Grey Skies

There's one good thing about being depressed, oddly enough this is the time I don't even really look at myself good or bad and it's sort of a break.
Spending the week at the cancer center for a rotation was not exactly conducive to a cheerful mood and then I really hit bottom last night knowing that my son and husband would leave this morning and I won't see our son until Tuesday and my husband until Thursday. Even when something is known beforehand and an established yearly thing it doesn't make it any easier. I've been with my husband 7 years this December and yet his yearly hunting trip that he will NEVER budge on still bums me out considerably. The last two years I have not cared or missed him and I would say that is worse. At least I am back to caring. Now missing my son? Always hard for me, always. I can now handle 2-3 nights okay but beyond that is very hard though I know the world will not spinning; still hard for me to be away from him just simply because he is so wonderful and cheery and sweet. He brightens each day and I hate for that element to be gone. I am fully aware I can't put my happiness on him though, my father did that to me and it was a heavy burden. So I don't pin all my emotions on him or being with him but he just makes you happy to be around him.
I have not been to the gym all week and it is weighing on my mind. I have simply been too worn out and feeling very fragile physically. I know if I pushed it I would be sick right now and I am narrowly avoiding that now. I slept until 3:30 today, just absorb that for a moment!
I also am getting my ass to a mammogram pronto as there is soreness and possibly a lump or swollen lymph node in my right breast. I don't think I need to elaborate on that and how that makes me feel. My paternal grandparents died of cancer. My maternal grandmother is dying right now of metastatic breast cancer. My father has lung cancer (that he is ignoring). My mother is a survivor of colon cancer. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't really concerned and freaked out. I hope it is nothing, I really, really do but regardless I am going to go on a round of doc visits (for all kinds of things) because all I can do is be hyper vigilant and live well.
I talked to my mom about all over the above and am feeling better and feeling positive and can only go forward from here trying to be positive, productive, and patient.

Hit the gym again for the first time since the wreck and it was really the highlight of my day. 30 minutes of cardio again, I'll probably do that tomorrow as well and then lift on Thursday.
Friday we drive to Tulsa, my father in law is walking! I am so excited that he has made such tremendous progress and we're going to have yet another 2 year old party for our boy (with all the Oklahoma relatives, combined with grandpa in law's 80th birthday).
Once again I have a monster headache and that description is coincidental but it actually came from drinking M0nster energy dr!nk again and then for going it today. I lost my focus here...(see:headache, huge).

Some good things I want to list:

Blood pressure down to averaging 100/60 from 120/80 and a resting heart rate down in the 60s, that is awesome. Also I am stronger both when lifting weights and doing cardio but I'm not sure how to quantify that without it being even more boring than this.

Still being positive and also, made a new friend! Like, a real friend that I call without feeling awkward and talk to every day. Very cool.

I could strangle my last OB/GYN, I feel more and more that she has contributed greatly to a lot of my mysterious female issues. Whats more, when I communicated to her that I had too much pain to have relations (wink wink, nudge nudge) with my husband she was not too concerned about fixing it. She's seemed increasingly bitter towards her own husband and I don't appreciate the fallout on me. Anyway, sonogram came out clean so my new gyno thinks maybe the nuvaring birth control I was on, which is higher in estrogen-THANKS OLD GYNO, might be encouraging the out of control bleeding, disrupted cycle, etc. Anyway, she's moved me to a different type and I think I'm going to like it, instead of sugar pills during your off week (in this case four days) you have iron pills. That's pretty neat and something I need as I am always slightly anemic or borderline.
FIL is now in rehab hospital to work on his left side, heart is doing great but the after effects from the stroke are what is bothering him at this point. Thank you for well wishes for him and me as well, much appreciated.
The vaccinations I got on Friday kicked my ass all weekend. They were required for my program this fall in order to insure me while I see patients. Measles, mumps rubella (mmr), tetanus/diphtheria and a tuberculin skin test-all of which left me feeling crappy. Today I did manage to get to the gym for the first time since we went and played racquetball together, and I knocked out 30 minutes of fairly intense cardio and managed to like it. I decided to go back to my old method when I started exercising which was 30 min cardio, ten minutes on 3 machines. I started with the stationary bike, then the tread for intervals, then the stair master. No stair master today, my knees need the break I think so I did incline walking and some running on the treadmill for some extra time. Nice equipment, nice facilities, etc. Of course this IS at one of the snootiest private colleges around so I'll just let you imagine the clientèle.
Speaking of taking it easy, I've had this weird sore spot on my spine that started freaking me out when it got really big and hurty this weekend and the skin was red. Doc said it is bone, I was right and that it is most likely from lifting too heavy over my head. Whoops! I have to take it down a notch so I will probably switch to lateral raises for a bit, or I may just cut back the weight even though I think it is already a paltry amount.
The free weights area at the new gym is meathead central which I am not too excited about, I only saw one woman working out over there and of course that was with her boyfriend who was putting her through the paces. Lots of ab work, no heavy lifts that I saw, definitely no compound movements. Sigh.
Please update lovelies, I have no energy and would like to be able to read stuff.

