Year 3, Day 293: We were doing so WELL for a few days there. Smol Acrobat was eating most meals with gusto, they were communicating better and best of all: were not coughing, sneezing, dripping, or burning up. Until today.
Add that to the last three days of terrible sleep (worse than my usual, which is saying something), caused by searing pain in my neck and shoulders, and feeling really shitty about the weekend of conflict with JB which had me feeling like a total parenting failure. I could absolutely cry today.
All I want is a burger, fries, and 16 hours completely alone with my computer, some books, a pile of blankets, and Sera.
Sigh. None of those things are happening, of course. Not on a Monday, not with a sick Smol to tend to. I vented to some friends and sat at my desk, glumly working as fast as I could, wanting to let out the stress with tears but not being able to.
At some point, the thought occurred to me: everything feels very hard right now. Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to give myself a little break. Maybe I can commit to just a little time to myself, sometime this week, if Smol can be away during a school day.
My therapist often says being gentler with myself would help let off a little of the pent-up pressure and I usually don’t know how, but that silent ghost of a promise helped.
I stress ate some candied pecans (why do they sell these by 6 oz bags and not the pound?!), went in on a little lotto pool with a friend, tried to set up Yotta and got rejected, and discovered that Smol can put on their own jacket. I had forgotten they would have learned at daycare by now, so when I asked semi-jokingly “can you put on your coat?” and they said “yes”, well surprise surprise, they can! Only when they’re inclined to.
This tweet thread is timely. Given these two options, if I am transparent at all, I’d almost always opt for emotional transparency instead of vulnerability. I get close to emotional vulnerability here, mostly, and with a very few other people. I think it’s because I am so accustomed to people not showing up when I express a need or a struggle. I expressed it in the past and I was still on my own. So why bother? Why bother and be disappointed when I could just skip that entirely? I understand the flaws in that thinking now but I remember why it developed.
Year 3, Day 294: Treating my pain today is a whole universe away from when I first experienced my chronic pain 27 years ago. None of these factors listed on the tweet below were ever examined back then, most certainly not the trauma bit. It’s not eliminated my pain, this week is a huge reminder of that even if I were inclined to forget, but it makes a big difference. I can function more. The joy is dampened by having developed ME/CFS in the meantime but I can appreciate the reduced pain frequency nonetheless.
Year 3, Day 295: Alas, we did not strike it rich on the Mega Millions, friend and I bought tickets on a lark, so after a terrible night of hysterics and some vomit for Smol (with PiC and I sort of splitting the night), and night sweats and nausea for me, it’s back to the donut factory for both adults this morning. Darn.
Semi-related: My sense of taste is all off this week. Things taste metallic or “chemically” (I don’t know how else to describe it) to me, where they taste perfectly fine to others. This could just be my normal weirdness rather than anything COVID. I go through cycles where potatoes taste bad and carrots taste like soap. No idea why, but I hate it. Last night’s Japanese curry dinner tasted too salty and my berry flavored sparkling water tasted like medicine. 🤷🏻♀️
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Some days I feel all kinds of conflict internally: I want to be up and about, I want to curl up in a ball and hibernate, I want want want. It’s puzzling today because I already let myself lay down for a couple hours today to rest, anticipating another hard night with Smol Acrobat. These feelings make me feel like a child. Shouldn’t I feel like an adult by now, here in my 40th year? What does an adult even feel like?
In fact, that reminds me of a conversation I had with my friend and mentor who is starting a new stage in life and likens it to being like a toddler again: it’s exhausting having feelings, feeling them, and learning how to navigate them. No wonder we get sensory overload and exhausted.
Speaking of lacking emotional vulnerability: I saw a tweet asking for help for a stranger going through medical issues, from a friend of theirs, among many many other Mutual Aid tweets. It struck me, again, that my whole emergency and savings planning revolves around never asking for help. I want to save enough for retirement and for our future health needs, and set very high goals, because I don’t ever want to tell anyone that we need help in an emergency. I spent too many years digging out of financial holes, and getting set back frequently, and I can’t believe or trust that anyone would care enough or be able to help us if we hit the rocks. SMH. My scars run deep.
