MFA Mama

administrative notes

*   To the person who sent me the eleventy-seven jillion increasingly profane and obnoxious e-mails: just because I didn't address every single one of your poorly-spelled and -punctuated "concerns" in the edits added to my last post doesn't automatically make me a lying liar who tells lies while lying down. It just means that you don't get a public response to everydamnthing you e-mail me. You got a private response to everything up to the point where it became clear that you were less curious about my life and more nucking futs, and after that you got filtered straight to the trash folder.

Figure One: In fact, my people-pleasing schedule is jam-packed for the forseeable future...don't call me, I'll call you.

*   Today seems like an excellent time to refer all interested parties to my About page, which has remained pretty much unchanged since this blog's inception (with the addition of "wife" when I got married, my Pinterest information when I joined Pinterest, and each year to the copyright statement as time has passed, because OBVIOUSLY). If your knickers are currently twisted over anything I've said on here and/or you wish to set me straight on my own life, US health insurance laws, the therapeutic applications of Pristiq, the availability of standardized test results in my home state, the existence of an omnipotent God, or any number of things, really, the disclaimer on there is for you.

*   Maybe the party the two preceding bullets were directed toward is just wanting to keep me from missing The Narcissist? If that is the case then a) I don't, not a bit and b) those are some mighty big and crazy shoes to fill, and while you get an A for effort, unless you're prepared to make it a lifelong avocation (please don't do that) and get slapped with a restraining order? KNOCK IT OFF. Thanks.

Monday miscellany [ETA] [ETA again)

*   From what I could tell, the second interview this morning went well. They're going to run a criminal background check and talk to my references, and make a decision hopefully by the end of this week. A friend has shared that in her experience this usually means the job is yours unless you are a felon, and since I am not a felon I am cautiously optimistic.

*   I have not made a final decision re: Pristiq vs. Effexor yet. My online research has revealed that Pristiq has the same active ingredient as Effexor, but Effexor contains some other additional "stuff" (possibly inert ingredients?) that seems to heighten the incidence of side effects. Hotter spoke to his mother yesterday and apparently asked her to help us out with this, which I have...let's go with "mixed feelings"...about since I don't know that she can afford to do that. Either way I really don't want to pay as much out of pocket as Pristiq costs, particularly when we need that money so badly for other bills. I have reached out to Anthem to see what my options are for short-term individual coverage in the meantime; if their website is to be believed that may cost about the same as a one-month supply of Pristiq would out of pocket, in which case obviously acquiring health insurance would be the way to go with this and also take care of most of the cost of the prescription. If not then I'm back to making a tough call. Feel free to weigh on on Pristiq vs. Effexor in the interim if you have any experience with either drug and/or switching between the two.

*   Thank you for your kind words, both here and on the facespace/via e-mail, about The Narcissist's passing, and I'm sorry to hear that so many of you also have a narcissist in your family tree. 

*   As part of my duties for Temp Agency #2, I recently helped a client make restaurant reservations and came across this place's website in the process. The image of the roasted bird (it looks kind of small for a chicken; I'm thinking that if they're serving it this way it's most likely a Cornish game hen) on the front page has been haunting me ever since. WHY ARE THE FEET STILL ATTACHED? I don't see how this sight on their plate would enhance anyone's dining experience, and more importantly THEY SCRATCH IN POO WITH THOSE THINGS. Gahhh!

*   I am now within five pounds of my goal weight, which is exciting. I woke up yesterday to find my scale broken (nobody will fess up, naturally) and was seriously bummed as I am looking forward to seeing confirmation of having finally reached my goal, but it still works for weight, just not bodyfat and water percentages. That's fine with me; I don't use the other functions much anyway (I kind of doubt they're very accurate).

*   How are all of YOU? I am super-busy working for Temp Agency #2 as much as I am able to in an effort to keep us afloat over here. I hope your Monday is going well.

