liadanslyre's Friends
[Most Recent Entries]
[Calendar View]
[Friends View]
Below are the most recent 15 friends' journal entries.
| Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009 |
greyseal
|
4:01a |
|
duriyah
|
6:01a |
Musings on turning 44
My birthday was a couple of weeks ago, but I was too down at the time to write my annual self-inventory. I'm feeling more upbeat now, so here it is. Body: This has undeniably been a challenging year for me, physically. My pain is on the lower end of the scale, and manageable, but I have had to make a lot of changes in the way I order my life in order to keep it that way. I am so very grateful for Rob's help with helping me with the more strenuous parts of daily living: shopping, carrying, lifting, even cooking. The accident that set me up for this current pain, some 18 years ago, was a head-on collision with a semi that could easily have taken my life. I need to remember, as I continue forward in healing, that I am grateful to be alive to heal. Mind: It's been three years since I was in school, and am starting to get the urge to take classes again. Probably in GIS (geographic information systems). On the other hand, Rob keeps suggesting that we could write apps for the Hero phone, so a class in the Java computer language may be in my future. However, I won't be able to commit the time to a full college class until after my body is better healed, and I have attained the weight and basic fitness level that I would like to have. Spirit: My spiritual life has been up and down this year. I studied pranayamas (yogic breathing techniques) last winter, and went through a time when I was keeping a daily pranayama practice. I have had to give up my hatha yoga practice due to my back problems, but I discovered the more gentle practice of qigong instead. There have been times when I have been in too much pain to sit for meditation, but then there's acupuncture, and the nifty feeling of the chi moving during a treatment. It seems this has been an adaptive year in my spiritual practice and growth. I have had to adapt my practice to fit my current life, and learned new things in the process. I feel I'm setting the stage for a more integrated practice. One thing I want to focus on in the coming year is to better integrate the physical (exercise) and mental (meditation and guided meditation) parts of my practice. My relationship with Rob continues to be a source of joy and comfort in my life. I am so glad we were able to have the wedding we wanted. My we continue to grow together in friendship, as individuals, and as a couple. Current Mood: middle-aged |
| Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
greyseal
|
4:01a |
|
| Monday, December 21st, 2009 |
duriyah
|
5:29p |
Weekend in brief
I had a really nice weekend. Friday evening we watched Helvetica, which I enjoyed. I found the typographers interviewed for the film to be entertaining and wonderfully nerdy. Helvetica: whether you think it's perfection or boring, it's inescapable. Saturday I spent several hours running errands and doing just a bit of "relaxation shopping". I managed to entice ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) rfunk to go along with me, so he was able to help me dump off the recycling before it took over too much of the kitchen. It was mostly running around doing stuff for me, but I was very glad of the company. It was a great weekend for togetherness in general, actually. Since I am only at work for three days this week, I decided not to worry about doing laundry or cooking food for lunches over the weekend, so it was a more relaxed and leisurely weekend than they have been of late. I am also more able-bodied now that I stopped seeing the physical therapist twice a week. I'm still doing the daily PT exercises, and so maintaining the strength I gained. But without the extra pain the visits to the therapist were causing. This helps my mood immensely. I recently decided to start making my own greeting cards. I finally got inspired to make Christmas cards (one of Saturday's stops was to a scrapbooking store), and spent several hours Saturday evening making cards for my coworkers. I handed them out this morning, quickly, before I could decide they were utter crap and throw them all away. Next year's cards will be better. It is a relief to have found a means of artistic expression that I can do while seated. Last night we went to a joint birthday party for me (my birthday was two weeks ago), rfunk's sister, and his cousin's son. I had fun and ate too much cake. Now, I have a three day work week followed by a four-day weekend. Next week's schedule will be the same. Just when I need days off the most. |
| Sunday, December 20th, 2009 |
greyseal
|
4:01a |
|
| Saturday, December 19th, 2009 |
greyseal
|
4:02a |
|
| Friday, December 18th, 2009 |
jeney
|
4:19p |
Please advise.
