How not to start a day-

-unable to speak, surrounded by paramedics, sensors and IV lines all over yourself, children at the foot of the bed crying, and oh yeah, NAKED. under a blankie. Oh, and sweating like a whore in sunday school. Not so much fun. So, lets not do that again.

I was sleeping, do you mind?

really really really sucketh. yet it’s my fault. and not my fault. dammitall.

So…to begin,

I am a Type 1 diabetic, juvenile onset, insulin dependent. There are two types of diabetes. 90% are Type 2, which can be caused by poor diet or being overweight, etc. Type 1 is an autoimmune disorder, usually inherited, in which the body destroys the islets in the pancreas as though they were a foreign body. Those islets are what create insulin and regulate blood sugar. Which basically means digestion of everything you eat. I don’t make insulin anymore so I have to use needles and put it in myself. I’m fairly used to that. (Though I was very much at the high end of the spectrum for juvenile-onset; I was 19 and had already had my kids before I got really sick. Could never have had them afterwards, though, so.

I'z not ded, but I playz wun for treatz. and belleh rubs.

I’m also depressed. And wiggin out. And insomniac. I had a lovely friend who told me about a lovely place here that helps primarily with mental health for those who can’t otherwise afford it. Thanks to this lovely organization I have been medicated for 2 years now. Maximum dose of Prozac, over the max dose of Wellbutrin, plus Neurontin which is experimentally used for anxiety. And Ambien-the loveliest most wonderfullest pill ever, because I can sleep like I never remember sleeping before. I’m sure I have, but I can’t remember. I go to sleep, within minutes, and I’m out-really just sleeping. I dream, and I wake up when my alarm goes off, I get the kids to school, I go to work, and I have SLEPT!!  ”With insomnia you’re never really awake; you’re never really asleep” (chuck palahniuk)

There is no such thing as too much sleep.

But see, a big problem for insulin dependent diabetics is low blood sugar, insulin shock. Because we have to shoot up and it takes a while for the insulin to really kick in, it doesn’t always coordinate with what we eat or what we’re doing. Occasionally my sugar will get too low after I’ve gone to bed. Always I have woken up. I would wake up sweaty and shaky, knowing exactly what was wrong, and I would go get juice or something and take care of it. No biggie. I ALWAYS woke up before it got too bad. And even after I started taking the Ambien, a couple of times I woke up with low sugar. So I felt confident that if there was a problem, I would still wake up. Until I didn’t.

Once or twice lately (in the last few months, not like days or weeks) BF woke me up to get some sugar in me, because I was sweating and shaking. But still out, asleep. Completely new for me. And I have been dealing with this crap for more than 10 years. So I started making a habit of checking my blood sugar before I took an Ambien at night, and making sure it wasn’t on the way down.

And I did. GODDAMMITALL, I DID!!! I checked my blood sugar Weds. night, it was at about 115. I was concerned that it was going down, so I ate a couple of chocolate chip cookies and took my handy-dandy sleeping pill.

FUCKINGODDAMMITALLTOHELL!!!

It’s my children that get me, see. Younger tried to wake me up when he was getting ready for school Thurs. morning. He couldn’t wake me up, so he got Older. Older couldn’t wake me up. (All of this is told to me, I remember nothing.) Apparently my jaw was clenched so tight they couldn’t move it. Older called BF and they figured it must be low sugar. BF had been at work since 6:00 am, BTW. He called 911. Gave them a synopsis, at which time the emergency responders called my cell to talk to Older and assess my condition.

I’m guessing they got here fairly quickly. It’s not something that waits, much. I’m told that my initial blood sugar reading was 22. Anyone that knows anything about diabetics is now picking up their jaw. Death routinely occurs at rather higher numbers than that. I should have been dead. Really. (WTF?)

So…

First Responders are the Fire Dept. and they were great (I’m told) and the EMSA ambulance and EMT’s weren’t far behind. Soon I was plugged full of holes and covered in sensors. (So I’m told.) Got some glucose directly. I know all the sugar fiends are jealous now. Add caffeine and we’ve got a dream come true, right?

I’m not sure how long afterwards I woke up. I couldn’t see properly. I tried to move, and there were wires and stuff all over. Plus, I felt like crap. And discovered that I couldn’t talk. It was all OK in my head, the words were there. But my mouth wouldn’t listen. It was in a different time zone. The rest of my body, too. I saw my kids at the foot of my bed and tried to hold my hand out to them, and it wouldn’t go right.

