It's My Anniversary! 6 Years Of Bliss!

6 years ago today, I left an abusive husband, packed up my 2 kids and my very pregnant self, despite because of his death threats and left.

I had no idea where I was going, or what I was going to do, but I did it, and I don't know where we would be if I hadn't made that decision.I remember the 1 year anniversary of this day. It hit me like a ton of bricks how much my life had changed, how much of a stronger person I had become because of my decision to leave.

I suck at being sober...

[caption id="attachment_456" align="alignright" width="300"] I'll never see this view without thinking of my grandmother[/caption]

To be fair with myself, I was only sober for just over a month. Three weeks in, on a Monday, I got a phone call from my step-mother, my grandmother had just passed away. My grandmother, the woman who lived next door through my entire childhood, the woman I spent the 4th of July with, I had JUST seen her. A picture of she and my grandfather has a permanent residence on my living room shelf. I felt like everything in my life had shattered. Ironically, I had just, days before this, written about the last time in my life that I felt this broken. I couldn't have imagined what I was about to experience.That entire week was awful, I couldn't get off my couch for more than a few minutes at a time, I wandered around aimlessly, trying to find some meaning, trying to forget that in an instant, I could lose any of the people I love most.There were a lot of tears.

6 Years, 1 Month and 1 Day Ago... My Heart Broke

6 Years, 1 month, 1 day ago, my heart was lifted as high as it could be, hopes and dreams soaring, just to be pushed off a cliff and sent hurtling to the jagged rocks below, where it proceeded to shatter.

You see, 6 years and 2 months ago, I found out I was pregnant.

My Children Are Electronically Deprived

That's right, I'm one of those mean parents who hasn't given my children access to every little gadget man-kind has created.

We have a Wii, that is hooked up in the family room to our large flat screen TV. That's about as fancy as we get. We use it for Netflix, and we have an assortment of sports and fitness related games, things that make the user MOVE their body instead of sitting still and vegging out on nonsense.For those mind-numbing days, we do have 2 MySims games and Oregon Trail (because HELLO, what childhood is complete WITHOUT Oregon Trail?!?!?!). We don't really play the games every often, 90% of the time, when the Wii is on we are watching Netflix (and even THAT is limited). We rarely watch Television and when we do, Netflix and VHS movies are about it.

11 Days... and COUNTING!

I can hardly believe how fast the last ALMOST two weeks have gone by considering everything...

I haven't had a drink in 11 days. 

This is HUGE... the longest I've gone without a drink in the past... well, I don't even know how long I've been drinking constantly... anyway, the longest I've gone without a drink was probably one day, I may have hit the 48 hour mark (or close to it) before I bought another bottle. None of that was by choice I should point out. It would have been the super hubby telling me "We can't afford to buy any booze tonight, so what's there is it."

I've been known to roll change, borrow money from my children (my KIDS, seriously, what the hell kind of example was I setting for them?!?!?!) and willingly overdraw accounts and probably have knowingly bounced checks because I needed to drink.

I can only imagine what our bank account will start whispering after it realizes the strain it has been carrying has been lessened.

I feel amazingly good.

The bath I took after my last post was great, I didn't feel any different after the bath (aside from the fact that I also took the opportunity to shave my legs, so there's that) but by the next morning I felt good, better than I had since I quit drinking. Then we had a fun filled day with the family on the 4th and headed out the next morning for our 4 day long family camping trip. That's another blog in itself.

We got home yesterday around lunch time and spent the rest of the day cleaning up, unpacking, doing laundry and just generally resting from the trip... we needed a vacation from our vacation, haha.

Today I woke up feeling energized, it was like someone hit my RESET button.

