this man

there's been a lot of talk 'round here lately. about the future. about marriage. it's exciting, a bit unnerving. today at work i talked with one of the girls in my office for no less than an hour and a half. we discussed everything from pregnancy to the stupidity of men to the intuition of women. this past weekend dave had a very good (long lost) buddy come visit, and he stayed with us for 4 days. during that time, the three of us also had a similar talk. in these two conversations, i've learned a lot about myself and about dave, and our future.

it is because of him that i know my strength. i've found my strength through him. i've learned what strength i have inside me, and whatever i'm lacking i know he has there waiting for me. i now know what love is.

with dave, i can be anything or anyone i want to be. and i am, on a daily basis. i'm the first to admit that i'm not an easy person to live with, to deal with day in and day out. but he does it with such ease. even when i drive him crazy, his response isn't really evident. maybe i'm not watching close enough. by the same token, this man sitting next to me on the couch even as i type this - he drives me fucking crazy. i told him when we first met about my two rules: don't fuck with my food, and don't fuck with my sleep. he does both. mostly just to screw with me. he has 9 fingers left, and after 2 years i think that's pretty good. that's like 34% left, right? any idea why i'm not doing well in finance?

within the first week of our romantic relationship beginning, i knew i was done. i even told a few people as much, even back then. my co-worker backed me up on this part. women just know.

i think of the path my life has taken, the path that lead me to david. i can't be more thankful. for my ex being an ass. for my being immature in my handling of his stupid ass. in my daring desire to be a travel nurse, and come to a state where i'd never in my life wanted to go. when i was married, we were coming up with his 'dreamsheet' - a list of bases he/we'd be willing to live. i was ADAMANT that we weren't going to CA. i can't believe how ironic it is that i leave him, and within years i find the man i was always meant for in the exact state i would never go to with him. there's something very poetic about that.

when i went through all i went through last year, the logical side of me knows that it was probably the hardest thing i've done in my life so far. but mentally, a lot of the time i think the year before it was worse. i was attacked, i lost my job, my furniture was taken, i slept on the floor of my apartment(s) for 4 months straight, i had no money. and yet when i look at those two different times, the one thing that stands out in my mind is dave. the first rough time we were just friends, yet he was my rock. corny, yes. but this man was there for me every single day. he paid my way everywhere, when money was my absolute #1 source for stress. he met with me all the time, he made me laugh all summer long. he was amazing. and this past year, i can't even really put into words what he was for me. i know i could've made it through it all without him. i know that now because of all he's shown me. had i never met him, i don't know that i would've made it through. i can honestly say that.

to my love: you are my future. you are my past. i cherish our present, and i thank you. for all of it.

cruisin'!!!

so we own more than 10 bikes between us. jason, dave's friend comes to town and what do we do? we rent 3 bikes, and cruise up and down the santa monica - venice strand. we ditched the pup at daycare for the day, which only left us with about 4 hours including drive time. we had an absolute awesome day!!!

dave named his bike (far right) the purple panther.this isn't the best view of it, but it was bright purple. he's not very creative. jason had the middle one, appropriately named his orange crush. mine was the black stallion, complete with the basket on the front. we rode for probably an hour and a half to two, and then decided to hit the water.

the day was amazing. the weather was perfect. it was pretty windy, but it kept us a cool 75 degrees or so. the bastard fucking ocean claimed yet another set of my eye jewelry. my fav pair of specialized sunglasses took their last swim when a wave caught me off guard. i'm a little rusty in my wave timing evidently.

dave bringing up the caboose

and jason leading the train

this one pic says it all. in this look, you can see the day we had. i can't believe we've lived here for 2.5 years and we're just now doing this!!!

and ps - we're hooking jason up with eve next time. his exact words after seeing her pic: "you had me at blonde athlete, sign me up." he may be a hairy bastard, but he's the sweetest/funniest/manly hairy bastard you'll ever met. consider yourself warned evey!!!

it's time

to get back into it all. the crazy fatigue, the soreness, the aching/constant hunger. i believe it's finally time for me to start training again.

i'm now back down to the weight i was around oceanside 70.3. i figure if i could do that race, plus the training prior, and i was safe without injury, i can start getting back into it.

