lajendi

Book meme

Do you snack while you read? If so, favorite reading snack?
Sometimes. Chocolate is a good accompanyment. M&Ms or jellybellies. A drink is good too, hot chocolate this time of year. If you see me with a Starbucks cup it is their carmel apple cider, oooohh man.

 But none of this is necessary.

Do you tend to mark your books as you read, or does the idea of writing in books horrify you?

Yes, I mark. In fact when I get a book from the library it drives me crazy because then I wish I owned it so I could mark it. Even books that turn out to be mediocre end up with at least one good quote. Or even a bad book may even turn out to have something so bad that it's comical and should be marked. I need those little post it tabs to put in my library books so I'll stop dog-earring the pages (sorry library!)

Doesn't matter how you mark it, dog-ear, highlighter, pen, pencil. Just so you can find it quickly again to show your friend or refer to it later. Or to quote it on your blog ;)

How do you keep your place while reading a book? Bookmark? Dog-ears?
A random piece of paper if there is one handy, dog ear, receipt, envelope, every once in a while I actually use a book mark. But then I worry about losing them, and they're so nice.

Did you get one of those National Parks bookmarks from the library? They are made with paper infused with seeds. If you put it on top of the soil and water it, wildflowers will grow. But they should have handed them out in the spring.

Laying the book flat open?
I don't like doing that.

Fiction, Non-fiction, or both?
I like to learn so I try non-fiction but honestly I rarely finish non-fiction. What does that say for my attention span? It's got to have a story line to keep me hooked. I usually go back later and finish the really good non-fiction.

When I read I do it to use my imagination, to expand my vision, and to escape from life. Non-fiction seems like the opposite of that.

Hard copy or audiobooks?
hard copy. It is even difficult for me to read a book on the computer. I like to feel the book in my hands, to own it and to hold it. I also like to buy books to support the author and the book trade as a whole.

Audiobooks are good for long road trips without my husband when the kids are watching DVDS.

Are you a person who tends to read to the end of chapters, or are you able to put a book down at any point?
I prefer to read to the end of a chapter because I never know how long it will be until I will return to a book. It could be a week and if I return to the middle of a chapter I'll be lost. But sometimes you just don't have a choice - if the baby is into the mayo and eggs you just gotta drop it and run!

If you come across an unfamiliar word, do you stop to look it up right away?
No, never, though I usually can guess the word by the context.

What are you currently reading?
The Princess Bride - Definately better than the movie. Just finished it this morning at the gym.

I'll be presenting Crossing To Safety by Wallace Stegner as my bookgroup choice tonight. Hopefully everyone likes it.

What is the last book you bought?
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls - the woman at the bookstore talked me into it. We were in a funny/weird conversation. Then the kids were there and she mentioned that the LOLcats book was half off with purchase so I bought that too. (I can't believe I just admitted that publicly.)

Actually now that I'm thinking about it I bought The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo (Also wrote Tale of Despereaux) at Walmart yesterday.

Are you the type of person that only reads one book at a time or can you read more than one at a time?
I usually read one at a time. But because of my current health issues (see my previous post) nothing is normal here.

But then if you count textbooks I guess I always read more than one.

Do you have a favorite time of day and/or place to read?
At night before bed. But now I'm too tired for that. It is lovely to curl up in the living room with a book but that doesn't happen uninterrupted much anymore either.

Do you prefer series books or stand alone books?
Stand alone. It almost feels as if the author is being dishonest with me, holding something back, playing head games with me just to get me to buy another book with a series. Although I like the way Shannon Hale did her series. The books connected, each character a new spin-off book. So you didn't feel you missed something if you didn't read the other books but they built on each other if you did read them.

You can also remember what I said earlier about my short attention span. 

Is there a specific book or author that you find yourself recommending over and over?
Wallace Stegner is my new favorite, I've read two of his and both have stayed with me- Crossing to Safety and Angle of Repose.

Cry the Beloved Country is one that I recommend over and over again. As well as The Book Thief and Shadow of the Wind.

How do you organize your books? (By genre, title, author’s last name, etc.?)

All the fiction go together. Non-fiction mostly go together, except religious books, they go on a seperate bookcase because we have more of those. And the kid's books all go together in their rooms. Does anyone ever feel like they have enough bookshelves? Never enough, ever.

