Pet Peeved

One of my biggest pet peeves is being ignored.  It drives me nuts when someone can't be respectful enough to respond to me, especially when it's work or business related.  This week is young, but already it is rich with frustration!

#1 Offender:  My ex-trainer.  Did I mention I'm dumping his sorry ass?  He was great for about a year, but his priorities have shifted, and suddenly I was getting screwed over.  He's literally not had me on the schedule since the week before my breast biopsy.  WTF?  That's just about a month.  I tried to contact him about it in the first couple of weeks, and he basically ignored me, or gave me blow off responses.  I finally told him I wanted to sell my remaining sessions.  He acted all faux apologetic, telling me he has too many clients and not enough time, and that it wasn't fair to me.  Meanwhile, his website was advertising a referral special.  It's been nearly two weeks and my sessions are STILL NOT SOLD.  I just want to wash my hands and be done with him, but I can't until I get my money.  He's leaving for a Vegas trip tomorrow until Sunday, so I'm sure I'm not going to be seeing any money anytime soon.  You better believe that once I'm done with him, I'm revising my year old Yelp Review to reflect the kind of business he's operating now.

#2 Offender: Everyone I work with.  Ok, not really.  But I feel like I've been chasing a handful of people around for verging on two weeks, and NO ONE WILL GIVE ME WHAT THEY OWE ME.  I'm not chasing them around for my own enjoyment.  I'm tired of being willfully ignored, and I'm also tired of the others who give me BS excuses for their own laziness.  It holds me back from doing my job when others won't do theirs.  You better believe I'm saving documentation of all of these exchanges so I'm not held accountable for the slacking of others.

I've decided to just try to step back from these frustrations and realize I can't do more than I am already.  I can follow up with my POS ex-trainer every couple of days or realistically, every week, but I can't force him to sell my sessions ASAP.  I will have to just pay for new trainer sessions out of my check tomorrow and not be too pissed off about it.  I'm going to focus on the good things, which include meeting this new trainer tonight, and hopefully getting a fresh bout of motivation from a new person.  I'm also pretty afraid I'm going to pass out from exhaustion since I have not worked out with a trainer in  over a month, and so my body is out of practice.  I've also been slacking on the cardio, which I need to remedy.  I've gone Sunday and Monday, though, which is a step in the right direction again.

Anyway, that's my vent for now.  Wish me luck with the new trainer tonight!

Wednesday should be Thursday

I had big plans for productivity last night.  I was going to do some things around my apartment, do laundry, get to the gym, and paint my nails.  I ended up laying around for longer than planned, eating popcorn on the stove for dinner, watching Dance Moms and some other assorted nonsense.  I stripped my nails, but never managed to get new polish on them.  I am not exaggerating when I say this NEVER HAPPENS.  I am known for my constantly changing, always in reasonably good shape manicures.  My nails feel so naked today!  I had bought a new color I thought I liked, but I put it on my toes last night and it was a bit blah.  It's fine for my feet for now I guess, but it's just not the right mood for my fingernails.  I need something bright and spring-y to pretend that it is NOT in the thirties outside and that I did NOT spend last evening listening to freezing rain pelt my window briefly.  :-o  I may actually just go get a manicure over lunch.  I like to do that periodically to get my nails back in shape since I don't do all of the maintenance on a daily basis personally.

I have maybe plans for dinner tonight with some girlfriends.  If it works out, great, but if not that's okay.  I MUST do at least one load of laundry.  I probably actually have 3-4 loads to do, an accumulation of blankets, towels, and other assorted nonsense, but I can get all the most pressing items in one load.  Beyond that, I definitely need to get to the gym again tonight.  These are my goals!  Laundry & gym.  I dream big, folks!  ;-)

So BF left this morning for his twee family trip to Williamsburg.  He said his family asked if I were coming.  I cannot imagine having my first meeting being on a family trip whereupon we'd all be stuck together for three days in shared space!  He'd asked me about it when they originally planned the trip, and I declined, telling him it was too soon.  I guess it's nice that they asked!  He did say that I'm expected at Easter dinner now, which is fine since I told him I'd go to that.

I've been reading quite a bit lately.  I read "Divergent" after seeing the movie.  Pretty enjoyable, but I suspect I would have liked it better if I'd seen it before the movie, or at least given it some time before I jumped into the book.  Did buy Insurgent, though,and will read that eventually.  I read this fluffy little book called "New England Witch Chronicles" LOL.  It's basically a YA witchy book, but I did enjoy it.  It's a series, so I bought the second book, "Conjured", which is on my to be read list eventually as well.  I also read the Veronica Mars Book, "The Thousand Dollar Tan Line", which is a god awful title.  However, it picked up right where the movie left off, I love Veronica Mars, and I really enjoyed the book. I will definitely continue to read this series just because of my love for the characters.

