Random 5: Healing bones, the weather and a look at the moon

Happy Friday, everyone! Once again, I’m linking up with Nancy of A Rural Journal for Random 5 Friday, where, as Nancy says, “you can share 5 random facts about you, your day, your pets, your kids, whatever!”

One

I go back to my orthopedic doctor today to see how my fractured foot is healing. I broke it in February, so it has been a long journey. In June, my doctor said he expected it to be 95 percent healed by today. I hope it’s 100 percent healed.

Part of the road in the park where we ride our bikes.

Two

One question for my doctor is whether or not I can ride my bike. I have missed it. Larry and I enjoy riding in the park by the river.

He is going to get his bike adjusted so that he’s not leaning over so much. Doing that causes his leg to go numb because of a narrowing of a canal in his lower back. He was going to give up riding, but he enjoys it so much, he decided to try the adjustment.

Three

Thursday would have been a great day to go bike riding. I had to leave the house early in the morning for an assignment for the paper. The temperatures were in the 50s. Unbelievable in August, but so nice. Practically sweater weather.

This summer has been cooler and wetter than any summer I remember for a while. Look at the following two photos.

The first was taken in our backyard on June 30, 2012. The grass was brown and dry. The leaves on the ground are signs of the derecho that had recently blown through.

The second photo was taken in the backyard on July 14, 2013. The grass is so much greener and softer.

June 30, 2012

July 14, 2013

Four

Do you ever sense that you need an attitude adjustment? I’ve been holding on to a lot of irritation and resentment lately, and it has such a negative effect on how I feel. I’m finding that there are some situations that I just can’t talk about with others or I’ll get upset. But my mind keeps mulling over things.

I’m managing to get some relief by focusing on the moment—when I think about doing it.

Anyway, how do you adjust your attitude as needed?

 

August 15, 2013

Five

Larry and I went out to eat Thursday evening at about 7:30. I looked up and saw the moon already appearing in the sky, though the sun hadn’t set yet.

Now that’s something lovely to ponder instead of negative things, wouldn’t you agree?

Reading OCD revisited

The most-read post I’ve written for this blog is one called “Read, reread, again and again: Reading OCD.”

When I check the list of search terms used to find my blog, I often find listed something to do with reading.

I never knew until I wrote that post that so many people with OCD suffer from the compulsion of rereading the words on a page until if feels “right” to move on to the next page.

I used to believe that I was the only person in the world who had that problem.

Reading OCD is one of those OCD symptoms that come and go with me. Sometimes I read unimpeded by any sense that I haven’t read each word “perfectly.”

Other times, it’s a struggle to read, so I just avoid it.

On Goodreads, I set as a goal to read 26 books this year. I set a low goal on purpose, so if my reading OCD kicked in, I wouldn’t totally blow a high goal.

So far, I’ve read 12 books. According to Goodreads, I’m three books behind schedule.

That disappoints me, to be behind schedule. I’ve still got enough “good student” in me to want to measure up, even to an arbitrary goal I set on an online social media site.

More than reaching that goal, though, is the desire to free myself from the reading OCD.

What works best for me is to plow through the pages. I don’t allow myself to go back and reread.

Something I do that helps me to be able to do that is to tell myself that I can go back and reread later if I need to or want to. I delay doing the compulsion of rereading.

After a while of doing this, the anxiety lessens and I start enjoying myself. And I don’t reread.

Reading is one of the chief pleasures of my life. I’m not going to allow anything to keep me from enjoying it.

For your reading pleasure, here’s a list of books that I’ve read this year so far. All of them have been good reads, and I encourage you to check out any that interest you:

Flash and Bones. By Kathy Reichs.

Killing Floor. By Lee Child.

Lessons from the Monk I Married. By Katherine Jenkins.

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business. By Charles Duhigg.

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. By Susan Cain.

Bones Are Forever. By Kathy Reichs.

Ransom River. By Meg Gardiner.

Reaching: A Memoir. By Grace Peterson.

Proof of Heaven. By Eban Alexander.

Tripwire. By Lee Child.

Poison Flower. By Thomas Perry.

The Kill Artist. By Daniel Silva.

  Reading is my favorite leisure-time, solitary activity. What’s yours?

Nature doesn’t procrastinate

Procrastination may be a habit common to humans, but I don’t see it in the rest of nature.

Honeysuckle doesn’t wait for everything around it to be perfect before it blooms. It blooms when it’s time to bloom.

Birds move with purpose, even when it’s just around a branch to get to a better position.

The moon rises when it must.

I want to be more like the rest of nature. I need to study its ways and practice blooming, moving, rising when it’s time, even when I don’t feel ready, even when everything around me doesn’t seem perfect.