i started my day with a run. and it wasn't a good run. like, at all. it was nice to be back out there, running the same route i did 100 times before oceanside. but it hurt. hell, it's now 8 hours later and it still hurts. i guess that's one of the things i said i was ready for in the first paragraph, huh? yeah, i'm not the sharpest tool in the shed.

for whatever reason, today is decision-making time. i decided (while peeing on the toilet) an hour ago that i'm not applying for that position in the NICU. i don't like the docs. i'm not too fond of the one who'd be working directly under me. and i'm not too fond of a good majority of the nurses. it's not my idea of fun to try to wrangle all those egos and attitude to whip that damn unit back into something of substance. it's not a good unit. i'd be nieve to think that with no managerial experience, i could single-handedly turn that around. plus, it'd completely cut out school. i couldn't train, work, and do school. there's just not enough hours in the day. so, the job is out. i'm relieved to have it decided. i guess my thinking was a bit deluded in the first place, but kaiser is made up of delusional thinking. it's actually a job requirement. what's not in the job requirement is a map showing you how quickly you'll fail. i don't need my first endeavor into the management world to end in an epic fail.

after making this decision, the first thing i did was check my email. it was fate that a little email popped into my inbox regarding the 2012 la marathon. it was also fate that my coach immediately knocked that one out. since dave already registered us for oceanside 70.3, the 2 races are only 2 weeks apart. not enough recovery time for legs. bummer. so, i'll just have to do the la half marathon in january!

we have santa barbara coming up late august. that particular race has a lot of sentimental meaning to dave and i, and at this point i'm just hoping i'll be able to cross the line. which is a bit defeating before i even get started. i could do a half ironman 3 months ago, and this morning i ran a very slow, very painful 3.5 miles the first stab back at it. ah well. you've gotta start somewhere, right?

after that, dave is very excited about Soma in Tempe, also a 70.3. for that one, i believe i can get back into it with my coach and be ok, depending on just how hot it gets. i also want to do the la tri again this year. same race that i became the human pretzel back in 2009. something about riding my bike down the same city streets i traverse every day to get to work, it's just awesome. it's pretty expensive, but it's also sponsored by kaiser so i need to start snooping about a discount...

'tis all. for now.

she's alive!!! she's alive!!!!

why hello. my name is charrissa. i believe we knew each other awhile ago...

i am alive. i'm working like a dog, trying to survive yet another class. i never thought 6 weeks could last so long.

work is a bit nuts right now. we're getting busier in my clinic, plus our NICU manager just quit. out of the blue. she interviewed, accepted, and put in her notice, and left within a week. i had no idea, and as it turns out, no one did. i spoke with her, she says she left because it all just got to be too much. i could totally understand - the docs we work with aren't the friendliest. add that to labor and delivery staff, newborn nursery staff, and post-partum staff, and i could see where she'd want to flee the moment she got the chance. now here comes the stress for me - do i apply for her job? she introduced me to her interim replacement, whom i already knew. in that little meeting, i shit you not those 2 interviewed me for the job. not that they have the capacity to hire, but i'm sure they have some input, if they're not on the interviewing panel already. i left that little 'meet-n-greet' feeling very odd. i felt like i'd just been set up, like i'd been lead into something that would be the doom of me. this was 2 weeks ago. they still haven't posted the job on the job search site and i'm going crazy. there's a chance it requires an MSN. there's also a chance your MSN could be in-progress, which mine is. the job directly under this particular position (a standard job title in kaiser) has an open posting and the description reads a preference for a BSN, but will accept a BSN in-progress. i could very well ask the interim which of these it requires, but after walking away so weirded out last time, i don't want to show that much interest. to my knowledge, there's only one other nurse on that entire unit with an MSN. i spoke with him yesterday, and he says his name has been dragged through the mud over the years, and he seriously doubts he has that much of a chance. extremely nice guy, i'd hate to go against him. but if it allows an in-progress MSN, i think i've decided to apply. if nothing else, for the paneled interview. for a department admin position, there'd be upwards of 7-10 people in on the interview, and most likely several interviews. my other worry is if and when the nurses on that unit finding out i've applied, or want to apply. it's a very tight bunch over there, lots of filipinos. and i've learned - you piss one of them off, you're screwed with the whole bunch. seriously, there's only one blond/blue-eyed nurse out of probably 50 nurses. if they find out i think i have what it takes to be their boss, that would really suck. if i went for it, they found out, and i didn't get it, it'd really suck thereafter.

