I thought I was going to blog about something real. Something not dog related. Something not book related. An actual honest to god topic. I even had three to choose from. But that’s not happening. I’m only writing this because it’s day 20 and I’ll be damned if I’m going to fail at another NaBlo, dammit.
I am sick. I feel pretty darn proud of myself for having (mostly) made it through the work day. Without breaking anything. Or causing any significant problems for others.
I am sick. I need to get up right now, while I’m not moaning and coughing and TW isn’t telling me I look like shit, and get ready for the cleaning ladies who are coming tomorrow.
I am sick. I hope tomorrow I will feel well enough to blog about something other than my illness or a dog or a book.
Keep your fingers crossed or pray for me or do whatever it is you do to help people recover from illnesses. Pretending I’m not sick didn’t help. Neither do over the counter medications or TW’s really yummy ginger tea. (Gosh that’s really yummy and almost as good as feel better tea, which I don’t have.)
I’m tired of writing about TW’s tummy troubles and about puppies but darn if I’m finding time to plan a post before it’s suddenly 7:30pm and I have no freaking topic to write about. I’ve got to do a better job of planning these posts because I’m pretty sure you’re getting sick of hearing about TW’s gut and Skeeter’s annoying habits.
So tomorrow — no posts about hospitals, dogs, or crap like that, ok?
Today, however, I’ll point you to the post TW wrote way back in 2007 where she first mentioned the “car accident” as we’ve come to call the unexplained back pain that she’s been living with for, well, more than five years now.
Yep, she went to the doctor with what she thought might be a UTI — or she hoped might be a UTI because the back pain was errr painful and a doctor actually asked her if she was SURE she had not been in a car accident and she had just forgotten… and then he sent her on her way.
Turns out there’s an actual name for this pain that she’s had for all of these years and not a single damn doctor had ever bothered to tell her what this was or why it happened — until the nice Dr Elliot, (one of the doctor’s in TW”s primary care doctor’s office.)
I don’t actually remember what he said this was called. But it’s related to gas and the abdominal wall and hell I don’t know. I’m just going to keep calling it the fake car accident — but it was nice to have a doctor explain something. For once.
TW takes a lot of meds and some of those meds make it hard for her to sleep, so she takes a sleeping pill. To be specific, she takes Lunesta. This works really well for her but it’s not so great for me. Last night’s a good example of the power of the “butterfly” pill.
I turned off my bedside lamp at around 10pm. TW took her evening meds and then we took the dog out one last time (hah) shortly after that. I climbed into bed and rolled over to go to sleep while TW finished a chapter of a book. The puppy was laying on her bed, on the floor — until all hell broke loose and she sniffed something scary. (More on sniffing scary things tomorrow…)
TW got up and walked her around the house and outside and generally made soothing noises along with warming up a frozen beef bone to keep her occupied rather than sniffing scary things.
She came to bed at about 10:45 and turned off her light. The puppy was on the floor eating a mostly frozen bone. The puppy eating that bone was very, very loud and I commented upon this to TW. Her response was, “It’s better than her running around howling and growling and barking.”, which was true.
I closed my eyes again, listening to the dog make horrible bone chewing noises. I was just getting used to those noises enough that I thought I might be going to sleep when TW said, in a loud and clear voice, “Why did you push that kid under the counter?”
I said, “Huh?”
She said, “Why did you push that kid under the counter?”
I said, “What?”
She said, “That kid at the ice cream shop.”
I said, “TARRANT. SHUT UP.”
She said, “OK”
It was obvious to me that she was asleep and talking. She does this a lot after taking her sleeping pill but it’s not usually so quickly after falling asleep. And she’s not usually so clear — it’s more often low mumbling that I have to fight to listen to in order to make out the words.
At 10:58pm her phone vibrated.
She JUMPED out of bed (this is a big deal because TW never jumps out of bed and she’d also just gotten out of the hospital and was taking more woozy inducing meds than just a sleeping pill.) She read the text, I assume from Prince J, typed something, peed, and then climbed back in bed.
Notice the time between her turning off her light, accusing me of doing something weird to a kid, and the text message? 13 minutes. 13 minutes!
Because besides the bone crunching noises, the dog also spent much of the night growling, howling, barking, pacing, jump on the bed and laying there for awhile, jumping off the bed and eating her bone again for awhile (or sleeping on her own darn bed) and TW says she doesn’t remember ANY OF THAT.
She also doesn’t remember taking the dog outside or wandering around the house with the dog twice more in the wee hours.
The power of Lunesta. She sleeps through all sorts of things and I get no sleep at all.
And no, I’ve never pushed a kid under any counter much less an ice cream counter.
When I decided to do NaBloPoMo, I was kind of afraid I’d be writing about stupid hospital visits. Bah humbug.
I’m also tired of everyone saying “How is Tarrant?” I don’t have a good answer for that. Here are some I’ve tried:
– She’s fine.
– No change.
– She’s bitchy.
– She’s more confusing as ever because she’s getting pain meds.
– She’s grouchy.
– Fine, thanks.
