Asphalt, Metal, Composite? What’s Your Favorite Shingle?

I am not talking about the roofing for our new home.

Heck,
we don’t even have a bid on construction yet.
(We get the first bid tomorrow 2/01)
It’s a little soon to be deciding asphalt over composite.

I’m talking about the kind that is more commonly known as
”Herpes zoster”

What the….?

Herpes zoster is the other name for a medical condition known as
SHINGLES!

Which is the newest diagnosis I received today.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

This morning when I woke up, I still wasn’t feeling great, and that surprised me.
I thought I’d have a little relief since I took my antibiotics as prescribed.
Surely, some of the swelling should have gone down.
Some of the pain should have decreased.
Maybe the redness of my face mountains wouldn’t be so vibrant….

It didn’t happen.
As a matter of fact, as I slept, a new face mountain erupted.
This time on my chin.
I was still in the same amount of pain.
Swelling was as big as ever.

Also, I was awoken at about 5 am by a weird sensation.
I felt things moving inside my face!!
The sensation – kind of a tingly feeling – would start in the middle of one of my sores,
and trickle down my face.
Or it would start in the swollen area and inch its way across my cheek bone.
Sometimes it just felt like a hair was brushing across my face… or a tiny spider walking across my skin.

YUCK!

After I ate breakfast, I discovered another sore.
This time on my tongue. In the back of my throat.
And more on my lips.
And the tip of my tongue.

And I began to worry.
Really worry.

Thankfully, there was time in the doctor’s schedule for me to come back.
He was just as concerned as yesterday.
Probably a little more.
And he was still as confused.
He grabbed a colleague and had this man come look at my face, in my ear.
Then I had TWO confused faces staring at me.
Talking about me like I wasn’t in the room.

Finally, a decision was made.
It was time to get aggressive.
Send Betty to the hospital for a CAT Scan, CBC.
Worst case scenario would be possible hospital admittance for IV hook-up of antibiotics.
Best case scenario, have an ENT doctor review my scan and get a diagnosis from that.
We were all voting for the Best Case.

I have never had a CAT Scan before.
Yuck.
I hear it’s better than an MRI, and I guess it is.
But I sometimes get motion sick and sure enough,
as the table was moving back and forth in that little circle of imaging technology,
I had to just close my eyes and hold on.
And I was certain I wet my pants when the contrast dye started working itself through me.
Thankfully, I didn’t.

To make a long day and a long story short:
There were no large masses or growths in my jaw.
That’s GOOD NEWS!

Off to the ENT I went.
He walked into the room, took one look at my face, looked in my ear and rambled off
slkjdasglajeialfdkjadf.

Yep. That’s exactly what I heard him say.
But then he spoke in people speak and said,
”Betty, my dear Betty, you have shingles of the inner ear.”

Maybe not that familiar, but you get the gist.

I HAVE SHINGLES!

While that may be a devastating diagnosis
and I’m certainly not happy about it,
I’m happy to have a diagnosis.

I will start a nice cocktail of medicines to aid in my recovery.
I feel like an 80 year old woman:
I have shingles (not the usual disease of a 25 year old…. )
And I have to get a days-of-the-week pill case to help me remember what
medicines I have to take each day.
Next week I buy the support hose and the blue hair tint.

But the best news is that I will get better.
The sores and “blistering rash” will go away.
My 3rd and 4th chins will disappear.
I’ll be able to hear again.
And my mouth won’t hurt so much when I try to smile.
That’s the best news of all!

Cancer, A Leper & Mumps. Oh My!

What do you do when you wake up and you find large lumps on your neck,
in your glands under your ear?

Do you immediately start planning your funeral,
because
LUMPS + NECK =
Almost certain death by a highly incurable form of aggressive cancer?

And after you get past the shock of your impending doom, you look in the mirror
and gasp when you see

LARGE BUMPS GROWING ON YOUR FACE
THAT YOU THOUGHT WERE ZITS WHEN YOU WENT TO BED LAST NIGHT,
BUT IN THE LIGHT OF THE MORNING, YOU REALIZE THEY
HAVE GROWN EXPONENTIALLY
AND IN NO WAY RESEMBLE A PIMPLE ANY MORE.

Well, of course, you start packing your bags.
You know you’re being sent to the Isle of Lepers.
Never to return.

So, you sit down and put your face in your hand
overwhelmed by your looming demise,
when you pick up the phone to call your mommy.

After describing your symptoms, she calms you down.
Of course it’s not cancer.
Those are GLANDS not LYMPH NODES!

Whew!