ETA: Oh my gentle Jesus, y'all. If you think that I am a big lying scammer who lies on the innernet and scams people for bad fun and profit, please do us both a favor and do not e-mail me offering to help me in any way. Just...yeah. Please don't do that. I now have someone who I thought was a friend accusing me of of either being the unluckiest person alive or having a "huge imagination," based largely on their assertion that pre-existing condition rules have changed and there is no longer a 60-day rule. I was basing my knowledge of pre-existing condition rules in the health insurance industry on information I got from Anthem the last time I shopped for individual coverage with them during The Great Health Insurance Clusterfuck of '11, referenced here and in numerous other posts from the same time period. Apparently (maybe? I don't know but I have already e-mailed Anthem to ask for some quotes and will definitely ask whoever I speak with when someone gets back to me on that) that rule is no longer in effect. I don't know. I'm not an expert by any stretch of the imagination, so please don't base any health insurance decisions of your own on anything I've said on here or decide based on my ignorance of health insurance laws that I'm full of it. Or go ahead, if that's your thing, hell, I don't even know what to say. Also, please don't base your understanding of how Pristiq works on what I have shared here. I'm aware it's not supposed to even start to wear off within one day. I've said as much. Pristiq (apparently, according to one of the several scathing e-mails I have received over the past twenty-four hours from the same party) is not a treatment for OCD. I have never been diagnosed with OCD, which is why I used the phrase "OCD tendencies." My treating physician has theorized that they may be a way that I manifest anxiety, and Pristiq does treat that, so maybe that is why it works for me? I don't know. Your mileage may vary. This message may self-destruct.

ETA (again): Well okay nevermind, I think the person I mentioned above is just afflicted with their very own dose of The Crazy. Because now they're going off on me for things like my non-belief in a higher power, which...I don't even know what to do with that. Oh, and also claiming that the standardized tests in my state have not been graded and there is no such award as the one I mentioned Big Child receiving. Which good grief, I didn't mention the name of the award because I AM PSEUDONYMOUS, FOR FUCK'S SAKE, and yes, actually those tests HAVE been graded (and I sent them a link to an article about the preliminary results). I'm not going to waste any more time that would better be spent working for Temp Agency #2 on this nut-job, and have set gmail to direct any further craziness from them straight to the trash without even showing it to me. Carry on.

redundant

   I lost my mother to mental illness over thirty years ago, but a Google Alert just informed me that The Narcissist died. For me, this is nothing but a relief. I can stop tensing up every time I see a fat bottle-blonde at one of my children's school programs or award ceremonies. The XY has lost his star witness should he take me back to court over custody. And I and the good people of the two (TWO, not just one but TWO) states where there are warrants outstanding for her arrest can sleep a little easier at night.

   Here is where if I was anyone else I'd insert something trite about her finally being at peace, but since I'm me I'll just be honest and say that while I don't believe in any kind of afterlife, if I'm wrong I hope she's getting prodded with the pointy end of a richly-deserved flaming pitchfork right about now. Hard.

Pristiq (yes, still)

   Yes, I am still hung up on the medication issue. I just don't know what the best way to handle this is. The lowest price I have found for Pristiq is at Costco's pharmacy, which you don't need a membership to use. $178.92 is still a lot of money. If I thought generic Effexor would work as well, I'd switch in a New York minute, but I tried damn-near every drug on the market before settling on Pristiq and none of them worked even ALMOST as well for my depression, anxiety, and OCD tendencies. I am kind of attached to the ability to get out of bed, leave the house without fear, and turn pages in a book without turning them back and re-reading the last word three times (yeah, I know, it's dumb, but if I'm not medicated I HAVE TO). If I get the job I'm interviewing for tomorrow, I really want to put my best foot forward, and if I don't my mental state is already going to be in the crapper. The question is, is it worth possibly having my phone and/or electricity shut off to stay on Pristiq?

   If I get the job, I'll just go ahead and get the Pristiq, whether that means getting short-term insurance coverage that will help with the cost or just paying out of pocket. I'm not going to get a job this good and then lose it because I can't stop crying or touching things the right number of times. That would just be dumb. If I don't get the job, that is where the decision gets harder, because it would mean there's no steady paycheck coming in on the horizon (I love Temp Agency #2, but it doesn't pay THAT well). However, it would also mean that things here are about to get super-ugly, and I don't want to do anything to compromise my mental health any further than it would be by things like talking about handing the kids over to my ex indefinitely, getting evicted, etc.

   What do y'all think? What would you do? For the record, Hotter's answer seems to be "GET THE DAMN PRISTIQ, WHATEVER THE COST. I'D RATHER REJECT MY DONOR ORGANS THAN BE AROUND YOU WITHOUT PRISTIQ IN YOUR LIFE." Thanks, honey. I have four more pills, so I need to figure this out soon.