professionally i'm in a bit of turmoil. of course you can't be in a 'bit' of turmoil. it's like being pregnant - you either are or you aren't. so i'm in turmoil. i don't know that i'm ready to leave my current position. i get paid way too well for the little amount of work i have to do. to be completely honest, i'm so bored stiff that the only way i saw to continue in this job was to start school again. well, i'm now 4 classes in, and i'm still bored. i'm on every committee i can possibly be on, but that only gets me out of the office once every couple months. i don't really feel like i can do much more here. and that's ridiculous - i just got this job 9 months ago!!!

school is ok. i'm not really putting my all into it. each week everything is due on monday. well, i don't have clinic on monday, so each week i leave everything to be done that day. i've always been a procrastinator when it comes to school work. but i know that if i were to start some of this stuff earlier than the day it was due, i could probably do better. but i don't know that i care that much. i'm doing the stuff for the MBA right now, and at any given point i'm lost. i have no finance/accounting experience, so i just regurge everything from the book or from a credible website. it's worked up to now. it's not hard, it's just hoop-jumping.

personally i'm ok. we found out a very dear friend is pregnant, and for the first time i discovered hearing that news from someone around me didn't make me jealous. it was a turning point for me, maybe i'm growing up. when i lost my own, from that point on, i became so ragingly (it's a word now) jealous that it was hard for me to deal. but when i heard this news, i was so sincerely excited that i cried. these are people who mean the world to me, to us, both as friends and really the only family we have out here. they're extremely analytical about every detail of everything, so i'm having a very good time watching that process from afar. i know, i've seen it happen - women in control of every single aspect of their lives. then they have a baby. then they struggle with losing that control. it's comical once they come out on the other side. but you can't get someone to that other side until they're been through the tunnel. i'm waiting for the tunnel. and laughing at home, with dave. plus i get to buy girl baby clothes. that part i'm still a little jealous about, but i can handle that. can't wait to be an auntie again!!!

i'm still fat. but a little less so. the weight loss people have put my thyroid up to 1.5 grains (75 mg). i've not noticed a difference yet, but with thyroid you don't really build up a blood level for a month or two. still waiting. i'm noticing though that if i add more protein back in, it's helping. which has come in the form of protein shakes. i don't mind. if it'll help, i'm ok with that.

dave and i are good. i've learned to yearn for the weekends. when i was a nurse, the weekends were a source of stress for me. i stressed out when i had to work on a weekend and i knew that dave was at home or out playing. now i get to go play too. i haven't worked out in ages though. i'm still tired a lot. more than 3 days a week i fall asleep on the train going home from work. that can be dangerous if i don't wake up in time. i'm hoping to get back into it. i need to. my lovely hubby signed me up for santa barbara, and the long course at that. the bad part is if i switch it to the short course, we'll be racing on different days. and that would suck. who knows.

we got a new baby kitty. i don't believe i've posted yet about that. her name is jaxi. dave and i were at petsmart one afternoon, and he said something about being excited to have our own house because he could see having a couple more cats. that was all i needed. we had jaxi a week later. she's this tiny little girl who plays and wants love all the time. she was very playful with her other caged com padres. turns out she's already 4 years old, just as our other 2 heathens. and what sealed the deal - her birthday is 7/7/07. lucca's bday is 6/6, and sasha and niko were 1/11. she was meant to come home with us. she's the sweetest little thing, looks like a mini niko. he's finally growing used to her. sasha thinks she's the greatest thing ever, they play together all the time. and if sasha goes someone, jaxi will follow him. sasha has been the ambassador to our house i guess. lucca is a different story. he wants to eat her. can't wait for that kid to grow the hell up. jaxi won't hit him either. sasha is safe because sasha will slap him silly. with claws if need be. niko and jaxi won't. they flee. and he chases. and traps them somewhere until we can yank him out of there. and he's now having to sleep in his crate again because her home base is under our bed. if he's out, he just sticks his head as far under the bed as he can and he'll just lay there. it's stressful. it's not fair to him because he ends up locked up more now. and it's not fair to her that the only time she gets out of the bedroom is when he's on lockdown. ugh.