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A whole lot of friends discovered they had ADD/ADHD during the pandemic, and I was happy that they were getting treatment that helped. It took Abby’s latest post to make me start wondering if I might have a touch or more of it. I emailed my GP with the list. I am a slow learner!
Weirdly, as I sent it off, I had this bizarre feeling of “no I don’t WANT to have another thing wrong with me!” I was almost embarrassed. I feel so broken. I already have fibromyalgia and ME/CFS.
And yet, I will have to laugh if I end up with another diagnosis, courtesy of blogging friends. So many gifts from Twitter/blogging/the internet.
Year 3, Day 296: Much less overnight hysteria from Smol last night, though they still had multiple wake-up, which was much appreciated because my joints and tendons are furious today. It feels as though iron spikes were driven deep into my joints. It was impossible to find a comfortable position to sleep in that didn’t make it worse. So, that’s fun! /sarcasm
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I’m trying to redeem an expense benefit from an employer today. They offered a small stipend for certain expenses this year so I chose to use it on daycare.
Since daycare won’t take credit cards, we paid in full and followed the directions (I read them three times) to submit a claim for reimbursement with the receipt.
Dear readers, they rejected the claim today because “you paid in full”. Yes, we did, that’s why we’re asking for a reimbursement. Duh? Who asks for a reimbursement when they didn’t pay? That’s a whole other verb. That’s what the whole reimbursement and uploading a receipt process is for, is it not? Annoying. I’ve submitted a help request. Let’s hope someone gets their head out of wherever it’s hiding. I’d like to cross this thing off my list and deploy that money where it can do some good.
Year 3, Day 288: Gas is below $5/gallon. I checked our records and it went below $5.25 around Thanksgiving weekend. What a difference it makes to each fill up total! We’d been nudging $100 for a 3/4 tank at those prices. *shiver*
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We have a break between storms today and I’m trying to make the most of it. I ran out of steam yesterday. We’ve got two more loads of laundry, I’ve got some donations to ship to Allen Youth Center, and I’d like to get Sera a doggy sweater.
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Huzzah! Nicole and Maggie’s comment fixed my problem. Well, got me to fix it. When the block editor was first rolled out, we were able to pick which editor to use for new posts. Then they took that choice away. So I went into the settings but my toggle to turn off block editor was greyed out.
I checked again this week and the toggle is functional! I can write new posts in classic editor! 🎉
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I noticed on Twitter that a player collapsed on the field during the Bills/Bengals game, and the NFL didn’t immediately, or very quickly after, cancel the game. I don’t follow football but this is the kind of stuff that floats up to my attention because it’s something my circles are interested in. It was both not at all surprising that the NFL didn’t have what it took (morality? souls?) to immediately cancel the game and apparently expected both teams to take the field again shortly after, without knowing if a fellow player was ok. I heard that the teams and the team reps told the NFL that the game wouldn’t go on (buzzfeed article). There’s something deeply wrong with parts of our society for that not to be an immediate decision, IMO. And football is such a dangerous game.
Year 3, Day 281: Sharinga Donors Choose project: Clothing Closet.
My stomach has been excessively grouchy for the last few weeks. I respond by eating less and less because everything irritates it to some degree and it seems logical to give it less to be annoyed by. Maybe it’s stress related. This reminds me of my childhood where I was constantly having stomachaches and no one knew why. The doctor just diagnosed me with a (never ending) stomach flu and gave my mom a hundred amoxicillin to treat it. Pretty sure he was wrong on both counts. Today I suspect this is and was all stress related.
Year 3, Day 282: Someone wished us a Happy New Year today and I was thoroughly confused. I still don’t feel like Christmas has happened yet so it’s too soon for that. But it’s not actually. Phew. Weird times.
Just took my fourth COVID test in two weeks. Negative still. I have had an intensely sore throat for several days and my sense of taste just suddenly dropped out so I figured I should check. I’d be more certain with a PCR test but we won’t be able to get an appointment for a few days yet.
Year 3, Day 283: Another negative test today which means once again probably I just feel terrible because my body is broken.