I guess I came back fairly quick. Once the sugar gets back up, business is back in. I heard the EMT say that my sugar was 177. Safe enough, so they took out the IV. And I was waking up and aware….that I was naked. So the lovely EMT’s started removing all the sensors etc. they had on me, and pulled the blankets over. (I was never out in the open or anything, but still!) The guy in charge started asking me questions, like “Who is the president?” and “What is today?” and all the crap they ask on TV shows!!!!! Oh Gawd.

About 15 minutes later I could talk OK. I’ll never remember any of that hour or so. My kids will never fucking forget. I did that to them. Younger thought he was watching his mommy die. So did Older, but he doesn’t let things show as much. He’s 14 and a half, after all. Younger just turned 13 two days ago. jeezus christ on a crutch.

BF was there, he was en route and not too far when the kids called, so he came home and his boss was waiting in the truck outside. So once I was coherent he left to get back to work. The kids made the decision that I wasn’t in any shape to drive them to school, and that they should stay home to keep an eye on me anyway. The bit that makes me feel really guilty is that I think they meant it, more than they wanted to get out of school.

I had sweated enough to soak through my pillow and the sheets, and I was wet and cold and miserable. So I got in the shower, and then I took a nap on the couch, where Younger woke me up often to make sure I was OK. Then I started washing sheets and blankets, etc. And really contemplating and getting down and depressed and hating me.

SO. I’ve promised the kids I won’t take the sleeping pills, and I’ll be more careful of my sugar. And they are planning on waking me up every 6 hours or so just to make sure. Oh yeah, apparently I was foaming at the mouth. For reals. Oy vey. So, yeah. I can’t remember a whole lot, couldn’t identify a single one of the firemen or EMT’s surrounding my bed. I’m forever grateful, though, and of course don’t know how to tell them so. So, any and all: Firemen (women) EMT’s, police, any person who will hop in a truck and take off at a second’s notice to save a stranger: Thank You. I owe you my life.

Really really. It is very hard to accept, to realize, to fully grasp. I. Should. Have. Died. 22. My sugar was fucking 22. And I was gone. Would never have woken up. Now, later, all fine and dandy, it’s easy to think it’s no big deal. Just another episode of low blood sugar, right? But no. Soooo not taking the Ambien. for a while at least. If I can get it figured out, foolproof, I would love to be able to take it. I’ve never slept so well in my life. But, y’know, death is a lot more sleepy-full. Rather too much so.

I don’t know how much this will affect my kids. My poor, awesome kids, without which I would not be here right now. I’m bawling. My poor babies. I did that to them. It wasn’t on purpose and I tried not to, but still, I’m an adult responsible for her own body etc. and it was my own fault if it was anyone’s. DAMMITALL.

I am so sorry.

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Pre-Existing Condition – Can’t Wait for Health Care Reform

I feel very bitch/babble/rant tonight. Awake, as always. Ok, my spacebar isn’t cooperating. That just pisses me off. Lets start there…

just google “birds and bees”

Ok, I’m on a deadline here. cuz I just took my Ambien and I’m gonna be good and go to bed when it kicks in. BF is trying to tell me I was up until 5 am yesterday, but I’m pretty damn sure I didn’t stay up that late.

an interesting development…teenage boy, 13.5, was caught on the computer very early this morning, before school. closed the window & acted uncomfortable when BF walked in. So I checked the history. Boy has been googling salacious materials. A bunch of different searches, a few different sites visited, all variations of a ‘girl-on-girl’ theme. yup. So anyhow, I kinda thought about it all day, trying to figure out how I was going to react. What eventually happened is that I drove him to meet his scout troop for a campout, and I brought it up in the car on the way. something like,

“So, I was on the computer in the living room today. Did you know that you can go in and check the history, even what people have searched for in google?”

(silence from boy)

“You were on the computer this morning, huh? Before school?”

“Yeah, after I took a shower.”

I said, “AFTER your shower? I woulda thought it would be before.” (He takes nice long showers. A lot more often than he used to.)

Then I said, “You’re not watching this stuff with your brother around, right?” “no” “Promise?” “yes. He wasn’t in there.”

So then I went into my monologue.

“You’re not in trouble, ok? I just want you to talk to me. That stuff won’t teach you all the details you need to know, trust me. But I understand that you are a 13 year old boy, and that totally goes with the territory. I just want you to know that if you need something, you can talk to me.”

“Uh, like what do you mean?”

“Like, if you have questions about something. If you need condoms maybe.”

“mom, no. I’m not stupid. I know I’m not ready for all that.”

“Well, a lot of people your age aren’t that smart. So it’s better to have some layin around just in case, rather than wishing you had some or stressing about it in the middle of a moment.”

