He was impressive, young and agressive
Saving the world on his own.
But the warm summer breezes
the French wine and cheeses
put his ambitions at bay
and the summers and winters
scattered like splinters
and four or five years slipped away.
I know my brother Will would have picked up on those lyrics just in the title alone. I'm overdue for a post but I was mostly waiting for some news, and also, trying to decide if I still liked my job or not. Both have verdicts.
Before I get into the dark stuff, I'd like to talk about my recent carpentry endeavors. This weekend I decided I was going to build a deck, and an ottoman, and I did. The deck was actually built during reprieve from the ottoman.
So I have to give credit to where I got my inspiration from, my friend Dani, who I went to bootcamp with, made a storage ottoman of her own after she had her first baby (shortly after baby girl started walking I believe), and I was so impressed with her ottoman! Kyle and I have always wanted a whiskey barrel coffee table but they cost about $700 before shipping, looking at about $1000 when it's all said and done, we're just not making that much money at this point in our lives... but eventually. I definitely couldn't have constructed this massive ottoman without Dani helping me (all the way in California!) she answered all my messages almost immediately (OK - I did wait until a reasonable west coast hour to shoot her a message). My dad drove to my house (an hour away) two days in a row to help me with these projects. And of course, Kyle, who always supports my crazy ideas - emotionally, physically, and financially, amazingly he rarely challenges me - and I think maybe it's because he knows I might be onto something (realistically he probably knows at this point arguing with me will get him nowhere and I'm going to do what I want anyway... oops).
So here's the pics with explanations, which you've mostly seen if you follow my Facebook:
Naturally, we went and got the wood first, for both projects... Dad and I planned to do the deck the same way we did in Pensacola. I had my measurements for my coffee table/ottoman (I say coffee table because I literally took the measurements of my coffee table and used that for my ottoman) so I had the guy at Lowe's cut my wood for me for that so we wouldn't have to do it when we got home.
We planned on doing a 6'x10' deck since there's a huge tree about 6.5' off the back of my cement slab. After we loaded a dozen 12' boards for the top part of the deck onto our cart, I chimed in and re-evaluated the "plan" with my dad at which point we realized we were NOT on the same page. The employee at Lowe's thought we were awesome and didn't care that we just nit-picked a dozen pieces of decking only to move to the next isle over to pick a dozen more of a different size. We argued for about 10 more minutes until we each drew out on a piece of scrap paper what we were talking about, and decided to go with (my plan) the original deck build from Pensacola. By the time we checked out and loaded the wood in the truck we realized we had spent over 2 hours at Lowe's, and Kyle was waiting for lunch (it was 4PM at that point - OOPS! - I told you I give him a lot of credit for putting up with my antics!!)
After Dad left, Kyle and I went to Joann's (thank goodness they are open until 9PM!) and I made my buttons that I would use for tufting out of fabric that would be used to cover the rest of the ottoman. This was surprisingly easy and a task I would happily do again.
I ran to Joann's again after hand sewing all that stuff together to buy my foam, because I had a 50% off coupon that wasn't good until Saturday morning. Kyle and I got it cut the night before but once we realized I couldn't use the coupon it was worth the second trip since foam is $48/yd and I needed just about 2 yards. While I was waiting for my dad to arrive I started tufting. This was the hardest and most tedious part of the project. I didn't take a pic but the night before Kyle, dad, and I had pre-measured where the tufts would go by doing MATH and figuring out how to organize 14 buttons fashionably on top of the ottoman. Kyle drilled holes so I could cut through the foam and tie off my tuft under the board. Once I laid the foam on top of the board I shoved a tufting needle through and pulled out some foam (since the blog I was following said to follow those directions for best look). I realized after I did this I didn't get enough batting for the top and made a third trip to Joann's. When I got back, I dove right into the tufting. Basically I drove a tufting needle from the bottom up, made a hole, and followed a threaded tufting needle down, it was nearly impossible to find the drilled hole (even though it was large) because the needle never went through the foam the same way twice. I cut up some little pieces of material from a throw-away shirt to tie to the bottom of my tufts and this is what it looked like once I was done.