I got up, I started a load of laundry, made blueberry pancakes for breakfast, got the boys both doing their chores (Oldest son doing dishes, youngest son folding laundry), then the boys went off to play with boy-next-door2, while I worked on doing more laundry (washing it in the machine, hanging it on the line to dry, then bringing it in as it dried and putting it on the couch), I even managed to work on stabilizing the clothes line (had to dig out some of the SAND from the area it was in and add some of the CLAY from the other side of the yard... seems to be working well so far!)... I also managed to clean the house, edit photos from our camping trip and get those uploaded to Facebook so friends and family could see them (I'll show you some when I get a chance to blog about our trip, may take a few posts haha), in addition to all this, I also worked in the garden a bit and kept the kids under control without losing my cool OR craving a drink! Hubby was pleasantly surprised when he got home :)

I haven't craved a drink for 3 days.... though I did have a dream that I had been sober for a number of years and slipped up by drinking a shot sized mixed drink, spent the rest of my dream upset because I had to start over being sober again. I felt guilty about it when I woke up, and it's been on my mind all day. It made me more determined NOT to drink anymore.

I still can hardly believe it's been 11 days. It's flown by and I don't know how it managed to pass so quickly! Thanks go out to everyone I've been venting and talking to CONSTANTLY about all of this for the past almost 2 weeks, I'm sure you're getting sick of hearing about alcohol and my awakening, but it's helped immensely for me to know that I have a handful of people I can lean on when I need it.... I'm still working up the courage to face everyone else who knows me with all of this... that's the hardest part.

The First Step...

© Ctacik | Stock Free Images

You always hear that the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.

Here I am, admitting it. I drink too much. This is no surprise to most people who know me personally, and really wasn't much of a surprise to me. It was more of an awakening.

It was a sudden awakening. Early on a Friday morning, I was browsing around reading some nonsense articles, killing time and enjoying my morning cup of coffee. Then it happened, I came across some not-so-nonsense articles about the things no one tells you about quitting drinking, or alcohol detox. Some of the things mentioned really made me think, and I decided to take the plunge and do what any other modern woman who might have a problem would do... I Googled it. I googled "How to tell if you're an alcoholic", I answered some questionares and surveys and the results were pretty conclusive. I am an alcoholic.

I broke down in tears. I had to admit to myself that Yes, I have a problem with alcohol. Come 3pm EVERY day, like clockwork, I'm craving my first drink. My stress levels go up after 3pm because that's when the kids come home from school during the school year, and that's also the time of day that their cumulative issues flare up the worst. Immediately following that comes the hubby home from work. It's not always bad, but things can get a bit tense, to say the least. He is working 7 days a week lately to help make ends meet because his REGULAR job doesn't have enough work for him. I'm home now and working from home, but by the end of the day, I'm burned out from working and dealing with kids and trying to keep things in order, running errands, doing doctors appointments and just generally trying to make sense of things. On top of the fact that I drink. Too much. And that stresses him out. Noticing a pattern yet?

There is SO much more too it, and I'll leave it with that and the fact that we were sometimes going through 3 BIG bottles of booze per week... and I'll just say that hubby might max out at 3 drinks if he's in the mood... most nights it's 1 or none.... I'm sure I don't have to give you too many chances to guess where the rest of that goes...

Admitting it to myself was hard. Admitting it to other people has been increasingly harder. I talked to my brother first. I knew he would be the least likely to judge me, and I HAD to say it to someone else to really make it "real" you know? I waited impatiently for 2 hours for him to come online so I could talk to him. He has been really supportive.

Next I told Hubby. I was terrified of telling him. I told him via text message. I sent the text with a warning, that I didn't need judgement, criticism or "I-told-you-so's" that I just needed to tell him this and that I needed him to say "ok" and "I understand". He responded with "ok..." and didn't say anything for 2 hours after that. When he finally did respond he was still in shock.

When I picked him up from work that evening, he was glowing. Told me how proud he was of me, and that he's just been waiting for me to see that I had a problem. He's been a huge part of my success so far in giving up alcohol. Because Yes, I'm an alcoholic, and I know that I have to give it up. It is not easy, it hasn't been easy and I'm sure it isn't going to get any easier.

