Tuesday, October 25, 2005

OKay OKay Okay I'll post

At the incessant urgings of some people who will remain nameless I have been forced to forgo my usual blog lurking and post something so that I can return to my favorite pastime of lurking. I did this test today.
Your Hair Should Be Orange

Expressive, deep, and one of a kind.
You pull off "weird" well - hardly anyone notices.


So a quick and dirty update on my life.

Tim continues to work although I think he has come to the realization that this type of work will be impossible to continue for too many more years. He has the mind of a young man but his body has been completely torn down by years of abuse and of hard physical labor. He is exhausted and grumpy much of the time and yet he makes to work every day. This in itself is a milestone for him because he has a reputation of laying out regularly. I am very proud of him.

Bella--OMG. I could go on forever about the angel babe. Incredibly smart, furiously mobile, zooming thru life with a ferociousness that scares me. She remains my inspiration, my source of joy, and the reason I am totally exhausted all of the time. I worry about everything with her but a hug and a look from her sweeps away any fear I try to hold on to. She shines.

Me--well I don't know. I feel good most days. Then I will have a bad day and it seems all overwhelming again. The last week or so I have started not sleeping or resting again. I don't know what to make of it. I am still dreaming so I know I get some rest. I remain confused about my job. One day while I am there I feel right where I need to be and then if I am at home I feel like there is no way I can go to work and take care of people. So the dance goes on.

Basically everything is okay. Tim and I have our good days together and our bad days together. I have always said to other people that relationships are like accordians. Some times you are closer together, somedays you are further apart yet you remain part of the same instrument with the potential to make beautiful music together. On the bad days I try to remind myself of that. :) I am excited about the change of weather. Although as usual in SC it has gone from unbearable hot to freezing. But this is my favorite month, my favorite season and my favorite type of weather. This weekend we are going to the fair. It isn't the state fair but the local county fair. I can't wait. It is perfect weather and I can already taste the food. I laughed at myself the last time I went to the fair. I said "It's sad when your favorite booths are the mary kay and the tuperware booths". I would say I had become my mother but for those of you who know my mother that would be hysterical. My mom, yeah, she's the flaming redhead on the rollercoaster with all the men hanging around in groupie like style. I should be so lucky.

So now I have updated and hopefully that make people happy. I must say it has made me feel better and less stuck in a rut. Go figure.
I love you all, Yvette

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Tom Cruise Sucks Wind

So Tom baby has all the answers, huh? I guess with him being a female and everything he probably knows a lot about post-partum (sp?) depression. Geez. Honestly though if you would have asked me one week ago if a person should take anti-depressants I would have said no way. However now on my fifth day of one I can say I finally feel like my old self. Maybe better than my old self. I have had a complete turn around. I have more energy, I am sleeping, really sleeping for the first time in many months. I am dreaming again. I have always had vivid dreams and for months I have not dreamed. I think it was because I wasn't sleeping. It is truly amazing how important sleep is to a person. I had gotten to the point of not being able to function. It feels a little like what I imagine it would feel to be waking up from a coma. I look back on the last few months (that is significant) and see how low I was, depleted in energy and spirit. And for the first time in a long time I can look forward and choose a path to move forward on. There is something to be said for living in the now but to be stuck and to be barely surviving in the now is not good. I think in order to really live in the now and to enjoy the bliss that state can bring, you must also be able to look back and to look forward. If you have no knowledge of where you are coming from or where you might want to go then it makes the now a stagnant, unflowing place. The now should be flowing, dynamic, in tune with the natural order of things. This is a place I intent to aspire to from this day forward. Wish me luck!!
I love you all, Yvette

Saturday, July 09, 2005

Damn dial-up

Well I had a post all typed up but I lost it. Suffice it to say, it was full of sparkling wit and funny lines. Yeah right. Oh well I am tired and will try again tommorrow. In the words of Scarlett O'Hara, I can't think of this today, tommorrow is another day. I love you all, Yvette

Thursday, July 07, 2005

I'm Baaaaaack!!!!

