HEADACHE BE GONE!

GRRRR....  Seriously!  Nobody likes a whiner, but here I am.

February is almost over and for once I'm glad there is a month with fewer days.  I usually want to expand my life expectancy with a full complement of 30 or 31 days in a month, but I'm ready to bid this month a (not so) fond farewell.

Let's see, this month Hub and I had a huge "disagreement", resulting in many difficult conversations. Then he left town to go snowboarding and I swirled into the pit of depression, then got basically snowed in with the big Snowmaggedon dump coinciding with Yoga Training weekend, stressful in itself.  Then he came home with a bit of a cold, which I promptly caught, leaving me feeling stuffy, drained, and headachy.

Headachy is actually a bit of an understatement.  I've had 8 "headache days" this month so far, 6 of them in a row this week.  Today too.  I don't like to give in to feeling ill unless it is totally incapacitating, so I've forged ahead with regular life stuff all week, but yesterday I was so tired and and nauseated from my headache that I decided to finally take a sick day.

I don't like sick days.  Feels like big waste of time and that I'm a big wuss.  Can you tell I grew up in a household where illness was akin to weakness and sloth?  My dad did take some time off work when he had his massive coronary at age 57, which would have killed him, said his doctor, had he not already been in the hospital for observation due to troubling symptoms the day before.  My mom...hmmm...I don't recall even once seeing my mom sitting down in the middle of the day let alone lying down sick.   And Hub is the same.  He had surgery on his knee 25 years ago and took some time off then.  That was it, in his 30 year career.   We power through.

But yesterday I'd had it.  I posted on FB about my headache and asked my wise friends what to do.  Naturally I got lots of helpful advice!  I'd been going the traditional route of Tylenol and Ibuprofen.  I added an Epsom salts soak in the tub, a capsule of magnesium (but I understand the powdered version is better), and have leads on acupuncturists and auravedic practitioners to call in if needed. I'm scheduled for a massage and facial next week.   I also got a private message letting me know that CBD and THC help.  Well, it's all legal here with "pot stores" nearly as thick in some parts of the city as Starbucks.  I've tried the CBD tincture and ointment and find some relief for aches and pains, but not headache.  And I won't go the THC route.  I have a bad reaction (no, it's no fun for me to be "high") as well as a personal aversion to intoxicants on spiritual and personal growth grounds.  It's just not for me, but I appreciated the concern and the advice anyway.  By the end of the day, I felt a little better....I think it was the warm Epsom salt bath.

Today the headache is back and I'm back to trying to ignore the whole thing.  I'm acknowledging that it's been a very stressful month, my sleep schedule is totally screwed up, my head cold is lingering, and it's no wonder all of this is manifesting in a weeklong headache.  I'm working on my asana practice and pranayama homework for Yoga training, hoping the stretching poses and breath work will yield a relaxation response in my parasympathetic nervous system. (Listen to me!  Yoga teacher talk!)

I'm also looking for the bright spots -- Hub and I have made an attempt at peace and that feels better;  Son Two and future DIL brought home a Golden Retriever puppy and I dare anyone to feel shitty when a Golden puppy is in the vicinity; I've had lovely breakfast and coffee dates with friends; we've hosted our weekly family dinners; I went to a catering biz tasting with Son-Two and future DIL as they make wedding decisions and even got to go along when she made her final wedding gown decision.  Not having daughters, it thrills me to tears that my sons' women include me in these meaningful moments.

Next week we will celebrate our little granddaughter's 4th birthday with rainbows and unicorns.  I ask you, what better way is there to banish a headache and usher out a stressful month?!?

At least, that's the view from here...©

Photo Credit: www.pixabay.com

SNOW DAZE

It started snowing on February 3rd.  I think we had three dumps in a row.  It's been only 10 days, but feels like forever.  Well, "forever" in a Pacific Northwest lowlands kind of way, where snow is rare and when it does accumulate (maybe about 3 inches max) it lasts like three days.  But here we are on February 13th and we've officially recorded 20.2 inches of snow this month -- the most since the whopper Blizzard of 1916 when 35.4 inches blanketed the region.  (We also had a few days last week of not breaking 32 degrees -- unheard of!)

