Fun and Frolic With Long-Term Love

PunkRock took me to Sandy Point State Park on Thursday for a day trip. He decided I needed some beach time, and he was right! On the way, we stopped to pick up my youngest unexpectedly, because she was having a rough day at work, so that made it even more fun!

Near the late afternoon, we started getting bit by flies - they looked like normal houseflies, but they were fucking biting us and it sucked. After a few minutes, we went back into the water for relief, but when we came back out, we realized that where they had bitten PunkRock, he had large welts forming. My daughter and I had barely even any marks at all, even though we had been bitten as frequently. We took a picture, because weird!

The flies were still there, so we packed up at around 4 pm and headed home. It was an hour and a half back to Frederick to drop my daughter off. On the way, a red rash started to spread up PunkRock’s neck, and down his arms. He said it was itching quite a bit and by the time we reached Frederick, he said it was burning. We went into the grocery store where she works and bought some hydrocortisone cream and Benadryl. He took two of the pills and figured he could take a shower when we got home and put the cream on then.

We didn’t make it home.

On the way to Hagerstown, the red rash started getting darker and his tongue started swelling inside of his mouth. We went immediately to urgent care, where they called us back right from the reception desk, bypassing the 8 or so people in the waiting room.

When they had him pull up his shirt, the rash was clearly systemic - covering his front, back, both legs and arms, plus his neck and face. They had him lay on his stomach and gave him a steroid shot in his ass (which was also red and inflamed from the rash) almost immediately.

Within 10 minutes, he said the incessant itching had stopped, and in 15 minutes, his tongue had returned to normal size.

Guys, this was super frightening. He had never ever had an allergic reaction, so this was new to us. I am glad to report that by Friday morning everything was back to normal, with no signs of a rash. Even so, I made him take it easy, and we canceled plans for the rest of the weekend.

I have no idea why he reacted so to some beach fly bites, but we will not be returning to Sandy Point!
 
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Wow, that was scary! Glad you got care soon enough.

Also glad your daughter got her car issues taken care of. Sorry about her stalker. There are few things worse!

About your older daughter, hang in there. When mine was in that state, I was ready to hear the worst every minute. I sort of gave it up to the Universe. I couldn't live with the stress. :(
 
DarkKnight and I bought our brand-spanking new Honda Fit last night. I am supposed to go pick it up today, in about an hour. I am nervous. We did all the financing and such yesterday, but the car itself wasn’t being delivered until this morning. So, we didn’t even lay eyes on it yet. That’s kinda crazy - not only have we never owned a new car, but also having never seen it in person makes things a little unusual for us! Still, I am currently confident that things will go well. We got a great trade-in amount on our POS Rogue, so we were not so far upside down as I was fearing - just $1300. They gave us an additional $500 incentive, and after the price was set, I added pinstriping, wheel locks, a cargo tray and all-weather floor mats, for no additional cost. W00t! The only thing that had me aggravated, was that our credit score SHOULD have qualified us for 2.9% financing, but they pulled it up and it was lower. They gave us 3.9% instead. Not terrible, by any means, but still annoying.

I am tired today.
 
Updates and my life.

DarkKnight loves his new car more than me. Lol

I went and got my white roots covered today, so I am feeling okay about my hair at the moment.

My period is due this week so I am feeling out of sorts, but oh well. Nothing new about that.

I am going to be launching a new Facebook blog that will work as a side project to my Blessing Box. I’ve been interviewing people in my city, and each person will get an entire week to be featured. Every day I will post part of their interview, to focus on a particular aspect of their lives - their childhood, their work history, their struggles, their hopes & dreams. I’m calling it Hub City Humans. I am excited about it, though it’s going to be a bunch of more work.

I will be starting back on a good diet at the end of the month, after my birthday. I will be getting my Invisalign right after, so my thought is that my food intake will change up anyway due to the dental nonsense, so that will be a good time to begin eating healthy and focus again on weight loss.

Still nothing from my older daughter, and I can’t continue to be so emotionally out of sorts - I have to take my life back. I don’t know if it’s possible, but I have to try.
 
Some days it’s just impossible for me to function. I am still just devastated over my daughter. I love her so very much and this wedge between us hurts so very much. I’ve found myself in tears at random times today. I feel so broken over it and so don’t know how to move forward with such fear that she could die due to this addiction. I’m just stuck in this rut.

