ran yet again!

This week has been all about running, apparently. Thursday I ran away to the beach. Saturday, I ran away with friends to DeLand (but I did come back). Today, well, I just RAN. And it felt good. It felt so good, in fact, that it made me wonder what made me not run for 2+ weeks. I don't really know. Grief hits you in funny ways, I guess. It hit me with about 8 pounds as well and that weird, restless feeling in my arms and legs when I eat crap and don't take care of myself. Jason encouraged me to get back on the trail tonight - he even accompanied me, though those long legs of his meant he didn't exactly run side-by-side with me, of course. I went, thinking I would make it a few blocks and want to go back home. Amazingly, the energy was there. Where it came from, I don't really know. But it was there, and there I went. I'm sure my run was slower than it could have been, and I definitely felt two weeks' worth of inactivity catch up with me as I ran. I'm a little achy and sore as I write this. But I feel alive, and I just can't get that feeling any other way these days. I put in a little over 3 miles, and it felt good.

Each day, one more step.

ran away again

I had a lot of work to do this morning. Instead, I ditched it and went to DeLeon Springs with my friend Rachel and her Bible study group, a fantastic group of ladies collectively known as Virtue in the City. We all met at a McDonald's (not to eat) and drove through the couple of streets that were ravaged by these recent tornadoes. What a powerful statement to go and see my brother's apartment complex torn to shreds... except for his apartment, which sustained only cosmetic damage. Except for the red spray-painted "X" on the front door, it looks fairly livable: not the case for his next-door neighbors, who looked like they came out on the losing end of a fight with a wrecking ball. Here are some photos from the media:


Applewood Apartments in DeLand, where my brother lives


Applewood Apartments and a rescue worker looking for the injured


More damage


The shopping complex across the street


Remains of the trailer park next door

After seeing what damage the storm did, I am so grateful my brother was spared from any physical harm. One of the girls I was with today told us of a kid in her church youth group - her church community is only about 60 people strong - and in the tornadoes, he lost both his parents. His mom was found in the wreckage of their home, and the boy and his dad had been knocked clear across the road. He's 17, an only child, and he just buried his parents yesterday after having been in the hospital himself for surgery. We actually ran into him with family friends at the pancake place at DeLeon Springs; he was remarkably, well, OKAY, and actually had the biggest smile of anyone in the group. Here's a snippet of his story.

I have to admit that these last few weeks - the last month, really - has left me hurt, confused, even a little bitter, though hopefully not permanently so. When my mind cannot wrap around the things that hurt and how they fit into God's plan, I get so angry and resentful of Him. Jason has been understandably worried for me, and one night as he wrapped his arms around me and began to pray over me, "Dear God..." I interrupted him and said, "Just don't even bother." And though it was my childish, limited-view attempt to challenge God to come through that much more and prove me wrong, that even my unbelief cannot subdue His graciousness and limitless power, I felt immediately stricken, like I had taken a knife to the one life preserver that had been thrown my way, like I had struck at the heart of my closest friend. Indeed, I probably had, but so endless is His forgiveness, even when I am a brat. And boy, can I be a brat!

One thing I have learned over and over as a resident of this storm-stricken state is that the sun often shines brightest just after the worst has hit. And maybe we are sometimes so debilitated by our grief and sorrow that the brightest light of all is needed just to illuminate the path, to take us step by step on the journey. The sun shone brilliantly today as it has over the past few days, and so I walk, one step at a time, and maybe I can see a little more of the way tomorrow, take a few more steps.

ran away, then came back

It was good. Nice drive - I listened to my new musical find, Rosie Thomas, and enjoyed the salty sea air when I got there. I managed to snag a really good spot in the parking lot at the beach ramp, so good that I had a full, unobstructed view of the rolling ocean waves without having to leave the privacy of my car. Normally, it would seem slightly ludicrous to drive all the way to the beach and just stay in one's car - you could pull up a picture of the beach on your computer or TV screen for roughly the same effect, minus the seashell fragrance - but I had some personal journeys to make, and I didn't want to have a Kleenex moment in front of 30 half-naked George Hamiltons. I read a great article about a woman's miscarriage story and cried for her and myself. I had a Publix sub and popcorn. I watched a couple of pregnant ladies walk by and really took time to explore the feelings attached to all of that.