Nestled into the plastic branches of our Christmas tree is a paper cone fashioned out of an old tankless water heater flyer and masking tape. Lots and lots of masking tape. The cone has been commissioned by Hannah and lovingly crafted by Violet. David (who contributed nothing towards the making of this solely utilitarian craft), Hannah and Violet have been putting money into the cone. I didn't think to question this, as they often have little projects or experiments they are working on together. Today, I was informed of its purpose (though, in the informing, it was clear to me that I was assumed to have known its purpose all along). The money is to be used to buy them Christmas presents. They want us to buy them gifts with their own money. Is this: a) Sweet b) Sad or c) Obnoxious |
| Thursday, December 17th, 2009 |
duriyah
|
7:59p |
|
duriyah
|
7:29p |
MRI results
The MRI test results were good. Apparently I have some mild osteoarthritis (which the doc said was like having a diagnosis of "grey hair"), but nothing that is impinging any nerves. There's no disc or nerve problems, and I don't need any injections or surgery. That means the pain is all muscular. That's a relief. I was worried that I had some structural issue that I was continuing to aggravate. It turns out that I just have very sensitive muscles, which I already knew. He recommended that I stop working with the physical therapist as that has been aggravating the pain. Instead I should work on core stability exercises on my own, just much more gradually than the PT has been doing. Basically I need to be patient and go more slowly, and I'll get stronger again. My plan now is to continue acupuncture and massage to manage the pain (Dr. K has a massage therapist with her again, so I should be able to get weekly massages!). I'll continue the set of at-home exercises the PT prescribed, and then add additional exercises as the pain improves. In a few weeks I think I will also try swimming at the downtown YWCA for some aerobic exercise that doesn't involve walking. And when I am strong enough I want to give Pilates* a try, as I have heard that's great for developing core strength. It's tempting to think that my experiment with trying physical therapy was a mistake, since the twice weekly vistis this past month both wore me out and made the problem worse. But, frankly, I got from it exactly what I wanted. I knew I needed to strengthen something, but I was completely lost about what sort of exercise program I needed. I now have a sheet of paper labeled "Pelvic Stability," on which are about a dozen different exercises. I also got some coaching from the therapist about paying attention to my body while I'm doing the exercises, and ways to modify the exercises so I can do them safely. AND the MRI was able to rule out any other structural problems, and give me peace of mind. My real mistake was in stopping the acupuncture treatments when the pain stopped. But I felt odd asking the students to give me needles for a non-existent pain. Now I know I need to continue getting periodic back treatments whether I feel pain or not, as a preventative. I won't make the same mistake again. For someone who has just been making this up as I go**, I think I'm doing pretty well. *If anyone has any recommendations for beginner level Pilates videos, I would love to hear them. **Somehow I feel the need for a fedora. And a whip. Current Mood: relieved |
jeney
|
7:25a |
There is no end to the amount of toast I can eat. |
greyseal
|
4:00a |
|
| Wednesday, December 16th, 2009 |
ericalynnfoster
|
9:49p |
Come On, Week. COME ON!
