S.A.D. isn't it?

Living in Alaska, people often talk about having SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder. Often this has to do with the long, dark, winters and how depressed people get because of it. In December, we have about 6 hours of daylight and most people, like me, spend it at work. People ask me about it often "doesn't that bother you?," or "how can you stand it?" Well you keep yourself busy. You learn to not judge your day by light and you try to have fun no matter what. It also helps to take off to Hawaii or Mexico for a couple weeks but we bought a house this year so nooooooo vacation.

I fully expected to have a HORRIBLE time this winter. I was injured, in pain, not going on vacation, and it felt like the temps were below zero FOREVER. I know I complained and it did bug me. But I expected it to be much worse.

Well I was just a little delayed in feeling it.

Daylight savings happened the first weekend of our Spring Break. I always hated 'springin forward' because it meant losing an hour of sleep. Last year, it happened the day before we returned to work and THAT SUCKED. Nothing like staying up late and sleeping in for a week and then losing an hour right as you jump back into Monday of work. I was pretty excited about the timing this year.

Well 'springin forward' and gaining 3-5 minutes of sunlight a day for a week is pretty noticeable when you go back to work. Suddenly, it's past bedtime and you haven't noticed. My time gauge was thrown off. That wasn't the depressing part. Fighting with the kids about bedtime being an actual time and unrelated to the sunset has been a yearly thing. Something else, however, was starting to consume my soul.

Monday, I got off work and took a good mental note of how light it was and how nice it was - it was actually starting to feel like Spring. The Break had been great and I was loving the weather. But still... there was a strange nagging feeling Monday evening - watching the sunset (which was beautiful) left me feeling sad & empty. Tuesday, I was leaving work after 5, which as the Mr. informs me via phone,  is way too late based on our contract day. I had to put on my sunglasses before I could even back out of my parking spot. The sun was bright, the car felt warm and I turned the radio up loud. This felt good at first until the first song that happened to shuffle on my playlist was one that frequented my "running playlists" prior to hip drama. I felt a stabbing sadness and as I drove home on roads that are finally free from snow - the stabbiness of the sad grew. I passed a runner, then a second, then a third and about 1 mile from my school - I realized that I WANTED TO GO RUNNING SOOOOO BAD. I thought back to last year when on days near the end of the year, when the sun was streaming into my office window like it was that very day - my friend and I would head out from school as soon as the day ended and run. Or I would go home, say hi to the family as I ran to the room to changing into my running gear. By the time I got out onto the main road, tears were streaming down my face. I had spent the better part of the day in pain and using crutches to get around the front office and it's total of 700 sqft.

I wanted to run but I couldn't even walk.

I cried on and off for a good part of the evening. When I woke up Wednesday morning, I felt a little better and I figured I had a good pity party and had gotten it out of my system. Which held up until the end of the day and the drive home... in the gorgeous sunlight... again.

Day two - spent crying my way home.

I got home and sat on my couch, leaning back, and with my heating pad. Blinds open and gorgeous view out in front of me - something I have been doing for the last several months, and I cried some more.

I couldn't get it. It was warmer. It was sunny. It was beautiful. I had made it. I had survived the long, cold, dark winter and I had done it on crutches with relatively few meltdowns so WTF was this.

Then it hit me. I got through it because it was easy. Few people are chomping at the bit to jump out in sub-zero weather. It was super easy to go home and sit on the couch with a heating pad when it was cold and dark and no one expected anything more. It was ok. It is NOT the same when it nice and sunny. People want to get out and play - my kids, my husband, and even me... but I can't really.

This week I truly felt that my quality of life was gone. I knew it was diminished but I had tried to be positive and stick with it and do things but now I felt defeated. And it was depressing. It was even worse to try and fathom that I am still months out from surgery and beginning recovery. It may not be the "winter blues" but it is depression affected by the seasons...

spring breakin' it

**So I started this post last week but never actually hit publish.... hmmm. I will post it now just for memories sake!

This week has been Spring Break from work...  Another five days off from work... YAY! right!

Except that we usually do a bunch of fun stuff. Which we still... tried... I was game to try and get some fun out of this break! So I partipicated with as much (and actually probably more than I should have).

We started the break off at our cabin! It was awesome - sunny and the temps have started to warm up into the 30s during the day. We watched the kids race their machines, we hung out, and we fished. It was good couple days.

Then - our friends invited us out to their cabin at Red Shirt Lake (and by their cabin I mean a state public use cabin). That was an outing for the books! It was a 9 mile snowmachine ride in to the cabin (18 miles roundtrip). Lil guy's snowmachine busted a chain about 2 miles in so we hid it in the woods. The girl jumped on the sled we were towing and he drove her machine. The trail was crazy bumpy and my hip screamed at me the whole way (and for several days after). On the way back out we helped them pack out and we were all loaded up. We had 2 adult snow machines, two kid machines, one 6-wheeler with tracks and one 4-wheeler. We packed out 7 adults, 7 kids, two dogs and probably 80% of their gear!!! It was quite the site! Lil guy was such a trooper. Drove his sister's machine all the way in, rode it all over the lake while we were there and drove it back.... well.... until he fell asleep!!!!

