Grateful Gratitude is GREAT

I was inspired from Krista’s blog (I’d give you the link but the dear has it set to private) to do another why gratefuls are awesome post so that I can focus on the super and not the sucky. I mean, I truly believe that for me humor is how I get through the yucky in life. It’s not for everyone, and I think sometimes people read my posts and wonder how I can crack jokes about a yummy – nay, delicious – doc when he was considering admitting me, etc, but it’s easier for me to do that rather than cry and wallow. And I’m not saying crying is bad. Or wallowing. Because I certainly do my fair share, just not on my blog. At least, not often. Things are weird for me right now, and this whole situaish is getting yawningly long and drawn out (that’s what she said) so I’m just going to think about why life is rad to forget about why it reeks for a bit:

*I have a flower in my hair. And though it only cost me $4, I feel like $100,000.01!!
*Lil C cracks me up. When I went to therapy yesterday, I was in the waiting room waiting for my madre to come and watch C while I went to bear my heart and soul. C kept saying, “Go away Mama, go talk to the lady!” He knows that when I “go talk to the lady,” he gets some serious Grandma time. But then, because my mom has stellar babysitting skills, while she was talking on the phone, C started banging on the door, yelling, “Mama, let me in! Let’s go!”
*Not to mention his haircut. My little boy just went from 2 years old to 22. He looks so old now and (dare I say?) DELICIOUS!
*For some reason stores that sell really cheap items (think Walmart, Kohl’s) always make me need to go potty while perusing their merchandise. And while I entirely realize this is TMI, I was just really pleased with my little bathroom adventure/emergency at Kohl’s - though I did run out before anyone saw me. Not eating or drinking enough or whatever can really mess things up down there. Nothing a good trip to ShopKo can’t fix.
*We finally found a realllllly awesome house to move into. Go 2 car garage and fenced in yard!
*My new hobby has become stick figures and the Paint program. Stay tuned.
*National Stay at Home Week IS ON. Love the premieres of all the smutty shows I watch on TV! Still have DH on my DVR, but finished Grey’s last night. Pretty sure had love palpitations when I saw Denny in the elevator (K squared, you were right!) but reallllly wished he had come back to life like Lazarus or whatever. I mean, it’s TV! Heeelllll-ooooo. You can do anything! Lame lame lamazoid.
*Racher directed me to this website that shows the 15 fattest cats ever documented all over the world. Here’s a little taste to whet your whistle, but peruse the entire site, it’ll totally hit your spot. Holy oh my moly I honestly had no idea cats could get that big. I mean, I thought Bobbi was the 8th wonder of the world, but here's this Maine Coone totally kicking her trash. Bobbi's not that big. YET.
*Pretty sure I love all you guys (well, actually, mostly GIRLS) in the blogosphere. Who knew such cool people besides me and my besties actually existed? Love it (AND YOU)!!!!

Doctor Delicious

Totally had my seriouslysuperscary (alliteration: 3 points!) appointment with my doc today. I hadn’t seen him in a few months, but was pleasantly surprised to find he was as delicious as ever. (Pretty sure he paid his way through med school with some male modeling. Hotttt.) He was so nice to me, too, which was SO WEIRD. I’m always expecting everybody to be mad at me since I suck or whatever at maintaining my weight. But maybe he was as deliciously excited to see me (?) as I was him?? (Just kidding Honey!) (You know how it goes.) At any rate, he like smiled at me and only mentioned the hospital twice instead of like nine times. He basically told me I met all the requirements for admission, but as long as I was seeing my treatment team weekly and gaining weight, then it wouldn’t be necessary as long as I MADE IT WORK (go Tim Gunn!) and didn’t need the tube again, (like after this second time) otherwise that so wouldn’t fly with him. I was so glad he was the bearer of good tidings today, otherwise I might have had to bitch slap him, and in return, pretty sure I’d have been karmically put down or something, no kidding. So Doc Delicious definitely sated me. So to speak.

This Weekend in Pics

This picture I have entitled, Trying too hard: when it just doesn't work for you. At any rate, I was trying to snap a pic of the curly do. Took me like 65 exposures till I stopped screaming in horror and went to mildly whimpering and settled on this one.

Lil C's first haircut in nearly a year. Clutching the teddy for protection. He was such a brave boy. Grandpa did a good job - Mama was realllllly relieved.

The after. We likey!


Hangin at the park with my fam for a belated celebration of my dad's birthday.

He SO wasn't a fan of dinner.

Aw, I love my niecy. Pretty sure she is a beautiful individual.

Holding my new niece Chloe. I asked Big B over and over afterward in the car on the way home if I could have one. I want one I need one oh baby oh baby gimme gimme gimme!

Listening to my iPod with my Skull Candy and tube. Seriously, look how gross I look - that tube is poked like a foot away from my face. I couldn't tame it last night. Sad!

And thus concludes my weekend.

BEEing Viciously Attacked

OMG, I was just assaulted by a huge furry bee. It was zipping around my person and even my muscular arms swatting away could not thwart it of its mission to partake of my luscious smell. I had just had some strawberry cream cheese, and perhaps the odor still lingered. At any rate, after I smacked around the air cautiously a few times, it kept zeroing in on me, so then I had no other option but to stand up and start jumping and spinning around, causing passing cars to really stare. I even got two honks and a whistle of approval. Not only was this bee intent on murdering me, but also humiliating me in the process. THEN, when even that failed to foil the blood-sucking bee, I started trying to smash it with my hefty 3 pound book. It was a library book, though, and I didn’t want to get bee guts all over it and have to pay for it or anything. When even THAT failed to work, I began to realize that this bee was on a mission to sting me to death and have its poison send me into anaphylactic shock, where my helpless being would collapse, and no one would help me, but perhaps I’d illicit a few more honks.

