Allergies. WHY.

Over the past two... okay, maybe three... weeks, I've been absolutely miserable.
It seems that my sinuses have decided to rebel against me, and cause me great discomfort. By that, I mean stabbing pain above my eyes, below my eyes... Basically, my face has been killing me, somewhat like if I inhaled acidic Jell-O.
I've been trying to medicate myself with Advil Cold & Sinus (that's the serious stuff, the one you need to show an ID for) but for the most part it's been only a temporary relief that also knocks me out for a few hours. Not exactly the perfect fix.

It was last week that I finally threw my hands up and decided that this needed professional attention.
I showed up at our local medical center, which is basically a giant building next to a hospital that houses just about every damn specialist you could ever be needing.
My specialist? "Ear, Throat, and Nose."
Or maybe it was Sinus instead of Nose.
Whatever.

It was then that I became acquainted with THIS thing...

Yes, that is a giant metal rod.

A giant metal rod that goes up your nose.

WITH A CAMERA.

Let me tell you, that was the oddest sensation. Imagine being on the brink of sneezing for about a minute.

It was kind of like that, except I did actually sneeze... Not with that thing up my nose though, I had to raise my hand to alert the doctor, at which point she removed it and I sneezed.

Anyway, the moment she stuck that metal nose probe up my nostril and into my sinus, her first reaction was, "Oh... You look REALLY allergic."
Allergic.
THIS WAS DAMN ALLERGIES ALL ALONG.
All the pain, the headaches, the throbbing, the clogged airways... ALLERGIES.
I don't HAVE allergies.
I'm allergic to mold and cats, and that's about it. No trees, no pollen, nothing.
Despite what an allergy test said a decade ago, I'm apparently severely allergic to something, and it's causing really bad inflammation of my sinus tissue.

In two weeks I'm going back to get a full battery of allergy tests done, because apparently you can suddenly become allergic to something you've never had a reaction to before, and I think this is what has happened to me.
I've lived relatively allergy-free for the past 13 or so years since we gave back our cat. (We got a hairless cat thinking it wouldn't trigger allergies... only to find out that it's cat SPIT I'm allergic to, and hairless cats lick themselves more. Go figure, huh?)
It's annoying to think there might be something else I have to avoid, but I guess that I just will have to suck it up.

Until next time... for now, I'll be taking some weird-smelling prescription nasal spray that doesn't seem to do anything, and waiting for my test date.

What Happened To Me?

Here's what happened in a nutshell... with PUPPIES.

Productivity Bonanza - Monday

Unpleasant mornings have begun to become ordinary.
I woke up yet again for breakfast, and had to sleep until 12pm because of a high pulse and chest pains.
I'm sure somebody reading this is thinking, "You're probably a fat lard-ass and you don't know why you're having heart problems?!? LOLOLOL"
...except that I'm 5'4", female, and 120 lbs, which is a perfect weight for someone my age/height/gender.
So yeah, I really have no damn clue what's going on.

Well, after waking up to Jon returning from class (he came back super early), I ate lunch and took a refreshing shower.
I wrote my blog entry, and then got to work.

When I organized my craft supplies, I found all these blue beads that I didn't even know I had.
Not sure where I even got them from.
I knew I had to do something with them, along with all the UV beads I purchased a couple years back but never actually did anything with.

Since my fish fiasco on Friday was a bust, I decided to do something with the rest of the pawprint cane slices I had made, once again, a couple years ago.
I started to string up some beads and designed a pretty snazzy bracelet, and then proceeded to repeat the whole process 4 more times until I ran out of the tiger's eye beads.

I'm pretty proud of the finished result, and I even glued the ties together for extra strength.

RECAP:

• Wrote blog post
• Made 5 bracelets with a possible value of $10 each

Not too shabby for a shortened day's work!

I just really wish I could feel better in the mornings though.

Productivity Bonanza - Friday

Yes, I'm late with this entry, but for good reason.
Something is really not right with me.

I've been waking up with Jon like I'm supposed to, but when I do wake up I have chest pains and my pulse skyrockets up to 90-110. It usually abates after a while, but for some reason it was really bad yesterday.
I slept almost 16 hours yesterday and had a persistent headache. Really unpleasant.

Anyway, enough with my continuing health issues. (Can't I ever get a break, though?)
TIME FOR PRODUCTIVITY!

