The Family We Choose

There are so many old sayings such as "blood is thicker than water" and "family is family" and other such quotes.  Those sentiments are framed as wall art, embroidered on pillows, and stated over and over on television shows, movies, books, and even in memes on social media.  However, I do not believe that is always the case.  There are also sayings about finding out who your true friends are when you go through hard times.  Now this I absolutely do believe is infinitely true.

In the last 18 months, as I've dealt with the many symptoms of Long Covid along with complete financial devastation due to loss of wages while going through an 11-month delay in receiving my disability insurance benefits, I truly learned who is there for me, who has my back, and who I consider "family".  Are some of them family, either by blood, adoption, or marriage?  Absolutely.  Are some of them colleagues, friends, neighbors, and strangers?  Again, absolutely.  I have family members who have never once checked in on me or asked how I was doing.  I have family members who have made care packages, brought us suppers, dropped off treats and still check in on me regularly.  I have friends who have shown up to sit beside me at an emotional school board meeting, covered the cost to have my house deep-cleaned, text me weekly to see how I'm doing, bring me coffee, and make an effort to see me.  Others, who I thought were good friends have never reached out, or as time has gone on, have just kind of drifted on with their own lives, separate from me.  

Last year, while battling for my disability insurance to pay what was owed to me, I was completely overwhelmed by the generosity of so many people who I never expected to show the support they did.  People donated time, money, resources, emotional support, and compassion in a way I never could have imagined. Some of these were people I didn't know well, who were parents of students, community members, and anonymous donors who showed unimaginable kindness. I always said that when we were in a position to pay it forward, I absolutely would.  That's what I have been trying to do this year, now that things have calmed down, now that I have the ability to offer those same things to others that they offered to me during a difficult time. 

Yes, we have family.  But family isn't just those related to us.  For me, family is not just formed by blood, but by love.  I read a quote from Elizabeth Warren (that she credited to others before her) that really stuck with me.  "If you don't have a seat at the table, you're probably on the menu."  That's not a table anyone should even want to sit at.  Get your own table and fill the chairs with the family that you deserve to be sitting there with you. 

Happy Anniversary to Us

Tomorrow, May 20th, marks my 23rd anniversary of being married to my husband.  October will mark 25 years together.  That's more than half of my life.  It's crazy to think I have spent over half of my life with this man.  That's a really long time...

The single most significant person in my life was my grandma.  She was my best friend, confidant, cheerleader, and unwavering supporter, as well as my Sunday comics reader, board game opponent, Barbie doll dresser, and roller skating judge.  (The fact that she would let me roller skate around the kitchen, do "tricks" and then hold up a sheet of paper with a "score" on it as I pretended to be various competitors in the Roller Skating Olympics, Kitchen Floor Edition, still makes me shake my head in wonder.)  She passed away when I was 31.  It's hard to believe it's been 17 years since we last spoke.  My grandma is how I measure so many things in my life...It's also hard to believe I've now spent almost as much of my life with my husband as I had with my grandma.  

My husband and I met at a time when we were both really struggling.  Rob bid on a job in the same department I was working in at a local meat processing plant.  (This was during that period of time while I was still trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up.  It paid the bills and had decent benefits.)  One day we were put on a line together, just the two of us, and we spent 10 hours together that day, standing across from each other, and we talked about anything and everything you could possibly imagine.  We discovered during that talk that we were both very recently separated from our spouses.  (I had not told anyone I worked with that my husband had asked for a divorce recently, so it was a surprise to Rob.) He then confided in me that he'd had a huge crush on me several years earlier when I'd worked at a local retail store.  He shared that he'd always made it a point to go through my checkout line.  He even knew what kind of car I had driven and what my rims looked like!  It may sound a bit stalker-ish, but I couldn't help but be flattered.  I confided in him that I'd always thought he was cute, remembered seeing him at the local 4th of July carnival several years earlier, and had commented to my friend how cute he was, and that it was too bad he was married with a baby.  

