I Clearly Don’t Deserve You

 

This is a saying that Hubby and I use frequently.  Sometimes it’s a great compliment.  Sometimes it’s not.  It all depends on whether we’re very happy or very annoyed. 

 

These days it’s a supreme compliment to Hubby.  I can’t say enough about the wonderful job that he’s doing taking care of me since the surgery.  His first response to the news that I needed surgery was “Okay, we have a problem.  We’ll do what we need to get it fixed.”  Every time I got nervous about the surgery, he was right there giving me the “nothing to worry about” speech.  He let me ramble on about how to do certain things around the house like feed the dogs and do the laundry even though he already knew how to do it just because he knew I needed to be sure that I had everything covered before I went into the hospital.  

 

Once I got to the hospital, he rarely left my side.  If I even thought about moving or that I needed/wanted something, he was right there to help me move or to ask me what I needed or what I wanted.  He even rubbed my back and held my hair when I would get sick to my stomach.  Let me tell you, that’s a big thing because this is a guy that gets queasy whenever the cats would cough up a hairball.  

 

The fussing didn’t stop there, though.  Once I got home it was more of the same.  Every time I had a thought that I might need something he was right there.  “What do you need?”  “Are you okay?”  “How are you feeling?”

 

I will confess that I wasn’t too sure how this was going to work out.  This is the first time in all the years that I’ve known him that I’ve been the one that needs taken care of.  I’m usually the one that’s taking care of somebody – my Mom, Hubby, my MIL, my FIL – so letting someone else take care of me is a totally foreign concept.  It’s been very difficult for me to be the “sickie” this time.  I’m not used to being the center of attention and having people fuss over me.  After a couple of days, I realized that Hubby didn’t do things the same way I did but everything was under control and the house was running just fine.   

 

Because of the wonderful attention that Hubby gave me, I’m recovering a little faster than I anticipated.  He knew just when to let me be a couch potato and just when it was time for me to start doing stuff on my own.  I can’t thank him enough for all that he’s done for me.  He gets a few dozen gold stars . . . and I bet he’ll remind me of this for a long time to come.

Hokie Pride

 

Hubby and I discovered Blacksburg, Virginia, about 12 years ago when his daughter moved there to start a new life when her first marriage started to fall apart.  We got our first taste of Blacksburg when we went to visit her a few months later.

 

Blacksburg is a beautiful little town nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  Our first trip down there was in the fall and it was as beautiful as you could ever imagine.  We were lucky enough to be there when the leaves were changing colors.  Absolutely breathtaking.  The town itself is your classic little college town.  Quaint shops, historic downtown area with charm oozing out of every nook and cranny.  

 

Virginia Tech is one of the area’s largest employers.  In the city of Blacksburg, everybody knows somebody that works at Tech or that attends Tech.  It’s really hard to think of Blacksburg and not think of Virginia Tech.  

 

I heard about the shooting at Virginia Tech last Monday as I was driving home from my pre-op testing appointment at the hospital.  To say I was stunned that something that horrific could happen in such a quiet little town is a total understatement.  There’s no way that something that awful could happen there.  It just didn’t seem possible.  I hurried home and turned on the TV and found out that it was true.  The peace and calm of that beautiful place had been shattered.  The lives of 32 of those beautiful people had ended.  It just didn’t seem possible.

 

I’ll admit that because of my surgery on Tuesday I didn’t follow the story as closely as I would have liked and I’m just now getting through some of the articles that were written after the attack.  I’m still as unbelieving as I was last week.  How could such a thing happen?   How sad that the poor soul that did the shootings couldn’t get the help he needed?  Will we ever know why this happened? 

 

The one thing that didn’t surprise me, though, is the remarkable spirit of the Virginia Tech Hokies.  The “We Are Virginia Tech” speech moved me to tears – as did the pictures of the candlelight vigil in Blacksburg . . . and all the other college campuses around the country.  The Hokie spirit is amazing.   

 

Please pray for the families of those that lost loved ones.  Also include in your prayers the family of the shooter.  They need our support, too.  Pray for all the students at Tech so that they can find the courage to deal with this tragedy.   

What To Do First

 

The reality of being a couch potato for the next week or so is starting to hit me.  I have plenty of time to read, to nap, to watch TV or movies on DVD, work on my cross stitch . . . . all the wonderful things I’ve dreamed about doing when I’m normally running through my life at 100 mph.  If I’m going to be cooped up at home for the next two weeks (I can’t drive until the 30th), at least I’ve got plenty of stuff to keep me occupied. 

 

The weather here is beautiful.  Sunny and warm – temps in the 70s and 80s.  And it’s going to be this way for a few days.  Hubby cleaned the deck and the deck furniture yesterday.  I can sit out on the deck with my iced tea and my book and enjoy the weather.  

 

Now I just have to decide what to do first.  

 

 

   

Home Again

 

Surgery went just fine on Tuesday . . . even though I was a nervous wreck and myself so upset that I made myself sick to my stomach just before surgery.  Thank heavens for "relaxing" drugs.  Don’t know what they gave me, but by the time I got into the operating room on Tuesday morning, I really didn’t care. 

