¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[might-bite]

My shark bracelet came in the mail today! I love sharks! 🦈 If you love the ocean and want to help with efforts to get rid of the trash in it, check out @4ocean #4sharks #4oceanbracelet

[maliciousindungeon]

Boris Groh is one of my favorite artists, mostly because of his works that feature LARGE skeletons just doing their thing

[might-bite]

(I don't know how to do hash tags anymore... Send help 🙁)

[might-bite]

I woke up my roommate when I was getting ready for bed and he was NOT a happy camper. #boxturtle #bachyboy #reptilesofinstagram

[might-bite]

Rescheduled Appointment

I'm sick, I've been sick since at least last Saturday, which means I had to reschedule my pain management appointment for today. Which would be fine if my doctor was in today, but she's off, which means I'm seeing someone completely different on the day when I'm completely out of it and feel like the barely living dead. Fortunately my mom agreed to go back with me, so she'll be my external memory and together we'll get through it. To say I'm not looking forward to this is like calling a tornado a little wind. 😧

[might-bite]

[might-bite]

I have a doctor's appointment in the morning, it's not a big deal or anything - just the monthly check in with the pain management clinic. It'll take an hour at the very most and my doctor is really nice, we have a good relationship so far and seem to be on the same page, so everything should be fine. But I'm freaking out. Like hard core. The joys of anxiety.

[might-bite]

Me and my little brother chilling at the hotel. #siblings #familydontendwithblood #littlebro #ilovemybabybrother #ilovemyfamily #ilovemylittlebrother

[might-bite]

Pixel "helping" me play GW2. At least this time she didn't make me run off the cliff... #kitten #pixelation #pixelpics #gw2 #guildwars2

[might-bite]

I missed my PM meds, the 2nd dose of pain killers, two days in a row. I'm still alive and functioning, so that's good and shows progress etc. But I'm in a lot of pain right now. A LOT.

[might-bite]

Me and Kova after I'd dressed her up and covered her in beanie babies. She was such a patient cat - she never hissed at me or my sisters, no matter what crazy thing we did with her and she only bit me when I tried to pick her up when the vacuum was running. Growing up I didn't really know that cats could be mean to kids because she was just so great with us. #cat #blackcat #flashbackfriday

[might-bite]

Updates updates

I have a weird relationship with social media; I completely forget it exists until it’s actually important, like when a friend gets married or I need to actually update my medical stuff. Then I put everything off because I am procrastinate like you wouldn’t believe, it’s a habit I need to break if I’m going to go back to school in the near future. Crunch time is death. 

Anyways, here are the updates!

New Pain Doc She was really nice and I think we connected when it comes to my pain situation and where I want to go with it/what I want to do with my life. You know - live it. She disagrees with pain doc #1 and thinks that if the pain killers I’m on right now are working, which they are, then there’s no real reason to mess with things. I know this medication and how it effects me, I know that it works and I know how to use it to manage my pain. One thing that she is concerned about is my anti-seizure medication and my pain medication being together. I’ve been on higher doses of both meds at the same time and I’m fine, so I’m not worried, but I’m behind seeing a neurologist - my twitches have been getting more frequent and more intense, reading and writing is more difficult and my memory is kinda crummy. It’s probably linked to my head injury from a few years ago, when my house randomly decided to try and kill me via basketball goal. 

The 5K Training You know how I said my ribs were just a little bump in the road, but I'd be back to running soon? Yeah, that didn't happen. Getting my ribs out of joint was actually Costochondritis and wearing a bra lasted like a day, but it was too painful to keep on. I’ve been pretty much out of commission since then; spending most of my time resting and longing for the sweet release of death. Everything hurt so much, I just couldn't handle it. When I went to get it checked out by my doctor and he was pressing on my ribs to confirm what he suspected - that I had Costochondritis, I almost threw up because of the pain.  

I’m at the point now where I think I can wear a sports bra, so I’ll try that out in a few days (it has been awful weather change central here) and pick up some running shoes/clothes from Walmart or something. The past month or more has been awful and I am very very glad to have healthy ribs again. I’m going to take things a bit slower this time, pushing myself too far too fast is what got me into this mess and set me back a month. I really want to do this and I don’t want that determination to be the thing that makes it an impossibility. 

