Cleaned out my bedside table and realized how much time is slipping by and how busy you get once you have a family, career, child, mortgage, and all those responsibilities. Still had books I started to read before my son was born in there. Had the rattles and blocks I used to keep in there when he still slept in a pack n play in our room and we would bring him to bed in the morning and try to get him to play and give us a few more minutes in bed.
Things are starting to look up, only because I don't think the universe is allowed to throw any more things at my family this week. The day after my back went out and I was in the ER, my husband found out his job might be in jeopardy. He works for the airlines. Has worked for the airlines for over ten years. Turned out that we probably don't have to worry. And at this point we just don't have the energy to do so.
Went into work on Friday and put in 9.5 hours. Spent the first two hours sitting in IT trying to get them to de-bug my profile since my desktop wasn't allowing me to log in. Brilliant. But after I nearly had a nervous breakdown, someone allowed me to log in as them so I could access the database. So I got some junk done so I won't feel overwhelmed tomorrow after being out 4 days last week.
Last night my son threw up in his bed and his temperature was 101. He wouldn't eat dinner. This morning he was still a little hot potato. My husband and I took turns pressing a cold compress to his head and finally coaxed him into eating some lemon yogurt. He held it down. We spent the day at home and it was 90 degrees today. Towards the end we were going a little batty trying to find things to keep my son entertained.
I am still gimping around. Waiting for the muscle relaxers to take hold of me and settle down my aching back and leg. But I think it is getting better.
This week is only four days long. Good. 4th of July. Bad. Fire crackers are ridiculous in our neighborhood every year. We have to stay home every holiday because rockets are always shot onto our roof and in our yard. We have to make sure the house doesn't burn down.
But my baby (okay almost 20) sis is coming on July 5th to visit and it will be great to see her again!
I'm getting sleepy. Hope you had a good weekend internets. Thanks for all the well wishes. As long as I still have bladder control I will not let them cut on my back. Was that TMI? :-)
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Back Trauma - Part One
I believe that this blog may center around one thing for awhile. My back. I have worked as a paralegal for over ten years. This fact coupled with my complete lack of exercise and the fact that I tend to direct my stress and anxiety into pain has finally caught up with me. Monday morning I woke up with lower back pain. At first it was normal. I thought I could muscle my way through it as I have done in the past. I drove to my chiropractor's office and I was in tears by the time I got there. On the way home I had to call my husband to talk to me because I was convinced I would pass out from the pain. It was not until Tuesday night that I finally ended up in the ER. The diagnosis? A herniated disc at L5-S1 that is pressing on all the nerves going down my left leg. Did I mention? My left leg had been in spasms and my left foot had gone numb by this point.
We started in the ER at 4pm, we got home at midnight. The MRI was hell because even though they had given me four kinds of pain medications (including morphine) the pain was so excruciating, that I couldn't lay flat through the whole thing.
Today my leg is still numb. They recommended that I go see a surgeon. I am not all too hip to that idea. All the good doctors that I know of are booked out a month and the rest are on summer break. I found a physical medicine and rehabilitation doctor that can see me on July 3rd. Until then...I don't really know. I can't sit for any length of time and I can't lay down for any length of time. The pain medications make me go directly to sleep.
Please send me good vibes.
We started in the ER at 4pm, we got home at midnight. The MRI was hell because even though they had given me four kinds of pain medications (including morphine) the pain was so excruciating, that I couldn't lay flat through the whole thing.
Today my leg is still numb. They recommended that I go see a surgeon. I am not all too hip to that idea. All the good doctors that I know of are booked out a month and the rest are on summer break. I found a physical medicine and rehabilitation doctor that can see me on July 3rd. Until then...I don't really know. I can't sit for any length of time and I can't lay down for any length of time. The pain medications make me go directly to sleep.
Please send me good vibes.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
My first REAL car buying experience
This past weekend I had my first real car buying experience. I am almost 33. It's not that I have never owned a new car before, but my husband and I have always bought Saturns in an attempt to avoid the process of haggling on the price of a car. My husband is almost 37. Needless to say we were very nervous about dealing with dealers. This past weekend we decided to trade-in our 2001 Saturn wagon which only has 52,000 miles on it, but has had a tendency to be finicky lately about when it wants to start. This is not good when you have a toddler and are out and about with a car full of groceries or if you decide to drive downtown one evening to catch a flick with your friend (Hi Nora) and then get stuck having to call a tow truck when you should be in bed getting necessary sleep for work the next day.
That being said, I researched cars and decided on the Honda Fit, being the MPG-savvy gal that I am. But this also meant that I would be going to a Honda dealership. As you may know, Saturn advertises that they have one price for all their cars and that is that. No haggling, no selling you a car for $2,000 more than the last person who bought the same damn thing, no trying to push undercoating or scotch-guarding down your throat like your life depended on it. None of that. Herein enters the traditional car dealership, where all of that happens, and more.