As of right now, I have only told maybe 8 people who know me personally about this. And that doesn't include my parents. I'm not ready.

Honestly, this is a new thing for me still. It's been less than a week, 5 days to be exact, almost to the minute, since my last drink.

I picked a good week to quit drinking. Hubby was home with me through the weekend, just down the road for the last 2 days for work, tomorrow is a holiday and then Thursday we are headed out for a 4 day camping trip to help us all refresh and de-stress.

So far my withdrawl symptoms have been fairly mild, maybe leaning a touch toward moderate. I've been super tired, like I can't seem to wake up completely. I've doubled up the coffee a couple of days when I would normally just have the one cup. I'm also quite irritable. Think, PMS-like, even though that's not due for a couple weeks. I've been trying to "trick" myself subconsciously by drinking sparkling lemonade from a wine glass, and making STRONG iced tea (which I'd normally drink with rum)... definitely drinking lots of fluids. And craving comfort foods like crazy... I'm giving myself until the end of our vacation/camping trip before I worry too much about what I'm eating, I think I deserve it this week. Momma needs to spoil herself.

Tonight I am going to do some deep meditating, and take a Full Moon Bath (its a ritual thing) to help remove some of the negativity surrounding me. Here's to hoping I feel better after this week!

I Love A Good Read!

So, I was on Facebook recently, scrolling through the list of my friends updates and looking up parks that hubby and oldest son were reading about so we can plan out our camping trip, when Chris, over at Wicked Awesomology, posted a link to his latest post about a road trip he took through our state this weekend. Always up to read something he's written, and get ideas for places in Maine to visit, I clicked over... After reading yet ANOTHER great post from him, I happened to notice on his sidebar, a list of books he was reading and some he had currently read. Ask anyone who knows me, and they'll tell you that in my "abundance" of free time, if I'm not on the computer, I'm probably curled up with my nose in a book (that's how I spent most of Friday and Sunday in fact!), so I clicked through and got hooked!

I spent about 3 hours rating books that I've read (and wow, it didn't even come close to touching how many I actually HAVE read), and adding books to my "To-Read" list. This morning I found more, and actually went onto Amazon and bought a book that I'm now anxiously awaiting the arrival of. I was so excited to read about this book that I didn't even cash in my Swagbucks and wait for a gift card to arrive, I actually paid cash!

The book that I ordered is: Against Medical Advice and can also be found under the title  Med Head: My Knock-down, Drag-out, Drugged-up Battle with My Brain - This is a book by James Patterson (one of my favorites!) about 5 year old Cory Friedman waking up with tics and eventually being diagnosed with Tourette's syndrome and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, the struggles that go along with finding the right doctors and treatment and the heartache of his family dealing with this.


I have read one other book called Ryan: A Mother's Story of Her Hyperactive/Tourette Syndrome Child that was a personal story of a boy living with Tourette's Syndrome, his was caused by his ADHD medications, it was an amazing book, I'd recommend it to anyone who is struggling with a family member who has been diagnosed (or is suspected to have) Tourette's Syndrome.
 
You can find me on Good Reads at http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/9659853-j  I'll be working on adding more books I've read and reviews as I am able to!

Full disclosure: If you click on any of the links that go to Amazon.com above and purchase any of the items I posted, I'll get a tiny reward for sending you their way, I'm all about saving money though so if you can find it cheaper somewhere else,  more power to ya! If you sign up for Swagbucks through my link, I'll be rewarded for introducing you to the site!

Springtime Crazy

I apologize for the lack of posts for the last month, it's been kind of hectic around here.

My mother got married a few weeks ago, and the little one had a birthday (she's THREE!), after that I got hit with a bunch of orders, and then my back went out and triggered a massive flare up of Sciatica that had me in pain for more than a week and unable to do much of anything.... And then when I started feeling better, the sun finally came out and I've been obsessed with gardening, lol. That was my month in a nutshell!

So, onto the gardening!

