I am back!!

It’s been a while, but I’m back. Just like always, I’m always writing posts, I’m always thinking of what to write, and then I get pulled away from one distraction or another.

Kids and I are having a lazy day today. They let me sleep in until 7:30 (we usually get up at 7 during the week) so I got an extra 30 minutes. I usually get up at 6am on Saturday’s to play “Grow a Garden” on Roblox since that’s when they have admin abuse where you get a bunch of extra items. We decided to miss it this morning to sleep in.

We finally had a break in the rain. It rains here most winter. Oh yeah, I live in Washington State now. There have been many many changes. I’m recently divorced. The kids and I are living our best live out here on the west coast. Mountains meet ocean, what could be better?

Meet Pearl

We went to the Humane Society of Weld County on the 6th of May to just “look” at some of the dogs available for adoption. I had a few smaller dogs picked out that I wanted to see but as soon as we walked in all the dogs I wanted to see got adopted within the first 10 minutes of us being there. We decided to go browse and see what else they had anyway. Most of the dogs were jumping up on the window and barking at us as soon as we passed by their kennel. Except one. She just turned around and looked me in the eye and something magical happened. She spoke to me. My kids looked at her and said, wow she’s so pretty! She did jump up on the window very slowly to see Zahkya and Tristyn closer and they both had a magically moment with her. We all decided, we wanted to visit this dog in the visiting room.

While we were out int he office area to let them know we wanted to have a visitation with Pearl some other people walked in with a pure white baby pit bull puppy. He was sooo cute and in my mind I thought, wow we were standing at the right place at the right time. We put our name on that puppy to get a phone call as soon as he was available for adoption. Even tho we thought we found our forever puppy, we all decided we still wanted to visit with 3 year old Pearl.

They took us back into the visiting room and here came Pearl. She immediately gave us all kisses and learned up against our legs giving us hugs. They picked her up as a stray and her teats were hanging and looked as if she had puppies recently. She had this look about her that said, I love you. She was the sweetest dog ever and the humane society confirmed that. We only got a 5 minute visit with Pearl and we all chatted as a family afterwards what we thought about her. We were all in agreement. We wanted Pearl.

Pit Bulls get such a bad reputation. We brought Pearl home and she’s been an absolute dream dog. She isn’t house trained so we are working on that but she is truly the sweetest dog ever. She is very people motivated and wants nothing more than to get a “good girl” and some snuggles. Oh boy does she snuggle. She’s slept with Tristyn in his room from day one and sleeps with him in his bed every night. Her spay incision started leaking when we brought her home so I had to get her to the vet where she got some antibiotics and that leaking cleared up within days. She’s continued to amaze us and we have continued to fall even more in love with her. I’m sad we didn’t get to do this the first three years of her life and I’m sad that such a sweet girl never had a forever family. She does now. We love her so much.

Things that annoy me

There are several things that have really annoyed me lately.

When I say to someone, I’ve been up early and running non-stop today, and have them say, me too. For one, I know that I’ve done about a zillion more things than they have, I know that they went out to casual lunch, I know that they have taken a nap and I know they have only walked less than half a mile. Sure, maybe it was a busy day, for THEM but damn, don’t compare that to my day when I’ve done 10,000 more things and never got to sit down once. It’s not the same. Don’t compare. Napping isn’t running non-stop, so stop. Just stop.

School zones. I’ve figured out a way to get my kid to school without passing through one single school zone (other than his school zone). I am a rule follower. There are speed limits in front and around schools for a reason. I would say, 80% of people don’t follow it and don’t pay any sort of consequence and speed through those school zones without batting an eye. Here I am doing the 20 mph that I’m supposed to be doing and I have these mother fuckers flipping ME off and honking at me like I’m the one in the wrong. I hate school zones. I hate that people don’t follow the rules when in them so I avoid them now like the plague.

Adults that don’t know how to adult. I have several of these in my life. I’ve been responsible and able to take care of myself since I was 18 years old. I’ve cooked my own meals, done my own laundry, and paid my own bills. I took care of my responsibilities like an adult should. So when I see adults who don’t know how to be an adult and act more like a teenager it infuriates me. From staying up all night to not being able to feed themself to asking everyone else to do everything for them. To be completely dependent on their partner for basic needs. Even though they are capable they CHOOSE to be dependant. Daily the choice is made to not even do the bare minimum and rely on everyone else to keep everything running smoothly. I lose a lot of respect for that.