medication update

   The Pristiq Fairy is definitely not getting out of Club Med in time to send the next bottle, and me being unmedicated for depression and anxiety right now is such a horrible idea as to be laughable if we weren't talking about THE END OF MOTHERFUCKING DAYS. My current next-best idea is to beg and plead with my doctor's office to call in Effexor without seeing me first (Pristiq is a derivative of Effexor, which is available generically, and I'm hoping my doctor will take pity on me and be willing to make the change over the phone). I'm going to wait until after my second interview Monday, because I want to be my most fabulous self for that and also if I DO get the job I'll probably use the middle-of-the-month child support to get short-term individual coverage (which is less expensive than regular individual coverage) and my first paycheck to catch up the middle-of-the-month bills, and in that case I'd just be able to fill the Pristiq (if I could scrape together the co-payment, but I'm not going to borrow trouble by worrying about that just yet). Hotter looked nervous when I mentioned the possibility of a medication change and asked if Effexor would work as well. I said no, probably not, but it would hopefully at the very least keep me from having a withdrawal seizure, which if I don't get this job is kind of the best-case scenario: not having a seizure on the way to the homeless shelter. HOW THE FUCK IS THIS MY LIFE, Y'ALL?

   I hate this feeling, the feeling of (to steal blatantly from an e-mail I received from a reader who phrased it better than I ever could) waiting for either the killing blow to land or the cavalry to arrive.

   Probably I won't be on here or The Twitter much for the next little bit; I'm working my ASS off for Temp Agency #2 when they have work for me (which thankfully is almost always). I'll definitely let y'all know how the second interview goes, and in the meantime if anyone needs me for anything just holler via e-mail. I sincerely hope your weekends are going better than mine!

things that shrank my black little heart back down to normal-size

*   An overdraft, and the associated fee, which I can ill-afford right now (when I took Big Child out to celebrate his big achievement, the check went over the gift card balance by a dollar and change, so I used my debit card to cover that and the tip...for some reason, PF Chang's only billed me the dollar and change initially, and yesterday they added the tip...oof).

*   The Pristiq Fairy is in the hospital :( This is mostly unfortunate for her, because Club Med sucks and she's there for some not-good stuff and I Am Worried. It is also unfortunate for me in that this prevents her from being able to send me the next bottle, and I'm going to have to start tapering down after my job interview Monday to avoid going cold-turkey and risking a seizure. This TERRIFIES ME. I can't function worth a crap without that stuff. If I get the job, I'll be setting myself up to look like a mental case, and if I don't get the job, I'm ALREADY going to be super-depressed.

*   I think this current financial clusterfuck may be The Big One, wherein I have to give the kids to my ex so that they can eat and end up losing my home, and I have no idea what to do with that, particularly if I'm off my sanity pills when it all hits the fan. Currently I'm working my arse off for Temp Agency #2 an hoping something unforeseen comes up and saves the day (maybe a callback and quick-hire from one of the dozens of applications I have out?), but if I'm honest I'm not optimistic about that.

things that made my black little heart grow three sizes

   I've been pissing and moaning on here plenty of late, so here are a few POSITIVE things that have recently come up:

*   The kind words from my maternal uncle in the wake of his commenting on here and my subsequent agida. I had finally, after a long and bumpy road and several years of therapy a while back, come to a place of being able to forgive The Narcissist's family for not saving me from her as a little kid, but I didn't even realize how many feelings I was still carrying around on the matter, and I certainly never expected to receive an apology from any of them. That was truly balm to my soul. Sometimes I guess you don't even know what you need until you finally get it?

*   Having recently received a promotion at Temp Agency #2, I got to bring a few qualified folks on board (they have their best employees help do the hiring, with the understanding that your picks reflect on you--it's kind of genius). When a reader of this blog offered me that opportunity it was a real lifesaver, and I was able to pay it forward today to another reader who really needed to find something gainful to do from home while she recovers from some pretty serious injuries. I'm not kidding when I say that y'all are like my extended family in a box; you look out for me plenty and I love it when I have the opportunity to return the favor!

*   Baby hedgehogs are called hedgehoglets. I just...AWWWWWW...

Big Child's big achievement

   Having found out more on The Narcissist's condition, I think it's safe to say she won't be reading anything I write on here from this point forward, so I can go ahead and tell y'all that yesterday my Big Child won THREE academic awards (one for being in the top 10% in the district in FOUR different subjects, one where he was one of only two students in his grade to receive the school's "Thinker" award, and one for straight As for the entire academic year), and was ALSO recognized for achieving a perfect score on the math portion of our state's standardized tests (so clearly the hospital switched babies on me, but I'm not giving him back).

