Guest Veteran's Day post for Hypersomnolence Hub

I was asked to write a post for Veteran's Day for the Hypersomnolence Hub blog. Here's what I came up with. You can also see it at http://www.hypersomnia.info/this-veterans-day-support-efforts-to-improve-awareness-of-sleep-disorders/

I am a veteran, and I have Idiopathic Hypersomnia. I've probably had it since I was born - when I was diagnosed, I called and explained it to my mother. She said it made a lot of sense. But getting to that diagnosis took a while. To be honest, realizing that my levels of tiredness, the difficulty I had staying awake on a regular basis, the amount that I slept, realizing that none of that was normal took the longest. But once I did finally get myself to a doctor, it took two more years and separation from the Navy before I finally had some answers.

I entered the US Naval Academy at 17, and spent the next 10 years in the Navy. Just as there had been for most of my life, there was always a reason for my tiredness - physical and mental stress, the lack of a regular sleep schedule, sometimes just the plain lack of sleep. It could always be explained away. I never thought that there could actually be something wrong with me. I was just not someone who could do well on a little bit of sleep, especially not for multiple nights in a row. I needed that rest. 

But then, in 2006, I went to a "shore duty" job - a job on land where I was working normal hours, 8-4 or so every day. I was going to bed by 9 at night, and having trouble waking up to my alarm at 6. On the weekends, I was sleeping in, and still waking up exhausted. I was falling asleep at my desk. For the first time, there was no reason for it.

So I finally decided asked the Doctor about it. Military medicine has a reputation, usually for not being too great. It's true sometimes, but I really liked the doctor I was seeing at that point, and I figured it couldn't hurt. So I made an appointment, and asked her about it. And she pretty much blew me off - "You're in the military, everyone's tired in the military." When I told her that it just didn't seem right, she said she'd test my thyroid. Basically, she was blowing me off.

Of course, my thyroid came back just fine. But I let it go. I felt pretty helpless. I knew that something wasn't right, but what was I supposed to do about it? I knew nothing about any sleep disorders other than sleep apnea, and even that knowledge was very limited. I had no idea how to advocate for myself, especially in the military medical system. And honestly, I wasn't sure I wanted to. There's a thing in the military that if you're going to the doctor too much, you're trying to get out of something. You're a dirtbag, you're lazy. 

Lazy. The worst four letter word for someone in the military. And, as it turns out, the worst four letter word for someone with IH. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I got out of the Navy in 2008. When my insurance from my first post-Navy job kicked in, the first thing I did was go to a doctor and ask about a sleep doctor referral. In January of 2009, I finally got to one, and for the first time, I was talking to a doctor who didn't blow me off. Who didn't think I was trying to get out of something. Who didn't think I was just lazy. He immediately recommended a full sleep study - the overnight test that most people are familiar with, and then the daytime test the next day. Due to a cancellation, he was able to get me in within a couple of days. A few weeks later, I had my diagnosis: Idiopathic Hypersomnia.

I had no idea what Idiopathic Hypersomnia was, and it seemed like the internet didn't really either - there was very little information out there at that point. The doctor explained it as basically Narcolepsy without some of the clinical indicators required to actually diagnose Narcolepsy, and I was OK with that. It was an answer, a validation that something was actually wrong. That I WASN'T a dirtbag, or even worse, just lazy.

I started to look back on my time in the Navy, and so many things started to make sense. I so badly wanted (and let's be honest, I still want) to go back and find some of the people I had worked with and tell them - you guys, see? There was a reason! I want to go back to that Operations Officer who told me I could sleep when I'm dead, to which I responded by asking him if he knew how stupid that sounded, and say see? This is why! And I want to go back and find that Pakistani Naval Officer who realized one night while observing my watch that even in the craziest of conditions, I was having trouble staying awake, and instead of just watching for a few minutes, stood my whole watch with me and helped make sure that nobody else in that pilothouse noticed. I want to tell him that the Pakistani warfare device that he gave me is still one of my most prized possessions, and that I will never truly be able to express how thankful I am to him for that night. It could have ended very poorly otherwise.