I negotiated the price of the car over the internet, before we had even done a test drive. That I was happy about. However, there was still the little issue of our trade-in. My little 2001 Saturn had been behaving good this past week. We drove it down to the dealership on Saturday for our scheduled test drive. We loved the car and decided to talk numbers. The dealer said he would take our Saturn over to the used lot to be appraised. We waited. My husband went out to check on things and came back red faced. "The car won't start," he says to me. Here is where I become a shrinking violet. My husband does his trick of popping the hood, disconnecting and re-connecting the battery cable and "Voila" the car starts. We lost about $2,000 off the value of our trade-in right there.
But all was okay. We refused the $100 cargo tray and we told them to take off the $695 extra security system (it already comes with one). Then we went to financing. I thought this would be a breeze since we had already come into the dealership with a check for the car from our bank. We didn't need to finance through them. They didn't like this. We went into the office and there was a sign stating that our session was being tape-recorded for "training purposes."
My ass.
The finance guy went through our options for extra warranties. We refused. He was flabbergasted. Wanted to know why. We said, waste of money. He wanted to sell us GAP insurance and extra life/disability coverage insurance. We refused. His phone rang.
"Oh, excuse me for a second, my supervisor needs to see me really quick."
He exits the room and I look up to the camera on the ceiling. I say to my husband under my breathe, "The supervisor is about to come in here because he has been watching us the whole time."
In walks the supervisor.
He tries to give us a "deal" on the warranties. He slashes the price in half and then proceeds to pull out an agreement stating that if 6 years pass and we never use it, we can get our money back. Right, like I am going to hold onto that paper for six years and remember to cash it in while you make interest on my money. No thank you. I tell him I work insurance defense and I know how these things work. Not worth it. My husband says, "If your car breaks on us that easy it's simple, we'll never buy another Honda again." The supervisor leaves.
In walks the underling. In a last ditch effort to get us to spend more money he says, "Are you sure you don't want the scotch guarding or the undercoating." I stifle a laugh, thinking that he is joking. He is not. I want to say, "Haven't you ever seen that Seinfeld episode?" I don't. He says, "Don't you have kids?" I am thinking, "Yes, but he isn't eating spaghetti and nachos in the car and I can buy a can of scotch guard myself." Again, we refuse.
After four+ hours we drive out of there in this car:
That being said, I researched cars and decided on the Honda Fit, being the MPG-savvy gal that I am. But this also meant that I would be going to a Honda dealership. As you may know, Saturn advertises that they have one price for all their cars and that is that. No haggling, no selling you a car for $2,000 more than the last person who bought the same damn thing, no trying to push undercoating or scotch-guarding down your throat like your life depended on it. None of that. Herein enters the traditional car dealership, where all of that happens, and more.
I negotiated the price of the car over the internet, before we had even done a test drive. That I was happy about. However, there was still the little issue of our trade-in. My little 2001 Saturn had been behaving good this past week. We drove it down to the dealership on Saturday for our scheduled test drive. We loved the car and decided to talk numbers. The dealer said he would take our Saturn over to the used lot to be appraised. We waited. My husband went out to check on things and came back red faced. "The car won't start," he says to me. Here is where I become a shrinking violet. My husband does his trick of popping the hood, disconnecting and re-connecting the battery cable and "Voila" the car starts. We lost about $2,000 off the value of our trade-in right there.
But all was okay. We refused the $100 cargo tray and we told them to take off the $695 extra security system (it already comes with one). Then we went to financing. I thought this would be a breeze since we had already come into the dealership with a check for the car from our bank. We didn't need to finance through them. They didn't like this. We went into the office and there was a sign stating that our session was being tape-recorded for "training purposes."
My ass.
The finance guy went through our options for extra warranties. We refused. He was flabbergasted. Wanted to know why. We said, waste of money. He wanted to sell us GAP insurance and extra life/disability coverage insurance. We refused. His phone rang.
"Oh, excuse me for a second, my supervisor needs to see me really quick."
He exits the room and I look up to the camera on the ceiling. I say to my husband under my breathe, "The supervisor is about to come in here because he has been watching us the whole time."
In walks the supervisor.
He tries to give us a "deal" on the warranties. He slashes the price in half and then proceeds to pull out an agreement stating that if 6 years pass and we never use it, we can get our money back. Right, like I am going to hold onto that paper for six years and remember to cash it in while you make interest on my money. No thank you. I tell him I work insurance defense and I know how these things work. Not worth it. My husband says, "If your car breaks on us that easy it's simple, we'll never buy another Honda again." The supervisor leaves.
In walks the underling. In a last ditch effort to get us to spend more money he says, "Are you sure you don't want the scotch guarding or the undercoating." I stifle a laugh, thinking that he is joking. He is not. I want to say, "Haven't you ever seen that Seinfeld episode?" I don't. He says, "Don't you have kids?" I am thinking, "Yes, but he isn't eating spaghetti and nachos in the car and I can buy a can of scotch guard myself." Again, we refuse.
After four+ hours we drive out of there in this car:
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