i'm going to get my half im tattoo this weekend. i'll post pics of it. i've thought and thought about it. if i had just done oceanside as my first race, i probably wouldn't get it done. since i went through the wreck and all that drama, i feel like it's quite an accomplishment, and i deserve the tattoo. plus when (in the way future) i finish a full, i'll be able to fill it in and be a real ironman. i've asked dave more than a few times if it was ok that i got it, if i deserved it, and if other triathletes would look down on me for having only done a half yet still getting the tattoo. but i've realized, screw them. it's something i want to do, it's a major accomplishment for me. plus i'm not getting the traditional m dot like full ironmen do. mine'll be a little different. i'll post a pic.

that is all. you're caught up.

and a progress we shall see

hello all. greetings from not-so-fat-ville. all your hopes and prayers for me lately have paid off!

i went to my weight loss appt this past wednesday. met a very nice, young, (*clears throat*) HOT doctor (i love you dave). we sat for about 30 minutes and just talked. i told him about my history, focusing on the past year. he became very excited when i told him i was a triathlete. he seemed to light up every time he realized some aspect of their plan he'd have to tweek for me since i already have such an active lifestyle. that gave me a bit of confidence in him. i was very hesitant to follow parts of the plan, and in fact so hesitant that i'd had all the meds for 6 days already and hadn't taken a single one. i wanted my questions answered first. at the end of the appointment, he sealed the deal for me. "i want you to lose 3 pounds a week." done. that's totally within acceptable weight-loss range, as losing too fast just leads to yo-yo affect. i left that office feeling very uplifted, like i finally knew for a fact that this body would no longer be mine.

so what's the plan, you say? well, obviously the biggest part for me was having my thyroid tested. i had my labs drawn on 4/25/11 as my part of my yearly physical. my TSH was 2.87 and my free T4 was 0.89. those are both within normal limits according to current ranges. i won't bore you with the specifics or give an anatomy lesson, you can find that here, it's a great article, albeit somewhat technical. a little over a month later, my TSH is now 3.52. that jump is ridiculous, and indicative. the night before my labs were drawn at kaiser, dave took me to red lobster and i had a wonderful shellfish fiesta. i didn't know it, but shellfish can actually skew thyroid results. so all this time i've been begging for an endocrinologist referral off labs that were crap.

for this program, this doc wants all of his people to have TSH levels below 2.5, so i was well within treatable range. we also discussed the fact that the current 'normal' levels are completely antiquated, and don't account for a number of other things that could be going on. a prime example - my PCP at kaiser wouldn't treat me because my levels were within normal ranges. however, they were on the outskirts of those ranges, so he should've taken into consideration my symptoms. this guy has. i'm now on thyroid.

"the plan":

• chromium twice a day = enhances insulin to increase metabolism
• thyroid once a day = also increases metabolism
• phentermine once a day = appetite suppressant
• hydrochlorothiazide = diuretic, not potassium-sparing
• potassium = supplementation from hctz
• vitamin B12 injections every other day = lowers homocysteine levels, helps to enhance metabolism

as is common with hypothyroid, i'm also needing supplemental fiber. which means my water intake has gone from about 16oz to upwards of 2L. i am somewhat worried that the diuretics would lead to a false-positive as far as progress goes. but i've counterbalanced that with a dramatic increase of water, to ease my own mind and to get my damn bowels working. tmi? yeah, well, deal. i didn't ask you to read...;-)

i've now been on all the meds for 3 days. well actually 2, i've not yet taken anything today besides the thyroid. i'm down 3.6 pounds. in the last 24 hours in particular, i'm noticing that i'm not as tired as i've been over the last year. this morning i woke up BEFORE dave (quite an accomplishment in and of itself), and i'm wide awake. i took the phentermine for the first time friday, that's still one part that i'm questioning. essentially it's speed. so he's put me on thyroid and speed. more like speed and speed, taken 3 hours apart. yesterday at work i was a bit wired, got a lot done in the morning and then after lunch i kind of lost my mojo. we'll see how it goes. this program does allow me to go completely natural, without the use of the diuretics or phentermine. i decided to give it a go. after i reach a certain spot, maybe i'll stop them and go natural. maybe not.