She has no explanation for the mountains on your face,
but she has an explanation for the swollen glands.

MUMPS

“But Mom, didn’t you immunize me when I was a kid?”

“I don’t know! Maybe I did? I wasn’t immunized. I’ve never had them.
But I think you ought to go to the doctor.”

“I’m waaaay ahead of you, Mom. My appointment is tomorrow.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ok. My week wasn’t really as dramatic as all that.
But I was quite concerned as I’ve watched my neck and face grow and swell.

And the pain?

Holy Hell.
(Sorry. Heck just doesn’t cut it.)

The whole right side of my face and neck is throbbing and pulsing.
And tingling.

So I went to the doctor.
He took a look at me and started asking questions.
As I answered, I watched his face.
I watched the concern growing.
I watched confusion deepening.
I heard him say,
”I’m not gonna lie. I’m very worried about you.
No. It’s not cancer.
No. It’s not leprosy.
No. It’s not the mumps.
No. You’re not dying.
I really don’t know what it is.”

He kept pushing and prodding.
He had me bite down on a tongue depressor
and apologized when I yelled out in pain.

He told me that I have a
HORRIBLE INFECTION in the gland that lies under your ear.
The Parotid Gland to be exact.

His diagnosis:
Parotitis
But he doesn’t sound totally convinced as he says it.

He prescribes the strongest antibiotic he can think of.
I have to make a follow-up appointment for day after tomorrow.
If it’s not better, I have to have an emergency appointment with an
Ear/Nose/Throat doctor.

Here’s the kicker.
I actually feel ok.
Except the right side of my face.
The rest of me is doing great!
I don’t have a fever (go figure!)
I’m not contagious.
I have no restrictions on my activities.

Here’s the freaky part:
(this could get gross)
There are times I can actually feel the infection moving under my skin.

HOLY COW!!

And the mountains on my face tingle and itch.
It’s like they have a life of their own.
Sometimes I think this could happen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XU1MAokrrUk

He said I could take
”Vitamin I” (ibuprofen)
for the pain, which does help.
In the meantime, I’m taking my antibiotics as prescribed.
And praying.
This will get better.
I will be able to travel to Flatlandia to visit Flynn this weekend.
My face will un-swell.
And the mountains will become flat and leave the
Valley of Betty.

And all of this will happen magically
TONIGHT
while I sleep!

Here you go!
(self-portrait from my iPhone. It’s the best I could do.)
The mountain by my mouth is obviously the largest.
The one on my upper cheek is still growing.
And I’ve got a new one on my temple

Can you see the lump under my jaw?
Not to be confused with my waddle.
My cheek at the back of my face is also swollen.
You can’t see my ear area which also is enlarged.
Yes, even my EAR is swollen.
SAY WHAT?!?!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

P.S. I promise I’m ok. I just have never had anything like this happen before. The doctor said is rare but not unheard of. I know I’ll be okay. And live to tell another dramatic story.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I’m going to make a long post even longer, but I’d like to end on a funny note.
Scooter asked me today how I was feeling.
(He’s a considerate boy.)
And I said,
”Well, I’m not going to die.”

This is his response:

”Mom,
We’re all dying.
Every day we wake up,
we’re one day closer to death.”

I can’t make this stuff up. He really said that.

Johnny “Scooter” Cash

If you know my son,
you know what a
HUGE
M.J. fan he is.

If you’re a fan too, you know exactly who I’m talking about.
Of course you know who M.J. is!
For the less literate, (or more musically well rounded)
I’ll just tell you that M.J. is non other than
Michael Jackson.

Scooter used to take dance lessons.
He started at age 3 and danced until the end of kindergarten.
He wasn’t the only boy in his class.
At one point there were FOUR boys in the class with him!
Oh yes.
We were very progressive mothers in this ultra conservative town of Zion.

However,
when classes went from being a
“creative movement”
type of class
to a more
”traditional ballet”
(i.e. plies, fouette, glissade, etc.)
type of class,
the brakes were applied and classes for the boys skidded to a halt.
It was just too “girly” for their tastes.
(We tried to recruit more boys to have an all boy’s hip-hop class, but weren’t successful.
People around here are very resistant to putting boys in a dance class!)

Anyway….. I digress….
Scooter’s very last dance recital’s theme was non other than
MICHAEL JACKSON!

All the dances were choreographed to MJ or J5 or J.J. (Janet Jackson) songs.

(this dance was to Rockin’ Robin ^^)

(I have no clue what this dance was! ^^)

So, through his dance class, the boy was introduced to the musical stylings of M.J.
And the boy became a fan.
A HUGE fan!