 

Everything looked fine.  Doc got everything out and from what he can tell by the looks of the stuff he took out, it should all come back as benign masses.  The mass on my ovary was called a Dermoid Cyst.  I read some stuff my sister found on the internet about it and it seems a little odd but thankfully they’re benign 98% of the time.

 

Hospital stay was oh so much fun.  Hot flashes and night sweats started Wednesday.  Okay, nobody told me they’d start that fast. Yea, they’re just as much fun as you think they are.  I’m on hormone patches for now and I can imagine how bad the hot flashes would be without them.  I did everything I was told to do.  Walk.  Breathing exercises.  Don’t let the pain get out of control.  I was the model patient.  By Thursday afternoon I was doing laps around my floor on the hospital.  I might have overdone it a bit and ended up sleeping most of the night last night when I got home.

 

I’m enjoying being a couch potato and being waited on hand and foot.  My baby sister came to spend the day with me today so that Hubby could go to work.  God bless her little heart . . . she cooked chicken and dumplin’s for me, did my laundry, swept the floor, and cleaned the front door glass, back door glass, and the TV screens.  Hubby is waiting on me hand and foot when he’s home – and he’s going to be on vacation all next week.  

 

I promised Hubby that I wouldn’t be on the computer too long.  I just wanted to thank everyone for their kind thoughts and prayers this week.  I’m sure they had a lot to do with the great pace of my recovery.  As a favor to me, though, I’d like for you all to remember the families of the kids at Virginia Tech . . . .

 

Go Hokies!!

A Zillion Things To Do

 

The surgery is scheduled for Tuesday morning at 7:30 a.m.  I have to be at the hospital at 5:30 a.m.  Okay, I can understand the doc being an early morning guy and I’m happy that I’m at the top of the list for the day’s surgery but do ya’ll know what time I have to get up in the morning to be somewhere by 5:30 a.m.?  Grant I won’t have to do my hair or makeup but I still have to be up, dressed, feed the dogs, all that stuff . . . . we’re talking getting up at 4 a.m.  It’s going to be a very long day for poor Hubby.

 

Today was my last day of work for a whole month.  The very thought completely stuns me.  I’ve never had this kind of sick leave ever.  I’m confident that my replacement is going to be able to handle everything just fine.  I’ll probably worry a little about the office but not a whole lot.  

 

So now I have a zillion things to do here around the house.  Get Blacky’s meds.  Get a haircut.  Go to Wal-Mart to stock up on some household items, clean the house, do the laundry, buy birthday gifts for the people who have birthdays in the next couple of weeks.  Oh, and I get to go out and spluge on new jammies to wear at the hospital and while I’m recuperating at home.  My Mom thought that new jammies would be more practical than sending me flowers in the hospital.  If I’m going to be feeling yucky and lounging around the house at least I get to do it in new jammies.  

 

Hubby is already starting to fuss over me and has told me what I’m will and will not be able to do once I get home.  He’s going to do the grocery shopping.  He’ll do the laundry – but he won’t fold, he’ll bring the clothes to me to fold.  (He’s just not a folding kind of guy.)  He’ll take care of the dogs.  He’s going to cook and do the dishes.  That’s a good thing because he’s actually a better cook than I am.  My job is to get better.  

 

I’m really glad that I have so much to do in such a short time frame.  Gives me less time to worry about what’s going to happen on Tuesday.   

Say What?

 

Last week I had to go for my annual "girlie" checkup.  I’m sure you all know the routine . . . get the "how ya doin’?" talk, doc checks out the girlie areas, writes a prescription for the birth control pills, writes an order for a mamogram (if you’re over 40), and sends you on your merry way.  That’s what I expected to happen last week. 

 

What actually happened was that the doc found "a sizeable" mass during the girlie check.  Sizeable enough that he ordered an ultrasound.  Sizeable mass appears to be some fibroids and an ovarian cyst.  They’re big enough that doc wants them to come out.  To be honest, I want them to come out too.  So, I’m having a hysterectomy next week.  

 

Yea, it came out of left field and I’m kind of freaked out.  Doc seems to think that the high powered birth control pills that I’ve been on for the last 4 years were a contributing factor.  He’s also pretty confident that they’re benign growths.  This week has been a bit of a blur for me. 

 

I’ve been training the boss’ wife to take over for my job when I start the new job with my friend in June . . . but we had to step up the learning process so that she’s able to handle things when I take off for my medical leave at the end of the week.  So far things have been going really well and I’m confident that she’ll be able to handle things just fine. 

 

As for the sick time, I’m luck to have 5 days of sick time and 3 weeks of vacation . . . and here I was wondering what I was going to do with all that vacation time.  Hubby only has one week of vacation and I was planning to do a bunch of day trips during the summer.  Between the sick days and the vacation days, I’ll should be covered for the amount of time I’ll need to be off to recover. 

 

This week has been a bit of a blur.  Figuring out what I need to get done before surgery – stuff at home, stuff at work.  Telling the family and friends about this latest development in my life.  