Big storms are predicted for the Bay Area but I’m still unclear whether that includes our little bit of it or not. I love rain but not so much flooding.
This was Smol chomping on my face and my shoulder today (image of Fritz the hippo at the Cincinnati zoo chomping a larger hippo). WHY SMOL WHY. (Weekend note: Upon meeting a new to them doll from the hand me down basket, they greeted said doll with a nose chomp. Again, I ask you: WHY?!)
Year 3, Day 284: I’m still impatiently waiting for updates about the under 5 bivalent booster. While Smol Acrobat is catching everything under the sun and bringing it home to me, I’d very much like to continue to dodge COVID for as long as possible.
My throat is a little less painful, after two weeks of testing and meds, and I’m still guessing it was related to exhaustion. Except the fatigue and causes thereof are still high, so it’s unclear why it’s less painful. Not complaining about that, mind you, just observing. Perhaps a more perceptive mind than mine will spot a pattern.
My cough has only gotten worse, though. No congestion, just a dry cough, but a hacking deep cough that frequently nearly induces vomiting which is a whole other dimension of fun.
Year 3, Day 285: I’veavoidedusing the WordPress app block editor for ages by copying old templates but whenever I start a new post, I have to use it. I hate it so much! I need to set up a way to dodge it on new posts too.
Also hate: when I run into someone who reminds me of my biodad in some ways but clearly leads a totally different life in some important ways. It brings up much hated guilt over how his life could have should have been better, grief for the father I thought I had but never truly did, sadness that my kids will never have the grandparents that I also wished for as a child.
I shared some of this on Twitter and long time reader friends and Twitter friends provided support that is objective enough that even I can’t argue that I should be to blame.
I’ve also updated our Giving Page here to carry us into the new year. It feels slightly impossible with Twitter falling apart but I’m going to hold hope that people will continue to share and donate through the year.
Year 3, Day 274: Fluh. Smol is finally through hand foot mouth and then immediately caught another virus. *Slump*
They’re grouchy as all get out and I’m still tired as hell because my cold thing still hasn’t gone on its merry way. JB is sniffling a bit, too, may it go no further. We’re quite the merry band.
I have got exactly zero holiday spirit at this point in the week. Maybe it’ll change as we go along but I’m skeptical.
*****
What’s the opposite of self preservation instinct? I caught myself feeling today as if I were not rested, but as if I had enough of a break that I should start thinking about how we could possibly fundraise in 2023 without a functional Twitter. I don’t have much reach here on the blog, I don’t want to spam email folks. But I also don’t want to let the Lakota Giving Project wither away.
I asked a friend to holler at me to settle down if I try to start hatching plans too early. I really do need a real break before diving headfirst into new iterations of the project.
But surely brainstorming ideas isn’t doing anything?? I don’t want to use a fundraising platform, I’d stick to the easy and informal setup we have now with Ruth. Put together a page on the Giving page again and ask friends to share it? Maybe offer small rewards when someone gets us over a fundraising milestone? I wonder if that makes sense. Thoughts?
Year 3, Day 275: Smol was screechily excited to meet our friend’s cats, they’re already friends with JB, but that delight was their downfall. They’re really good at petting cats gently but they can’t help their squeal of excitement once petting commences and that squeal absolutely terrifies the cats who take off running. We practiced doing shh shh shh with a finger over our lips, they imitated that, but the second contact was made: *delighted cackle* and off goes the cat. I can’t fault their joy but it was working against them.
*****
Oh hey, I made a sale on Kindle Direct Publishing! A little book that I designed was bought by someone! That’s very exciting! I hope they like it.
Year 3, Day 276: I thought my congestion had finally moved to a clear mucus stage but no. Alas. Not yet.
I had stocked up on kids; medications, thinking we’d have enough to get through the end of the year before I had to worry and of course the Imp of the Illnesses overheard my nonsense. Bam, we’re halfway through the medication supply, no end of their illness in sight, and not a medication to be had from any store.
