I'm going to quickly switch back to my education, specifically in the start of the second year of engineering. I had tried to get into Mechanical Engineering (to make cars), Civil Engineering (to make buildings), or Train Engineering (because trains are important too guys). I didn't get into them. Instead, I got into Software Engineering. At the time, I was pretty upset by it. Even though it was high on my list of concentrations to go in, I had spent the first few years of my life wanting to make cars or buildings. However, once I got going on Software Engineering in my second year, I found I actually really liked it. Software Engineering got to take classes with people in Computer and Electrical Engineering, so I was in classes with Mike, another one of my good friends, and another guy who I hung out with sometimes. There were a couple of classes that I had to take because of Engineering that I really didn't want to, such as Differential Equations. Seriously, what software engineer ever has to know differential equations? Since that class, I've never even had to use math.
It was around this time that my boyfriend of the time started being kinda mean to engineers. He kept saying that everyone was in it solely to get the iron ring at the end, and you could do any engineer's job with any different degree (ie. Chem degree instead of a chemical engineer, architect instead of a civil engineer, etc.) This is pretty wrong, otherwise they wouldn't have an engineering degree. However, with software engineering, there is an equivalent degree in computer science. He was taking an equivalent class to what I was taking at one point, and he was learning a lot more theory and things that I actually wanted to know compared to what I was learning. I decided to look into it, and I found that there were a lot more classes in computer science that were applicable to software engineering, such as computability. I started asking a bunch of professors in both engineering's software engineering and computer science's software engineering. Basically, the best response I got from the head of engg's software engineering as a reason to not switch is "but you won't get your ring." I was annoyed, and so I switched. Best decision I ever made, and one of the best things that came out of that relationship. After I did that, my interest went higher and higher, and my grades went up accordingly.
In my second year, I found out I had to get my wisdom teeth out. It seemed like a good time, since I was having a lull in health issues, so we agreed. I got my teeth x-ray sent to this guy by market mall (he was crazy as a bat) and we went to see him. We told him all about my health problems, and he was all like 'oh yeah, no problem, this will go fine, I'm crazy' and stuff, so we felt good about it. We scheduled it for reading week of my second year, and I was all ready to go. Two days before reading week, I got a phone call. It was the nurse in the guy's office, telling me that I needed to go for an appointment with the anesthetic guy before my surgery. This was Thursday, and my surgery date was on Monday, so I was like 'well, can I get into an appointment tomorrow?' and she said 'no.' This got me so mad. I said it was ridiculous, that was the only time I could go get it because I had to work over the summer, so I couldn't get it for another year, and this was stupid. She's was like 'whatevs, sorry, bye' and that was it. I called my parents in a rage. Then I called the guy's office back and told them it was extremely unprofessional, if they wanted me to go for an appointment with the guy they should have called ages ago after I had the appointment with the surgeon, and they were obviously just frightened of my health problems and so didn't want to do it. I told them again they were unprofessional and asked them to send my xrays back to my dentist, because I would never let this surgeon touch me, and I planned on telling not only my dentist but everyone I know about this stupid situation. It was so stupid. So then I found this other place in the south of the city I live in (I'm in the north) who wouldn't even need to see me before the surgery, I just had to tell them about my health problems on the site and they would know. It was great, I had a date booked for right after school (because I could actually do it then). I went to an appointment with my rheumatologist and told her about it. She told me I couldn't get it. I asked why. She said that if I get oral surgery while on the infusions, I could get the bone disease in my jaw. I was super upset, so she called the surgeon for me and told him. He then told her that he was planning on giving me a steroid after, a steroid called Decadron, the one that gave me the bone disease in the first place! She basically said 'like hell, stay away from her!' and my appointment was cancelled.
Around this same time, I stopped getting my infusions. My rheumatologist looked at my bone density tests and MRI's and decided that the bone disease had stopped killing more bone, and some maybe even grew back a little bit! But we were at a point where it wouldn't help anymore, so there was no reason to get it anymore. At that time, I was no longer getting kidney stones quite so much, so that was awesome! I was quite happy to not have to get two blood tests and an IV every month, so that was great.
In 2009, I went back to my rheumatologist, and I got an MRI of my shoulders, just to check up on things. It still hurt in that weird, pinchy way, but I wasn't concerned because it'd been doing it for a year and I was kind of used to it by now. However, when I went into her office and we looked at my MRI results, she started reading it and said "oh no. This isn't good. This isn't good at all." It turned out that the feeling of pinching in my shoulder was actually the feeling of a collapsed joint. The dead bone and some cartilage around it had burst apart, leaving a super raw point in my shoulder exposed. I needed to get it fixed. I was pretty upset by this, because I had had a good run of a few years with no health problems. I got a referral to a shoulder surgeon, and a "that sucks, sorry!" in the nicest way possible (she really is a great rheumatologist). I got in my car in the parkade and called my parents, and then my boyfriend, bawling my eyes out. I remember a car waiting behind me in the parkade, and I didn't notice for a while, so he just patiently waited for me to leave. After a few minutes, I shut my car off because I wasn't going to drive while on the phone and crying like an idiot (that seems a little distracted driving-y), and he got all mad and drove off angrily. I was very upset.
Shortly after this, in the summer between my third and fourth year, my boyfriend broke up with me. I'm very ashamed that I'm not the one who terminated the relationship, but oh well. He told me that for the entire past year, he didn't love me, he was just sticking around because he didn't want to hurt me. I was really upset. I had just spent a month helping him get through a cold or something, and then pneumonia because he didn't go to the doctor when it got really bad, and he didn't even care. Another reason he broke up with me was that, and I quote, 'how can I know that you're a good girlfriend if I've never had another girlfriend? I need to date someone else to know if you're actually good or not.' So yeah. A very long story short, this chapter of my life is closed. For now. I've learned that things in life are never quite what they seem, and this entire relationship is one of those situations. But once again, more on that later.
A few months after this, I ended up meeting a guy at work at Cardel and we started dating.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Don't Play Human Foosball Unless You Don't Mind A Soccer Ball In The Face
I'm going to skip ahead in the story to the start of University. This isn't because nothing happened, just that nothing massive happened that pertains to the story, so there's no need to tell you guys about it. From this point, the story will be on fast forward a bit because of the lull in my health problems. I'll get through this part as quickly as possible so I can get back to the fun stuff!
Halfway through the summer was an engineering open house. It solidified in my mind that I was doing the right thing for school. Partway through the day we played human Foosball, which is where a bunch of people hold onto long poles and face the same way as the people on the Foosball table. Then they throw a soccer ball in the middle of it. They put me in the very middle, and I was looking down at the ball right when someone kicked it up and into my nose. It bled for two hours. It was hilarious.
The first day of University was called UofC 101. The basic idea of it is that you run around the uni going to all these fake classes practising for the real thing. I was put in a group with this girl that I'd met a few weeks before at an engineering open house thing. I spent some time too with some friends from my lifeguarding job. It was weird for me because I was almost the oldest, a full year older than everyone else in my year.
When I got home from the first day of UofC 101, I got a phone call from my boyfriend at the time. Things happened a while ago that I couldn't remember (my psychologist has told me I was experiencing dissociation at the time) and we broke up. It was difficult for me because I couldn't remember doing it, so I had to just accept the fact that it had happened and was my fault. I never tried to pass the blame off, because I hate when people do that. Our relationship ended at the point of one year and eight months, and my family and I were alone again suddenly in the health problems. I still had my headache. I decided to not go to the rest of UofC 101.
