12/13/24

or maybe it’s the combination of both no more pollen AND no more dust mites? my skin doing so good now. i’m so happy about it, but also want to somehow prepare myself now so that it never comes back, so i never have to deal with it again.

One perk of being pretty poor, though: I can see what’s important to my husband. Like we have very limited resources, so what he chooses to spend his money on, I can take note of, that it means something to him, for whatever reason. and I could note it with myself as well.

12/18/24

just realized something…the look that feels a bit oppressive that my mom gives me whenever she comes over or i visit, that i assume she’s criticizing me in her mind… it just might be because i’m her baby, and she’s just looking and staring and searching to make sure i’m okay and nothing’s wrong. because that’s what I do with Hunter, whenever he first arrives home. I search him fervently with my mother eyes. like maybe things i thought- are not what i thought.

12/19/24

the other day i was in such a rush, i started the juicer without any cup underneath to catch the juice, and some celery juice got wasted spilled onto the stovetop. 

I feel like a happy bird in my husband’s hand; he doesn’t squeeze me too tight. I know that if I wanted to go, he would let me go. That’s why I love him so much.

12/20/24

i’m just so glad I made it to this day. Feet are now kind of the picture of what I was trying to visualize into reality before I went to sleep night after night. And maybe it was nothing I even did in terms of restricting diet, and supplements and trying out different medicines. Maybe all it was, was just getting through each day sane, day after day. Just surviving until this day finally arrived.

this afternoon while we were lying in bed, Hunter happened to put one foot on top of the other so that when put my hand on the sole of his foot, i could fit both of them in one hand, and i almost cried when it happened cause i haven’t been able to fit both his feet in one hand for so long- since he was a baby and still breastfeeding- i used to do it all the time.

today folded a whole load of laundry while next to Hunter. it was a milestone because every time before, he’d jump into it and mess it up so that i had to stop the chore. he was watching videos on ipad, but still, it was nice and a rare peaceful moment.

12/21/24

yesterday, Hunter had two great ideas, and I told him so when he said them. One was when I was sewing some fresh cranberries together to make a little garland to hang, I chose black thread for some reason, and he came up to see what I was doing and said why don’t you use red? he picked up the spool of red thread. And I looked and saw that it would look so much better with red, so I did that. And then later that night he got out of bed, saying he wanted to eat still (so late, around midnight), and I made him a snack that included sprouts, and he pointed to them and asked “are you going to juice those?” i guess because he knows I juice celery. But I actually never thought of juicing sprouts, and I still had the whole tray in the fridge that I wasn’t using fast enough and that was about to start going bad, and I said hmm- that’s a really good idea. Three years old and thinking of helpful stuff I would never have thought of.

when Hunter wakes up in the mornings is like an event I don’t want to miss. if I wake up before he does, I rush and hurry to get into his bed, because he’s just so affectionate and extra absurd when he first wakes up. he moves his body so funny and talks nonstop, saying unintelligible things and then laughing so hard like someone’s tickling him (but no one’s tickling him). it’s almost like a main event for me, and I know the approximate starting time, and usually my body will wake me up right before then. and whenever I miss it and wake up after him, I do feel like I missed out on something.

12/9/24

feels strange to be without pain now. I had it every day for so long…it was like it became a part of me. i’m so glad it’s gone. I wish I knew exactly what to do so that it would never come back, but… i’m still just guessing. it was seven months of just brokenness. i’m so happy that my body knows how to go back to normal- that it didn’t forget. i’m still wearing the pads in my socks out of habit (and the skin’s still tender, not normal-strong yet)- the first physical thing I did when getting out of bed every morning for the last few months was stick the pads inside my socks, and put socks on. But it’s been a few days in a row now that there’s nothing to soak up anymore when I take them off at the end of the day. Maybe next week, I can stop wearing them. like a normal person.

12/10/24

I can step on cardboard boxes now to smash them flat when recycling, instead of bending over like an old lady with the box cutter.

12/12/24

The only other theory I have other than tree pollen: is that with the drier weather, the dust mites I’m severely allergic to died off, and maybe now they are at zero? either way, I really feel it’s the absence of something that is healing me, rather than the addition of something. because I hadn’t added anything new before it started to slowly heal. I feel (hope?) that the celery juice is helping me, and may help me long-term, but things had already started reversing when I added it to my routine, so I know it wasn’t the main factor.

tonight, almost savoring clipping baby’s nails. This is in stark contrast to when I just started clipping them and would get anxiety about getting it done as fast as possible before he woke up. But it’s one of the only times, I realized, that I can admire him without him going nonstop- talking or moving or wiggling or jumping- or just staring back & judging me for admiring him. His face is becoming less babyish and more boyish/manly. The heels and skin on his feet a little rougher. 

