Crazy Thoughts and Giving Thanks

Okay this is going to be a long one so get ready........ so it's 3:00 a.m. and I'm WIDE awake! here's what happened. i started getting a bad headache at about 5:00. being a total dummy, i did not take anything for it. i kept forgetting. how do you forget when you have a constant reminder that you're in pain? i don't know but i kept getting side tracked. so finally after i got home from my moms house and it was pounding, i took my miracle migraine medicine called max-alt. it did absolutely nothing! this has never happened before. it always works. hours passed and i finally fell asleep at about 11:30. at 12:30, the pain actually woke me up. i know that every one always says that their head feels like it's going to explode, but i seriously felt like if anything even remotely touched my head, it would explode into a horrible mess. so after laying there for about a half hour, i decided to take some Excedrin. I'm not even sure if i was supposed to take it but i didn't want to take another max-alt because i think I'm only allowed to take one per day. i can't remember the neurologists orders on that. so after the Excedrin, i went and took a shower. this helps me when i have the luke warm water pound above the eye that is being affected. oh, i need to say that this headache was a doozy. i actually hurt all down the left side of my body. for some reason it went from my left eyeball around the top of my head, down my neck all the way down to my knee. my shin and foot did not hurt though. weird that it would stop there and hurt every where else. so while I'm in the shower getting pounded by the water, which by the way, is only a temporary minor relief since as soon as the water turns off it comes back in full force, i decided to pray. I asked for help in dealing the the migraine and for it to go away. during the prayer i kept getting promptings that i should wake up mister studly and ask for a blessing. i tried to talk myself out of it since i did not want to wake him up but the feeling to get a blessing would not go away. i went in and woke him up and he gave me a blessing. i laid in bed but then started feeling like I was going to throw up so i went in to the bathroom. i never did throw up but i sat perfectly still in the cold bathroom for over an hour. during this time, my headache slowly started to fade. i was afraid to move in case it came back, but eventually i got the courage up and i went and laid back down. my headache is completely gone! i feel so great. the problem.... i am totally wired now. probably from the caffeine from the Excedrin and the elation i have from being migraine free. anyways, i was laying there thinking about this past year. it has been so crazy for us. it just seems like we had a lot of trials and worries. we worried about ourselves and about other family and friends. it seems like a lot of people we know had a rough year as well. believe me, i know things could always get worse for us so I'm not complaining about our struggles this year (well...not a lot of complaining anyway). with as much stress we've had this year, we have had so many fun joyful happy moments as well. i would like to hare those with you. consider this my Christmas card to you since I'm not sending one out this year....
* we had a beautiful baby born this year. he is the most cutest boy in the world and always brings a smile to my face. i never would have thought that i would like being a mother but it is the best job ever. even when the kids are stinkers and you feel like you want to pull all your hair out, it's totally worth it. he's the funnest little baby. he loves to "talk" to us and it seems like every time i go up to him to pick him up or talk to him, he has a big smile to give me. i don't think I've ever seen a more smiley kid. he's healthy and sweet and super fun.
* moma is the silliest thing we have going right now. she's at that stage where she says the most random funniest things and has me laughing every day. during our trip home from Utah a couple days ago, we stopped for gas, i jumped out and ran to the restroom while mister studly filled up the car. when he was done, he started to drive the car around to come closer so when i came out i could just hop in. well moma says to him (exact words) "stop daddy. you're not going anywhere without my mama!" what a crack up. she is always saying funny things like this and is so dang smart it's scary.
* mister studly works hard so that i can stay home and i appreciate that. we don't make a whole lot of money, but i have realized recently that i would rather have the time that i have with him than him working all the time and more money in the bank. he is so funny and such a good dad. he helps me out with the kids so much when i ask him to and he never complains. i truly think he is perfect for me. i don't know of any other man that would be willing to put up with me yet he does and i am thankful for that. one of the things i love most about him is how when times are crazy and i start to freak out, he says something outrageous to make me laugh and then we can just joke about the situation and it seems like it's not such a big deal. he makes me so happy. sometimes i will have a dream where i am single or dating another man or whatever and i will wake up in a panic thinking "no no no!! I'm supposed to be married to mister studly. what did i do, where is he?" and then i will roll over and see him there and wipe the sweat from my brow and think "oh, there he is, it was just a dream. chill out girl". it's weird because i often wonder what i did to get so lucky to find some one like him. he just fits me so well. i think "what did i do to deserve this life and this awesome family?" he's just the best. i wish every one could feel the way i do about him about their spouse. i think the world would be a much happier place. i don't know if it's because I'm just lucky or if it's because we work hard at keeping our marriage together. maybe it's both. i don't know. i just know that he's the greatest gift I've ever received.