From what I can gather, knowledge of sleep disorders in military medicine has improved a little bit. But, as is the case in civilian medicine too, it often just depends on where you are and who you see. The VA has greatly improved - when I first went to the VA to get treated through that system, they tried to send me to a psychiatrist, even though their own system had determined that my IH had nothing to do with PTSD. But when the Ritalin stopped working and I realized I wasn't going to be able to afford any other meds on my then-company's horrible insurance plan, I revisited the VA. In DC, they now have a sleep clinic with several doctors who know and understand multiple sleep disorders, not just PTSD-related Sleep Apnea or insomnia. 

Sleep is a funny thing. It can be your best friend and your worst enemy, sometimes even at the same time. With IH, that sometimes becomes most of the time. That was definitely the case for me when I was in the Navy and still undiagnosed. Now, with medication, it's better. 

So on this Veteran's Day, I ask that you not only think of all of those who have served, past, present, and future, but also I ask that you support efforts to improve the understanding and awareness of sleep disorders and sleep medicine. While I really would love to see the military do better with this, I think that if it's better understood as a whole, it will make its way into the military as well. 

Big changes...

Yep, I've been silent again. Not on purpose, just didn't have a ton to write about for a little while, and then suddenly had a ton to write about but not time to write it.

Today is my last day in the Pentagon, my last day at the job that I've worked since February 2012, our last full day in Virginia. I've really enjoyed this job, I've learned a TON and gotten to experience some pretty cool things. I've made some good friends, and I'll be sad to leave some of the people. Working in the Pentagon has been really cool. I know some people hate it, think its too close to the top, whatever. But I enjoyed it.

However, it was time to move on. We've been looking at trying to move to Florida for a while, for various reasons It was something we talked about from the time we made the move back up here - cost of living is so high, and it's very crowded, among other things. For various reasons it was delayed several times.  But it finally worked out, and it worked out fast!! Less than a month ago, we found out that the contract had been awarded for a position that I had been offered contingent on that. It took a few days to get everything straightened out, but about a week later I had my official offer letter and a start date of October 13th.

So for the past 2 1/2 weeks, we've been packing the apartment, finding a place to live, arranging a move, trying to tie up loose ends and see everyone up here before we go, and not fully succeeding at any of them, I'm sure. But it's not like we'll never be back - I have lots of family and friends in DC, so visits are inevitable.

Today, I finish up at work and do all the admin out-processing goodness while husband and the movers load up our truck. Once I'm out of here, it's back to clean the apartment and get the cars mostly loaded and try to calm what I'm sure will be 2 very nervous kitties. His parents arrive around 4, we'll get them checked into their hotel, then an earlyish dinner with my parents and hopefully a friend or two. In the morning we wake up, get the kitties and the last few things in the car, and hit the road, hopefully by 8 or 9.

We have quite a couple of days ahead of us, and I know that someday soon I'll get to sleep all day :) It's exhausting, but the end result will be worth it. Wish us luck!!

The annual 9/11 post

I remember it like it was yesterday. I mean, how do you not remember something that was so close, so life changing, not to mention not knowing where my dad was for a few minutes, and hearing all the rumored additional target lists popping up, many of which seemed to include the Naval Academy.

But I've posted about the day before. That's not what I want to say today. I woke up this morning and did my normal routine, which includes looking at social media as I'm waking up. As to be expected, lots of tribute and rememberance posts today. But then I saw someone had posted a picture of the towers burning before they fell, of course with the caption "never forget."

I understand that everyone remembers differently, and everyone pays tribute differently. But those pictures are burned in my memory forever. I avoid the news and most TV 9/11 week because they're still very hard for me to see. I haven't been able to bring myself to go to any of the memorials yet, but its still just too soon for me. I should know better than to think that Facebook is a safe place, obviously its not. But it just really bothered me to see that this morning. I know I shouldn't be bothered, or insulted at the perceived but more than likely absolutely not intentional implication that I need to see those pictures to remember. Especially posted by someone who was nowhere close to the events, physically or otherwise, and who, while an old friend, I pretty much disagree with 100% when it comes to politics. I know that everyone is different. So why does it bother me?

The answer doesn't really matter in the big picture, and I would never dream of saying anything because its just not worth it. But I would ask that anyone reading this think about it before you post anything graphic from this day 13 years ago. How you remember and how you pay tribute to those lost this day and since may be a trigger for someone else. Don't be insulted if they react to it. Today is a day that should be filled with love, compassion, kindness, and peace. In the words of The Alternate Routes, "we are how we treat each other, nothing more." And never is that more important than on days like today.