I'm not all better, but I'm better. Lately my view of the world has been sober and melancholy, so it was nice to go to the beach and forget all of that, even if for a few hours. There's a statement from that article I mentioned earlier - I've had it on the front of my brain ever since I read it: "No one warned me that the life I was carrying inside of me was hope, not a promise." When I found out I was going to miscarry, I felt like someone broke a promise to me, and I was stricken by the injustice of it all. But every rare now and then, including a few short minutes today, I get a little bit of that hope back. I think, for a moment, that the bigger promise He made was never broken, though my heart cannot understand this loss here on earth. And my hope is not only for the children I hope to have in the future, the uncomplicated pregnancies I hope to enjoy without worrying 24/7, but that I will be solid once again in that promise, and the huge cloud of doubt I live under right now will lift.

i might run away

It's one of those days without a cloud in the sky, and it is cool but not cold outside. If you stand in the sun, you get that glorious warm-hug effect of feeling the sun on your back but not wanting to sweat your face off. Strangely, I'm still inside. I have the windows open, and the breeze is dancing around the room, but I'm still inside. And since it is such a rare moment when I have both a day that doesn't require me to be anywhere until the evening AND it's just perfect weather, well, you don't let something like this go by without some action. Damn the pile of laundry that needs washing, the notes that need studying, the long-term school projects that need starting.

I think I'll stick around long enough to make a good mix CD and leave. I could use a vacation.

ugly cry

I mentioned last night to Jason that I didn't know when the floodgates were going to open - I've been so stressed and felt like I never had an opportunity to be authentically, outwardly grieving (or that I missed the opportunity). Well, that question got answered today.

I've been stressing out about starting my acute mental health (aka psych) clinicals, and today was the start day. I had an exam in another class, then proceeded to finish that class completely in a daze, unable to concentrate while my professor (a really good one, too) explained all sorts of EKG readings, which is already sort of complicated and not easy to grasp on first hearing. Ran through a quick lunch, then went to the hospital, where we had about two hours of talks from case managers, social workers, and nurses on the types of patients we'd see, the really severe cases suffering from severe depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, etc. I think I was already dazed and stressed out... and then we went to orient to the actual floor itself. Now, our clinical instructor is a tiny, soft-spoken woman, and as she's trying to introduce us to the floor and the area, people in our group kept talking. It's a sore spot of mine, so I became, quite apparently, the villain and shushed in a general direction. One of my classmates (and someone I considered a friend) turned on me and said pointedly,"you know Anne, I am SO over you shushing me every day. Go stand up front or something."

I've seen the Seinfeld episode on shushers. I've heard them in class, at clinicals, even at the movie theater. I don't like them either, and I didn't think I'd morphed into one. And maybe on another day, in another situation, I might have had a handy smart remark to give back to her, or else extended grace to both of us since we're all so stressed, or whatever. But instead, I immediately wanted to cry, I felt like such a piece of shit. And this horrible, not-so-little voice in my head starts mocking me: "You are so hostile and mean that you kill life inside of you and alienate your friends." I know that sounds extreme and mean to myself and a pity party and whatever, but I felt so low, so at the end of my rope, at that very moment, that I looked at the patients around me and felt I should be right in there with them.

I ended up in the nurses' lounge area, waiting for the ladies room to come free, and the tears wouldn't stop no matter how hard I tried, and of course my instructor had to walk in at that moment, and I ended up sitting for 15 minutes with the "ugly cry", the kind where you gasp for air and snot runs down your face, and though I didn't get into everything - the baby, the shushing, the anxiety - I just said how stressed I was and how behind I felt. She was very sympathetic and sweet and just let me cry and reassured me that I would be fine in this clinical, that all students are apprehensive at the start. So I collected myself together enough to stop hyperventilating and got out on the floor, and it was fine, but I was so drained and exhausted that I think I just didn't care about anything that might happen with a patient!