He doesn’t do this as much anymore, but up until just a few weeks ago, whenever I carried him, he would stick his little hands in whatever warm pockets he could find, so like, into my armpits, around my neck, in my shirt, behind my ears, in my elbow creases. so funny. And for what seems like a whole year now, when you carry him or are just very close to him, he will lightly pinch and press your earlobes between his fingers while just hanging around you. he still does this all the time; he even does it to us as he’s falling asleep in bed.

12/13/24

I realize I am smack dab in the middle of my fertile period as I write this, but I think my sex drive is improving somewhat. I wrote before that I never felt like having it really anymore, but now I feel like, if it’s changed at all, it’s that I want it more than I did before. i’m sure what’s majorly contributing is that my skin is getting better so i’m sleeping a bit more, so I’m feeling stronger and more together.

Also, incidentally, this morning had a dream that I was going on a (scheduled and agreed-upon by all parties?!) date with someone we’re close to, which in reality would be disastrous, but in the dream, felt wonderful and natural. when I woke up, I felt romantic and dreamy thinking about it, instead of guilty, for some reason. He was supposed to come pick me up at 4:30, but he arrived early at 4, and I wasn’t ready, but then we went out to dinner or something or to do an arts&craft thing, and it was really nice, sitting across from him at a table, one on one. I think the big idea behind the dream is not so much the actual person, but what he represents to me. He’s always been so gentlemanly and thoughtful and gallant I guess is the word, towards me, and we’ve never had a sexual or even a close relationship, and I guess I maybe miss that chase? The uncovering of a new person when you start to date them, who you don’t know intimately yet. I guess I miss the romance of all that- of not knowing, of mystery. I won’t do it – I would never hurt my husband. but I dream of things like romance and fate and destiny and fairies and sparkle and candlelight dinners. I think also it balances out the mundane of childcare, is why these dreams come to me. right now, when we’re home, we’re basically working in shifts; Hunter takes the attention of whoever’s with him while the other one of us gets work and chores done, then we switch, and the other plays with and watches him while the other goes and tries to keep the house in order and get the most urgent personal things done. There’s not really any gap where we’re alone together unless my parents have him or he’s napping for some reason. Maybe once Hunter gets older, and we have more time, maybe R and I could do something to bring back romance. Though I can’t for the life of me right now, in the trenches of it, imagine what it would be… I invite it please, with all my heart.

12/2/24

I woke up yesterday morning and went to see R and H who had just woken up too in bed and one of the first things that happened was Baby punched me in the eye. I think he was getting frustrated at something before I got there. But it really kind of hurt so I just went away to brush my teeth. I don’t know if there’s a better way to do it, like tell him not to punch people, or something else, but we’ve told him before, so I guess he knows?

12/3/24

my skin has been getting better and last night it was like the best it’s ever been; I soothed my feet for like 10 minutes and then I could go to bed. I really think everything kind of coincides with the pollen: when it started getting colder up till now, is when it started getting better. I just checked my allergy app today and it says that pollen season is over for now and there’s zero pollen. And that completely coincides with what’s happening with my feet. The only thing is, treatment for tree pollen allergies is not so clear. They just say to take Zyrtec and stuff like that, which I don’t want to take because the ingredients can mess with your immune system and other stuff and it doesn’t address the root of the problem of why I’m allergic to it. at my most desperate, I actually did try Zyrtec/Allegra/Claritin, but it did not help. Then also, Google suggests I could get allergy shots, which seems over the top, and again not really addressing the root of the problem. I tried, when my feet were bad this year, various different allergy medicines: natural pills, the Allergimittel tablets, extracts, homeopathy, everything, but none of it seemed to help. So what do I do now? What do I do for next year? Will it come back? Google also suggests to shield myself from pollen, like not walk near the trees, or if I do walk near trees (we live right next to a forest) to wear eye protection and nose protection…but what’s the use of going outside if I have to basically drape a blanket over myself and not enjoy anything? looking into cromolyn sodium now as a result of my googling, which doesn’t sound too bad a thing to take, that might help.

i’m also annoyed because if this is all true, then at the time of year when I would most like to open my windows- spring and summer – I can’t. And then the time of year with no pollen, when I could open my windows and let in the best air for me, it’s freezing outside.

I feel like out of all the things I’ve done in my life, that breast-feeding was the loneliest thing. You have a baby right there- a person- but they can’t talk or really communicate past anything other than tears or smiles, and a husband, maybe, and family all around you, but no one can do it for you. People might cook and help around the house, if you’re lucky. But no one else except you will be getting up every 2-3 hours, no one else but you will be aching and twisting and writhing tired in the bed, finding different positions to stay still in for hours while feeding the baby, over and over again, every day, all night, until it’s finally over. 

i’m glad I did it – I would do it again solely because of how much I love this baby. But it was the loneliest and hardest thing. I remember feeling relieved when I got so sick I had to be hospitalized. not right away – I was worried at first. But when it seemed like things were getting better after they gave me the antivirals and antibiotics, I realized in my someone-else’s-urine-smelling hospital bed that I wouldn’t be bothered for a whole night- that I could rest for hours straight and not worry that baby needed me- and inside I just sighed with relief.

there must be a connection? 