   He asked if we could go out to dinner to celebrate, and I had to say that no, we couldn't afford it. But Hotter and I talked about it and decided that I would use the P.F. Chang's gift card I'd been saving for his birthday to take Big Child out to dinner instead, just him and me, so that is what I did. Big Child had never been to P.F. Chang's, and it'd been a long time since I took him out anywhere (in fact, the last time we all went out to dinner was his birthday last year I think), and he was SO APPRECIATIVE. We talked about the menu, asked our server to answer questions I couldn't (yes, I left the poor guy a good tip--he was a good sport about it and did a great job), and played the "would you rather" game.

   Big Child would rather:

*   Go deaf than blind
*   Eat a single live worm than an entire plate of mushrooms
*   Grow hair on his entire face, including nose and eyelids, than grow boobs
*   Win the lottery than be able to fly

   He's asked me why I'd been upset earlier in the day (I thought I'd hidden it pretty well but he pointed out that I don't attack the yard like that unless I'm upset about something), so I told him about the situation with The Narcissist. "Is it okay if I'm not sad," he asked, "because I really didn't like her when she came to visit. She was mean to us while you were in the hospital and you could just tell she hates taking care of kids." I told him feelings aren't right or wrong, they just are what they are, and that I wasn't sad either. "Because she wasn't a good mom to you. I'm really sorry you had her for a mom. I'm glad you're not like her." Oh, y'all, my heart. My number one goal as a parent is to not be like The Narcissist.

   On the drive home, Big Child asked me if The Narcissist being bipolar mean I might "get it," and whether his father being bipolar meant that he might. I told him that being bipolar is like having ADHD (which Big Child has) in that it may make some things, like being a nice person, or studying, more difficult for someone with the disorder than the average person. "But we all have a choice. Granny is bipolar AND she's not a nice person. They don't automatically go together. I think some people use things like that as an excuse. But just like you choose to work harder than someone without ADHD so that you can still do great things like win all these awards, someone who is bipolar can choose to still be nice to other people even if it's hard for them. I'm past the age where people usually show signs if they're going to be bipolar, and my doctors tell me I don't have it, but if I did I'd just try harder to still be a good mom anyway. If you end up having it, I already know you'll try harder too, just like with the ADHD, and you have a good heart. I'm your mom, so it's my job to worry about everything to do with you, but I'm not worried that you'll be like Granny or Daddy." He seemed satisfied with that.

   I am so proud of Big Child, and I'm glad he thinks I'm such a good mom, but it makes me feel like that much more of a loser for not having the money to take him to the doctor when he needs it. That kid deserves the sun, the moon, and the stars. And doctor visits when he needs them.

   I really, really, really need a job.

 

oh. right.

   I've had the nagging feeling of having forgotten something all day, and I just realized what it was. Big Child has his follow-up appointment with the shoulder specialist tomorrow, and I don't have the $40 for the co-payment. SHIT.

   I went ahead and texted my ex to ask him for help with this, although based on the precedent he'll most likely refuse and then accuse me of medical neglect.

   I guess the good news is, I already have a headache and can go ahead and cry about it?

   Also the place where I interviewed today was supposed to call me back tonight to set up a second interview tomorrow, and didn't, and I had kind of already decided I'd get the job, because otherwise I don't think we're going to make rent next month, let alone be able to get me any kind of insurance before it's been sixty days and the pre-existing conditions all kick in. 

   I don't know what to do.

headache

   I have had a headache for the past three days.

   So far I've tried hydrating, exercising, caffeinating, and feeding my headache, to no avail. The only thing that's helped was the night before last, when I couldn't take it any more and took a dose of store-brand Excedrin. I don't like to do that, though, as I'm a bleeder and the stuff contains aspirin (but oh man, it works SO WELL). And because many of you are medically-inclined and will ask, yes, I took my blood pressure with Hotter's home monitor. It's a little high for ME at 121/68, but I don't think that's anywhere near high enough to blame for the headache.

   I suppose it's within the realm of possibility that this is stress-related. Currently I have less than $5 to my name, the gas tank on the car is empty, the price of generic Mirapex went up to the point that it is no longer feasible to fill that without insurance, and all of this mishegas with The Narcissist probably hasn't helped my mental state any. I really, really, really need to find another job or I don't know how I'm going to keep us going over here. I need to get health insurance by the 28th or everything wrong with me will be considered "pre-existing" and not covered. I need to get my youngest a bigger bed (yes, he's still in a toddler bed, and won't be able to stretch out fully in it if he grows another half-inch). The MFA Beater is due to be inspected next month, and barely runs. I'm taking as many jobs as I can for Temp Agency #2 and hoping for the best, but I'm getting pretty worried.

   Okay, that's a damn lie: I'm scared silly.    

   How are all of YOU?