Who Knew Life Could Be So EVERYTHING?

 I always thought I knew what my life would be like.

I was going to grow up, become a doctor and work with mitochondrial research.

I was never getting married... but if I did, I was never having kids.

And then I had kids--- six of them! 

And I got married--- 3 times!

And when my life was finally perfect, I was loved and I loved unconditionally...

My children were all growing into amazing, intelligent and really good people!

And then my husband got sick and then he died. 

And my kids were grown and on their own. 

And I was alone and afraid and all my dreams had died.

A dear friend made me drink a cup of her special coffee and it changed my life. No, seriously, it really did Happy coffee helped to combat the anxiety, sadness, despair I was feeling after my husband died, helped me to get my energy back, balanced my hormones so that I could function again... and I was losing weight! 

Without the Happy Co products I do not think I would have been able to survive. I would not have been able to begin to live again. 

I got a new job I loved. I met new people I had fun with but they didn't quite understand me. I joined widow groups so I could find people who understood me even when I didn't understand myself. 

I found my tribe of crazy widowed people online.

We went on trips together, we met for dinners and picnics and we were there to life each other up on the hard days and celebrate the good ones.

And through these, i began to feel like ME again.

I began to have dreams and make plans and set goals for myself.

I began to see the all the colors in my life come back to their full brilliance ...

They began to light my way and show me the path to living my life and feeling EVERYTHING!

And that is how COLOR ME EVERYTHING was born. I decided to create art using photos I have taken and unusual words or poems or phrases I have created and put them in an online store. These words and places in my photos have helped me to heal, to grow and to believe in myself again...

I have re-discovered how to LIVE LIFE FEELING EVERYTHING and i want to share that with the world! 

Who knew life could be so EVERYTHING?

And who knew EVERYTHING could be WONDERFUL!

How Did I Get Here?

How Did I Get Here?

I wrote this about 3 weeks after my Covid infection. 

I wrote it down over several days...

It was so hard to read and to write, most days I could barley think coherently...

Some days I could not read , write or think at all.

All I could do was lay down and cry in pain...

I found this journal entry that I have no memory of writing.

I have short term memory issues now and am finding notes I wrote to myself, Facebook lives I recorded, that I cannot even remember doing. 

This is hard to see and acknowledge ...

the lost minutes, hours and days...

and to realize that I continue to have all of these symptoms, even 6 months later.

This is the journal I wrote to myself in early January...

January 2021-

I spent 5 weeks in the basement. I went in the week before Thanksgiving, and came out on Christmas day. I was finally night-fever free and I had finally tested negative.

The symptoms came on every day for nearly 4 weeks. The headache, loud humming in my head and nausea started first. Then came the vomiting and diarrhea. Next, all over body pain, the most concentrated in my lower back and hips and down my thighs. It felt like the bones were being burned and crushed at the same time. The mental confusion and inability to think and read and write started and is ever present still. I would sleep for 20 hours a day for days at a time, then be awake 20 hours a day for days on end. The symptoms continued to add on with the night sweats starting about day 7. Somewhere along the way the left eye began to lose vision clarity and have a haze at the peripheral vision. I also was having severe chest pain and it felt like every heart beat my heart was being stabbed. My 02 levels would drop to 90 but my heart would race to 130s to keep the oxygen level up. My body was compensating. I could not walk across the room without severe dizziness and heart pounding, shortness of breath. Talking and walking was a chore. My breathing was labored at rest. My fingers, toes, and left side of my face are numb. And all the symptoms would come and go, no rhyme or reason, every day, throughout the day, with no end in sight.

I cannot manage from day to day with any real routine. Sometimes I am feeling good when I wake. The headache level is good at 5 but as the morning goes the dizziness or balance issue worsens. I cannot drive unless it is a no dizzy day. I get maybe 2 or 3 a week. I will go to the store for an hour or 3, just wandering around to get some exercise and take advantage of being out of the house. But when I get home, I crash in exhaustion and find that I just cannot function.

Driving takes a lot of concentration because of all of the stimuli. I can't handle too much noise, light, activity around me or I just can't focus. This makes doing things very hard at times. And is exhausting mentally and emotionally.

If I cannot work as a nurse, cannot drive with any regular schedule, cannot read and comprehend and think clearly on a regular schedule , then what will I do, how will I take care of me and make money?

I really want to start a podcast taking about the trials of widowhood, depression, COVID. And I want to start an online community for women who have experienced life altering events,  people like me, to be able to speak to each other in a safe place and find help and support and advice and wisdom from each other.

I am doing my facebook lives as The Crazy Covid Lady in the basement. I Started them Dec 19^th after 4 weeks in the basement.

I want to help people and my podcast, Beautifully Broken with Dawn- Learning to Let Your Colors Shine, is my way of trying to do that.

I have to stop writing because my head hurts so badly and my left eye vision is fading out. Like when a candle flickers then goes out, only it doesn't go out completely, it just stays faded. I know, weird.

It's all weird.

It's all too much sometimes.

But... I will be OK...

Eventually, because what other choice do I have?

One Small Step... That's All It Takes

 

One small step---

 I began journaling today after a few days of mental and physical exhaustion. 

The post covid syndrome sucks the life energy out of me with the least bit of exertion some days; 

my mental clarity and ability to think, speak coherently, focus and remember simple tasks comes and goes without rhyme nor reason. 

Original photoart by DawnRanae 2022

Today I decided to journal about that one small step.

The one that I took to come out of 5 weeks of isolation in the basement, the one that led me to It's Your Turn, the one that compelled me to join Made To Do This.... 

And the hundreds, thousands, millions of small steps I have taken along this life journey to get to this place I am now in.