So, on Friday I had a bit of a difficult morning. Once again, chest pains and a high pulse...
...so I decided to sleep until 10am again.
Well, things didn't want to work out that way. My high pulse lingered and kept me awake, so I gave in and decided to give myself until 12pm. Thankfully I did manage to fall asleep, and waking at 12pm did help me a bit.

I had a small lunch, washed up, wrote my blog post (Thursday's), and then got to work.
My mission was to make some things out of some scrap clay I found.

At first, I was pretty much set on using some salmon-colored clay (I mean the color of real salmon, an orange... not the so-called "salmon" color) to make some fish. While organizing my supplies, I found a ton of blue-colored beads, so I thought making some small fish charms would be great for creating some bracelets.
Well, turns out making fish is a boatload (hahaha) tougher than it seems.
When I tried pinching near the tail, I'd warp the whole fish. No matter what I did I could not get that darn fish shape. Finally I tried working on a larger scale and managed to make a fish that could only be a necklace charm, which of course was not what I had intended to do at all.
I stopped trying to make fish after that.

Frustrated, I decided to go much simpler, and make some oranges for post earrings.
Well, okay, maybe making the orange itself is easy, but those little leaves were a pain.
All I could think as I pinched off microscopic bits of green clay and formed tiny leaves was "I hope nobody quit their day-job for something like this."
Being a crafter is fun, but most of the times you're really not paid based on effort.

After making a random pair of peach earrings too, I switched to making my famous (not really) wacky birds. I only had enough time to make two of them before Jon showed up and we ran off to get pizza. (Mmm, pizza.)

So, let's look at what got done...

RECAP:

• Thursday's blog entry written
• Approx $47.50 worth of clay goods created (when finished, of course. I still need to bake, glaze, attach to earring posts or whatever, and actually put them up in my currently non-existent shop.) 

Maybe not as much as I wanted to get done, but it's still a lot more than I do on a regular basis.

All I know is that this stupid health issue needs to resolve itself, or I... well, I don't know what I'll do. I guess I'll go to the doctor. Again.

Goddamn it.

It's upside down and I'm too lazy to flip it.

Productivity Bonanza - PROLOGUE

I try my best to stay strong and not let difficult situations get me down, but sometimes it's a lot harder than usual to cope with things.
This past month or so really got to me, though.
Between familial issues, friends leaving for other schools, my own school problems, and my own health taking a downturn, things have just absolutely sucked.

The thing that really did the trick was my anemia getting out of control once again.

If you've been reading this blog for at least 3 years (which I highly doubt, since my life isn't all that interesting) you'll know that in 2010 I had to leave the University of New Haven due to a bad case of anemia.
My hemoglobin levels were down, my iron levels were down, my red blood cell count was down, the sizes of my red blood cells were inconsistent... I was a mess. 
Worst of all, I had to leave college to recover, and lost my scholarship.
You can imagine how painful and upsetting that was for me. I didn't go back to school for a year, and instead moped around for 5 months until I finally got off of my butt and got a job.

Well, it happened all over again two weeks ago.
I started to nod off during class, had shortness of breath, heart palpitations, and dizziness. When it led to confusion that's when I got really scared... I quit my summer class, got a blood test, and sure enough my iron count was low again.
Once again, I fell into a period of feeling useless and upset. I started to stay up late, get up late, and generally do nothing.

This Monday was the final straw.
I stayed up until 5am, accidentally woke up Jon as I climbed into bed, and he couldn't fall back asleep. To make matters worse, he had to leave for class... On about 6 hours of sleep.
I felt so guilty for that, and told myself I had to start going to bed at a normal time... So I drugged myself to sleep with some ZzzQuil and somehow found myself sleeping for 13 hours.

Yesterday I had a psychiatric appointment.
I've had a psychiatrist for the past 7 years. Once again, if you've been reading this blog (which I doubt) you'll know that I've had major depressive disorder from approx. 2002-2008. I started getting psychiatric therapy in 2006, though of course I haven't had the same psychiatrist since. (I've had two.)
Even though I'm technically "better," you never really recover from depression 100%. You're still left with some emotional "scars," some painful memory triggers (which eventually just become annoyances rather than sources of pain), and of course, problems adjusting to being "normal" again.
One of my "scars" so to speak is a feeling of guilt when I don't live up to other people's, or even self-imposed expectations. That was a prevalent feeling when I was depressed, and I still react badly to it. (Of course, I just feel sad now, not an I-wish-I-would-die kind of feeling.)
I'm pretty sure it's guilt for having to quit my summer class, and that Jon is off doing something awesome every weekday that had me spiraling into a sort of mini-depression, so it was a relief to be able to blab to my psychiatrist about what had happened and what was going on.

