Monday, November 28, 2011

a few weekend pics.

thanks for the awesome fort, Uncle C.!

so, so sleepy post food.

the awesome Abbey.

naptime for kiddies.

sweet Oskar.

Grandma Jen getting love from Olive.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Monday, November 21, 2011

confession time:

some days i feel my heart get all weirdy and i then have to spend the next 15 minutes doing breathing that will calm me down. not calm my heart down, bc really that little palipatation lasted about 1 second. nope, just breathing that will calm me down from worry about my heart. which i shouldn't worry so much over.
after brammy died of a heart attack i got increasingly worried about my health, bc even though he had some health issues, he was only 33. every heartburn that seems to come out of nowhere, every skipped beat sends a speed-of-thought message to my brain that signals for my panic to kick in.
also, every so often i get an aura migraine, which is scary and makes me worry i'm having a stroke. which is unlikely, but even just the migraine stuff is hard when you have little ones -- first sign is usually vision issues in one eye to the point where i can't see without having a black spot where one eye is trying to focus. then the dysphasia, which is the inability to speak using the correct words for things. then hand/tongue numbness. and, if you have any history with panic, you know that tingling fingers is a part of panic, which means if i sense a slight tingle, it flags my brain as "PANIC NOW! MIGRAINE ON THE WAY!"
why am i confessing all this? i don't know, i feel like it's some dirty little secret that i'm tired of carrying all on my own (although dustin knows about it) and i'm so fucking tired of being afraid so much. it was really bad when i was at home alone with the little kids more -- it would get so overblown that a slight feeling of dread would balloon into what felt like my arms being on fire - necessitating dustin to come home from work bc i was sure something bad was happening to me and the little ones would be all alone and scared and abandoned.
i've even gotten a fucking SELF-HELP CD that i listen to when i have the slightest sense of anxiety that is unwarranted. (it's from a company in the UK, so they could be reading out of the phonebook but the accent alone seems to help me out.) yep, i'm that person. i've stopped drinking soda with caffeine bc it never fails - i go overboard with it (bc coca-cola is the most awesome-est beverage on the planet) and BOOM -- racing heartbeat. feeling of dread that comes from raching heartbeat, and then my brain can't be stopped.
monday i will be tested for all things allergic and if it's in the clear, my next move will be to buy the biggest bag of cashews EVER. (and, fun fact, cashews can help with anxiety. WIN.)

*update
i just ate a slice of pecan pie because my love of pecan pie, which i have not had in years, outweighed my fear of allergic reaction. i'm pretty sure the fluffy lips feeling i experienced was psychosomatic, but we'll see ... and the fact that i'm not FREAKING out over this shows that blogging about all this crap has helped me a little bit.

**update 2
no unusual allergic reactions. YAY PIE!

***update 3 (just two minutes later than previous update)
my throat feels sore -- not itchy, but like i have a tender throat when i swallow. probably unrelated. STAY TUNED!

****update 4
just heard that allergic reactions can take up to TWO hours to show up. are you fucking kidding me?

Wednesday, November 09, 2011

Random thought ...

that popped into my head: the art collection at the Minot public library. I have no idea why, but suddenly I was remembering walking through the aisle that displays the collection you can actually rent. then I started thinking about the hours spent using the card catalog to find books, the tapes I'd check out, I can even recall the smell of the place. I've not heard about the damage the library sustained in the flood, but I'm guessing it must've been substantial. I miss that library.
I was sort of planning it to be a crappy, stressful night -- and it mostly wasn't, except that poor Olly had a fever. now sleeping feels like what I really need.

and then there are the days ...

... where if i think too much about certain stuff, i'll just fall apart. blergh.
 

Thursday, November 03, 2011

pictures! lots of pictures! and exclamation points!


me and the youngest larson sister.

sweet oskar.
lunch at sammy's pizza - always a win.

us girls.

olive loves grandma jen.


what a face.

sleepy birthday girl.

"olive's birthday, blah blah blah ..."

3 of 4 sisters plus a lil olive.

olive explaining something important to auntie m.


gnome olive!

mmm ... cake.

"i'm one!"


she loves her aunt.

"yayyy!"