My birthday is this coming weekend. DarkKnight and I went on a picnic in a park in Frederick - it was super fun being with him, even though we were swarmed by flies! Thankfully they weren’t the biting kind that he’s allergic to! On Saturday coming up DarkKnight & PunkRock are taking me to go and see a live production of Sweeney Todd.I am trying to focus on the positive.
 
Dagferi said:
https://www.nar-anon.org/

Have you thought about joining a support group for family and friends of addicts?
Click to expand...

Also, Al-Anon is full of parents in similar situations, the substance need not be alcohol. I'm active in Al-Anon, Bluebird. I'm here if you have questions, concerns, thoughts or would like a referral for meetings in your area. Nobody can thrive in an addiction situation without community, but you can definitely thrive with one. AlAnon has been wonderful for me.
 
Thanks everyone. I am going to talk to my therapist about a support group. I need something.

I had a good birthday weekend. I was teary a couple of times from anxiety. To be honest, most of the tears were from thinking about my oldest daughter, and not my birthday. She didn’t contact me, which is what I expected, but it still hurt terribly. I had one mild stress at one point about DarkKnight making my cake - he makes me a carrot cake from scratch every year. I started thinking that maybe he would rather not do it anymore and I started feeling sad about how he doesn’t feel okay with telling me that. I went to him immediately to give myself a reality check, and he was very much like, don’t you dare try and take this away from me - I love making you a cake! So that went well and I moved on with a better mind.

My son, youngest daughter and her boyfriend came over and had lunch with DarkKnight and me - PunKRock had to work yesterday. We had ice cream from the corner shop as well. In the evening after dinner (grilled steaks and homemade pasta salad) we had my cake. My guys went in on a gift together - they bought me Betrayal Legacy, which I am REALLY excited about. I don’t know when we will start the campaign though, as we are 4 weeks into our Zombicide:prison Outbreak campaign with our gaming group. We have at least 7 more of those to go! Maybe we will start it in the new year, but I don’t think I can wait that long! Lol

DarkKnight and PunkRock also took my out to the dinner theater Saturday night to see Sweeney Todd. It was crazy good, and we all had fun.

I just reread my previous posts and I totally fucked up - DarkKnight did not take me on a picnic in Frederick - that was PunkRock! Gotta give credit where it belongs.

Today I am really depressed and don’t want to get out of bed. Instead I am going to shower and eat, and that should launch me into my day. I need to have the Blessing Box filled at 11 so I probably will eat after. I had a good cry already. Over nothing and everything.

Hub City Humans is doing great - today was the start of week 3. Reception has been positive. I have another interview to transcribe this week, so I need to do that sometime.
 
Happy late Birthday, Bluebird! It sounds like a nice day. I love carrot cake and am envious that your husband makes it homemade! You have two great guys :)

There are a lot of parents of addicts in al-anon...plus you also qualify as the wife of an alcoholic. If you try it, you may want to try a few different meetings because they are all different.

I'm so sorry about your daughter. There's nothing worse than feeling powerless to help our children. ((Hugs)) and prayers. You're a great mom. Don't let her addiction make you forget that.
 
I bought Betrayal Legacy for my son's birthday next week. I hear good things about it.

Happy belated birthday!
 
Today was not good - I woke up at 3:30 am and was up for a while. I fell asleep for about an hour around 8 am and then my day started. I had just the runniest poos and the most upset stomach - I just felt gut sick, in every way that a person can. I still got it together and managed to dress, feed the cats and keep the Blessing Box full. However, that was the limit of my accomplishments. Around 2:30 pm, I feel asleep on the couch and when I woke up, I felt really refreshed and much better.

For a while.

There were a couple of hours I was feeling pretty great. I felt really empowered and positive about my dental visit tomorrow. I should be getting my attachments on, and my new Invisalign aligners will start tomorrow evening. I am looking forward to getting it done. I know it is going to be a year, but I am wanting to get it over and finished. I am wanting to go back on a diet - I feel like now is a good time to do that. I need to take back my life and push back this anxiety and depression that is starting to become overwhelming. A year on a solid diet, a year of dental work, a year of budgeting and refocusing on our finances, a year of therapy - this is how things get better.