The hardest part is letting go

There is just about no worse feeling in the world than realizing that someone you once considered your best friend is no longer interested in reconnecting or having any sort of relationship.

I thought this person had deleted his facebook. I hadn't really thought about him in a while, but for some reason yesterday he popped into my head. Last I heard, he and his husband were adopting 4 (I think) foster kids in order to keep the siblings together. I found myself wondering what was going on with them, so I messaged his cousin, who was also a classmate of ours in high school, to see if she had an email address for him. She surprised me by saying that Facebook was probably the best way to get ahold of him. 

I started looking for his page. I looked in the friends lists of everyone that I knew if he was on Facebook he'd be friends with. Nothing. I started to suspect that he'd blocked me, a suspcion that I'm pretty sure was confirmed when one of our friends gave me the link to his page today and I got a "page not found" error.

This person that, once upon a time, I was closer to than anyone else. My senior prom date, because we were both single. My best friend, once upon a time. He no longer wants to have anything to do with me. I know I'm at least partly to blame. A LONG time ago, I was dating a guy who made me into something I was not proud of. We were talking about marriage, and he thought the gays were icky. I made the mistake of telling this friend that said ex wouldn't be comfortable with a gay couple around. That really hurt him. Sadly, he never told me that, so I spent the next several years trying to figure out what the hell had happened. When I finally found out, I was mortified.

I tried for a while to make it up to him. I apologized, I thought we had talked it out, but I could tell that he just wasn't going to put a ton of effort into it. But I still had hope. That's part of who I am - I do not let go of people easily, even when I probably should. I wasn't ready to give up on this friendship. Today, I find myself thinking it might be time.

I asked our mutual friend to pass a message along for me. I guess I'll wait and see what happens, see how or if he responds to my outreach. If he does, great. But if he doesn't, I think it might just be time to let him go. 

A little more about Idiopathic Hypersomnia and how it affects me

It's been a while since I blogged, I know... I've been having some issues, primarily the one where I realized that my medication doesn't really work anymore. It's been super fun, or something. I had to re-establish care with the VA because other medication options were so cost-prohibitive on this crap insurance my company has stuck us with. I thought it was going to take until August to see a sleep doctor. Luckily, they had a cancellation so I was able to get in last week. I have a prescription for a new medication coming soon, and another overnight sleep study scheduled for next week to make sure nothing has changed in that department. Thank goodness he didn't want me to do the daytime one again too - that was pure torture the first time!

Anyway, as I mentioned in a previous post, these IH Facebook groups have really been helping me get a better grasp on the IH - understanding it, realizing that the meds haven't really been working that well for a little while, researching some possible options, and feeling like it actually CAN be better than it has been. On one of those facebook groups, a gentleman named Dean Jordheim shared this absolutely fantastic letter that he wrote for people who know / love / care about someone with IH. I know my readership isn't huge, but I figure at the very least, a few people can learn something, and as GI Joe used to tell us all when we were kids, knowing is half the battle. I've taken the liberty of adding some bolded areas to show where the IH is different with me than what he writes and to add my own thoughts, but I've left his words because what he writes about is present in many people and as we all know, everyone's different.

It's a bit long, but I greatly appreciate you reading!!

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Dear Reader,

I am sending this letter because Rebecca wanted something to help you better understand some of the issues that she faces on a daily basis because of Idiopathic Hypersomnia (IH).

I don’t know Rebecca personally but I don’t have to. There is some variation in how the disease affects people, but there are a lot of similarities. The first thing I can promise you is that she hides as much of her suffering (I hate this word, I really do. But the point is true) as possible because showing it would drag everyone else down. This is commonly referred to as our “game face”. You need to understand that if you ask “How are you?” the response you get is relative to how she feels all the time so it doesn’t mean the same as when you use the same words. If the response is “Good!” it probably means that she is really frickin’ tired but is dealing with it well enough to almost function like a normal person. There is also a pretty good chance that it is a flat out lie. If the response is something like “ok” or “fine” she is struggling and needs your help. If the answer is “tired” she is on her last leg. Something more like “Crappy” is an indicator that, if you really care, you need to send her to bed and keep the kids quiet or take them outside or somewhere else so she can sleep and she probably actually needs more than that, but everyone needs to understand that you are only human too. (This is mostly true. I will almost always say good or some variation thereof. If I say something else, it means I'm having a rough go of it. Mostly, I probably just want you to cut me a little slack that day.)

