You say "resolutions," I say "goals"

Happy New Year! Welcome back to my corner. *dusting off cobwebs* It’s been a while, I know. If you’re reading this, thanks for sticking around through the lean times.

I don’t make New Year’s resolutions, because it makes me feel way too guilty when I break them. For the past couple of years, though, I have set myself a few goals—areas where I think I need to make improvements over the next year. Sometimes I follow them, sometimes I don’t. I’m hoping that sharing this year’s list of goals with you guys will help me actually follow them. Kind of an accountability-partner thing, or whatever the buzzword-y types are calling it now.

1. Lose nine pounds – I know, very original. Everyone makes this resolution. But just because it’s not an original idea doesn’t mean that my behind is not expanding at an alarming rate. I’ve gained five of those pounds since Thanksgiving. (Seriously. Six weeks, five pounds.) To that end, all treats except peppermint patties have been banished from my house. I have an ice cream coupon that expires on February 11th; if I have lost five pounds by that time, I get to buy the ice cream. Ah, ice cream. The Great Motivator.

2. Focus less on material things – This is really, really hard for me, because I love clothes and shoes and cool gadgets and purses and shopping and trying on and buying. (And boots. I particularly love boots.) But, I realized that I put too much emphasis on those things, and I need to do better. Hopefully this will also help me wait the six months until my cell phone contract is up and I can get a new phone. (Goal or no goal, I’m gettin’ a 4G phone, Jack.)

3. Exercise more – Again, very original. But my thighs have become ever more thunderous since my surgery last August, and I need to get my butt up and get moving. I should not be getting winded from tucking skinny jeans into my boots.

4. Read more – When I was younger, I read four or five books a week. In the last 10 years or so, though, I had kind of lost interest in fiction, with a few exceptions. Thanks to Masterpiece Mystery on PBS, I have discovered a newfound passion for mystery novels. Since the public library is conveniently located right next door to my office building, I have no excuse for not reading. My goal is to finish at least two books a month.

So what about you? Did you make resolutions or set goals for 2011? Have you broken them already? ‘Cuz I ate four Starbursts this afternoon, and I’m trying to figure out if that means I’ve already broken Goal #1.

I'm back, y'all!

Well. It's been kind of an interesting summer.

On the first weekend in July, Mr. Nerd and I were looking forward to our upcoming week of vacation. That Friday night, dinner out at a Mexican restaurant for my aunt's birthday left me with a terrible stomachache. By Saturday afternoon, the stomach pain sent me to the local walk-in clinic, which sent me to the ER for a CT scan. I had suspected appendicitis, and the walk-in clinic folks agreed; when the ER doctor walked into my room looking really freaked out, however, I knew something else was up. He told me that my CT scan showed several masses in my abdomen...and then he wasn't the only who looked freaked out. After that, Mr. Nerd and I spent our week of vacation going to various doctor's and testing appointments, and trying to have a bit of fun when we could. One of the blood tests checked for cancer markers in my blood, and it came back elevated. I saw a gynecologic oncologist, who reassured me that it might not actually be cancer, and scheduled me for surgery.

So, two weeks ago today, I had major surgery to remove a whole mess o' lady parts. It turned out that everything was okay--no cancer whatsoever! Obviously, I am incredibly thankful that everything is going to be fine. I am currently sitting at home, trying to combat boredom, and doing the required four- to six-week recuperation period.

This whole thing is so new to me--I've never had surgery, spent the night in the hospital, or really had any medical problems, except for a bout of scarlet fever when I was little. I was pretty nervous going into the surgery, but, for the most part, being in the hospital wasn't too bad. With the following exceptions.

Your modesty suffers

I am modest. Nearly to the point of prudishness. I've heard many mothers claim that, once you've gone through the process of labor and birth, you lose all modesty. Well, I've never had kids, I hate discussing my (ahem) personal business with anyone, and being in the hospital was just mortifying because of it. It was not at all unusual to have a perky patient care tech bop into my room and ask several embarrassingly personal questions (in front of various family members, deacons from my church, whomever): "Ms. Absepa? Are you peeing? Have you passed gas yet? Would you like a stool softener?" Cripes, people. Couldn't you write me a note? Or at least whisper? And that doesn't even begin to cover the mortification I felt anytime someone wanted to take a look at my incision, which is on my lower, lower, LOWER abdomen. Mortified, I tell you.

