Babies and Shingles

It's Sunday, and I'm laying in bed with Beulah. How bad could life be?

This week has been something else.

Let's begin. I guess it was around Monday that I first started feeling funny, but I thought I had bruised my arm or maybe got a little sun that day, and didn't think much more about it. That night I went and got supplies for our Book Club Girls Night and did some baking.

The next day, I felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to my neck and back. Weird, but can be ignored. We had a great night together with our new 'club'.

Wednesday, only the greatest day of my life. We found out Jared and Maria will be welcoming their first babe in the Spring of 2010. This actually still doesn't seem real. Too good. Last year I remember thinking clearly about what I thought their little girl would look like, now I will have to do some brainstorming on what I think a boy could or would look like.

I was a tiny bit out of it the night they told me, but we went to Target and got 'Your Pregnancy Week By Week', (a classic). And obviously Auntie Beulah needed a lobster costume for Halloween, and for celebratory purposes for Baby Hogan.

Thursday, still high on the pregnancy news, I kept trying to ignore how crappy I was feeling, and I couldn't think about much else besides wanting my parents to know they were going to be grandparents. (they all found out on Friday).

Started asking around to see what this pain could be from. Some people said pinched nerve? Had I lifted something heavy? (almost 50 lbs of twins up and down three flights of stairs 16 times a day..), so it shouldn't just now be getting to me. I was confused, and felt really tired all day, but again, like a smart one, did my best to ignore, until Friday.

I woke up and noticed a mark on my right arm. First thought: spider bite. Second thought: I am being slowly paralyzed by spider venom.

Later that morning, I noticed a rash forming right above the 'bite', and sort of thought, 'Enough, what is going on?'. I called nanny Mom and said,

"I'm pretty sure I have been bitten by a spider, is there any way someone can come sit with the twins while they nap so I can go get it looked at?"

After talking with her, she told me about having a spiderbite in college, and it didn't sound anything like that. Also, after talking to Jessi, I felt the same way. Didn't sound like I had a bite from their description.

Decided to hold off on Urgent Care.

I had two dogs to dogsit that night, so I just put this whole thing on the back burner.

Then my whole right leg started hurting. So, let's recap, whole right side feels like it's burning from the inside, with stabbing pain in my neck, back, and arm. What?

This is all relative obviously, but I feel like I have a pretty high threshhold for pain. This had been a gradual build up, but by Friday night it was screwing with me.

This is getting way long, can you stick with me?

Saturday morning, my plan was to go in to the doctor before doggie daycare work. But, I was too scared. My thought process was, right side=neurological, neurological=scary cancer or something. Ignored.

Went and did a six hour shift at doggie work, and threw the freaking tennis ball with my right arm all day (I guess to prove that I was fine..to myself? The dogs, not sure, but stupid). At this point I was still saying, I thought I'd been bitten, but feared I had a tumor. There's a girl training to be an EMT that works with me and she said it was definetly a spider bite and it looked like the venom had traveled up my vein causing the rash. Great.

After calls and texts from friends and family telling me I HAD to go get it checked out, I finally went.

Within 30 seconds of the doctor seeing my arm she said, "you have shingles". To which I replied,

"huh?"

Hadn't I heard of old ladies having that at church growing up? As in, please pray for my homebound Aunt Beatrice who has 'the shingles'.

Confused, I asked questions and she told me that after you have chicken pox, the virus lies dormant in your spine, and can reappear as shingles (in about 20% of people who've had chicken pox). The chances of someone under 50 years of age is very rare.

To be honest, I was relieved. Yes, I was and am in some pain, I was just glad I didn't have a tumor or venom spreading through my body. I can deal with a shingle or two.

Here's the big issue: can't be around pregnant women. And I don't know how nanny Mom will want to handle this. She hasn't called me back yet. So it's possible I won't be able to work for two weeks, and it's definite that I won't be able to see Jared and Maria and Baby BB Pellet (his or her size right now) for TWO WEEKS.