Hubby and I have had this grand plan, every year, for the last 4 or 5 years, that we are going to start growing as much of our own food as possible. It hasn't worked yet.

This year, I'm not working outside of the home, so I'm here to actually DO SOMETHING with the garden!

Back a few months ago we ordered an awesome seed kit from Baker Creek, a huge variety of seeds, specifically picked to grow in Northern Climates (YAY!), and ordered the book All New Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew. We had come across his website a few years ago, and liked the idea of this method, but never really did much research into it and it fell to the backs of our minds.

We've had the book for a couple months now, but hadn't read it. Hubby put together some garden beds, and we bought a few loads of a Loam/Compost/Vermiculite mix from a local farm and put that in a couple of the beds. Then I read the book. So we aren't using "Mel's Mix" like the book calls for, but it should still be a good start!

I started by planting some Lettuce that we had been growing inside. Some of it survived being harvested and then transplanted a day later and is coming back with new leaves, some of it didn't make it. I also started some seeds in the ground, other types of lettuce and greens (Oriental greens, swiss chard, etc).

That was about 2 weeks ago. This weekend I worked on transplanting Cauliflower and Broccoli and getting the grids up on the beds. Unfortunately, I ran out of string, so had to eyeball a few of the transplants. I came across a really good idea for planting Radishes and Scallions in the 1 foot grid lines, so maybe hubby can have his string back!

After I did all that and got the cauliflower and broccoli planted I was exhausted, so I relaxed the rest of the night. The next day I transplanted the rest of our seedlings (except the onions, those are coming due this weekend). I'll post a list at the end of this with the count of what I planted, it's kinda crazy lol

So here are the pictures:

Our "Three Sisters" bed (ONE of the two we will have) Corn and Beans/Peas in the center 2 rows and different types of Squash in the outer two rows

At the far end you see Hubby, next to him is where our lettuce is planted. This was taken before the picture at the top, as you can see from the top picture our tomatoes are now along the fence with peppers and eggplant in front of them

Our first time using "home grown" compost! Had to sift out some uncomposted materials, but found some useable!

Adding the compost to the soil (we didn't buy a mix for these 2 beds, they were an afterthought and we were broke haha)

Cauliflower in the top 6 rows, then Broccoli in the bottom 2 (and in 4 rows of the next box that you can't see)

As for the final tally, I sat down yesterday and figured out exactly how much I have planted, here we go:

I currently have 2 areas of the yard with garden beds, one bed is 64 square feet, it runs along our front fence (2 feet deep by 32 long) and another that is 4 sections that are 8x4 for a total of 192 square feet..... 

This is what I currently have planted:

1. 144 corn seeds (80 more will be planted this weekend in a new bed that will 10x4 feet and will also include more beans and squash/Pumpkins) 
2. 16 Zucchini plants
3. 8 Japanese Cucumber plants
4. 8 Winter Squash
5. 8 each of 3 types of beans
6. 8 sugar peas
7. 24 Cauliflower and 24 Broccoli plants
8. Lettuce and other greens
9. 8 varieties of tomatoes, up to 12 plants of each type (Nearly 100 plants total by my count)
10. 24 each of 2 varieties of garden peppers
11. 12 each of two types of hot peppers
12. 6 each of 2 varieties of eggplant

I also have 4 rows of 4 squares that are left empty, originally waiting for peat moss (at hubby's request) so I could plant 2 types each of carrots and radishes, but now I'm thinking of doing those in place of the grid lines, so I'll have those 4 rows for something else!

I also planted 13 Sunflower seeds. Hubby and I ordered more Corn, some Jack O Lantern pumpkin seeds and some Buttercup squash. Fast producing varieties because we have to have them shipped and our growing season is short anyway... All of our seed varieties are Heirloom seeds and we also ordered a book on Saving seeds called Seed to Seed: Seed Saving and Growing Techniques for Vegetable Gardeners so the $110 we've currently got invested in seeds will HOPEFULLY be a one time investment!

