Sunday, July 27, 2008

hmmmmm

i woke up this morning feeling like today isn't really any day at all, a little groundlessness from the lack of schedule with rodney out of work, i guess...
there's a good feeling in the air, though, of all the projects we can do in the next few weeks. rodney will likely just stay on unemployment (hoping for some side jobs, too) until school starts (unless, of course, he's needed back at work--hopehope), so there'll be another adult here to help out with jubal so the girls and i can take care of a bunch of art projects that need doing...a special soap i want to make that i'd like them to help with, some gocco prints, and a trial run of my homeschool plan (which is to study everything through art. everything!)
we did a gocco print run last week of a design hazel made--a tuxedo angel cat with a little gold halo, and it turned out awesome! vesta did a sketch, too, but we had to order more screens and bulbs (i've been promising them that i'd let them try the gocco, so i used my last child support payment to order the stuff). vesta's is a sketch of a flying fish and she wants to run the print in gold ink--she has quite the eye, it's going to be very nice. we'll likely do that today. we also have this project we got from santa last christmas, enough goodies to make 4 stepping stones, which we haven't done yet, and i'm super looking forward to.
so i'll try to stay positive, especially since rodney is uber-stressed out, and just enjoy the time together and the opportunities it offers us...i imagine once school starts, there will be a reshuffling that might be hard to adjust to, so i want to enjoy some lovey-dovey family time while we can.

i am grateful for:
rabbits, the best pets in the world
rice, which doesn't contain gluten!
my home
my family, especially dad and aunt kim right now, who are being extra-special supportive in this crazy time
energy--the small bits i have and the larger bits those around me have to keep working on keeping the school open

Friday, July 25, 2008

everything's blowing up

this is the time of year when the garden really blows up. i've pretty much lost all control and the thistles will be where they may...the cauliflower is growing up into the tomato cage, the borage has sprawled everywhere, baby thyme plants have sprung up all over the north herb garden (maybe next year i'll have some sizable plants to give someone!), the scarlet runners have far surpassed the height of their string trellis, and more. i surrender to that and merely harvest and water. if i happen to see a weed, i might pull it. it's working fine, we haven't had to buy any veggies for a month or so, except zukes and cukes--the cukes i forgot to plant and the zukes aren't ready yet (lots of blooms, though). oh, and carrots, which i succeeded in not growing effectively AGAIN this year. they all went to flower without making carrots first...pull them up and you get this tiny white rootlet topped by a giant flower. ah, well. the only other thing that flopped was the potatoes. we got two meals out of the 18 plants! they were yummy, though. i planted them without properly preparing the bed, so i'm not hugely surprised, though i was sort of hoping for a pass on that this year.

other things are blowing up, too, but not in such a good way...
hazel is an unpredictable emotional wreck this week. she misses layla so badly. she just aches with it. layla was her best friend at school, her main playmate, and just a special girl. hazel is stressed out about how school is going to be without layla there. she believes no one else likes her and she'll have no one to play with. she's bitterly upset about elise and lesley leaving the school. she said her three best things at school were layla, elise and lesley, and now they're all gone. wail wail. i asked her if she thought she'd like to try going to a different school (thinking there'd be a wider base of kids to choose from than blue mountains current enrollment) and she said only if it was a school with people like layla at it! it was another rough night.

jubals's mouth is blowing up. he went from having 6 teeth to having 10 teeth in like a week. and those 4 extras are molars. he's fine all day, but he's a wreck at night. in pain and frustrated and bewildered. it's sad and it's loud and it hurts my heart.

and now that rodney is able bodied enough to work full time on a real crew--there's no work! he had to file for unemployment and we have to figure out what to do. maybe it's just slow right now while the crews wrap up the jobs they're on and it'll go back to normal with new jobs...or maybe the economy is so fecking bad that there won't BE new jobs and we'll be extra screwed. i've considered trying to get hired on for a night shift at the mcDonald's that's a couple of blocks from our house. i know it sounds crazy that i would work there, but it's a mindless, easy job that's close to my house and one of the only places around here that is open at night. of course, i have the energy level of a hot bag of sand, so i have no idea how i'd mother and chore-do all day and then work a shift at a job, but...god, i really hope i don't have to do that.

the pigpills seem to be working a little better with the increased dose. i don't feel !GREAT! and !FULL OF ENERGY! like i hoped i would, but i don't feel quite so exhausted. maybe one more grain will do the trick. the gluten-freeness sucks ass and even if it lowers my antibodies, i doubt seriously that i could do it for my whole life. it's hard and everything costs more and there is no quick lunch--obviously if i planned things out better, there could be, but no on the fly sandwiches these days. i'm learning to keep a pot of rice in the fridge so i can fry it up for lunch.

no news on the blue mountain front. or any other fronts that i can think of.

