"Once I was 7 Years Old"

The title of this post comes from the song "7 Years" by Lukas Graham.  The first time I heard it I was struck by the age he chose to use as the first age he sings about. For me, seven was the last age I remember being me, really me. After 8ish, I was increasingly consumed by my anger and acted/reacted to the world from an angry point of view. I chose anger and hiding instead of honesty and openness.

Being as blessed as I am with a husband who truly cares about me and my well being, he suggested I talk as much as I can about how the experiences I had and have are all clouded by the anger that started at 8. It has been hard and eye opening. I am no where near being done with this process but already feel better and more aware of why I feel the ways I do and how to deal with those feelings in my life now.

Now, to be real, I still have not been able to lose the weight I want to lose, or stop smoking, both things I know are a result of the choices and beliefs I started when I was 8ish. But I am able to talk about the choices I have made to get here and that is a necessary step in changing my belief in the need for bad foods and cigarettes.  I never have really wanted to see myself for who I really am and see that all the things that have happened to me and all the things I have chosen to do or believe affect my everyday actions and choices. It is very difficult to admit that I have done many things to myself that have put me where I am right now. Yet this uncomfortable feeling is a large piece of growth and change. 

The future is the real test to how much this self awareness will change me. I am hopeful that I can use this in the best way possible and motivate myself to get closer and closer to being me, just me.

 

 

Do you have childhood trauma that you hide from?
Do you struggle with anger and hurt?
How do you motivate yourself in the face of your own issues?

Love yourself because no one can really love you until you do.

Hugs!

Its Good For Me

Its good for you! 

Remember hearing that when you were young? I sure do. My parents often told me I should do something because it was good for me. I am not great with doing what's good for me; really, hearing that, whether I say it to myself or someone else does, makes me want to run to the opposite extreme, almost all the time. I know, I've got some issues. But its the truth, and I am clear about this in myself.

So recently, I came across an article about the results of repressing anger in childhood and a kind of self help therapy that seems to change people's lives. It was written by a neuroscientist, and  I thought it made sense so I started to do it. I call it punch/yell therapy. Basically, I go into my guest room and hit the bed and yell at my parents' mistakes that hurt me so badly. I yell and hit about them living in separate rooms, about pretending everything was okay, about ignoring me yet micromanaging my world, and then, I feel a little better. Sometimes, I am embarrassed to do it or angry that I must do it to help myself, but I have just decided to do it each time. Its good for me. :)

It has made me reflect on other areas of my life and how I am avoiding doing what's good for me. Rolling things around in my head; trying to get a bead on things.

Do you also avoid doing what's good for you?

Why do you think you do it?

Hope you all are well and trying to challenge yourself in some way, no matter how small. :)

Hugs!!

Why hello!!! Yes, Life is Interesting!!!!!!!

 . .  . everyone. :) 

Yet again, there has been a lapse in time since my last post and so much has been going on! Like, tons!!!

So for this first back at it post , I thought I would update y'all (yes, I live in the country so that verbiage is completely acceptable. :)) on the situation with our cats, an ongoing saga in our household.

As of last post, I had 5 cats, 4 cats I'd already had and a new addition, Winston, which you read in my last post had special needs.  Sadly, we only got one more day with Winston. He started having seizures  the next day and lost control of his bodily functions. He had several more seizures through out the day on Sunday, and unfortunately, I live about hour away from an emergency clinic (which is the only place open around here on a Sunday) and I knew that putting him in a crate and taking him to the vet would have been torture. So we made him as comfortable as possible and loved and pet him a lot in between seizures. We had a big fire all day and made the house super warm and before we went to bed, we loved him again and wished him good luck.

Fortunately, for his sake (because he seemed to be suffering a lot), he passed in the middle of the night on Sunday night. Even though I was sad, it was really the best thing that could have happened. He was not doing well, so life would have been hard for him. It would have been hard for us, as well. We had 6 other pets to think of and take care of as well as Winston, so it would have been a sacrifice of time to Winston in lieu of time with other pets and hobbies.