 I'll post more pictures as things progress, and try to get a big picture view of the whole garden area so you can get a really good idea of the layout, it's hard to tell from the pictures I've got!

 

Full disclosure: If you click on any of the links that go to Amazon.com above and purchase any of the items I posted, I'll get a tiny reward for sending you their way, I'm all about saving money though so if you can find it cheaper somewhere else,  more power to ya!

Mama On A Mission...

For years now I have leaned toward finding a more natural lifestyle, which isn't always easy. It started small, with me learning about my oldest son having dry skin which turned out to be Eczema, which he inherited from me (who would have guessed it, all those years I thought I just had pimples all over... heh.) from learning we had Eczema to educating myself on the best ways to deal with it, I started to discover that all of the "soap" products we had were really nothing more than chemical filled synthetic products, nothing natural about them, it's no wonder our Eczema was constantly flared up! That's how I learned about all natural handmade soaps, and began making them myself.

I grew up on convenience foods (Hamburger Helper and Rice-A-Roni anyone?) and thought nothing of continuing to eat those after I had children of my own. My family was eating loads of just-add-water "homemade from a box" (as my ex mother in law used to say) meals, generally cooked in a microwave. (Have I mentioned I haven't owned a microwave in 4 years? It's amazing to discover you don't really NEED one!)

I'll tell you that for a good 8 years I fed my own family overly processed, highly synthetic, convenience foods, just like 60% of the rest of the Nation***

In the past 5 years that I have been with my husband, I have learned to make some drastic changes. I started to eat healthier, mostly because he insisted, and gradually I began to like some of it... though I was heavily into the coupon game for awhile and most of what you can get with coupons is convenience foods, so that's what I bought.

Around the time I got pregnant with my youngest, who will be 3 next month, I was starting to really get a good grasp on the whole thing... actually paying attention to what products we use, and more recently what we eat. In recent months I've gotten to the point that I absolutely dread going to the grocery store. I walk through the aisles and I can just feel the labels screaming all their obscene nasty chemicals and additives at me. Two months ago when I went shopping I literally stopped in the middle of an aisle looking around and could just feel myself getting wearier by the second thinking about how I KNEW all the crap that was in the food I was buying, but I felt nearly powerless to do anything about it.

Not anymore!

When we got our income tax return we bought half a cow and a pig from a farm down the road. The meat was butchered by two local meat cutters, and cost maybe $1,000 between the 4 checks we had to make out... was well worth it to have a stand up freezer so full of meat that it was overflowing... AND we supported THREE local small businesses in the process. Our hamburgers and roasts don't shrink when we cook them, and our pork chops have fat that gets crispy not chewy... how's that for GOOD products?

The meat tastes so much better than the junk at the store, and in the end cost about the same, we won't have to buy meat again until fall at least.

We also have 2 chickens who started laying eggs this winter... not a lot for a family of 6 but 2-3 eggs a day is helpful! We are getting a few more chickens to help increase the yield and then we can cut out having to buy eggs... yet one more thing we will know where it came from and what went into it and can feel good about eating it! It's also another good source of meat!

We are working diligently on growing a nice sized garden this year, which I've already mentioned here, and Last time we went for a big grocery shopping, we bought almost all fruits and vegetables, which is great and since we didn't have the added cost of meat to consider, I splurged and got lots of fresh ones and as much organic/natural as I could. We did buy a bunch of pasta and pasta sauce, cause lets face it, my husband is Italian and pasta is one of the ultimate comfort foods (go me!).

I've been researching more about MAKING more foods from scratch, and today I convinced hubby that it would be a great investment to buy a pasta machine. He was planning to save up to buy attachments for our Kitchen aid Mixer (Super frugal find from a couple months ago, I'll write about that soon!), but when I got looking at the cost and everything, explained to him that it might be more cost effective to buy a separate machine. After doing some shopping around and him thinking back on his childhood (his grandmother used to make pasta all the time... heck, probably still does!) we settled on an Imperia SP150 and ordered it from Amazon using some gift cards I've earned from Swagbucks (not many because I just ordered a bunch of books for my son who paid me cash in exchange for the gift cards I used)

We also got a 2mm Spaghetti attachment and a Norpro Ravioli Maker and Press.