The result of that appointment was a game-plan to help get me out of this spiral downward, and get back to being happy and proud of what I'm doing.
The plan is:

• go to sleep when Jon goes to sleep
• get up when Jon gets up
• when Jon is at class or at his internship, work on crafts or videos or anything useful
• NO NAPPING, no matter how tempting it may be
• make a blog post of my progress at the end of each day

Since I obviously am running out of time (Jon is already asleep, but he went to bed much earlier than usual) I'm going to make a blog post of the previous day's happenings each morning.

I hope that by following this "plan" I can stop feeling so useless. I know having this list given to me by my psychiatrist sounds kind of silly, and almost juvenile, but I've always held adults in high regard... So when an adult tells me to do something, I listen. 

I know I'm technically an adult myself now, but I guess I mean I respect my elders. 

And by elders I mean people older than me. 

Or something.

Here's to hoping this works in the long run.... I feel a lot better today, to be honest.

That's a start.

Beneful. Deathful.

I've never been much of an activist.
Sure, there have been many movements and causes that I've supported to and donated a little bit to, but I've never actually fully taken part in increasing awareness for any kinds of issues.
That all ends today.

Over the past week, I've been made aware of an awful outbreak of issues regarding Beneful, a popular pet food made by Purina.
After a lot of online research into consumer reports, and the ingredients contained in Beneful, I've come to my own personal conclusion that this stuff isn't just garbage...
...it's POISON.

I am not a vegetarian.
I am not a raw-diet advocate.
I am not a holistic hippie.
I am not saying that Beneful is poison because it doesn't agree with my worldview on food.

I'm saying it's poison because of it's awful, low-quality, and potentially toxic ingredients.

I will be releasing a video at some point analyzing the ingredients in Beneful.
When it's posted please watch it, and spread the word.

Productivity Week - Day 3

Okay, so Day 3 was yesterday.
Yesterday was pretty busy and stupid at the same time, but I did get a little bit done in terms of the list. I also made some strides on a more personal level.

I woke up at 11am, don't ask why. I don't have a clue either.
I had a 1:45pm appointment with my psychiatrist, so I had breakfast... err, lunch... brunch.... yeah, and got washed up and ready to leave.
My psychiatrist appointment went really well.
No, I'm not crazy.

I've been seeing a psychiatrist since I was 16, when I got tested for a multitude of learning disabilities and my IQ after complaining of having trouble at school.
I initially was diagnosed with pretty intense ADHD, inattentive type. I was referred to psychiatrist for both therapy and medication, but within a month I was sent to the hospital for a heart ultrasound. Needless to say, ADD meds did not get along with me, and did some crazy things to my heart rate. The chest pains were pretty bad too.
About a month or two later it was apparent that my problems were worse that imagined... I had severe major depressive disorder, the fancy name for depression. Therapy and psychiatrist visits became more frequent, I had to take and test a lot of medications, I had a brief stint in a psychiatric hospital, blah blah blah.
Eventually my psychiatrist retired, but he felt horrible for not being able to cure me. I was referred to a new and younger female psychiatrist, and she had an idea to try a medication that tackled two different neurotransmitters. During the summer of 2008, I was finally cured.
Of course, having lived a portion of your life with depression still has some lasting effects.
My life's timeline often confuses me because your mind simply deals with memory differently when you're depressed. You remember a lot of the horrible things, but can't remember any good things. You still have lingering emotions that emerge when reminded of the past. Most of all, it's hard to figure out who you truly are when you find yourself again.

