A month already???

Good grief Charlie Brown!

I knew it's been sometime since I posted anything in this blog, but nearly a month has passed and I've seemed to have neglected this site! It's been a crazy, close to depressing time for me. But, there is light at the end of the tunnel and I'm sure happy to see it!

I try not to gripe too much about my job. I appreciate the fact and very thankful I am fortunate enough to have a job where there are many who don't. I am human after all, and have several negative factors which have tried to work against me, the beginning stages of menopause is perhaps the worst one. I do find I'm griping more, I have weird mixed feelings about things, nothing specific really, just....well, it's hard to describe the emotions a woman goes through during this period in her life. It's not that I cannot have children, I don't have any as it is, and on March 17, 2000, an emergency surgery resulting in the loss of my Fallopian tubes took care of any wants of children then.

It's a jumble of emotions, most of which are sadness, melancholy, remorse perhaps. That main one is getting old. Many people tend to embrace this time in their lives, maybe I should and I'm trying. I look at people in their twenties, so much is still in store for them, they think they will go on forever. Teenagers who believe they are invincible, and now I know the frustrations my folks and grandparents must have suffered when they tried to offer advice. It goes in one ear and out the other for most kids. They think these people are old fuddy-duddies and don't know what they are talking about. And now I have turned into one of these people! It's funny though, I seem to think I'm logical, I tell nephews and nieces the same things I was told. Guess what I get? Blank stares, a threat of a snicker, it's like a slap in the face and that old saying of what comes around goes around? Right there is a fine example, all a person can do is sigh and say a prayer that it somehow sinks into those hard heads. I'm only happy in the knowledge that one day they will be the old fuddy-duddy, they in turn will be telling their children the same things which were told to them.

My body is doing weird things too, I'll not go into to too much detail on this. If you are a woman who has had these experiences, you know what I'm talking about. On the evening news one night last week, the subject of hormone replacement therapy was once again the topic of controversy. I told my husband that perhaps I should just go buy an electric razor or wax kit to keep the beard hairs from growing. His eyes got pretty wide until I started laughing, but I'm not kidding! Although hot flashes do not seem to be a dominant factor, I wonder, because 20 and 30 degree weather seems pretty nice. Last summer was horrible and all I wanted to do was stay indoors under the air conditioning. My boss mentioned several times about my face and neck being so red. I finally have come to the conclusion, I must have been under a hot flash warning, I may need to carry ice-packs with me to work and store them in the freezer. No kidding there, it could make all the difference in the world! I can remember mowing lawns in 90 degree heat and it not having such adverse effects, sure I got hot, but not to the point passing out, no matter how much water I drank! Another sign of the times I suppose *sigh*.



I am a happy person for the most part, but a nervous one at times. I try not to let situations get to me, talk things out amongst myself and take a deep breath. With all the crazy stuff going on inside of me, I decide it's time to quit smoking as well. On March 7th, it will be a month of no "ciggies" whatsoever! Yeah for me! Most of it has been a desire to do this for sometime but not really having the financial capability to tackle this. Thanks to our company, our insurance had a smoking cessation program and I opted for the best one. "Chantix" is a prescribed medicine and with the help of a counselor, this medicine is paid for except for co-pay. I was concerned about how this was going to do at my job, it was just too easy to pop a smoke in the mouth and puff away under stressful situations, but this medicine works wonders! The first week, I still smoked, while taking Chantix, but I had a quit date and when that day arrived, gone were the smokes, ashtrays and cigarette butts. The first night, I even put on a nicotine patch, bought a bag of cinnamon candies and a couple bags of sunflower seeds. I only went through three-quarters of a bag of seeds and a couple of the cinnamon candies, but they were not the only things I had in my arsenal, I also carry a bottle of lavender oil, one of my favorite scents and a tube of chapstick, wintergreen flavor. The lavender oil is well known to soothe ragged nerves and the chapstick is something to keep my hands busy and to keep my lips hydrated because the salt from the sunflower seeds dried them out so bad. Water has also played an important part. It helps in detoxing the body and accompanied with taking deep breaths and long, slow sips of water makes the craving pass. I thought work would be the major stumbling block, but I discovered another. At home writing. I did not realize smoking played such a major role, but it did. It was something I could do when I wanted to hash over a scene or a plot point or dialogue from a character. I could go outside and smoke and think.
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I wrote all of that yesterday and have found that it's Tuesday already. We've been waiting for a monstrous snow storm that was supposed to dump 6-10 inches of snow. As of now, at a little after six in the morning, we are expected to only get 1-3 inches of snow. Frankly, I'm glad, I won't have to put up with a bunch of it melting off, making our yard which is soggy from a drenching rain yesterday that much worse. I'll just be glad for sunny days and warmer temperatures, maybe my disposition will improve.
At work, we finally have a new person which I will start training next week, and hopefully by the end of the month I can let him go on his own. I'll only have to work a couple of days and then it's vacation! My husband has a "honey-do" list for the both of us! There is always something to be down around here and I'm far behind on getting things done.
That includes writing. It would be nice if I had a place away from the house, a small studio, all my books writing material, everything pertaining to writing could go there. No phone, and a big-assed sign saying "no admittance", a couch, fridge, hot plate/microwave, no tv and no cats! In the ideal world I could have this, I guess I could just keep on dreaming, or as the saying goes wish in one hand and spit in the other and see which one fills up the quickest would most certainly apply here.
I really have to keep reminding myself I do have a good thing, I'm just being a petty bitch. It's hard to maintain a bright, sunny outlook, but I tell myself, it could be much, much worse. I am truly thankful for what I have, because I could have nothing. Some days, I don't want to even get out of bed, yet, there are those who can't. When I want to whine and moan I stop and think about how it could be, I put it to rest.