i'm grateful for:

my sweet, sweet kids
my youth
my home
perseverance
love

Friday, July 18, 2008

suckimoto

well, i've been back to the naturopath's to see what the new bloodwork fairy brings...turns out a further, but not more helpful, diagnosis: hashimoto's thyroiditis (also known as "hashimoto's disease"). if you just say "hashimoto's" it sounds kind of exotic, add the thyroiditis and it sounds made up...call it hashimoto's disease and it sounds straight up too diseasy for my tastes. so, hashimoto's it is. it means my body is creating antibodies to attack my very own thyroid with--the average person gets a rate of 35, i have 1000. nice, huh? "they" (ie. doctors, medicos, etc etc) don't know what causes it, but it tends to be genetic and there are theories, as i mentioned before, involving all the toxins and pollutants in the environment--they really screw with your endocrine system in lots of nasty ways.

so it basically sucks. there is no cure, they just treat the symptoms--ie. the hypo-thyroid. though my doc did recommend trying a gluten-free diet, as a guy she took a seminar from earlier in the year has had great success with lowering the antibodies that way. so i have an incurable disease in which my body attacks itself from the inside AND i can't eat gluten. i bet you didn't think of it, but gluten can even be in BEER!!! so i can't even wallow with a cold one in a pool of pity and weariness. guess i'll be a wino, then. i'm trying the gluten-free diet for three weeks, starting probably sunday. then i get more bloodwork (to see if the antibodies went down), then i "challenge" the gluten-freeness by eating a bunch of gluteny things (come to me beer, let me make a sauce of you to pour all over my pasta!!!) yeah yeah logic logic...if it makes me feel better it's worth it blah blah blah.

it is so--make that SOOOOO--depressing to learn that your body is attacking its own self. if you think of your mind and body and spirit as a unit (you-nit, haha) then it's especially interesting (in a way that makes you want to drink a bottle of wine all to yourself and cry about what a failure you are) to think about the fact that you are attacking yourself. why? why would your mind/body/spirit do that? why can't you do anything about it? (whispered thoughts: can you do anything about it?!) if it's all connected, then couldn't you figure out why you're attacking yourself on an emotional/spiritual level, then resolve it, and then be all better?! medically, it does not appear so, though maybe deepak chopra would say different, i dunno. and this is where quantum physics always breaks down for me. even when every cell of my being believes in something, i cannot always "choose that potential"...so. hmph.

anyways, right now i'm wallowing. i always give myself a few days to wallow when REALLY bad things happen.

yeah, it's not cancer, it's not AIDS (though it does cause me to have a greater propensity for developing other auto-immune disorders), but it's big and sucky to me anyways, and i feel like crap about it.

now for the hopeful bits...my piggypill dose has been upped to 60 milligrams, so hopefully i'll finally start to feel some relief from the chronic, nagging, annoying, horrible fatigue. and...in my research and my discussions with the doc, i've discovered that many things are symptoms of hypo-thyroidism, things that i've been dealing with, but didn't really think of as symptoms...like dry skin ( i thought i just didn't eat enough fish!); ridged/cracked/brittle nails (i've had this one nail that always splits in the middle no matter what i do or how careful i am with it--for YEARS); weight gain, of course (new t-shirt idea: " i'm not fat and lazy, it's my thyroid!")--no wonder all those grueling curves sessions made ABSOLUTELY NO FECKING DIFFERENCE!, itchy skin (there is this spot on my stomach that has been bothering me since jubal was born!). stuff like that. i honestly think this was brought on by my pregnancy with VESTA! i've had symptoms that didn't seem like symptoms for that long! (she's ten now, by the way). the bitter irony--when i was dealing with the "breastfeeding issues" after she was born, clarebeth said something about "it could be a thyroid problem" to joe (her naturopath husband) and he responded with something about what good would it be to know that if there wasn't anything you could do about it--i guess assuming i wouldn't take the pills. maybe i wouldn't have then, who knows. but damn. i sure wish THAT path had been pursued at the time. sigh.

here's to pigs and oncoming relief and the resilient human spirit, which i hope i have somewhere in me.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

my hearing must be bad

they voted no, five to two--with one of those being leslie r. so she can bring the motion back for re-deliberation later, after the final order comes back from the state....so: appeal, appeal, appeal....say goodbye to a meetingless, relaxing summer where we could all be assured of our futures and just enjoy ourselves without this damn stress crippling our hearts ("goodbye summer!"). i have no doubt that if we actually make it to COURT we will "win"...i have doubts that we have the collective energy and money to get to court.

Monday, July 7, 2008

come to the hearing!!!

just a reminder...
the blue mountain hearing with the school board--about the charter application for renewal--is TONIGHT at five-o-clock. if you are near cottage grove, come out to support the school. we want a massive crowd, so pass on the news. a lil birdie told me there's a celebration afterwards at t's house...be there or be square, hai!