I see my psychiatrist a lot less often now, only once every two weeks. She is more of a mentor now, and I look to her for advice regarding my troubles in life. She's the one who has really pushed me to find a job, and this week was no different.
This past month we have been working on two things: reducing my medication, and figuring out what is holding me back from moving forward.
I've dropped my medication from 250mg to 200mg, and am going to now reduce it slowly over the next two weeks to 150mg. There have been no adverse affects, so I'm delighted that I might be able to live without medicine. I've been taking the same medicine for 3 years, and I'm glad to see that something has changed in me.
We also had a long talk yesterday about why I am so hesitant to get a job and move forward in my life.
A lot of people think psychiatry is bullshit, but they really know how to bring out emotions that you subconsciously have buried in the back of your mind. They ask tough questions you've never thought to ask yourself.
Through talking I realized that the thing holding me back is an intense fear of failure.
After dealing with depression and problems in school and college, I really am scared of not being good enough. I'm scared of not living up to my parents' expectations, and embarrassed in front of my friends, family, and peers.
The worst part is that the more I fail, the more I start to believe I'm a failure. That makes me feel like my only option is to give up.
The thing is, I WANT to move forward in life. It's like two sides constantly warring...
If I put myself out there, get a job, go to work, there is a chance that I'll be happy and successful. There's still that fear of doing horribly and getting fired, though. I've failed in the past, haven't I? That's what my mind keeps saying...
So this week I have to really try and shut out those doubts. I need to try instead of saying that I will try, and putting it off because of fear.

I came back home at 3pm, feeling better having been able to uncover that fear. I vowed to face that fear... later in the day. At least it wasn't later in the week.

I hopped on World of Warcrack... err, Warcraft, to test out the latest patch release.
It was a lot of fun, and we were on the second to last boss in the new Zul'Aman dungeon when we all got disconnected.
When all my group members logged back on, to our horror we were no longer in a party together, meaning we would be kicked out of the dungeon.
A lot of swearing took place, and we all dejectedly said goodbye to each other knowing that we had done a huge portion of that dungeon all for nothing.
I managed to leave with a shiny new piece of wrist armor and a ring, but the other people weren't as lucky.
That was the end of my little gaming break.

At about 6:30pm I finally decided to keep to my word, and I checked Craigslist for local jobs.
I have to admit, I had a bit of a panic attack.
All of the jobs had an experience requirement, a degree requirement, or just were jobs that I wouldn't ever want to do, like line cook or telemarketer.
In my panic I realized that I didn't have a resume. Thankfully Jon sent me his, which I used for a template to make my own. (Thank you Jon! <3)
I managed to find two jobs to apply to: a local part-time nanny job, and Crumbs Bakery.
I submitted my resume, and am awaiting a reply. Yay!
So that's 4 jobs that I've applied to... Gamestop, Barnes & Noble, Crumbs, and a nanny.
Let's hope I hear back from someone soon...

So that's about all for Day 3.

Productivity Week - Day 2

Being productive isn't very easy this week...

I woke up at about 9:30am this morning, and was feeling pretty zombie-like.
I had an 11:20am doctor's appointment, so went and got washed up, had breakfast, and listened to music during the 20 min drive.
The appointment went well, and we got out at about 12:25pm. From there we went immediately to my sister's school to pick her up, then back home.

Let me tell you... today was BEAUTIFUL outside.
It was a comfortable, sunny 78 degree Fahrenheit day, so I decided that today would be perfect for taking photos.
I photographed all of my new clay items except for the snocones, which needed another layer of glaze. (I'm still unsure if it'll work, or start another chemical reaction over time... It seems to be working, but who knows how it'll be the next morning.)

By the time I was done taking photos, I was exhausted from the bright sun, heat, and just being awake.
I plopped down on the bed downstairs at about 2:30pm, and took a nap...
...only to wake up at 6:30pm.
You can just imagine my dismay when I found out I had slept 4 hours of the day away. (Too many unintentional rhymes, ahh!)
After spending some time with my family, I ran downstairs to my laptop and began the tedious process of posting things on Etsy.

You can see the new listings over at my Etsy shop right now!

Mmm, delicious!

That just about wraps up Day 2 of Productivity Week.

Got another doctor's appointment tomorrow, so probably won't be accomplishing anything major tomorrow either. 

Ah well, such is life.

I Should Be Sleeping

I really should be sleeping, but I feel way too restless...
...not just in a "I can't sleep!" sort of way, but also a "what should I do with my life?" sort of sense.

Things have changed a lot.