(these are my feet almost healed. i’m only including “after” pictures of my feet. No “before” ones, though I have them just for reference, because I don’t want anyone to barf.)

12/4/24

I think if in the spring, my feet/skin get bad again, I will consider making a big location move. I was reading that living right next to trees, as we do, can expose you to 10 times more pollen than living down the street from them. so maybe I need a whole change of scenery, like different trees, and also not right next to them. looking up walkable cities that have good children’s libraries and a decent school system.

12/5/24

working through it

have to go back to the beginning, build it back up block by block, now that we’ve been decimated.

a little every day.

“calculated exchange creates boundaries, and non-calculated exchange creates bonds.”

take it down. take it waaaaay down a notch. be appreciative of everything. Go back to the beginning. Assume nothing and no one is attacking.

One thing I love about cats: how when they’re falling, mid-air, they self correct.

***

during the day, when I flex my feet and curl my toes, it doesn’t feel like things are cracking and breaking in there anymore. everything is starting to come together in one piece again. it’s so nice to have this burden lifted. 

12/8/24

my plan to prevent becoming sick next season is to become so healthy before then that I don’t react to pollen or anything anymore. Is that even possible? 

11/22/24

maybe we don’t go back to the lovers we were. Maybe we go through it- the storm- and meet again for the first time on the other side.

11/23/24

started reading some Medical Medium books- something that struck me- is making me reconsider- he continually repeats that your body- liver, specifically- will never betray you, is always working to protect you. i know i’ve felt and said, when sick recently, i felt betrayed by my body- and i did feel that way. but also, in the book, whenever he keeps insisting that that’s not the case, I feel that it’s true- that it wouldn’t- that maybe I just need to understand better.

when you have a child, starting from pregnancy- at least for me- everything you do, you do before you’re ready. Because nothing can prepare you. raising a child, everything is in real time, learning in the moment. You can try to prepare, but that is mostly like, food. The other stuff- like his actions and emotions and all that- are unpredictable. that’s what’s so scary and I guess exhausting about it. But also wonderful.

realized i never wear my seatbelt in the car anymore when in the backseat on family outings. Hunter always wants my attention so i have to lean forward unrestrained, or else if he falls asleep, i have to keep watch sitting kind of backwards, to hold his head back whenever R stops and turns hard (happens frequently, multiple times a trip). or i’m leaning forward holding his cup of water for him to drink, or leaning forward holding something in front of his face to block the direct sun on it. besides this, sitting behind R and not ever having enough alone time with him these days, it’s in the car when i can reach up and massage his shoulders, have conversations by holding my head close to one of his ears, and just leave my hand on him while he drives- all of which I can’t do seatbelted. so I’ve just given up that for now. But I always wear it when I’m alone and driving, or everything is calm for some reason, whenever I can.

11/24/24

was in Rastelli’s market and looking for organic celery to restock my stash, but couldn’t find any. Found nonorganic, pre-sliced, like in little bits like I need to feed into my juicer, prepackaged, and I bought two packs just to relieve me from the slicing and dicing for a little bit. Just drank the first batch this morning and it tastes sweeter than the organic kinds I’ve been drinking (from ShopRite, sprouts, Imperfect Foods). I’m a little worried though because dad told me last night about an E. coli outbreak on Whole Foods celery and ground beef and some other stuff. Was wondering if I might ever get poisoned like that, especially if I’m drinking celery every day?

11/25/24

again this morning, halfway through drinking celery juice, overcome with hunger. ate ravenously again after the juice. loving the sweet-tasting, pre-cut, Rastelli celery, though not organic. Emailed Imperfect Foods to see if they would start carrying a pre-cut organic celery. skin still getting better in general, but day-to-day, still not in a straight line: it’s better to worse then better to worse – fluctuating. Still need to wear the pads inside of socks to absorb fluid.

just realized, while sitting in the quiet house today working, that part of heaven, for me, is silence. Like even recently, there was a small gap in which I had no air filter running in my room because I had moved mine (bigger) down to hunter’s room and was waiting for the new (smaller) one to come in, it was just so nice – I loved the grounding feeling of silence there. And maybe also explains why I get so stressed with the baby, because baby’s so loud all the time. I love it, but… I really need a balance between noise and silence.

