GAH!

Though I'm lil Miss TMI, I'm not one to share THIS much. I'm having one of the worst cases of ADHD I've experienced in a long time. It's horribly frustrating. It's preventing me from sleeping at night and then I'm just dead in the morning. I can't concentrate on work to save my life. It could be a manic state, I'm not sure. I just know that I'm going nuts.

After 2 hours of having that paragraph sitting in a facebook update, waiting for me to hit ENTER, I decided to not share it.

I think what is happening is a response to letting someone go who ... this is unbearable. I feel so alone. I know in my head that I'll feel better tomorrow or the next day... not perfect but better and not so alone. But I just want to cry myself to sleep and wish I had someone to be here with me.

I'm utterly paralyzed. I don't know what to do, so I'll just go to bed.

Something funny that just juxtaposed on my computer...

What is it with me and Bowie’s death? Bring me the Disco King song came on and I started crying again.




I get sad when folks die. I feel sad when celebrities die, but I’m over it pretty quick, like minutes… blips of emotion. Mostly because 1. I didn’t know them in person, 2. death is the end of suffering and 3. I know people just die, nothing I can do will stop that. I enjoyed much of Bowie’s work, but not enough to own everything he put out, probably only 3 or 4 albums. I watched him act in movies, saw him speak to interviewers, admired his poise and his wife. What is it about him? Why has his death hit me like this?

Jesus! So much blood!!!

Squeamish folks not interested in the science of a woman's menstrual cycle... close this window. Read no further.

NOTE: My life doesn't suck and I'm basically a rather happy person. I just need to get this shit off my chest so I don't dwell on it any more and I can remain happy.

My menstrual cycle has been terribly inconsistent for many years. One of my periods lasted 9 weeks and the two bookend periods lasted 7 weeks. I consider myself lucky that they are down to 3 weeks. And, when I say period, I mean lots of blood. I don't have any reason for regular, medium or plus tampons. It's either super plus or 2X... and a pad. The time between periods can be as little as a week and as much as 5 weeks. So I go between being annoyed at 'this, again???' to 'I sure as shit better not be pregnant'. Good times.

Yes, I've talked to my general practitioner(s) and my gynecologist. Poking and prodding has been done ad nauseum. Nothing abnormal has been found. Though I have been warned to go immediately to the hospital if I bled completely through a large tampon in an hour for a few hours in a row. Since I never felt more than rather tired, no blood-pressure drop feeling, I haven't followed that. All they will do is stuff me full of cotton and monitor me till it's done. I'm not waiting around in an ER full of folks coughing up who knows what ebola and rising a staff infection for a goddamned period. I'm not.

Ablation has been discussed. The first time was when I was on blood thinners for a clot in my arm. I got this clot from a combination of things. I was on the pill to try to control my periods (not recommended for me due to blood clot risk but I was desperate. The other part was donating blood where the needle pain I felt should not have been ignored. My vein got pissed at me and a clot started. By the time I realized something was wrong, and received a mis-diagnosis from urgent care, then realized the misdiagnoses, the clot went from my armpit to my wrist. I remember lying in the ER after the sonogram, listening to the doctor tell me I might die due to pulmonary embolism, which I found out later was not as likely to happen as in the leg and actually not that likely anyway. I looked at my boyfriend and cried. I wasn't ready to die yet. I think I am now. I don't want to die or anything, I've just kinda made my peace since then. Back to the ablation discussion, since I was on blood thinners this was not a possibility until that was done. Oh, and think about how bad my periods got whilst on blood thinners. Color me NOT a happy camper.

I have to really complain here. Changing a double-absorbency tampon AND a full overnight pad every hour 3+ hours is literally debilitating. It takes me 10 minutes to clean myself up and get new ones in place at a minimum. There are times I'm changing underwear and cleaning my work chair, too. For even worse accidents, I go home to shower and change. How much can you concentrate on your job with interruptions like this?

So, after the blood clot was treated, I got back to regular exercise and this helped regulate my periods. Unfortunately, my exercise is about as regular as my periods, so during an exercise slump, the fun returned. I discussed ablation with my gyno again and we figured I should be soon menopausal and going through this type of procedure might not really be worth it. I'm having second thoughts about this after getting up every hour or so to change a 2X tampon and soaked overnight pad. How did I know when to change this stuff? The feeling of blood squirting from my nethers. Yes, squirting like an open artery.