The cats LOVE the new ottoman/coffee table.
...and so does the husband.
I thought I could beat her difficulty by NOT BUYING a piano hinge and two simple hinges... it didn't work and now I need to either return or just outright buy a piano hinge. Not a necessary addition but we will add it in the future.
ANYWAY... last Sunday I had an MRI ordered on my dome to look for a pituitary gland tumor. This may seem random but it's not - I have posted in the past about my struggles with weight gain/loss, fertility, my ocular problems, exhaustion, thyroid, etc... After having full labs run my doc determined that a bunch of my hormone levels were irregular, so he wanted to search for this because it was the only thing that made sense... anyway, I called my doctor on Wednesday since I was told by the Naval Hospital that my results would be ready in 72 hours. After speaking with the nurse I was told I would need to make an appointment to see my doc to discuss results and their earliest appointment was 27 September... I explained to her that I was going to be away during that time and I felt comfortable discussing results over the phone if my doc would also. The nurse put in for a "call back request" but said it could take an additional 72 hours to hear from my doc. She called later that afternoon and requested again to know when my MRI had been done... after I told her she said I'd hear from my doc soon. My doc called the following day and asked me "who ordered this MRI?", to which I reminded him, "you did!", he argued "No, I didn't... when would I have ordered this?" and I reminded him, "earlier this month", he responded, "Okay, I will look again and call you back this afternoon". He never called back. Finally on Friday I heard from my doc. He called and said, "you have a tumor on your pituitary gland", he felt that the tumor was not what caused my symptoms and the best thing to do at this point was to re-run blood work in 6 months and see if any of my levels change dramatically which would mean the tumor is growing. He added, "unless you plan on getting pregnant anytime soon, this is something you can live with". He must have forgotten I told him I thought my infertility was a symptom of some other underlying health issue - not hypothyroid (I reminded him).
I was in Joann's picking out fabric for my epic ottoman when I received this call so maybe I was a little distracted or jaded by the news, but it really didn't bother me until I spoke with my family and Kyle. I feel a little different knowing that I have a tumor in my body, let alone my brain. Every time I have a little headache I wonder now if it's the tumor. Every time I feel lightheaded or nauseous I think it must be my tumor. I don't want to feel this way or think this way, because God only knows how long this thing has been in my head. If I know my body, and I think I do, I'd say it's only been a few years... I felt different about a year after we got married, and I didn't think it was marriage related but that's how I was treated (the honey-moon phase is over, the first year is the hardest, blah blah blah). Realistically, Kyle has always been extremely easy-going with me, he deals with my mood swings and melt-downs as if it's second nature and never treats me differently. I love him for that!
My docs response to me reminding him about my fertility as a symptom was to give me a referral to the fertility specialists. This isn't what I wanted. I wanted him to tell me what he was going to do about the tumor in my brain. I wanted him to explain to me how this is going to affect the rest of my life and what the treatment options are if there even are any. I really didn't want to go home and read every article about pituitary gland tumors. What if I am the 10% who has a malignant tumor? He didn't even talk about testing for cancer. I am frustrated at this point and don't know what to think. I feel a little better knowing that what I felt and my suspicion that our infertility was not one-sided and my 'symptoms' (weight gain, thyroid disease, exhaustion, mood swings) are all explained because of this alien in my brain... but I want normal...
I am going to wrap this up... but I want to add that I think I hate my job. Not the Coast Guard, just this job on the 87'. I really vented last weekend about it and accepted that I really just F***ing hate it on this boat, and Monday seemed to be just a little bit better because I showed up giving less shits. I'm not that person though, so even though I feel better about not being stressed out about caring, I still have a complex about the fact that I'm not giving 100%... is 75% okay? Can I maintain 75% for the next 18 months (who's counting anyway?)... but that's why I really needed to build my deck and sink my feet into this house... I'm guessing since I'm not getting pregnant anytime soon, I'm going to go tour complete here - might as well have a deck to drink a beer on (I haven't had a landlord complain about my signature deck-building up to this point!! - we used screws this time so I can take the materials to my next rental - hahaha!).
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee44444444444h (that was Pippin typing a little)
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