11/26/24

found a celery I really like. It comes from Sprouts, in a bag from Earthbound Farm, it’s organic, “thoroughly washed”, and pre-cut. All I have to do is open the bag and feed into the juicer. No washing, no cutting, no chopping off leaves and separating the leaves from the stalks and the end bits and different containers and wet hands when my hands aren’t always all intact, etc. It’s pretty perfect – not medicinally bitter like the Imperfect celery, not as sweet as the non-organic celery from Rastelli’s- a neutral taste somewhere between the two- but definitely I could chug this every morning. The only problem is that it’s $4.50 a bag, that’s like double what a bunch of uncut celery is. The time-saving efficiency of it, though, makes up for it for me. I guess for now, it’s seven bags a week of this. so about $125 a month, times 12- an extra $500 a year more than I thought it would be. 

feet are getting better and better. Two nights this week, I peeled off the bandages, and there was hardly any stain there. But there’s a small spot on my face that’s dark and dry and irritated that’s bothering me, but it’s not too bad. if you’re standing like 5 feet away, it’s hard to see.

11/27/24

when I hear cars revving outside my sleeping baby’s window at 12:45 AM, it makes me not want to live here anymore. it doesn’t happen much at this time, but it does happen a lot during the day. We don’t even live right off the road- we live on a street that comes off of the main road, but we can still hear it really prominently. for some reason, this stretch of road, people like to rev and rev their engines. I wouldn’t care as a single person. But as a mother with a child, it pisses me off.

had a sweet dream. I wandered into a classroom; at a school. Lots of people all around. the place I wandered into, only one guy was there, M____, this boy, who, in real life, I went to school with, who had pretty intense blue eyes but I’ve never had any real relationship with. It was just him watching the projector screen, they were teaching old stuff like VHS before they would teach us the new video technologies, and it was kind of funny to watch. It was weird now that I remember because there weren’t chairs and desks in this room; it was just a big kind of sofa lounge that incidentally fit the two of us. I sat a few feet away from him, but it was on the same sofa, because that’s all there was – the sofa facing the screen- he offered me some pens or pencils to use, which I did use them, and just ended up close to him, and we both ended up falling asleep to the boring projector reel. So I was actually dreaming that I was asleep- that I woke up slightly, but was so groggy and heavy when I woke up that I could not really move very far away from him- our shoulders and heads were touching in a really cozy and comfortable way, but I still tried to move away from him when I woke up in the dream because I subconsciously knew that we should not really be seen sleeping together because I had a husband and he had a wife, but we just had simply fallen asleep, and I did feel so sleepy in the dream- like so sleepy that you feel paralyzed and not able to move.(it seemed maybe I also physically woke up when I dreamt that I woke up?) it seemed like a long time, maybe two hours, when finally some noise from neighboring classrooms woke us both up- an older-looking woman teacher peeked around the corner at us- not sternly, but not kindly- and I smiled shyly and left, running through the hallways, looking for my R. I was anxious to find him, but also sweetly refreshed from the innocent incident that just happened. 

I really need to deep clean the house, but the only time I have to do it is when R and Hunter are not here (when they’re here, we spend the little time we have together, together). And when they’re not here, I’m working- and when I’m working, I have actual work, so I can’t do it. and when I take PTO days, most times, my parents will give back Hunter, so I’ll be with him the whole day and can’t do anything else. I guess the only time I could clean would be, I would need to take a PTO day and not tell them I took it? Just so I can clean.

I think I had a little bit of PMS today, by myself. I had to clean the whole house today: vacuum, dishes, change bedsheets, decorated for Christmas, took Halloween decorations down finally, laundry, on top of having work. About to go scrub toilet and bathtub before I take a shower now. The whole day I was moving and going and whenever I got held up just a little, I got frustrated. i was going as fast as I could, and then finally at night, when things were winding down, R got home and was taking a shower while I folded laundry and watched baby sleeping in his bed on the monitor in the living room, and it was then I thought a little bitterly about how in the early days when Hunter was a newborn, I didn’t have that – I was alone and trying to take showers and there was no baby monitor or anyone else here helping me, besides my mom sometimes coming over for a few hours during work days. I remember taking a bath/shower when he was a newborn and bringing him in his car seat into the bathroom with me, or just running away for a shower after I put him down for a nap hoping to God he didn’t wake up during, and rushing  through everything during those showers- my adrenaline going and going until I could get back by his side. Too many times to count, holding him while sitting down peeing, because he would not let me put him down – he’d cry and scream if I did. I just thought about all this tonight, and was comparing how easy R has it compared to what I had to go through, and just didn’t feel like talking, just wanted to go up to my room and cry. it’s not really R’s fault, I know. I know he didn’t know it would be like this, and we both weren’t prepared. But I still feel, three years later, that it hit me the hardest. And I know you should take responsibility for your life and your decisions and everything that happens to you – that that’s the best thing to do – and I want to do that- the best thing- and I love my baby so much. but there’s a small part of me that comes out, that I can’t stop sometimes, that is just blaming and blaming: why didn’t you take better care of me? Why weren’t you more prepared? how could you let me hurt and suffer for so long?