Life is definitely interesting, isn't it?

So you would think this is where this post ends but wait there's more!!

Around the time I adopted Winston, we had a stray cat hanging around our house and we decided to let him stay instead of trying to shoe him away.  When I first started feeding him, I thought he was a girl and pregnant. He was eating sooo much and looked he had a belly bulge. Well, apparently, he was just really hungry and ate a ton because when I took him to the vet and asked if he was pregnant, they came back and let me know not only is he not pregnant, but he is a boy and nurtured. Whoops!
His name is Booger, and he is really a lovely cat, about 2 years old or so. And oddly, he is our garage cat yet so sweet. We have actually made cat spaces for him in the garage, including a cat bed, a cat box, and food with water bowls. The garage window is being left open for him to go in and out
as he pleases.

So you might think THIS is the end of this post but wait, there's more!!!!!!

Two days after Winston died, I am sitting at my desk when I hear a knock on the door and see an adorable cat head in my door window. Yes, a cat head in a window that is 5 feet off the ground.  I open the door and the janitor had a cat in his arms and says that he heard I might want a new cat.  He had a cute little what I thought was a girl cat. We stashed her for the work day in a janitor's closet and I took her home at the end of the day.  I didn't have a cat carrier and just put her on the passenger seat of my car, thinking she would be wondering around the car on the 20 minute drive home, but she didn't. She laid there the whole way home. She has become my favorite cat already; she is sweet, and loving, and a killer. Yes, I have had many dead animal parts in our cat room since she's been here. WOOHOO, I got myself a killer!!  Her name is Isabella, and she is about 10 months old.

Alright, so here is the end of this post. I now have 6 cats and am officially on my way to being the crazy cat lady. Hee-hee!

Hope you are well and living life to the fullest!!

Thanks for not giving up on me!  Thanks for stopping by again!!  Hugs!!!!!

New Family Member

Introducing Winston

About a week ago, I got a new kitten. I have been wanting a new cat for a while now but hadn't found one that worked for us, either because of time or availability of a younger cat. We have 4 cats and in another post, I talked about my cats and why I wanted another one.

After going to a couple of PetsMarts many times and looking at ads on the internet over several months, I found a kitten, a 4 month old male, named Loki (now Winston) at a PetsMart.  I asked to look at him and the PetsMart worker let me go into the back, and she let Winston out and another kitten who was in the same cage. They were running on the floor in this small space and Winston was tripping over the other one (or so I thought). I picked him up, and he was very responsive to being held. He purred and relaxed into my arms. So . . .  of course I took him home. I held him on my lap for a while on the way home, and he was chilled and purring happily.

When we got home, I put him down on the ground, and he looked like he had a hurt back leg. He was tripping and kind of flopping his back end over, sometimes even dragging it.  He seemed to be doing better the next day, but I took him to the vet the next day just to be sure. The vet wasn't really sure what was wrong with him after a thorough check through; he mentioned it was possible that he had a certain condition but didn't think the kitten would seem better if he had that.

Well, after observing him for a while and doing research, it seems that he either got injured at some time that caused his back end to not work not, or he might have a condition called Cerebellar hypoplasia. Either way, we now have a special needs kitten. Although it may be more work than a regular cat, we decided to keep him and see how it goes. He may need a little hind leg support but he might just figure it out without it. So far he does walk around sometimes with hind legs dragging, and sometimes using them a little bit.

Winston is quite a lover kitten so far, and we have only had to do a few things to help him like get a food bowl on legs, and a high walled litter box my husband modified so he can get in and out easier. We also try to exercise his back legs when we hold him.


I'll keep you updated about how things turn out with this little guy. :) Isn't life interesting!?

Hugs!

Quilt Update

So here is a picture of the quilt I am working on. It is in the final stages and now I just need to cut off the excess from around the edges and sew the binding around that outer edge. It has taken me several months because I do not always want to work on it. Sewing, I have found, takes an enormous amount of patience on my part, and I do not always have the patience to sit down and work on it.