Back but I've just been too exhausted and busy to get online much. I am usually bored surfing the net wondering why no one understands I am the center of the universe and they should update for my amusement. Lately I have not even had enough time to make it through my regular reads, let alone hit Whingey Level Orange, Danger Danger.
Anyway, FIL is doing well/not doing well depending on what angle you examine the situation from-he has been finally moved to a private room out of ICU I THINK, though that could be misinformation as they tried to move him before but he had a stroke that morning that made him go back to ICU. He had four bypasses and it was a beating heart surgery, meaning no bypass machine was used which as a science nerd I find absolutely fascinating. Only a very quick, very skilled surgeon can pull that off and that part of the ordeal went very well. They couldn't just go in and clean out the blockage because diabetes had thinned out the connecting portions of his arteries, they were screwed every which way to Sunday so had to be chunked in the bin basically. His leg is hurting something awful where they took out the vessels used for the bypasses.
I am about to leave to get a sonogram done, abnormal bleeding and pain has been plagueing me since last Tuesday and my doc wants to find out what is going on inside. My mother had a full hysterectomy at roughly one year older than I am now because she had cysts that did not dissolve which turned cancerous. I am praying this is not what is going on right this minute as I sit here and type.
I've experienced some wonderful, tasty healthy food lately and discovered some great restaurants. Yesterday I had a meal by myself in a French place and it was absolutely incredible. I can see why they say French women don't get fat, the food is so damn good it's a crime to choke it down like I do burgers and fries. I took forever to eat my soup and salad and crusty bread and felt super satisfied when I was done. I also spent a lot of moola at Target and got tons of great tops, I think I left feeling so happy because I avoided trying on pants.
So, drinking water to have a full bladder, about to go get a rude test done and I only hope nothing terrible is wrong, but I don't have the best feeling at this point. I'm trying to catch up on blogs as I can, hope all is well.

My father-in-law went in for his angiogram this morning and it was as far from good as it gets. They're doing a full bypass on him immediately and we are headed that way in the morning. His blood force (push of blood through the chambers) dropped from an already bad 35% of 60 down to 20% and his arteries are obstructed big time. One is pinched and the other may not even be operable.
People, this man was thought to be in relatively good health, but he had diabetes unknown to any of us that has screwed up his heart in a big way and I'm terrified I'm going to lose someone very special to me.
We only get one body, let's hope they can repair his. I guess I'll be doing a ton of walking since I'll be out of my element. I'm an emotional passionate person and my husband and his whole family are very stoic and detached, pray for me or send good thoughts, whatever your preference.

I ordered a neti pot and it arrived Saturday, but for some reason I felt overwhelmed with the idea of mixing things and pouring it through my nostrils. Tonight I dug down for a bigger set of balls (metaphorically) and did it and I feel great! I think I've gone around with partially obstructed passages and mucus in my throat pretty much all the time and just thought that was normal. Apparently it's not and you feel way better if you get rid of it. Let's say I am feeling extremely optimistic that I will rest better and not get sick as often as I tend to do. At least four or five doctors have told me my issues stem from allergies and that Dallas is one of the top allergen centers of the country so I have to take meds every day or just deal with it. Perhaps some natural medicine can do the trick, please, please, please.
I now have the use of my arms, at least partially. What a weird statement, eh? Well my husband and I played an hour or more of racquetball yesterday and if you've never experienced this particular game, it is an ass kicking workout. I used to play my own modified version of it at home with a tennis racket, bouncing a tennis ball against the back wall of the house and keeping it going was the objective. I did that all the time when I was much younger, maybe 12-15 yrs ago. So let's just all assume I got my ass handed to me and am sore in places I didn't know existed. My right arm in particular has been pretty much useless all day, like the Wii arm you hear about but I actually played a sport instead of a video game. (not that I am against the gaming system, anything that gets people active is great) We had so much fun and it was a great workout that just felt like play time. I can't wait to do it again.
Speaking of playing again, I'll probably play solo several times a week now that my class schedule is shifting and I'm familiar with the gym. It's gorgeous, only about a year or two old with all these nifty features I've never had the privilege of using. I will be trying a guided nordic track treadmill class with hills and sprinting, heavy bag cardio class, and a fused yoga pilates class-though that one may be harder to get to. There's a staircase you can run and then it has a track that goes down you can walk instead of running back downstairs-hard to explain but way cool. Well equipped free weights area that I'll definitely be taking advantage of, individual lcd screen tv's on the cardio machines, an indoor rock climbing facility, lap pool, outdoor lounge area pool that's shallow and you can just hang out-waterfalls and such. We both have memberships for $10/month because of Husband's employment at the university. Not bragging, just super excited. I've never been part of something like this, it's like fitness heaven. The showers even have the little bench enclosed with the stall but out of the water area so you can put your stuff down there without it getting wet. My new class will be over by 11:30 and I can just cruise over there before picking up the young'un.
It will probably be another week before I tackle the classes, we shall see. Two more exams and anatomy I is over.

PS Live Free Die Hard was the most fun, exciting movie I've seen in a long time. Obviously it's an action flick, but I'd say it's the best one in quite a while.