11/28/24

i’m so perfectly happy that my baby is healthy and thriving. i can hear him yelling in nonstop sentences downstairs. But as I lay here tired when I should be getting up, I wonder: why did it have to be like that – that he like sucked the life out of me for the first two years to get stronger, while it made me sick, and left me still currently recovering from all that over a year later? Like why couldn’t we both have just been strong at the same time… with no one unpreparedly sacrificing anything. Was I weak? Would many others, if they’d undertook, for 15 months straight, never sleeping a full night and waking up every 2 to 3 hours to breastfeed, have gotten as sick as I did? I just don’t know anyone personally who’s been through the exact same thing. But it was a sleep deprivation experiment I never wanted to try.

definitely had dairy and gluten today. Went over parents for Thanksgiving and she had Wegmans Thanksgiving meals out: turkey with gravy, mashed potatoes that tasted really buttery and good, mac & cheese- of which I only ate a few spirals just to taste, green beans which were probably OK, broccoli with cheese, and stuffing which was so good I would’ve eaten the whole tray, but it was obviously bread stuffing, so just took a few bites. ate mostly green beans and turkey. Also had pumpkin pie, lots, which I scraped off the crust and it was basically pumpkin pudding, but I’m sure there was still cream and eggs in that part, that also was really good. brought a strawberry vanilla cake which I made gluten-free and dairy free, and Hunter was really excited by, and tasted pretty good- mom even said so. The last time I had gluten, it seemed to affect me, if at all, only for a few days and went away. hope it does the same this time, and maybe also the celery juice is working too.

just found out that R had a beer(s) before picking up Hunter and driving him home last night. only found out bc i thought he was acting weird (fell asleep on couch while on baby monitor duty and when i woke him up after soothing baby who woke up while R was sleeping on couch, he said unintelligible things to me and grabbed my butt calling it a lemon. also just this look on his face he gets, that i can’t describe), so on the way home from parents from Thanksgiving meal today, asked him if he had any alcohol last night, and he said yeah, he’d been working on Paulo’s deck and Paulo’d brought out some beers. I recoiled for a moment then said, “can you please not drink and drive w the baby.” he said ok. Then i said, you can call me to come pick him up if you drink, or tell my parents to take him home (from their house, where he’s babysat). He said he didn’t drink that much. I said you were drunk enough for me to think you were acting weird and not answering baby when he was calling for you in his sleep. He said baby needs to learn to sleep by himself and that we’re not always going to be there and if we keep babying him, he’ll always act like a baby. he said he wasn’t worried about baby waking up by himself and crying. and i said ok, then let’s tell him and warn him and prepare him that we’re going to do that, like we tell him we’re leaving somewhere in 5 minutes, instead of doing it all the sudden with no explanation, after we’ve been sleeping with him every night since he was born. so he doesn’t know what’s happening when he wakes up alone and no one’s answering him. He said it sounds like I want him to be perfect. I said no, i just want you to not drink when driving the baby. He said, well then don’t bring up all that other stuff, just say “don’t drink with the baby.” (he apologized the next morning, saying that he was wrong and that he’d never speak to me like that again)

11/29/24

funny: dad told me too while I was over there yesterday, that the celery juice (I shared the book with him, and he started drinking it) makes him hungry too. He feels like he’s gaining weight because of it.

11/30/24

ate cheese bread today because i was taking care of Hunter alone and that’s what he likes and didn’t have time to make separate meal for both of us. also bc i missed it, and feet are still getting better – rash on them is shrinking and shrinking.

11/19/24

been celery juicing every morning for about a week now. I like it. the taste doesn’t bother me- sometimes it has this savory broth-like feel/taste. it does take more time now in the morning, every morning now, though. I have to wash the celery, put it on the chopping board and cut it into small pieces, feed it through the juicer. Then the juicer rinsing and clean up afterwards. And it’s about $2.50-$2.99 for every bunch of celery, I use one bunch every single day – so that’s an extra $1,000 a year. If it helps me though, it’s worth it and I’ll keep doing it.

11/20/24

it seems like the celery juice makes me hungrier. After I’m done drinking it, I’m always pretty famished, and after the 30 minute waiting period after finishing it, I pretty much devour my breakfast and keep eating for hours afterwards. that’s a change from the norm.

broke every dietary restriction I have tonight at dinner, but it’s OK, it was just for R’s birthday. And it was one of the best meals I’ve ever had – Kitchen 519. every dish had butter or cheese or cream or all of them together. I orgasmically said “oh my God” about five times total by the end of the dinner.

