekend and that should have provided dopamine for days, instead my brain is quietly chanting new dopamine new dopamine in the background like whispering Minions. Waiting for a lot of things to ship/arrive: snacks for my Lakota sponsee, the hose accoutrements so the drip watering system can work properly, an answer about my new seeds order.
I keep hoping something going right will fix the mindset or settle down the unpleasant unsettled restless feelings but that’s not happening.
Instead I got the opposite of a fix: a meeting ran way too long and then my team ran into tech problems that ate the rest of my afternoon like a hydra chomping on a nice snack. What a Monday. I received too much Monday, I need to return some. Where do I send it?
Year 5, Day 69: I miss my girl. I just realized again today that I can yell at my computer in frustration without upsetting any canine sensibilities. On the one hand, great, I’m yelling, but on the other, of course I wish I couldn’t. The grief has dulled, it’s a bearable sadness.
Whenever the turmoil at work gets to be too much and a friend says “you’re great you can get another job if they suck”, I feel the opposite of reassured. I know what they mean but also (I sound whiny even to me here, sorry, I know) I don’t wanna. Where else can I be a total gremlin? Avoiding talking to people 99.9% of the time is a huge factor in my quality of life. While the job is definitely imperfect, it caters to the highly antisocial part of me. I can exist in almost sheer isolation, while still managing a large team, which has preserved a good deal of my energy for the important things all these years. That’s the part that’s so hard to replace. Any other high level management job is going to require peopling to an unbearable degree.
Changing jobs may be unavoidable but … Cross your fingers that it’s not?
Year 5, Day 70: My hook finger is a hook no more! Yay!
We can never use up a whole container of sour cream or even remember we have it. The waste makes me sour. How do you remember things that accidentally get pushed to the back of the fridge or are only a sometimes food?
PiC brought home a chocolate chip and a raisin bagel, the tasty and the terrible respectively, leftovers from some work meeting. Raisins are for other people (like everyone else in my household).
We’re on the last steps of THIS chore!: The will and trusts have been updated to include Smol Acrobat, change our executor(s), disinherit my biodad and biobrother from claims on the estate or guardianship of the kids (in the hopefully unlikely event that our chosen guardian won’t be available, the court will generally go first to bio relations and I don’t want them to be in the mix AT ALL), and name backup beneficiaries. We need to sign the documents with a remote notary, and we need to find a friend to witness that signing. Once that’s done, I’ll make copies available to our executors and our chosen guardian so if they’re actually needed in the worst case scenario, all responsible people have the required documentation in hand already. I’ve seen some horror stories about people having had wills made but locked them in some drawer where they couldn’t be found, thereby rendering them useless and the estate went to someone it was not intended to go to.
I’m beyond overwhelmed right now. In the next two weeks, at home, we have scheduled: a (much anticipated) family visit, a wedding, 2 more family visits, a funeral (not someone I knew but family knew). At work, everything is a complete mess, and tons of vacations requiring coverage coming up, and tons of recruiting I have to somehow do at the same time, and KPIs to meet. My ears and shoulders have become one.
Year 5, Day 71: Work: terrible. Spreadsheets to document the terrible have been enabled so we can try to attempt to fix ALL the terrible and also because there is SO MUCH terrible that I can’t keep track of it all.
Also terrible, I’m still waging bureaucratic war with UHC that is holding more than $1000 hostage. They keep rejecting my therapy claims with “PLEASE PROVIDE DESCRIPTION OF SERVICES PROVIDED SO WE MAY PROCESS YOUR CLAIM REQUEST”.
I DID! SIX TIMES! On every claim! There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to the ones that they accept and the ones they reject. For some claims, it looks like they have actually sent more rejections than I have submitted claims. United Healthcare is the worst.
Also also, Smol Acrobat spiked a fever and tested positive for COVID AGAIN today. Then negative six hours later. I’m thoroughly confused. PiC and I are negative… I’m not feeling great but that’s as much attributable to stress and sleep deprivation as any virus.
But my claw finger is still not a claw (yay!) and the green bean sprouts have put out two large leaves each (yay!) and the snap pea and snapdragon seeds have arrived (yay!) so I will plant some tomorrow? This weekend?