My dear friend happened to be around. He checked all the local stores I hadn’t checked (because I was pretty sure they wouldn’t have it either and I was right) and then ran over with some from their own supply because his partner had stocked up before the shortage without any notion a shortage was coming. That buys us about 7-8 more days, I think. Haven’t quite figured out the math on volume to doses to how long a single 4 oz bottle will last.
*****
I’m organizing all our receipts for the tax year. I’d dated several of them incorrectly and had to download another dozen or so. Usually I’m a lot better about keeping up with all the paperwork as we go through the year. This makes me mildly paranoid that I’ve forgotten to either record the donations or to download the receipt, or both, for others. For the moment, so far as I know, I’ve gotten that all together.
Year 3, Day 277: This time of year feels BEYOND hectic but there are some small bright spots. We got to visit with a very good friend. She was talking about buying me some clothes but I didn’t want them to go to the trouble, so I redirected with my current need I’ve been pondering: what kind of wallet can I switch to? My debate is between two fundamentally different shapes: a long slim zip around, vs a thick squat sort of shape. Having had both, I couldn’t decide.
She happened to have an old but never used wallet in their closet and so I have now inherited that. Perfect! It saved me the trouble of overthinking this for the next six to twelve months! But it didn’t ultimately deter them from buying me clothes which was the point. Whoops. But they were awfully nice sweaters and I’d just discovered four holes in one of my two turtlenecks so it worked out in the end.
*****
A Black professor I follow talked about how she grew up surrounded by Black people and was loved growing up, enough so that she was surprised by anti-Black racism when she encountered it as an adult. She was talking about this in relation to people disbelieving Meghan Markle’s not realizing how very very racist the UK was going to be towards her. I had a similar experience growing up within Asian culture. Asians have a real problem with anti-Blackness, that wasn’t a surprise to me but I learned to see it for what it was because I grew up playing with Black kids and anti-Blackness was easier to identify as wrong. I was surprised by Asians claiming to be superior Asians to others. I was, of course in this scenario, the inferior Asian. A boy I dated told me his mother would just have to deal with the fact that I was “an inferior Asian race” (paraphrased). She only wanted him dating the superior Asian races. Of course. I was offended but I was more surprised than anything at first because what? What’s your problem??
Year 3, Day 278: Smol’s whatever they’ve got, and my cough, seems to be finally on the mend so naturally, OF COURSE, JB spiked a fever of 104. They went from playing at top speed and top volume, of course, to dragging, no appetite, burning up, and exhausted with a headache and sore throat. I put them to bed at 7 pm and crossed my fingers.
That’s about all I can take of this week. I hope everyone’s holiday weekend will have gone well by the time you read this.
*****
Help! Our lovely elderly neighbor we have said hello to most mornings for the past few years as she passes by gave us an unexpected Christmas gift and a $25 gift card. I consider that a not-small present, especially when we don’t know them beyond 2-3 minute conversations. Our kids/grandkids don’t play together.
I have trouble with feeling transactional about gifts of any kind, it’s taken me 20 years to shut up and accept gifts from chosen family that are greater than what I can give them, so this throws me on a bit of a loop. What’s expected in a situation like this? Do I need to get them something? Do I not commit to a gift giving cycle and send them a warm thank you note? Would it be unforgiveably rude not to gift back to them? I really don’t know if there’s an etiquette for this.
*****
Thanks to Nicole and Maggie for highlighting these Donors Choose campaigns to support trans kids that only have a couple or a few funders and may not fund in time. Can we help them out?
Year 3, Day 267: If I ever have to justify why I insist on prepping for things like travel or holidays six months ahead, this is why. How I feel today and will likely feel all week is why. A viral steamroller has come through and absolutely crushed me at one of the worst possible times. December is a terrible month for my immune system and it’s inevitable that something will derail any plans to prepare at the last minute.
I’d had a bit of a sore throat last week but after so many sleepless nights, naturally it was fatigue. Saturday night I was starting to feel iffy. Sunday morning confirmed it. I had caught something. I’d had more than a few hours of sleep and still felt like I’d been completely flattened by morning. I feel like that on and off normally but combined with actual sleep and a sore throat, it’s most likely something viral. Sigh.