11/21/24

skin still holding its plateau of getting better, but not healing all the way.

the lover i married. how do we get back, after all this?

11/12/24

something I realized just now that I love about R: he never intentionally makes you feel bad about anything.  by which I mean whenever I tell him something that I’m ashamed about, like I just did last night, I told him something…and he immediately responds with some kind of justification or kind remark against the obvious pointing fingers route. He’s gracious. I could definitely learn from that.

leaves keep falling/being blown in such a way that it’s not even afternoon and like three times already this morning I thought there was a big bird or something flying by the house. and the dry leaves hitting against the house almost sound like hail, there are so many of them and they’re all so dried out.

I can’t describe the elation I feel sometimes when Rodrigo brings baby home and he’s fallen asleep. That I have more time to prepare, more time to get things done.

11/16/24

last night, Rodrigo and Hunter were roughhousing in the bed before bed, and I reached around them to draw the blinds down and pull the curtain closed, when Hunter who was throwing his arms really wildly, came too close and hit me in the face, actually right in the eyes, and it really hurt, and I stepped back, holding both hands over my eyes for a few seconds, and Rodrigo said it was just an accident and he didn’t mean it, and I knew that, of course. And he just kept playing while I walked out of the room and for some reason, I just started crying really hard in the living room while they kept playing. Just maybe the physical pain triggered it and it made me think of how it was a metaphor of how having him has hurt me physically, but there’s nothing I can really do about it because he’s innocent- I’m the one who asked for him to be born and be here. also, it’s been really hard the past few days because I’ve been watching Hunter 24/7 while my parents are gone to a wedding for a week. I have to wake up earlier, like around six am when Rodrigo leaves, to go downstairs to sleep with baby, and I’m still going to sleep late because of my feet, so I’m not getting enough hours- I’m getting maybe like five or six on average. Then it’s just me watching him all day until Rodrigo comes home late at night. also, I feel a cold or something coming on, maybe from just all of this.

been eating cheese the past few days, but skin hasn’t seemed worse. maybe it’s the celery juice counteracting it? there is a small spot on face though that’s bad though- maybe that is the cheese?

11/17/24

something incredible happened yesterday morning: out of nowhere, just me and Hunter in the living room about to play an action transformer kind of show on Netflix, he turned to me and said, “Mama, I’m sorry for hitting you last night.” he may have messed up some verb tenses and stumbled over words, but that’s what he said. I just couldn’t believe he thought of it, seemingly out of nowhere and said it to me and I was so touched, and I told him, and we hugged, and I almost teared up, and I just felt so grateful. I was thinking, maybe he didn’t say sorry right away right after it happened the other night because he was so into playing and also he might’ve felt ashamed, like when he goes in his diaper now and he knows that he shouldn’t, and he tries to hide it.

i wish i had an audio recording, or at least written record all his sayings. they’re the most absurd, awesome things i’ve heard in my life. The other day, I guess he saw something scary and said to us, “that scared my butt” which is something I want to always say now. and then just nonsense words when he’s playing, telling us to say things like hotdog roll and roll and rollie pollie or something. and last night:  “i don’t like sticky things” (why?) “…because they stick on sticky places” -something like that but funnier. most times there’s too much happening for me to stop and record them. But a greatest hits phrases by him would be so funny to look back on.

definitely ate gluten today. I did it to be a good guest at a hosted lunch. I do not regret it, as I truly love the hostess. took some digestive enzymes in the car right before we got there, and after we got back a few hours later took Oregon wild harvest aller-aid capsules and an allergiemittel tablet. had nothing but celery juice before the lunch, and just fruit smoothie and snacks afterwards. So we’ll see how my skin is. I have a feeling if there’s any effect, it won’t be too bad. But I really had cut gluten out for a long time now, before this.

11/7/24

been reading books on healing by the medical medium. He sounds wonky at times, but I like some things he says, and really want to try celery juice and foods for healing, because it seems the easiest and something I could stick with for the rest of my life, as opposed to supplements, which I don’t want to take too many for the rest of my life. I think ideally, if I could use foods, the only supplements I would take is maybe just a multivitamin and an antioxidant such as glutathione or olive. and Gaia Herbs black elderberry gummies, just cause they taste so good. about to buy a juicer.

11/8/24

just noticed this sticker on my bedroom floor. 

11/9/24

“i wanna be a bus driver when i grow up! and i wanna be spiderman too.”

– Hunter

11/10/24

it seems like skin has plateaued at this “not as bad as it was” stage, but it isn’t getting better than this- it isn’t healing all the way. I feel like if it continues like this and doesn’t make the next leap, I’ll just have it forever, this low-grade pain in the feet. because it’s been so long now- 6 months- that I’ve had it. I feel like this is the longest or one of the longest times I’ve had a flare – I don’t want it to become a way of life.

