The Illness of Guilt

Illness has befallen my family, except Boa. My Little One has been on antibiotics for strep throat since Valentine's Day, when she came home crying. She threw open the front door, bawling and whaling about how much her head, throat and belly hurt. We took her right away to CareNow and sure enough, positive strep.

As the weekend went on, my husband started feeling sick, but wasn't bedridden. He goes to bed early on Sunday, feeling pretty crappy.  Monday, he's staying home from work. He'd been running a fever, aching, etc.

Me? I go to work on Monday. Then, around 11 a.m., I start feeling stiffness in my neck, across my shoulders. I can barely keep my eyes open due to the immense headache consuming my brain. I try to sleep it off for an hour in my car, after telling my boss about how I'm feeling. I tried going back to work and working through "it", but I couldn't. I left.

I don't remember driving home.

My husband and I both went to CareNow. He tested positive for flu. My test revealed negative for flu. For the record, he received a flu shot this season;  I didn't.

Tuesday, today, I'm still home. So tired. So worn out. Fighting fevers, chills, shivering, sweating, teeth chattering, headache after headache, nausea, wheezing (but not much coughing), body aching. I felt so much pain overnight that moaning and groaning seemed to be the only relief I could find, temporary at best.

All day long yesterday and today, I've fretted about work. I'm worried how it looks -- am I lying? Who else is noticing my absence and thinking ill of me? - that sort of paranoia. I feel guilty for not being there. Why? Why don't I give myself permission to be sick...ever?  Doesn't that kind of guilt only harbor more illness - emotional, physical, spiritual?

I should note that my feelings aren't limited to who my boss is or who my employer is; I feel this way no matter where I go and for whom I work.  I'm blessed to have the job I currently have and I don't want to jeopardize it.

It's getting late, so I'm going to take my final dose of cough medicine and get some sleep. Hopefully I'll make it through the night and get back to work tomorrow.

Whoosh!

House of Cards, Season Two: Jackie

"I like the pain." - Jackie pic.twitter.com/iZDOQyNeIX

— House of Cards (@HouseofCards) February 16, 2014

I'm addicted to Netflix!

Jackie from season two of House of Cards is a fascinating character. Of course I'm paying extraattention to her because her name is Jackie and my name is Jackie so we're both Jackies. But she's the Cool Jackie.

I highly recommend this show if you don't have a moral compass or you're looking to escape from your moral compass for a while. Binge watching is certainly encouraged.

Painfully,
Whoosh

Stress and Breathing

*deep, slow inhale*

*slow, methodical exhale*

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It's no secret, I go to counseling. My counselor, she's great.  She helps me see things in a way that is new, but in a way that I feel is very tailored to the jackiewayofthinking -- and that's not easy! She's worth way more than I pay her.

For years now, I've been tossing around this idea of doing yoga and meditating. It started when I read Eat, Pray, Love and the spark has grown into a constant flame. It isn't an inferno (yet?).  

It wasn't a conscious new year's resolution, but rather a slow but sure foray into the practices of breathing and meditating. In the past, I'd find reasons not to: kids, work, stress, family events, feeling "too fat", not having money and/or access, needing better rest.  Here lately, my motivation has finally started to fall in line with the ruminations.

I've only meditated 4 times in the last week or so, and done yoga seriously once in the last week, but you know what? I feel better.  Even if it's the placebo effect, so be it. I like it.

The kicker is -- I'm scared to feel good. How preposterous is that?? Being a bigger girl, one reason I don't diet or commit to an eating plan, join in with others who are having a group-accountability activity isn't because I'm afraid to fail (again) -- I'm afraid to succeed! So paradoxical. And irrational. 

Over the last two to three years, I've experienced some pretty traumatic and upsetting events from various aspects of my life, and the lives of those around me. Many of them have gone or subsided and I'm feeling a sense of awkwardness. I feel relief, but I'm almost afraid to say that for fear of what's around the corner to knock me on my ass again. So I was asking my counselor, is it normalish to feel afraid like this? She validated me and said sometimes when there've been extended periods of stress, people adjust to that as "normal" so when those stresses/stressors diminish, the dynamics of a person's psyche changes, too. She went so far as to say that some people even become addicted to their stress! (God forbid! WHY?!) I was very enlightened by this conversation and I think it's, in an effortless or subconscious way, given me permission to feel good again. 