PiC is a saint, he ran to Costco late tonight to pick up supplies and also get me a new hose for our drip irrigation system that’s awesome except for the wickedly leaky old hose that we haven’t used in about 7 years and no wonder it’s leaky after sitting in the sun and fog all this time.
Year 5, Day 72: Smol Acrobat’s third COVID test is negative. So did they have COVID this round of fever or not? I have no idea and I hate this all so much. Smol Acrobat has also started engaging in prolonged histrionics this week, screaming they want or need a hug at the top of their lungs but refusing all overtures. These fits last anywhere from 15 minutes to a record 75 minutes, set off by the most innocuous things. It’s exhausting. I can’t tell if this is a post-COVID or a terrible-threes or both thing but I’m very much ready for the fits to stop.
I was going to push myself to help clear out the work logs for my team who are swamped because of the Terrible, but then remembered that I handle an entire section of work alone on top of active management work . They each have 2-6 people backing them up, and I have no one. So it’s probably ok that I don’t ALSO over extend myself to help them (which necessarily means neglecting my whole host of responsibilities).
Year 5, Day 61: Despite wearing sunblock and a hat, I managed to get sunburned this weekend. It’s really unusual for us to get enough sun for that to be a problem! Truth: We didn’t.
We went a little outside of our usual radius to spend time with friends and that little microclimate had Roasty Toasty temps. My face feels crispy. But I got to pet two large fluffy dogs at length over the weekend which is exactly what the doctor ordered so it was totally worth it. (Remind me I said that if I’m peeling like a lizard next week.)
School is nearly out and we waited too long to book some camps for JB. Our schedule is a bit spotty in places and we were trying to coordinate with their friends for some camps so ended up leaving it long enough that we missed out on some spots.
It’s ok, I don’t think they need to be booked every day of every week. They can handle a few days that are just unbooked and boring – they can sleep in, clean, read, do art, etc. Maybe I will also make myself take them on walks those days. Probably be good for both of us.
Year 5, Day 62: Holiday weekends are nice but the short workweeks after a long weekend are BRUTAL. Someday this will not be the case! (I am trying to have faith. In what, I don’t know. Maybe I’m just trying to have hope.) It’s also a wallop upside the head to try to get focused when you’re starting with a double Monday workload on the wrong day. It’s like trying to start a race with your weight on the wrong foot. I don’t get the Sunday Scaries but I sure do have the short workweek wobbles. Ugh. Anyway I’ve learned to plug those time chunks when I first sit down and need to corral my brain by doing a chore that I have to do anyway first. By the time I’m done with that bit of administrative nonsense, my brain has had time to remember what we’re here to do and can get to work again.
Having the strangest feeling: Do I know this song? Sort of? But I have no memory of hearing it in the past.
Year 5, Day 63: Did my 15 minutes of “KB Spangler” weeding this morning, with a begrudging heart. Someone ought to have warned us how much time in adult life would be spent waging a hopeless battle against the weeds. Also, I find it deeply unfair that the shallow rooted weeds are out in the open, easy to grab and easy to uproot but the deeply rooted weeds are wedged into the sidewalk and driveway cracks so I skin my fingers trying to get enough of a grip on them to dig them out. Humph.
Usually my pain pays me the courtesy of waiting until I lay down at night to spike into “curl up an cry” territory but mid-morning my back pain spiked. Like a genius, I pulled out the Hyperice to massage the muscles into submission. Usually I forget about it! Buuuuuut that backfired terribly. I had to pop some OTC painkillers and crank the heating pad to try and get it to back off. Nothing like getting mugged by your pain midday.
Then in the height of my pain, I had to conduct an interview. That was a miserable 10 minutes of anticipation. But the conversation went well enough that my pain faded to the background. I liked them. That doesn’t often happen!
Year 5, Day 64: I had to crank through mountains of work today: training people and processing documentation and planning for summer coverage and recruiting and OH GAH. So much. I hadn’t complained yet but PIC
Smol Acrobat didn’t nap again today and they are always a hysterical (both kinds) mess by the time we get to the bath and bed portion of the night. They cackled the whole way to the toothbrushing station, hissy-fitted between that and the toilet, then cackled all the way to the shower. It was emotional whiplash even though I was prepared for it. They rallied after the bath to run at me HARD and slam into me (JB style, honestly). When I objected “why did you push me?” they replied in a hurt voice, “I was trying to play a game!”