Which brings me to my experiment. I am weighing the tampons. An unused 2X tampon is 4 grams. I weighed 5 of them from about 8 hours and they were: 21+24+20+19+23=107, then subtract the original weight (5x 4g=20 grams) for a total of 87 grams of vaginal secretions (it's not all blood). I looked around on the omniscient Intarwebs to find info on this. Seems that during an average menstrual cycle a woman secretes from 40 to 100 grams. A paper from Johns Hopkins says, "Bleeding amount was measured per day and per cycle for each woman in the study. Cycle blood flow was classified in tertiles as light (≤36.5 mL), medium (>36.5 and ≤72.5 mL), or heavy (>72.5 mL). Individual bleeding days were classified in tertiles as light (≤4 mL), medium (>4 and ≤14 mL), or heavy (>14 mL) blood flow." I had 87g in under a day and I didn't bother weighing the pads. Is there any wonder I'm fucking exhausted? Is there any wonder why I snap at folks that are annoying me?

I'm so close to menopause, but really, nobody knows when that is. It's different for everyone. I want the ablation, but I also don't want to take time off for any more health issues. Some days the thought of a cattle prod for cauterization would be welcome. Anyone got one I can borrow... well, keep?


References:
- Vaginal Secretions measurements: http://www.womhealth.org.au/conditions-and-treatments/understanding-your-menstrual-cycle-fact-sheet
- Johns Hopkins: http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2012/02/20/aje.kwr356.full

Autogen Birthday Cards

I'm not huge into birthdays. I think they are weird. You are celebrated for something you had no control over. Makes no sense to me. I like that my parents recognize it; hell, they were actually involved.

I received two birthday cards from my hone/auto insurance company. One was from my direct agent, the other from the team. My insurance agent is genuinely nice and her father was the original agent for my account. A nice family. Both cards were the same except for the pre-printed signatures and, in the case of my personal agent, her photo.

That being said, I started to think about the auto-generated cards that are sent to people on their birthdays. I imagine that the folks that are happy to get them are already self-involved in their day and feel some sort of entitlement. You know the kind of person, they run around announcing it in plenty of time for getting gifts, telling folks what they feel entitled to.

And, I suppose others that are happy to get them in the mail are more private about their birthdays and this is a teeny reminder of something nice for them. It makes them have a quick smile, and the card is tossed in the recycle bin never to be thought of again, till the next year when they get another.

I don't think either of the above people would give a rat's ass about not getting these cards. They already feel ok about their birthdays. They would never miss it.

A third person might feel horrible about their birthday. I did on my 25th, and I'll never forget how horrible it was for me. For this person, getting a very cold, auto-gen, mechanically-signed card, let alone two of the exact same card, from the same company, a company that could have taken a second to look at the duplicate cards and decide to either only send one, or two different ones, it might just suck. It might double the misery they are already feeling. It may set off their depression to dive super deep.

All this gives me an idea. How about not sending these any more? For 475 cards with envelopes and personalization, you can spend $360.00. Then there's the postage. How about don't waste the money? Donate it to orphans or something. It would make them happy, no matter what.

I have finally joined the smart phone crowd. Now I need glasses to see this this tiny stuff. Oy!

QuakeCon 2012

Ya, I know, long time no post and this post is WAY late. Sue me, I'm a zombaby with balled up plastic fists. You try to type like this.

Anyhoo, I attended QuakeCon2012. The first day there, I spent 12 hours in line with a great bunch of guys, all of us waiting for a coveted computer spot.


(back row)JC, Fletcher, Kevin, (sorry dude, didn't get your name)
(front row)Ben and Tyler.

The first 10 hours were fine, we were all enjoying hanging out, but the last 2 kinda, um, dragged like a body pulled by a zombaby... really slow. I was too tired to have much fun that night, so hit the sack.

The rest of the weekend was full of drinking, hanging out, taking photos of hundreds of my 'closest friends' (newest fiends?). Some folks had no idea what I was about. I'm not about nuffin but havin fun and meetin peeps, yo! And full of more drinking, watching many folks play video games, attending a panel on game mods, DRINKING at MASTER PANCAKE THEATRE!

On Sunday, after volunteering with my buddy Al Gore, we sat around while many many many great prizes were lotteried off to those who volunteered. I scored some major hot hardware, way past my comprehension. Al Gore and I will be doing a mod, methinks. I'm still not sure what my favorite part of winning was, the major bankage on parts, or the fact that 3 announcers did 'rock/paper/scissors' to find out who would read my name 'mareezmeat.com'. That was priceless.

For the FIFTH year in a row, Derek Jackson won the computer case mod contest. Here's a couple shots of his box. (tee hee)



Sean, the wonderful waiter at the hotel restaurant, was so nice. We had a nice chat about his original home, Jamaica. I hope he enjoys is trip back to see his family.

Sadly, Al Gore and I missed the infamous Party Elevator.

All in all I had a great time.

Phoenix Comicon 2012
My zommy was a lot less outgoing this year, she's kinda had a tough time of things lately. But, she did manage to get a few photos at the Con so peep them here:

Mareezmeat