And then, the biggest tragedy of Scooter’s short life,
M.J. died.
It was seriously, the month after recital.
Scooter was devastated and his obsessive fandom grew bigger.

° We listened to MJ on the iPod
° We bought MJ books
(disclaimer … all MJ books had to be approved by a parental unit!)
° He acquired an MJ calendar
° Scooter learned how to moonwalk
° A rhinestone glove came to reside in Scooter’s bedroom
and was worn outside of the home on numerous occasions
° Finally a CD was purchased so we could turn off the iPod and give mom a break!
° During soccer season, Flynn was trying to motivate our young player and bribed him.
Scooter was told that if he kicked a goal, Dad would take him to the store and buy
him an MJ Video.
Sure enough, Scooter actually scored a goal that night,
All the other parents chuckled when Scooter came running, at top speed, off the field yelling,
”Dad did you see that? Now you have to buy me a Michael Jackson video!”
° You get the picture, right?

So, this obsession went on for… 3.5 years.
Approximately.

Until…

One day….

The Man in Black
came on the iPod.

Immediately, the boy was entranced.
° The deep bass voice.
° That silly song about “A Boy Named Sue”
° (GASP!) A man that swears in music
° The deep bass voice
° A singer that was a “manly man”
° Interestingly enough, he can’t stand to listen to June Carter Cash!

All of a sudden, Johnny Cash was the main request when we were traveling down the interstate.
And then, Santa put a Johnny Cash CD in Scooter’s stocking.
After that, all bets were off.

Michael WHO?!?!?

(Time for a funny “Scooterism” story insert:
One day, Scooter’s best friend Bulls Eye was over playing.
They always get along and respect each other’s differences in opinions and tastes.
It’s really a great friendship!
Well, Scooter really wanted to share his love for JC
so he brought his CD player down to the living room and very excitedly turned on
his new CD.
At first, Bulls Eye was receptive.
But after a minute or two, he finally said,
”Ummmm…. this is gross!”
So then Scooter turned off the music,
had Bulls Eye sit down on a chair,
and started to read to him out of a new book he’d just gotten!
Poor Bull’s Eye!
Scooter really loves sharing things he’s passionate about!
I can’t wait for him to be a missionary!)

Back to our regularly scheduled blog:

Scooter now listens exclusively to The Man In Black.
He takes the CD player into the bathroom and blares it while he’s showering.
Flynn gave Scooter his (very) old iPod Touch and 90% of the music is JC,
so he carries it around the house listening.
(In case you’re wondering, the other 10% of the music is
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Ray Stevens.
There is NO MJ on his iPod!!
I’m still trying to figure this kid out.)
He listens to the CD or the iPod as he goes to sleep at night.
I’m not kidding or exaggerating when I say that one night he put
”Ring of Fire”
on repeat and that blasted (insert fave swear word here) song
played for an hour before I realized
it was on repeat.
If I have a song running through my head in quiet times, it’s
”Ring of Fire.”
(Are YOU singing it now?)

I had to video Scooter when we were driving to visit Flynn one weekend recently.
It was just too great of a moment to miss.
I’m going to share it with you today.
And yes, Scooter would be mad.
Today.
But hopefully, he’ll appreciate it in a few years.

(Yes, I lied at the end! I was videoing him! He gets mad at me!
But some of these spontaneous moments need to be captured and preserved.
And I would never get them if he knew I was videoing.)

Instagram

I love Instagram!

Love

LOVE

LOVE

Instagram!

I can’t convey the depths of the love I feel for that app.

I love it even more now that I have an iPhone that takes
much better pictures than my old, dumb DROID X.

Here are some of my favorite pics that I put on Instagram.
(Some also went onto FB… but not all pics make it to FB. I like to keep the two medias separate.)

A Pick-Me-Up

Ok….

Enough with Debbie Downer. I can’t leave such a “BLAH” post sitting on my blog, all alone for the next month. We need to perk it up just a bit around here!

Does this work?

DO YOU KNOW WHAT THIS IS?!?!?

The architect finished the plans for our house!!
This is the front and back view of the Craftsman Style house we hope to build in the coming months.
♫ (See? I used the “H” word!) ♫

I’m trying not to get too anxious about it.
But the architect worked real hard on it,
we gave him a lot of ideas and (I think) were very patient and
FINALLY
we believe we’ve got a great house designed that will be enjoyable to live in.

So, yes, we
HOPE
that things come together in the next couple weeks
so that we can break ground on our new home by March.