I can tell you that for her just getting through the day takes way more effort than the average person has to accomplish throughout that day. I can tell you that doing the dishes, making meals, keeping the house clean, mowing the lawn, and even things as simple as folding laundry take two or three or four times more effort than anyone who doesn’t have IH. If she isn’t doing enough to help keep the house clean I guarantee she feels like a failure because of it but just doesn’t know how to handle it any better. (Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.) When you have IH your standards for how to do your job and take care of your home and kids don’t drop, but living up to your own standards can become almost impossible. (Again, yes. I am not lazy, I promise. I WANT to do things. I really do.)

When you have IH your body usually gets plenty of sleep, but your brain is in a constant state of sleep deprivation. Institutions don’t do experiments involving long-term sleep deprivation because it causes physical and emotional damage. People with IH carry a significant amount of sleep deprivation which only gets worse over time because sleep doesn’t provide relief. The most common symptoms of sleep deprivation are forgetfulness, memory issues in general, difficulties with concentration, decision making, and overall ability to think clearly. This happens because sleep deprivation directly affects the frontal lobe of the brain where these things take place. (Note: Even though I should be able to easily list these things because I talk about them on a regular basis, I had to flip back to my list several times to get them all included.) The extra effort required to focus on the issue at hand makes it very easy to forget about things that are out of your field of vision, causing problems with anything that resembles multitasking. (Hence my heavy reliance on pop up reminders and lists.) The emotional results of sleep deprivation are probably the easiest to see though. I am sure you are familiar with how easy it is to get cranky when you are tired? Now imagine fighting off this crankiness every minute that you are awake.

Most normal people are accustomed to linear thinking. In planning an activity, a day, or just getting ready to go somewhere they have the ability to think of each thing that needs to be done in order and automatically add up how long each step is likely to take, establish an expected time frame, and build in some extra time for things that take longer than expected or other things that pop up. When you have IH your head is often a blur of thoughts and instead of mentally lining steps up in chronological order everything just blurs together like your grandma’s once-around-the-kitchen casserole so nothing goes as planned and you wind up being late for things regardless of how important they are to you and make time management in general ridiculously difficult. (I don't always have too much trouble with this, as long as I stick to the same routine. When things change or I get flustered or I have to deviate from the norm, that's where I have issues. Like this morning, when my husband said he would take the car in and I had planned on doing it and realized that I needed to get moving or miss my shuttle and left my wedding rings on my dresser. Luckily, I was able to get back in and grab them and still make my shuttle. Sometimes, this involves silly things like forgetting to wash my face in the shower if I do things in the wrong order, or forgetting to brush my teeth in the morning if I wake up late or realize that the shirt I had pulled out to wear the night before has a stain or a hole. Sometimes, I forget to take my medicine on the weekends because I always take it at work during the week. Lots of examples of this... Some of it is OCD, but some if it is having to stick to the routine so I remember to do everything I need to do)

Another issue which is probably related to both the lack of focus and lack of linear thinking (or maybe not) is the tendency people with IH have with finishing things before moving on to something else. Yep, it is pretty normal for someone with IH to have a house full of unfinished projects. (If you've been to my house, you know this is me.) Nagging them about it won’t help the situation. Anticipating it and helping them stay on track will. (My husband has gotten pretty good at this - giving me that push I need to get through. He rocks.)

People with IH typically get meds to help them with energy, mental clarity, etc, but they rarely do the entire job because there is no replacement for restorative sleep. Healthy people can’t stop sleeping at night and take a pill in it’s place and people with IH are no different. These meds help some people gain mental clarity but they are still struggling to stay awake most of the time. They help some people stay awake but do nothing to help with clarity and in many cases actually make it worse. A very good friend of mine says: “My meds just help me do stupid stuff faster.” and this is really a great description of how they affect a lot of us. They may provide the energy to do things, but they take away a person’s ability to channel that energy properly. Have you ever pulled an all-nighter and relied on high doses of caffeine to get you through the next day? Yes you made it through the day and you accomplished some stuff, but do you remember how you felt all day? Were you really you? How many days in a row do you think you could do that? That is just about exactly how I feel when my meds are working their best. (Welcome to every day of my life right now. Hopefully when the new meds get here that will change a little bit...)