Feeling Better

After feeling like I was going to DIE this weekend we have found the problem and I am on the mend. First, just to keep you on the edge of your seat, let me make sure you understand what the problem was.

My hair has been falling out. Not a little, a lot. Like my husband was sweet and said he didn't notice but when I mentioned it to R. this morning she said, "Ya, I noticed something about your hair but I didn't want to say anything." There has been an ugly monster around the shower drain every time I step out. You tell me that's not scary, and not just from a vain point of view.

My muscles hurt, my joints hurt. My days were spent laying around with a heating pad and ice pack. So I gave in and took the muscle relaxers the doctor gave because the pain was so great. They took the cutting edge off the pain. 

Headaches that just weren't going away despite the meds that were supposed to be making it better. Then those PT exercises every day. That just seemed like cruel torture on top of everything else.

Food has lost it's savor. When you prefer Ramen noodles to real food - there's a problem. Even going out to dinner with DH left me shrugging. There was a nausea, dizziness, a sensitivity to odors. This is a problem when you're doing the grocery shopping and cooking for everyone else.

I'm confused, it's hard to keep a train of thought moving in my head. I repeat a word over and over again as I try to tell that little train, "I think I can , I think I can, I think I can!" just to finish a sentence. This morning just to fill out the kid's school picture form I DH had to help me.

Now, I know you're all winking at each other and nodding, oh, she's preggers. That's it. No. That isn't it. If I were on top of everything else I'd absolutely fall apart. My body just can't handle it. Steps have been taken. Let me assure you.

In fact I've learned that many of these problems I'm listing are symptoms of malnutrition, like what happens when you're pregnant and the baby gets all the good stuff. I'm losing weight, but not in a good way.

So to accompany all this I've been a little emotional. Not so surprising considering I felt like I'd disintegrate into a pile of goo at any moment. But it was more than that, it was depression brought on by medication.

Thankfully this past weekend was General Conference for our church. So that meant none of the usual demanding responsibilities for me. Which was such a mercy because I could not have done it, I was flat on my back. Another reason it was a mercy was because we were able to stay home and receive wisdom and counsel from our leaders.

Elder Richard G. Scott

 To some it may sound crazy, to others it confirms the faith we share, when I say that I received direct and indirect answers to my prayers and pleadings to God for help.

The problems I listed above were caused by a medication for headaches that the Neurologist prescribed. When I visited with the Neurologist a few days ago he asked if I had side effects but I couldn't answer.  Which is the sign of one of the side effects - mental sluggishness. Instead he got agitated that I didn't answer his question. I don't know why he didn't identify the other side effects, it just makes me really sad that someone I went to for help let me down. It occured to me Sunday morning that this drug could be the problem. I reduced the dosage, felt better and then looked up the side effects on the internet. This specific drug has to be tapered up and down, so I'm slowly tapering off it. Already I feel the symptoms easing. But it will take months for my body to return to normal.

At the same time I can be happy that this isn't something lasting or permanent and that God answered my prayers so quickly. I am also so grateful because yesterday at PT they assessed my progress and my knees are stronger and have less pain than a month ago. The other health issues I've had have been so overwhelming that I haven't fully appreciated the healing in my knees. But it is getting better.

Real healing takes work, like physical therapy. Medications can be helpful. But be wise about it. Taking a medication is not a quick fix. There is a trade off, a side effect - long or short term. Please be sure you know about the medications you are taking. Each body is individual, one med that works wonders for one person will nearly kill another. So I won't tell you what med it was that didn't work for me.

Never turn over the responsibility for your body to someone else completely. I didn't think that was what I was doing. But maybe I was so tired and so much in pain that I wasn't being as careful with this gift of my body as I should have been.

los ninos (the children)

My mother-in-law mentioned in an email that she enjoys seeing pictures of the kids on my blog. It pricked my conscience a little, because I don't post them very often. Since we're taking it easy this weekend and I have such lovely kiddos -

Ta Da!

Here they are! 

Last winter!

J's first lost tooth

  

R's fav.

With the AZ cousins

 
Eating cotton candy at a baseball game.

 
Hiking at the boulder field.