So I’m very glad that A) PiC was amazing and ran every single errand on Saturday, including the Costco run where he B) found a few premade foods so we can get through the week with minimal cooking from scratch. We liked their confusing but tasty ravioli lasagna, so we are going to do that more often.
Year 3, Day 268: I’m doing my best to think and wish it away but it’s possible I caught Smol’s HMF disease. I’ve got a variety of symptoms and some fit and some might fit or might be unrelated. Please be unrelated.
There was a new episode of Leverage Redemption today! YEE! It helped me through the tired and sick brain fog hump.
I recently discovered that a friend had escaped a DV/stalker situation with very few belongings and I put out the Bat signal on Twitter. I had to be discreet and protect their privacy but we raised enough to get them a winter coat and boots. Someone else is donating some gently used clothes as well. Depending on cash flow, we’ll see what else we can get together. I remember our family sheltering a cousin, when I was about 6?, from an abusive stalker ex and I hate that this is still such a problem 30+ years later. Another good friend recommended these resources. I hope you never need it but I’m sharing them here: Stalking Resource Center, SafetyNet, and NNEDV.
As a brain relaxer, I browsed things on sale at Kate Spade. There’s dopamine from looking at pretty things, and sale prices, without the danger of buying anything because I’m not paying even 60% off Kate Spade prices today. $80 after discounts on a wallet? Not today, darlin.
I do like that little nylon backpack. I have a use for something like that for day trips and errands without kids, it’s handy to have something hands free but that’s something to think about later.
Year 3, Day 269: Today’s arguably the worst day of this illness so far. My ability to remember faces and names and similar facts was just gone. That’s not super critical to my work but it’s important enough that I cancelled a meeting to conserve the few remaining functioning brain cells for the critical stuff. While angrily griping to myself mid morning that I still wasn’t better, I caught myself. I’d done nothing to help me get better. I’ve been popping pain meds around the clock for days to ignore the sore throat and other symptoms, and doing the bare minimum at work and at parenting, but that’s not actually resting. Oops. I moved myself to work from bed, since I still had to get through some things, and took a lot more breaks.
I wrote JB’s teacher a thank you for doing a unit on a variety of fall and winter holidays, instead of Christmassing it up, because that is important to us. Finished up my last handwritten letter of the year to my senior friend and put that in the mail. We’re not sending Christmas / family cards again this year. I enjoy getting them but have simply not been up to the task of getting any together for us. Maybe in the spring I’ll throw together a tiny 4 year look back. One picture from each year we’ve missed since 2020. That’s a lot of ground to cover.
Minor food victory: I helped Smol eat a little bit of salad with dressing, and then they chose to eat a little bit more on their own. They can be a very reluctant eater most of the time, and reject veggies a lot, so these tiny wins feel big.
Year 3, Day 270: We’re having a really rough time with JB this week in particular but this situation has been developing for some time. They’re staying up later and later, I can hear them singing some nights, and waking up very late the next morning which almost always means they’re dragging their feet and having to be told to get through a routine they already know. At the start of the school year, they were getting up on time, on their own, and getting completely ready without a word from us.
They tell me that they’re really tired in the morning, which I can see and am unsurprised by, because there are a lot of nights they’re up singing to themselves late into the night. They claim a dry throat is why they’re getting up in the middle of the night too. Gee, correlation?
Parenting remains frustrating.
*****
Seeing Scalzi’s offer to write a short story to get Locus Magazine to their fundraising goal made me think, gosh, it’s too bad I don’t have any talent or skill that I can offer as incentive when we do these giving things that come up every so often or…every year. I’m good at a few things that are useful but nothing at all useful to offer up as a prize of sorts.
Year 3, Day 271: I’m admiring stamps again. I still want the elephant stamps. Also the women cryptologist stamps. The red fox ones look very cute but I’m not sure I have a real need for 40¢ stamps. Charles M Schulz ones are cute. Next year they’re coming out with the Tomie daPaola and John Lewis stamps.
I’m not a philatelist, of course, I just love using neat stamps when I send people letters and cards.