Well here I am again. I could go into the gory details of the last couple of months but just suffice to say that we are finally moved, things have returned to normal, and I am exhausted. Take this morning for example. The angel babe has her first tooth peeking thru her gums. This is such a big milestone in the journey of life. I am totally excited for her. However, it made for a night from hell. She slept restlessly in the bed with me, up about every 1/2 hour or so. She is running a low grade fever and is just very grumpy. I got absolutely no sleep last night and no sympathy from her dad this morning. (he slept on the couch) I called in sick to work and felt terrible about sending her off to Grandma's, like I would have if I was getting up and going to work for 12 hours. Did I get any support for my decision? No, none, nada. Just a silent feeling that I am a bad mom for not taking care of my own child. Tim being a reflective sign probably was reflecting my own disapproval and guilt feeling back to me. However, I would love to just once hear him say to me that he understands the pressures I am under and that staying home to sleep in peace was something I need to do. Why can't he say that? Why can't he make me feel like I'm not a bad person for taking a morning for myself? Why do I need him to validate me? Why do I even expect him to care? What is it in me that requires his approval constantly? I am sure it deeply rooted in my childhood struggle to gain my father's approval. I never felt good enough and I guess I still don't. This has shaped every thought I have had for 35 years. It has driven me to make the wrong choices in men, in jobs and to constantly second guess myself. I had asked the universe to give me a day off to rest and instead of taking it I created a atmosphere of guilt and shame. How can I stop doing this? Does anyone have any answers? Sometimes I feel like running away. My mother has aways said that when you run away you take yourself. So that won't work. Because whereever I end up, I will still be there and I will still be feeling not good enough. How do I heal this? I have no answers this morning, only questions. But I am back and I am back to stay. So it's just me, as I am, no other way to be. I love you all Yvette

Monday, May 09, 2005

Me and my big mouth

Okay so last post I was lamenting the fact that my life sucked and how could it get worse. What was I thinking? I know how karma works and how intent creates action. I like to consider myself a fairly intellectual human being. Yet, I opened my mouth and asked for more stress. It reminds me of nursing. You know when you are having a great day, not much happening and then some silly person opens their mouth and mentions the q word. (for people who are not nurses the q word is oh geesh I can't even type it I'm so superstitious but it means silent) Anyway, Friday, we are waiting to hear about Tim's dad, who ended up having a 8.5 hour surgery, when the angel babe started fussing. Not her usual "I'm tired, hungry, bored" fussing but really fussing. I could tell she was in pain but I wasn't sure what was wrong. She was drawing her little legs up and pooting so I thought she must be having gas. I gave her gas drops and she cried herself to sleep on my shoulder. Now this is very unusual because she is mostly sunny unless she is wet, dirty, cold, hungry or bored. After she woke up she was wet I went to change her and to my horror she had a big angry red lump in her groin. Of course she howled when I touched it. I was immediately hysterical. I knew what it was. An inguinal hernia. An incarerated hernia. So I'm screaming and the babe is screaming. I put in an emergency call to the pediatrician who had to be paged and started packing the diaper bag. I should say Tim started packing because I was running around with the angel babe crying and generally being hysterical. The pediatrician that called back tried to get me to reduce it which resulted in more crying on the angel babes part and increased hysteria on mine. Tim really needed to stay by the phone in case something bad happed to his dad and he was needed to drive his mom to the hospital so my very best buddy in the whole world who I cannot ever repay for all of her kindness drove me and the angel babe to the emergency room. Of course by the time we got there the hernia had reduced itself but it left her ovary outside which one silly pediatric surgeon tried to say was a swollen lymph gland. Thank God the attending surgeon knew immediately what it was. I guess I shouldn't be so hard on the resident surgeon. The incidence of inguinal hernias are extremely low in little baby girls. However, strangely enough, I had bilateral inguinal hernia repair at 14 weeks old. I also had an ovary that slipped outside. The end result is that the angel babe will have surgery on Tuesday. On top of everything that is going on, my precious angel babe will be operated on. I have no doubt that she will be just fine. But this has been one of the most stressful weeks of my life. Enough is enough. I do have a whole other post to reflect on past lives and why we incarnate with this weekness in an area where mostly baby boys are weak. More on that later. So tonight I am going to finish with this intent. This move, Tim's dad's recovery, my angel babe's surgery and recovery are going to be easy. Life will be smooth, gentle, kind and loving. I refuse to accept any less than that. I love you all, Yvette

