While You Wait for Change...

While I was straightening up my room this evening and putting off having to make my bed - does anyone actually enjoy doing that?! I mean, ew. - I looked over at my dresser and my little catch-all glass star caught my eye. And I had this sudden, overwhelming feeling of...relief|appreciation|pride. It was a moment where a little thing suddenly meant a whole lot.

When Kacie and John told me they would be moving to Ohio and therefore, I'd be looking for a job (despite their very best efforts to sell me on movig to Ohio as well), I tried my best to give it the old 'glass half full" approach. I threw myself - and anyone who was willing to help - into finding a job that I would love. A job that would challenge and excite me; a job that would not only acknowledge and appreciate my skills and experience, but would take those skills and build on them, nurture and teach me to being better. 

I have never been turned down from so many jobs in my life. 

It was honestly one of the hardest transitions I've experienced. I'd gone from working, at minimum fifty hours a week at a job where I knew I was making a difference with the ladies, to receiving daily rejection letters for jobs I just knew I was perfect for. 

And rejection emails don't pay the bills. 

And so, needless to say, I was broke. Actually, I don't know if there's a word between broke and destitute, but if there is - that's what I was. There were days when I couldn't even scrounge up enough change to get my gas light to go off. It was frustrating and disappointing. I was mad at myself for not having built up more savings. I was mad at the people who wouldn't hire me. I was mad that I was too prideful to ask for help. I was mad when I had to ask for help. I was mad that I was wallowing in my anger and frustration and disappointed. I was just mad. 

Mad and broke. 

And then I got a job. A job that challenges and excited me; a job that acknowledges my skills and experience, that appreciates me as a professional and an employee. A job that allows me - encourages me - to learn and grow and create. A job that betters me. 

Which brings me back to now; back to my little catch-all glass star. 

It wasn't too long ago that little glass star would be empty. There'd be no loose change, and certainly no errant dollar bills, laying around as it would all be stressfully spent on whatever small amount of gas or grocery it would allow. But now loose change and errant dollar bills sit in that little glass star for weeks without even a glance in their direction. That's not to say I'm rolling in money - far from it - but the ability to pay bills and loans and still have money in my bank account is a blessing I do not take for granted. 

I am immeasurably blessed by parents who would -and have - go to the ends of the earth for me. They sacrificed and scrimped and saved and struggled most of my school ages years to ensure that I never went without things that I needed for school. There was always food on the table and a roof over my head and clothes on my back. And they are solely responsible for teaching me the value of a hard-earned dollar. And the relief and joy I can hear in their voices and see on their faces when they know I'm able to stand on my own two feet financially is a feeling I can't express in words. 

I am thankful and humbled by that little glass star full of change. While I may have spared it an unconscious glance now and then in the past, I will now look at it as so much more - 

A reminder that sometimes things - and life - have to be empty to truly appreciate it in it's fullness. And that life is full of moments where we wait|pray|wish for change. 

Ain't That a Kick in the Head...

I'm no stranger to headaches. I get them so often/consistently that unless they're really bad, I rarely notice them; they're just always kind of there. And while they're not nearly as frequent, I'm also no stranger to migraines. My dad grew up with headaches/migraines and my cousins on the other side of my family seem to suffer from migraines as well.

Genetics paired with stress and wisdom teeth that decided to make their grand entrance left me with a migraine so bad this morning I fell apart in tears while talking to my supervisor at work. Needless to say, she was more than happy to usher me out the door with a sympathetic smile and well wishes to feel better.

After the hell of driving home with the sun peeking through glaring overcast skies, I immediately climbed into my bed, and threw the comforter over my head with every intention of sleeping it off. I tossed. I turned. I buried my head under the pillows - sleep never came. The tension from the migraine paired with stress had my body wound so tightly that I couldn't relax enough to sleep. So I fought through the pounding in my head and moved on to option B. An option I'm going to call "The Poor (Wo)Man's Homeopathic Migraine Cure".

Now if you have Magic!Migraine pills you can pop or Wonder!Oils you can slather yourself in, this blog is probably not going to do much for you; this is much more of a "Do what you can with what you have" guide - if you even want to call it a guide. (Disclaimer - all but one of these photos were taken post-migraine; if you've had a true migraine, you know it's near impossible to do anything with a headache of that magnitude.) Okay. You may proceed.

Splish Splash

Taking a bath has become my go-to remedy as of late for pretty much everything. I'm normally more of a shower girl, but in the last few years I've started to really appreciate the quiet, relaxing time that taking a bath provides - especially when I'm stressed or not feeling my best. So when I realized I was too wound up for a nap, I opted for a bath. Because I wanted my body to relax, I opted for a very warm/just hot enough bath instead of my usual scalding hot shower.