They might kill you trying to take blood

I did not sleep the first night in the hospital. At all. Any time I started to doze off, someone popped in to check my vitals, IV, incision (gah!), etc., etc. So naturally, after my sleepless night, a girl showed up to take blood...at 4am. I am not kidding. She made two tries on my right arm, but came up with less than a thimbleful of blood, probably because I was so dehydrated. (No food or liquids after midnight before the surgery; ice chips only until late afternoon; and clear liquids for supper. I truly thought I was going to turn into a human-shaped tumbleweed and just blow away.) At 5am, she came back, and took a stab (well, two) at my right hand. She was getting mad by this time, sweating and growling at my uncooperative veins. She finally gave up, threw me a disgusted look, and left. ANOTHER girl showed up at 5:45, and went to work on my left hand. Apparently the additional thimbleful that she was able to extract was enough, because they left me alone after that. I came home looking like I had gone a couple of rounds in fight club.

Some medical procedures are just evil

While I was in the operating room (but, thank God, after I was asleep), the doctors set me up with a Foley catheter. If anyone ever tries to do that to you, RUN as far and as fast as you can. This was, by far, the worst part of my surgery experience. As the nurses explained to me, your bladder can kind of "forget" how to do its thing after you've had a catheter. Well, mine forgot for a while, and it was no picnic. Things went on for so long that the nurse was on the phone with my doctor (talking about putting the evil thing back IN), when my bladder suddenly came to its senses and did what it was supposed to do. A huge relief, in every sense of the word.

Honestly, although I'm making fun, everyone at the hospital was really nice. I have been blessed with a smooth recovery and not too much pain. And Mr. Nerd is totally jealous that I get to sit at home, waste time on the Internet, and nap whenever I want. All things considered, I'm feeling pretty grateful lately. And glad to be back to my blog.

They say knowledge is power...

So gather round, kids, and let Ms. Absepa fill you in on some of the things I’ve learned over the  past (extremely busy, moderately stressful, fairly exhausting) week or so. Don’t worry—there won’t be a test on this material.

Lots of kids + lots of sugar = a little scary
I spent a few nights last week working my church’s Vacation Bible School. One night, the kids had root beer floats--with cupcakes--for their snack. There were about 60 kids, and roughly 20 or so adults to corral them all. It’s a miracle there wasn’t a mini-riot that night, because those kids were all so jacked up that I'm not sure we could have gotten them back under control if they had decided to mutiny. I’m thinking next year we should consider serving fruit and bottled water.

Moving sucks, hot weather makes it suck more
I’ve developed a theory that, unless you schedule your move in January (which, of course, guarantees that there will be a blizzard), your moving day will always be the hottest day of the year. My parents and sister moved last weekend, and it was 94 degrees, with about 400% humidity. It was already nearly 90 when I joined the fun—at 9 am—and it only got worse. Fortunately, they had movers for all of the really heavy stuff…and Speedway has slushes for 89 cents. I drank so many of those this weekend that I believe I might have replaced all of the liquid in my body with Wild Cherry Freeze.

Investigate your doctor’s background carefully
In general, I am not one to doubt the medical community. After all, doctors go to school for a long time, so I feel like I should trust them. However. I’m pretty sure the fellow who performed my arthrogram yesterday was actually a sadist (who decided to show up at the clinic, throw on a lab coat, and torture a few poor souls who were already suffering), rather than a radiologist. And he knew I wouldn't try to run away, either, since his nurse made me take off my bra and put on that flimsy gown. And that “contrast medium?” They might tell you it's iodine or barium, but only pure, unadulterated bottled evil could be that painful. Here's the most important lesson I learned last week: If your doctor ever mentions anything about a contrast MRI, run away as fast as you can. It hurts like *#$&, which might make you want to kick the "doctor" in the groin as hard as you can. And they would probably frown on that.