A year ago yesterday, I was told I may never read anything but large print or braille again. A year ago this Wednesday, I had double optic nerve sheath fenestration performed to halt my vision loss. Some of the loss was reversed, so I can read normal text and still work, though I can't see very well in the dark or drive or see much of anything in my periphery.
To all of you who prayed and/or sent positive thought and energy my way then, thank you for being part of that miracle. I will forever be eternally grateful.
To all of you who still pray for me and send positive thoughts and energies to me, please keep it up. I have a lot more vision to be restored, and right now, modern technology can't help, though we are moving closer. Right now, you, me, the power of positive thinking, the Divine, and our combined healing energies are the only ones who can make the miracle continue!
* Stringham high: Being able to work and read.
* Stringham low: Meh. Why get bogged down in that stuff?
* Stringham super-high: Amazingly supportive friends and family like you.
And now for the educational segment of this post! For those who are interested, the title on my blog page links to a short video bit about how science is helping some people see. There are somewhat similar techniques being worked out for blindness caused by other issues (for example, people who have damaged corneas), all slightly different because several things can cause blindness and visual impairment, so they all have to be "fixed" differently. They're also working on reversing damage that happens in the normal course of aging, which is pretty similar to the damage to my eyes. (That's why I sometimes make a crack about having "old" eyes or "old people" eyes.) Researchers haven't quite figured out how to make it work for people like me yet, because my retina is actually physically damaged rather than "simply" deficient or undergoing natural atrophy. Still, someday soon, maybe extreme visual impairment won't have to be so scary and debilitating for so many people.
Showing posts with label anniversary. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anniversary. Show all posts
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Revisiting Autumn
After a bumpy start to my evening, I finally managed to be calm, even cheerful, for most of the night. I've had a crockpot meal cooking, and several windows open to let in the fresh (and cold!--49 degrees) air. It smells like fall in our house, with the combination of fresh cold air and cooking pork, onions, and green chiles. That's great, the smell of fall, and it makes me happy.
But then I got a headache spike a little after 2 AM. It wasn't terrible, and it resolved after a few minutes, so I attributed it to the weather, as we've got a couple squall lines moving through. But then I felt anxious out of the blue. I was working--editing--and felt anxious, then started thinking about the hospital and going in for my D&C last fall. (It was a warm and rainy night when we went to the hospital with my heavy bleeding, but the next afternoon when they wheeled me down for surgery, they had the doors to the basement open and I talked with one of the doctors about how great the new first cold air of fall is, because it had just arrived that morning.) My feelings of anxiety, like my pain spike, went away fairly quickly and are mostly gone now, but a trace of them lingers, in the way that the feel of a particularly peculiar dream hangs around for a few hours after you wake up.
I wonder if these ups and downs are going to be common for the next few weeks, over the anniversary of...well, anniversaries, I guess...of the hospitalization for the miscarriage, the D&C, the beginning of my vision loss, my weeks of pain, and my eye surgery. It's been nearly a year since I've driven a car. Nearly a year since I've been able to look at my husband's face and see all its details all at once without having to shift my gaze just so.
Normally, I love fall. This year, I'm not sure how it's going to go. The next month promises to be an interesting revisit to an...interesting combination of bad and good.
Normally, I might expound upon the thought that's been chasing around in my head about autumn being the death of things preparing for rest and rebirth, and the cycle of life and healing, but tonight, I think I'll leave that for another time.
*Stringham high: autumn
*Stringham low: not-so-happy anniversaries (see above)
*Stringham super high: happy anniversaries (my parents' 36th year of marriage, my friend B's 1st year of marriage, my and Mike's 7th year of being together)
**Title links to a song that I'd like to "dedicate" in honor of those happy anniversaries and to our child, whom we never got to meet.
But then I got a headache spike a little after 2 AM. It wasn't terrible, and it resolved after a few minutes, so I attributed it to the weather, as we've got a couple squall lines moving through. But then I felt anxious out of the blue. I was working--editing--and felt anxious, then started thinking about the hospital and going in for my D&C last fall. (It was a warm and rainy night when we went to the hospital with my heavy bleeding, but the next afternoon when they wheeled me down for surgery, they had the doors to the basement open and I talked with one of the doctors about how great the new first cold air of fall is, because it had just arrived that morning.) My feelings of anxiety, like my pain spike, went away fairly quickly and are mostly gone now, but a trace of them lingers, in the way that the feel of a particularly peculiar dream hangs around for a few hours after you wake up.