None of these seem to appease those who are asking. So what the heck am I supposed to say? Here are the facts, you tell me what my answer should be, ok?
– She has a lot of abdominal pain, when it’s been awhile since she had fresh pain meds.
– She is nauseous if it’s been awhile since she’s had nausea meds.
– When she sits on the toilet to pee, her oxygen levels drop.
– Her oxygen levels drop off and on just in general, for no clear reason.
– Her blood pressure was high, for her. (Not super high for normal human beings) And is still a little higher than her normal, from time to time.
– She has no fever.
– She’s not vomiting.
– She’s also not having any bowel movements, which annoys pretty much everyone right now.
So basically – she’s fine. Nothin’ happening. Nothin’ to talk about.
Except me! Let’s talk about ME!
– Nobody put a mint on my pillow last night.
– I had to make the damn bed this morning.
– I had to feed TW’s mom dinner and also her birthday breakfast this morning. I guess I have to take her to Culver’s tonight for her birthday dinner, too.
– I have been making trips back and forth between the house and hospital for 24 hours now and it ain’t a walk in the park. (Do you know how many god damned trains there are between me and the hospital?)
– I have to deal with a very unhappy, pathetic puppy who is either in my lap, biting at my coat sleeve, crying, barking at me, or staring at the bedroom door (refusing to move or even blink in case TW is on the other side of that door.) PATHETIC.
– I had to take the dead pumpkin out of the prairie dog cage.
– I had to feed the prairie dogs.
– I AM THE ONLY ONE HERE TO SAY YES to the PUPPY!
– Driving around in the car by myself is lonely.
– Going to vote by myself is not fun.
– Sleeping all by myself is errr well it’s kind of nice because nobody is causing me to have dreams about fires but it’s also kind of depressing, too.
– There is nobody to talk to about weird emails and weirder blog posts.
TW’s fine. I’m pretty much in hell. Thanks for asking.
I say all of the time that I need a nanny cam in my office to record some of the crazy that goes on around here. I do. I need that nanny cam because these people are crazy and also pretty funny. But while we’re wishing for an office nanny cam, let’s add one to the kitchen too.
Here’s part of this morning’s crazy funny:
RJ: You still have that cold?
TW: Yes, that’s why I’m coughing up a lung.
RJ: Wow, my colds never last that long. Drink some Trop 50 or something.
I’m not sure it’s really a lesson learned, more like a very big reminder of something I already knew. A very big reminder of something I already knew and should be doing but probably won’t.
I should blog more often.
That’s it. That’s the big lesson. The big reminder. It’s not anything new, I say it all of the time. I need more time to blog. I don’t have time to blog. I missed my own damn deadline (no CEs are reading this, right?)
I’m not blogging much and while I miss it, I don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about it or trying to juggle my schedule or my energy so I can do it. It’s not a big deal, nobody is reading my blog anymore anyway. And, I keep contracting great writers on BlogHer so I’m not missed there either.
Except, that damn community keynote on Friday reminded me that I actually have been known to write posts that are important.
When we were reading the zillion entries for the community keynote and I saw Y’s post about body image was one of the submissions, I cringed. I cringed because I knew I’d get all weepy if I read it again. I had a hard time writing my post about Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters. I had a hard time reading Y’s post when she published it and I was right, I had a horrible time reading it again during the selection process. And then listening to her read that post…during the keynote… ack.
That damn keynote.
Emotional subject matter with a little something else thrown in – the reminder that I really should blog more often because I do occasionally write stuff that other people appreciate reading.
You probably want to know more about the Wii Fit than the fact that TW tried to kill us getting to the UPS to accept delivery and that she sniffed it and that I laughed my ass off during her first run through of the various exercises. Since TW is Wii Fitting again right now, I figured this would be a good time for a bigger post on the topic. I had videos that were significantly more amusing than the ones I have up on youtube right now. But, I was an idiot and deleted them from the Flip before I actually uploaded them. The videos that came later, not quite as funny because we knew more about what to DO. Oh well.
Anyway, the Wii Fit – fun and funny also it makes you sweat. And, it’s obviously flawed since it suggests TW is more “fit” than I am. But then again, she barely MOVES unless she’s falling off of the thing so maybe it’s not the Wii Fit’s fault? It does indicate Michelle is more fit than both of us, so it’s accurate in that respect.
In the beginning, when choosing a trainer. I insisted she choose the female. Obviously. Duh. And as soon as the chick opened her mouth, TW started to giggle and I started to laugh and I said “OMG She sounds like Anne Pearce Ornish” and I’m listening to the trainer’s voice now, and she STILL sounds like Anne Pearce Ornish. I find it hard to focus when listening to Anne Pearce Ornish and I don’t even want to think about what TW is thinking while listening to Anne Pearce Ornish….
That push up thing, damn. I was impressed with my six repetitions even if I did do “girl” push ups.
The tree – I can do that for hours, but when it comes to standing ON the Wii Fit and doing it, something goes wrong. I blame the texture of the Wii Fit. Or maybe the little thing that tells you whether you’re keeping your balance or maybe the blue circle trying to force me to breathe on command. Whatever.