The meds also tend to multiply any existing weaknesses a person has. Some of those weaknesses are physical ailments, but more common it is mental or emotional issues and sometimes they create new issues in people who have never had any. They commonly create or multiply issues like anxiety, and they can mess with the rewards system in the brain to cause obsessive or compulsive behaviors causing a much higher percentage of people on stimulants to struggle with issues like compulsive shopping or hoarding than normal people. Because of some similarly described symptoms, people with IH are often told that they are tired because they have major depression. Yes it is a fact that a lot of us have some depression, but that’s because it’s pretty tough to feel like total crap all day every day without letting it get you down. (My OCD mostly existed before the meds, as anyone who knew me pre-2009 will tell you :))

On top of all of the internal difficulties people with IH face they have a regular flow of external difficulties because other people just don’t get it. As a disabled workaholic the thing that really gets to me is the way people tend to think we are lazy. (Yes. See this post.) I am constantly judging myself on my productivity (or now typically my lack thereof) and Rebecca is probably the same. Sshe has probably become accustomed to being criticized for not trying hard enough by people who aren’t putting forth nearly the effort she is. When she appears to be sitting on the couch doing nothing she is probably wondering how it will be possible to accomplish everything that needs to be done. If he is still employed she is probably struggling more to keep up at her job than she lets on, and if she is no longer able to work she needs more emotional support than you can possibly imagine. If Rebecca is like almost every one of the 1,000-plus people with IH I have talked to in the past couple years she is constantly beating herself up for what feels like constant failure. Getting criticized for screwing up or not trying hard enough isn’t a slap in the face, it is a kick in the ribs when she is crawling because she doesn’t have the strength to stand.

I have often been told that I just need learn to cope like other people with other diseases do so I can function like a normal adult. The problem is that when you have IH the disease lies right where a person’s ability to cope is supposed to come from, so getting irritated with them for not functioning right is like getting irritated with a paraplegic for not being able to walk or someone with emphysema for not being able to breathe right.

There are many things that are very simple for healthy people, many of which are done with little or no thought at all, which are very difficult for someone with IH and no matter how hard you look at them through your own eyes, from your perspective, these things aren’t going to make sense. That’s why you need to step out of your perspective and look at things from another angle. When people are told about something someone else is dealing with they have a natural tendency to find something in their mind that they are familiar with and use it as a sort of reference point. When someone says they have a headache you probably think about how it feels when you have a headache and continue the conversation with that in mind. When someone describes a problem that you have never experienced you probably think about someone else you know or have heard about with a similar problem and set that person as a reference point for the difficulty the person you are talking to is facing and compare everything you are hearing to that other person. The natural responses those two scenarios tend to make it more difficult for us to really understand what someone is going through if they are dealing with an extreme case of those symptoms because we want to try to put ourselves in their shoes and it just doesn’t work because regardless of how sincerely we want to understand we don’t know what it’s like and we can’t really imagine it. That is why if you are talking to someone with IH you have to push aside everything you know about how it feels to be tired based on your experiences, accept that you don’t and hopefully never will know what it’s like to be IH-level tired all day every day, and take what that person says at face value because the chances of it being exaggerated are very slim.

In closing I have one request - I ask that you try to remember this letter next time you are at a family (I include non-relatives in the term family, of course) gathering. Try to remember to watch Rebecca here and there as she is sitting and talking to friends or relatives for hours. Has she held a smile on her face a lot of the time, and displayed interest in what everyone is saying and doing? If so she probably deserves an Oscar because to sustain that act and hold back all of the tired crappiness inside takes a hell of an effort and it should not be overlooked.

If this still leaves you thinking that Rebecca should be trying harder or you still might have a tendency to look down on her for her lack of performance look at it this way - How tired would you have to be to act the way she does? It would have to be bad, right? You would suck it up and give it every last bit of strength you have before admitting you couldn’t do it anymore? Do you really think Rebecca is less of a person than you? It is a pretty safe bet that she has already been to that point and beyond. Please go back and review my first promise to you.

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Bottom line, I bust my ass to power through this condition. I don't think I'm suffering from IH - I'm living with it, and I refuse to let it define me. Does it suck, quite often? Absolutely. Do I have breakdowns sometimes because I'm so frustrated? Had 2 last week. Do I feel like I'm letting down the people I'm closest to because I don't have the energy to do everything I want to do, or go to everything I'm invited to. Do I feel like a real a-hole when I bag out of something at the last minute because I am just too tired? You bet I do. But hopefully this gives a little bit of perspective. Thanks again to Dean for putting it all on "paper."