From that day on we were inseparable.  We spent 10 hours a day, 6 days a week working together and getting to know each other.  Our first date was dinner at Village Inn.  I actually told him at the end of that date that I didn't think it was going to work, that I just needed to focus on myself and my young son.  But he didn't give up.  He pursued me with flowers, balloons, songs dedicated to me on the radio, the works.  So, of course, I gave in.  And, as they say, the rest is history.

It has definitely not been 23 years of blissful married life. We've had many ups and downs.  We've suffered through the loss of a baby, the loss of my three remaining grandparents, and the loss of his mom (which almost meant the loss of our marriage as well because grief sometimes drives you to sabotage your life.)  But, through thick and thin, we've made it.  After 25 years together, married for 23, we are in it for the long haul.  We are best friends, we have built a life together, and we are each other's meaning of family.  No matter what happens, we have each other's backs, and we stand beside each other regardless of what else is going on around us or between us.  At the end of the day, it's us.

And, to be honest, if I laced up some roller skates and asked Rob to watch me do tricks in the kitchen, then hold up my scores on sheets of paper, I guarantee he'd do it.  But only if I let him have a turn at competing in the Roller Skating Olympics, Kitchen Floor Edition too!

Happy Bittersweet Day

Being a mom is hard.  Having a day to celebrate being a mom isn't always the best or easiest day either.  There are the women who desperately want to be moms, but have not been able to do so.  There are the moms who wish they still had their own moms, but have lost them.  There are the moms who have lost their child or children.  There are the moms who do not have relationships with their children, for a plethora of reasons.  There are the moms who don't have a relationship with their own moms, also for a plethora of reasons.  Mother's Day isn't always cards and flowers and chocolates and breakfast in bed.

Where I live high school graduation is held on Mother's Day every year.  I hate it.  Spending Mother's Day watching my children graduate is not how I would ever choose to spend Mother's Day.  It's stressful, emotional, such a roller coaster of a day.  It's also A LOT of work to prepare for and host a graduation party.  It's such a sense of pride, sadness, love, and anxiousness all rolled into one when you see your babies reaching such a huge milestone.  A gym full of people, so many emotions, pride, joy, and sadness all combined in my tears.  It's just not how I would ever willingly choose to spend Mother's Day.  But I did it.  Four times.

As for being a mom, there is nothing in this world more important to me.  It truly is life's greatest gift to have carried my babies for 9 months, to bring them into the world, and to watch them grow and learn and become their own individual selves.  My babies are all grown up now, but they still have my whole heart, and always will.  I was also blessed with two bonus sons when I married their dad.  Being a stepmom is hard, has a negative connotation to it.  It has always felt like I was being scrutinized, judged, doubted.  But, I can say with 100% sincerity, both of my stepsons have brought me so much joy and happiness, and I love them both to the moon and back.  

Today, I am going to do what I've been doing every Mother's Day for the last 15+ years (minus the years I was attending graduations); I'm going to plant my flowers in the pots and baskets on my deck.  It brings me so much happiness to see them grow, to see all their colors when I sit outside on the deck.  It's funny how something so simple can bring so much contentedness.  But, it's true, it really is the little things in life.  

Happy (Bittersweet) Mother's Day to me, to all the moms reading this, and to all the moms who are still waiting for their babies, and to all the grandmas and dads and aunts and teachers and neighbors and family and friends who have stepped into the role of "mom" for those who need them.  

Overweight and Out of Shape

Overweight and out of shape.  Those are words that could possibly have been used to describe me literally my entire life.  And maybe they even were...I was the largest of my mom's 3 babies.  I was a chubby child.  I always hated that day in the fall and then again in the spring during those elementary school years when the school nurse showed up, lined us up in the hall, and weighed and measured us.  Right...in front of...the entire class.  

Then there was junior high and those dreaded showers.  Oh my gosh, how I worried the summer before 7th grade, imagining those locker room showers and being judged by everyone.  But, it ended up not being so bad. Our PE teacher only made us shower once each quarter to give us our "shower grade".  And even then, everyone else was just as mortified about them as I was, so we all changed with our backs to each other, and we were FAST, everyone equally distraught about the whole ordeal.  