I’m tired again now though. I guess we will see how tomorrow is.
 
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My dental visit went well. It’s been a week now and things are going okay. I was given 3 sets of aligners, and I’m supposed to wear each set for two weeks. After those are done, I will go back in and get new ones, which will then be worn for a week each. They said this should take about 6 months.

Almost every single tooth has an attachment on it. The only ones that don’t are my front top 2, and my back molars on the top and bottom. It’s okay though - I am a pro at this now! Lol

PunkRock went with me and sat in the room for my appointment, but I focused and did well. No tears or issues. I did awesome!

The three of us started on a low carb diet on Sunday. It’s been rough, but we need this. I have gained 30 pounds this year, PunkRock has gained 50 pounds, and DarkKnight gained like 70. This is crazypants, but it’s what we are dealing with. My daughter’s addiction has left us all floundering. I am hoping to rejoin the gym after the first of the year. Until I lose some of this weight, there’s no way my auto-immune stuff will allow me to do any sort of workout there safely.
 
I forgot to weigh myself this morning, so I will have to do it tomorrow. DarkKnight has lost 5 pounds though! I have stuck to the diet all week and feel good about that.

PunkRock and I were called to a meeting on Friday morning, (DarkKnight has to work), by city council. My main contact was there, a city administrator, and two members of code enforcement. The gist of it is that city council is rewriting city code right now because little libraries and Blessing boxes are not in compliance. This is a bad thing, obviously, so this will be fixed. The problem is though that no code they can write will cover the extent of the popularity of my Blessing Box. We have to shut it down.

Right now I have 100% support from city council and they absolutely don’t want me to shut down. My contact was like, a few of them were *vehemently* opposed to doing anything at all, but of course code enforcement couldn’t let that sit. I am in violation right now and should be racking up fines. End of the meeting - I am not going to get any fines now or in the near future, because though the city can’t publicly support me, the council can individually. The plan is this - I need to file as an LLC or not for profit for insurance purposes. Several people high on the food chain are searching out a place for me to relocate, which they hope will allow me to rent for like $1 a year. I don’t have to do anything at all right now, they are doing all the legwork. Code enforcement is ignoring me until a building is found.

So yay?

I am so terribly stressed over this. Like it or not, Blessing Box is dead. I will be allowed to scale back at my house to just the Box, nothing else. Since I won’t be home to fill it (I will be at this other location) it will basically be filled twice a day and cleared out just as quick. This makes me sad. I will regain the space in my house though - my game room will be a game room all the time instead of part of the time.

I am terribly afraid of losing my passion for this. I am already feeling overwhelmed and depressed about it. The Blessing Box is me. That’s the reason it has been successful - visitors and donors connect with me, and they see they are helping directly. It’s the one leg up I have on other organizations. I’m not a faceless entity. Now I will have a building (or a small space in one, more likely) and I will have to do all this paperwork. I will have to cover utilities and maybe write grants. (True story, I used to work in the grants office in a community college a couple decades ago so this isn’t daunting - just aggravating.)

I am trying to be upbeat and excited about this - and sometimes I am - but mostly I feel like my community project is now starting its death spiral. Thinking about taxes and such makes me feel ill. Record keeping and shit. Ugh. I love just being able to do what I want, when I want. Yesterday I took 10 kids to see a local play (The Legend of Sleepy Hollow) after I got a brand new trumpet for a 10 year old boy, who’s elementary school didn’t have one for him to use. After the play, I went and visited a 72 year old woman who starts chemo for stage 3 cancer on the 15th. She was distraught because she will lose her sense of taste and her birthday is on the 22nd. She has no family or friends nearby and doesn’t drive. I took her apples, oranges and bananas, convinced a local bakery to make her a “fall flowers” themed cake which they are delivering in person to her this Tuesday (it will be cupcakes that look like a bouquet) and I have a family with 3 kids under the age of 10 who wanted to adopt a grandma who will be meeting her this week as well for the first time. Both the mom and dad are nurses. I couldn’t invent a better connection if I tried. I also now have an appointment scheduled to take her to get a wig when she starts losing her hair - she wanted a woman to drive her. Right now the hospital will be helping her with transportation to and from chemo, so no worries there. After my visit with her, I then came home and started prepping for today - I am giving away Halloween costumes and decoration this morning, then going to interview someone for Hub City Humans.