Those are the top three I can think of for now. I have more big news but I’ll write about that tomorrow with a happier blog post.

Got Tristyn a new desk

Found this desk on Facebook marketplace for $20. What a steal! Tristyn will be getting Mama’s old computer and needed a place to put it. He loves it.

My Molly is gone

Molly wasn’t eating her food like usual and was sleeping. She was sleeping a lot.

I decided to take her to the vet. The vet took X-rays and bloodwork.

Fluid was building up around her heart and lungs, probably due to some sort of cancer the vet said. Her liver enzymes were 6 times higher than normal. It was a Friday when this happened. Friday morning.

I asked the question I knew I needed to ask. Is this the end?

Yes, the vet replied. This is the end.

I said, let’s schedule the appointment for Monday. I needed to have the weekend with her. I needed enough time to say goodbye.

The vet looked at me and stared silently with that pleading look in her eye. She told me Molly most likely wouldn’t make it through the weekend and she would likely suffer as the fluid in her chest built up.

My body was heavy in grief, and through tears and a tear-induced migraine, I signed the papers to have her put down 3 hours from that moment. I only had three hours to say goodbye.

Now I’m lost. Without my Molly and I don’t know what to do about it.

So food is weird now

When I first got home from the hospital, I had to be around food again. I had to make it, I had to watch other people eat it. Food that I love eating, food that smelled so very delicious. I knew I couldn’t have it. It’s clear liquids for me for the first two weeks and then it moves on to pureed food. Then it’s soft proteins and such from there on out until I’m completely healed. On the first day back I went through a bit of a mourning period. I really wanted all that food. I wanted it back, my stomach, even though it was impossible for me to do so. My family was eating such big bites and such yummy food.

On the second and third days of being home, it changed a little. I saw a bunch of food I enjoy and love but the want, the need for it wasn’t as strong. I didn’t feel like I was missing out. They had pizza, from a new place and this pizza looked fabulous but I was ok not eating it. This is a whole new world I will have to navigate through. I want to keep exactly on my path because it’s easier to do.

Post-op with doctor and dietitian today. They wrote down my weight wrong right before going into surgery so if they took that weight they put into the computer wrong then it would have shown that I gained weight today. I showed him my weight entry which I logged before going to the hospital and it was exactly 20 pounds off, so clearly an error on their part. So that puts me at 7 pounds weight loss so far, yay.

Next week I can start eating pureed food. Scrambled eggs. Cottage cheese. Smoothies. I’m so excited. I’m so happy to be on this journey and my hips feel fantastic being on these pain meds. It’s the best they have felt in a year. I hope this lasts.

Surgery was done and now I’m back home

I got my Single Anastomosis Duodeno-Ileostomy with Sleeve gastrectomy on Monday. Everything went fine with the surgery. I made everyone aware that I had issues with pain meds (I require more because I metabolize them very quickly and they don’t last as long) and anesthesia (I wake up during my surgeries) so everyone seemed to understand. The surgery took a little over 5 hours. I was in ICU for 6 days as they tried to figure out some reasonable pain control for me. One of those days I spent screaming and crying for 12 out of the 24 hours that day. It was rough. The pain is pretty bad, still. I was sent home with the highest dose of meds. The pharmacy required me also to get Narcan in case of OD.

I’m still on oxygen due to the pain meds making my already shitty lungs sleepy so I’ll be on that for a few weeks too. I really didn’t think it would be as painful as it is, I thought it would be like having your gallbladder out. My belly is really big and bloated. I’m on a clear liquid diet and I can’t drink much at one time at all so it’s been difficult keeping my fluids up. Nights are really hard because I don’t have nurses coming in when my scheduled meds are ready to take and I’m having a really hard time getting comfortable. I’m doing everything I should be. It’s just a rough recovery. Way harder than I thought it would be. I’m excited to get all healed up and start my real journey.