“OH! I didn’t know that! Ok, now that I know, let’s try that again.”
And then they gleefully rammed me again. All was well.
Year 5, Day 65: Just like that, JB is done with third grade! It wasn’t the easiest of years, when is it ever?, but they are sad that it’s over.
We went back to the school once everyone was gone and cleaned out their lost and found for them. This saves them the trouble of doing that laundry and donating it themselves, we get free clothes in generally good to great conditions (KIDS) to pack and ship to the Pine Ridge reservation. I can ship like 75 sweaters and jackets for $30! Wins all around except for my arms which are going to fall off!
Then I had to get to work 😱
I continue to wage war with United Healthcare which keeps denying my FSA claims for perfectly legitimate expenses. They tell me to “describe the service so we may evaluate your claim”. I DID. ARGH. But I will persevere!
I’m also on the hunt for native flowers for our front yard. I don’t typically want flowers but I’m indulging a weird kick right now and it also occurs to me that getting seeds of flowers I LIKE would be a step towards fighting against the weeds that keep taking over. I’m thinking snapdragons to go with my poppies?
TIL clumping bamboo exists and isn’t the terrible invasive type.
Year 5, Day 54: A friend brought their puppy for me to play with and I had brain therapy on Saturday; we happened to linger by the dog park just long enough on Sunday to meet three very sweet dogs (one of which shoved her nose right into my face for the sweetest nuzzle and then placed herself firmly into a “Hug Me Now” position which I oh-so-gladly did); and this morning our local off leash dog greeted me with her usual intense I DO TRICKS YOU GIVE TREAT IS DEAL!
That was enough canine love that, despite my extreme fatigue, I’m not hugging rock bottom. I’ll take it for however long it lasts.
The kids have had a hacking cough intermittently for a few days and I tested them for COVID this morning. We got a very faint positive on both test kits from iHealth for both kids, but Smol Acrobat’s second test on AccessBio was firmly negative. If you hadn’t heard, Cue Health’s test kits are decertified. We scheduled PCR tests to try to get more definite answers.
I’m never happy (Zuko) #ATLA
Year 5, Day 55: It’s stunning how cavalierly the CDC’s managing COVID these days. I knew this at a superficial level but it hit home this week.
Our pediatrician advised us that, per the CDC, they’re treating symptoms only and treating it like a cold. IT’S NOT A COLD. Colds don’t affect you long term the way COVID does! This is depressing.
Our family has been doing our damnedest avoiding it since 2020 between masking, vaccines, and minimizing social interactions early on. Smol Acrobat is, somewhat predictably but still infuriatingly, the first of us to catch COVID. They were nearly asymptomatic (aside from full days of temper tantrums, is that a symptom?). They just had a cough that sounded just like every other cough they have had the past several months. Actually three of us had a similar cough but JB and I tested negative. I can’t tell if it’s because they have more frequent and prolonged exposure at daycare, probably(?) since the rest of us mask wherever we go. Breaking our streak was really upsetting. I had so hoped to dodge infection-level exposure until Smol Acrobat was old enough to mask properly. They’re good about masking when they’re with us, but the daycare isn’t able to help them mask.
Their pediatrician agreed that the appearance on the PCR and negative rapid tests, along with the physical exam, strongly pointed to the COVID having already run its course and that they’re no longer infectious. In one way, that’s a relief, I really needed childcare this week. In another, I’m still worried about any long term effects that aren’t obvious now and hate that they were running around the classroom, infectious, for who knows how long.
Year 5, Day 56: My crow (maybe? almost?) friend dropped in, literally, and cawed at me this morning. This is why I still have to carry my treat bag on all walks, who wants to be the disappointing human who doesn’t have treats on demand? After I left the offerings and walked away, they hopped over to pick them up. I meant to leave a third one but too many people were walking and driving by, so they hopped away looking casual. Next time.