After a few days I was pretty ready to get over the whole ordeal and move on with my life. If there's anything health problems have taught me, it's how to deal with things and put them behind me. The guy was still calling and asking me questions about what had happened, which bothered me because I didn't know any of the answers. I wanted him to stop so I could move on and focus on school.
School was awesome! I'd waited since grade 8 to be in University, and it didn't disappoint me. I had six classes, which is a very heavy course load. One thing I want to stress about this: it wasn't necessarily hard, it was just a lot of work. The people who drop out probably aren't dropping out because they don't understand the material, they're dropping because they haven't or didn't want to keep up with the course load. The first year, I did pretty good with sticking to it. I had to get my infusions still, once a month, and I had to fit it around my classes, which got a little difficult. I was at a good point with the pain though, and so luckily that didn't get in the way too much.
I had a few friends in this time. I found out that Mike, the guy from Chinook (my 27 year old friend) was in engineering too so we hung out every so often. I got a few friends in my block in engg, one girl and a bunch of guy friends (I've always got along way better with guys). I found that I didn't really like how some of the people in engg acted towards engineering. Some were being very competitive about it, which is ridiculous; you're not going to make it out being the only engineer, so you may as well try to take as many of your friends with you. The friends I made were people who where all for helping each other, which was great. One major thing that happened to me in this year was I started playing World of Warcraft. From now on, I'll refer to this game as WoW.
At the end of the first year, I was hanging out with one guy a lot in particular, because he was pretty down to earth compared to a lot of other people in my block. He introduced me to one of his friends, and the friend and I really clicked. He was in number theory or something. We started dating at the end of the first year of university, on May 7, 2007.
About in the middle of his and my relationship, my left shoulder started hurting. It felt like I was getting pinched in the shoulder joint, and would sting. I noticed it most while I was lifeguarding, but thought nothing of it other than a pulled muscle. I went to the doctor for it, who said we could do an MRI, and I denied. In my opinion there was enough wrong with me.
Halfway through the summer was an engineering open house. It solidified in my mind that I was doing the right thing for school. Partway through the day we played human Foosball, which is where a bunch of people hold onto long poles and face the same way as the people on the Foosball table. Then they throw a soccer ball in the middle of it. They put me in the very middle, and I was looking down at the ball right when someone kicked it up and into my nose. It bled for two hours. It was hilarious.
The first day of University was called UofC 101. The basic idea of it is that you run around the uni going to all these fake classes practising for the real thing. I was put in a group with this girl that I'd met a few weeks before at an engineering open house thing. I spent some time too with some friends from my lifeguarding job. It was weird for me because I was almost the oldest, a full year older than everyone else in my year.
When I got home from the first day of UofC 101, I got a phone call from my boyfriend at the time. Things happened a while ago that I couldn't remember (my psychologist has told me I was experiencing dissociation at the time) and we broke up. It was difficult for me because I couldn't remember doing it, so I had to just accept the fact that it had happened and was my fault. I never tried to pass the blame off, because I hate when people do that. Our relationship ended at the point of one year and eight months, and my family and I were alone again suddenly in the health problems. I still had my headache. I decided to not go to the rest of UofC 101.
After a few days I was pretty ready to get over the whole ordeal and move on with my life. If there's anything health problems have taught me, it's how to deal with things and put them behind me. The guy was still calling and asking me questions about what had happened, which bothered me because I didn't know any of the answers. I wanted him to stop so I could move on and focus on school.
School was awesome! I'd waited since grade 8 to be in University, and it didn't disappoint me. I had six classes, which is a very heavy course load. One thing I want to stress about this: it wasn't necessarily hard, it was just a lot of work. The people who drop out probably aren't dropping out because they don't understand the material, they're dropping because they haven't or didn't want to keep up with the course load. The first year, I did pretty good with sticking to it. I had to get my infusions still, once a month, and I had to fit it around my classes, which got a little difficult. I was at a good point with the pain though, and so luckily that didn't get in the way too much.
I had a few friends in this time. I found out that Mike, the guy from Chinook (my 27 year old friend) was in engineering too so we hung out every so often. I got a few friends in my block in engg, one girl and a bunch of guy friends (I've always got along way better with guys). I found that I didn't really like how some of the people in engg acted towards engineering. Some were being very competitive about it, which is ridiculous; you're not going to make it out being the only engineer, so you may as well try to take as many of your friends with you. The friends I made were people who where all for helping each other, which was great. One major thing that happened to me in this year was I started playing World of Warcraft. From now on, I'll refer to this game as WoW.
At the end of the first year, I was hanging out with one guy a lot in particular, because he was pretty down to earth compared to a lot of other people in my block. He introduced me to one of his friends, and the friend and I really clicked. He was in number theory or something. We started dating at the end of the first year of university, on May 7, 2007.
About in the middle of his and my relationship, my left shoulder started hurting. It felt like I was getting pinched in the shoulder joint, and would sting. I noticed it most while I was lifeguarding, but thought nothing of it other than a pulled muscle. I went to the doctor for it, who said we could do an MRI, and I denied. In my opinion there was enough wrong with me.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Well You Shouldn't Have Become A Teacher, But Unfortunately You Are
My year of Chinook had a couple of significant occurrences. One thing that is really important is that I turned 18. I was dating the same guy, so he was 19 at that point. He was a huge drinker, and so I ended up going out with him and drinking every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I was a lightweight, and was making a buttload of cash, so I could easily afford it. Our main stomping grounds was the old Cowboys. It's gone now (which makes me feel ridiculously old) after closing, reopening, and then closing again, so if you ever decide to take a tour of Kelli's life in Calgary, you'll have to skip that part. I liked the ability to dress up and look cute, because it made me feel like everything that happened to me didn't matter and I was fitting in like everyone else.
Around the same time, I found myself losing my thought a lot. By this I mean I would start driving home, would kind of space out, and then would come back a couple minutes later headed for Edmonton. This happened a few times, and I'm still not sure why it happened, but oh well. I didn't tell many people because I didn't want to freak anyone out. I actually mentioned it to my boyfriend of the time, who told me not to tell him about it because he didn't want to know. That was kind of a bad call (hindsight is 20/20). This problem will come back later, so sit tight!
Another thing that happened was I moved far enough away from my surgery that I was able to get a piercing! One day, Mom was like 'let's get your nose pierced!' and I was like 'ummmmm' and she was like 'yeahhhh!' so we got in the car and went. I was a little worried about it, because it's not every day you have a sharp metal rod punchered through your face (hopefully). So we went into the shop in Kensington that looked super sterile, and jumped up on the bed to get it done. Mom held my hand so I didn't start bawling, and she told me to shut my eyes. She punched it through and it barely hurt at all, I guess because I had had and was having enough pain to minimize all other pain. My eyes started watering like mad however, almost like I got punched in the nose. It looked great though! So we went home all happy. That was on January 7, 2006. I remember the date because it was mine and my boyfriend's one year anniversary, and I didn't tell him I got it. He didn't notice until we were going up an elevator somewhere that night and was like 'whoa! What is that!' It was awesome.