so here's the part where i say thank you. i've received feedback from every one of my 4 followers. thanks guys. this part has been so much harder than what i went through this time last year, but i see a light finally...

fatty needs a break

i've been going through some rough times lately. my weight has consumed me, pun intended. dave and i started the paleo diet, and we chose to do the version specific to athletes. the only problem is, i hadn't been doing workouts, so i wasn't able to see any results. dave was. and then my aunt slipped into a coma, so going home for 1.5 weeks threw everything off. dieting away from home is rough. dieting paleo-style away from home is all but impossible. it's just not feasible, especially this diet. i did the best i could.

when i got back from albuquerque, i came home to an absolute shit storm at work. i missed yet another nursing strike, and this one turned very ugly. my doc and i got into over a particular parent. it was just bad. plus i hadn't been to the grocery store before starting the week, and paleo all but demands at least 2-3 trips per week. i chose my foods wisely, but i definitely wasn't taking in enough. i also decided not to go back home for all the funeral services, and i had a ton of guilt about that.

last wednesday i realized in the shower that i was too fat to race or even train safely. i have zero lateral meniscus left in one knee, arthritis in both. i've been training without my knee brace for months now. i'm just begging for surgery at this point. added weight is a surefire way to get there. within literally 5 minutes i decided i couldn't/wasn't going to do barb's race. my world crashed in on me at that point. that was a really bad day. this time last year, i was laid up on a couch just dreaming of running again. this year again i'm sidelined, but by my own doing. i'm ashamed, i'm distraught, i'm disgusted. i absolutely hate my body. i have zero self-confidence of my appearance at this point.

it's funny, some of the people close to me come back with 'oh all you have to do is...' and then proceed to tell me about some variation of diet and exercise that worked for them. i appreciate the words, but really, if it were that easy, i would've been doing it. for fuck's sake, i did a half ironman 2 months ago, and trained for it for 3 months, yet i continued to put on weight. something is wrong. period.

my solution as i see it is to enlist the help of a professional. i had all my bloodwork drawn this past friday, which is why i chose this particular weight loss program. i need to know for my own sanity that everything is ok, that i don't have a tumor grown inside my stomach, or have grown insulin resistant, or hypothyroid. the possibilities are endless. on the one hand i'm praying it's something like that, something fixable. on the other hand, duh. i'm exhausted at all times of the day. i cry just about daily now. poor dave is losing his damn mind. he's constantly doing his job, telling me i'm beautiful, but when you see those 3 numbers on the scale, everything else just becomes bullshit.

this program administers B12 i believe twice a week. on top of appetite suppressants. and diuretics. since i've not yet seen a doc, they started me on the natural products first. i haven't taken them for some reason. one of them was the diuretic, and that has really thrown me for a loop. i know as a nurse that hctz and any diuretic is good for about 3 days. so why give it to your clients? well because when they see that drop in weight they think 'it's working!!!' and they fork over more money. i don't know that i'll be taking that particular course. i plan on discussing it with the doc. i don't know why i've been so hesitant to start it all. i'm miserable. i'm not sure this is the route for me, but i see no formidable options besides this.

needless to say, it's been a rough few weeks. i gave 2 different diets adequate time to work, and got no results (in fact i got negative results, as in gain). i'm at this dead end, trying to find my way out...

the catch-up numbers game

it's 10am. i've been at work for 90 minutes. here's what my morning has consisted of so far:

13 minutes reviewing all my voicemails. and that's only because the mailbox has a capacity of 20 min of messages, so when it hits that limit my mailbox is full

45 minutes going through email inbox

2 projects due in the next month with only my name on them

8 families that need me to call them immediately. 1 of those super-annoying with 4 different voicemails in the last week alone

7 minutes of juicy, nursing-strike related gossip

3 stories (so far) of other people's loved ones with brain tumors and their tumultuous ends

about 8 minutes of getting my ass handed to me by my doc

43 things on my to-do list, so far

76 patient charts needing to be reviewed

8 more calls needing to be returned

8 emails needing to be dealt with

undeterminable amount of reports due now

and all i want to do is run. and take a nap

fun day so far