I find it ironic because my job requires a large amount of patience, and I am usually up for it. But I do find that once I am home, I do not want to be patient any more. Probably a big reason I do not have children of my own. By the end of the work day, and during vacations, I find I have lost a lot of the patience I have so naturally have at my job.

I do plan to finish my quilt within the next two days. I think I can get it done today, but I am giving myself two days to have the whole thing finished. One of the things I find is very funny about learning to sew the way that I am (with the book, Sew Everything Workshop) is that I often make things I do not need or want. Although I like this quilt, I have not need for it and am not sure what I will do with it once it is finished. I have pondered making another one and then giving one to each of my nieces.

Which coincidentally goes along with something that happened to me this morning. I am back in physical therapy to work on my right leg, which has gotten hurt over the last two + years of using it more than my left leg (which I catastrophically broke 2 1/2 years ago). One of the helpers heard me say that I had made a dog coat and asked me for the pattern. I thought about it and told her that she can just have the dog coat I made for my dog. She offered to pay for it, so we'll see about that, but really, my dog will not want it. (I tried it on him after I made it, and he didn't hate it but surely, didn't love it. Here is my post about that http://gettingtomenow.blogspot.com/2015/10/doggy-coat.htmlhttp://gettingtomenow.blogspot.com/2015/10/doggy-coat.html ). It just made me think about giving away more of what I make while I am learning. I did donate one skirt I made to a local thrift store because I knew I would never wear it.

Well, anyhoo, I will let you know about my finishing the quilt and will show you what it looks like int the end! 

Thanks for always coming back to read about my world! I have been fairly sporatic in my postings lately and will try to be more consistant in posting in the future.

Hope y'all are well and in good spirits! Happy holidays all around! Happy New Year's!!

HUGS!!!!!

Nebula In Purple

My favorite color is purple so naturally I have several paintings of nebula in purple. All three of the paintings are smaller ones, about 9" x 11" or so. I really like that all three are purple but look different. That's one of the things I love about painting nebula; you can use the same or similar colors in many paintings and yet they all look unique. 

The one thing that I have really gained from painting is a tiny view into the world of no limitations. Although I am still not always convinced of this notion, painting allows me to see a world of having no limitations and what that can come about from that kind of thinking. 

I really love the three paintings above! I hope you do something that results in things that make you really happy and loving what you did, whether its a product like a painting or the result of helped peopled.

How do you spend your non-work time? Is it all "other duties" or do you spend time doing things that you love and makes you feel good?

I love it when y'all throw out your ideas and leave some sort of comment!

Hugs! Thanks for stopping by!!

Our Baby is Home

Indy (10 months)  and Buddy (9 1/2 years)

So after driving over 8 hours to and from the Yreka area, my husband brought home our youngest family member, our 10 month old chocolate Labrador retriever. As I told you in a recent post, Indy was at hunt school for 5 months. I have missed him a ton!

First thing about him is that he is a big 10 month old. Our 9 year old Lab is a pretty big lab at 75-80 lbs. (not a fat lab, just big), and Indy is already taller and longer than him. Second thing about him is that he is thin, really thin. He has been growing so fast that his body has not been able to put on weight, and he looks a little bit emaciated. The trainer let us know that they continually increased his food to get him to gain weight, but it just wasn't happening yet. We'll get him fattened up eventually so I 'm not worried about him.

We took Indy to the vet, and he said he looks healthy, even if he is thin. He already weighs 66 lbs. He recommended high energy food, puppy food, or adding hard boiled eggs to his food. I am going to start with adding eggs to his food to see how that effects his weight.

Indy is a lovely puppy who is calmer and more casual than Buddy, our first dog. I am so excited to see him grow and see what kind of dog he will turn out to be. So far, it seems like he will be a great hunting pal AND house dog.

Do you have a dog, or a  pet? I would love to hear about the animal family members in your life!!

Hugs!!

Thank you for stopping by!!!!!!