The second semester of Chinook started shortly after this. I was in Math 31 and Physics 30. I was worried about Physics 30 because I'd taken Physics 20 two years prior through a workbook only. I, by chance, was in this class with the girl that had the chest tumour, and also with a guy who I'd started calling my 27 year old friend (I'm pretty sure he was 27 at the time), both of whom were in my Chem 30 class the previous semester. The girl and I went up to the teacher shortly into the first week to tell her about our health problems because we would be away often, either from pain or from appointments. She asked us what we wanted to do after, and we told her (engineer for me, something for the girl, maybe nursing?). She gave us both a funny look, and then said 'you know, some people in life just can't do what they want to through no fault of their own'. We both went 'um. Okay.' It was so upsetting! She had no right to say it. We both decided to start hating her (because we were teenage girls).
Leading up to the end of the last semester at Chinook, Kyle and I discussed possibly getting tattoos together. We had gotten quite close as a result of my health problems, and we wanted a way to symbolize it. We chose the Red Cross because we had taken all of our lifeguarding courses. We decided to do it, so we booked it, and on the fateful day Mom, Kyle and I got in the jeep and drove down to the Smilin' Buddha, a reputable tattoo shop in Marda Loop. I got mine on the back of my neck, about a centimeter down from my scar, and Kyle got his on his left pec, right over his heart. I had gotten freezing from the nurses from my infusions, so I couldn't even feel it. They turned out great! We got them covered and went to get some beers at the Regal Beagle. A couple of days later, I was lifeguarding during lessons. A teacher decided they weren't going to teach that day (douche), so we needed a lifeguard to teach for them. Somehow, I was the lucky guard. I was worried about my tattoo, but wore my wet suit so I thought it would be okay (that makes no sense). Later that day, my family told me my tattoo faded terribly. I realized I'd have to get it redone. I went in a couple of weeks later, and he redid the entire tattoo for no extra cost. I had no freezing on, however, so I got to feel the whole thing. Though it was over my spine, it actually wasn't that bad. To quote my mom, "It's not brain surgery." It looked great after, and it's held it's colour beautifully, even now, 5 years later.
Sometime around now, I got my acceptance letter for early acceptance to the University of Calgary for Engineering in the mail. I was ecstatic! So was my family. They actually called me at work when the letter came in the mail. Kyle opened it and read me the whole thing, and the four of us were screaming and jumping up and down. It was awesome! I actually got in based on Extenuating Circumstances (or something... it was 5 years ago, give me a break). I had to get two letters from teachers (one teacher form Chinook and one from my high school) saying that they thought I would do well in University despite my health problems. I was pretty proud when I got in because I did it despite all my problems, and I saw it kind of as a middle finger to how my life had been so far. It was great!
Around the same time, I found myself losing my thought a lot. By this I mean I would start driving home, would kind of space out, and then would come back a couple minutes later headed for Edmonton. This happened a few times, and I'm still not sure why it happened, but oh well. I didn't tell many people because I didn't want to freak anyone out. I actually mentioned it to my boyfriend of the time, who told me not to tell him about it because he didn't want to know. That was kind of a bad call (hindsight is 20/20). This problem will come back later, so sit tight!
Another thing that happened was I moved far enough away from my surgery that I was able to get a piercing! One day, Mom was like 'let's get your nose pierced!' and I was like 'ummmmm' and she was like 'yeahhhh!' so we got in the car and went. I was a little worried about it, because it's not every day you have a sharp metal rod punchered through your face (hopefully). So we went into the shop in Kensington that looked super sterile, and jumped up on the bed to get it done. Mom held my hand so I didn't start bawling, and she told me to shut my eyes. She punched it through and it barely hurt at all, I guess because I had had and was having enough pain to minimize all other pain. My eyes started watering like mad however, almost like I got punched in the nose. It looked great though! So we went home all happy. That was on January 7, 2006. I remember the date because it was mine and my boyfriend's one year anniversary, and I didn't tell him I got it. He didn't notice until we were going up an elevator somewhere that night and was like 'whoa! What is that!' It was awesome.
The second semester of Chinook started shortly after this. I was in Math 31 and Physics 30. I was worried about Physics 30 because I'd taken Physics 20 two years prior through a workbook only. I, by chance, was in this class with the girl that had the chest tumour, and also with a guy who I'd started calling my 27 year old friend (I'm pretty sure he was 27 at the time), both of whom were in my Chem 30 class the previous semester. The girl and I went up to the teacher shortly into the first week to tell her about our health problems because we would be away often, either from pain or from appointments. She asked us what we wanted to do after, and we told her (engineer for me, something for the girl, maybe nursing?). She gave us both a funny look, and then said 'you know, some people in life just can't do what they want to through no fault of their own'. We both went 'um. Okay.' It was so upsetting! She had no right to say it. We both decided to start hating her (because we were teenage girls).
Leading up to the end of the last semester at Chinook, Kyle and I discussed possibly getting tattoos together. We had gotten quite close as a result of my health problems, and we wanted a way to symbolize it. We chose the Red Cross because we had taken all of our lifeguarding courses. We decided to do it, so we booked it, and on the fateful day Mom, Kyle and I got in the jeep and drove down to the Smilin' Buddha, a reputable tattoo shop in Marda Loop. I got mine on the back of my neck, about a centimeter down from my scar, and Kyle got his on his left pec, right over his heart. I had gotten freezing from the nurses from my infusions, so I couldn't even feel it. They turned out great! We got them covered and went to get some beers at the Regal Beagle. A couple of days later, I was lifeguarding during lessons. A teacher decided they weren't going to teach that day (douche), so we needed a lifeguard to teach for them. Somehow, I was the lucky guard. I was worried about my tattoo, but wore my wet suit so I thought it would be okay (that makes no sense). Later that day, my family told me my tattoo faded terribly. I realized I'd have to get it redone. I went in a couple of weeks later, and he redid the entire tattoo for no extra cost. I had no freezing on, however, so I got to feel the whole thing. Though it was over my spine, it actually wasn't that bad. To quote my mom, "It's not brain surgery." It looked great after, and it's held it's colour beautifully, even now, 5 years later.
Sometime around now, I got my acceptance letter for early acceptance to the University of Calgary for Engineering in the mail. I was ecstatic! So was my family. They actually called me at work when the letter came in the mail. Kyle opened it and read me the whole thing, and the four of us were screaming and jumping up and down. It was awesome! I actually got in based on Extenuating Circumstances (or something... it was 5 years ago, give me a break). I had to get two letters from teachers (one teacher form Chinook and one from my high school) saying that they thought I would do well in University despite my health problems. I was pretty proud when I got in because I did it despite all my problems, and I saw it kind of as a middle finger to how my life had been so far. It was great!
Monday, September 26, 2011
Looks Like You're Going To Have To Pick Up The Fork
That summer was pretty uneventful. In fact, the timeline here speeds up a little. I went through a few years of relatively good health (well, if you can call it good health), but a few crucial things happened in this time.
As I said, the summer went by without much happening. At least, nothing that sticks out in my memory. I went to some friend's houses a couple of times, but that was all. My main worry was school. I had to finish off Physics 30 and Math 31 in order to get into University, and I decided to also take Math 30 online to boost my grade, and Chem 30 again because I wasn't pleased with how I'd done on the diploma when I took it previously. I had a couple of options: I could go back to Queen E (my high school) and take a 13th year, or go to Chinook college. I took the Chinook route, because I never wanted to be in that school again.