As I write at this moment there's still about 10 inches of snow in our yard, even after yesterday's partial melt.  And now I hear the familiar and oddly sweet sound of rain coming down on my roof.  That's gonna make a mess of heavy, wet snow and slush to push off our long, steep driveway!

Rain is what it's supposed to be doing in the winter in the PNW.  I complain about it a fair amount.  Dark, gloomy, wet ... but I'm glad for it now.  The snow has been utterly beautiful; also treacherous and disruptive.  Kids are on Day 5 of No School.  Businesses and governmental offices have been closed.  Performances, church services, and social events have been cancelled.  Cars have crashed, semis jack-knifed (one setting free a load of live chickens on the interstate!), mountain passes closed, stranding travelers in their cars overnight.  A major pass over the Cascades got 5 feet of snow in 48 hours, causing the interstate to be impassible due to just too much snow to remove in a timely manner and the danger of avalanches, which were happening regularly higher up and threatening the highway.

I spent a tense few days wondering how I was going to make it back and forth to my weekend Yoga Teacher Training in a town 12 miles east of where I live.  We go for three hours on Thursday night, then 8 hours each on Friday and Saturday, and 8-1/2 hours on Sunday.  It's not a residential training; we commute, some only a few blocks and some up to 30 miles.  I fretted and stewed about this mostly because of the hill where we live and my long forgotten "skills" with snow and ice driving.  Sure I grew up in northern Illinois and dug myself out of plenty of snowbanks, but this weather is the reason we left there.  And I've been away from all that since 1980.  Plus, Illinois is flat; western Washington not so much; icy hills everywhere and not nearly enough snowplows.  I was a Nervous Nelly.

I was hoping it would be cancelled, like every single other thing scheduled over this past weekend.  But NO!  Yoginis are intrepid!  All agreed to forge ahead.  A dear friend, my teacher, trainer, and Yoga blog "boss" who owns the studio where I practice and is co-sponsor of the teacher training, took pity on me and offered me her guest room for the duration.  No commute!

But the best part is that she lives in an historical old Catholic church that she and her partner have renovated over the past 20+ years.  The sanctuary has become an art and performance space, as well as our teacher training location.  The rest of the building is their home.  Both are artists and it was like staying in a place of supreme comfort, wonder, and healing.  Everywhere the eye landed was a new place of quiet beauty. I was also surrounded by caring people, lively conversation, much laughter, piles of pasta and rich dark chocolate. Just what I needed since I'd been plunged into the black hole of depression just prior to the training.  Plus, yoga...the very practice is balm to mind, body, and spirit.

So, I more than survived the weekend.  I left the training exhausted from the focused attention I have to give to the teaching, but no longer depressed.  And I came home to a blissfully empty house (Hub gone on another snowboarding adventure) which also helped center and ground me back into my life.

It did keep snowing and I took dozens of photos and posted them to FB as did others.  This was a novel event for us and I think beauty and novelty need to be documented.  I mostly have stayed indoors, only going out to feed my birds and shovel a path for our mail carrier of 30 years.  (I also left him a thank you note and packets of hot chocolate, because for some there are no snow days.)

I expect the Seattle Snowpocalypse Snowmageddon will melt away in the coming week or so.  But the meme and T-shirt business will remind us of what we all lived through.  And just like good Seattleites, we will return to the familiar drip, drip, drip of winter, sipping our lattes, and telling tales of survival.

At least, that's the view from here...©

JUDGE NOT

My new year is not starting out so super great.

