I just received a notice in my email box that I had a new comment on one of my posts and realized I have completely been neglecting my blog. Time has gotten away from me lately; work has been hectic, we've nearly finished shooting Paranormals, and I have managed to injure my back to add complication to everything else.
My schedule started to get hectic when one of the stores I work at was flooded in Capitola Village. Not only did that turn schedules upside down, it presented the dilemma of how do we sell things there while construction occurs to replace all of the damaged flooring and walls. Well the mayor of Capitola had a tent set up and that has been the solution for the time being. While carrying one of the many boxes of jewelry from my car to the tent, as we do every morning to make sure our jewelry is safe overnight, I managed to bend over too far while trying to lift and voila, pulled a muscle in my back. I missed a week of work and school laying in bed, as the doctor told me laying down and icing my muscle would help me recover faster. It was an absolutely torturous time to do absolutely nothing, I used to think how glorious it would be, but no...it's insanely boring and made me kind of crazy to be honest. I thought of all the things I needed to do and literally couldn't move to do. Driving is apparently the worst posture for your back when injured and the break from sitting in the car actually did make a difference I think because I am starting to feel improvement. However, since returning to school and work, my muscles continue to seize up every now and then as I'm walking around and I end up frozen in my tracks till it passes.
In other news: I am nearly a college graduate! Holy C*&^, I'm actually almost done. When I think about being done, its panicking, where do I go from here and will I be able to accomplish what I want to accomplish. We'll see what the end of the school year brings. Is anyone else busy and crazy right now? Any good tips for relieving my lower back pain?
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Stiff
No, this is not about the book Stiff, although I am enjoying it quite a bit. This is about my back. Chronic back problems run in my family and I just had my first lasting run in with our health issues. While lifting and moving a box at work, I pinched a nerve in my lower back. It was agonizing and I could barely sit up in my car to drive home. Yesterday was filled with ice packs, Tiger Balm (no, not the energy drink...its like Icy Hot), and laying down with my feet in the air. After an extremely painful night of trying to find a comfortable way to sleep, I am feeling much better and can lay in most positions comfortably. I guess sleep fixes anything, even if it's extremely fitful sleep.
There were some good things about yesterday though. I went to Oakes College Senate and they awarded Film Production Coalition 100 dollars for our ongoing project Paranormals. It was not an easy meeting to sit through, but it was well worth the discomfort to know that we will be able to host our film premiere at the media theater on May 28th.
The other good thing about yesterday was helping Anthony with his film assignment. In film directing, they were asked to film someone for 3 minutes without the camera moving and without the actor talking. After the senate meeting this was easy for me. I was in a semi-raw emotional state because of my back pain and I was also feeling reflective after the senate meeting because everyone there seemed really nice and there are times when I'm mad that I felt so alienated from my college freshman year. My teacher for the required Oakes intro writing course continuously made a point to focus on the only two "white" students in the class and try to highlight the ways in which our life growing up was different from other students in the class. I found this hurtful and inappropriate, especially considering he was making many assumptions about every student, purely based on the way they looked, about the way they grew up. I felt very withdrawn and embarrassed to be picked on in this way. He continuously insinuated that I was "part of the problem" and never listened when I tried to tell him about how and where I grew up. This drove me away from involvement with my college, even though I picked Oakes because of its diversity and focus on equality and human rights.
So when Anthony turned the camera on, I just cried. There was too much going on for me to contemplate inside my head everything that I was thinking. Questions about every step ring in my head and usually I just ignore them because I am really happy with my life, but yesterday was just not a good day overall and I was extremely frustrated with my inability to move. I think the shot actually came out really nice because just when I start to really cry, my dog came to my rescue and licked my face. Its an up and down static shot and I wonder what people will see in me when they see it.
I often find myself asking if I made the right choices, picked the right path; even though I love everything I am doing right now, I always see a million different directions I could have gone in. I guess that's the consequence of taking, "you can do anything you want to" to heart. Never wanting to limit myself has time and again led to me spreading my time thin, but I always come through things thankful that I did more than I thought I could. What it all comes down to though is being proud of the path you did choose instead of dwelling on the ones you could have taken. Who knows maybe some of those paths will swing back around again. At least that's how I see it. How do you tackle college and career choices, and please, if you have any tips for my nerve problem, message me!
There were some good things about yesterday though. I went to Oakes College Senate and they awarded Film Production Coalition 100 dollars for our ongoing project Paranormals. It was not an easy meeting to sit through, but it was well worth the discomfort to know that we will be able to host our film premiere at the media theater on May 28th.