I thought I would feel better after my ugly cry. I don't feel on the verge of tears anymore, but I don't feel any better, just drained. I want my stress to go away. I want an apology from my friend. I want to apologize to my friend. Most of all, I want some answers - especially the reasoning behind this loss I've faced when I already had a difficult load on my plate to start with.

what I've not wanted to write

I've been away from blogging for a bit. One of those insane realities you face when you write a public blog - even if you have a readership you can count on your hand - is that when something huge affects your life, it's sort of hard NOT to write about it, even if you don't really want to write about it. And I haven't wanted to write about this, really, but perhaps saying it gets it out from underneath dark shadows.

Right before the New Year, Jason and I found out we were pregnant. Took the pregnancy test after feeling very hormonal, achy, and becoming the Human Disposall of All Things Unhealthy... and it was positive. Spent a few days in shock, and then several more after that dreaming of baby names, looking at online baby registries, sticking out my stomach to see what being pregnant in a few more months might look like. Since I've always been irregular with my monthly cycles, my OB ordered an ultrasound, and Jason and I spent a sleepless weekend, brimming with excitement because even if we just saw a little dot, we would be seeing our new Little One.

Ultrasound day: couldn't see anything but a shady gray area. OB informs me that we have either caught the pregnancy too early (so nothing notable to see) or something might be wrong, like an early pregnancy failure. And she felt compelled at that point to quote me miscarriage statistics, presumably to cover her own ass for liability, and I just sort of sat there, shaking and dumbfounded. Pregnancies aren't supposed to go wrong, and how many times had I heard from my parents that neither side of the family ever had pregnancy problems? Another ultrasound was ordered for two weeks later.

Next ultrasound comes... and the ultrasound tech, a terminally chipper person, points out the yolk sac (bigger than last time), my ovaries, my uterus, my cervix. When it comes to measuring what looks like a little kidney bean, I get excited: look at it! But the ultrasound tech sounds less chipper, and the text at the bottom of the TV screen says "Fetal HR ?". The question mark never gets replaced, but the one inside my heart does.

Ten minutes later, I found out I miscarried. I've had no bleeding, no cramping, but I've miscarried - the medical term they used was "missed abortion", which means the baby stopped developing for whatever reason but I'm still carrying it inside of me, and my body is still recognizing itself as pregnant, so I'm still producing hormones (hence the increased, er, yolk sac). I don't remember much after that: I was fighting as hard as I could not to cry because my OB is this no-nonsense kind of woman who, upon the last time I cried when I heard there might be a problem, started interrogating me with questions like, "What are you most afraid of?" which made me want to staple things to her head.

Today, technically, I am still pregnant. I still have this Little One, lifeless, in my body. I still have the hormones. And I have no resolution. I had scheduled a D&C to get it over with, but the only time they could do it was during a week of exams and clinicals at school, and even though I am training to be a nurse, the idea of general anesthesia, sharp scraping instruments, and questionable recovery symptoms when I needed to be mentally alert for school just scared me, so I cancelled it. I am supposed to "expel" this tissue on my own, sometime between immediately and 6 weeks from now. Six weeks seems like a lifetime. And in the meantime, I may have blamed the hormones for fatigue and cravings, but I've stopped my regular running and eaten everything in sight, so I'm feeling and looking worse.

Friends have been extremely supportive. Family has loved on me. Jason has been a saint, even though he is grieving, too. Ironically, I've heard the insensitive stock phrases every woman who experiences miscarriage fears to hear: "you'll get pregnant again" and, in my particular case, "at least you know you can get pregnant at all". Even more ironic is that those phrases came out of MY mouth, not anyone else's. I'll have many moments of sanity and regular life, but occasionally I'll see a late-pregnancy mom-to-be with her proud belly or I'll hear a song and it will unleash this flood of emotion that I cannot control. One of my favorite violin recordings is Pinchas Zukerman playing Vaughan-Williams' "The Lark Ascending", and when I heard it on the radio one morning heading to class, I wept. If you listen, the repeating violin motif, which literally sounds like a bird taking off into the sky, just made me think of this Little One and perhaps its own soul taking off into flight - corny, I know, but I cried and cried. Never mind that the song already reminded me of another poignant time in my life, living in Princeton and trying to prove myself (to myself) as a singer. (Side note: even now, the sensory memories of that time are so vivid when I hear the piece... I can smell the house I lived in, the combination of old creaky wood floors, fresh air, and the slightly musty smell of houses which are older than your grandparents)