[might-bite]

Pain Doc Switch Up

I have my next appointment in an hour, so this is going to be quick and messy. Sorry Grammer nuts. Turns out my old pain specialist decided to "pursue other options outside of pain management" leaving me and his other patients at the clinic, but paired with different doctors. Here's hoping she's a good fit.

[might-bite]

People deciding to call 'fake!' on a disability really ticks me off. How are you judging what's real and what's fake? Why do you feel the need to go around accusing people of faking something that majorly fucks up their day to day life? It's not just about you being right or catching someone in the act here; you're also making people with disabilities nervous about being taken seriously. Like Drew here has a very obvious stutter, he can't hide it and doesn't try, but people will accuse him of faking it. If you think someone is faking, even if you are fully convinced because you've grown up around people with that disability etc etc, keep it to yourself. You could easily be wrong and that accusation of faking a disability hurts like you wouldn't believe.

[might-bite]

A Bump in the Road with the Running Plan

So you know how I started running and it was super amazing? Well it went from 'amazing' to 'I have poor planning' in 2 days. This happened awhile ago, and I did write about it, but I had my app set to put things into drafts instead of posting them for some reason. Here's what went down; with the plan I'd worked out I was going to run every other day and, on run day #2 I was nervous but pumped. I was nervous because there were some fronts moving around and my legs were really sore, but I knew that running wasn't supposed to be easy, I watched and cheered my sister on through her 5k training and got to see how much running can suck. So, I decided to just suck it up and push through it. Bad idea. I only made it about halfway before my legs just gave out completely. I managed to catch myself before I hit my head because lord knows that I don't need another concussion. After deciding that trying to get up and run home would be a really stupid thing to do, I called my mom and she picked me up. Unfortunately while I didn't hit my head, I really got my ribs out of joint when I fell. I thought it was just bad back pain, but when I went in for PT and told my therapist what happened she felt around at my ribs and was kind of impressed. A 'only Sara could do such an impressive job... At messing up her ribs' kind of impressed. She used some of my muscles to engage other muscles to shift things into shape more or less and we got on to making my legs stronger. The PT trick only lasted me for a few days, then I was back on the heating pad and waiting to see my chiropractor. Fortunately we were able to get in quickly and he sorted me out. Not just with my ribs, but with my back and shoulders too. Now it's been a couple of days since the chiropractor and my back/ribs aren't as bad as the were, but they still hurt a bit. Undoubtedly just being sore from being pushed around so much. I spent yesterday on a heating pad, sitting up for 20-30 minutes at a time. Today I've been able to wear a bra, so hopefully by the time the snow (it's snowing here! 😄 ❄) has settled down and melted away I'll be able to get back to training. I'm going to take 2 day breaks instead of the 1 day break, that's for sure and get some running shoes and hopefully a pair of shorts that leave something to the imagination. The ones I have right now barely cover me up, which can get pretty chilly. So, that's the craziness that's been going on around my 2nd day of running.

[might-bite]

I'm finally doing it, I'm finally running! It was great for the 1st half and then just pure misery for the 2nd half. Forgetting to bring water probably played a role in that, but live and learn right?

[might-bite]

I've wanted this little guy from day one and now I finally caught him! So happy. #pokemon #pokemongo #squırtle

[might-bite]

Bad grammar alert - muggle sick

The other day I went to visit some old friends I haven’t seen for awhile and it was amazing. It was amazing not only because I caught up with old friends and saw their faces when I told them how much my health has improved - it’s always one of the best feelings in the world to see the happiness on their faces.

But I got something I didn’t expect out of the visit - a vision of my old self. Not an actual vision, calm down. But I heard about this person who was spunky and confident to the point where “I think it’d be impossible for you to be embarrassed,” and instead of wallowing in the fact that, for various “woe is me!” reasons, I’m not that person anymore. I felt challenged to become that person again. As weird as it sounds, I feel myself growing into that person again, that I’m getting my “Sara spunk” back. I don’t know when that’ll happen, or if it’s even possible, but listening to stories about the cool person I used to be and even acting like my old self a bit has given me hope.

So, to my ‘mother’ and friends I have to say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.