When September rolled around, I was bumped from my receptionist job at Metro Ford because my boyfriend was back in school and needed to work at the desk again. I took this opportunity to move to the Parts department as the Parts Girl. Basically I was setting up for inventory, and also helping the shipper/receiver that was there. I got to wear a metro shirt that was about a league too big for me, and I was supposed to wear steel toed boots (as I found out when I dropped an F-350 rotor on my foot), but I opted to switch from my normal heels to running shoes instead.
I was working in the Parts department part time, so I decided to take only one class at chinook that first term. I took Chem 30. I don't remember all too much about this class, except that there was a girl in it that had gotten a tumour in her chest taken out. I wasn't doing that well in it because I was more concerned about working, and my energy level from my hip surgery hadn't come back yet. I ended up raising my mark by ten percent, so that was a pretty good achievement.
One thing I should mention about this time. Around when I started school, I started getting pains in my abdomen every so often. It was confusing, but I figured it was because I was pigging out like I'd never seen junk food before. Until one day I realized that actually, I was getting kidney stones. I was still getting infusions at this time, and I had to take a bunch of calcium and vitamin D because of it. For some reason, my body decided it hated me and didn't want to put calcium in my bones. Instead, it wanted to inflict the most pain possible on me.
One night it got really bad. Up to this point I had just waited it out, because it was painful but not as bad as other pain I'd gone through (or was going through). However, Mom and I decided that I should go to emerg to try to get help passing this thing, as per the instructions from my rheumatologist. While I was in emerg waiting to be put into a bed, I passed the stupid thing. Have you ever seen a kidney stone? They're tiny! The size of them definitely does not make you feel triumph over passing them. They actually make you feel like you're a giant wuss. So, once I passed it, Mom and I discussed going home, even though we'd gotten a bed. One doctor came in and insisted doing an exam, which we refused (considering how the exam when when my bones were hurting), and we demanded to be allowed to go home. We won.
From then on, I got a ton of kidney stones. I worked with kidney stones, I went to Chinook with kidney stones, and so on and so on. It was great times (it really wasn't great times). I got so good at passing them that I could just pop a Tylenol 3 and just deal with it. Some other stuff happened with this, but to be honest, I'm not super comfortable talking about it, so it's getting cut out. I'll maybe put it in if I get to make this into a book.
Another great thing that happened around this time was that I found out about my low blood pressure. When you have low blood pressure, you body all of a sudden decides its going to feel like it has no muscles and is going to try to shut down. I had the pleasure of having this happen while I was driving. Good times! I was told that, to deal with this, I was going to have to eat things like chips more often. Num num num.
As I said, the summer went by without much happening. At least, nothing that sticks out in my memory. I went to some friend's houses a couple of times, but that was all. My main worry was school. I had to finish off Physics 30 and Math 31 in order to get into University, and I decided to also take Math 30 online to boost my grade, and Chem 30 again because I wasn't pleased with how I'd done on the diploma when I took it previously. I had a couple of options: I could go back to Queen E (my high school) and take a 13th year, or go to Chinook college. I took the Chinook route, because I never wanted to be in that school again.
When September rolled around, I was bumped from my receptionist job at Metro Ford because my boyfriend was back in school and needed to work at the desk again. I took this opportunity to move to the Parts department as the Parts Girl. Basically I was setting up for inventory, and also helping the shipper/receiver that was there. I got to wear a metro shirt that was about a league too big for me, and I was supposed to wear steel toed boots (as I found out when I dropped an F-350 rotor on my foot), but I opted to switch from my normal heels to running shoes instead.
I was working in the Parts department part time, so I decided to take only one class at chinook that first term. I took Chem 30. I don't remember all too much about this class, except that there was a girl in it that had gotten a tumour in her chest taken out. I wasn't doing that well in it because I was more concerned about working, and my energy level from my hip surgery hadn't come back yet. I ended up raising my mark by ten percent, so that was a pretty good achievement.
One thing I should mention about this time. Around when I started school, I started getting pains in my abdomen every so often. It was confusing, but I figured it was because I was pigging out like I'd never seen junk food before. Until one day I realized that actually, I was getting kidney stones. I was still getting infusions at this time, and I had to take a bunch of calcium and vitamin D because of it. For some reason, my body decided it hated me and didn't want to put calcium in my bones. Instead, it wanted to inflict the most pain possible on me.
One night it got really bad. Up to this point I had just waited it out, because it was painful but not as bad as other pain I'd gone through (or was going through). However, Mom and I decided that I should go to emerg to try to get help passing this thing, as per the instructions from my rheumatologist. While I was in emerg waiting to be put into a bed, I passed the stupid thing. Have you ever seen a kidney stone? They're tiny! The size of them definitely does not make you feel triumph over passing them. They actually make you feel like you're a giant wuss. So, once I passed it, Mom and I discussed going home, even though we'd gotten a bed. One doctor came in and insisted doing an exam, which we refused (considering how the exam when when my bones were hurting), and we demanded to be allowed to go home. We won.
From then on, I got a ton of kidney stones. I worked with kidney stones, I went to Chinook with kidney stones, and so on and so on. It was great times (it really wasn't great times). I got so good at passing them that I could just pop a Tylenol 3 and just deal with it. Some other stuff happened with this, but to be honest, I'm not super comfortable talking about it, so it's getting cut out. I'll maybe put it in if I get to make this into a book.
Another great thing that happened around this time was that I found out about my low blood pressure. When you have low blood pressure, you body all of a sudden decides its going to feel like it has no muscles and is going to try to shut down. I had the pleasure of having this happen while I was driving. Good times! I was told that, to deal with this, I was going to have to eat things like chips more often. Num num num.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Why Are You Following Me?
A few days after I got off my crutches, I got to graduate. The Jubilee was under construction, so we got to graduate in the gym of the University. Our whole graduation (ceremony, reception, aftergrad party) was on the same day. I wore a blue dress with a jacket over it I think, and these really cute flip flops that had a little bow on them (flats, because I wasn't allowed to wear heels yet). I was looking like a weird upper body builder who forgot she had legs, because my arms were ripped and my legs were tiny stick legs, so I didn't really care what I looked like. I hated high school anyway at this point, and didn't mind that I was probably never going to see any of the people again, so this wasn't special for me at all.
We got to the University, and we went through all the "oh my god, we're pretending to be friends, lets take a thousand pictures that we'll never look at again because we're pretending we like each other" thing. We went through this pretty quickly, and I went back to hanging out with my parents and grandparents. A little while into getting there, we got to go downstairs and get our gowns on, and then got a few more pictures of that. Click click click.
Finally, we got to get all lined up to go into the gym. I got to stand at the front of all the people, even though my last name starts with an N, because I was going to leave right away after. We decided I probably wouldn't be able to sit there for the whole 3 hours without pain or discomfort, so we decided that was the best option. We walked in, and I sat down in the chair beside my dad (he was there for me to hang onto while walking to and from the stage). They went through a couple of speeches, and then the first round of diplomas were given out, which included me. Dad walked me up, then went around the back to the other side of the stage. The guy read out my name, and I walked over to shake the people's hand and get it. The picture of this is actually really funny, our principle had to lean down really far to reach my hand (because I'm only about 2 feet tall), and my face is white like a sheet because I'm already getting dizzy. Then I walked to the end of the stage and down the stairs, where Dad was waiting. We walked down the aisle and out the back door, giggling because we got to leave early. Then we turned around, and saw that the next person had followed us! I was like "what are you doing! You're supposed to go sit down!" and he was like "Oh!" and ran back into the gym. It was hilarious.