Pasta is a big thing in our house, though we pair it with lots of veggies, salad, etc. I like the idea of making it myself so I can control what types of ingredients are going in it... and I think that by including the kids in the process they'll become a bit more aware of what they are putting into themselves and hopefully keep the love of making their own food with them as they grow!




***I have no idea what the general statistics are, but I'd wager on it being more than half, lol

Full disclosure: If you click on any of the links that go to Amazon.com above and purchase any of the items I posted, I'll get a tiny reward for sending you their way, I'm all about saving money though so if you can find it cheaper somewhere else,  more power to ya! As for the Swagbucks link, if you sign up through the link, I'll get matching Swagbucks for your first 1,000, which will net me somewhere around two Amazon gift cards for $5 each :)

So Sad...

Back in December, on Christmas Eve, while preparing for our annual get-together with Hubby's family, he fell down the stairs. It wasn't a typical case of clumsiness, see half of our house is in a perpetual state of renovation, we tore everything out except the outer walls about 4 years ago, and every time we've thought we might get it done, plans have changed. Over time it's become an unofficial storage area. We were storing some things for my sister-in-law when she moved to North Carolina, and when she came up over the Christmas holiday she wanted to take some of her stuff home with her

Best Christmas Gift ever - Dixie, a rescue dog from NC

So in the process of him helping her bring her things down, she tells him to be careful on the stairs because there is some lumber laying on them. He gets cocky, says he's fine, that he's been up and down that death-trap set of stairs hundreds of times. No sooner does he say this, and he steps on the lumber, slides down the stairs, and then can't walk properly for a good month. After having it examined the day after Christmas at the ER and then by an Orthopedic Surgeon we knew that if it wasn't better by the beginning of February, we'd be looking at surgery.

Luckily for him, it was fine by the beginning of February, and after a month of living on short-term disability we were ready for regular paychecks again. No such luck. Work had no work for him, and he had to use the ONLY 3 weeks of vacation/personal time he gets for the whole year so that we could have an income. After that, still no work. Time for unemployment. It is now March 26th, he's been out of work for over 3 months and home with me every day... As a happily married couple, you'd think we'd be driving each other crazy and just about ready to start calling divorce lawyers by now.... not so much... the last 3 months have been the best in our married life, but alas, it had to end sometime... he went back to work an hour and a half ago, and I'm missing him like crazy already...

However....!

With him being gone, it will be much easier for me to find time during the day to get  some soap made and work around the house! So thank goodness for the rain today, this momma is gonna be busy!

I Love Playing Dirty...

Or maybe that should be, I love playing in dirt, lol.

Hubby and I spent this past week working on prepping our yard for gardening... three years ago we had a pretty successful garden behind our house in a 10x35 foot strip, utilizing Square Foot Gardening and raised bed practices. It worked out well, but the following year we stripped siding off the back of the house and lead paint got through the garden area, so we had to relocate.

This was our garden that first year

Over the last 2 years whenever we've tried to grow anything, we've had these nasty ground hogs that have eaten everything! And then last year it was the chickens too! This year we got the chickens moved, and are working on gardening in the side yard, which is bigger than what we grew in 3 years ago, but it's also where the kids play, so in taking that into consideration, we've had to be careful about how we plan to plant. Here are some pictures of what we've done so far:

2ft by 32ft, for Corn and Squash type items - the pallet's create a box for potatoes

16ft x 4ft -for Tomatoes and Peppers - Hot boxed

Lots of other stuff has been going on... I sold some of my leftover inventory from the consignment store I closed this past winter and worked on making some more soap and stuff

Ohhh, yeah that was SATISFYING

First meal I've been able to eat since Monday, in a reasonable amount of time, with minimal cringing!

