Notes from the Shadows

I don't celebrate easter. For one, I'm not a christian. And for two, since I'm woohoo diabetic now, I can't shouldn't have a Reese egg, a peep, or even a jelly bean. Iit's just another holiday where I'm expected to do more work (cook and clean) and get nothing in return.

There are family members (his) that would say they want us to come over, but I don't want to do that either. For one thing, no one ever ever truly gets the food allergy thing. And for another, dressing up to go eat with people with whom I have no relationship is not my idea of a good time. My parents' house is too small for all of us, and if I invite them here, I'd have help, but I'd also have to invite his people, and that makes everything into a huge production and, oh yeah, we have no relationship. They don't ever suggest doing anything that is not (a) a huge production, or (b) involves alcohol, or (c) both, and they can't even agree among themselves on (a), (b), or (c).

Plus I already feel like death on a stick.

I think I made a(nother) medication mistake.

When I started taking the flonase and had a major resurgence of symptoms, I thought to myself, "Aha, self! The problem was never the statin. The problem was the flonase!" So I dropped the statin back into the pill sorter. Now, what...two weeks later? I need to sleep over twelve hours a night, and I'm weak and shaky, having dizzy spells again. Just bad.

So on Easter I slept until three p.m., spent the day OCD-ing it up by finding album art for my iTunes library, forgot until too late that I was going to make a lasagna, and we ended up grilling like we do every Sunday. I'll make the las tonight, assuming I feel well enough after the dentist.

Today is my first appointment with the actual dentist. Everything until now was scraping and chiselling scaling and root planing. Now I am to receive eleven fillings and a crown. Not all in one day, obviously. The tentative plan is to start with fillings and do the crown last, but the crown goes on that front tooth, and I am so worried it will just snap off. I hope she changes her mind and does it first. I know the cavities are important too, especially now that the protective (yuck) layer of tartar is gone, but my primary motivation in embarking on this dental gauntlet was to (a) not die looking like Pennsatucky, and (b) to be able to eat an apple again someday, or maybe even corn on the cob.

Well last time they razzed on me about coming too early, and this time they called and wanted me to come early. I couldn't do that, even though the office is rougly three minutes from here, because I wasn't even dressed yet and I had already taken my blood sugar medication, but had not eaten. I made it though, and it was moderately unpleasant--too bright light, too loud noises, too much touch, smell, and taste--but not painful at all. The worst part is, seven hours later my mouth is still partly numb and it took me about five hours to figure out I could drink without drooling if I used a straw.

Anyway. I have several fillings now, and they agreed to do the crown next visit, which will be in about a month. Little by little.

I'm not making the lasagna tonight either.

As of tomorrow Mr Moth and I will encounter our 15th anniversary on Saturday. We have always slept together in a double bed, even though we are double-sized people. So this year, for our anniversary,after much measuring and the use of several room planner applications just to be sure, we bought a king-sized bed.

Before we moved here, so at least six or seven years ago, I saw a comforter set on clearance, and I admired it aloud, and Mr Moth offered to buy it for me. I let him, thinking that some day we would buy the bed to fit it.

Getting a new bed was expensive and a hassle, and it meant losing a lot of floor (dog) space in our not-to-enormous bedroom, and only the thought of finally getting to use my new comforter made it worth it to me. We went to the Original Mattress Factory, because they have double-sided mattresses and I feel very strongly about mattresses being flippable. We tried out every mattress there repeatedly, consulted, tried some more, and eventually ordered a bed. We got our frame there too, which was the same price as a flimsier frame from Odd Lots, and a mattress cover, and also splurged on having it delivered and set up, which only cost $40. We did not have the old set hauled away because there is nothing at all wrong with it except it is small, so we moved it to the spare room that I dream of someday being a real guest room.

My comforter set is only a queen.

Words can barely express the magnitude of my disappointment.

I ended up running to Rose's Department store and bought a cheap bedspread to cover the dang thing just because my OCD won't allow me to leave it uncovered while I shop for another set. Finding a set I like will be a challenge because I don't want another set, I want the one Mr Moth bought me six or seven years ago. I picked one, well roughly this color: #33CCCC.

Ok, maybe this is better:

I would take a photo of the actual bed, but nothing matches on it. I threw on the new bedspread and just put all the pillows and our blankies back on top and it is a huge ugly mess.