So then we handed the gown back in and met up with my mom and grandparents, and we went to Boston Pizza. We had a niiiice lunch while all my classmates sat in the warm, stuffy gym listening to boring speeches. Then we went back to my house and got ready for the reception. Once I got dressed up, we took a couple of pictures in the living room, and then all went out back for a beer.
I had on a blue dress that hooked up in the back (so I wouldn't trip on it while I walked backwards, apparently), and black gloves, and a rhinestoned top hat. I also had on a bunch of jewelry that used to be my great nana's. I brought my Mom, my Dad, Kyle, Kyle's girlfriend at the time, and my boyfriend. Our goal was to fill up 90% of the table (succeeded!) Se we all had a beer together, and then all jumped in the jeep (someone else had to have driven...maybe we took Garth the van? Oh well) and went to the Telus Convention Centre. I don't remember much about when we got there...probably because it was so uneventful. For some reason when we went in, we all went in a big line and walked around the room, as if no one had ever seen us before. Then we stood there for a couple minutes, extremely awkwardly, and then all sat down at our tables. While we ate our terrible meal, a "slideshow" went up on the screen, which was literally just our pictures out of order to a lame song, and it was on repeat. It sucked. I hope the guys who made it didn't get a job making slideshows. After the meal, my boyfriend told me that he'd brought rum, so we drank some of that. Then we danced for about three songs, and we went home.
After that, my boyfriend and I got ready for the aftergrad. This literally involved a change of clothes, and another beer. Then Dad drove us to the aftergrad. I was still 17 so my 18 year old boyfriend got a wristband and I did not. We danced a bit and hung out with some people (his friend, who's now a cop, was also there, feeding beer to his 17 year old girlfriend through their mouths...it's as gross as it sounds). Then, one of my friends who know the owner got me a band, so I had one beer, and then danced the night away.
That was the last time I saw most of the people from high school. I went back only one day, to pick up my yearbook, and I snuck in and out so I wouldn't see anyone.
We got to the University, and we went through all the "oh my god, we're pretending to be friends, lets take a thousand pictures that we'll never look at again because we're pretending we like each other" thing. We went through this pretty quickly, and I went back to hanging out with my parents and grandparents. A little while into getting there, we got to go downstairs and get our gowns on, and then got a few more pictures of that. Click click click.
Finally, we got to get all lined up to go into the gym. I got to stand at the front of all the people, even though my last name starts with an N, because I was going to leave right away after. We decided I probably wouldn't be able to sit there for the whole 3 hours without pain or discomfort, so we decided that was the best option. We walked in, and I sat down in the chair beside my dad (he was there for me to hang onto while walking to and from the stage). They went through a couple of speeches, and then the first round of diplomas were given out, which included me. Dad walked me up, then went around the back to the other side of the stage. The guy read out my name, and I walked over to shake the people's hand and get it. The picture of this is actually really funny, our principle had to lean down really far to reach my hand (because I'm only about 2 feet tall), and my face is white like a sheet because I'm already getting dizzy. Then I walked to the end of the stage and down the stairs, where Dad was waiting. We walked down the aisle and out the back door, giggling because we got to leave early. Then we turned around, and saw that the next person had followed us! I was like "what are you doing! You're supposed to go sit down!" and he was like "Oh!" and ran back into the gym. It was hilarious.
So then we handed the gown back in and met up with my mom and grandparents, and we went to Boston Pizza. We had a niiiice lunch while all my classmates sat in the warm, stuffy gym listening to boring speeches. Then we went back to my house and got ready for the reception. Once I got dressed up, we took a couple of pictures in the living room, and then all went out back for a beer.
I had on a blue dress that hooked up in the back (so I wouldn't trip on it while I walked backwards, apparently), and black gloves, and a rhinestoned top hat. I also had on a bunch of jewelry that used to be my great nana's. I brought my Mom, my Dad, Kyle, Kyle's girlfriend at the time, and my boyfriend. Our goal was to fill up 90% of the table (succeeded!) Se we all had a beer together, and then all jumped in the jeep (someone else had to have driven...maybe we took Garth the van? Oh well) and went to the Telus Convention Centre. I don't remember much about when we got there...probably because it was so uneventful. For some reason when we went in, we all went in a big line and walked around the room, as if no one had ever seen us before. Then we stood there for a couple minutes, extremely awkwardly, and then all sat down at our tables. While we ate our terrible meal, a "slideshow" went up on the screen, which was literally just our pictures out of order to a lame song, and it was on repeat. It sucked. I hope the guys who made it didn't get a job making slideshows. After the meal, my boyfriend told me that he'd brought rum, so we drank some of that. Then we danced for about three songs, and we went home.
After that, my boyfriend and I got ready for the aftergrad. This literally involved a change of clothes, and another beer. Then Dad drove us to the aftergrad. I was still 17 so my 18 year old boyfriend got a wristband and I did not. We danced a bit and hung out with some people (his friend, who's now a cop, was also there, feeding beer to his 17 year old girlfriend through their mouths...it's as gross as it sounds). Then, one of my friends who know the owner got me a band, so I had one beer, and then danced the night away.
That was the last time I saw most of the people from high school. I went back only one day, to pick up my yearbook, and I snuck in and out so I wouldn't see anyone.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Is It Just Me, Or Is It Kind Of Warm In Here? Oh, Now It's Cold. Soooo Cold. Now It's Hot! Ahhh!
Finally, the date come for the two-month-after-surgery appointment with my orthopedic surgeon. We were pretty sure I'd done well enough for him to know what I was going to be able to walk. Instead of waiting in the office for three hours, my mom called about an hour before and asked how far behind they were. Then we sat at home and kept busy until they caught up, which was about two hours. Then we drove to the hospital and rolled into orthopedics. We still had to wait a bit, but it wasn't super long, so it wasn't so bad.
We rolled into the examination room and parked me in the corner (facing out) by the bed. The doctor came in. He checked my most recent MRI's, and told me that I was going to be able to walk! Then he asked if we brought the crutches, which we didn't. So he said no problem, stand up! This was terrifying. I think Mom's exact words were "What! No! Ahhhhhhhh!" So one parent stood at the other end of the room, and the doctor and the other parent stood beside me in case my hips suddenly shattered like your dreams when you parents told you that you can't live in their basement and play video games for the rest of you life. So I put my hands on the arms of the chair, and used my now super built arms to push myself up. You know when you work out and you take it past the last rep and your arm feels suddenly like it's never going to lift anything again? That's how my legs felt. I got to the maximum reach of my arms (four inches...well more like twoish feet) and went "oh my god" and sat down super heavily in my chair again. I lost so much muscle in my legs! I thought they actually weren't working. He told me to try again though, and I got up and managed to waddle over to the person across the room, toddler style, and back again. Then I sat down, exhausted. He told me I could start crutching around when I got home. I was so pumped!
So then we go into this one room where they usually cast kids, because he wanted to see the incisions, or something. While we were in there and he was looking at them, I asked him how long it would take until I could get my nose pierced, and how long until I could get a tattoo. He started ranting that I was too young for both, and then grabbed my transfer board and pretended to hit me. It was hilarious. He told me quite a while, because if either of them got infected, it would go straight to the rods in my hips, which would be terrible.