*note to all, just because you are a nurse does not make you automatically good at dealing with medical situations that involve people that you are close to. Sometimes hysteria rules. :)

I'm shutting up now.

Friday, May 06, 2005

Uggghhh!

Could life get more complicated? We are in the middle of the move and Tim's dad, Randy, is seriously ill. And we are SOOOOO broke. Sometimes I thing we cannot possible ever dig our way out of this financial disaster that started with the surprise birth of the angel babe. I feel like I am being squashed with the weight of all this, kinda the same feeling I get when I tour a cave. I can feel the weight of the earth on me and it creeps me out, never liked them cave tours. Angel babe is sleeping well and its freaking me out. I know it is the inconsistencies in her routine but there is not anything I can do to fix that right now. Life will not be okay until we make the move and are in our house with everything hooked up. Wow I just reread what I wrote and noticed I wrote angel babe is sleeping well but I meant she is NOT sleeping well. I think I may be having an official nervous breakdown. I don't think I am equipped to do all this stuff at once. Since the birth I haven't been able to do anything at all except take care of Bella. Sometimes I don't do too hot a job at that either. Tim has a bad tooth that he simply won't take care of and his stomach is hurting him. I know it is his reflective sign and his nerves and his reaction to stress. Even the cats are edgy, wandering around, getting into stuff they normally don't bother. All of us are smelling rain in the air and feel the storm coming. Oh yeah, the gray cat is sick. See, could this get any more complicated? Everyone is very cranky. I'm tired and I'm bleeding. I love you all, Yvette

Wednesday, April 13, 2005

For every thing there is a season

a time to change, a time to live, a time to die, a time to love.
Seems that change is in the air for a lot of us. My beloved sister is building a house and selling her old one, my mother is checking into buying property on the east coast, and my family is moving to a new location.
What is going on? Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the biggest change. The angel babe has started on solids.
This is an exciting time for all of us. I find that my life is reflected in the day to day lessons that my babe learns. For example, the other day she learned that objects have permanence. Now while this may not seem like a really big deal, in baby world, it is MAJOR. For her it means that her favorite fat duck (which by the way has a very annoying quack and can only be turned off by standing on one foot while closing one eye and doing the hokey pokey *who makes this stuff*) actually goes somewhere when she drops it. What this means for me is this: babe drops toy, mom picks it up...babe drops toy, mom picks it up...babe drops toy, mom picks it up...you get the picture. Babe is amused, mom is not. But what this also means on a grander scale is that she has learned about loss, evidenced by the fat duck going bye bye for now.
I hate that she has to learn this lesson. In fact, I grieve for all of us. My sister is leaving the first house she ever purchased. There has to be some sadness and nostalgia in that. What a special place it has been. It brought to this family, stability, a place for family gatherings, and for me a place of refuge that I utilized more than once. I am not saying that her new place won't have all the same qualities but that what we experienced there, the memories we made there have to be left there. My mother is leaving behind a life she spent many years building. It brought stability and a place for refuge for all of her children for as long as any of us can remember. My family is moving from our sweet spot that was our refuge and our first attempt at stability.
So where does that leave us? Perhaps in spite of our feelings of loss and because of our knowledge of object permanence we can forge a new stabilty and refuge. It is from knowledge that we experience and from wisdom that we grow. May we all have the wisdom to make the choices that will create a safe, stable "sweet spot" for all of us. I love you all. Yvette

picture of the fat duck to follow soon :}

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Things I hate about blogs

1. another thing I feel obligated to do.
2. blogs you can't escape from (the ones with no next blog button.