Michelle is awesome at the Step Dancing thing. TW is awesome at hula hoop.
TW wants to take the darn thing with us to Miami this weekend. Umm no. I don’t think I want Anne Pearce Ornish in my hotel room.
For those of you who do not know what I’m talking about… re Anne Pearce Ornish, check out her align your breath video – the one I was really thinking about is on the DVD in Ornish’s new book but this is a good example.
Now I’m going to fold some laundry and turn on some music to block out the Wii Fit trainer. Sheesh
When I was building the landing page for our BlogHers Act – GlobalGiving campaign I went ahead and made my donation before we officially launched. It’s always good to test these things, I like testing things.
I looked closely at all five projects and thought about whether I wanted to donate to all of them or just one of them or a few of them. I’m going to be really honest and say that it was super easy for me to donate money to some of them – how do you say “no” to $10 paying for a year of health care for five women or children? That’s just too easy. There’s a huge “wow! my money can do that!” factor. But, when I got to the PWN Project to End HIV/AIDS Stigma in South Africa and saw “$50 provides counseling and education for two women with AIDS” there just wasn’t a “Wow” factor. HIV/AIDS is an issue I care a lot about and if I didn’t feel the “Wow” then I’m guessing most other people didn’t feel it either.
Then I noticed that Erin had assigned this project to me to blog and I spent two days wondering how to bring that “Wow” to you – so that you’d give. But a strange thing happened to me as I was researching, I got angry and I felt sad and I was proud of my donation to this project – “wow” or no “wow”.
Let me show you what I found.
First stop, the project landing page at GlobalGiving for the basics.
The Positive Women’s Network helps HIV-positive women, who are often ignored or blamed for their infections, to support themselves and their families and fight against the AIDS stigma in South Africa.
I clicked over to the PWN external project home page where I saw a link to an audio interview with Prudence Mabele. (You should click over to it and turn it on to listen to while you read the rest of this post. Some music will play and a little newsy type of blip, and then the interview will start. Be patient, it’s worth it.)
While I was listening, I launched a google search for PWN, AIDS South Africa and Prudence Mabele and this is where I began to feel frustrated and sad and angry.
Women are at a greater risk of contracting HIV than men because of social, cultural and biological factors like child marriages, polygamy, rape, defilement, wife inheritance, poverty, exploitation and ignorance.
Sigasa was found with her hands tied with her underpants and her ankles tied with her shoelaces, with three bullet holes in her head and three in her collarbone.
The most obvious next stop was more information about the woman whose voice I was listening to. And here’s where the inspiration comes.
Prudence Mabele, one of the first African women to say publicly “I am HIV+” and founder of the Positive Women’s Network.
Ten years ago, when Prudence Mabele discovered she had HIV, she was told to abandon her studies. She was working towards her degree in analytical chemistry at a time when HIV was neither understood nor tolerated in South Africa. “There were a lot of problems then”, she said. “They didn’t understand a lot about AIDS, so they told me to leave what I was doing because I was going to infect staff and students. They thought if I was at the laboratory I would infect people.”
This woman started something amazing in a country where women are property of their husbands and can become property of their husbands brothers if their husbands die.
Babweteera says a major concern in her area is the practice of wife inheritance. When a man dies, his wife can be inherited by his brother, which when combined with polygamy, can lead to a greater spread of HIV.
And then, I found this youtube video created by a 16 year old girl who supports the work of PWN.
If that wasn’t enough, a couple of hours after I’d finished my research and was wandering around BlogHer – reading posts, catching up on forum entries, I stumbled into a very personal story about AIDS in South Africa.
One four and half year old from an ordinary suburb, with a dog and a pool, was being treated for AIDS.
Now, let me show you just a few more things. Go and read Jenn’s post about Mommybloggers helping Mommybloggers. Go and listen again to Maria Niles talking to Eve Ensler about the power of women and did you see what happened when Jen Lemen asked her community, many of whom are BlogHer members, for help? And imagine, just imagine, what Laurie and Nordette are getting involved in while they’re at SuperLove this weekend.
Women are changing the world through writing, through action, and through donations.
Go on – blog this. Please, tell people about what PWN is doing to help women and families in South Africa and then make a donation to PWN.
I made it! I am here to remind you that Emergency Contraception is available to YOU, over the counter, if you need it – or when you need it. Do NOT hesitate to go to your pharmacy if the condom breaks, if you forget to put your diaphragm in, if you are forced to have unprotected sex. In fact, I would urge you to do what I’ve done – buy a box right now. You can order it from Drugstore.com if you like. Have it in your medicine cabinet and tell your friends that you have a box if they ever need it.
I bought a box one year ago. So far, nobody around here has needed it and it will expire in six months or so – and then I’ll throw it out and buy another box. Just in case.
And even if you don’t order your own box right now, you should make sure every woman of childbearing age knows that emergency contraception is available – over the counter. Spread the word. There are still many, many women who don’t know it is available. There are many, many women who don’t know what emergency contraception is. There are many, many women who are afraid to use emergency contraception. Reassure them. Help them find information. Support them as they learn more about their reproductive rights and options.