So that's my week last week. And now I'm quarantined. But, it's okay. I'm not sick forever. Just for a little while. I'll do lots of reading, and pill taking (I have to take them every five hours, weird, huh?).

Okay, my sweet Mom is on her way to take care of me. Just one of the perks of living close to them.

Must go, didn't sleep much last night. Okay bye.

dare i say?

today seems fall-like here in charlotte. i am sure it won't last, but it's nice to get a little taste of cooler weather and general coziness.

here's what i'm looking forward to this week:

tomorrow night we're starting a book club/craft night/cooking group sort of thing at my house (also on the agenda..come up with a more concise name). it's going to be great. playing on the coziness of today, we'll have tea/coffee and chocolate chip banana bread, which reminds me of the northwest.

so that's my favorite thing about this week so far.

best part of my year, part II

i was nervous as we drove down our street. we had an entire country to cross, and i had made all of the plans and routes myself. things were resting pretty squarely on my shoulders. not to mention that my dad had just been diagnosed with bronchitis.

this was a big undertaking, and we were also feeling the anxiety of having to navigate potentially treacherous roads as we wound our way up and over the snoqualmie pass.

highway 167 that runs through puyallup was packed, and almost immediately i was convinced i'd made a navigation error, but it turned out fine and we got on i-90 after waiting in plenty of afternoon traffic. beulah slept quietly in her bed that had been tucked in between boxes and bags.

almost immediately we started making our way up, up, up. within an hour and a half we saw feet of snow packed on the sides of the interstate. definitely the most snow i'd ever seen. the roads were surprisingly clear, and we made it through without a thought.

soon after we got past snoqualmie, the scenery changed. before i knew it, this is what we saw:

(not my picture)

i had no idea that eastern washington had so many rolling hills and farms. but i loved it, and as we drove through this, the sun started to set. we passed through spokane, and crossed the line into idaho, and stopped for our first night on the road.

[i am pretty sure it was during our afternoon drive down from the mountain that i realized i had left my purse in the new beginnings van. i called jessi, and could not believe i left my wallet in puyallup. i'm still kicking myself about that. nick or jess, not sure which, fedexed it to one of the hotels along our route. thanks friends.]

we stayed at this hotel in post falls, idaho that didn't have an elevator. if you could have seen how much stuff we hauled in and out of our hotels each night (we streamlined SO much by our last night)-- coolers of food, dog bed, dog food, our bags, computers, it was ridiculous. not even to mention a dog on a leash. getting our stuff up the stairs was a workout, and not funny after a very full day, that had started with a trip to doctor's care, and was now finally ending.

as soon as our room was quiet, and beu had been walked, we closed our eyes. phew, deep breath, settle in for a good night's rest. pretty quickly, i realized-- i had not thought at all about my dad's snoring. oh the snoring. my dad had stinking bronchitis, so i was just glad he was resting at all, so i didn't want to tell him or make him feel bad, there was nothing he could do. so of course, i took to my blog in the middle of the night to talk about just how horrible it was. ha. and twitter (see above). as you can see above, that first night, i laid there, and thought of anything i could do to make it go away. finally, i decided the most logical (?) choice would be to use my nail clippers, go in the bathroom, and shred the inside of a maxi pad and shove it in my ears. i was obviously dillusional. i had an iPod. that was suggested later, and i felt quite silly.

we woke up that next morning, made our 16 trips back and forth to load up the car, and kept going east. this leg of our trip was one of my favorites. we drove back up a very tall mountain and into deep snow.

there were several well preserved mining towns, so we stopped in wallace, idaho to check things out.

b girl loved the snow.

not too long after these photos, we crossed over into montana. my favorite state (maybe i love wyoming more? toss up). this day was the most oddly perfect one of our trip. we stopped at the university of montana and threw the ball around the university's practice field for beulah. ate taco bell (which became our go-to fast food), and got some coffee. after that break we drove on, and this afternoon was the most picturesque leg of the trip, in my opinion.

after several hours of driving after our break the university, i asked my dad to pull over on an exit* and let beulah use the bathroom, and maybe there'd be room to run her around a little bit to keep her tired for the rest of the day in the car.