Right now I'm reading "Come Home" by Lisa Scottoline.  Not the best writing, first of all.  However, the story is decent and I feel compelled to finish it.  It's just one of those books that I feel would have benefited a lot from stronger writing.  Some of it feels a bit juvenile, like something I'd have written in high school.  It's weird, because the reviews for this book talk about what an awesome writer she is, but I just....something about it doesn't click right with me.  Again, good story, meh writing.

I have one more book on my Kindle waiting to be read, and that's "You Should Have Known" by Jean Hanff Korelitz.  I've heard rave reviews about this, so I'm interested to see what I think of it.  Same goes for "The Goldfinch", which I recently picked up in Target and desperately wanted.  It's one of those rare hardbacks that just felt good in my hands.  I decided to order it from Amazon, but now that the book just won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, it's back ordered by a couple of days, and I'm thinking I may just give in and buy it in Target.  Sometimes the instant gratification is just nice!  I shouldn't be in a rush since I have so many other things to read still!

Anyway, that's all I've got for now.  Happy Wednesday!

April Showers

So it is pouring rain outside today.  It has been for the bulk of the day.  I stupidly left my apartment to catch my bus wearing flats, considering only briefly running to switch into my rain boots.  I decided I was running too late and figured I'd be fine to at least get into the office.

HA.  I came up from the escalator to ground level in DC and it was a straight up deluge of rain.  My pants were soaked by the time I got to work.  It took nearly two hours to get dry.  It continues to pour outside the windows, and I do not look forward to my commute home.  I will at the least be changing into tennis shoes to minimize SOME rain on my feet.

Work last week was crazy busy.  I was super productive as soon as I got that weight off of my shoulders.  I got a ton of work done and cleared off my desk and I felt really good about it.  This week the focus has shifted back to my day to day tasks, and yesterday was essentially a big walking headache.  I managed to survive it, though, and my friend A and I rewarded ourselves by going to Wendy's for dinner.  It was just what the stress doctor ordered.  ;-)

I had a really good weekend.  Possibly one of the best I've had yet with Bluefish.  I went out his way Friday night after work.  We had eaten dinner separately since I don't get out there until 8 or so, so we went and shared a red velvet concrete for dessert before going to see "Oculus".  I love a good scary movie, and I enjoyed this one.  He was mostly indulging me, but it all balances out!

Saturday we had a bit of a lazy morning, and then headed to brunch.  We got to eat outside since the weather was so gorgeous, and it was such a nice change after the neverending winter.  After brunch we ran several random errands.  We stopped for groceries after in order to procure food for grilling that night.  We spent the evening outside on BF's deck, enjoying the lovely weather, listening to a NASCAR race (told you, balance!) and eating chicken and steak kabobs with corn on the cob.

Sunday BF made pancakes for breakfast, which was sweet.  We then went miniature golfing (I won!) and to Costco, because we are glamorous like that.  We spent the afternoon sitting outside on the deck again, listening to the Nats baseball game and then grilling hot dogs for dinner.  I finally packed it up and headed home after we ate, as it was a long drive home.

By the time I got home I had a raging migraine, probably a combination of allergies and hormones.  I spent the rest of the night feeling pretty miserable, finally falling asleep around 11 pm thanks to a cocktail of meds designed to knock me out.

So this week BF is spending Wednesday through Friday in Williamsburg with his daughter, mother, sister, brother in law and nephew.  They are all coming back to his place Friday to stay until Tuesday.  The current plan is to go to the zoo on Saturday, and do Easter dinner Sunday.  I'm invited to both events.  :-o

It's a good thing, I guess.  I'm a bit nervous, but it will be what it will be, I guess!  No idea where BF and I are headed in general.  We had a big talk last Wednesday night and cleared the air on a lot of issues that had been lingering between us, mostly just communication issues.  I think it was a necessary discussion, though it was three hours of fun (sensing my sarcasm here?).  :-)  Anyway, we managed to have a really good weekend after, so I guess that's a good sign!

We also have a short weekend getaway planned for May 3-5.  We got a cute, modern cabin in the Shenandoah Valley near Luray for a couple of nights.  It has a hot tub, an outdoor fire pit, pretty views.  I'm excited to get out of the DC Metro for a couple of days and see how we fare!

Anyway, that's my latest, long-winded update.  Thanks for plodding along through that novel!

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So there's been a lot going on over the course of the last two weeks.  I had my annual exam a couple of weeks ago and during the appt. my Dr. recommended that I get a baseline mammogram.  I'll be 36 in June, but because my paternal grandmother had breast cancer, she wanted to start me a bit early.  I went ahead and made the appt. for two weeks ago today.  I went in and it wasn't a big deal.  I'd heard widely varying assessments of it being mildly uncomfortable to very painful, but it didn't bother me at all.

That Thursday the radiologists office called me and told me that they wanted me to come back in for some more pictures and possibly an ultrasound.  They'd found a mass on my right breast that they wanted to take a further look at.  Of course I panicked.  I was able to make an appt. for the following day, as I'm all about getting these kind of things resolved as quickly as possible.