The potatos in the garden are flourishing. I was inspired by Ilona Andrews’ potatoes in an old blog post, you might recall, and wanted the same. I now have the same! There are so many potato plants. Yay! My green beans and cucumbers took ages to germinate but are now shooting up nicely. Half the lettuce seeds germinated and haven’t done anything else, just frozen in time. That’s less satisfying. I know we’re still a very long way off from knowing if we’ll have anything to harvest but it’s nice to see something happening. We’ll have to travel sometime this summer, I’ve been wondering what we could easily set up for watering things while we’re out and about. They don’t need much but they do need a bit of water every day. Too bad we don’t have reliable neighbors who wouldn’t mind dropping by for a quick water now and again. I’m eyeballing hoses and things at Home Depot but I don’t know what I’m doing!
Solo parenting starts this afternoon: the kids are on notice they need to help me out with best behavior, we’re down one herder.
Year 5, Day 57: Solo parenting again, PiC’s still at a work thing. The morning was a bit of a bumpy ride but everyone got dropped off nearly on time with no tears or yelling so calling that a win.
Then I accidentally used up all my willpower stopping myself from eating more than 2 cookies after an early lunch, this is the sound of my brain flopping over and refusing to do anything else.
I’ve made it through to today without the Backpack of Doom feeling. Three days of dog encounters bought 3 days of vastly reduced depression and anxiety. Science!
I haven’t been able to get on top of my work all week. Too much time consuming daily work stuff, recruiting which I hate, and random corporate nonsense to deal with made my brain go CORGI all week in one way or another. I’ve been trying to just do the best I can on the few things I can control.
There’s also a thing happening all week that I needed a friend to untangle for me. Every time someone makes a suggestion, or hints, that I could be worth worrying about or caring about or deserve a rest, I get mad inside. I don’t know why but internally, I immediately PUFFERFISH. Friend suggested “Acknowledging that you are worthy of care makes you feel intensely vulnerable and your body turns to anger to shut down those feelings and keep you “safe”” which strongly matches my reactions.
I don’t know why it feels so vulnerable but it does. I don’t know why being mad and pushing away that care and vulnerability is the default response but it is.
Year 5, Day 58: Am I ever going to clear my (work) inbox? Signs point to no.
I needed to replace the sandals I ruined around Christmas, so I procrastinated almost 6 months and then ordered 3 pairs. ADHD or personal problem? Hard to tell. (Friend gesticulates wildly at the ADHD/executive function dysfunction sign.) It really was only meant to be one pair. But it was $54 for one pair or $60 for two. It felt silly not to get two pairs for $60 because if they’re really comfortable (like they appear to be?) a backup will come in handy. Then I had to replace JB’s broken sandals. I had a 30% off and free shipping code from T-Mobile for Crocs which stacked with a sale, and remembering how my last sandals were ruined (the beach) decided it would be good to have sandals the beach couldn’t ruin so easily. Three pairs of sandals for the kids and myself: $50. Not too terrible.
My hacking cough is pretty bad today. Thankfully it didn’t crop up until after my interview call but I still have other calls. Booo.
Smol Acrobat’s pediatrician is leaving the practice due to life stuff, and we’re hoping that he will return when those things wrap up. To that end, I wrote him a note thanking him for caring for Smol Acrobat because he clearly won over the kiddo in their few visits. They frequently ask if they can call or go see their doctor, I thought that might be nice for the doc to know even if he doesn’t come back.
I’ve hit the point of work overwhelm where it feels impossible and hopeless which is an odd kind of peace. There’s more anxiety when I have hope that I might wrap things up in a reasonable time frame.
“Let me tell you something about my brother, Divya. He has no vision. At all. He’s vision-impaired. My brother would not know a gold mine if he tripped over a prospector and fell into a gold mine.” #RoyalPains (This is me. I have zero vision. I’m a doer, not a vision person.)
Year 5, Day 47: My sadness meter is roughly around about 100% today. All the layers of grief are making a tiramisu of sadness.
Lots of things I wish I could tell my recently deceased friend.
Way deep down, I keep wishing my mom had been the surviving parent while also wrestling with the knowledge that even if she had, that would have been even more painful because she was really sick and I couldn’t have handled her care plus having kids. It’s not fair that the grifter parent is the one in perfect health. I think there’s a correlation between people with great health and terrible other things (like the people who always dismiss COVID as a bad cold because that was their experience).