In high school, all was good.  I had friends.  I had boyfriends.  I had a part-time job, a car, and just did all the things high school kids do in small-town mid-America.  I certainly didn't put much thought into my weight.  I had been a size 18 from "school-clothes shopping" the summer before 6th grade all the way to my high school graduation, except for a very brief period of time at the start of my junior year.  That was after my first really big heartbreak occurred, and I could wear a size 14 for about a month.  But, I quickly grew out of them again as I moved on to bigger and better things and my appetite returned at the same pace that my heart healed.  

Weight was always just something in the back of my mind, but not something I stressed about too much as an adult.  It didn't stop me from doing the things I wanted to do.  It didn't stop me from going places, from buying clothes, from being active, from dating, hanging out with friends, or any of the things a young adult does during those first years out of school.  

It wasn't until after a couple of kids and 15 years down the road, when I was a size 24/26, that I really actively pursued serious weight-loss and the whole "diet and exercise thing" that I saw other people doing so diligently.  My motivation was a wedding I was going to be in, and a bridesmaid's dress I had to wear.  I was in my mid-30's, weighed about 100 pounds more than I'd weighed in my mid-twenties, gaining about 10 pounds a year each of the previous 10 years, so it hadn't even been a big deal to me as it was happening.  After all, that had been less than a pound a month, so it had just gradually crept up on me.  I was teaching middle school, absolutely loved my job, had great kids, a great husband, great friends, and life really was just "GREAT" during that period of time.  I began logging my calories, borrowed a friend's elliptical, and in 10 months, just in time for the wedding, I'd lost 50 pounds.  It was such a change in my body that I had to have my dress taken in several inches just days before the wedding when I tried it on!  However, over that next year, life just went on as a busy, working mom and wife, I stopped being so strict with my calorie counting, my friend needed her elliptical back, and I'd gained those lost 50 pounds by the end of the following year.  

I bounced around within the same 20 pound range over the next 10 years, sometimes up 10, sometimes down 10, but always within that same 20 pound range of the weight I'd been before my 50 pound "wedding weight loss" had happened.  It wasn't enough to cause my clothing size to change or for there to be any big changes in my appearance, my fitness level, my annual bloodwork at the doctor's office, or my life.  In late 2020/early 2021 I tried a prescription appetite suppressant.  It worked.  I lost about 30 pounds in 3-4 months, which was the limit to how many months my doctor would prescribe it at a time.  But the weight came right back on as soon as I stopped taking it.  I wasn't too concerned though.  I had been following the same "healthy habits" for the last 10 years. I tried to eat well Monday-Friday, splurged on the weekends if there was something I was craving or if there was something really ooey-gooey and decadent I wanted to cook or bake.  That was the life balance that worked for me.  And it did work. My doctor had even told me I was "the poster child" for not being able to tell someone's health by their outward appearance because all my labs were always great; my good cholesterol was high, my bad cholesterol was low, and my blood sugar and blood pressure were both good.

I was confident in saying 2021 was going to be a good year.  We had made it through our first full school year after being closed due to the pandemic.  I was teaching my "dream job" position, and loving every minute of it.  Summer break was one of the best I'd had in years.  I was just focusing on eating well, being active, reading, keeping my house clean and organized, playing frisbee every day with my dog while getting lots of natural vitamin D, cooking healthy meals when my husband came home from work, and enjoying every day.  We went to the zoo, went swimming, and even drove to Missouri to watch the Chiefs at Training Camp.  I was excited for the upcoming school year, and just really loving life.  

School started for the 2021-22 school year, and it was as great as I'd hoped.  I loved my 100+ new 6th graders, I was so excited for everything I had planned for the year, and I threw so much energy and enthusiasm into planning my lessons.  I dressed up for EVERY SINGLE DAY of Homecoming Spirit Week for the first time in the 22 years I'd worked there.  I was completely and totally in the groove and "living the dream" I'd always wanted.  Then, 8 weeks into that glorious, magical school year, I tested positive for Covid.  