 A place where my call to serve remains, but my ability to continue as a nurse is very likely not realistic. 

Because I contracted coronavirus from a patient. 

Because coronavirus infected my heart and brain. 

But I have persevered and overcome many hard times. 

I have been a teen Mom, a statistical anomaly graduating from high school in the top 5% of my class and graduating from nursing school at the same time,  a victim of domestic violence... 

And then, my wonderful husband, my lifelong best friend and the one who always lifted me up and gave me confidence to believe in myself...

Was diagnosed with cancer, and died. 

Leaving me with no money and a home I could no longer afford, 3 kids in college with tuition I could not pay. 

But the worst part was, my ability to dream had died too.

If I can overcome all of that...

I can overcome any deficits coronavirus has left me with...

I can achieve my goals... 

I can dream again... 

All it takes is that one small step. 

This blog is that One Small Step today.

Anti-Social Media...yeah

Twitter.
Tweets.
Hashtags.
Mentions.
Pins.
Pinning.

Does anyone know what I am talking about?
Does anyone understand how these things are supposed to work?

Yes, I have a Twitter account.
Yes, I tweet.

Sometimes.

Not because I have nothing to say but because I don't know how to do it correctly.

When do you use a hashtag? And why?
And a mini-url? I know what it is but where does it come from?

I am not Twittering with Sophistication or Savvy and am fully expecting to be cut from Twitter any day now...
Bratchild says they will do that if you don't have any followers...
how about if you don't have anything for your followers to read?

And that Pinterest?
Okay... I have requested to be invited to join...
because I keep getting links to really cool things ...
like photos of idea rooms, recipes, art work and so much more...
pinned to their boards...
from online friends and bloggers for me to check out, find inspiration in and just enjoy.

The problem?

Yeah, Pinterest says I will be getting an invitation to join soon...
Apparently there is a waiting list there...
and I doubt that I will make the cut.

It's like that really cool club you used to just walk right into...
when you were 22 and looked hot and sexy in a mini-skirt and ankle boots ...
it was the 80's people...stay with me here...

but if you tried to walk in now?
That hottie at the door would have you at the curb and into a cab on your way to anywhere else before you could blink an eye!

At least that's how it feels.

I could be wrong.
I could get that Pinterest invite any second now...
And I could go to a club and walk right in and dance all night...

What?
If I'm gonna dream I may as well Dream Big!

To Dream the American Dream... of Hearth and Home and a good credit rating

Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop
This week's prompt is to "Describe your dream home...house, location and grounds.

This is the letter I wrote to tell prospective buyers about our house when it was on the market last year. I was hoping someone would understand how much more than just a building it is, how much living within it's walls meant to us, that it has been our Dream Home for 15 years

Welcome to Our House ...



Fifteen years ago we built this house and have spent those years living and loving within it's walls.

We have celebrated the births of our 3 youngest children, graduations from preschool through to high school and college, engagements and weddings, and the arrival of our 1st grandchild here.

This house has offered sanctuary to family and friends in times of need and has played host for pool parties, baby showers and wedding showers for family and friends, and friends of friends.

The state park that backs to the property supports wild life from white tail deer, red fox and rabbits to red tail hawks, owls and bald eagles.

Often, we sat at the breakfast table and watched deer graze on the clover in the yard before starting our busy day; been delighted by the families of young bunnies and fledgling birds as they learned to run and fly outside our window.

We enjoyed the sweet scent of the honeysuckle and wisteria growing along the fence, the wild magnolia that blooms in our woods from mid-June to mid July giving way to the heady scent from the wild butterfly bushes that bloom through the month of August.

Our gardens and feeders are visited by hummingbirds and butterflies from as far away as the southern tip of South America and the northern most parts of Canada.

Our house is more than a house.
It is a HOME.

Love, laughter, and living have been the heart of our home and we hope it will be the heart of yours for many years to come.

Oh No Mr. Bill... Sluggo's at it again!

picture link:www.futurelawyer.typepad.com


Dreams.

There are many kinds of dreams.
The sleeping kind. The future goal kind. The Day kind.

Dreams are fantasies our subconcious engages in.

If our subconcious is nice, it waits until we are sound asleep to go wild. Preferrably, with some wonderfully restful, or enticing dream.

If it's not being cooperative, well Stephen King novels come to mind.
He swears he writes what he dreams. Now that guy has some one seriously F'ed up subconcious!

Anyway...

Everyone dreams, even babies. And here is my question to you.

What is the earliest dream you can remember, that is IF you even remember them.

HeMan Hubby swears he never remembers his dreams. Never has. Never will.

Me, on the other hand, have had dreams that continue from one sleep to the next, like a mini-series or something!

Picks right up where it left off like when I woke up was a commercial break long enough for me to change position and fall asleep again.

Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and write what I was dreaming, just to get it out of my head, so I can go back to sleep.

My earliest dream memory started before I can actually remember an age.

There is a white room. Just a blinding white with no furniture or windows.

There is a door that swings open into the room. Through that door rolls a large black ball.

It's not really black, so much as a ball of nothingness. Void of color or substance.

In rolls another, and another, and another... until there is only one small white corner of the room left.

Another big black void is pushing it's way into the door. The voids already in are pushing into the white space.

I KNOW that the white space is ME.

Just like I KNOW that if that final ball of nothingness gets into the room I will cease to exist.

I have no idea what this dream means.
I have no idea when it started, or why.
I only know that it has been with me as long as I can remember...

Which according to HeMan Hubby is about 10 minutes...
But that's because that's what I want to him think... I think... ?

Or...it's an old Mr.Bill episode... I wonder?