A Closet Expose'

I have been "tagged" by my friend Tess, (http://archwords.blogspot.com/) in a practice I have never heard of before known as "meme" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme). From what I can gather, this is similar to some blogging rite of passage or world wide web tribal bonding experience or some such thing...At any rate, I am to write a witty and urbane, gritty and grueling expose of the contents of my closet and then tag three more blogging cohorts to do the same, thus spreading the joy and allowing more literary juveniles to cross over into puberty with us really real bloggers, so here goes...

Three Random Facts About My Closet:
1. It is entirely too small.
2. It's doors have not been closed since we moved in.
3. There is no sense of organization to it at all whatsoever.

Three Items I've Never Worn But Still Haven't Tossed:
1. The fuschia prom dress I bought at a vintage clothing store in 1994 and never finished modifying to fit my boobs.
2. The polyester jacket my MIL gave me that I'm too afraid she might actually expect to see me in one day.
3. The black turtleneck MIL gave me 3 Christmases ago.

Three Items I'll Never Get Rid Of, No Matter How Ugly They Get:
1. My favorite corset from Frederick's of Hollywood tho my post preggo body will NEVER fit in it again!!
2. Camel hair long coat my mom bought me in high school.
3. Vampire doll pictured on floor of closet in photo.

Three Items People Wouldn't Expect To Find In My Closet:
1. 5 Barbie Dolls in their boxes
2. Victorian wedding gown I dyed grey and wore 2 Halloweens in a row.
3. Real feather angel wings.

Three items that made me go, "Oh Lord, what was I thinking?":
I don't really have any of these...I threw away most of the "oh Goddess what was I thinking" stuff when we moved to this house.

Three things that I have a surprising number of:
1. Long skirts.
2. Halloween decorations.
3. T-Shirts with lots of holes in them.

Three dominant colors in my wardrobe:
Black, black, and black.

Three items that never fail to put me in a good mood whenever I wear them:
1. Any of my long black skirts.
2. My new purple poncho.
3. My new red silk skirt.

Three people I will tag:
I will tag Natalie (http://looseendsknotted.blogspot.com/) because I love her writing style and she always makes me laugh. I will also tag Smander for the same reasons. (http://mayfamilytreestump.blogspot.com/). Lastly, I will tag Celena, (http://blog.myspace.com/Celena) because I bet her closet is interesting and she's also witty and darn it I'm just greedy when it comes to humor...I like people who make me laugh..I eat it up like Ben and Jerry's Phish Food at PMS time!!

SO.....TAG, YOU'RE IT!!

So in the midst of adjusting to the roller coaster of new medications...(see previous post) we also learned that my husband's hours at work were going to be dramatically cut (from 50 hrs/wk to 35)...this was quite a blow indeed, and our already tight budget got significantly tighter. Hurrican Katrina's effects were far reaching indeed. Bryan works as a temp for the Advance Auto Parts Corporate Call Center as Customer Svc Phone support and the storm destroyed and/or shut down several stores, as well as delayed shipping to several regions of the country. He's actually lucky he even has a job, the only kept 2 other temps besides him.
On the same day he found out about his hours being cut for the second time, our son was diagnosed as developmentally delayed. Chronologically, he is almost 16 months old...his adjusted age is almost 14 months...his language development is that of a 5 months old, and his overall motor skills are that of an 8 month old.
I had feared this kind of outcome for quite a while. It took a lot longer for him to be released from the NICU than his twin sister. He has always been smaller and also sick more often. He had to be hospitalized in May for dehydration. He has also had recurrent ear infections.
He has always been "high needs" and very sensitive, but I thought it meant I was failing him somehow...having never raised a son, I truly felt like I was the weak link in the chain.
The therapists that evaluated him assured me that is not the case, and that I am actually being a wonderful mom to him by getting him tested so early in his life and pursuing therapy for him so aggressively. He is going to have his hearing tested, have Early Intervention here at home 2x a month, Speech Therapy, learn Baby Signs, and probably some Occupational Therapy. I plan to take a very proactive role in his therapies and learn everything I can so I can work with him and integrate the techniques into our daily routines. I want to help him get the most out of his environment and be able to communicate better.