I'm not super girly about many things, and much as I'd like it to be, our house is not ever going to have a spread in Better Homes and Gardens. That being said, I find little touches, like a candle flickering on the ledge of a bathtub, quite pleasing. Ideally, because the theme here was relaxation, I would've preferred a lavender candle, but because Kristin is allergic to lavender scented things, we don't have much of it around the house. A lot of our candles have some kind of orange/citrus element to them and as much as I love their bright/sunny smell, I know that citrus scents can often help energize - which is the exact opposite of what I needed at the moment. So I settled on a Warm Sands scented candle which has a very light, vanilla/coconut smell.

I also couldn't find any lavender scented bubble bath/body wash but I do have this amazing body wash I got from Target when I was suffering from hardcore allergies. It's made from echinacea and menthol oils and extracts which, as is indicated by the bottle, are usually used as aides in cold and allergy relief, but the scent is so comforting and relaxing, I added a bit - just enough to put a nice layer of bubbles on top of the water. (Side Note:There's a learning curve that comes along with using this body wash/bubble bath - if you use too much, you get out of the tub with your whole body feeling like you bathed in IcyHot. It's an odd sensation that's not entirely comfortable. If you're using it for a cold/allergies, put enough in the water to get the scent, and then use it generously as a body wash across your neck/throat/chest area to help you breathe better.) 

After adding in the bath oil and getting my candle set up, I turned off all of the lights and slipped all the way into the tub - up to my jawline. (the menthol in the bath oil was nice and cooling against my jaw that's been sore from my wisdom teeth pushing through). I was tempted - as I always am - to turn on music, but resisted and found comfort in the silence. I tried to concentrate on nothing other than relaxing my body muscle by muscle - a trick I learned in one of my kinesiology courses in school.

Put on Something That Feels Good...

After a nice twenty minute bath, I could finally feel some of the tension releasing. I slowly got out of the tub and lathered on some of this B&BW sleep lotion - it's one of the few lavender scented things I use in the house, as I only use it before going to bed and I'm on the opposite side of the house as Kristin so there's no chance of it bothering her. I find just the motion of putting lotion on relaxing and this has such a warm, soothing scent to it.

After my body cooled off from the bath, I applied some doTERRA PastTense to my forehead, temples, behind my ears and along my right jawline. My good friend Brooke told me about PastTense for headaches and it really has been such a lifesaver when ibuprofen just isn't getting it done. I've discovered that if I use it right after a bath when my skin is still warm, it tends to burn after I apply it to anywhere other than across my forehead, so I wait ten minutes or so to apply it to my neck/shoulders. I love the way it smells and the way it rolls on like lip gloss from the 1990s. (Please, for the love of god, do not put it on your lips.).

...Or Don't Put on Anything At All!

Okay. This is the part where some people are going to judge. I read an article a few weeks ago about the benefits of sleeping naked - yes, you read that correctly; it can be beneficial! I saw the post on a radio station website (read it here) and while I don't agree with all of it (like the pajama thing - I delight into changing into pj's the second I'm done with my day) and some of the benefits simply don't apply, two of them stuck out to me.

The older I get, the more I realize how lightly I sleep. I feel everything while sleeping - which is why I so rarely can sleep in the cute pajama sets I love to buy. The drawstrings and frills are uncomfortable. When I don't feel well, I'm even more aware of how uncomfortable I am in my bed if there's anything bunched or twisted or askew and it causes more tossing and turning.

Aside from washing makeup off of my face at the end of the day, the concept of my skin needing to breathe didn't ever occur to me. I sleep with 800 blankets on my bed at night, so the added layer of a tshirt probably doesn't make a huge difference when it comes to my skin breathing, but when I'm not feeling well or uncomfortable, the cool sheet on bare skin is a welcomed feeling!

Drink. Breathe. Repeat.

I'm awful at drinking water. Like, terrible. It's not that I don't like the way it taste or anything, I'm just really terrible at remembering that water isn't just used for making coffee. Working at the clinic, I've gotten better about carrying water around with me, mostly because I am often having to encourage my kiddos to drink their water - practice what you preach, right? So I refilled one of my big 'teacher cups' with cool, not cold, water and set it next to my fan where I'd see it and remember.

One of the things my dad has always driven home with me when it comes to headaches is that air circulation is important. Even when I was little, he discouraged me from covering my head with blankets when sleeping, so I've always been in the habit of sleeping with a small fan by my bed so that I had cool, circulating air blowing on my face to breathe in. Now, does this actually help? I don't know, but sometimes comfort items are just as helpful as anything medical might be.