Where in the world will I find time to write grants and maintain records and stuff? I want to cry. I don’t want people telling me what to do and I feel like my baby here is dead.

It may just be this morning though. I should be optimistic but at this moment I am not. I’ve kept all of the city stuff off of the Facebook page because I want to just announce things as a done deal and make it be a positive thing. I kinda am rethinking that though. Part of what made my endeavor so popular is that I am upfront about my personal struggles and our growing pains. I have to think about this.
 
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I am so sorry, Bluebird :( You've done some really amazing work with your blessings box.
 
Got my period yesterday. Ugh.

I feel more upbeat about the upcoming changes to my Blessing Box. I have been in contact with the councilperson and I let her know my main worry was that my preferences would be ignored, and that everyone would see me as being ungrateful by stating them. She quelled those feelings by saying they were absolutely wanting to be sure that I was clarifying what I needed. For me that means no shared space with a religious organization, and the fact that I have to have street access - I want my visitors to be able to grab and go, as they do now. An internal room in a building wouldn’t be helpful - I don’t want anyone to have to climb stairs or take an elevator to get to me, or walk through hallways.

I am still stressing over whether to become an LLC or nonprofit. I don’t have time right now to read up on things. I guess there is no big hurry to decide yet, but I am a planner. Lol I’ve talked to a few of my donors - and a few visitors - and the results have all been really positive. A couple of people volunteered to be on my board if I decide to be a nonprofit, so that was encouraging!

Today is going to be ugh - I have an appeal letter to write to social security or Medicare or someplace (the details are fuzzy at the moment but when I look at the paperwork it will be clear) for some medical bills that weren’t covered for my son. I also have some phone calls to make for him, so this is actually a good couple of hours worth of work. I also need to budget for the rest of the year for my own household and pay this month’s bills. There’s a meat giveaway I am planning for tomorrow, so I will have a 2 hour block in the middle of the day where I will be signing people up and though the actual time frame is advertised to be an hour long, it takes me twice as long to process everyone that tries to sign up. Tonight I have an Hub City Humans interview and I have to go shopping for the meat giveaway, and then bag everything up for that. I am thinking I am going to close up early Wednesday after the meat giveaway, and remain closed Thursday and Friday this week.

Unfortunately, PunkRock’s cat Stormy will be put to sleep on Thursday. We are all heartbroken over this. She is 16 years old - he has had her since she was two. She’s a Russian Blue so she is VERY bonded to him - she tolerates everyone else. When they are together, it’s amazing to witness her absolute devotion to him, and him to her. If we try to cuddle at night, she puts herself in between us. She’s very jealous - she wouldn’t make a very good poly person! I love her dearly too though, as does DarkKnight. When I called the vet to make the appointment, DarkKnight was in tears. We all have been, on and off since. Sadly her gains over the last few months are all slipping away and she just is back to not eating anything again, and she even leaves treats to sit out and be ignored. She will yell for her meals, then give a few half-hearted licks and walk away. She’s lost weight again and just seems dazed. We’ve had to strip the bed and wash all of the bedding every single day last week, sometimes twice a day. She just pees where she is. We are sure the cancer must be working where we can’t see it. We want to let her go while she is still having good days, and those seem to be running out. So yeah, Thursday.

PunkRock was sent to Urgent Care yesterday from work. He had a dizzy spell. They tested him and they think it is probably a prescription drug issue but we are waiting for blood tests. It could also be a combo of anxiety and lack of sleep. He came home and just slept all day. He lost 7 pounds on the new diet so they checked his blood sugar, but it was absolutely fine.

Oh! I weighed myself this morning and I have lost 9 pounds so far, so I am happy about that. I hope it continues.
 
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No updates on the Box situation, but I am trucking along with day to day and seasonal plans as always. Sunday is another costume giveaway, and we had a hotel remodel and so we got, let’s see, sofa beds, kitchen tables, chairs, desks, chairs, ottomans, 2 different types of lamps, mirrors, end tables and nightstands. I’ve been “closed” the last two days but literally I am running the furniture deliveries, nonstop. The donor is doing the actual physical delivering but I am running dispatch and doing all of the scheduling, and figuring out what people want and counting up inventory. Holy hell I am tired!