Mr Moth went to bed first, and when I went back a couple of hours later, he was clinging to his edge of the bed just like always. I did take a picture of that, but not for public consumption. I took it because he had expressed a concern that no matter how big a bed we got I would take it over and he would end up clinging to the edge of the bed just like always. That photo is my evidence that the edge-clinging is not my fault, but it's not for public consumption. (We have an agreement that we don't post photos of each other without prior authorization.)

I woke up this a.m., peed, boosted Kelly into bed, and went back to sleep until after noon, OMG. When I sent Mr Moth the photo, he asked how I'd slept I told him, and mentioned that nothing hurt (except the right shoulder, which always hurts and is probably genetic since my mother's entire family has shoulder pain). And he said that he was surpirsed that nothing hurt on him, either.

So. Worth. It.

To summarize the New Bed Experience:

+ No pain
- Kelly can't get in by herself. I'm hopeful she can learn to bounce higher. Use your JRT heritage, girlfriend! Or The Force. Whatever works.
+ Olver can't defend the entire perimeter
+ Enough room
+ room for foot pillows
+ because no headboard, and I hate headboards, but
- no headboard storage
- Too tall. When I sit on the edge, my feet don't reach the floor
- Less floor space, which when combined with too tall, makes it harder to pass out bedtime treats.
- Can't use my red plaid comforter set
+ No pain
+ No pain
+ No pain

I am guessing the lack of Mr Moth flipping and flopping like a big fish is a result of the no pain thing also. Or maybe he just flipped and flopped far enough away I didn't notice. Either way, + No flipping and flopping.

Just to be clear, I didn't spring out of bed feeling finer than a frog hair or anything. A mattress can not cure sleep apnea. Ever since I learned about the apnea, I have a peculiar relationship with sleep; it feels a little like playing Russian roulette. But what can you do? You have to sleep, even if you're not so much sleeping as dying >70 times per hour. In the immortal words of that old Mouse Trap commercial, you rolls your dice, you moves your mice. But I did roll out of bed not hurting, and that is a definite step in the right direction. The fact that Mr Moth seems to have enjoyed the same benefit is extra banana peppers on my pizza.

Yes, I know I said I would never go back there. But I kind of decided I'd like to, you know...live. There was an entire thought process behind that deciding to live thing, and I may share it at some point, but not widely and not now. This entry is for public consumption. That one won't be.

Since I can't remember what I've said so far on the topic, I went back to the lung doc who said I stop breathing >70 some times an hour while I'm sleeping, and if I want to stay alive, I need to have a cpap. But he was not mean or scary about it like I was afraid he would be. In fact, he was incredibly understanding about (forgive me if this sounds ridiculously melodramatic) the trauma I had experienced at the sleep center, and both he and they bent over backwards to accommodate. They scheduled me for something called "desensitization." They promised I could come when I wanted and leave when I wanted and the idiot tech (her name was Britney, as it turns out; I had forgot it) would not come near me.

So I went yesterday to be "desenisitized."

The person who worked with me is named Cheri, pronounced Shuh-REE. I told her before we did anything else I wanted to tell her what happened before. She leaned back and tucked away her clipboard and seemed to be genuinely present, and I told her about that feeling you get when you're a kid in the back seat of a car and your parents put the windows down and you can't breathe.

Cheri said, "That's amazing that you say that, because that's the exact example I use when I'm explaining what happened to patients."

It's a thing.

As she explained it, there's a nerve (actually two) called the phrenic nerve. It times your diaphragm; when it misfires it causes hiccups. And, if it senses too much air pressure, it shuts your airway so your lungs don't explode.

Cheri said, "She really had it cranked, and it overstimulated your phrenic nerve."

I said, "So I really couldn't breathe."

Cheri said, "You really couldn't breathe."

I really couldn't breathe.

I'm not some hysterical drama queen having a panic attack and blaming a hapless tech.

Cheri did all the things that should have been done in the first place, if Britney had not been late. She showed me different masks and let me pick. I chose the one Britney had used anyway, because I am a mouth breather. Also the nose-only ones made me thing I would have to change my name to Horton. Seriously. And then we did a test run. I had trouble with it right at first, but only for about twenty seconds. She adjusted the pressure up a couple of times. I could still breathe.

Some other things were discussed, but nothing that strikes me as important right this moment. Then came a point where Cheri said, "I'd like to call Dr [Lung Doc] and tell him you did fine on your desensitation and have him send up an order for a cpap titration appointment."

I said. "Ok. But I'd really like to have, well. Some other tech. Because, well. Trust issues."

"Oh, she no longer works here."

So, cutting to the jist, I have an appointment.