*exits in montana are much different than i was used to. they all have cattle guards and are free range, meaning cattle just roam where they please.

it was late afternoon by now, and we drove up over a hill as we exited the highway and saw the prettiest scene..ever.

turns out we had stopped at a historical marker, and this was a campground for lewis and clark. as i walked beulah around, i looked down by the river bank beside me and saw a group of horses walking over to me. history, animals, farmland. i was in heaven. this is still my favorite memory of the trip.

more to come..[this is getting long:)]

best part of my year

as i drove up to starbucks this morning, i started thinking about my trip across the country with my dad. i think about it a lot, actually. to say that i loved that trip would be an understatement. it was perfect. i realized today, that besides a few quick pictures, i never really told you about any of our tales from the road.

i need to get out the binder that i made (with directions, phone numbers for hotels, starbucks at each stop, and dog parks near our hotels, etc.) and look at our route and all of the receipts and stuff that were collected along the way. that would probably bring back a flood of other memories. for now though, we'll just go with what i've got stored in the ol' mind grapes.

i picked up my dad from the airport the night before we would head out. i was not particularly 'excited' about everything that was about to happen, i didn't have a job, and was not sure where i would live when i made it across the country, so it was the next step in the process, but it wasn't particularly exciting. i made it through the heavy traffic to the airport, picked up my dad, and quickly realized that he wasn't feeling too great. we stopped by trackside pizza on the way home, and then back to new beginnings.

i don't remember thinking anything out of the ordinary about spending the last night in my bed in washington.

the next morning i went to take beulah for a walk, and fixed my dad and i some toast and eggs. the first thing out of my dad's mouth that morning was that he needed to go to urgent care. he avoids the doctor more than anyone i know, so hearing him say that i knew things had gone south over night. before we headed out for urgent care, we checked the condition of the snoqualmie pass, which we would have to cross to continue on our way east. on the washington DOT website they have a 24 hour a day webcam of the conditions of the pass. when it came up on my computer, all you could see was white. all white, with maybe a swirl of white once in a while. we would have to re-route.

i was familiar with the local puyallup doctor's care, because i just been there myself after getting bitten in the face by a dog about a week earlier. so he and i made it up the hill, and got in and out of there relatively quickly. turns out my dad had bronchitis, and the doctor put him on an antibiotic that was 'one rung below hooking him up to an IV'. all morning i had been trying to convince dad that we should take another day, let him get better, and hopefully allow the pass to thaw out some.

there was no convincing him, and after a stop by fred meyer for his prescription and some food to fill our cooler, we decided to go ahead and pick up our rental car. on our way to get the car, i dropped beulah off down the street with her best friend tucker, so she would be nice and tired for the first leg of our journey. tucker's mom, vicki and i talked about the pass, and she said that many times it will snow all morning, but then be 'passable' by the afternoon, but that the window is very slim, because as soon as the sun starts to go down, everything refreezes. we were on the clock, we had to make it to the pass at just the right time.

that rental car trip turned into an ordeal that lasted a couple of hours. after some frustration, including waiting for a car, hertz taking back a car, and then waiting another hour for a new car, we drove off the lot. the wait was only intensified as watched our window of time dwindle smaller and smaller.

on the drive back to the house, i texted jessi and told her that we were on our way. she was waiting to leave for her doctor's appointment until i got back. she also waited to put glory down for her nap until i could say goodbye. this trip home before saying goodbye was the first time i really cried about leaving the connollys. i walked in, and hugged the kids on the stairs, hugged jessi, and she left quickly for her doctor's appointment.

we just ripped it off like a bandaid.

my dad i packed the rental car quickly, and it began to rain. we packed and repacked the car trying to configure all of the puzzle pieces of boxes and luggage, and dog beds. finally, we had everything placed. we hugged nick goodbye, and pulled out of new beginnings, and drove down the street to pick up a tired and wet beulah. i said a tearful goodbye to our friends vicki and tucker as well.

then we were off.