Yes, my 4-year-old fell asleep while driving a snowmachine and leaned forward just enough to keep the throttle pressed and drive in a straight line. I was watching him and told the Mr. that he was nodding off. I got the "he's fine" a couple times until I noticed that his eyes weren't opening back up. We yelled to him a couple times and.... nothing. So we had to slow down and get alongside him to wake him up without scaring him off the trail. We did and stopped for a bit to make sure he was awake enough for the last 3-5 minutes of the ride into the parking lot. He promptly fell asleep in his carseat.

It was a great week ending with even more nice weather and snowmachine races but my hip is sooooooo over it!

Here are some pictures!

pity... party of one

I hate pity parties.

Don't get me wrong... I vent, I whine, I complain, I bitch. Whatever you want to call it - I do it. That isn't what I am talking about. You know what I am talking about. It is the sitting around, unshowered, eating crap, crying to anyone who will listen about how completely devastating your life is at THAT VERY MOMENT. Nothing else matters. It's selfish. It's unproductive. It's consuming, so consuming it pulls other people in. What I hate about it, is that it doesn't serve any purpose and it makes you lose all perspective. It is simply an adult version of 2-year-old pouting.

I am doing it right now... and yes, I still hate it. I am probably guilty of doing it many times (especially on this blog) more often than I actually admit... Whadya do? Ya give into it... cause it won't go away until you do. Maybe that is the purpose.

My arms hurt. They hurt because I have been using both crutches. I am using both crutches because I popped my hip out. I popped my hip out knocking snow off my shoe. Snow, it is always freaking snowing. I never ran in the snow it was cold. It's not really cold now but it's freaking snowing... still.  Now all I see are people running in the snow and I wanna do it but can't. Why would I want to do it? It's a FREE workout and it WAS freeing. I can't afford a gym membership to work out. I have nothing to free me. I am irritable and crabby. The only workout I can wrap my head around right now is swimming. Can't afford swimming so I don't work out. I haven't worked out in months. My arms are going to hurt more after surgery... and....

repeat circle of pouting...

But that's where I am at right now and I hate it.

someone bring me some Hagen Daas Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Cream... please. 

nothing says love like a craigslist hospital bed

So... me and the Mr., we haven't talked to in depth about this surgery.

This is slightly unnerving considering the gravity that I feel comes along with intentionally breaking your pelvis and hoping that the bone grows in where you want it in order to regain proper functioning of your hip. You know, for those of us that are fond of the following: walking, sitting, sleeping, and well, and life in general...

I can't decide if he doesn't want to talk about it because he doesn't think I need it (overreacting) or because he is just as scared as me but doesn't want to admit it.

Today he called me at work to let me know he found a hospital bed on craigslist - free. I don't actually know if insurance will cover it and I had mentioned that we needed to keep our eyes open.

I told him I didn't want anyone's death bed... I didn't care if it was free and did not mind at all to pay a pretty decent amount of money to make sure of this. Well apparently it was a bed in a training facility for assisted living. It was placed in a role-play room for people to train and practice the skills necessary to work with the medically fragile.

And apparently it is a beast. Several hundred pounds... all electric... took 4 adult men to get it out of the building it was housed in. I appreciate all their help!!!! One less thing to worry about. And the Mr. seems happy that we have secured this (checkmark #1), that it was free, and that he has the chance of making money selling it after I am released to move about again!

So we may not talk about it but at least I know he is thinking about me.

20 minutes of crying/driving does a body... bad

So I was picking up my kiddo from daycare...

Left my crutch in the car cause it's a short distance and only a couple stairs. Got to the front door and did the usual, kick each foot into the other to knock the snow off the bottom of my shoes... well when I kicked my right foot into my left it popped. It has been popping more and more recently - almost anytime I shift my weight from right to left.

Well this pop was a little more... um, forceful-feeling painful... I uttered a quick obscenity before the daycare provider opened the front door and I hobbled down the stairs... Got back out to the car, thinking, well hell, this still hurts...

Sat down and started my 20 minute drive home. About five minutes in after sitting through the longest red light in history... I went to press the gas and almost blacked out - $#%& that hurt. Proceeded to cry the whole way home using my right foot only for the gas and left for the brake.

Now I am sitting on the couch with a heating pad - aware that I should probably be using ice but... I am hurting, it's cold, and I don't freaking care.

Moral of the story... don't go out in the winter???