Smol Acrobat slept hard today, sleeping in until 8:30. It’s been a rough week for them too, I think. But happily they were so enthused about breakfast, I didn’t have to fight with them at all. They asked for two helpings of eggs, ate them all!, half a banana, and a whole waffle. Amazing.
My headache is still a constant companion, as is the iffy throat and congestion.
Year 3, Day 260: Smol’s third round of fever started last night, coinciding perfectly with my fatigue deepening to the point I didn’t even hear them wake and cry at 4 am. PiC took care of them, but I usually hear and respond to all middle of the night wakings. Getting up felt like a forced swim up through multiple levels of sediment. Heavy and yucky and my ears kept popping.
Working felt the same way today, too. Just a lot of yuck and struggle to get the basics squared away. Pre-holiday hangover?
My arm is still sore from my flu shot which reminds me that yay I finally got my flu shot! It’s been hard to muster any energy or time. No new symptoms from the shot, I just continue to be generally headachy, muscle achy, fatigued and have an on again off again sore throat. Maybe, maybe if I can pull off another night of sleep or ten, I’ll feel better? It doesn’t help that I’m also anticipating with great stress and no joy the upcoming time with family that involves a lot of logistics and problem solving and no help whatsoever.
Year 3, Day 261: Ah yes one of the few days I have meetings scheduled would be following a horrible up constantly with a very sad Smol Acrobat night. It’s not clear what was wrong. They were sad and couldn’t get comfortable, but I didn’t know why. Their fever was down and I had administered Tylenol just for their general discomfort but they just couldn’t deal. They napped at daycare, thankfully, twice even, but were terribly sad at lunch and refused to eat. This was a puzzle and teachers tried to feed them to no avail. According to the doctor, though, this is actually their third virus in the past 2.5 weeks, so we have to take them for another round of COVID and flu tests. Also, it turns out there’s a chance they were exposed to hand foot mouth disease last week, we’re just finding out now. Mega sigh.
For my part, I was 90% zombie today. I’m just so tired. And maybe this contributed to my feeling slightly inadequate. One of my dear friends (#1) was a key player in planning a major inauguration and gala, and she did a magnificent job. I simply cannot imagine wrapping my head around doing anything that immense or that highly visible. Our mutual dear friend (#2, much older than both of us) selected #1 over me to be the executor of her will in this year’s rewrite and #1 is also the designated party planner. #2 doesn’t want a funeral, she wants a big party. Don’t get me wrong, I am not gunning for more jobs, but I admit to a small pang of “well gosh, what am I good for then?” As you know, if I don’t have a use, a job to do, then I don’t know what the point of me is in a friendship.
It’s possible I’ll write the obituary, I wrote her late spouse’s, but that feels like small potatoes. Then again, I’m not sure how I’ll even do that, my heart is in my throat whenever I think about writing it. And yet I feel like I need to prepare raw material now before it’s too late. In any case, I agree with #2s choice of #1 for an executor. It’s practical, her kids are quite a bit older than ours and she’s more intimately familiar with #1’s tastes and preferences because she’s very particular about tastes herself. I’m not that person. I’m a nuts and bolts, behind the scenes person. Pure functionality over form, entirely about getting a job done with zero thought for performance and flair. I’m no good at the latter, I’m uncomfortable with fanfare. I 0% wanted to be the center of attention at my own wedding and only got through that by ignoring people if I wasn’t face to face with them. The choice truly does make sense to me. I just want to be more of service in the event of #2’s passing. If nothing else, to numb the grief, I suppose.
Year 3, Day 262: I really don’t know what’s what with COVID anymore. PiC’s employer has noted higher community transmission rates and moved their company guidance accordingly. But it’s only “masks recommended and limited in person meetings”. Meanwhile everywhere I look, hardly anyone is masked. Half the people at the orthodontist were unmasked, and they actually require masking. One lady had the nerve to tell her kid to REMOVE their mask when they stepped inside. I guess that’s “require” since they didn’t enforce it or chastise it unmasked people.