Sleepy =/= lazy.

I had a revelation this weekend. It's sort of a follow up to the post the other day about finding the IH website and Facebook group, and sort of as a result of the move (which, thank dear sweet 8 pound baby Jesus, is just about over, other than getting some stuff to my parents house).

(Yes, I am actually posting about the same topic two posts in a row. Crazy, right?)

For my entire adult life, I have called myself and allowed myself to be called lazy. I don't work out enough because I'm lazy. I sleep extra on the weekends because I'm lazy. I'm not a good housekeeper (for my own house) because I'm lazy. I'm perfectly happy in a desk job because I'm lazy. I want to go to bed at 9 on a Friday night instead of going out because I'm lazy.

It has taken the facebook group and the website and seeing that not only am I not alone, but that I don't even have it as bad as many people with IH to realize that it's not necessarily that I'm lazy, it's that I'm sleepy, and that it's not just in my head. Who knows if I would be lazy without the IH. Maybe I would. But I kinda feel like I wouldn't be. I like going to the gym (as long as its not running. I hate running.), I like going out, I like coming home from work and doing more than plopping onto the couch counting the hours til bedtime. I am a master at powering through physical pain, and slightly less masterful but still effective most of the time at powering through the sleepiness. Take this weekend, finishing the move. Especially yesterday, which was finishing getting the last few things out of the house and cleaning the whole place.

I am not lazy. I am sleepy. There is a difference. I am not making it up. I am not just trying to get out of things. Well, 99% of the time I'm not just trying to get out of things. I don't secretly hate hanging out with you. I really DO want to do all of those things. But my body is telling me it wants sleep more. And the validation that I've gotten over the last few days that this is normal and that, in fact, I'm better off than a lot of people with IH, is AMAZING.

Most of the time I absolutely would like to tell my body to go fly a kite, as my mother says. Sometimes I can. Quite often I just can't. But please believe me when I say I wish I could.

I am not alone

I've mentioned once or twice before on this blog that I have a sleep disorder. I was diagnosed not long after I got out of the Navy with idiopathic hypersomnia. Most folks have never heard of it - I had never heard of it before I was diagnosed. At the time, my sleep doctor said that he originally wanted to diagnose narcolepsy, but I'm missing a clinical requirement for that diagnosis so idiopathic hypersomnia it would be. So for the past 5 years, I've basically just told everyone I'm borderline narcoleptic. Made it easier for most people to understand - everyone's heard of narcolepsy. Of course, most people believe narcolepsy means constantly falling asleep. Again, I did too. In reality, that's just a symptom. But that's neither here nor there.

When I was first diagnosed the doctor wanted to prescribe a specific drug, but I wasn't comfortable with some of the side effects. I'm in a different place now, so I was ready to talk to my doctor about making the change. In doing my research, I discovered that my crap "insurance" would make that drug $500 A MONTH for the GENERIC, so obviously I'm sticking with my current meds for now. But also in my research, I found a website called Living With Hypersomnia AND a Facebook support page for people with IH and similar disorders. Overwhelmed, relieved... I can't even put words.

Funny thing is, I KNOW how important support groups and things like that are. I have a sister with juvenile onset rheumatoid arthritis. The first time she went to a conference and met other kids like her, even at age 6 she was moved. But I haven't been to a sleep doctor since 2009, and it never even occurred to me to look for something like that for IH. But in the past 2 days, reading other people's stories that sound so similar to mine, and being able to compare some notes, and just be able to vent a little bit and have people understand.

Because that's the thing. People close to me know I have a problem. It manifests itself in several ways, but two of the biggest are excessive daytime sleepiness and the ability to sleep seemingly well for 8+ hours and still not feel refreshed. I am ALWAYS tired. The end. I have to take medication every day to maintain some level of alertness and not fall asleep at my desk. I don't care if I got 10 hours of sleep, it's how it is. Waking up is hard, especially if I'm being awoken and not waking on my own. Yet I still get asked how I can be tired when I slept for 9 hours the night before, or why don't I just take a little nap? I tell them I take Ritalin and they ask if I have ADD. They think I'm joking when I say I have to take pills to stay awake.