Week three of working without my buddy hit me really hard. Or rather didn’t wear off from the wave of sadness that hit me hard on the weekend. If anything, it’s intensified with the start of the new week. I wanted to go on a family walk / hike with my dog for Mother’s Day, but I couldn’t. We had to get out of the house before the thought “my dog can’t go on a walk, she’s in a box now” crumbled me entirely.
We went to explore a bit in the city and it was less fun than I had hoped for. Honestly, I was a little bit hoping for some temporary retail therapy because even if I was still sad, at least I’d have stationery. But nothing appealed enough which is probably a good sign in and of itself that my sadness is too deep right now. We had several run-ins with brightly colored arcade-like claw machine set-ups that had Smol Acrobat moaning dramatically “I want to p’ay a gaaammmeeee” on repeat. That bit was not great but we cajoled them out of it long enough to get out of there and pick up a sack of banh mi for lunch which was well received by everyone.
“Or maybe he ran off so fast because he knew three pissed off soldiers and a kaiju were coming for him.” (Neagley) #Reacher
Year 5, Day 48: Semi-jokingly asked myself this morning: have you tried just not having depression and anxiety? How about we try today?
Can’t say it worked. Can’t say it didn’t work either? It didn’t dispel the depression and anxiety but the awareness that my physical feelings, this puddle of sad and skittishness, is caused by depression and anxiety rather than a personal failing helped me stick to feeling just that instead of punishing myself for being way below 100%. This puddle still stinks but it could be worse.
“I need a dog to be happy” and “I need fewer responsibilities right now” are both true facts and it’s feeling impossible to balance them at the moment so depression is kicking my butt.
I should text the neighbors and borrow their puppy for a bit. I just can’t face another conversation that Sera’s gone yet. Working my way up to it.
This day looked to be a day fully steeped in the tea of depression but then a friend mentioned Huskies singing and reddit and I had to go find this for myself. This is terrible and wonderful and I can’t stop laughing at it. So that was a nice break.
Year 5, Day 49: Speaking of my inherent trend to frumpiness, it took 13 tries to find 3 dresses that felt like they fit my present body and doesn’t require the dislocation of any single body part to put on, pull off, or zip up. I might have to try to sell off most of my pre-second-pregnancy dresses. That’s disappointing, I liked those dresses. At least now I have enough to get me through a few events that require me to be more dressy than the jeans, tee-shirt and hoodie uniform.
I’ve been putting sprouting potatoes into the containers as normal but some months ago decided to actually pay attention and water them a little every day.
“When you’re invisible, you can have all the amusement you want, without any of the expectations popularity brings.” (Penelope) #Bridgerton
Year 5, Day 50: Today’s theme: doom and dread. All day long all I could feel was this unsettling feeling of something terrible looming over me, metaphorically. Or metaphysically? Maybe both?
By late into the night, I felt it as a sense of worthlessness and terrible motherhood. Everywhere I turned was “proof”: JB’s memories book bulging with pictures and written memories, compared to Smol Acrobat’s slim volume. Even still, that giant memory book missed entire years of documentation because COVID and inability to be three people. I hate this feeling. I tried to walk it off, I tried to go get some sun in the garden and talk to the plants. It only budged very momentarily when that cute puppy rammed my leg for attention.
I put on Reacher this week since Alan Ritchson seems like a decent enough person between sharing his experience with mental health issues and pissing off the MAGA folks who expected him to be as horrific as they are in a recent interview: “Trump is a rapist and a con man, and yet the entire Christian church seems to be treat him like he’s their poster child and it’s unreal. I don’t understand it.” His mother remains staunchly Catholic, but he quickly swats away any associations. “It’s worth saying that the atrocities that are happening in the church that are being actively covered up, even to this day with people not being held accountable, is repulsive,” he says, as the tenor of his voice changes. “I can’t for one second support the Catholic Church while there are still cardinals, bishops and priests being passed around with known pedophilic tendencies.”
I always want to support the folks who speak the truth about this stuff. Also, I like Neagley.
I’ve been hanged, swung over a fire, and nearly shish kebabed on razor sharp spikes. How do you mortals get from day to day, y’know?? (Aries) #Xena
Year 5, Day 51: I can’t think of a routine health appointment I hate as much as eye exams. Give me a dental cleaning any day. I’m always left feeling somewhat hung over and nauseated after the dizzying array of slides and bright lights flashed in front of my eyes. Even worse, the dilation lasted more than 3 hours, and so did the accompanying headache.