Smol’s still sick and in a lot of pain. They couldn’t eat all day and PiC and I were racking our brains on how to help them. I’m exhausted from the past two nights of all nighters with them. I had to set aside time to just lay down and rest during the day because it doesn’t look like this will resolve quickly, it’s very probably hand foot mouth disease. They were exposed last week and we only got the notification yesterday about the exposure. Not that we could have done anything about it last week, either.
After I had the brilliant notion of picking up Jamba Juice for them, and it worked! They slurped down a huge amount and were smiling for the first time at a meal in days! They opened their mouth wide saying ah! ah! ah! They suddenly felt good enough to let me take a good look inside and sure enough: herpangina. Sigh. They’re miserable and it’s so sad.
Year 3, Day 263: Not for the first time since I started using them, I’m grateful someone mentioned setting phone alarms for things like appointments. It’s been a huge help for picking up JB from school. I get very deep into my focused work day to day and really need that sharp jerk to pull my brain out of the depths on time.
Especially on days like today, my third day after a sleepless night, and my brain is barely just creaking along, at least I don’t have to also worry that I’ll forget someone somewhere. That’s happened a couple of times, before the alarms, and I know they’re fine but I would just as soon skip that guilt (strongly linked to how I felt when I was constantly left at school), thank you very much.
I thought about cooking with that chicken I defrosted on Monday and haven’t touched. Since I started work at 530, I had some time by the afternoon. But the two and a half brain cells I had left piped up and said maybe don’t wipe yourself out the rest of the way cooking when there are still classes to drive to? Good job, tiny voice.
Year 3, Day 264: Mulling over how, since starting daycare, I’ve gotten a few days a week with chunks of uninterrupted time to work which is REALLY good. But the tradeoff is germs germs germs omg germs. Thankfully so far not COVID, but every other kind of viral fever-inducing thing out there has come home with them. They’re on Virus number 6 in 3 months and this one is absolutely brutal. I thought patting them down 3-5 times a night was bad (and it was). This go-round, they’re absolutely hysterical with discomfort throughout the night, night after night.
Today is an at-home day for Smol, who is still sad and sick, which reminds me just how physically exhausting it is to be ON constantly with an active toddler when I’m super tired, plus have work to do (which I of course cannot even think about while I’m on Smol minding duty). Feels like all the options are bad right now.
Big sighs.
*****
I noticed that my lifelong friend had big smile wrinkles that weren’t there before this year, in pictures she texted me. Then I noticed that I have them. We’re prematurely aging! The long running joke is that this sort of thing doesn’t usually show up on our (Asian) faces for a few more years, and then generally it happens all at once. I guess the pandemic kick-started it.
*****
We donated again to the Child and Family Relief Round 2: Our goal is to provide 500 food packages to families in need in different provinces of Afghanistan. Aseel’s Emergency food Package Emergency Food Package 1 (92 USD per package) feeds a family of 6-8 members for five weeks.
Year 3, Day 253: *creak* go my bones and *creak* goes my brain. Having gotten up with Smol several times overnight, I’d logged maybe three hours of sleep by the time it was time to get up for the day. This mystery illness is the pits.
After seeing everyone off, I made the call that laying down first, rather than last after I’d done the majority of my work and felt like a herd of elephants had trampled me, was the wiser choice. It was but I didn’t feel refreshed after a 45 minute liedown during which my back started complaining. What’s with our bodies getting hurt from laying down?? Honestly.
Work itself was happily uneventful. I ironed out more details for holiday stuff and when my brain stalled out, hopped over to organizing the administrative details of the Lakota orders. Several are pending or starting to ship.
I have several orders of my own pending. Some things are for packing, some things are for wrapping. All the things I bought already have a place to go: closet, or wrapped gift pile, but the combination of several boxes of hand me downs and shipped goodies overwhelmed my brain.
One last package arriving tonight hit my limit of patience with the amount of STUFF in the office which triggered a cleaning cascade. I can’t work surrounded by mess. An hour of sorting and cleaning mostly returned us to pre holiday equilibrium mess. That’s not good. I need to do a bit more decluttering or I’m going to be a real mental mess going into the end of the year. (more…)
Year 3 of COVID in the Bay Area.