I really couldn't breathe. Everyone believed me. She no longer works there. (Don't know why. Don't need to know why. Do wonder why, though.)

Phrenic nerve. It's a thing! A real thing. I really couldn't breathe. I am not crazy--at least not about this.

I bet in all of history no one has ever been so happy--or even happy!--to find out they couldn't breathe.

(one)  I am thankful for Spring Break.  I got stuff to do.

(two)  I am thankful for sunshine.

(three)  I am thankful for all the ways I won the birth lottery.

(four)  I am thankful for Mr Moth, Zor, Mom, Dad, and Squabby.

(five)  I am thankful for friends.

Somebody at the sleep center tattled on me. I'm guessing it was someone who thought/thinks the doctor is going to "make" me return there, because his office person called before I was well in the door from class yesterday.

I was not in the mood. At all.

The sleep center called, and the wants you to come in and discuss this, the office person said.

I will not, WILL NOT call her "the girl."

I also will not, will not use the term "tattletale."

Or...maybe I will. SNITCHES.

"Oh, I can come in and discuss it," I said--although I'd rather go to the dentist. Really. Of all the medical stuff I'd rather do without, I'm ready to get my toofs did. "But I'm not going back to that place, so if he has that in his head, he can get some other idea."

OK. So I go tomorrow.

By last night, still sleepless, I had begun to doubt myself, because as I have mentioned here, I have been having memory issues for a while now. Surely the sleep center/cpap titration episode could not have been that bad. When I hear myself tell it, it just sounds bizarre and paranoid. I must have overreacted. I called my mom, who basically said even if I did overreact, so what? When someone says, "I can't breathe," that's pretty straightforward.

And as I turn it over in my mind, I'm absolutely clear on that. I repeatedly said, "I can't breathe." I even said specifically, "It feels like someone has their hand over my face trying to smother me."

Although the tech had know way of knowing this, yes I do know exactly what that feels like, and so there may have been some flash-backery at play. Doesn't matter. What matters is, I said take it off, and she tightened it. And as I debated these things in my head, how much was real and how much--if any--was PTSD drama, I realized my screaming headache was largely in my face. I had some back-of-the-skull stress ache (all the way down my neck, in fact) and some top-of-the-skull lack-of-sleep ache, but I also had some under-the-eyes and across-the-bridge-of-my-nose ache.

This is not the first time my body's reluctance to bruise has worked against me. However, the entire thing did take place on camera, so in the end there will be no she said, she said. Unless something happened to the footage, in which case I'm going to take that as a sign I should hire a kneecapper.

Ok, not really. But it's a nice fantasy.

I am dreading this visit though, and not only because winter has finally arrived and I have a winter driving phobia. I really do feel like I've been summoned to court. But I am not Lucy, and I am not the one who should be doing the 'splaining.

The thing I am most angry about is how angry I still am. Seething with rage. It just keeps bubbling up, and to a degree I honestly find frightening.

So we're having a blizzard.  I go to the stupid thing anyway.  They call me sir and stick me in a room and give me a tv remote that doesn't work, and then go away for some indeterminate period of time.  At first I'm glad to see there's a fan.  No clock, though.  They come back and tell me my "real" tech is late.  Eventually she shows up and writes on my head, covers me in glue, and sticks electrodes everywhere.  I notice she repeats herself a lot.  One of the things she says is that she can't tell me what time it is, ever.

She gives me more covers even after I tell her it's too hot, and that should have been my first clue that no one was going to listen to me the rest of the night.

I fell asleep the first time fairly easily, but then snowplows woke me up and it took a while to fall back asleep.  No idea how long because NO CLOCK.  Then she came back to tell me ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED, I'd reached some unknown number of episodes and would now have a cpap machine installed on my head.  She proceeded to pull my hair and install a mask over my fucking EYE.  The thing was too tight, and the pressure on my sinuses was comparable to a moderate-to-severe sinus headache or migraine.  The air inside the mask was even hotter than the already hot room, and stale.  Nothing like continually breathing your own used air.  Then, for no apparent reason, my nasal passages slammed shut and I couldn't breathe so swell anymore, so I called her back in and said I couldn't breathe, to which her reply was that if I didn't finish the study the doctor would make me come back and do it later so I should just go to sleep.

Hello bitch, I can't BREATHE, and there is a mask on my EYE.  Remember the big thing online a couple months ago educating cops and others about how when someone says they can't breathe you should listen?!  It's not like I was vague, either.  I specifically said, "IT FEELS LIKE SOMEONE HAS THEIR HAND OVER MY FACE TRYING TO SMOTHER ME."