Please,
CROSS YOUR FINGERS, TOES, EYES, LEGS (WHATEVER CROSSES)
SAY A PRAYER
LIGHT A CANDLE
PUT A PIN IN THE VOO DOO DOLL
RUB THE RABBIT’S FOOT
WHATEVER YOU DO FOR LUCK….
that this will work out in our favor.
PLEASE?!?

Is Hope Shining Brightly Before Me?

That line in the Hymn We Thank Thee O God For a Prophet has always made me smile. There’s an old joke running around in church circles about an overly pregnant church chorister named Hope leading this song in sacrament meeting and the line “and we know that deliverance is nigh” made the entire congregation burst out laughing.

I have struggled writing a post about Hope.

I struggle with being too personal, trying to remember this is not exactly a private space and some of my thoughts should be recorded in my journal instead of here where any random Joe could read what I’m thinking. But then again, I don’t want to turn my blog into a Christmas letter where I portray everything as peachy and hunky dory, like we live in a world where there is only rainbows and sunsets and balloons, because… LIFE ISN’T LIKE THAT!

So here goes. I’ve decided to give a Reader’s Digest condensed version.

2012 was a stinky year. It was AWFUL! Nothing worked out the way we hoped, the way we wanted, or the way we dreamed it should. We felt like we were following our heart and had inspiration in all the decisions we made, and yet, every time we decided to move forward in something…

BAM!!!

We ran into a brick wall.

And I can tell you, that after that many disappointments and heartbreaks, a person starts protecting their feelings.

In my case, that lovely lady named HOPE, standing in front of the congregation singing about deliverance, walked to the back door and left.

Yep. Hope was gone and absent from my life. She left and didn’t leave a forwarding address or phone number.

Anytime someone would mention the future or a dream or a plan, I might agree with it outwardly, but deep down I’d scoff. I stopped believing that anything good would happen. I stopped planning for the future.

For me, a naturally optimistic person, that’s huge.

Then one day in Relief Society, the president gave a lesson about The Abundant Life. (What is an “Abundant Life?” The answer is in John 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”)

She asked me to participate in the lesson by reading several quotes. I believe this woman was inspired. I believe that I needed to read those quotes out loud, because I needed to pay attention in class that day. (I’m known to zone out frequently in class.) This woman was also inspired the next day to drop by my house and catch me at one of my lowest points. When she saw my eyes and nose swollen from hours of crying, she ran home and brought me back a copy of the lesson, so I could have it to refer back to.

As I have continued to attend church and try to pay attention more in my classes and really listen, I have learned more about faith. I have learned that without Hope you cannot have faith (Moroni 10:20). I have learned that Heavenly Father really does love me and my family and even though things are really hard, we can get through them.

And Hope has started maneuvering her way back into my life. She’s coming slowly…. like molasses slow … but I realized today, for the first time in months that I look forward to the future and I could actually see something working in our favor!

As I read the Relief Society lesson left to me by that caring president, different quotes affect me differently at different times. But the quotes that stand out the most are about attitude:

“Jesus’ teachings help us to have a correct view of life and our circumstances. Sometimes the solution is not to change our circumstances, but to change our attitude about that circumstance and its difficulties so that we see more clearly our opportunities for more [abundance]” – Spencer W. Kimball

“So much in life depends on our attitude. The way we choose to see things and respond to others makes all the difference. To do the best we can and then to choose to be happy about our circumstances, whatever they may be, can bring peace and contentment.” – President Thomas S. Monson

Have things finally worked out for me and my family? No they  haven’t. But today we think we may have found an answer to long asked for prayer. Do I have hope that this is the solution to our problem? Hmmmm…. that’s an interesting question. I want to have hope. I want to believe that things will improve for us. I want that light at the end of the tunnel to be shining brightly, offering deliverance, but I still have to proceed with caution. Hope is knocking at the door.

(One more quote sent to me by my dear sister who has been a rock for me through this year.)

“In this sad world of ours sorrow comes to all and it often comes with bitter agony. Perfect relief is not possible except with time. You cannot now believe that you will ever feel better. But this is not true. You are sure to be happy again. Knowing this, and truly believe it will make you less miserable now. I have had enough experience to make this statement.” – Abraham Lincoln

Disclaimer: I don’t claim to own all the stock in suffering. I know and understand that there are people out in the world whose problems are far worse than mine. I haven’t lost a child, my marriage is strong, my family is healthy. Thankfully, I never lost the ability to recognize the blessings I do have, and I have many. I began keeping a gratitude journal several months ago to help remind me of these facts.