* i am so proud of my sister. she is graduating college next week! she's going to be a teacher. she is the first person from our family to graduate college. i wish i had set a better example for her in that way, but she did it all on her own and I'm so proud of her. she's going to be a great teacher. she's one of my best friends. it's so great when family can also be your best friend. i feel like that happens a lot to me.
* there are a lot of family members of mine that i feel i have gotten closer to this year and i also feel like i have made some new friends as well. a lot of it has to do with blogging. how awesome is it that we live in a world where we can communicate so quickly with people that live so far from us. cell phones are awesome too! my sister in law "c" and i have always been close but i feel like we have grown even closer this year. she has helped me a lot in dealing with some random stresses. she has been in my shoes and was able to give me her advice many times this year. my sister in law "m" and i have gotten closer this year as well. we talk more on the phone and i owe that to blogging and also to being coupon addicts. we call each other about once a week to discuss our savings and chit chat. it's been really nice to get to know her better. my cousin "k" is the best. i feel like i have really gotten much closer to her this year through blogging and play dates. i feel like she is one of my best buds. my BFF "v". i don't get to spend as much time as I'd like to with her since we live in different states and we're busy being moms and wives, but she is the best. i know i can always call her or email her and vent or share some funny story with her. she's the best. i think you come across certain people in your life and you just click with them. they get you like no one else gets you. this is what it was like for us when we first met through working together. she actually hated me at first but she warmed up to me once she realized that i was pretty awesome. ha! ha! she's the awesome one. she's silly and says random things that always make me laugh. she's a really good person with a good heart and is not afraid to be silly or stand up and do the right thing. i often call her when I'm having a moral issue where i need some help deciding what to do. she always gives me just the right amount of sympathy that i need and then gives me that awesome spiritual look at the situation and i always think "duh! why couldn't i come up with that?" she' just great and i wish i could be as good of a friend to her as she is to me. i think she gives 60% while i give 40% most of the time. i need to be a better listener to her. i want to be the one that gives the 60% this next year!
* one of the things that i am probably the most thankful for this year is my spiritual growth. I've never really been the person that thinks to pray first. ever since i joined the church, it has been a struggle for me to just put my faith in the Lord and try and do the right things. i always think I am the one that has to FIX everything that's wrong with our life. i have learned this year to just relax more and do the right things and that i will be blessed. some times it's not always in the way i want it to be, but i can tell you that i always look back on a situation and think "wow.. that really did work out for the best!" prayer is something that i still need to work on. it's just not something that comes naturally to me. it's like i forget to pray or i feel guilt if i am only praying when i need something. but the thing is, i always need something! whether it be "please let so and so's surgery turn out okay" or "please help me to sleep well tonight". there's always something to ask for but there's always things to be thankful for as well and sometimes i forget that. even though i have been a member of the church now for nearly ten years, i often feel like there is so much i don't know. important stuff that i think i should know but then i sit back and think, you know what.. it doesn't matter if my brain can't hold important information. it holds the most important information which is that i know the church is true. that's all i need to know. everything else just falls into place. i don't know what year the church was restored. i have heard it a hundred times, but it doesn't stick in my brain. it doesn't matter. all that matters is that i keep trying my best and when i slip that i get back up.
* i am thankful for my family that took a vacation to mammoth and drove and flew many miles to be there for thumper's blessing. we had a great time and i loved being able to watch my brother in law catch a really big fish. that was so much fun!
* there are just so many things that happened this year which i have to be thankful for.. here's a couple more without going into super detail..... my nephew "r"'s surgery went okay and it turned out to be nothing serious. there was a little scare that it could have been leukemia. i didn't run over mister studly on the freeway and he didn't get badly hurt. my dads house didn't burn down in the so cal fires even though the fire came within a hundred yards of his home. i am thankful that we got so many good years with our dog Jedi and that PD was able to go to such a loving home where he is spoiled to death. my mom is happy. i haven't seen her this happy and laughing so much in a long time. I'm glad that she got out of the situation she was in and has made a new life for herself which has allowed her to be a bigger part in our lives and a awesome grandma to my kids. she's a great free babysitter! there's just so much, i could go on and on.
sometimes i feel like i have been pretty negative this year in my blog posts and i did a lot of the "why me's?" but when i think about it and type this all down, i really do have a lot to be thankful for. i have a lot of really truly great people in my life. oh, one more thing. i have really gotten closer to my aunt "k" this year too. she has been great to my kids and helped watch moma for us all day when i was giving birth to thumper. she always laughs at me when I'm being silly and makes me feel like I'm a super funny lady even though I'm probably sounding like an idiot. I'm thankful for our phone conversations like the one yesterday where we talked for almost two hours!!! i felt like a teenager again talking on the phone for so long.
okay. that's it. i really don't think I'm going to be able to sleep at all tonight and I'm going to be hurting tomorrow.