(And yes, I do think that 13.5 is still too young to be experimenting with the opposite sex like so. Right now, he’s at the age to explore himself, and that includes finding out what pitches his tent. I imagine that involves narrowing it down from ‘all women sexy’ to certain types of women, stereotypes I’m sure, but it’s a start.)

“So anyway,” I says to the boy, “I’m not mad, there’s nothing wrong with it. I ask that you be discreet because you have a younger brother. If you want some magazines or something so you can look at those pictures in the privacy of your room, we can arrange that. (he seemed interested in that idea.) If you need tissues and baby oil, let me know.”

by then he’s just embarassed as all hell, but I think we’ve done fairly well so far at keeping those lines of communication open, so it wasn’t too bad and I was too. So, I told him that I didn’t grow up with a brother, so there’s a whole lot about male puberty that I’m just not aware of, but I’ll do my best to help out, if he has questions. I told him that I know a lot of things are going on, for boys and girls, during puberty, and it’s a stressful, mostly horrible time to go through.

I can see down your shirt.

I hope I handled it well, I hope I said the right things. He is a very good boy, and he does talk to me about problems. I guess we shall see. I think we are getting to a boundary that I am very fuzzy about. How much of my own past should I disclose to him during our discussions of teenage life? I already know that, to get to the point where we’re best pals isn’t the best way to go, because he’s still early teen, and he’s going to need guidance and discipline for a few years yet. So I can’t just become the buddy.

Ok, Ambien is kickin my ass so I’m outta here. stay tuned for more episodes of  “Awkward Talks with a Teenage Boy”

just something to make it until tomorrow again

no

I’m so not good right now. It’s nearly 6 am. I’m still up. Getting kinda goofy now, but not really sleepy. haven’t been sleeping much for a week or so now. yes, I have pills that’ll knock me out. but all day I feel so tired, so depressed, so nothing…  then at night, I have energy, I want to do things, I cleaned the kitchen and made dinner and did some laundry. I cleaned some.  I almost organized all the movies. thought about adding books to my database. I’d like to have lists, on my computer y’know, of all my books, and movies. I always think I have stuff, like, “Oh, I have that movie” or “I don’t have that book yet, I’ll buy it.”  which is how I end up with 3 copies of Needful Things. which isn’t one of my faves.

So lets try to get it all out, right? nobody is reading this, I’m not bothering anyone. I’m all twitchy because I don’t want to wake anyone up, making noise. my cats have fleas. the little one was swarmed when I got him, and he’s being treated. Sprayed with Adam’s thoroughly and often. We see the fleas dropping off him afterwards. I was getting snuggles from Big Love earlier and saw several fleas in his fur. He doesn’t seem to mind them much, which is why I didn’t know he had them. Ferg has some skin thing going on, so he’s always scratching. I keep telling myself I’m going to start giving him regular baths with head & shoulders, see if it helps. But we’ve got to get rid of the damn fleas. I think maybe I’m just about fucking over this climate. You really don’t appreciate something until it’s gone. I always complained that I hated the desert, wanted to live somewhere green and alive. well, there’s lots of alive. and a lot of it is icky and crawly and evil. roaches in the kitchen, fleas on the cats, and I can’t walk down the street without being paranoid that a tick is going to paratroop down onto me and get frisky. I get rather twitchy just thinking about it. I don’t like bugs. admitting, even to myself, that my kitchen has roaches just kills me. I never say their name. I just say there’s ‘bugs’ in the kitchen. it makes me feel like such trash, ghetto disgusting things. Cat messes and kid messes I can deal with. just take away the insects.

in case you can’t tell, the reason I’m so upset about the bugs is because I can’t do anything about them. I do try to kill the ‘bugs’ in the kitchen, to keep it clean, put the traps and power around, all that jazz. but it does rather seem like they are impossible to get rid of. I fucking hate them. and I feel guilty about the cats. I should be able to take care of them and provide for them properly. but I can’t afford to frontline them all. I’m mad at myself.

I’m sorta kinda looking for work. sent out my resume, but I’m awful at cover letters. and I don’t customize my resume for each job. it’s so stressful, I want it to be perfect, the awesome resume and cover letter, different and unique but reassuring and confidence-inspiring. and I know they’re not, and I don’t know how to make them be. I google it every time, how to write an awesome resume & letter, it just all seems so cliche and manipulative. and I don’t really want to go back to work. I’ve gotten in a rut, lounge around, watch TV, munching & grazing. I bitch & moan every time I have to wear a bra and any pants other than pajamas. seriously, all my laundry is pajamas. I hated getting up early and always being late anyway, frustrations and stresses of work, the constant battle against the clock vs. the paycheck. like, yes I would love to leave early on fridays. but I’m also fond of having electricity and a phone. it just fucking blows. and I know that I could do things from home, could probably do fairly well at it. editing, proofreading, maybe even writing. I just don’t know where to go, how not to get scammed. I need to do something. the holidays are coming up and we just keep getting further behind.