[longer than i expected, will continue soon..]

rambler

i actually like mondays. i've had some time to build up a resevoir of patience, and it is fun to see the kids after being gone a few days, so mondays are usually full of twin kisses and new words they've learned over the weekend, it's the wednesdays and thursdays when we're all used to each other again, that things get a little hairy.

life these days is really good. my nights are filling up with time with great friends that i'm beginning to know well enough that i don't feel like my house has to be spotless for their visits, and i know that i can call them if i'm feeling upset or having a bad day. you know when your friendships cross over into that mode? from acquaintances to daily supporters? it's nice.

i'll tell you though, loneliness does still creep in. more so now that i'm living by myself. because when i drive up at night, it's just me. i've thought a lot about this, because when you get married, or are in a relationship, this doesn't magically change. you are still alone in your heart of hearts--alone in the way that you're accountable ultimately to the Lord for your thoughts and actions. so the struggle to find contentment in that quiet place where it's just you, is something we all share, right?

but on a more basic level, i can get a little sad, being on my own. i think i forget that God can be my biggest supporter, if i let him. many times, i keep him contained to being 'my help in trouble' or i seek him so that my motives are a little less selfish and little more serving, and i forget that he can be my encourager, my comfort, my cure for loneliness. my ultimate companion when i come home to an empty house again.

i am going to do my best to remember he can be that for me.

happy birthday to my sister

this is maria the first time i met her (after she and jared were dating--this picture is from the weekend i came down to meet her as jared's girlfriend). i met her that one other time at metro coffee house, and wondered to myself who exactly this maria thomas was, and if my brother loved her. turns out he did.

tomorrow you'll be 22. weird that i didn't know you four years ago, and now you're my sister and best friend.

on your birthday i want you to know, that i couldn't have dreamed up a better person to marry my brother. ever ever. you have a big heart (and regular sized hands), and i learn a lot from who you are. thanks for being my partner in crime in this new life here in charlotte.

also:

• thanks for helping me out with the babies more times than i can count.
  
• i love our sunday mornings, going to starbucks (when we can afford it, french press when we can't) together after jared has gone super early to work.
• you love beulah even though you're allergic, and you pretend like it doesn't bother you even when you're sneezing.
• you're a GREAT wife to jare.
• thanks for taking the time to know me and love me well.

happy birthday maria!!! i hope it is a great day, and maybe they won't call you in to work!

a little heavy hearted

today i feel bogged down. just like there is a LOT going on. and to be honest, a lot of spiritual warfare stuff happening. like that feeling of needless worry, darkness, and anxiety. but also of hope and expectation.

i've been put in situations in the last few weeks where i have the opportunity to speak truth. but it's hard because i have the opportunity to speak truth about things that i am currently struggling with, or have struggled with in the past. in the midst of those opportunities i am convinced that i am an impostor, and that i am in no position to speak truth, and have even belittled the healing that has taken place in my life, because i'm scared that i will mess up in the future, and that someone will be there and say, "HA! i thought you said you were healed".

and i know none of these thoughts are coincidental. part of me runs from phrases like "spiritual warfare" because of ways i've seen people abuse the notion in the past. they've made it an excuse for emotional fanfare. but here is the reality, when you get involved and become apart of something that is changing lives, there will be a force that works against you.

so today, right now, i feel equal parts excited and ready to fight.

all of this said, i also covet your prayers for my church and all of the staff and families in the next few days. saturday/sunday are huge days for elevation. the anticipation is thick and tangible. please pray for protection and rest for everyone gearing up for this weekend.

it's been a long time since i've been this excited about church.