For one, I am most likely not returning to college.
Before you judge me and label me as a college dropout, that's really not the case.
Originally, I left college because of my anemia and planned to return once I got better. It took about a month for me to realize that I really didn't want to go back. It wasn't that I wanted to laze around at home all day and leech off of my parents. It was that I really wasn't me anymore, and I wasn't truly happy.
Let's face it... School is one extremely long journey that ultimately leads to a college degree.
Not a job... a degree. The degree is a tool that is used to get a job, and usually you get a degree so you can get the job of your choosing.
The thing is, college only complicated my ideas of the future instead of condensing it into a decision.
I really became lost in all the possibilities, and though some classes were incredibly enjoyable, others were pain-staking and annoying. All of the work and stress really made me wonder what I was really working for.

The truth is, I don't know what I want to major in.
I don't know what kind of job I want.
I don't know what I'd like to train to become, and I don't know what I want to spend the rest of my life doing.
Stress to do well, stress due to my health, stress of the future... it all adds up.
It also really detracted from my life.

Without college, I realized, I was nothing.
I was nothing but a student, but when that's stripped away, I'm nobody.
I don't have any real hobbies, goals, ambitions, or anything else.
My one goal in life was only to graduate college for a degree... but that's an empty goal, and that's really no way to live.

Taking this time to recover from my health issues has really helped me realize what in life I actually value.
With all the stress from college gone, I've gotten a lot more in tune with what I actually want in life as well... not just what is wanted from me.
I've come to the conclusion that I want to get a real job. I want to have something to be proud of, I want to bring home a paycheck. I want the satisfaction of knowing that I am capable of doing something out in the real world.
I want to further expand my art. Since my recovery from depression almost 3 years back, I've barely drawn anything, let alone actually worked on art. Of course, I've done some polymer clay work for Etsy, but definitely not enough. I want to try to get back into drawing, digital art, maybe even perler beads... those look like a lot of fun. Either way, I want to produce. I want to share my work, sell my work, whatever. As long as it isn't just sitting in my mind somewhere, that's fine with me.

Do I really want to never go back to college?
No, not really.
I'd like to go back someday. My credits are good for the next 8 years, so there's always the option to go back.
For now though, I feel like I need to prove to myself that I can self-provide and that I'm capable of... well, living.
I need the success that I stressed so much over... because honestly, it's 4 years to get a degree, and that's kind of disheartening and discouraging at times. But a week for a paycheck... that's almost instant gratification in comparison, and right now I need that.

So why am I so restless?
I'm brainstorming all of these things I should do.
I want to try out perler bead art.
I'm thinking of all the things I can draw when I get my new tablet.
I'm planning new things to make out of clay.
I'm mulling over job possibilities.

Now that I've written this though, I'm finally getting sleepy...
That's a good thing, I think.

Nightmare on My Street

I've been incredibly lazy when it comes to updating the blog, though I swear, there's good reason for it.
...okay, maybe only a little bit of reason.

For starters, I'm taking a semester off because of my anemia and various health issues.
Unfortunately my iron levels aren't going up as fast as they're supposed to, so I have a bunch of tests queued up for this week. I was supposed to already be done with all this insanity earlier this week, but as you may have heard, Connecticut got a freaking BLIZZARD... And I spent that whole time on Blizzard's World of Warcraft, leveling my Worgen Mage.
(He's level 59 now, and seeing that I made him when Cataclysm came out Dec 7th, that's kind of sad.)

I'm also getting some colored clay one of these days... Once again, the snow kind of ruined our trip to get some from the craft store, and the preparation of food and stuff for the onslaught of Christmas guests didn't help any.

FINALLY... I am going to Delaware to visit Jon for New Years, and also our 15th monthiversary!
Yes, we still celebrate months... We love each other too much to take every month together for granted.
(That sounds so incredible corny, I know. It's true though.)

SO. Everything is very hectic right now, and full of insanity!
Thank goodness that blogging isn't my full-time job, or I'd be in some really deep doo-doo right now.
One of these days I'm going to actually be a good blog owner and start updating regularly like I did before...
...and fix this darn layout.

OH MY! What is to become of Hello Interloper?

It doesn't take a genius to notice that there has been a significant gap between my last post and this one.
I assure you, there is a reason why.

Life Drags on By... Like a Dead Person!

Things have been pretty much staying the same...
...which is pretty bad all around.