Day 39 To Everything There Is a Season

My trainer likes to remind me every once in a while of a workout shirt I bought about a year ago. In gold letters it states, "Not wishing for it, working for it."

Not that wishing or praying or hoping for something is in and of itself a bad thing. It's just that wishing, praying or hoping is not a complete thing. That is why we visualize, think, direct our thoughts on our goals. But there is more....

Despite this week's shock to the system, and the anger I felt for myself and my co-workers, I realize that this too, is a chance to find a new open door.  This may be God's way of answering one of my prayers, but I have to be wise enough and open enough to see just what that answer is. All those goals and visualizations and positive thoughts are worthless if we don't take action.

Day 38 Good Grief!

You may remember the five stages of grief that we were exposed to back in the 70's. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross wrote about death and dying and her writing about her patients opened the door to understanding more about the grieving process. The five major components she uncovered:

 1) Denial

2) Anger

3) Bargaining

4) Depression

5) Acceptance

Since its release in 1969 nearly 50 years ago, a lot has been written about these stages. In the studies and treatises and commentary written since, some have further expounded on each stage, or perhaps identified more. For instance, some have elucidated on denial by adding the reactions of shock and isolation. No matter, Ms. Kübler-Ross got a whole generation talking about and looking at how loss affects people facing death.  

Day 37 "Please, please. A moment to reflect...." Michaelangelo

 Got my stomping and swearing done last night, not that I really do much stomping or swearing.

I guess the whole thing bothered me more than I thought it would.  I tossed and turned last night and didn't get more than thirty minutes of sleep at a time. When 4:00am rolled around, I got up, got ready and went to work. I clocked in at 6:14. I'm left wondering what I'm going to do when everyone is gone and the doors are finally locked.

Day 36 Third Worst Day of My Life

First of all, I want to say a HUGE "Thank you!"

to all of you who have put up with my ramblings on this blog. Some of you have reached out to me and shared positive and encouraging words. You keep me on track and accountable! Thank you so very much for your support.

Day 35 S.A.D.

Some of you may know the acronym S.A.D. to mean Seasonal Affective Disorder.  SAD is a type of depression that seems to recur about the same time every year. For many people who suffer from SAD, this occurs during the darker winter months, although it can occur at any time of the year.  

I know I can barely wait until the shortest day of the season arrives as it means each day will start to get longer and have more light.

Day 34 Unexpected Surprises

This weekend has had a number of unexpected, unfriendly surprises. I'm happy to report that I survived them and hope to have learned a few lessons as well.

I went out Friday night as I have done in the past. For dinner, I had nachos.  The plate was massive and if I ate a 10th of it I'd say that was a lot. Unfortunately, it did not pair nicely with the black Russians (2) I had. About 3:20am I work up with terrible heartburn and promptly lost dinner. 

Sleep took a while to come and when it did, it felt glorious. When I work up, though, that feeling did not remain. I felt weak, dehydrated, nauseous, and just icky.  There was a tightness in my chest. My blood pressure was 100/67 (not terrible) but my pulse was rocking at 108.  

I went to urgent care, where they hooked me up to a bag of rehydration fluids. Given my past sketchy heart history (unknown heart attack in the past) and an EKG he didn't quite like, the urgent care doc decided to call an ambulance and shoot me off to the hospital.

Let me tell you how weird it is to be riding in a vehicle backward, on a gurney, taking the curves without being able to brace yourself.  The whole experience was surreal all while my EMT attendant, a nice fellow named Jason (who reminded me of Spider Sabich)

inserted not one but two IV's into me. I was impressed. I can't even imagine what it must be like to do something like that with the ambulance going full tilt and needing to get something like an IV into an unconscious patient.