I Will Not Suffer In Silence

I felt crappy on Monday and Tuesday.
Tuesday was even moreso, with the uterine pain and the sloshy feeling inside growing more intense with the commute in to work. My shift started at 8am and I just barely made it before a ‘tardy’ could be declared, because traffic sucked on the way in again.

After fighting traffic and uterine pain, then I sugar crashed. This, after having eaten a full breakfast, consisting of two eggs, two gluten-free waffles, and gluten-free rice milk. I don’t eat eggs very often anymore since the gallbladder pain I had last month, but I was tired of sausage or flax shakes or tuna pate as my breakfast options. I felt dizzy and nauseated and headachey - classic symptoms of the sugar crash feeling. I hadn’t had any wheat, so it must be sugar crash, which ALWAYS happens right before george. I’d been crashing even after full meals at breakfast and lunch for the past few days. This happened around 9am.

And then, george showed up by about 9:30am. The cramps began setting in, thankfully not at warp speed this time, so I pulled my new boss aside and asked for a word.
We went into an empty meeting room and I told her what I go through each month, how it’s being handled by HR, and that it was time for me to go. Told her I’ll likely be out for two days because of the pain. She sounded really supportive and actually even angry on my behalf, for the way HR has been treating me, making me get a doctor’s note each time. She then told me that she went out on maternity leave twice during her employment with this company, and both times she had to FIGHT to get the pay owed her according to the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) - and that this company fought her both times in having to pay out, and did so reluctantly.
WHY the hell would she stay at this company? I’m so sorry to hear her story, because the woman who is now out on maternity leave, the one who broke out in hives in front of me while panicking one day - she was RIGHT and JUSTIFIED in her paranoia surrounding the FMLA. And now she too will have to fight to get the money owed her. All because she wanted to procreate.

So, sucks to say it but it’s good to know that I’m not alone in the harrassment. I’m not singled out.

I got home from work by around 11:30am yesterday and took my medication. I spent the rest of the day in the usual drug haze, with a heating bad on my lower back and another one on my pelvic area. I was stubborn though and couldn’t lay down - was too fidgety - so my pain lasted that much longer as a result, and my entire back felt like it was locked up from steeling against the pain all day.

Eh, good thing I didn’t go in to work today, either. It’s the first rain and traffic is screwed. I’d have been late to work, anyway. Check out the speed limit on south-bound 880 - it’s only 25MPH right now:

I’m actually feeling pretty good right now, but I’m nearly over feeling guilty about work. I’m not beating myself up over it. I acknowledge consciously that although I’m not in pain at the moment, I made the right choice by staying home because it is likely, given the consistency in my pain cycle, that I will be in grave pain today, and I don’t want to be at work when it does happen, because the ride home would be grueling and I’d be crying. Been there, done that. Multiple times in the past ten years.

Oh, on the forgetting note:
Monday night, I RSVP’d with my health counselor to meet her after work on Tuesday. Tuesday night came around and I was lying on the bed with a sore lower back due to george when she came knocking at the door. Whoops. I forgot. Although I really must blame this on the pain meds and medical condition rather than on just all out forgetting. So I’ve forgiven myself. Good thing the health counselor was understanding, too. Good thing she only lives next door.

Still depressed. Still don’t feel like cooking for myself or cleaning house or even sitting up straight for that matter.

But I had a good weekend after Friday night’s mess.

On Saturday there was some grumpiness as we rushed around doing shopping for a backyard BBQ in which the neighbors in our big victorian house all discussed how to turn this place into a haunted yard for Halloween.
I made two pumpkin pies and one was happily devoured by people. I drank several glasses of wine and didn’t get trashed, nor did I have a hangover. My man however got quite drunk, so there was no going out to a club for us that night.
On Sunday, I cleaned house and then we joined up with friends at the tiki bar to welcome home a couple who’d just returned from their honeymoon road trip. I had two drinks on Sunday but did not get trashed.
George pain was intermittent yesterday. I assumed he’d be here by today.

Today the drive in to work was uncomfortable because I have that heavy sloshy feeling in my pelvic region - george is about to lay waste Real Soon Now. I had mild to moderate pelvic cramping intermittently today at work, and while I was on the phone with a new trainee sitting beside me towards the end of the day, I began getting the ass stabbies. I squinted my eyes shut and clutched my fist a couple of times. She looked at me but didn’t say anything, and I recovered and didn’t tell her what was up.