10/28/24

last night, Hunter being so difficult- wouldn’t let me change his clothes or change his diaper for bed (he ended up peeing in his bed while I was still trying to get him to change- i had to change all the bedsheets) and refused to brush teeth. I didn’t have any more patience because it was getting later and later while nothing was getting done, so I held him down for maybe 20 seconds and brushed his teeth, just trying to get to the goal of being in bed at last. i had to pin his arms down. he screamed and looked at me incredulously while I was doing it. After that, he still refused to do anything, so i stepped out of the house for a half minute to his increasingly high screams to do something i needed to do (put a bag in R’s truck to take to my parents’ in the morning). When i came back, R had calmed him down and also found an absurd loophole in Hunter’s logic- Hunter was standing naked and letting himself be changed, because, as R said, “We’re not changing – we’re just putting the diaper.” I didn’t reply, because it was technically still changing, but didn’t wanna say anything that could possibly set H off again. I was still quiet later from all the difficulty, and was surprised when Hunter said, “now we have to brush teeth.” I had to ask him again what he said, because after i’d just held him down crying while i brushed them, it seemed illogical he would ask for that again. But yes, he said, “yeah now we brush teeth. But this time you don’t… you don’t hold down my chest.” My heart…dropped, i felt so ashamed. i stood there for a moment and then said to him, “i’m sorry. i’m sorry.” i held out my arms from the foot of his bed and he walked across into them, and i gave him a long hug, close to tears. i came back w the toothbrush and he laid down and dutifully opened his mouth, looking up at me into my eyes, as i hovered over him, and i brushed them as gently as i ever have. When i laid down next to him to hear R read him stories, the tears were still in my eyes. I’ll never force him like that again. i’ll find another way. glad i married someone so patient- much more intuitively patient than me- to save my flaws from getting out of control. and proud of my son, that he is so brave and confident to ask for a re-do of something that besides upset, probably scared him. as if he were saying, “I know that’s not how you really are mom – let’s say we try that again.”

*

said an audible “wow” when I took off to my socks tonight and saw how good my feet looked. The bandages had practically no stains on them, nothing stuck, and they looked markedly better than last night. And I haven’t even had good nights sleep this week – one night I went to bed around 2:00 amand woke up at 5. have also started taking an olive supplement (Pure Synergy organic olive extract), but it’s too recent an addition to have been a major contributor to the change. 

10/29/24

the night after my feet looked so much better, they looked worse. disheartening, but not much, much worse at least.

today, started drinking celery juice every day. not fresh juiced, but whole organic, with only og lemon added.

if I could only understand my body and take hints from it / the way I do with my mind.

10/30/24

the celery juice is starting to taste delicious. also i love routines…i like being faithful to things.

skin still hovering between good and bad. It’s definitely not taking a straight line to healing. is it because I let myself eat cheese? One night I think I’m on my way and nothing can stop me, and then the next night, it’s like “what happened?”

10/31/24

still clipping his nails when he’s asleep because he can’t and won’t stay still yet. I’ve noticed lately that his hands and fingers and nails seem bigger. It makes me smile to myself in the dark. Nailclipping’s gone from a chore that I really didn’t like doing when he was an infant, to now something that I almost enjoy because it’s so nice to hold his little hand and see it growing and growing, always soft and warm.

11/1/24

Hunter going through this phase where he says he’s scared of things in the dark and gets clingy and just wants you there next to him most of the time. Was talking with R that it’s like he’s going in cycles, because that’s like how he was when he was a baby. It feels to me like he’s growing up- that it’s just like fear of change and the unknown.

10/21/24

past few days, the mint and lavender has not been really burning my feet as it did like the first day. I take it as a good sign, that my feet skin layers are getting more/even so that it’s not so raw. I feel it tingling and stuff still, but it’s not very painful anymore. i’m so glad. But now, heels have started to crack, and that hurts, trying to remedy this now.