I forced myself to take it easy for at least an hour, and eat lunch so I wouldn’t feel like I was completely wasting that time, and then finally got back to work later in the afternoon than I wanted to. Lucky we cancelled the dinner for our friends that we were planning to host, this would have been extra stressful. Maybe next time I have to have an eye exam I can also take the rest of the day off.
Do you know what is romantic? Security. #Bridgerton
Year 5, Day 40: Infuriating. This is the second time I’ve filed a Dependent Care claim for FSA redemption on our daycare expenses and, once again, their website has pulled an “What are you talking about no claim was filed”. It’s disappeared entirely from their site. WTF United Healthcare?? They were reliably reimbursing us last year but they changed their site two months ago and now nothing works. Actually, from January, they were automatically denying claims first with incorrect codes (claiming we were out of the grace period, for all new 2024 expenses 😒) before backtracking and approving them. None of my claims for which I have saved confirmations since mid-March are appearing on the site at all. It’s ridiculous.
I’m still symptomatic from the virus that Smol Acrobat gifted me last week. After pushing too hard on Friday and feeling worse than ever, I forced myself to rest as much as possible on the weekend. I did NOT hill my potatoes. I did NOT pull weeds. I did NOT hack at the encroaching branches from the neighbors’ yards. Today, I chastised myself to do the bare minimum until I’ve shaken the hacking cough and all: no appointments, no running errands (I have 3), no doing the laundry, no extra anything until I can actually recover. It’s been 8 days, I’m thoroughly tired of this. And Smol Acrobat keeps asking me every 3 hours: are you fewwing better? And I have to keep saying no, not yet.
It should not be so hard to just not do things!
I did hill SOME potatoes today, just the one batch that was tall enough, and of course that wore me out. But I needed the satisfaction, along with accosting cute neighborhood dogs to pet them. We met a delightfully regal retriever today who was doing her best imitation of a statue as she enjoyed our pets. I asked her dogwalker to come by this way more often.
Year 5, Day 41: I found our neighborhood off-leash dog! We were excited to see each other. She did tricks for me in exchange for treats and then hunted down a tiny stick for me to throw for her several times. That was good for my heart. No dog will ever replace Sera, Seamus, or Doggle, but petting a dog is vastly superior to NOT petting a dog, any day of the week.
Checked on the plants, gave them a light watering, whispered “germinate germinate germinate” to the seeds.
I still have a racking hacking cough but I feel less horrible today, even though I wasn’t able to sleep until well into the wee hours. I could walk up a hill almost without stopping, almost without stopping for a long cough.
Got our CPA to find the check that I sent her weeks ago. She thought it’d never arrived and just didn’t say anything. All this time, I was waiting for her to cash it already so I can balance our cashflow. Glad I followed up and got her to look at her mail.
Year 5, Day 42: Everything’s coming up Milhouse this morning (in a limited fashion). Physically felt much less terrible today. I’m still pretty sick but the least sick I’ve felt for several days. I got to pet a neighbor’s fluffy dog. I had to drop off Smol Acrobat instead of JB and they were pretty cooperative. Traffic was ok going and returning, there was no line at Costco gas, there was easy parking at the notoriously awful parking lot by the place I had to return to (again) for fingerprinting, picking up my packages was super easy. No awful drivers on the road this morning. That was all a welcome respite from the stuff and nonsense waiting for me at my work desk.
For the first time in a long time, in thinking about this post where Nicole and Maggie’s touching on a topic that’s on my mind a lot (Do I really have it together? Have I been hiding things?) I felt not terrible about things. Also, I’m realizing I don’t have any idea what I mean by “together” anyway! Best I can say is I’ve kept most things on the conveyor belt moving most of the time, much like those moments in the chocolate factory about 14 seconds before it all goes horribly wrong in that I Love Lucy episode. Does anyone remember that? But feeling impending catastrophe is not the same thing as actual catastrophe. I’ve always tried to do the best I could, for highly variable values of “best”.