Speaking of telling people what’s up though, on Friday when another cow-orker was in the middle of having another one of his debilitating migraines, he explained to our new boss…wait did I tell you I have a new boss? That happened last week. The cool boss is now working in another department due to departmental reorganisation. Anyway, he explained to our new boss right in front of me (we sit in the same pod) that he’s nearly out of PTO and he’s having a hard time with the HR department because of all the absences and “incidents” even with a doctor’s note each time. Remember that under their insane policy, you can be fired if you use up your PTO days, but if you are off work for the same condition for more than one day, they will kindly count it as an “incident” - which is supposed to, in theory, turn three days off for example into one, relabelled as an “incident”. But .. somehow they can STILL decide to fire you if you have used up the PTO days, regardless of “incidents” and doctor’s notes.
Our new boss was sympathetic thankfully but told him honestly there’s only so much she can do, but that she’ll definitely let HR know how hard a worker he is despite having a medical condition, and that she’s fine with him the way he is. This is how our last boss used to fight for us, so that’s good to hear. So I gave her a heads up, saying that I too have a health condition and would like to talk to her soon.
My one-on-one meeting was supposed to be with her today, but she postponed it.
Well, I might be off tomorrow due to george, so now I have to do a post-mortem with her. Ah well.

Regarding the forgetting…no incidents over the weekend that I know of. Like I’d remember anyway. :p
There was an incident where I lost my phone, but it wasn’t from forgetting where I left it. It had fallen out of my pocket in my man’s car, and thankfully ended up between the chair seat and the passenger door. I found it hours later after having searched the house several times. My ringer was set so lightly that calling the phone didn’t help.
Oh, and I found my car just fine this morning.

10:38pm Edit: I am proud of me! After this post, I got off my ass, sauntered to the kitchen, did some dishes, and went through the fridge and cupboards trying to find something to eat. While I didn’t end up with anything I could eat tonight before bed, I did end up making a spinach and … dammit what’s the name of those… like cucumbers but … ZUCCHINI…. I made a cheesy spinach and zucchini lasagne (rice noodles) which should last me a week! The whole house is filled with the lovely aroma of cheeeeeeeeese. Mmmmmm….cheeeese..

Today at work while I was on a long call with some poor sap on dialup, the building I work in lost power. The incoming calls queued up as a result of us not being able to answer calls because we’d lost power. The outage lasted only a few minutes and then we were back up, but the damage was done - the incoming calls were backed up.

Today everyone was supposed to end their shift at 4pm to allow people time to go home and change into cocktail party wear for a big anniversary party the company is having.
Well, at 4pm something went wrong, and they couldn’t shut down the phone system. So customers just kept calling in like they always do, with 4pm - 5pm being a peak call time normally. Several people managed to leave the building, thinking their shifts had ended, or not caring that the phone system couldn’t be shut down. The few of us who remained, including management, had to hop on the phones to answer the freakin calls.

So I got to work at 7am and didn’t get to leave til 5:15pm.

I may have mentioned this before, but every day my shift is supposed to end at 5pm and I am never out of work on time because the calls are *always* still spiking right to the end of the day, with the last several who were in queue when the phones shut down being allowed to remain in queue until their calls are answered. So I never get to leave on time. And I might have mentioned this before but this is not what I signed up for - I signed up for 8am - 5pm. My expectations were not met and continue not to be met.

So for every minute past the end of my shift, I grow more and more depressed and/or pissed off, on a daily basis, because although I know full well that the calls are not going to cease right at 5pm, it still pisses me off that I’m expected to stay until all calls are clear.

And yes, they CAN fire me if I refuse to comply.

And so it was with today. A glitch on their end but didn’t matter. I had to stay. One of my cow-orkers decided no, he wasn’t going to stay, and he left the building but was forced to come back in or be fired. He complied.
Bloody hell.

The ride home was an exercise in stonefacing so I wouldn’t cry.

I got home and couldn’t find a way to have my meltdown, though I badly needed one.

Then my cat provided it for me.

She jumped up onto the back of my chair and puked down the side of the chair. The cat vomit spilled down the side of my right arm, all over the arm of the chair, onto the side of the chair seat, and onto the floor (thankfully onto the plastic mat my chair sits on).
She then hopped off the chair, ran from the room, and puked in the hallway by the bathroom door.

I got up and couldn’t see very well because in my depression, I’d left the lights in the house dim. So naturally on my way to trying to gingerly step across the floor, I stepped in the cat puke in the hallway.

So while crying my eyes out, I had to mop up cat puke in two places. I stripped off my clothes and put myself in the shower to finish my breakdown.

I went to bed after that.

My man came home and was kind to me. He massaged my back and shoulders. He listened to my story. He sat in silence just being there with me. He let me cry again. He held me. He suggested I quit my job immediately. But I am stubborn. I want to see if they’ll fire me yet for having a health condition, since I’ll be missing work again sometime next week. I keep hanging on.

Now he’s gone to get dinner for us. I love that man.