The other good thing about yesterday was helping Anthony with his film assignment. In film directing, they were asked to film someone for 3 minutes without the camera moving and without the actor talking. After the senate meeting this was easy for me. I was in a semi-raw emotional state because of my back pain and I was also feeling reflective after the senate meeting because everyone there seemed really nice and there are times when I'm mad that I felt so alienated from my college freshman year. My teacher for the required Oakes intro writing course continuously made a point to focus on the only two "white" students in the class and try to highlight the ways in which our life growing up was different from other students in the class. I found this hurtful and inappropriate, especially considering he was making many assumptions about every student, purely based on the way they looked, about the way they grew up. I felt very withdrawn and embarrassed to be picked on in this way. He continuously insinuated that I was "part of the problem" and never listened when I tried to tell him about how and where I grew up. This drove me away from involvement with my college, even though I picked Oakes because of its diversity and focus on equality and human rights.
So when Anthony turned the camera on, I just cried. There was too much going on for me to contemplate inside my head everything that I was thinking. Questions about every step ring in my head and usually I just ignore them because I am really happy with my life, but yesterday was just not a good day overall and I was extremely frustrated with my inability to move. I think the shot actually came out really nice because just when I start to really cry, my dog came to my rescue and licked my face. Its an up and down static shot and I wonder what people will see in me when they see it.
I often find myself asking if I made the right choices, picked the right path; even though I love everything I am doing right now, I always see a million different directions I could have gone in. I guess that's the consequence of taking, "you can do anything you want to" to heart. Never wanting to limit myself has time and again led to me spreading my time thin, but I always come through things thankful that I did more than I thought I could. What it all comes down to though is being proud of the path you did choose instead of dwelling on the ones you could have taken. Who knows maybe some of those paths will swing back around again. At least that's how I see it. How do you tackle college and career choices, and please, if you have any tips for my nerve problem, message me!
Friday, April 1, 2011
29) The story behind one of my scars
The most obvious choice for this one is the giant scar on my neck, but I feel like a bit of a broken record with the number of times I explain that I have had cancer. So I'll try to keep this short.
In my Junior year of college, fall quarter, I discovered that I had a lump in my neck that I could move around and not really feel. At my annual exam I pointed this out to the doctor and she referred me to a specialist. The specialist asked me if I smoked etc (risk factors for cancer) and, when I said no, he informed me it was probably a cyst and that it was probably not cancer. When my results came back...he was proven wrong in his assumptions. I was diagnosed with metastasized papillary thyroid cancer.
The treatment was a surgery and radioactive Iodide treatment. So as far as cancer goes, I got away easy. Here's a picture of me directly after surgery. Note my suction cup drains to keep fluid from building up in my neck.
...I had been discussing what lymph nodes look like with my surgeon at all of my appointments. Directly after my surgery apparently showed me the lymph nodes they had removed. I was still drugged up pretty badly sooo I don't really remember that, but all told they removed 25 lymph nodes, 15 of which were cancerous.
Any who, I believe that the term cancer needs to be evaluated. People hear it and instantly life seems to be over, but in many cases, like mine, there is an extremely high recovery rate. Also people get tense when they ask me what my scar is from and I respond cancer. They seem to think they have stumbled upon a touchy subject even though I am very open and comfortable discussing my experience. Cancer has come to denote death and despair, which can make treatment more difficult for those facing it.
If you have any questions about me or my experiences in treatment for cancer, please comment or message me. I really believe being open and honest is the key to surviving treatments, but that's just how I see things.
In my Junior year of college, fall quarter, I discovered that I had a lump in my neck that I could move around and not really feel. At my annual exam I pointed this out to the doctor and she referred me to a specialist. The specialist asked me if I smoked etc (risk factors for cancer) and, when I said no, he informed me it was probably a cyst and that it was probably not cancer. When my results came back...he was proven wrong in his assumptions. I was diagnosed with metastasized papillary thyroid cancer.
The treatment was a surgery and radioactive Iodide treatment. So as far as cancer goes, I got away easy. Here's a picture of me directly after surgery. Note my suction cup drains to keep fluid from building up in my neck.
...I had been discussing what lymph nodes look like with my surgeon at all of my appointments. Directly after my surgery apparently showed me the lymph nodes they had removed. I was still drugged up pretty badly sooo I don't really remember that, but all told they removed 25 lymph nodes, 15 of which were cancerous.
Any who, I believe that the term cancer needs to be evaluated. People hear it and instantly life seems to be over, but in many cases, like mine, there is an extremely high recovery rate. Also people get tense when they ask me what my scar is from and I respond cancer. They seem to think they have stumbled upon a touchy subject even though I am very open and comfortable discussing my experience. Cancer has come to denote death and despair, which can make treatment more difficult for those facing it.
If you have any questions about me or my experiences in treatment for cancer, please comment or message me. I really believe being open and honest is the key to surviving treatments, but that's just how I see things.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)