Life continues on: some days easier, and other days feel like a giant step backwards. It's not something I like to talk about, unless I run across one of the several or so friends who have confessed their own miscarriage/child loss stories to me, friends that don't get that scrunched, uncomfortable stance of one who feels bad for you but has NO idea what to say. And not all of those friends, either - I still have several people, even an especially dear one who had suffered a similar situation just weeks before I did, that I haven't yet spoken to... because I think I'm afraid of opening the gates and seeing what happens. There's also a kind of embarrassment that sets in regarding the people you told about the pregnancy (when it was still a positive, much-anticipated event), because they were just as excited as you, and having to share the bad news... you just can't erase the memories of going out to dinner with your dad and giving him a picture frame that says "Grandpa" or the excited conversations over milkshakes you had with your mom the night you found out.

For everyone who has kept me in their prayers and offered support: thank you. Forgive me if I have dropped off the face of the earth or else acted as if nothing was ever wrong. It still hurts a lot, and it's just not a sharp learning curve for me.

you have to laugh

I can't decide if I am cold-hearted or, as the author describes, ready to shop for bassinets by laughing at this:

Picture Day

And this one gets better each time I look at it. #2 and #64 are among my favorites:

Scared of Santa

i got mad math skillz, bay-bee

First, I receive this ominous posting from our professor on the class discussion board:

"I'm afraid I have very bad, and, I have to say, surprising news. I have corrected the med exams from Orlando and Cocoa, and no one has passed. I don't believe that that has ever happened."

Then, 10 minutes later, I see this:

"An awful lot of you missed question 16 on the exam which caused me to look at the exam and key. Indeed the key was changed to make the doses given to BID instead of TID. Unfortunately, the change was never made on the exam. So those of you who got that wrong will now have it graded as right. Therefore there will be people who pass the exam, but still a lot who have not. I will email those who passed."

Then, 5 minutes later, I get the little envelope icon on my screen, and this e-mail pops up:

"Congratulations. You received a perfect score on your med test. You may now pass meds in clinical with proper supervision. Please copy this and show it to your clinical instructor."

random stuff for today

Although I'm usually pretty random about everything, actually. So this isn't anything new.

My skills checkoffs this morning went fine. I was nervous initially: when I met one of my instructors yesterday during orientation, I discovered that this person was not only the one who would check me off on skills in the morning, but she was also a huge, huge Buckeyes fan - she had on a massive "buckeyes" necklace. And this morning when my alarm went off, the first thing I heard was the DJ announcer guy yelling, "The Gators WON! The Gators WON!" Truthfully, I am not a football kind of girl, and I guess if I had to root for a team, I'd pick the Gators only because my brother went there and I almost went there myself. But I was NOT looking forward to coming into my 90-minute checkoff experience with a huge Buckeyes fan when the Buckeyes had just been royally spanked the night before. This woman, possibly bitter, would hold the power over whether I could continue in the program or not!

Thankfully, whatever disappointment she may have had last night had already faded by the time she saw me, and she was very easygoing and relaxed about the process. Whew. I passed with flying colors.

And another cool event: my dearest friend Rachel started her own blog for her family today, and under her links section, she refers to me as "Super Anne". I had to take a moment to preen a little bit after I read that - she thinks I am super! I think she is super. Go look at her blog and tell her so, too.

not so bad, really

First day of school: it was doable. Attempt 1 (out of a possible 3) of my calculations test turned out well, I think, except for one question where my thought process (and my answer) was interrupted by the dripping, snuckly sniffing of the guy next to me. I just wanted to tell him to suck it all up, but instead, I just heard this half-assed sucking of the snot up his nostrils... ugh. Nothing like destroying concentration with nasal congestion. Anyway, I feel that even despite distraction, I'll only have a few problems to make up. Whew.

Tomorrow is the skills checkoff - 10:30am, which is nice since I won't have to get up at the crack of dawn, but I'll have the afternoon to recuperate (whether I pass or fail!).

Short post - gotta go study. Wish me luck!