Seriously though, I have been doing a major amount of blog browsing. I have run onto a lot of interesting and excellent writers and a lot of just plain crap. Oh yeah, and lest I forget the advertising. I did leave some desparate plea on a lady's blog because she sounded like someone I could talk to on a day I was desparate to talk to anyone that didn't drink from a baby bottle. I had to work 3 12 hour shifts in a row, and the first day with the babe was pure hell. I think that when she is at Grandma's she gets way more attention than I can give her here. I give her plenty but I also think there is some value in amusing yourself while Mommy grabs some sanity. I just thought of one.

3. forgeting to add a really clever blog to your favorites and losing it.

This parenting thing is hard on me. I have been wound up tight since the babe arrived. It has made me a hateful person. I can't seem to relax. When I allow myself to feel, it is like something is sitting on my shoulders twisting a band around my head. I learned today that much of my problems are created by what I think other people are thinking about what I am doing. It is MY perception problem and it is causing me to lose my mind. Living with a reflective sign like Tim actually compounds the problem. Here is how it goes. The babe is fussing because she has not learned how to sooth herself to sleep. Somehow I decide I am not a good mother. Then Tim comes home and I think he thinks I am not a good mother because the babe is unhappy. Being reflective, he picks up on my feelings and being true to his nature reflects back to me and says something like "Perhaps you should pick her up." Now I really think he thinks I'm a bad mother. So now I'm mad. I am such a control freak. I now have to control what he reflects back to me. See! I am losing my mind. (sigh) Maybe I am just tired. Think I will go to bed.

Before I forget, today is Bella-Dawn Marie's 4 month birthday. Happy birthday to my miracle baby.

I love you all, Yvette

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

A Cave Day

I had a cave day today, me and the babe. That's what Tim calls my penchant for dark, cool houses. I closed all the blinds, turned on the ac and hibernated. When I was younger, I would sleep and not answer the door. I would call it "my ugly phase". Back then the "ugly phase" would last for weeks or months. I know now it was probably depression. Today, however, there was no depression, just contentment. I was quiet, the babe was quiet, both of us were totally relaxed and content. I also had a realization about myself. This will probably come as no surprise to those of you who know me better than I know myself. I am a perfectionist. If I can't do something perfect then I refuse to do it at all. This glorious condition I am experiencing called motherhood has helped me come to terms with this realization. There is no way in hades that I can every be a perfect parent. I cannot control every aspect of the babe's life, every experience she has, or keep her from unpleasant occurances no matter how hard I try or how perfect I am. More importantly I cannot refuse to do this because I can't be perfect. I am a mother with a child. That is the reality of the situation. I can only do my best and strive for excellence. Maybe in that I can find light to seep into the dark corners of my life where I have stuffed those "ugly things" that I refuse to complete because I am not perfect. Hmmm...

Friday, March 18, 2005

I am so lucky

Tonight as I finish my day, I count my blessings. Once again in the other room sleeps my husband and my little girl. There is such joy and contentment and peace in that knowledge. Today was the first day both of us have had to go to work on the same day. It was total chaos this morning. But as we rushed off, me to the hospital, Tim to the construction site, I felt happy in a way I haven't felt in a long time. Maybe happy is the wrong word. Relaxed is a better word. Tim took the baby with him to Grandma's house where I know she is safe. I had no tension in my shoulders at all today even when bed management was breathing down my neck to hurry up and empty beds they needed to fill again. There was no tension when two people were looking to me to start their iv's and I was trying to make the assignment for the night shift based on acuity. What a marvelous, beautiful feeling. No tension, just relaxation. Now there is a concept. It just makes me realize that many other people have it so much harder than I do. I am lucky to have my life, my baby, my job, my health and my relaxation. Thank you universe. I love you all Yvette

this is my peace Posted by Hello

Thursday, March 17, 2005

Drudgery or peace?