My chair at work.

For the last six months or so, I've been bringing up the notion of meditating to my counselor and she's spoken highly of it. For years and years, I've heard about how breathing a certain way can really help with a mind-body balance.  I don't really know what sparked it -- it was rather an impulse, but I finally emailed the counselor asking if we could do a meditation together in her office at my next appointment. She, of course, was totally on board with it. So I went in and yapped my mouth for a while, then we settled into a ten-minute guided medication by Tara Brach. It was the fastest, slowest ten minutes of my life.

While ALL my stress wasn't gone, I sure felt more peaceful. PEACE is a feeling I'm always searching for....I crave serenity. It seems inside my chest, there's a constant tornado of movement, even when I'm at rest. It's a physical feeling, one that I'm conscious of every day, all day. I'd like to use a natural way of stress-relief to minimize or eradicate that anxiety ball in between my boobs.

So, here's to keeping on keepin' on. 

~Whoosh!

Happy Birthday to Me!

This is happening today!

Welcome 2014!

Happy New  Year, Friend. I trust you had a lovely holiday season. I certainly did! I'll be posting a blog about my trip to South Carolina soon. Keep your eyes peeled!

In the meantime, below is something that was in my Facebook timeline. I think it might've originated from George Takei's Facebook page.

Take a look at the letter grid below. The first three words you find will be yours in 2014.

Feel free to share what your words are in the comments section! I'd love to hear from you.

Mine? Love, beauty and youth.

~Whoosh!

Some of My Favorite Christmas Music: Elvis

No one sings like him. No.one.

Gordon Keith on Gift-Giving

Conversions of heart: one man's journey.

The Journey YOU are now on. Go forth and share the wisdom.

Gordon Keith: The Gift of Receiving Gracefully

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Gordon: Thank you for being you, and sharing glimpses of the not-radio-guy with the rest of us. ~J

Elf on the Shelf - A Tongue-In-Cheek Post

A friend of mine posted this picture on her Facebook page this morning. I don't know from where it originated, otherwise I'd give due credit. It's brilliant!

I don't understand the fascination with Elf on the Shelf. I hadn't even heard of it until about five or six years ago, but apparently it's been around for eons. I guess I was such a good child that my mom and dad didn't need to coax me to behave, and I'm raising such good kids that I don't need to trick them to stay on Santa's Nice List. :P 

I almost think this is become more about the parents than the kids, meaning, the creative process of how to change the Elf every night -- where to put him or her. I've seen hanging from the chandelier Spidey-style Elf, reading books to Barbie & friends under the Christmas tree Elf, cooking Elf, and various others. You grown-ups are very creative!

And thanks to all of you Shelved Elves Enablers, My Little One is feeling left out. She keeps asking me how come we don't have an Elf on the Shelf. I keep telling her it's because I shouldn't have to trick her into being a good girl, or I'll use the scare tactic of "isn't it creepy to have a tiny elf trolling around our house while you sleep, getting into things and then freezing when you look at it the next day, acting as if nothing's abnormal about it being in our house and then becoming inanimate when you look at it?" *laughing* Having Santa come one night versus having Santa's elf roaming around our house for a whole month isn't so bad now, is it, you nay-sayers of "lying to your kids about Santa".

Now, those of you reading this who use Elfin Magic, I'm not judging you. This isn't an indictment of your parenting skills, nor is it an indictment of your child's behavior. I'm totally fine with you using it and if it works for y'all -- more power to ya! I'm so busy at this time of year especially, that keeping up with an elf is one less (or shall I say 25 less) thing(s) to do. So, again, it's all about me. #selfish

Merry Christmas, y'all!

Old-souled Children

How do you help a child who is wise beyond her years, trapped in biological childhood to try to enjoy being a kid?

How do you explain to that child that one day, she will grow into her wisdom?

Jerry the Owner about Jerry the GM

Clearly, Jerry doesn't own mirrors....

Good job, Tim MacMahon (even though it isn't recent)!

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And the mediocrity continues.....