I went into the office and had a spot compression mammogram done, which was basically just a smaller, more specific mammogram.  I then had an ultrasound done, during which the tech and then Dr. confirmed there was a mass.  They told me it looked like it was probably something called a fibroadenoma, which is a benign kind of tumor that is apparently very common in women in their twenties and thirties.  However, they said that sometimes things could present with those characteristics and turn out to be something else, so they would need to do a biopsy to confirm.

I scheduled the biopsy for this past Wednesday.  I could have had it done sooner if I didn't have ibuprofen in my system, as I had to be ibuprofen-free for five days since it can act as a blood thinner.  One of my girlfriends picked me up for a Starbucks coffee date, and then we went to the office for the biopsy.  It was in-office and took about thirty minutes.  They used a local anesthetic and it was basically painless.  I've had cervical biopsies before, and I think they use a similar tool for getting the sample.  I didn't look at it, but it sounds like a hole punch.

They took three samples and also left a clip in me that acts as a marker.  They explained that if it turned out to be a fibroadenoma, it would tell future radiologists that this spot has already been biopsied, and if something was wrong, it would tell future surgeons where to go.  I had one more mammogram before I left the office to confirm that the clip was in the right place, and then they wrapped my chest in a big old ace bandage afterwards, and I left the office with my bra in my purse and a sheet of aftercare instructions. I was told I couldn't shower for 24 hours (ugh), among other things.

My girlfriend took me to lunch after that once she confirmed I was up for it.  I took some Tylenol for the soreness, and she joked that that was the most flat chested she'd ever seen me...I was bound like a girl trying to hide her boobs!  I went home after that and just relaxed.  I tried to get comfortable, I iced my poor boob like I was told to.

I'd asked BF to come over that evening after work, as he knew what was going on.  He arrived around 4pm and we later had crockpot tacos for dinner.  I'd planned ahead for once!  He earned many boyfriend points that day and was asking me what I needed, listening to me vent my fears, distracting me when I needed it, and just generally taking care of me.  My other good girlfriend, A, also stopped by to check on me later that night.  I felt very loved!

I kept the following days as full as I could.  They'd told me it would take 2 days to a week to get the results back.  Thursday I kept myself busy as I could with mundane things around the house once I got home from work.  Friday I went to happy hour with some friends, then got home and crashed HARD by 10pm. Saturday I went to the chiropractor and I ran errands all day long.  Then I met with a girlfriend for dinner and ice cream, and she came over after to hang out.  A came by and joined us, and we just had a nice, impromptu girls night in that evening.  Sunday morning I went to brunch, then to the grocery store, and that night I was super productive around my apartment and wrapped up the night at the gym.

By Monday my patience was wearing thin.  I became convinced I wouldn't hear anything until Wednesday.  I was getting incredibly stressed.  Around three PM, the Dr. who did the biopsy called.  He informed me that it was, in fact, a fibroadenoma, and advised me that I would need to come back in for a 6 month follow up ultrasound just to monitor it.  Bottom line?  I was okay.

I felt such a huge, massive, overwhelming wave of relief, and when I hung up the phone I nearly burst into tears.  I went out to a friend's desk at work and told her, and she gave me a tremendous hug and I felt the weight of the last two weeks lifting off my shoulders.  I relayed the news to those who'd been there for me during the whole thing, and I felt this intense joy and happiness and gratitude for all of the good things in my life, all of the amazing people.

I know some people probably don't think this is a big deal.  They told me it was probably something benign, maybe I was just getting worked up over nothing.  But it was a big deal to me because I didn't know for sure, and it was incredibly stressful.  I spent a week and a half wondering if something really wrong was going on with my body, and wondering how I would deal with it, and if I would be okay.  It made me hesitate booking a weekend getaway in May, it made me unable to focus on anything beyond finding out that news.

Today the only remaining signs of this experience are the steri strips that are hanging on like champs onto my right breast, and the clip they left inside me.  When I went in for that mammogram, I thought I was just getting a baseline for future mammograms.  It didn't work out that way, and I found out that that's pretty common for first time mammograms.  They have nothing to compare it to, so everything can easily be irregular.  I found out that even ultrasounds and biopsies are not hugely uncommon results of first mammograms.  I never knew that.  It was a scary, stressful several days, but I'm glad I did it, and I'm glad the doctors and techs were thorough in their assessment.

Anyway, that's been a lot of my world for the last couple of weeks.  I have more to write about that's unrelated, but for now I'm going to wrap up.

still here!

I am still here, and I'm still reading.  I promise to try better with a goal of getting back to blogging for real at least a bit more often next week!  In the meantime, clinging desperately to the first lingering appearance of springish weather, waiting for more, and super excited for baseball games to be re-introduced into my social calendar.  :-)

Still dating BF, tomorrow marks three months.  Going well, but it hasn't been without growing pains.  There are advantages to being more aware of your past mistakes and missteps, but sometimes too much knowledge can be a pain, too!  We did just book a weekend trip to the Shenandoah Valley for a couple of days the first weekend in May.  Looking forward to that little escape.  :-)