Then we went to physio. They taught me how to walk with crutches (crutches first, then one foot, then the other), and also how to walk up stairs (foot one, foot two, crutches). Then I went in my chair and we rolled back home, where I had a terrific, long nap.
There was still about a month left of school, but I didn't go back. I'd pretty much finished my social 30 by this point I think (and was exempt from the diploma exams again, for medical reasons... I think I actually had only taken the Chem 30 diploma the year before by the time I graduated), and there was no need to go back for friends. I missed a lot of stuff in regards to graduation stuff. I went in one day with mom to drop stuff off, and I caught a glimpse of the graduating class board that had all of our pictures. I saw that my name was spelt wrong, and I chuckled at it. This guy who worked there was like 'what are you laughing at?' and I'm like 'oh, my name's just spelt wrong.' and he goes 'well you should have told us a long time ago!' and I was like 'well that was at the top of my priority list, so...' I missed all the grad rehearsals. I'd actually managed to get one in before my surgery, which involved me getting a massive panic attack (my first!) and bawling in the office until Kyle came and picked me up. Apparently my friends all saw him come in and said hi, and he didn't even look at them. So I spent this month healing at home, playing The Sims.
I realized I was going to have to start thinking about work. At this point I'd been lifeguarding since October (this was May), and I obviously was still going to need time to heal before I could guard or teach lessons. My boyfriend at the time worked at a Ford dealership as the receptionist as he went to Mt. Royal in business or something, and for the summer he was going to move to the service department, so he got me a job as one of the part time receptionists. I remember them asking me how long I was going to be on crutches, kind of in an annoyed tone. It bothered me, because it's not like my weak legs were going to somehow stop me from answering phones and paging people. Except for those times that I answered phones with my feet, but that was pretty rare. However, I told them that when I started (in a couple of weeks), I was going to be up and walking, so they were happy.
At this point, my rheumatologist decided I was going to go on a new drug, Pamidronate. The point of it was to get my body to stop eating the dead bone in my joints to try to give my body a chance to revascularize it. It wasn't very widely used, and actually was mostly used in cancer patients. I would get it over three days every three months for eight hours a day. Before I could take it, I needed to go in for an EKG. We went into the children's again to get it. I've always liked the EKG tests, because they put a ton of sticky things on you and then just start the test up, there's no effort involved by the patient whatsoever. This test, as with all the blood pressure tests I get, still made me freak out a little (I'm always waiting for an "Oh my god, what is wrong with your heart!!!!"), so I controlled my breathing (in for four, out for eight). And, as usual, they asked if I was athletic, because I had a really low heart rate. I'm not. In fact, the first time I was asked this, Mom laughed her head off. The EKG came back good, so I was a go for the Pamidronate infusions.
I'm not sure why, but during this time people always asked me how the blood transfusions were going, which would make me have to explain all of it all over again. I'm not sure what people were thinking, because as far as I know, I didn't and don't need blood transfusions. So remember: Pamidronate Infusions, not blood transfusions.
We went into the day surgery ward to get this infusion, at the time it was ward T. I was warned that I was probably going to get a fever from this, nausea and slight discomfort too. Then I was hooked up to the drug and settled in to watch TV for the next 8 hours. Then the fever started to hit. Throughout the day, my temperature went from normal (37 degrees Celsius), to 39.6 degrees Celsius (103.28 degrees Fahrenheit). Not only that, but my veins really started to hurt. At the end of the eight hours, they put me in a wheelchair because my arms hurts too much to use crutches, and we rolled me back to the Jeep. We actually have a picture of me sitting in my wheelchair in our driveway with my blue downfeld blanket wrapped all around me so you can only see my angry eyes because my fever was making me so cold.
That night, my arms started getting red streaks from my wrist to my shoulders. I was holding both arms up, holding on to the other shoulder, to try to keep them elevated (at some time throughout the day they'd changed the IV from one arm to the other), and they were both hurting a lot. My parents kept asking if I wanted to go to the emergency room, and I kept saying that I could wait it out until the morning, when we'd be going back for more infusions. Finally, at about 11pm, I said that yes, we should go to emerg. We got into the jeep and went back home, oh I mean to the hospital. We went into emerg, and got into a room right away again. They said that though it's likely inflammation (phlebitis, they called it), it's impossible to tell the difference between inflammation and infection, so they were going to have to pump an antibiotic into me intravenously, through the already super painful veins. This was when I started getting IV's in my wrist. There's a few IV scars on the front, and they're all from this trip. That was the only vein that would take the IV without just rejecting the drug altogether. They put a bit in me, and then told me I'd have to go back in a few hours when the infectious disease clinic opened. We did as we were told, and when we came back we were put into the orthopedic unit, which doubled as an infectious disease clinic on the weekends. I got to lay on an all-to-familiar bed, and I got more antibiotics pumped into me. Then, when we were done, we got to go back to get more infusion. After all this, besides being extremely hydrated, I was questioning whether or not this drug was worth it. We were assured they were, however, and I was told that in the future, I was going to be doing one day a month for about 13 hours a day, because if the drug went in any faster, my veins would get mad again.
Coming up to the end of my crutch time, I was feeling a lot better and was looking forward to my upcoming graduation. This was in May of 2005.
We rolled into the examination room and parked me in the corner (facing out) by the bed. The doctor came in. He checked my most recent MRI's, and told me that I was going to be able to walk! Then he asked if we brought the crutches, which we didn't. So he said no problem, stand up! This was terrifying. I think Mom's exact words were "What! No! Ahhhhhhhh!" So one parent stood at the other end of the room, and the doctor and the other parent stood beside me in case my hips suddenly shattered like your dreams when you parents told you that you can't live in their basement and play video games for the rest of you life. So I put my hands on the arms of the chair, and used my now super built arms to push myself up. You know when you work out and you take it past the last rep and your arm feels suddenly like it's never going to lift anything again? That's how my legs felt. I got to the maximum reach of my arms (four inches...well more like twoish feet) and went "oh my god" and sat down super heavily in my chair again. I lost so much muscle in my legs! I thought they actually weren't working. He told me to try again though, and I got up and managed to waddle over to the person across the room, toddler style, and back again. Then I sat down, exhausted. He told me I could start crutching around when I got home. I was so pumped!
So then we go into this one room where they usually cast kids, because he wanted to see the incisions, or something. While we were in there and he was looking at them, I asked him how long it would take until I could get my nose pierced, and how long until I could get a tattoo. He started ranting that I was too young for both, and then grabbed my transfer board and pretended to hit me. It was hilarious. He told me quite a while, because if either of them got infected, it would go straight to the rods in my hips, which would be terrible.
Then we went to physio. They taught me how to walk with crutches (crutches first, then one foot, then the other), and also how to walk up stairs (foot one, foot two, crutches). Then I went in my chair and we rolled back home, where I had a terrific, long nap.
There was still about a month left of school, but I didn't go back. I'd pretty much finished my social 30 by this point I think (and was exempt from the diploma exams again, for medical reasons... I think I actually had only taken the Chem 30 diploma the year before by the time I graduated), and there was no need to go back for friends. I missed a lot of stuff in regards to graduation stuff. I went in one day with mom to drop stuff off, and I caught a glimpse of the graduating class board that had all of our pictures. I saw that my name was spelt wrong, and I chuckled at it. This guy who worked there was like 'what are you laughing at?' and I'm like 'oh, my name's just spelt wrong.' and he goes 'well you should have told us a long time ago!' and I was like 'well that was at the top of my priority list, so...' I missed all the grad rehearsals. I'd actually managed to get one in before my surgery, which involved me getting a massive panic attack (my first!) and bawling in the office until Kyle came and picked me up. Apparently my friends all saw him come in and said hi, and he didn't even look at them. So I spent this month healing at home, playing The Sims.