But on these forums, and on this Facebook page, THEY GET IT. And it is probably one of the best feelings I've felt in a long time. I have learned more in the last 2 days than I did in the entire last 5 years since I was diagnosed. I almost want to cry, in the best possible way. I can tell my whole story and not have people get bored or not get it or try to make excuses for my exhaustion. There is really and truly something to be said for a support group, even if it is on Facebook.

With all of the stuff going on in my world right now, this has been a little ray of light. It's also helped me not be really angry over the medication thing - I've seen a ton of people say that it didn't work that well for them anyway, or it worked for a little while then stopped, or that the side effects really were unbearable. Just needed to share :)

When life hands you lemons, or something

So, I know, its been a little quiet in these parts. Sorry for that! 2014 has been a bit busy already.

With the New Year, I started looking for jobs in Florida. Husband and I have been talking about getting back down south basically since we moved up here 4 years ago - this was never meant to be a permanent solution. I was ready to start hunting after Christmas last year, but my boss resigned, and I was not going to leave the client in a lurch like that. So we figured after Christmas would give us enough time to start the search, and we'd just stay in the house we're renting month to month until something works out. Well, the best laid plans... in late January, when I emailed the landlord about something else entirely, she told us that she wanted to sell the house, and would not be extending our lease. I replied with the situation we were in, and asked if she'd be willing to let us stay and put off putting the house on the market until jobs were sorted out. She declined, saying she had some work to do on the house and wanted it on the market by 1 May.

Well, crap.

That throws a wrench in things, doesn't it. I upped my searching, even got a couple of hits on my resume, but so far, nothing. Our lease is up on March 31st, so we signed a lease on an apartment down the street. Not ideal - it's going to cost us a pretty penny to break that lease if a job comes up. So starting today, we move our stuff from the townhouse to a two bedroom apartment and my parents' basement. I'm taking a temporary break from job hunting, because frankly, right now I have enough stress to deal with, and I'll pick it back up again soon. We're still hoping to get to Florida - all of his family (which is a generation older than mine) is down there. That and cost of living is so much lower than here, and we'd like to have kids in the near future, which will be hard up here.

I will say, though, living in this house and dealing with this landlord, who is self-managing, has really made me more conscious of decisions that I make for my own house. I understand the need to get rid of a house - I want nothing more in the world than to be able to sell mine. But I will pick compassion for my renters and a guaranteed income to offset the mortgage every time, at least for now. Oh well - we'll deal with it and keep on trucking. What else can you do?

But at least we had The Rock Boat to offset some of the stress! I'm pretty sure that of the seven I've done, this year was the best yet. And considering how awesome the one that topped my list before, that's a pretty big deal. It was also our honeymoon, which was didn't hurt. But the lineup was amazing, the weather was pretty much perfect, everything about it was just fantastic. I think I'll save the recap for another post - gives me a reason to write again!

How's your 2014 going so far?

New Music! (Not mine. Yet.) (Well, a very teeny bit mine)

I've blogged many times about my good friend Amy Gerhartz and her awesome music. Well, she just put out a new Acoustic album (aptly titled Acoustic), and it's AWESOME. And yes, there's a tiny bit of bias in there because she's a friend, and also because I helped her write the song Too Young :)

You can check it out here on Amazon MP3 and here on iTunes.

I'm super proud of Amy and all of the hard work she put into this album. Most of these songs were inspired by The Rock Boat, either the trip itself or ideas Rock Boaters suggested to her for songs. I highly suggest you all check it out!

OK Polar Vortex, You Can Leave Now.

If you live anywhere in the Eastern half of the United States, or Texas, or the Midwest, or the upper plains, or just about anywhere except California and South Florida, it seems, you can relate to my sentiment. I've had about enough of this.

This morning when I left for work my phone told me it was 7 degrees outside. Fahrenheit. And you know what? It actually felt WARMER than yesterday or the day before, because there was no wind!! Not that I wasn't still wearing sweatpants over my tights with my skirt in my purse, my ridiculous looking poofy down ski jacket with hood up over my hat, scarf around my face, and flaps buttoned over my chin, Ugg boots (I don't even want to hear it, those things are WARM), and gloves. Because you bet your happy ass I was. And then there's the part where I had to walk to the bus on the street because the sidewalk on the public road in my neighborhood is a sheet of ice.