Soon I will have all of this job crap behind me. Please, soon.

Today at work I had to create a Help Ticket for a customer who needed a domain renewed because it had expired when their account had closed due to non-payment.
They just updated their credit card today, so the billing hasn’t gone through yet, so I can’t submit the ticket to renew the domain until the payment goes through.

Ok, so I created the ticket and left it open and assigned to myself so I can remember to check on the billing for this customer tomorrow.

After creating the ticket, I wondered to myself how long it would take before I forgot I had an open ticket that didn’t need addressing til the next day.

I shit you not, it took less than ten minutes.

I had just ended another support call and went to check the inbox. I saw that I had two tickets - one was escalated so I didn’t need to touch it. But … what’s this? A new open ticket? Where did that come from? Did someone assign me a ticket?

I opened it up and there it was - my face flushing with embarrassment even though no one might know why.

A veritable HAHA! GOTCHA!

It was the ticket I’d created myself less than ten minutes earlier.

And I’d forgotten.

:(

In george news, steady uterine pain all day. The Checking… all day. I betcha five dollars george will be early this month.

Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 11:20:23 -0700

this morning i couldn’t find my cell phone.

looked everwhere.

the last time i had it, it was in my lap in the car.

went out to my car, there it had sat in the driver seat all friggin night. i’d forgotten i had it in my lap while driving home.

good thing it didn’t fall into the street.

good thing no one broke into my car to get it.

________________________________

Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 11:24:26 -0700

my man just told me last night that he would not be on chat today because he’s not at work today (2 days off! go him!).

i didn’t remember and started messaging him at work. i just remembered that he’s not logged into chat today.

________________________________

Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 11:55:55 -0700

i was on my way to make lunch when i remembered that i was supposed to take out the bag of food recycles this morning. I’d set the recyles in the bag and set the bag at the door of the kitchen on the way to the front door just this morning.

And i STILL forgot.

i also forgot i was supposed to work 7am on friday til my boss just reminded the team.
i am now setting a calendar popup for end of day thursday to remind myself again.

________________________________

I’ve been emailing myself every time I have an episode of remembering that I’d forgotten something. I still have post-it notes all over the house and in my pockets to remind me of things.

I want so badly to make time to research forgetfulness, and to research brain injury in depth. I have no time til Sunday.

________________________________

In other news, george pains last night while eating dinner. Pain radiating down my legs to my knees, feels like soft tissue pain. Can’t explain better than that. Happens every month right before george. And the uterine cramps - mild to moderate. Not ovarian. Uterine.

And my forehead and temples are broken out in a pile of zits again - likely because I’ve been overdoing it on chocolate again, and corn syrup-ladden foods. I know I’ve violated my own rule of never eating corn syrup again. I’m in major craving/dietary self destructive mode just before george. He’s due by next Wednesday.

Monday night I realised I forgot to email my health counselor to let her know that I had a work function on Tuesday, so I’d be late to my appointment with her. I said I’d mail her in the morning, knowing full well I’d forget.

Tuesday morning, I was at work and checked my mail, and she’d written to me to remind me of the appointment that night. I wrote back, telling her I was sorry for the late notice but would likely be late.

She wrote back, saying I could meet with her on Saturday instead, if that worked out better for me. I consulted with my man, asking about our schedule on Saturday. I had time to meet with her.

Of course, then I didn’t write back to let her know this - I forgot.

I didn’t remember until I was done with my work event. Then she got an apologetic voicemail.

The work event - they are celebrating their yearly anniversary, so they had us all gather at a brewpub and the CEO gave a ra-ra speech and people were nominated as best cow-orkers, and there was free beer and wine. Everyone got a bonus representative of the months or years they had worked there. This month marks 12 months but not to the day for me - not til the 16th, but still… I MADE IT TO MONTH 12 AT THAT PLACE!
I am proud of me. Now I just need to make it to the 16th without being fired for having a health condition.
I drank 2.5 glasses of wine at the work event. Of course this made me get all chatty and not so shy and socially freaked out.

Regarding george - he’s due a week from today, but as of this past weekend, I’ve started to have symptoms. The symptoms cropped up when I ate certain foods. I had coffee during the day, and ice cream in the evening on Saturday, and within 2 hours of each consumption, I was having light uterine cramps. This lasted through the next day before subsiding. I’ve had gassy stomach SINCE Saturday, of the likes that normally appears within 3 days of george.

On Monday, I drank 1/3 cup of coffee and again got pelvic pain.

Just now I got a sharp stabby pain in my left lower pelvic region - probably ovulating.

Right now I’m eating cheese with my breakfast sausage, so that’s not helping with the gassiness.

That’s the brain, employment and uterine report for the day. I’m off to work soon.