However, since this is my blog, my outlet, I can admit here that I am scared, freaked out, mad as hell, annoyed, and just plain not happy suzy sunshine right now!! It's a damn good thing I'm in therapy myself and on the right%2

Dumb As A Mud Fence...

So the Depakote Definitely didn't work...In the 2 months I was on it I lost 1/4 of my hair, got hemorrhoids, put on 25-30 pounds, couldn't stop sleeping, had worsening heart palpitations, (never good for someone who already has congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy) and was Still a moody mess. I slashed myself with a dirty razor blade and got an infection and started drinking again. I craved carbs and sweets and was binge eating, especially late at night.
I always try to be an informed patient, and when I made the decision to go back into counseling and back on medication for my mental illness, I found a website that to me is Mecca for lunatics. http://www.crazymeds.org/
I did a great deal of research there and went to my psychiatrist and approached her about Topamax...I had my arguments all prepared only to find that she agreed with me completely, (something doctors rarely do, or at least I have rarely had good doctors that treated their patients like they had a brain in their heads at all). She said she likes Topamax and prescribes it regularly and felt I was a very good candidate for it.

I left the office on this med regimen:
50 mg Topomax / 50 mg Zoloft / 300-500 mg Seroquel / 500 mg Depakote x 3 days
50 mg Topamax / 500 mg Depakote / 300-500 mg Seroquel x 4 days
100 mg Topamax / 500 mg Depakote / 300-500 mg Seroquel X 7 days
150 mg Topamax / 500 mg Depakote / 300-500 mg Seroquel X 7 days

I am supposed to return to the office during the last week of the regimen to re-evaluate and work on removing the Depakote and replacing it with something else while upping the Topamax, in order to get the weight issue under control.
Now I knew all about the side effects, having done my copious research...HOWEVER I did not know I would get lost in Wal-Mart!! I did not know I would lose complete track of time...I did not know that when my daughter asked me to spell characteristic for her while she was doing her 4th grade english homework it would take me 2 minutes and 5 tries to do it...I never expected to have to run "spell check" on this blog!! I can count on one hand how many times I have used spell check in 30 yrs!! It is all well and good to know a thing in the abstract and quite another to experience it first hand...
Then there is the experience of trying to talk anytime in the first 3 hrs after you've taken your Topamax/Seroquel cocktail...."No Occiffur...I..thswear imm nut dwunk...tsee...Imm wallkeeng finnuh...iyuh..justht..cannt..talk..." as you wander past the police benevolent association fundraisers standing outside Target.
Although, I am the happiest dumb mud fence I could have ever conceived of being, no homicidal rages, urges to bury perfect strangers in the backyard, driving need to demasculinate my husband on an hourly basis...So I know that the medication is doing what it is supposed to do...And the dumbing down is temporary...Or so I'm told...But at this rate...Soon...I'll be too intellectually challenged to care!!

So Much Pain...

New Orleans is a place close to my heart, 'though I have never been there. It is home to the Cajun people and culture...the heart of American Jazz...Anne Rice and her vampires...stately Garden District Mansions...The French Quarter...Rue Bourbon...Historic above ground tombs and beautiful architecture...or at least it was.

New Orleans was also the home of Loyola University, my first choice college, where I planned to study music. My lifelong dream has been to open a nightclub on Rue Bourbon, where I would sing each night. I started collecting vampire items in high school for the vampire museum I was going to have on the second floor of the club, then live on the third floor where I could look out on my adopted home each night from my balcony.

I have fought back tears so many times in the last few days...there is more pain in my heart than I can express. All the images of suffering, the scope of this massive loss, feels like more than anyone should be expected to bear. Hurricanes are a fact of life here in the south, but the horror and destruction in Katrina's aftermath is nothing I ever thought I'd see.

I am joining with multitudes of bloggers in the relief effort. I have chosen the American Red Cross http://www.redcross.org/ Please, donate whatever you can. If you cannot afford the listed pre-determined donation amounts, please call them at 1-800-Help-Now. No amount is too little.

"I got the ways and means
To New Orleans
I'm going down by the river
Where it's warm and green
I'm gonna have drink, and walk around
I got a lot to think about oh yeah"

Concrete Blonde "Bloodletting"