Some of you might remember when I wrote about getting the DITI scan, which is the Digital Infrared Thermographic Imaging. It was quite the experience, to be sure. It was embarrassing, and it was expensive, but at least it was noninvasive (something my poor needle poked arms were thankful for).

Well, the results of my scan came back. I wanted to share the results with you guys, and I’m going to, but first… when I received the results, I was alone. I read through them quickly, and then re-read them slowly, and I promptly began crying.

It wasn’t because there was any significant bad news here. There wasn’t. In fact, the DITI really didn’t tell me anything I didn’t really already know. But that was the point, I think, that made me cry. For the last few years, struggling to be ‘normal’ and be my ‘old self’ again, I’ve been telling the doctors what hurt, where it hurt, how it hurt, the only thing I couldn’t tell them was why it hurt. I sort of figured that’s what the doctors were for, you know, I pay them to tell me why I hurt. Not one of them ever could. Some doctors dismissed me, saying I needed to lose some weight, eat better, exercise more, and take an antidepressant. Others tried things valiantly, but when all the tests came back negative, they too suggested an antidepressant. Read the rest of this entry »

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We’re having a discussion on the writing forum about where creativity comes from, what the sources of each person’s creativity are. For me, it’s mostly dreams… well, maybe not. Sometimes, I’ll get a flash of something in my head, something really innocuous, and it will plant itself in my brain, dig in and really just tear things up until I pay attention to it. Once it’s germinated in my brain for awhile, it usually will find its way back out somehow and into a story or article. Everything, and I do mean everything, inspires me.

But not everything motivates me to actually sit down and write.

For example, the swimming pool right now is looking a little green. A strong gust of wind came through a month or so ago and took every single leaf off the pear tree and deposited it in the pool. We have gone and scooped leaves out of the pool a little bit every day, but it still looks like an entire tree full of leaves exists at the bottom of the pool. Read the rest of this entry »

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My son came into the kitchen today, and I’m currently working with my laptop at the dining table which is sort of part of the kitchen, so I get to kick back and watch what is going on. He decided to cook himself some dinner, because he didn’t like the spinach and goat’s cheese pizza I had made. Go figure. A 15-year-old boy won’t eat spinach and goat cheese. Who woulda thunk it?

So he decides to grab some bagged french fries from the freezer and a couple of corn dogs. This is, with a squirt of mustard (he loves mustard) one of his favorite meals.

Now, to give him credit, he read the instructions and turned the oven on and checked the time to see how long before he had to come back downstairs to check on the food. This is a good thing. Often, he will forget he has food in the oven and walk away until it burns or I pull it out and rescue it, then he’ll come back downstairs later. “Sorry, mom,” he always says.

Yeah, right. Read the rest of this entry »

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I can find metaphor in anything, and it’s both a blessing and a curse that this is so. There is, however, one thing that’s been tickling at the back of my brain for months now, and I finally had to write about it.

There is a bag hanging on a hook on the door of the closet that is in the bathroom. The location where it is hanging is beside a little alcove type toilet area. The bag is bursting with my personal things, like perfume, hair clips, my favorite brush, lotions and other things I use regularly for my mornings or nighttime beauty routine. I have put them all in this bag so I can grab the bag and carry it to other locations in the house, sit with it, do what I need to do, toss everything back into the bag, and hang it back on the hook. It’s neat, clean, easy, convenient. Hey, I’m all about convenience here.

When I was so sick last year and the year before, doing things like this made a world of difference for me and for my family, because, when I was unable to get up and get things for myself, they could bring me the bag, and it had everything I needed in it, so they weren’t constantly being called to bring me one little item, then another, then another. Read the rest of this entry »

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