10/22/24

went for a run today, the first time in around six months. The last time i ran was the day I stopped, because I couldn’t do it anymore from my feet bothering me so much. Today, I ran and was not bothered by any discomfort from my feet. It was landmark. it was warm but the leaves crunched under my feet. I was grateful that my body moved, that my body finally worked.

yesterday, listened to an old playlist I made on Spotify that I almost forgot about, it had been years. It made me feel things that I’d also almost forgotten about, and made me feel more like myself again. Felt really good.

read something on an Instagram post about parenthood today: “clean the clutter only when you wish; but always view it as a gift.” it was a line among many, but when I read that one, it choked me and my eyes watered. I sat there realizing that with all the difficulties that come with raising a baby, I have viewed almost all of it as like hardships and things getting in the way of my comfort and happiness. which, yes, technically they are obstacles- like cleaning up toys all day long and getting no sleep- but at the same time, paraphrasing Mark Manson: there are inherent obstacles and problems in anything you do in life. The point is to choose the thing that you want to do so that the obstacles are like meaningful and not pointless to you. And I realized that even if I never had a baby, I would be facing different obstacles. And I realized how much I want this clutter, because it means he’s here. that I want these late nights, because it means he’s here in my arms in bed refusing to sleep. I want all the “problems” that come with my angel child. I realized if I didn’t have these problems, he wouldn’t be here.  The house would be empty. 

relatedly thinking of something else: this morning was typing a dictation from a new attorney on the team, and was a bit blown away by how well-mannered his dictation was. He super annunciated words so that they were clear, even saying “period” at the end of sentences so I didn’t have to guess where to end them, remembered to tell me when to stop the bold and caps so that I didn’t have to guess where to stop it, etc.. And as I was typing, I was so uplifted and refreshed by this wonderful dictating, which made my work so much easier so that the typing was actually enjoyable and freely flowed, that my gratitude bubbled up in that I wanted to do the best I could for this note and make sure everything was right, and that it looked good, and that just I myself was giving my best, because it seemed like he was. Reciprocity. I was thinking about this principle applied to my relationship with R, like… maybe when someone isn’t so difficult and they try their best to help you, it boosts the morale of the other one, so that you get into this positive feedback loop of just helping and helping and helping each other. how beautiful.

10/23/24

first time shopping for panties i’ve felt uncomfortable… like why such a sexual…vibe to them? and they’re not even women’s…they’re from the girls section.

10/24/24

ate gluten free but dairy-filled ravioli last night for dinner – not a bite – a whole meal’s worth. it was really good. 

10/25/24

Hunter just said to me while walking through the forest, “mama, one day I’ll grow up, I’ll be big, and I’ll live by myself. and I promise to hold your hand!”

today felt like eating a fish salad sandwich, meant to use vegan mayo with the canned salmon, but realized we were all out, so I used the regular mayo that contained egg instead, and ate two sandwiches of that. Still in this testing phase of skin gradually getting better and me tentatively trying foods from food groups that would give me problems before (namely, dairy and egg) to see how big an impact diet has on my skin when I’m seemingly in a healing phase. like what all that means. if I was really bad in the thick of it, I would not do this though.

relatedly, how I know I’m getting better: tonight, scrubbed the bathroom sink and the toilet, and it did not really phase me; if I had been hurting with my skin and attempted that, it would’ve upset me.

10/26/24

something I just realized today might be contributing to my skin getting better, that I only realized when I was texting my friend Billy about the current fire restriction in nj: it hasn’t rained in like a month, and the conditions now and lately are very dry, and I was wondering if all the dust mites are dead because of this and maybe since I’m so severely allergic to them, this is what was radically helping my skin to get better? It’s still not healed, and I’m still weeping a bit, but it’s not like it was – the pain is not like it was before. Like something had definitely changed, and I feel like all this coincided, now that I think about it. My theory now is that the main culprit is my mite allergy, and that diet plays a role, but is secondary. 

10/17/24

got the notion this morning, while sweeping the crunchy fall rainbow leaves from the trampoline in the sunlight, then sweeping them down the steps, that this act was akin to communing with God. Equal to like sitting across from him at a table having coffee…it was silent and beautiful.

ran out of the non-herbal Honeypot panty liners i’ve been using in socks, and now have all these herbal ones that contain mint and lavender, which were stinging my feet all morning. not sure if the herbals are better for skin or not, but I’m not gonna buy the original ones just to be in perfect comfort, because the pain is not unbearable. it’s bothersome, tho.

when R brought home Hunter asleep from Granny’s for the third night in a row, I almost cried. I had prepared a salad with warm onion & garlic mushrooms, and fried the barbecue from this weekend, and when I was washing the grape tomatoes was thinking how he would probably be fascinated picking them off the vine himself making his dinner plate. But what could i do – I put the nightlight on and took off his socks, looked into his face, and just left him alone to sleep with a heart heavily missing him.

10/18/24

it’s like i can either be exhausted out of my mind and have baby home, or i can feel rested but be without him. will i ever have it all?

10/19/24

still so happy when Hunter and i holding hands walking. today we went for a hike through the woods and he was holding my hand the whole time besides the part i carried him on my back. it’s like falling in love for the first time, again. well like falling in love, but different, cause i wipe his butt and everything, and it feels like i’ve assumed the traditional man’s role of protecting and thinking about his every need, putting him on the inside part of the street when we’re walking, etc. but major love nonetheless.