Tonight before I retire, I am thinking about drudgery. Maybe it was the rain today or maybe it is postpartum depression but it got me thinking. When you are exhausted by your drama filled life, and you ask for a more peaceful existance, is what you receive drudgery? Sometimes when I wake up in the same old life that I fell asleep in I wonder if this is all there is. It isn't that I don't appreciate my gifts. Bella, my miracle baby, brings such joy to my life. But I sometimes feel like there has to be more. I guess my real question is about balance. When I was younger I lived my life from one peak to one valley. I was either very happy or very sad. If I traveled along for any period of time in the gentleness of being neither high or low, I eventually would get bored and create some sort of drama to send me to a pinnacle or plumment me to the depths. So why do I fret so when my life flows along in that middle ground? What keeps me from relaxing and enjoying the peace of "no drama". Yesterday, when Bella fussed all day long, I was totally exhausted. I found myself looking forward to going to work. Today as I watched her squirm and giggle at a new toy, I dreaded leaving her to go to work. Where is my enjoyment of the moment? Why am I always looking forward or glancing back. How do I exist in the gentle, middle place and not have it feel like drugery? What do you say to yourself when you wake up and look at the life that you have chosen, the life you are living, the life that is yours and wonder what you are doing, accomplishing, and is it meaniful. Then when you actually jounal your thoughts you realize that, yes, this is all there is. The child and the man peacefully sleeping in the bedroom is all there is. This is your life, this is what your doing and this is your meaniful accomplishment. While it might seem like drudgery today,it is really the sweet peace desired by your soul since the world was sang into existance. Draw the curtain on the day, allow yourself to enjoy this moment in time where all that you have, all that you love, is safe, whole, and sound. Enjoy the peace. Tomorrow is yours for the taking. I love you all Yvette

Tuesday, March 15, 2005

Good Morning

For some reason as I tried to type the title to this post I kept typing goose morning. Maybe the subject of the day should be geese.:) I have heard they are mean and chase other barnyard animals including their human owners. For this reason, we don't have any on our farm. But while we are talking about fowl, I have a birth announcement. One of our black hens has hatched four little fuzzy chicks. After being gone all day yesterday I came home and found that they had somehow gotten out of the brooder pen. Mama chicken was a cluckin, baby chicks were hysterically peeping. all was chaos on the farm. I had to crawl on my belly and capture them. I returned them to their mom and everything quieted down again. Then and only then could I unload the groceries and get the babe into the house. Such is life on the farm now that the main farmer has returned to work. Oh, by the way, for those of you that I haven't told, Tim has a JOB!!!! It is really quite exciting. He hates it of course but it is an income that we so desparately need right now. It will suffice until he can find something that will be more suited for him. As I type this the babe is asleep in the swing. As a new mother, I must salute the inventer of the baby swing. They should get the noble peace prize. That is what the swing brings to my household, noble peace. Speaking of the babe, she is growing like a weed and developing quite a personality. She exhausts me and exhilirates me all at the same time. Once I figure out how to download pictures to this blog I will post them so all can see her growth. We go to the doctor on the 30th of this month for her 4 month well visit. 4 months old, can you believe it? My life has changed so much since her birth. There will be more on that later. Well I must be going. I have such a small window to do my chores in between the babe's naps, that I must manage my time properly. Have a beautiful day. I love you all Yvette

Princess Bella Posted by Hello

Monday, March 14, 2005

Welcome

Welcome to my blog. I created this as a place for my family and friends to gather. A place that doesn't involve cell phones that drop calls or phones ringing that disturb the peace of households. A place to chat, to vent, to speculate on whatever subject is on one's mind at the moment. A place for a family of writers to do what they may or may not know they do best. This place of communication has no rules or set topics only free flow communication. So put on a pot of water, brew a cup of tea, pull up a chair, relax and enjoy. I love you all. Yvette