I have several projects that I’ve been thinking about for a long time, but I’ve taken little action on them.

Anxiety can be an immobilizer, but there are ways to handle anxiety and override its ways. It’s time to get serious about it.

Animals and plants don’t procrastinate. Why must I?

How do you fight procrastination?

Random 5: Building things and meditation

Thank you so much for all of your kind comments on my last post. Your support and kindness mean the world to me!

I’m joining with Nancy of A Rural Journal in her Random 5 Friday, where, as Nancy says, “you can share 5 random facts about you, your day, your pets, your kids, whatever!”

See the haze in the photo? It was so humid, my lens was fogging up.

One

Larry is making great headway on our raised bed garden frame.

I love how he goes about his work. He did a lot of research beforehand and made a few drawings. Then he figures out things as he goes along. He’s very exacting, precise and thorough.

This is the dirt that forms the bed of our yard. You can see the red clay mixed in.

We’re going to get a load of topsoil to put into the frame for the planting. Fencing will go around the tall posts.

I don’t know if we’ll have time for any winter crops. But planning for next spring is fun, too.

Two

I just finished a spy thriller called The Kill Artist, by Daniel Silva. It was well-written and absorbing. I feel the need for a switch to something a bit more peaceful, though, so I think I’ll be reading a nonfiction gardening book I’ve mentioned before, The Backyard Parables: Lessons on Gardening, and Life, by Margaret Roach. I’m also currently reading The Lotus Still Blooms: Sacred Buddhist Teachings for the Western Mind, by Joan Gattuso.

What are you reading?

Three

Speaking of peace, I am feeling the need to get back to the practice of meditation, specifically, mindfulness meditation, which at one time I was becoming pretty regular at. I let the habit slip away.

I have been allowing negative and angry thoughts to creep in and take over, and I can feel the resulting anxiety and discontent. I need some time to slow down my thoughts and focus on the present.

Do you meditate?

Four

I asked Larry about a year ago to build a meditation chair for me. He looked at some samples I showed him and said he couldn’t do it with the tools and machinery he had.

I think he has proven that he can find a way to build what he needs to. So I’ve asked him again about that meditation seat. Maybe when he’s through with the gardening frame?

Five

When I was at the dairy farm last week on assignment with the paper, I captured one of my favorite shots I’ve ever gotten on the job. I can’t put the photo on my blog, but if you’d like to see a photo that includes a Holstein calf, you can find it HERE.

Thank you for visiting, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Despair and an angel named Sharon

I cried at the bad news. I cried when there was no news. And finally, I cried at the good news.

I’ve cried a lot in the last two weeks.

Sometimes I couldn’t stop crying. The tears just poured out. And one day, the particularly bad day, I knew the tears were part of a larger problem.

I learned once again that physically, I have to be on antidepressants and on the right dose of antidepressants. My depression is a medical problem, an illness.

I wasn’t sure if I should share this story. I don’t want to appear weak. It’s not easy for me to admit how dark life can seem sometimes.

But this is a blog about my journey through life with mental illness. That journey sometimes turns dark. Without warning.

Part of what I’m here to say is that if you feel that darkness, you are not alone. You are not alone. And it can get better.

Over two weeks ago, on July 20, I dropped off the prescription for my antidepressant at the pharmacy. I had run out of refills, but my doctor had given me another prescription at my last visit.

The pharmacist tried to fill it but told me that my insurance company wouldn’t authorize payment for the prescription because of the dosage.

This was nothing new. Periodically my insurance company does this. I take a higher dose than the usual, so every so often, my doctor’s office has to talk with the insurance company and get approval. The only problem is I never know when this is going to happen.

The pharmacist said she would fax the doctor’s office the request for authorization. They wouldn’t get it until their office opened on Monday.

I was OK. The pharmacist gave me a few of the pills to last a few days so I wouldn’t go without while waiting.

By Wednesday, I hadn’t heard anything, so I called the doctor’s office. I was told they were waiting on the authorization.

I won’t bore you with all the details of what followed. In summary, the doctor’s office kept telling me the authorization hadn’t come through. The pharmacist gave me all the pills she could without filling the prescription. The price for the prescription without insurance was exorbitant.

I started taking half my dose to save pills.

I did all I could to hold on, to keep fulfilling my responsibilities, to interact with others as normally as possible.

I found out fairly quickly that half the dose of the medication was not doing the job. My anxiety was sky high. I’d become aware that I was clenching my hands in tight fists. I had a hard time focusing. I had trouble sleeping.

I was simultaneously so depressed that all I could think of was how hopeless my life was. I was sure my life was never going to get back on the right track. I didn’t want to live.

Last Friday morning, I had a panic attack.