I got my left wisdom teeth out on Tuesday morning, and I think I've eaten a total of 5 meals since then... most of my sustenance has been of the liquid and pharmaceutical forms... No pain meds since 6:30am today though and only minor irritation in my lower gums... this is a plus, especially since the day after my procedure I developed an infection on my jaw and was laid up for the next 24 hours severely swollen and in pain, fighting chills and a fever... I slept Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday away!

The Contents Of My Purse

So I was hunting for a receipt tonight... couldn't find it... dumped my purse out (all 4 sections!) onto the couch and started going through things... realized the receipt I was looking for wasn't in my purse at all, but in the bag of things I purchased... HA! Here's a look at the clutter I carry around with me daily...

YIKES!

 

Tomorrow's mission.... shopping for supplies to make more soap... since I realized tonight I'm running low on soap AND I've got a few more types in mind to test out! Also, stopping at the pharmacy and correcting a mistake they made on #2's meds last week... thankfully we discovered the mistake today and not a week down the road when he's out of the correct meds!

Once Upon A Time...

Once upon a time I owned a successful business with hundreds of clients and even more customers. I went from having a home based business one year to the second best in the entire county in my third year in business... who knows where we would have been if I had continued to be in business through my fourth year, however I made the tough decision to close because we were in a tight spot financially at home, in addition to having two special needs children, it was just too much for us to handle at one time.

Within two months of closing my business down, my two special needs boys have both improved drastically, my 2 year old has finished potty training and I actually am enjoying my family.

A year and a half ago, I found myself suffering from what I believe is a delayed form of Post Partum Depression. It didn't hit me until my youngest (of 4 if that matters) weaned from nursing... then all of a sudden I began to get severely agitated to the point of near hysteria and just ready to be done with it all. After a few months of this I began to realize that my moods were peaking (or falling to all time lows) just before my periods... and I called my doctor and set up an appointment.. he put me on Lexapro, which I took for a few months, and it helped, no doubt.... Over that period of time I was able to learn to recognize the signs of my hormonal imbalance and focus on staying in charge...

Since then I have learned that I had a Progesterone imbalance, began using an over the counter progesterone cream for a couple weeks out of each cycle... and after two months of that, my hormone levels completely stabilized (as far as I can tell without having them actually tested that is...) and life has become great!

That's a very short version of the story... but since I've gotten my hormones straightened out and stopped working and have been able to focus on my family (where my focus SHOULD be)... my marriage has never been better, my relationships with my children are fantastic, and I've been able to focus on ME a bit...

I've been able to get back to the path I had been on many, many years ago before I mistakenly got involved with the wrong guy (who I eventually divorced) and allowed myself to be brainwashed into being nothing more than a built in babysitter and housemaid.

I Wear My Life...

Come close, just look at me, can you see
That new England breeze blowin' through my hair
Stare into my eyes, can't you see the endless sky
Peekin' through the cracks of that abandoned barn
Got my first kiss there

My victories, my broken dreams, you don't have to look too far
Like an old pair of shoes, like a tattoo, sometimes like a scar

I wear my life, right on my sleeve
Who I am ain't no mystery
Where I've been has left a mark on me
No, I'm not one to try and hide
Or keep it all locked up inside
I wear my life

I'm like an old scrapbook, not afraid to let you look
Every day's a brand new page I can't wait to cut and paste
This picture that I see, right now of you and me
Two people so in love even time can't make it fade

My smiling face, gives me away, yeah everybody knows
When you feel something this real, boy, it's bound to show

I wear my life, right on my sleeve
Who I am ain't no mystery
Where I've been has left a mark on me
No, I'm not one to try and hide
Or keep it all locked up inside
I wear my life

You can see right through me. I'm transparent
I don't just live it

I wear my life, right on my sleeve
Who I am ain't no mystery
Where I've been has left a mark on me
No, I'm not one to try and hide
Or keep it all locked up inside
I wear my life

~JoDee Messina