R&R 

I mentioned before I'm not super girly, but I like little aesthetic touches. Because of that, there's been a sleeping eye mask placed just so on my headboard - mostly for decoration. But the last time I had a migraine I couldn't get it dark enough in my room to relax, so I thought I'd try it - oh my gosh! They're actually like, useful. It wasn't nearly as tight and confining as I thought it'd be and it allowed me to close my eyes without any distracting lights or movements. Now it sits on the corner of my headboard for moments like this. I turned my phone on Do Not Disturb (A must. The last thing you want when you have a migraine/headache is to constantly have your phone go off or light up.) and slipped the mask over my eyes and finally, finally could feel my body relaxing.

Slow and Steady

I have a really bad habit of jumping on my phone or computer, or flipping through the channels on the television the second I begin to feel better because, obviously, the world has drastically changed in the few hours I've been separated from social media, right? So when I finally felt the last of the migraine drain from my body , I forced myself to take it slow and easy. I went out to the kitchen and made myself a mug of Irish Breakfast Tea before crawling back into my bed with a book that I could leisurely flip through without having to focus too much on the words or get to into a gripping plot line. (Until, ya know, I hopped on the computer to write the blog.)

So that's my The Poor (Wo)Man's Homeopathic Migraine Cure" guide. This is by no means meant to be a miracle cure for migraines. These are simply the things I had around the house that work for me when I don't have access to Miracle!Meds or a wealth of proven homeopathic methods to choose from.

Do you have any nifty tricks or suggestions for curing/staving off a migraine? Share them in the comment section below!

And That's How I Feel Right Now

It's no secret to anyone that I enjoy a good jam session in the car. They are (usually) more tame if someone's in the car with me, but very little stops me from rocking it out while I'm driving. The iPod was on shuffle yesterday and Kelly Clarkson's "How I Feel" came on. Which, if you've never heard it, is basically the anthem of all single, 20somethings who get told that "The right one will come when you least expect it." or "He's out there, you just have to look." And people are being supportive when they say that, I know they are. I don't think anyone has ever said those words to me with any form of malice or judgement. 

But let's call a spade a spade - sometimes, being single sucks. It just does. Regardless of how independent and self-sufficient you are or how much self-confidence you have. No one truly likes being alone. And I feel like there's a lot of mid-twenty/early thirty women who feel like if you complain about being single, or you simply mention it might be nice to have someone, you're labeled as desperate or as the kind of girl who always needs a man. 

But as I laid in bed last night with the words to "How I Feel" circling around in my head, I realized how unfair that is. I am twenty-six, almost twenty-seven. I've not been in a labeled relationship since I was nineteen and in the seven year span between then and now, I've been in that weird, awkward, kind-of dating-but-not-really limbo once. So why do I feel so pathetic every time I mention it might be nice to have a boyfriend - like I'm not allowed to verbally express that, yeah, it'd be nice to have someone hold my hand and tell me I'm pretty and banter back and forth with me. 

My favorite part of "How I Feel" is the line -

Oh, I'm getting tired of believing 
Even sicker of pretending
That "it's not so bad, just wait it out" 
Oh, I think you're feeding me lies again 
The only good man left wasn't him
And that's how I feel right now so just let me be
Let me be

Which translates to me as, "For the love of God, just let me feel what I feel instead of trying to tell me it'll change...because it hasn't yet." 

Again, people are trying to be supportive. I get that. But sometimes, you just need people to listen and sympathize instead of prophesying when you'll meet "the one". I've been promised "he's out there" so many times. But where? Where out there? And is he going to find me when I least expect it or am I supposed to be independent and find him myself? 

I just feel like it's okay for girls - and guys - to embrace that sometimes, it sucks to be single and it's okay to want someone to want you (cue Cheap Trick) and to be scared that it might not happen. Chances are it will, but in the mean time, I think it's okay feel what you feel without any apologies or shame. 

That all being said, and I feel confident in speaking for single people everywhere when I say, the "So, still single, huh?" question - it's never okay. Like, ever. 

First Thing's First...

I've been thinking of starting a blog for quite some time. And to be honest, this isn't my first rodeo in the world of blogging - I've started a few; some that include entries not intended for the everyone to read and some started back in the days of Xanga that I myself am too embarrassed to read at this point. That being said, I find myself often going to Facebook, rambling and/or ranting in the "Update Status" section and then erasing it because who the hell cares enough to read every random thought that crosses my mind, right? But, at the same time, I'm getting to that point in my life that I'm starting to realize my need to document my thoughts and share them are for me, not for anyone else. So this blog is my happy medium. I have no intention of it being updated regularly with long, five paragraph essay style entries - it's simply a medium in which I can share my thoughts - however random and rambly they may be - with those who care enough to click on the link and read them.


So enjoy reading them. Or don't. That's kind of the point. :)