I realized I was going to have to start thinking about work. At this point I'd been lifeguarding since October (this was May), and I obviously was still going to need time to heal before I could guard or teach lessons. My boyfriend at the time worked at a Ford dealership as the receptionist as he went to Mt. Royal in business or something, and for the summer he was going to move to the service department, so he got me a job as one of the part time receptionists. I remember them asking me how long I was going to be on crutches, kind of in an annoyed tone. It bothered me, because it's not like my weak legs were going to somehow stop me from answering phones and paging people. Except for those times that I answered phones with my feet, but that was pretty rare. However, I told them that when I started (in a couple of weeks), I was going to be up and walking, so they were happy.
At this point, my rheumatologist decided I was going to go on a new drug, Pamidronate. The point of it was to get my body to stop eating the dead bone in my joints to try to give my body a chance to revascularize it. It wasn't very widely used, and actually was mostly used in cancer patients. I would get it over three days every three months for eight hours a day. Before I could take it, I needed to go in for an EKG. We went into the children's again to get it. I've always liked the EKG tests, because they put a ton of sticky things on you and then just start the test up, there's no effort involved by the patient whatsoever. This test, as with all the blood pressure tests I get, still made me freak out a little (I'm always waiting for an "Oh my god, what is wrong with your heart!!!!"), so I controlled my breathing (in for four, out for eight). And, as usual, they asked if I was athletic, because I had a really low heart rate. I'm not. In fact, the first time I was asked this, Mom laughed her head off. The EKG came back good, so I was a go for the Pamidronate infusions.
I'm not sure why, but during this time people always asked me how the blood transfusions were going, which would make me have to explain all of it all over again. I'm not sure what people were thinking, because as far as I know, I didn't and don't need blood transfusions. So remember: Pamidronate Infusions, not blood transfusions.
We went into the day surgery ward to get this infusion, at the time it was ward T. I was warned that I was probably going to get a fever from this, nausea and slight discomfort too. Then I was hooked up to the drug and settled in to watch TV for the next 8 hours. Then the fever started to hit. Throughout the day, my temperature went from normal (37 degrees Celsius), to 39.6 degrees Celsius (103.28 degrees Fahrenheit). Not only that, but my veins really started to hurt. At the end of the eight hours, they put me in a wheelchair because my arms hurts too much to use crutches, and we rolled me back to the Jeep. We actually have a picture of me sitting in my wheelchair in our driveway with my blue downfeld blanket wrapped all around me so you can only see my angry eyes because my fever was making me so cold.
That night, my arms started getting red streaks from my wrist to my shoulders. I was holding both arms up, holding on to the other shoulder, to try to keep them elevated (at some time throughout the day they'd changed the IV from one arm to the other), and they were both hurting a lot. My parents kept asking if I wanted to go to the emergency room, and I kept saying that I could wait it out until the morning, when we'd be going back for more infusions. Finally, at about 11pm, I said that yes, we should go to emerg. We got into the jeep and went back home, oh I mean to the hospital. We went into emerg, and got into a room right away again. They said that though it's likely inflammation (phlebitis, they called it), it's impossible to tell the difference between inflammation and infection, so they were going to have to pump an antibiotic into me intravenously, through the already super painful veins. This was when I started getting IV's in my wrist. There's a few IV scars on the front, and they're all from this trip. That was the only vein that would take the IV without just rejecting the drug altogether. They put a bit in me, and then told me I'd have to go back in a few hours when the infectious disease clinic opened. We did as we were told, and when we came back we were put into the orthopedic unit, which doubled as an infectious disease clinic on the weekends. I got to lay on an all-to-familiar bed, and I got more antibiotics pumped into me. Then, when we were done, we got to go back to get more infusion. After all this, besides being extremely hydrated, I was questioning whether or not this drug was worth it. We were assured they were, however, and I was told that in the future, I was going to be doing one day a month for about 13 hours a day, because if the drug went in any faster, my veins would get mad again.
Coming up to the end of my crutch time, I was feeling a lot better and was looking forward to my upcoming graduation. This was in May of 2005.
Monday, August 8, 2011
Kickstart My Heart....Not What You Think
Time went by pretty slowly for me for the next two months. Mom would come downstairs at all hours of the night if I needed anything, like painkillers or a glass of water. Have you ever tried to drink a glass of water while you're walking? Now try it when you're using both hands to push your wheelchair. Not so easy now, eh?!
During this time, I remember mostly Kyle's band coming over and jamming in the basement while I was rolling around upstairs. I was happy, because it made me feel like I was out at a concert, something I missed while in my wheelchair. At one point I asked Kyle if I could learn the bass while in my wheelchair, and we took the arms off the chair and put it on me. That was when I realized I couldn't ever learn to play the bass because my hobbit arms were too short.
This was the point that The Sims really took a big part in my life. Mom and I took one of my few trips out of the house to go to the mall to get an expansion pack. We'd already spent my graduation money on a laptop for me because we realized that I wouldn't be able to do much else, so I was all pumped to put this expansion on it. We rolled into Compusmart in Market Mall, got it, and came home. I tried to install it and watched as the progress bar began to fill. 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%... and then it didn't move anymore. It got stuck at 60%. I was super upset, and already pretty exhausted from our previous outing, so Mom made me have a nap while she took it back and got a new one. Well, that one did it too. And so did the next. Finally, Mom just returned it and went to EB Games. That copy worked. That's the reason I only get games from EB Games now.
I couldn't get upstairs to shower (except for one time, where Mom and Dad made a sling with their arms and lifted me up... I've been trying to get them to do it again ever since, but to no avail), so Mom and I had to go to my pool (because I was a lifeguard at this point) to shower. So one day, Mom and I got ready to go out to this pool to shower. We put the ramps out the back door (because it was less of a slope, and thus less likely that I would take out the person helping me down going 60km/h) and we got me down it. Then, for some reason, Mom decided we would roll around the house at a full out run. Did you know that wheelchairs have seat belts? I found out why. We hit a hole, and if I hadn't been holding on as hard as I was, I would have gone flying off my chair and shattered my hips. Hilarious at the time, but now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure she was trying to kill me. Well, you haven't succeeded yet Mom!
The only time that I remember negatively in this time had to do with my high school friends. None had visited me in the hospital again, which sucked, but I had my boyfriend at the time so it wasn't so bad. Well, they decided that they were all going to pile into a couple of cars after school one day to come and visit me while I was at home. However, they failed to tell me about it. Mom and I happened to be headed for Market Mall at this time, and it took me about a half an hour to get into my car. So I got a phone call from one of them telling me they'd be there in about 10 minutes. I was upset, because this was the first time they were visiting and if I managed to get back into the house in the allotted time, I'd be so tired already that'd I'd just fall asleep when they got there. So I told them the truth: I wasn't home. They got mad at me and decided it was my fault. I hung up feeling pretty low. I felt it was unfair that I already had so much troubles healthwise in my short little life, and now I was getting mega rejection from my friends because of it, even though neither of those things were my fault. Mom cheered me up with a good ole' "buck up, buttercup" and we were on our way to the mall.