The surgery date has been set

I know that it’s been a while since I’ve written any updates. I just had my pre-op appointment on Friday and the surgery date has been set for my bariatric surgery. The big day is February 27th @ 10:45am. I can’t believe we are weeks away at this point. Exactly two weeks today in fact. I’m starting to mourn the foods that I love knowing I’ll never be able to have them again. I wish I could get some salsa in the next two weeks but I don’t think our budget will be able to handle that.

I won’t be able to take any NSAIDS for the first month or two after surgery and I’m not sure how I’m going to handle the hip and shoulder pain. I’m really really worried about that part, way more than anything. Even my surgeon said she was worried about it. I got diagnosed with adhesive capsulitis also known as frozen shoulder. I knew something was wrong and I was scared it was AVN developing in my shoulders, and without an MRI they can’t rule it out but they did find evidence of frozen shoulder. I got a cortisone shot in my right one since it was more painful and that really seemed to help. I’d like one in my left eventually, I’m just really full with appointments right now.

I’m nervous about how the kids will be while I’m in the hospital. I have my Mom on board to take them during that time but that’s a lot of work for her. I just don’t have other options. The kids don’t want to stay with their Dad. I’ll be restricted when I get home, I’ll only be able to lift no more than 10 lbs for the first month and no more than 20 lbs the second month. I’m lucky to have a strong son who I know will help me out with all that.

It’s been a busy day today, getting things done around the house. I have a lot of organizing to do before my surgery date. I still need to put dishes away and switch out laundry but I’ve gotten a lot done.

Working for what you want

I got a phone call yesterday from my bariatric office. I’m scheduled for surgery at the end of February. I can’t believe the time is finally here. I’ve been anticipating this so much and looking so forward to it. I’ve cut back on my coffee and come February 1st I’ll quit caffeine altogether. I guess the caffeine eats through the staples so I can’t have any caffeine before or directly after the surgery until I’m all healed up. I can do that. I need to start getting in the habit of logging my food however, I started and then blamed being too busy as a reason why I stopped. I can’t have excuses for this. None. So I need to start logging food again. There are a few more steps and procedures I have to get done too before surgery. One is a fecal test where they will be testing for h-pylori. They don’t want to be cutting my stomach with bacteria in it. The other thing I have to get done is a mammogram. That’s it. That’s all I have left to do. I called my primary doctor already and got the mammogram ordered. I just have to go over to the hospital and pick up my kit for the fecal test. Easy peasy.

I don’t have any appointments today so it’s going to be a housework day. I have a ton of laundry to get done but I only have enough detergent for one load so I’m either going to have to order some and get it here today or concentrate on that one load. I took Tristyn to get his hair cut yesterday and the haircut lady tried some new detangler in Zahkya’s hair that worked like magic. I told her I wanted to order some so she’s going to let me know when it comes in. I secretly keep hoping that Tristyn wants to grow his hair out again but he likes it short. He’s a good-looking dude so his hair is his choice.

Back to school

The alarm was set at 6 am this morning and neither of my kids wanted to get up. I was surprised that Zahkya was still sleeping as she’s usually up between 4 am-5 am. Not this morning, however. After I shut the alarm off I turned on the lamp in the bedroom thinking that would wake them up. Nope. I don’t blame them, I was tired too. Tristyn was apprehensive about going to school today because he was up so early but I kept reassuring him that he’d feel differently after seeing his friends and teacher. He said he had a stomach ache right before I dropped him off but I think it was just his nerves. I told him if he still had it after a while to go to the nurse’s office and they would call me and have me come pick him up. Poor kid. Last night he wanted to go to bed an hour earlier than his bedtime so this morning would come faster. He was really really excited to get back to school.

I plan on getting the Christmas tree down today as much as possible. I already got laundry done but I need to vacuum. I got some emails taken care of, I’m so bad at emails sometimes. I heard from my friend Trish which was awesome. I’ve been friends with her since my early FRCC days and I’m so glad we have kept in contact with each other. Hopefully, we can meet up for lunch sometime in the near future.

I completed my book challenge over at Goodreads again this year. I barely made it but I read 25 books this year. I’d really like to read more this next year but it’s just so busy I don’t think I’ll be able to. I set my goal again for 25 books to be read in the year 2023.