She accused me of having come in with a cold--I do not have a cold, or anything at all--and eventually she brought me some saline nasal spray. Which did squat. Sitting up helped a little. Getting the mask off my EYE helped a little.  I tried to go back to sleep.  Forever later, I did.  No idea when, of course, because NO CLOCK.

At some point the pressure on the machine went up again and my lips were actually literally blown apart like a floppy dog with its head out a car window.



I am not making this crap up, either.  I was exhausted though, and hey at least hot stale air was no longer an issue, so I rolled over and went back to sleep.  No idea when because NO CLOCK.

The pressure went up again, and it stole my breath.  When we were kids and rode in the back seat of Pa's Corvair and he had the windows down, the air would whip in and steal our breath, and this setting felt just like that.  I told her again, for the fourth or fifth time, that I couldn't breathe.  She said she would turn down the pressure, but if I didn't continue the doctor would make me come back.

That line of bullshit was beginning to piss me off.  SHE might work for him, but HE works for ME.

She turned the machine on again.  It was not turned down.  Immediately I started gasping and flailing and trying to take the mask off.  She starts HOLDING THE MASK DOWN.  It was like she was doing CPR on my FACE.  Holding the mask down with one hand and trying to tighten it with the other.  And then she starts in about how she needs me to stay longer to finish the test or I might have to come back.

I CAN'T BREATHE.

She needs me to stay longer...and I can no longer think why I'm not going to.  So I say I have school.

Do you teach?  What time does it start?

I can't think.  She seems to expect me to justify my need to leave.  Like I can't breathe is not reason enough to get the fuck out of, and off of, my face.  I'm gasping for air and trying to take the mask off.  She's pushing it to hold it on my face.

I start yelling GET IT OFF GET IT OFF I'M DONE I WANT TO GO HOME GET IT OFF.

She prattles on with this bullshit about how the doctor is going to make me come back, and she really needs me to stay longer.  I think she has a script or something, like a telemarketer, because she keeps saying the same thing the same way.  But with a tone.  You probably know the tone.  That tone oblivious nimrods use to dismiss the feelings and needs of others.  Like I am crazy because feeling like I am smothing is a ridiculous little issue that I could just power through if I were not such a princess with a pea.

WE'LL JUST SEE ABOUT THAT GET THIS SHIT OFF ME I AM GOING HOME I AM DONE.

She goes away, and is gone a long time.  No idea how long because NO CLOCK.  Then I remember my phone, so I get it out and turn it on.  It says 6:50 a.m.  When she comes back she tells me I have to fill out paper work and the doctor is going to make me come back.

WELL HE MIGHT JUST HAVE TO GET OVER HIMSELF.  THIS IS A FREE COUNTRY AND I AM NOT COMING BACK.

There was a little more, but basically I got dressed and left.  F**K that crap.

F**K F**K F**K F***ETY F**K.

This is one of those occasions where there is too much in my head to allow me to make a coherent post, so this here is going to be one of those stews of random thoughts, or as unclebillybob calls it, slumgullion.

(Random Thought 1)  I feel like crap. Still having dizzy spells, although they are not usually so severe. The shortness of breath is worse. I get winded walking the length of the house. Shopping is so hard. Actually, standing up to let the dogs out is hard, not because of dizziness or breathlessness, but because I am just weak. So weak, I can't glet yo unless I have something to push up off of. Mr Moth put a hillbilly board in the sofa to make it easier, but still.

(RT2)  One more week until school starts again. I really don't want to. I'm not sure why I'm still planning to, considering how much I don't want to.  Or maybe I am sure why.

(RT3) A while back, in my last remaining writing group, in which I barely participate because I don't really write anymore except for here on LJ, the discussion turned to, "Why do you write? What drives you?" Now the real answer to why I write (wrote) fiction is, control.  But as for why I never quite pack up my doll dishes and go home, well, that slightly different question required a metaphor.

If you've ever read Where the Red Fern Grows, you may recall a part where the protagonist Billy (I think his name is) needs to catch a raccoon with which to train his new coon hounds, so his father builds a trap, which I am going to describe here, and if you consider such things spoilers, now is the time to move along. Same goes for if you consider calling raccoons coons racist, which I admit I find ridiculous and can't believe anyone actually does.

Anyway, the coon trap involves a hole drilled in a log, and two nails driven into the log at an angle, and a bit of shiny tin dropped in the bottom of the hole. As the story goes, the coon reaches in to grab the shiny, and can't get it's paw, now expanded into a fist, out past the nails. So it just sits there clutching the shiny while someone comes up and clubs it to death.