So I decided to run. And my relaxing lunch break was over. I was really hoping to finish my chapter, too. Although, I’ll admit a small part of me wanted to get stung, (but not profusely, I’m not talking a reenactment of My Girl or anything) just a few dozen stings that would get me out of work for the rest of the day. However, my self-defense mechanisms seemed to kick in. That’s a powerful instinct; one that can’t easily be ignored.

So I remain sting-less, thanks to my dexterity and skills. But at least I got a few honks.

Her Life Was Not in Vain

I first met S when I was in my last stint in treatment, in December of 2006. She was a smart and witty 15 year old that had braces and a fantastic weave.
And she’s not here anymore. And it makes me sick.
My favorite thing about S was that she wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. In the eating disorder world, so many of us don’t want to make waves, we don’t want to speak up because we value other’s feelings before our own. But not S. She’d speak up if you ticked her off, or if you were breaking some rule at CFC, she’d march right up to you and tell you to knock it off. I used to laugh and roll my eyes at W, because there was little S telling everybody what to do. But she did it because it was right and it was brave and because nobody else dared to do it.

I think about S being gone, about what an incredibly beautiful and talented 16 year old she is. I think about the world not having her anymore. I think about the things she’ll never do, about the family she leaves behind. I think about how lucky I was to know her for the three months we lived with each other 24/7. I think about all the weight she gained in treatment, and I think about how hard it was for her (and me), and I think about us rooting each other on. I think about the strides she made in therapy. I think about when she learned to smile again.
But mostly I think that I hate this murderous eating disorder. I hate that S felt so desperate, so scared, and so loathsome of the life she lead that she felt she had no other option than to leave.

It terrifies me because I realize it could be any one of us. I just got off the phone with my best friend, W, and she was sobbing, and I was empty, devoid of any more tears. We told each other we loved each other, over and over, as if it might be the last time. We cannot let the ED win, let the depression and anxiety that sometimes seems to rule our lives conquer. We are beautiful, intelligent, sane, wacky, flawed individuals. We are good people. We deserve to take up space in this world.

S will be missed. But her life was not in vain. I know that. I hope that she can know that, too.

An Up to the Date

So much drama for your mama going on right now. I hate stress; I swear it’s making me break out. Yuck. So, for your reading (un)enjoyment, here is the low down ho down of what’s been going on with the Briester:

I’m back to the freaking feeding tube again. For reals lost a lot of weight, I guess. I saw my dietician, H, yesterday and she was kind of having a mini freak-out about how I looked; I haven’t been to see her in 2 months (I know) (my bad) and she was shocked. I can’t do more than 3 cans of Jevity a night until I get my lab work done because of the re-feeding phenomenon. Seriously, so weird. Who knew your heart could stop beating when you start giving it a butt load ‘o nutrients again? You’d think it’d be happy. Huh. So I’m plugging along, again, which is soooooooo awesome, and I don’t think I even mean that sarcastically.

What else? Nothing. My life is a barren wasteland of a corporate job bowing to The Man. I am a domestic/fertility/corporate/brunette goddess. I guess that’s the one plus I have going on in my life. I continue to thoroughly enjoy my haircut. Lil C is still my best bud, except yesterday we got in a fight and I bought him a fire truck to make it up to him. I guess I’m the adult or whatever, so I’m supposed to be mature. I need to immediately comprar this, and when I do, I know that my life will be complete. I already own it in white and red. I need its twinner.

That’s all, homies. LOVE YOU!!!!!
Holy oh my moly this post was all over the place. Whaaaaaat is up with that? Whateva.

Since when is it okay to hit someone with your car and drive away?

This morning as I was driving Lil C to my sissy’s before work, I was yielding at a light, waiting to turn left. I looked to the left and noticed a big black suburban trying to turn right. She kept nosing more and more forward until she had completely blocked the walk-way for pedestrians to use when they are crossing the road. I could see a young kid there, trying to cross the road on his way to school, but she was in his way, so he walked around her. The woman then, right at that moment, decided to turn right. Fortunately he saw her (SHE DIDN’T SEE HIM!!!!!) and jumped out of the way, instead “just” getting clipped on the upper thigh rather than getting completely mowed over. The woman paused for a minute, looked at him, and KEPT DRIVING. I was appalled. “DID YOU SEE THAT?!” I yelled at Cade. “HOLY SHIT!” The poor kid, he couldn’t have been older than 14 or 15, kept walking, but he was limping a bit and I could tell he was in shock – hell, I was in shock and I wasn’t the one who had freaking gotten HIT BY A CAR. As I turned left, he was on the other side of the road, trying to cross that intersection as well. I slowed down, rolled down the passenger window, and asked him if he was alright. He nodded uncertainly, and I think I may have embarrassed him. But I persisted. “Do you need a ride? Do you want me to take you home or to school or to the hospital? Can I call your mom?” Just as he was mumbling, “No, but thanks,” some prick behind me honked. Honked at me for stopping to talk to someone who had just GOTTEN HIT BY A CAR. Helllloooo…? Since when is it okay to be so in a hurry to get to work you don’t stop to help some scared kid? Since when is it okay to be so in a hurry to get to work you don’t actually stop when you hit another human being? Not one other person stopped to help him, to ask him if he was alright. Not one other person.

Sometimes I really do hate the world I live in.