Two concerts happened while I was in my wheelchair: Velvet Revolver and Motley Crue. They were two of my favourite bands, so I had to go. My boyfriend and I got my handicapped placard and went off to the Saddledome. The band's were awesome (at the VR concert, Kyle even got me Slash's cigarette <3 because he was in the front row, the place that I would also be had I been able to walk). When we were at the Motley Crue concert, I had to go to the washroom, so I pushed myself into the women's. As I was washing my hands, I heard someone go "hey, you can't be in here!" I turn around, and there stands an extremely drunk Kyle. There was a line for the men's room, so he came into the woman's (wearing his friends shoes, for some reason). As the women in it started to get angry, I said "it's okay! He's my brother!" and everyone kind of went "ohhhh okay" and calmed down.
Another new thing we got during this time was our Jeep. Mom and Dad's car at the time was the Opaz, which I was using whenever I could, and Kyle had Garth the van, so they needed a new vehicle. They bring it home one day, and took me and Kyle outside to see it. To get me into it, however, Dad had to lift me up from the chair and put me in the Jeep seat, because it was wayyyyyy too tall for me to transfer into. It was a cool vehicle, and I got to claim the front passenger seat because it was easiest.
During this time, we thought it would be good for me to get my hair cut. It would be hard getting me into my hairdressers house, so my hairdresser decided she was going to come to me. She came and cut my hair in the middle of the kitchen, like Mom used to do when we lived in Ottawa. It was really nice of her, and I'm super appreciative of it! She's the best hairdresser I've ever met, so caring!!
The last awesome story I have about this time is when we went to Hys, this really high end restaurant. I'm quite the steak fan, so I was immediately stoked to go. We had a great time, and at the end they asked if we wanted deserts or speciality drinks. My family all chose Spanish coffees or whatever, and I, being a tea lover and under 18, ordered a blueberry tea. The waiter kind of looked at me, then at my parents, and then said okay and walked off. Then he returned with Amaretto and Grand Marnier, poured them together, and told us to enjoy. We all looked at each other. None of us had heard of this, and I had successfully ordered alcohol underage because he didn't want to ask me for ID! Too bad I wasn't a drinker. I had it anyway though.
Coming to the end of the two months, I was healing pretty well. I still couldn't put weight on my legs, but I was close!
During this time, I remember mostly Kyle's band coming over and jamming in the basement while I was rolling around upstairs. I was happy, because it made me feel like I was out at a concert, something I missed while in my wheelchair. At one point I asked Kyle if I could learn the bass while in my wheelchair, and we took the arms off the chair and put it on me. That was when I realized I couldn't ever learn to play the bass because my hobbit arms were too short.
This was the point that The Sims really took a big part in my life. Mom and I took one of my few trips out of the house to go to the mall to get an expansion pack. We'd already spent my graduation money on a laptop for me because we realized that I wouldn't be able to do much else, so I was all pumped to put this expansion on it. We rolled into Compusmart in Market Mall, got it, and came home. I tried to install it and watched as the progress bar began to fill. 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%... and then it didn't move anymore. It got stuck at 60%. I was super upset, and already pretty exhausted from our previous outing, so Mom made me have a nap while she took it back and got a new one. Well, that one did it too. And so did the next. Finally, Mom just returned it and went to EB Games. That copy worked. That's the reason I only get games from EB Games now.
I couldn't get upstairs to shower (except for one time, where Mom and Dad made a sling with their arms and lifted me up... I've been trying to get them to do it again ever since, but to no avail), so Mom and I had to go to my pool (because I was a lifeguard at this point) to shower. So one day, Mom and I got ready to go out to this pool to shower. We put the ramps out the back door (because it was less of a slope, and thus less likely that I would take out the person helping me down going 60km/h) and we got me down it. Then, for some reason, Mom decided we would roll around the house at a full out run. Did you know that wheelchairs have seat belts? I found out why. We hit a hole, and if I hadn't been holding on as hard as I was, I would have gone flying off my chair and shattered my hips. Hilarious at the time, but now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure she was trying to kill me. Well, you haven't succeeded yet Mom!
The only time that I remember negatively in this time had to do with my high school friends. None had visited me in the hospital again, which sucked, but I had my boyfriend at the time so it wasn't so bad. Well, they decided that they were all going to pile into a couple of cars after school one day to come and visit me while I was at home. However, they failed to tell me about it. Mom and I happened to be headed for Market Mall at this time, and it took me about a half an hour to get into my car. So I got a phone call from one of them telling me they'd be there in about 10 minutes. I was upset, because this was the first time they were visiting and if I managed to get back into the house in the allotted time, I'd be so tired already that'd I'd just fall asleep when they got there. So I told them the truth: I wasn't home. They got mad at me and decided it was my fault. I hung up feeling pretty low. I felt it was unfair that I already had so much troubles healthwise in my short little life, and now I was getting mega rejection from my friends because of it, even though neither of those things were my fault. Mom cheered me up with a good ole' "buck up, buttercup" and we were on our way to the mall.
Two concerts happened while I was in my wheelchair: Velvet Revolver and Motley Crue. They were two of my favourite bands, so I had to go. My boyfriend and I got my handicapped placard and went off to the Saddledome. The band's were awesome (at the VR concert, Kyle even got me Slash's cigarette <3 because he was in the front row, the place that I would also be had I been able to walk). When we were at the Motley Crue concert, I had to go to the washroom, so I pushed myself into the women's. As I was washing my hands, I heard someone go "hey, you can't be in here!" I turn around, and there stands an extremely drunk Kyle. There was a line for the men's room, so he came into the woman's (wearing his friends shoes, for some reason). As the women in it started to get angry, I said "it's okay! He's my brother!" and everyone kind of went "ohhhh okay" and calmed down.
Another new thing we got during this time was our Jeep. Mom and Dad's car at the time was the Opaz, which I was using whenever I could, and Kyle had Garth the van, so they needed a new vehicle. They bring it home one day, and took me and Kyle outside to see it. To get me into it, however, Dad had to lift me up from the chair and put me in the Jeep seat, because it was wayyyyyy too tall for me to transfer into. It was a cool vehicle, and I got to claim the front passenger seat because it was easiest.
During this time, we thought it would be good for me to get my hair cut. It would be hard getting me into my hairdressers house, so my hairdresser decided she was going to come to me. She came and cut my hair in the middle of the kitchen, like Mom used to do when we lived in Ottawa. It was really nice of her, and I'm super appreciative of it! She's the best hairdresser I've ever met, so caring!!
The last awesome story I have about this time is when we went to Hys, this really high end restaurant. I'm quite the steak fan, so I was immediately stoked to go. We had a great time, and at the end they asked if we wanted deserts or speciality drinks. My family all chose Spanish coffees or whatever, and I, being a tea lover and under 18, ordered a blueberry tea. The waiter kind of looked at me, then at my parents, and then said okay and walked off. Then he returned with Amaretto and Grand Marnier, poured them together, and told us to enjoy. We all looked at each other. None of us had heard of this, and I had successfully ordered alcohol underage because he didn't want to ask me for ID! Too bad I wasn't a drinker. I had it anyway though.
Coming to the end of the two months, I was healing pretty well. I still couldn't put weight on my legs, but I was close!
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