Right off the bat, Hub left for nearly 2 weeks on a snowboarding trip.  He came back with a painful knee that he could no longer ignore.  I wrote about that in January.  Since then he's been almost full time making various medical appointments with specialists to address knee, foot, and shoulder issues.  Looks like Job #1 is a total knee replacement in the spring.  Always an athlete who is in great shape and who still wants to take on all manner of physical challenges with skill and confidence, he initially felt sidelined and despondent.  But now with a plan in place, he's moving forward, so that's good, but I'm still worried about all of it because that's what I do.

His absence was a challenge for me, given my wee anxiety disorder.  I don't like being home alone.  But instead of fretting and lamenting, I tried a different tack.  I pretended he didn't exist.  What if there was NO alternative to me being home alone?!  Voila!  No resentment.  I had to just put on my big girl panties and live my own independent, single lady life.  I called to mind all my strong, capable, live-alone woman friends... and you have no idea how much you all helped me!  I also did a daily check-in with a BFF, and felt loved and safe in her knowing all was OK with me and if she didn't hear from me, she knew to send in the militia.  What would we do without our women friends?  No idea.

So pretending he didn't exist got me through the weeks, but made it a difficult adjustment when he got back....hmmm.  Glitch in the plan.  I empathize with military wives who miss their man when deployed, learn to get on without him, then find there is a big adjustment to be made when he returns.  So, yeah, that was a thing.

Then I seemed to run into a buzzsaw of unintended pissing people off.  I also mentioned in my January post that Son Two and his fiancé had had enough of my judgmental side comments about big weddings with big price tags and my "joking" advice that they just elope.  When he sat me down with the 'knock it off' request, I knew he was right.  I recalled when I overstepped a couple times with my advice to Son One and my DIL too.

And then Hub and I had a significant disagreement last week, that has been an ongoing conversation, where my judgements also play a part.  Sometimes I apparently express my opinions like a reformed smoker who thinks those who still smoke should quit too, instead of recognizing that some people still smoke...and that I should just shut up about it.  "This doesn't affect you", he says.

So, given my super strong ego and ability to take in criticism in a healthy, confident, "Gee, thanks" manner, none of this phased me in the least.  NOT!  Naturally I dove into the pit of hell and decided I was the world's worst mother, wife, friend, human being.  Blah Blah Blah.

So, I start February a woman on a mission to be a "no-judgement, "no-comment", "no-advice" zone.  The problem with this is that I find I have very little to say.  I go silent in conversations, rehearsing if my pithy comeback and clever repartee is full of judgement, or if I'm about to say something that is less than kind or charitable or is dismissive or, hell, I don't know...just WRONG.  Given that I apparently am often unaware when I'm being hurtful, it makes it hard to trust my judgement. (Judgment being judged!  Oh, it's all so confusing!)  But I'm trying.  It's an interesting challenge to just observe and offer data-driven feedback.

Here, try this.  At breakfast at a local restaurant, my food wasn't as good as it usually is in this place.  I might have made a joke to my dining partner along the lines of, "Sheesh, the cook must be hungover today.  This omelette sucks."  Then we laughed and told shitty food stories for awhile, starting with how bad a cook I am.  Instead, I guess I should have said, "Guess this omelette is not hitting the spot today."  Data.  No judgement.  Nothing more to say.

Maybe as I get better at this it won't seem so lifeless to me.

I'm pretty sure I haven't actually left a wide swath of hurt feelings in my path of family and friendships.  People seem to like me well enough and appreciate how I behave in the groups I frequent.  I think.  I hope.  But there is always room for improvement and I've been knocked silly by recent events, so I'm all in with trying to rid myself of commentary that may serve some purpose in the moment, but as Hub warned, can also ultimately be isolating if no one can live up to what may be interpreted as my exacting standards, I guess.  Don't want that, so hey, live and let live.  Then I'll decide how much of how you are living I can accept in order to remain in integrity with my own life.  A girl's gotta draw the line somewhere.

At least, that's the view from here...©

Photo Credit: www.pixabay.com