I wonder if these ups and downs are going to be common for the next few weeks, over the anniversary of...well, anniversaries, I guess...of the hospitalization for the miscarriage, the D&C, the beginning of my vision loss, my weeks of pain, and my eye surgery. It's been nearly a year since I've driven a car. Nearly a year since I've been able to look at my husband's face and see all its details all at once without having to shift my gaze just so.
Normally, I love fall. This year, I'm not sure how it's going to go. The next month promises to be an interesting revisit to an...interesting combination of bad and good.
Normally, I might expound upon the thought that's been chasing around in my head about autumn being the death of things preparing for rest and rebirth, and the cycle of life and healing, but tonight, I think I'll leave that for another time.
*Stringham high: autumn
*Stringham low: not-so-happy anniversaries (see above)
*Stringham super high: happy anniversaries (my parents' 36th year of marriage, my friend B's 1st year of marriage, my and Mike's 7th year of being together)
**Title links to a song that I'd like to "dedicate" in honor of those happy anniversaries and to our child, whom we never got to meet.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Happy Mother's Day
It was cold, but we planted. M hoed and raked, and I raked and hoed, and we built mounds for our corn and transplanted our seedlings and planted 2-liter Mountain Dew bottles. We hope to corner the market on New Dew, the second-generation Dew that results from 2 Dews mating. We even threw in some Dr. Pepper and Coke bottles for good measure. The female bottles should fill up, and we harvest during gestation, and bam! Instant money-maker!
Okay, seriously, we DID plant 2-liter bottles, in a hexagonal pattern with tomato and pepper seedlings in the hexagons. The 2-liter bottles are filled with water and are meant to serve as a temperature equilibriator, protecting the plants from sudden rises and drops in temperature, which is apparently the kiss of death for tomato and pepper seedlings.
We made 30 mounds for corn and planted 4 types of corn: 3 sweet varieties and a blue corn for grinding for flour. We transplanted about 50 pepper and tomato seedlings, I'm guessing. And some cauliflower and broccoli and marigolds and chives. And we planted lavender, cilantro, dill, and sweet basil in our "herb garden" (a section of our very large "normal" garden). And then there was a row of carrots and white onions; a row of turnips, beets, and radishes (oh, and we transplanted one "volunteer" radish that Mike found in the garden); half a row of leaf and head lettuces; and some dwarf marigolds as "barriers" to some parts of the garden to help with pest control.
All in all, it was a lot of work, but not bad for about 8-10 hours. And we did all that while entertaining somewhat unexpectedly--my parents called late Saturday morning to ask if they could come visit for the night.
We are both exhausted (me so exhausted that I can't even TRY to make this post funny or entertaining), I am peeling from the sunburn I got two weeks ago, M has just added more to his standing sunburn (I swear, I'm just going to have to tackle him and put sunblock on him forcibly, or he'll never have it on), and we (of course) still have more planting to do. But we planted everything that was planned for this weekend. Tuesday, in honor of our anniversary (our agreement to always plant something on or near our wedding anniversary instead of buying each other cards or flowers or going on a date), we're planting some sunflowers.
* Stringham high: No more tilling for months! (Unless we run out of garden space...)
* Stringham low: M is so exhausted that I don't think he can remember his name, much less help me come up with an idea of a low.
* Stringham super-high: 7 more days of my contract (9 calendar days), and hello, career independence!!!!!
Okay, seriously, we DID plant 2-liter bottles, in a hexagonal pattern with tomato and pepper seedlings in the hexagons. The 2-liter bottles are filled with water and are meant to serve as a temperature equilibriator, protecting the plants from sudden rises and drops in temperature, which is apparently the kiss of death for tomato and pepper seedlings.
We made 30 mounds for corn and planted 4 types of corn: 3 sweet varieties and a blue corn for grinding for flour. We transplanted about 50 pepper and tomato seedlings, I'm guessing. And some cauliflower and broccoli and marigolds and chives. And we planted lavender, cilantro, dill, and sweet basil in our "herb garden" (a section of our very large "normal" garden). And then there was a row of carrots and white onions; a row of turnips, beets, and radishes (oh, and we transplanted one "volunteer" radish that Mike found in the garden); half a row of leaf and head lettuces; and some dwarf marigolds as "barriers" to some parts of the garden to help with pest control.
All in all, it was a lot of work, but not bad for about 8-10 hours. And we did all that while entertaining somewhat unexpectedly--my parents called late Saturday morning to ask if they could come visit for the night.