UGH! This week has been dragging by, micro-moment by micro-moment, wringing the life out of me with violence and anger and pain. END, WEEK! END! Here's the run down: Sunday: rain, cold nasty rain, not enough sleep, flying solo with kids all morning, not wanting to go to church, taking my bad attitude anyways, God makes me work through immature (non) forgiveness issue involving snot and tears (thank you, Kirstin, for praying for me), more cold rain, exhausted carrying of son through cold rain, chaotic church lunch thing, restless-too-deep nap from which I could not wake up, slowly improving but stumbling evening. Monday: hello period! hello migraine! hello student slipping on wet playground pavement and splitting his lip open into a bloody, 8 stich mess! hello writing in pain in my bed all afternoon and evening! except for that hour when I sat at dinner with my friend who just got some of the suckier job news I've run into recently! hello 12 hours of misery with ice packs utterly powerless to help anyone or anything, including myself! Tuesday: Migraine, why did you stay? You are supposed to go away after a night's sleep (read: suffering). Emma's Christmas program in which she sat on stage and sucked on her lips and chose to do neither singing nor hand motions and wait, where is MY daughter? Ohhhhh, riiiiight, it turns out Erica gave birth to an individualist who cannot be bothered to conform to the group norm WHO COULD HAVE PREDICTED THAT ONE! Mom and Dad come for dinner - A BRIGHT SPOT! YES! Wednesday: Can we do origami Ms. Foster? No. Can we participate in Settlers of Catan, Ms. Foster? No. Can we talk all day while you're talking, even, hum through every word you say? Um, no, but I see you're doing it anyways. Wait, what's that? HELLO MIGRAINE! And then my husband twisted his ankle, debilitatingly so. Therefore: come home, three needy people all reaching for me and talking at me at once, hug them all, get them all snacks, clean living room, clean dining room, clean kitchen, do dishes, set table, make dinner, serve dinner to eight, leave early to clean kids room, lay out jammies, leave kids with friends, go to reception, have very cold fun (I was so cold. So cold.), still, BRIGHT SPOT! Aaaand, scene. I swear, tomorrow better go faster, and Saturday had better GET here. It feels like last Friday was a month away. I need a break. |
greyseal
|
4:00a |
|
| Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 |
greyseal
|
4:00a |
|
| Sunday, December 13th, 2009 |
ericalynnfoster
|
8:39a |
Success! Conflicted.
Yesterday was a triumphant shopping success. I'm not quite done, but I made major progress. I found cutie little containers in which to put Christmas cookies for Emma's teachers, because NOW I AM A PARENT OF A SCHOOL-ATTENDING CHILD! And every teacher knows that teachers need good Christmas presents! I will also use the cutie containers to We will now interrupt this post to tell you that William is paging through my Christmas Cookie Cook Book and with every turn of a page is saying, "Cookie! um. Cookie! um." If this post does not get finished, it was because I died of cuteness. pass out cookies to my neighbors in my continuing yet shakey quest to love my neighbors. The ones across the street will also get long, elaborate letters lauding their neighborly awesomeness and begging them to come for dinner sometime so I can shower them with edible affection because they refrain from waking me up at 2:30 in the morning. I LOVE THOSE PEOPLE! Also, I found something called "stick-um"! With which one sticks candles into candle holders. JOY AND LOVE AND PEACE FOR ME! When I lived in Japan, I made myself a ceramic advent wreath, Advent being my favorite holiday and all. Unfortunately, I listened to the yahoos in the ceramics studio who told me that I shouldn't construct the candle holders by simply sticking a candle into the wet clay and letting the clay dry around the candle, because the candle would shrink. No, I did it their way, and as a result? The candles are always tippy and lame and falling over and driving me nuts. I love this Advent wreath so much that I made them for Mom and Amy last year, and this time I made the candle holders my way, and guess what? I WAS SO RIGHT! So any ways, this stick-um stuff has pretty much solved the problem in 2 minutes or less. My advent candles! They are standing up straight! ALSO, I bought mailers and found the hardest to decide on gift. Last night I watched Jane Eyre and wrapped presents and put them into the mailers and wrote the addresses on the mailers and oh my heavens! I may actually mail Christmas presents for the first time ever! They may even make it there in time but I don't even care if they do. Sometimes late presents are better and getting something there at all is pretty huge success for me, so I don't care! I even got Brian's presents wrapped without him seeing them (although, his will not be mailed. :) ) And, there we are. SUCCESS! But now. Now I feel lazy and Christmassy. I want to pack up the kids and do the grocery shopping, then come home and make cookie dough with Emma. I want to lay around while things are baking. I want another cup of tea. But it's Sunday, and I'm pretty sure Emma would kill me if I let her skip church and I really do like church. And then there's a big hanging out socializing thing going on after church that we're sort of supposed to be going to, which means we won't get home from all this until nap time, and guess who needs a nap? Me, that's who. So ... when will the shopping and baking take place, she wonders? humph. I'm just sorta conflicted about it all. (Shhhhh. I COULD drop the kids off at church (Brian is there playing drums, so I wouldn't be abandoning them without parents present) and then go shopping by myself. Hmmmm. That's so tempting. Hmmmm.) Ugh. CONFLICTED! |
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}