And then there's the part where I don't get warm. It takes me hours to thaw out. And when your living room is in a basement, that just makes it worse. Combine that with the fact that our house does not heat evenly (thanks, builders, for putting the thermostat in the coldest part of the house) so while the rest of our house is freezing, the bedrooms upstairs are a sauna. Not super comfy.

But the good news is, it looks like we get a warm up starting tomorrow. HOORAY!! It's going to be in the 40s!! Kinda makes me want to pull out the picnic gear and lawn chairs! OK, not really. But the husband is going stir crazy, so I'm hoping at least the rivers thaw enough for him to go fishing. And I'd really like to get those Christmas snowflake light things down from the front of the house, but it's either been raining, too cold, too icy, or some combination of the three every weekend, and it definitely takes the two of us with the step ladder to do it.

And people ask why we want to move South... here's hoping February warms up a little bit. If not, 23 days until the Rock Boat...

What's my point again?

I've had the strangest dreams the past few nights. Among the ones that I remember include one where I was back in high school, although it wasn't really my high school, and I was getting picked on by the head cheerleader, although it wasn't the real head cheerleader from my senior year because she was super cool. (I'm not sure why I assume I was a senior in this dream - or maybe its just because that one head cheerleader is the only one I remember.) Anyway, I did something I never did when I felt picked on in high school in this dream - I stood up for myself. I became that girl who did not give a flying f***, I got back in their faces, and I wasn't a pushover. Everything that, these days, I wish I had done back then. Of course, in my dream, that just made it worse, tons of other people started getting on me, and when I tried to stand up and say that they could harass the new girl all they wanted (I was not new when I was a senior, but whatever), they just drowned me out with their taunting. Then suddenly I was on the Rock Boat, and one of the a capella groups from my USNA days was there along with the men's glee club, and I was mad because my small group wasn't there, among other things, and this dream got even stranger. 

The point is, I woke up troubled. We're always told that when you get picked on you should stand up for yourself. I've spent a lot of time thinking about some situations that I dealt with as far back as elementary school - the mean girl writing a note signed from the boy I liked telling me he liked me too and laughing when I realized it was from her, the girl in my 8th grade civics class who liked to regularly accuse me of copying her / being a poser when I ended up with the same brand of powder or style of shoe, the girls in my 2nd high school who made fun of me for coming to school in jeans, tshirts, and flip flops when they were all made up in tight jeans and heels. What if I had told them all, to use an expression my mother would approve of more, to go fly a kite? Would it have made it better? Or would it have made it worse? Honestly, it doesn't really matter, because everything in my life, the way it all happened, brought me to where I am now and the person that I am today. I'm still a little shy about conflict. (That's about the only thing I'm shy about, to be honest, even though when I take those personality tests I tend to come out more on the introverted side.) I'm no longer afraid to stand up for myself, though, even if its in a more passive way than getting back in someone's face.

I'm not sure why this dream bothered me as much as it did. Bothered isn't even really the right word, maybe just stuck with me. I'm not sure why it stuck with me so much. Maybe because it felt so real. I don't know. All I know is I'm glad I'm not in high school anymore. While people still suck, and always will, I'd rather deal with them as an adult, in my own way, comfortable in my own skin and understanding that life is too short to deal with other people's drama and BS.

I shared a similar thought process (the life's too short to deal with other people's BS part) with my college aged sister recently, and the way she handled it ended up teaching me a bit of a lesson. She was having issues with her roommate and suitemates basically being the type of girls she spent high school avoiding, and it was getting to a breaking point. I told her not to let them walk over her She called a meeting with their RA to discuss some things, and basically made it clear in her own way during the meeting that while she had a perfect opportunity to get them in trouble for a variety of things, she wasn't going to do it - she said just enough to address the issues without actually getting them in trouble. And funny thing, the passive confrontation worked - things were great with them for the rest of the semester. They even decorated her room for her birthday! I wish I had things figured out the way she does when I was her age.

So yeah, I think the point of this post is that life is too short for other people's garbage and drama. It took me until my mid-20's to really learn the value of deleting people from my life. Do I still wonder about some of them? Sure. But is my life much easier without most of them? You bet it is. How does this tie back to the dream? I don't think it does, but I'm OK with that. What good is a blog if it can't be a bit rambly sometimes!