We are both exhausted (me so exhausted that I can't even TRY to make this post funny or entertaining), I am peeling from the sunburn I got two weeks ago, M has just added more to his standing sunburn (I swear, I'm just going to have to tackle him and put sunblock on him forcibly, or he'll never have it on), and we (of course) still have more planting to do. But we planted everything that was planned for this weekend. Tuesday, in honor of our anniversary (our agreement to always plant something on or near our wedding anniversary instead of buying each other cards or flowers or going on a date), we're planting some sunflowers.
* Stringham high: No more tilling for months! (Unless we run out of garden space...)
* Stringham low: M is so exhausted that I don't think he can remember his name, much less help me come up with an idea of a low.
* Stringham super-high: 7 more days of my contract (9 calendar days), and hello, career independence!!!!!
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Wish List
I couldn't force myself to be productive, per se, after we got back from our errands today, so I started in on performing MY bit of expertise. M's decided that planning the garden is his thing, so he's learning about what to plant where, how to plant certain plants next to each other, how to prevent pests, etc. So what was my expertise to be? Planning time, of course. With the planner I purchased two weeks ago specially for the occasion, I lay on the floor and grabbed one of our books from Christmas.
Three hours later, not a thing was pencilled in to our planner, and I had read only one chapter of that book, but I've added to our shopping list, added to the list of things we need for our emergency kit, and created a wish list. We decided last spring that our anniversary, because of its timing, is a perfect way to help the earth by planting something. No fancy dinners, no flowers, no cards...just me, M, a trowel or shovel, a bucket of water, and some gardening gloves.
And with all of this focus on building a home that can sustain us, we've decided that we really would prefer that people get us useful things. Not that we don't want fun things, but we're finding more and more that the useful things ARE the fun things. So we've created a little wish list, sort of like a bridal or baby registry. But this is our life registry. The perfect gifts for any occasion, in no particular order:
Three hours later, not a thing was pencilled in to our planner, and I had read only one chapter of that book, but I've added to our shopping list, added to the list of things we need for our emergency kit, and created a wish list. We decided last spring that our anniversary, because of its timing, is a perfect way to help the earth by planting something. No fancy dinners, no flowers, no cards...just me, M, a trowel or shovel, a bucket of water, and some gardening gloves.
And with all of this focus on building a home that can sustain us, we've decided that we really would prefer that people get us useful things. Not that we don't want fun things, but we're finding more and more that the useful things ARE the fun things. So we've created a little wish list, sort of like a bridal or baby registry. But this is our life registry. The perfect gifts for any occasion, in no particular order:
Books
How to Live on Almost Nothing and Have Plenty by Janet Chadwick
Managing Your Personal Food Supply: How to Eat Better for Less by Taking an Active Role in Producing, Processing, and Preparing Your Food, edited by Ray Wolf
Practical Skills: A Revival of Forgotten Crafts, Techniques, and Traditions by Gene Logsdon
The Self-Sufficient Gardener: A Complete Guide to Growing and Preserving All Your Own Food by John Seymour
Storey’s Basic Country Skills: A Practical Guide to Self-Reliance edited by Deborah Burns
When Technology Fails: A Manual of Self-Reliance & Planetary Survival by Mathew Stein
Primitive Wilderness Living & Survival Skills, by John and Geri McPherson
Diaper Changes: The Complete Diapering Book and Resource Guide by Theresa Rodriguez Farrisi
Heart & Hands: A Midwife’s Guide to Pregnancy and Birth by Elizabeth Davis
Emergency Childbirth Handbook by Barbara Anderson and Pamela Shapiro
Childbirth Without Fear
Spiritual Midwifery by Ina May Gaskin
Small-Scale Food Processing by Emma Judge and others
How to Make $100,000 from a 25-Acre Farm by Dr. Booker T. Whatley
The Legal Guide for Direct Farm Marketing by Neil Hamilton
How to Direct Market Farm Products on the Internet
Where There Is No Doctor: A Village Health Care Handbook by David Werner, Carol Thurman, and Jane Maxwell
Medicine for Mountaineering & Other Wilderness Activities by James A. Wilderson, M.D., editor
Ditch Medicine: Advanced Field Procedures for Emergencies by Hugh L. Coffee
Deck of Edible Plants
Deck of Poisonous Plants
Tools
Battery- or crank-powered weather radio
Supplies
Emergency First-Aid Kit
Knots “cheat sheet”—an 8 ½ x 11 laminated card with instructions for several key knots on each side
Old clothes or blankets that can be recycled into quilts or patches
“Umbrella” style clothes dryer or posts for clothesline
Canning supplies—especially jars (new or used) and lids, pots, cooking racks, cooling racks
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)