Adventures, Misadventures , Reflections and Profanity

The experiment of using cannabis to treat my extreme menstrual discomfort was an astounding success. I did not use one single narcotic pain pill nor did I feel the urge to reach for alcohol to soothe and dull my sharp cramps. I was blown away. Additionally, the pain in my left knee which is ever present was also calmed quite a bit, reducing to a distant ache rather than the white hot needle pain that I have grown so used to. The biggest benefit, however, was the huge reduction in my anxiety. Over the course of a few days, I finished both of the joints I had purchased. While the benefits were fairly incredible, the economy of this type of medicine was not so incredible. I cannot afford to spend $42 every three days. I was feeling disheartened about the cost, but my husband advised that we go back to the dispensary and talk to the experts about it and see what they advise. So back we went to the dispensary. The same staff greeted us warmly and we were shown into the sales room. I spoke...

So it has been over a year since the Pokemon Go! phenomena first launched, and I am not at all ashamed to say that I have been a player ever since. A lot of people got real cynical and mean about how excited the players all were, but I just have never understood what the hell there is to be so mad about! It is a free app that you download on your phone that immediately encouraged people to get outside, go for walks, get exercise and socialize in a perfectly harmless way while filling the world with whimsical little cartoon creatures. What is so bad about that? Oh! And the people talking the most trash usually have Candy Crush installed on their phones, like that is somehow less stupid than Pokemon Go!... Right. LOL. It is hard to go out looking for the little bastards in the summer time when the weather is so dreadfully hot, but I still get out and go "hunting" once in a while. Last summer when the app first launched, every park in the city was filled with people of all a...

This year I completed all of the credits required for my bachelor's degree except for one single class. The class in question began on the very day my mother died this year. As a result I missed most of the class because I was overcome with grief and anxiety. After that it was impossible to catch up and the result was the only class I ever failed in my entire college career. I have to make up those three elective credits before I can obtain my diploma. I have been using the website StraighterLine.com to take the class. I have presently completed everything in the class except for the final exam. My current grade is 91%, but I have been putting off the final exam for over two months. Why is that? Well, I will tell you. I have opened up the computer multiple times over the past several weeks with the intention of taking the stupid final exam and then getting my credits and moving on with my life by obtaining my bachelor's degree and likely moving forward to grad school. When I ...

Warning! This post contains graphic descriptions of menstrual distress and the discussion of drugs which are now legal to consume n the state of Nevada. Yesterday I had a surprise day off from work in the middle of the week. My homeschooling student wasn't feeling well and so his parents cancelled school. This doesn't happen often, but when it does I like to make the most out of the day and try to be as productive as possible. I have been intending to use some old rope I had laying around to make my first attempt at a rope rug for my shop and so at 7:30am, I busted out the rope, my hot glue gun, and the Netflix and got to some early morning crafting. It was really wonderful to sit, enjoy my iced coffee that I would usually be trying to drink as fast as possible on the freeway on my way to work and to just do some mindless craft work. That kind of crafting is on the short list of things that actually relax me (sex, laughing, crafting, eating is pretty much the whole list). So ...

I got mine back. That is all.

Managing my emotions is a thing I have always struggled with. I cannot remember a time when I didn't feel entirely ruled by the chemical and electrical goings on in my brain that are entirely outside of my control. It feels like there is a creature inside of me that consumes my experiences and expels reactions to those experiences that don't align with reality at all. Intellectually I know it is happening, I know that my instinctive responses to things are out of line with what has really taken place, but knowing it intellectually and being able to stop it or control it aren't the same thing. Today I am feeling so anxious and defeated that it is making me physically ill. I have been battling literal nausea for most of the day, twice dry heaving at work. My heart has been racing and I feel like I am in a state of "fight or flight", which you can't actually maintain for more than a few minutes, but I have been like this all day. I feel caught in a loop of pani...

So here is something hilarious that happened to me at work a while ago that I wanted to share: I have been working with children affected by ASD (autism spectrum disorder) for over a year now. My most recent vocation in this area is as an independently contracted home school teacher for a single child with ASD and ADHD. I love this kid and I love what I do. A while back we were working on some social studies assignments, one of which was on the executive branch of government. We were discussing what the president does, how we elect a president and why it is important to vote when you are old enough. Then we talked about a few of our past presidents and things that they have done. I always like to get the kids I work with to try to relate to whatever we are learning about and to encourage them to express themselves and to form opinions about things because these are often very difficult for kids with ASD to do. So, I ask my student, "If you could meet any president in the histo...