This is still how Baby tells us that it's dinner time, except now she puts them on the table.

 

 Mom and R.
 
  

 
In the backseat of Grandpa's car, like sardines. 

J. and Baby at Lagoon

Baby saying, "These Doritos are making me thirsty!"

A. and J. at the lake
 

Baby with her twin cousin (OK, I know they don't look that much alike). 

R. hiking with Baby.

Finally I got a picture of her reading! She does it so much you'd think it would be easy to get a picture.

 
J. with cousin J. (these initials aren't helpful really, are they?) 

All the kids with Great Grandma D.

  

A's Girl Scout award ceremony

Now it's time to take pictures again because they've all gotten haircuts!

October brings strange bedfellows

Pain

My husband had physical therapy many years ago after knee surgery. He always told me that the pain of physical therapy was worse than the surgery itself. When my grandma and husband compared notes on physical therapy following surgery she heard his theory and laughed and nodded her grey head in agreement. Now it's my turn, although to a much lesser degree, as I'm not recovering from surgery.

I've been going to physical therapy (from here on out I'll refer to it as PT) for more than two weeks now. That also means that twice a day I've been doing exercises at home that the physical therapist instructed. I also ice my knees three times a day. So far I'm still not even walking for exercise, let alone running (yes I'm impatient), and have added Sciatica to my list of complaints. Know what they do for Sciatica? Give you more pain meds and send you to PT.

In the meantime my headaches are intense and daily despite the increased meds for those. I was supposed to call my neurologist to update him about how the meds were going anyway so I called yesterday. When I told the nurse that the meds weren't going well she said they had a cancellation so I went in. The results of the appointment were complete confusion .

The Neurologist doubted everything the Orthopedist recommended, including joint hypermobility and PT. Despite the Neurologist being more alternative and natural he sent me home with five trial medications and two new herbal supplements, in addition to the four I am already taking. Yes, that is ELEVEN all together. Granted it is a combination of cremes, patches, vitamins, and prescriptions but holy moley it is nearly impossible to keep it all straight when you have a headache! Of course he recommends acupuncture, theracane, hot rocks massage,....

 

 It turns me off when a professional disregards another professional's opinion without giving them the benefit of the doubt. My health is too important for the doctors' egos to be battling it out here.

I have to stand strong, because it is my body. I have to make my own decisions while they stand there with their egos and their certificates on the wall and their expensive educations. I have to say a silent prayer and have faith that what I decide is the right thing for myself and my family. I can't tell the doctors that my husband gave me a blessing so they should work together. And that my patriarchal blessing gave me a piece of counsel that is particulary fitting for the situation, so let's lay off the drugs. Or that General Conference is coming up and I'd really like them to watch so we can all be on the same page. Yeah, that's just not going to happen. I've got to be strong in my own convictions, if they all understand them or not.

Physically I just feel a mess. I don't understand how things could be getting worse despite my adherance to the protocols the doctors have set up, including medications. The worsening daily pain brings me to tears often. I am very close to my heating pads and ice bag. I chide myself for being melodramatic or gothic, but it is hard not to consider the long hard road after dealing with this for so long.

DH gave me a blessing a few days ago, it was encouraging, but it wasn't. As is usual for the blessings I've had related to this illness I was told that this is my trial and that I have things to learn. It is good to know that God has a plan. It is hard to think about pain tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow as a good thing. So I think about just tomorrow.

I think that good things will happen tomorrow to distract me from the pain. Like yesterday when Baby said so clearly to my friend, "Goodbye Nancy!" A new name to her repertoire, just like that. The fact that Nancy came over to talk because she needed comfort and I could give it - that felt so good.

That J. is getting 100% on his spelling tests without breaking a sweat. That's good.

To hear R.'s church leader say that she's seen her grow and change in such good ways since the summer. That's good.

For A. to make a hard choice between band or choir because I just can't manage both, when she's already agreed to give up girl scouts, but she doesn't pout, cry or make me feel guilty at all. That's good.

When DH is on call for work and his phone goes off all night waking me up, which also means he's waking up all night, and I bite his head off. He apologizes with half-closed sleepy eyes, and I apologize back. That's good.

So life is good, despite the pain.