a collections agent actually got ahold of me last week. someone switched to a new collections company, so the number was new, and I answered it. I talked to the woman honestly, said, yes I know I owe money. but being unemployed means I don’t have the means to do a damn thing about it. and she said something about me needing to be aware of the consequences. um, yeah. thanks. y’know, I’m already going to the free crazy clinic for my prozac and ambien. they don’t generally prescribe the heavy stuff. if I can’t have some valium, I need everyone to stay off my back.

boy 2 is giving me stress. trouble at school, trouble at scouts. lying and acting out, I know he’s snowing this counselor just like he did the last one. of course if he’s getting one-on-one attention he’s great. that’s what he wants out of life. but the rest of the time, when someone isn’t being paid (once again, at the guv’ment welfare clinic) to listen to him, he still wants at least that much attention. and he will manufacture anything and everything to get it. hence the problems. there is no attention to be gained by quietly learning or doing homework. and I feel so shitty every time I shoo him away or tell him to wait a minute when he starts talking. but I know he knows when I’m trying to do something, or pay attention to something else, or trying to defuse a bomb, and that’s when he is the most insistent that he needs to ask me if ferrets could live on the moon and he wants a roller coaster for christmas. valium? pls? ativan. lithium. thorazine? vodka. but that occasionally causes projectile vomiting of a truly impressive distance. and volume. which generates a lot of cleaning for me, hence the downside. and I don’t want my kids on the montel williams show talking about mom the drunk. I mean, it’s true, I just don’t want it to be obvious.

a couple of times now I have taken the ambien and stayed up on purpose. it’s rather groovy feeling, floaty-like. but I’m still feeling productive, want to get stuff done. get the crock pot going, including actual potatoes that I peeled and chopped me-self. send out a resume or two and make a couple of phone calls. actually, what I really really want is to go buy the fourth season of Bones. I think it’s getting sick. I NEED to look at all the bills, see what someone is about to shut off and pay it. pay the rest of the rent. hey, guess what we’re not gonna have on Dec. 1st! RENT MONEY! they’ve been very nice thus far, but they are hinting that they have other properties, like apartments, that we might be able to better afford. jesus humping christ on a silver crutch, I really hate apartments. I hate shit jobs, call centers, cashiers, ‘customer service associates.’ drones. sheep. shit on the bottom of one’s shoe. I feel like I’m better than that, worth more than that. but how do I convince a total stranger of that within a minute? getting a job isn’t exactly cake and pie right now. and looking for him too. I thought I was lazy and unmotivated. wow. maybe that’s one reason I let him stick around. makes me feel less lazy and awful. but at the same time, depressing and dragging my ass down with him. it’s the sort of thing I excell at. finding a guy who can ruin my life in as many ways as possible in the shortest amount of time, and hanging on to him like my life depended on it, rather than being rational and moving onward and upward. well, down with the ship then, captain! how else?

so why don’t I want to sleep? why have I been up all night? avoiding the pills that’ll knock me out for a while. time is going by too quickly. I keep telling myself I’m going to do things, make it better, suck it up, be an adult and fix it. and then I sleep all day and think about how shitty it all is and how it’s never going to get better.

depressed, adopt another cat, eat some chocolate, look at lolcats.

and another day is gone, and another day is gone.

I don’t want to get dressed and go to scouts,

I don’t want to get dressed and go to the grocery store,

I don’t want to see anyone. I don’t want to think about anything.

I’ll think about it tomorrow.

tomorrow is another day, can’t think about it today,

can’t do anything about it today,

they’re probably out to lunch or they’re closed by now

or I can’t do it right now, I need to find a paper first.

something anything a pill a drink a funny

to make it all stop.

for another day.

wait, what?

and I'm losing my religion...

I don’t really know what I’m doing here right now.  I just took the Pill. Ambien is wonderful stuff. If one doesn’t knock me out within 30 minutes, I take another. Sure, if I was employed I would quickly become unemployed again, for much the same reasons I became unemployed to begin with. But sleep is one of the most wonderful things on earth. It sucks so fuckin bad not to be able to GO to sleep. I’m not gonna bitch about wanting to STAY asleep longer in the morning. or afternoon, whatever. the boyfriend sleeps about 18 hours a day, and he’s not taking a sleeping pill. and he doesn’t care one way or the other if he stays in bed all day or does something constructive. I just don’t get it I guess.