 

Hubby has been wonderful.  His reaction was "okay, what do we need to do to fix this?" And "what can I do to help?"  I asked him if he’d have the surgery for me.  Would you believe that he actually said yes?  Now that’s love . . . . 

 

 

 

Interesting Easter Weekend

 

I’m not sure how to do the add photo thing to the blog so this whole entry is a big experiment.  I wanted to put in the pictures individually with a short description of what they were.  That plan didn’t work out for me so I’ve put a brief description of each picture over in the Photo Album.   

 

Look at what I woke up to this morning.  Snow on the ground.  Snow on the car.  Snow on the trees.  Luci and Blacky are very happy romping and playing in the snow.  Both of them are having a grand time licking the stuff off the deck.  Did I mention that it’s only 25 degrees outside?  The weather peeps have a freeze warning until 2 p.m. today.  That means it’s going to be below freezing unil 2 p.m.  I have to run some errands a little later today.  Guess I’ll be out and about in the warm woolly winter clothes.  I’m really grateful that I didn’t buy one of those cute spring dresses I was looking at for Easter Sunday church services.  I’d be freezing!  I never dreamed I’d be wearing long johns and a heavy sweater for Easter Sunday services.  Geeze!!

 

 

 

 

What’s New?

 

The replacement I talked about earlier this week is great.  She’s got a good secretarial background and is really catching on quick to the stuff I’m teaching her.  Even if I’m not 100% confident in my teaching skills.  I can do this job in my sleep . . . I don’t think I’m doing that great of a job explaining the "how and why" of all the things I do.  Oh, yea, it’s been crazy busy this last week and we’ve been jumping from task to task instead of taking a more focused approach to learning the job.  I’ve talked to the boss and he’s agreed to schedule some blocks of time where we can work on some training issues without him coming out of his office every 10 minutes with something else that needs to be done.  Hopefully that will give me the time I need to finish the training in a way that will make some sense.

 

Oh, did I happen to mention that my replacement is married to the boss?  That adds a whole other level of stress to the training.

 

I’m still waiting to hear from my friend about the job with her firm.  I’m hoping that I hear something from her in the next week or so.  I’m getting a little nervous about the job search situation and I’m starting to wonder if I might need to do a full out job search to find something before my self-imposed deadline of June 11.  

 

Let’s see . . . training issues at work, learning how to deal with the boss’ wife as a co-worker, setting up the office for Hubby’s fishing rod repair business, dealing with the stress of not really knowing what’s going to happen with my job search situation.  Yea, that’s a good description of my week . . . 

 

This Isn’t Funny Anymore

 

Okay, it’s April 5.  It’s officially been spring for a couple of weeks now, right?  So then can someone please explain to me why we are having this blast of winter weather?  At the moment, I’m having a hard time believing Al Gore’s global warming claims. 

 

We had some snow squalls today that the weather peeps were calling "lake effect snow."  That’s what they call snow that is formed when cold, arctic dry winds move across long expanses of warmer lake water.  Okay, I live at least three hours away from Lake Michigan and Lake Erie and we very rarely get lake effect snow – at least not in APRIL!  It wasn’t a major snow event.  It stuck to the grass and made the roads a little slick but that’s about it.  The slick roads though caused a big problem.  There were crashes everywhere this morning.  I had to take a two hour snow delay . . . not because I was afraid of the snow but all the major highways were closed because of accidents.  Jack-knifed semis, multiple car pileups, cars on their tops, cars into guardrails, exit ramps and bridges too slick to drive on.  I finally got so frustrated at just sitting at home that I figured out a route to get to work that didn’t involve the highway and was all backroads.  A 30 minute commute took almost an hour . . . yea, that was fun.

 

In my travels this morning I did happen to get a glimpse of the major highway that I normally take to work.  It was a parking lot.  We didn’t have this much trouble when we got that serious snow storm back on Valentine’s Day.  I’m wondering if the 80 degree weather the other day melted the snow memories out of some people’s brains and the forgot how to drive in snow. 

 

Oh, and the weather forecast for the next few days calls for more of the cold stuff and the possibility of more snow squalls.  You gotta love springtime in Ohio . . . .

 

 

 

What A Difference A Day Makes

 

Yesterday it was sunny and beautiful.  The high temperature for the day was 80 degrees.  I had the windows open to let the fresh spring air in.  After work, I changed out of my work clothes and put on a pair of jeans and a tee-shirt.  I was barefoot out in the yard playing fetch with Luci.  Truly a beautiful spring evening.

 

A mere 24 hours later I’m sitting here with the house all shut up and the furnace on.  The temperature outside is 37 degrees.  It was snowing on my way home.  SNOWING!  A snow shower that looked like something we would get in January or February.  I’m wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants, heavy socks, and my warm clogs.  

 

The weather here the last week or so has been absolutely wonderful . . . . warm and sunny.  Just the kind of weather that makes the spring flowers and trees bloom.  Luci has had a wonderful time on our walks sniffing the flowers.  We’re going to have three days of these cold temperatures and I’m sure that it’s going to hurt all the spring flowers. 

 

I’m thinking that we’re going to have to dig in the snow to find the Easter Eggs this weekend . . . .