I sat on the bed and sobbed. My chest and both arms hurt. The pain made me breathless. I remember thinking that perhaps I was having a heart attack. And I didn’t care.

By Monday afternoon, I decided to do something besides wait for others to fix my problem.

I decided to call the insurance company myself.

I talked with a woman named Sharon.

“We can fix this,” she said after hearing my story and looking at my record.

She called the pharmacy while I was on the phone, then came back on the line and told me again that she would fix it so I could get my prescription. She would call me back, hopefully that day.

“If you can take care of this, you will be my angel,” I said.

“Well, I’m going to be because I’m going to call you back today,” she said.

And she did. She fixed it. I picked up the prescription Monday night.

I learned a lot about self-advocacy during this episode. There’s a lot I want to say about that. But I’ll save that for another post.

For today, I’m just thankful for medication that keeps the scary depression and anxiety at bay. And I’m thankful for angels named Sharon.

Have you received help from any angels lately?

Saturday at the festival

Larry and I immersed ourselves in the heritage of our county on Saturday.

As many of you know, I’m not one for crowds, and I’m not one to jump when I hear the words “Let’s go.”

But I knew I needed to get out of the house Saturday, so I suggested that we head over to Naruna, an area in another part of our county, and attend the annual Heritage Festival.

The festival documents the history of Campbell County and provides fun activities for children, plenty of music and lots of displays.

I’ll let the photos do most of the talking today.

There were lots of old tools and gadgets on display. This is an 1885 egg beater. You turn the lever, which I inadvertently cut out of the photo, and the beaters turn.

A 1903 milk fat tester.

This was identified as a hair pressing comb. I was never very adept with a curling iron. I don't think I would have done any better with this.

 

I liked the wooden pitchfork on the left.

Old farm equipment was scattered around the grounds.

Tobacco was a main cash crop for Campbell County for many years. My father raised it. I have mixed feelings about this part of my heritage.

Wagon rides behind horses were available.

A display of cornhusk dolls. 

Dancers from the Monacan Native American tribe in nearby Amherst County performed.

One of many quilts on display.

As we were leaving, we stopped to watch a family who started flat-footing to bluegrass music playing in the background. I like the combination of dress shoes, pink boots and bare feet. 

Have you attended any fun festivals this summer?

Visiting the farm

I’ve gone country for this week’s Random 5.

I’m joining in with Nancy of A Rural Journal for Random 5 Friday, where, as Nancy says, “you can share 5 random facts about you, your day, your pets, your kids, whatever!”

Thanks to Nancy for hosting this fun meme!

Note on the photos: I took them in the 1980s with my 35 mm camera. They have faded with time and poor storage, though.

 One

I was a back in Evington on Wednesday. One of Virginia’s gubernatorial candidates for this November’s election was in the county and visited a dairy farm where another politician gave his endorsement.

My editor wrote the story, while I took the photos for the newspaper.

The dairy farmer gave the politicians a tour of his place. It included a walk through a cow lot and a visit to see calves.

I grew up on a farm, and my uncle had a dairy farm nearby. On Wednesday, I smelled things and saw things I haven’t seen in many years. I also picked my way through manure like I haven’t done for a while.

Two

My family lived in a white house with a red tin roof on the farm until I was 10 years old. The farm had been my father’s grandfather’s, then had gone out of the family. My father rented it, and then when he and my mother were first married, they bought it on a five-year note.

It was called Terrace View Farm.

The white farmhouse, my first home,  in a photo taken from the yard of the second house. On the right, you can see the roof of the old red mill across from the white house.

Three

When I was about 5 years old, my father started working for the post office as a rural letter carrier. He kept farming, but eventually, my parents decided to sell part of the farm, along with the house, to make it easier on him.

They built a new house, a brick ranch, in sight of the white farmhouse, and we moved there in 1973, when I was 10.

My parents sold the rest of the farm and the brick house in 1989.

The lower pasture below the brick house. This was a good place to go sledding when we got a good snow.

 Four

Once we moved, my father limited his farming to raising beef cows, Black Angus. But when he was farming full time, he also had milk cows, pigs and chickens, and he raised tobacco as a main crop. My mother made butter and sold it and eggs.

Farming can be a 24 hour/7 day a week endeavor. It’s hard work. I was reminded of that as I toured the dairy farm Wednesday and heard about all the tasks that needed to be done to get the milking done and take care of the animals.

The stable at the second house. The wood was for the woodstove that my parents had in the house.

 Five

My father built the stable and tractor shed at the second home. I put my footprint in the footing of the stable. I wonder if it’s still there?

Old barns and sheds have a smell that takes me right back to childhood. It’s a mix of musty and dusty scents with some oil from the tractor thrown in. I smelled some of those scents on Wednesday.