One really good think to come out of this is that we realized halfway through that the desks are really close to the size tables PinkRock was going to have built in his art studio. We had budgeted $1000 earlier this year for materials, and we had scheduled it and everything, only to have DarkKnight lose his job that same week. So we never got them done. So PunkRock hasn’t been doing much - he still has a table for his airbrush station, and his original paint table, but the space just hasn’t been able to be utilized. Well, I brought home one of the the desks to check the sizing and we think they will work! So we spent late afternoon completely emptying the studio portion of the basement, and right now PunkRock is scrubbing the floor. (The cats have been puking in certain locations.) The desks we need will be delivered on Sunday - and I am super excited about it!!

It won’t be exactly what we planned but free is currently better for our budget than $1000. Originally the tables were going to be 3’ x 4’ or 3’ x 8’. The desks are 2.5’ x 4.25’. Definitely doable. I am really excited because almost all of my hobby stuff has been in boxes since we bought the house - almost 3 years ago! Crazypants. I have no idea what I own anymore in scrapbooking, model painting or in my jewelry stuff. A year ago I bought a crap ton of board games to dismantle and use to make jewelry, so I have like 4-5 totes full of those. I can’t wait to see what I own!

On a super depressing note, we did have Stormy put to sleep yesterday. PunkRock was absolutely broken. He was shaking and crying, repeating “She was my family...” Stormy was 16 years old, and it’s been the two of them alone together since she was 2. I have never seen a cat so closely bonded with another person! She really was his family. :( I was really sad too, but I’ve only known her for like 6 years. That’s nowhere near 14. DarkKnight dug a hole in the backyard, so we buried her together. Next year we are going to plant a tree for her.
 
Today PunkRock and I are going to go meet with a property owner in town, to look at different locations he is willing to have the Blessing Box operate from. Another organization hooked us up with him. I have no idea what his idea of rent will be, or what he’s been told. I’m just moving on autopilot with this. It’s very exciting but all of the pitfalls are bouncing around in my head and it’s hard to keep focused. One foot in front of the other here. Things will work out, or they won’t. Meanwhile, things are moving along in my life.

My to do list is crazypants. And when I say it is crazy, it really is over the top. This morning I need to take two of my cats to their annual checkup and shots. Then I have the meeting with the property owner. My house is a mess, I have...you know what, no. I’m not going to list it all. I don’t have time!

Things are good overall. I’m happy. Just things need to slow down today.
 
Gah! I haven’t written in forever. The Blessing Box has been closed all week due to construction on my street. Our brand new sidewalks are looking good, and tonight was the first evening we were able to park in our driveway in what feels like forever. The new plan is to open on Tuesday - we got a letter today that the entire street will be closed on Monday for repacking in parts. I wish I could say it’s been relaxing not being open, but if anything it’s upped the number of messages I have been receiving and I’ve been more stressed than usual!

Our 2 remaining foster cats are returning to their rescue group tomorrow afternoon - I tried the best that I could, but only half the older kitties I had were adopted out. I need to return them because I need the space! My Senior Santa project this year has 43 letters, and some of the gifts are already arriving and I need that room to store them in. Also, I will soon start collecting for our Christmas decoration giveaway, and last year that room was packed FULL.

My weight loss is going well - I weigh myself on Sunday mornings, but I know I am at least at 12 pounds lost. Yay! My Invisalign is also going okay and I am on week 5 with that.

Our matching pajamas for Christmas this year are going to be Harry Potter. I ordered it all this morning and I am super excited. Each of us is going to have a buffalo-plaid bottom that matches our House colors (DarkKnight is Hufflepuff, PunkRock is Slytherin and I’m a Ravenclaw). DarkKnight & PunkRock have matching tshirts that say “Mischief Managed” while mine says “I solemnly swear I am up to no good.” Lol Freaking perfect!

I still am not dating anyone, but I really don’t feel a lack of relationships in my life at the moment. I mean, I REALLY wish I was having more sex but I’ve mostly been managing it through morning masturbation and then staying up super late until I can’t possibly stay awake any longer. I feel depressed about it, but I really do believe this is just the way life is for me.
 
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