I quarantined for my 14 days, as was the protocol at that time.  I was still very winded, weak, exhausted, and still had this mysterious swelling at the end of the 2 weeks, so took a third week off to continue recovering, and then returned.  By the end of that first week back, I was so worn down, I couldn't quite make it to the end of the day on Friday and left early.  I was completely defeated, in pain, exhausted, and the edema was worse and worse with each passing day.  My principal was so kind, so concerned.  He completely supported me trying to only work half-days that next week. But it soon became apparent that something wasn't right.  I started each Monday thinking, "OK, this is the week I am back in the swing of things."  But it wasn't mind over matter.  Not even close.  The more I pushed myself the more exhausted I was, the more pain, the more fluid built up, the more headaches, the more brain fog, confusion.  My shortness of breath began to get worse and worse, my heart was racing all the time, and the edema in my lower extremities was horrible.  Then more and more cognitive issues began to develop.  The more I tried to do, the worse I felt, the more I pushed myself, the more I felt like I was getting pushed back.  But by what, I didn't know...And then, it finally all added up.  I had Post-Covid Syndrome, now more commonly known as Long Covid.  

It's been 18 months now, since that first week I tried to return to work.  It's been 18 months of nerve, joint, and muscle pain, headaches, dizziness, severe edema, and debilitating exhaustion.  It's been 18 months of dealing with cognitive deficits, loss of mobility and balance, loss of some dexterity and fine motor skills.  It's been 18 months of gaining 40 pounds of fluid, losing it with diuretics, filling right back up with 40 pounds of fluid when the meds stop, and repeating this cycle.  Now it's to the point that even the diuretics aren't working.  The fluid doesn't leave, just shifts up and down my legs, into my abdomen, up into my arms, back down into my legs. My shortness of breath has gotten worse and worse, my racing heart sometimes feels like it's going to pound right out of my chest, and even the smallest of tasks is absolutely exhausting.  It's gotten to the point where it's difficult to even leave the house more often than not, and is rarely worth the amount of time and energy it takes for me to do so.  Just forcing myself to still get up to an alarm each day, to get out of bed, to get fully dressed, comb my hair, throw it up in a bun, and make it down the hall to the couch is a feat in itself.  

Some of the doctors I've seen and been treated by have been amazing.  They have shown kindness, compassion, and patience with me as I've explained my symptoms.  They've included me in decisions, listened to my concerns, and even to my ideas. They've gone above and beyond to help me navigate a disease they are still only just now learning about themselves. Others have looked at me and seen an overweight and out of shape woman in her late 40's, and they can see nothing else.  No matter what I tell them or what they see in my chart, they see overweight and out of shape, and look no further.  I must just be deconditioned from those 3 weeks I was off with Covid. (Oh, you mean those 3 weeks I was off 18 months ago?)  

I can't deny being overweight.  I have not been considered in the "average weight" range since I was about 5 years old.  I've even received such backhanded compliments as, "It's a good thing you're overweight  because if you were pretty AND thin, you probably wouldn't be as nice of a person."  Ummm...thanks...?  And I'm sure as heck not an athlete.  I was once asked to sub on a "just for fun" women's volleyball team, and literally told them they would be at less of an advantage being a player short than having me play on their team.  But you know what else?  I was overweight and out of shape the summer of 2021 when I was living my best life.  I was overweight and out of shape when I tested positive for Covid in October of 2021, and I was still overweight and out of shape when I was still feeling ill in November and again in December, and still in February 2022 when I was officially diagnosed with Long Covid.  But, is that what's "wrong" with me?  No.  Is this overweight and out of shape identity something I've only taken on since being home with Covid for those 3 weeks over 18 months ago?  Nope, not accurate either.  Should ALL  doctors (and other medical personnel), and strangers, and even colleagues, and heck, even friends and family, always remember that there is a lot more to someone than just their physical appearance?  Absolutely.  Because, last I checked, just being overweight and out of shape has never stopped me from living my best life.