There are many things I wish I could do but can’t right now (in this very moment or this year or further out): supporting a grieving acquaintance, making plans with friends we want to see and haven’t in too long, horseback riding. I don’t have riding time (or money or energy) right now but it doesn’t sting to realize that as much as it once did. I can look at all those wants now as a “later / maybe in a few years” thing rather than an acute failure for not doing it now. Maybe it’s because I’ve made myself rest more during this grieving and illness period, my body and mind are finally getting a moment to heal a little bit. It’s not nearly enough rest but, for the first time in a while, I’m not using this time to kick myself when I’m already down. Therapy!
Though in this same vein, the place where JB does self defense keeps running special event! after special event! Social get togethers, competitions, seminars OH MY. I’m getting exasperated. They get 90 minutes of my time (or PiC’s) up to three times a week, who has time for all this extra stuff? If and when I add more stuff, it’s gotta be something that brings me some joy.
“So you think because the system always works for you, the system always works?” #LeverageRedemption
Year 5, Day 43: Warm day ahead and the birds know it. They’re singing their little hearts out this morning. I’m so grateful for my friend who sends many dog pictures and videos daily. It’s not the same as my Sera 🐶 (or Seamus, or Doggle), but it staves off the worst of the dog-loneliness.
We’ve got an unusually jam packed day: PiC’s appointment, JB’s self-defense class, open house. Our friend who doesn’t drive has an appointment late tonight and we’re both frustrated we can’t save them a bus ride by chauffeuring because we’re already over-committed.
Frustration at work keeps increasing. There’s a ton of pressure to fix problems caused by people acting in bad faith, produce more than we can produce, while taking a hit from a hiring misstep. But we still have to try to do the best we can do, even though we now know that it’s impossible to hit our primary KPI, and of course I’m responsible for making it happen. Thus, this headline from a Fortune article resonates: Workers are eyeing the exit in 2024 as LinkedIn and Microsoft study warns more people want to quit their jobs now than during the Great Resignation. For the most part, my job has had the key elements needed to support a comfortable life. Not enough balance but we were getting there. Things changed dramatically this year. It’s too early to say whether it was for the better or worse because a lot of change is still to come, but the changes that have already happened stink. We’re inundated with lousy new colleagues who just barely do their jobs a month and change after deadlines and I’m feeling absolutely stabby. ⚔️ Even while we’re grateful that PiC is still employed, I’m taking many deep breaths. I have to give this some time, not least because we aren’t ready to lose my income either. We can do this.
Third try finally worked! My set of fingerprints are finally approved for volunteering at the school. I don’t want to volunteer for most things that involve herding children and talking to people. I do want to volunteer to help out in the library sometimes. Once in a while. That’s for next year though.
Summer camps are booking up fast, and I’ve booked four weeks of camp with 3-4 more weeks to figure out. I volunteered to take 2 bonus kids (JB’s friend and their sibling) for one of the weeks where we could only do half days. I’ll still be working but figured the kids are old enough to entertain themselves enough to get by for 3 hours a day.
I need to just put the brakes on for literally anything else extra, for a while, I think.
“She’s your friend? You have friends?” #Xena
Year 5, Day 44: Smol Acrobat insisted on sleeping on my arm all night so naturally I couldn’t sleep. They sure woke up cheerfully, though. Still a whole lot more coughing and sneezing today than I’d hoped to be doing on Day 12 of this. I appreciated the day hitting the mid-70s one more time, though. These are our handful of summer weather days for the season, probably. The fog’s rolling back in soon enough.
I’m doing my best to resist the urge to eat all the Girl Scout Lemonade cookies. They’ll all taste great until I hit the fourth one and then it’s all regrets. Just two cookies!
Dear old friend and I had a short chat about how terrible things are right now. Every generation has had their horrible terrible thing that dominated the social consciousness, I admitted, we’re no different in that respect. She’s got 40 years on me, she personally remembers many of them. But, she pointed out, what’s different is this time it feels like democracy is about to collapse. We didn’t have that before in the middle crisis or the Vietnam war and protests and so on. She’s right about that. It does feel like fascism is on the brink of taking over completely more days than not.
“You and I will be together for all eternity” #Xena (Is it just me, or do only villain types think having to exist for an eternity as a good thing?)
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.