Why on earth did I ever love that book, I have no idea, but anyhow...

I am that coon, and I have been clubbed to death while hanging onto many shinies, yet somehow I do not learn.

(RT4) I had four weeks off between semesters, and on the first week I had the doc (CNP), the dentist, and the OB/GYN. Plus Zor had an appointment.  The second week was the oral surgeon, Zor's birthday, and Christmas. This has been the third week, and I had a cooter cam ultrasound and a last minute chest x-ray, plus the dogs' annual and shamefully late vet appointment, plus a trip to the school to straighten out Zor's financial aid.  This upcoming week I have a follow up with the OB/GYN (I love how he turned one free checkup into three office visits) and the pulmonologist (which I am for some reason terrified of) and Zor has two various appointments plus one (at the same OB/GYN office) pending the arrival of her depo shot by mail. There is also a trip to the school bookstore to make, and the feed store.

I feel like crappy things ate up too much of my break and, in fact, I didn't get a break, or accomplish anything much either.

(RT5) Zor calls the OB/GYN office The Vagina House, which cracks me up.

(RT6) Zor just turned 22 and has her driving permit. If she got her license, I might have less driving to do, but she doesn't have a car and I am not super cool with letting anyone use my vehicle ever, including my husband, who technically paid for it. Nobody takes care of my stuff right/like I do, and I don't like to share. Pretty sure I blogged about my inability to share a while ago, so no need to revisit the topic.

I do realize this, in the eyes of many, means I have chosen to do a lot of extra errands, but to me, it is not actually a choice. Especially when I count up the number of my friends who went for long periods of time without a vehicle because their children destroyed cars they could not afford to replace.

(RT7) So Mr Moth is on a five-day weekend, and they are in the post-holiday lull before school milk starts again so there's no overtime available. We are using this time to get some things done around the house. You know, the things he can't find time for, sometimes for years at a time.  For example, our house is brick. He has been painting the window trim for three years. Of course painting window trim in January is a no.

Last year over winter break we tore out the ckatten-shredded wallpaper,installed the half brick, assembled a new tv stand, set up the new TV, and painted half the living area/hall.



While it may not be obvious from this picture, the wall above the brick is a kind of peachy color (Mr Moth chose it), the other side of the hall is a completely different shade of peach, more of an apricot really, and the other side of the living room is still white. So today's plan is to finish peaching things up in the living room.

Other house plans are to nag him until he cleans up the pigsty he has created in the basement common area (he is allowed to pigsty up his office down there if he so chooses, just as long as I don't have to look at it) and to replace the overhead lights in the galley kitchen and dining areas with a matching pair, and to move the existing fixture from the kitchen to The Keep, and to replace the non-working closet fixtures in the closets in both our bedroom and The Keep.

So far our bedroom closet is the only one of those done.

The light fixture project is one of those deals that has snowballed.  He wanted to replace the chandelier over the table because the sockets are gritty and weird and loose, and I couldn't find anything he liked or that matched the kitchen one.  I wanted a new light for The Keep because it is dark like a dungeon in here and I have vision challenges.

We'll see how much we get done.

(RT8) We've been experimenting with the LED bulbs. The cheapest ones are $8 per, so I've been replacing them a few at a time.  Fixtures and bulbs all together came to $125, but that includes repurposing the old kitchen light in here.

(RT9) I mentioned above, I think, taking the pups to the vet. They're both fine, although Cobie always drags for a day or two after shots. Every time I go and see that big red sticker on his folder, "MAY BITE," it breaks my heart a little. But...he may. I don't actually think he would; he's not mean, he's fearful. That's not his fault. And he's king of the warning snaps--he air snaps in the general direction of whatever is alarming him. But it's not their fault either, and I do want them to be safe.

This time he came out smelling like somebody's perfume. He kept going outside and sitting in the rain. I think he was trying to take a shower. Poor Cobie.

(RT10) There is a spot in the hall that looks like a spider in the dark, at least it does if you have an astigmatism and aren't wearing your glasses. I wonder if I will miss that spot.

(RT11) There are sure a lot of dog toys under the sofa. It is like doggie Christmas in there.

The horror fiction character that scares me the most is Kevin, from We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver. Kevin is real. Kevin happens a few times a year. And there isn't much we can do about him before he happens.

I have too many peeves to mention, but one of the worst is when people ask a question and then talk over the answer.