I Will Not Suffer In Silence

Yesterday was quite the roller coaster. I went in to work and the director showed up and said hi. I forced a cheery ‘hi’ back at her. She’d never returned my calls about my missing keys on Tuesday, so I was mad.

Then one of the supervisor/permanent teachers came up to gossip to me that while at the Zoo on Tuesday, she mentioned to the director that I’d be getting my doctor’s note to her for next week, when I’m due to be out ill for the first time since taking this job (my illness, Endometriosis, is highly predictable as it is tied to menses). The director snipped, “what illness?” and proceeded to tell this co-worker of mine that I’d never informed her that I am ill. The co-worker’s jaw dropped. She said she was right there when I told her on the first day. The director denied it all.

See, this is what I was trying to avoid.

Then, all the rooms were over ratio by 9:15am and the director pulled the two full-timers from us and said they needed to all huddle in the Director’s office for training on the employee manual.

UM, WHAT?

California law dictates I have a MAXIMUM of 6 Toddlers, aged 1 1/2 to 2 1/2.

I had NINE.

California law dictates a teacher can have a MAXIMUM of 12 children, aged 3 and up, in a room at a time.

Temp C, the other woman there who knows what she is doing, had FIFTEEN.

This went on for over an hour and per all the other temps there, this happens ALL the time.

She gave notice.

Oh shit…

So I got pissed off and called my agency and reported we’re over ratio. The agency called up the church board who runs the daycare, who then called up the Director. Within half an hour, the two full-timers came out to help us.

I was taken aside by the senior most full-timer and asked what my problem was. I cited state law. She point blank told me that the children I’m caring for, some still in diapers and nowhere near potty training, some still not even speaking yet, ARE NOT TODDLERS.

I looked at her like she was retarded. I cited that the definition of a Toddler is 18 months to 30 months of age, and that’s what I had before me, here, NINE of them.

Her reply? “Not in this school, they’re not considered toddlers. They’re PRE-SCHOOLERS”.

I laughed out loud and told her I should walk off the job right now.

I was called into the Director’s office and asked why I thought I should only have a maximum of 6 toddlers. I got the same B.S. from the Director over the definition of Toddler.

I about quit right there, but the director asked me to lay it all out on the line, what was bugging me about the place and the staff. So I did. I told her about the abuse from Temp B. I told her about the lack of security and the front door being broken and the security gates between classrooms also being broken, so children wander off all the time. I told her she’s never around to see what all goes on, and that I am not comfortable even talking to her. She was beside herself with surprise, and cited ONE DAY where she was here all day in the past 7 days that I’d worked there. This apparently was good enough “proof” for herself that she’s always available for us.

I also told her about the rumours over my illness. She flipped her shit at me, demanded to know who told me this, and said she NEVER said those things. I told her GOOD, because I don’t want to also have to bring in the labor board over this. I refused to tell her who told me, and said that I don’t know who to talk to, who to trust, or who to LISTEN to in this place, it’s so whacked, so I’m not even going to name names in this instance, just drop it. She glared at me. I raised my eyebrows in a “I dare you to fire me over this” stance.

This woman accused me of lying to my agency about ratio, and berated me. She said now she has to call the agency and stop them from filing a report with Social Services and licensing. I just sat back and smirked at her. This woman is off her nut.

She forbade me from talking to the full-time staff about any issues I have, and told me to report things directly to her ONLY, that the full-timers are NOT supervisors, they’re my co-workers. I smirked again and said I’d certainly look for her then when I have something to speak up about.

After our vent session, I went back outside with the children and other teachers, and abusive Temp B started venting at me, saying that the Director had called up our agency to ask what California law is regarding ratio after she’d complained to the director about being over ratio not long ago. She told me that the agency was shocked that the director of a daycare would call and ask what California law is…

Temp B was fired later that day, based upon the testimony I gave about last week’s cot-slamming incident.

Temp C’s last day is this Friday because she can’t handle that place anymore. I’m losing my only competent co-worker. :(

I’m thinking I’m not going in to work today because I feel sick to my stomach and I’m having some Endometriosis pain and I just can’t handle going there today. I may change my mind at the very last minute. Not sure yet.

Meanwhile, I’m still getting all sorts of compliments from parents on the daily sheets I’m providing them on how their children did in my class all day. Yesterday, one parent was even excited that I noted that her child had a bowel movement in the toilet. She said it’s important to know if her child is constipated or not, and had felt weird having to ask staff a “gross question”. I told her at toddler age, it’s VERY important for the parents to know the progress of potty training! She thanked me again.

Today was my first day back to work in seven months, since the dotcom job fired me for missing 1-3 days of work each month due to Endometriosis.

I am no longer working in the computer industry. THIS EXCITES ME TO NO END!!!

I’ve gone back to what I started out doing in life – what I went to school for –

I’m corrupting the minds of children aged 2 – 5.

Today went well because I was told by phone yesterday that I’d be on probation and could be sent home immediately if I wasn’t a good fit…

…and by lunchtime, they asked me if I could come back next week, and asked if I’d be interested in long-term employment. ;)

The only issue now is the agency that sent me to the daycare. They didn’t tell the daycare that I was part-time. They didn’t tell the daycare that I have an illness which renders me bedridden each month. They didn’t fax a timecard to the daycare and I had to call them to do it. And the daycare assumed I’ll be a substitute teacher to start off, instead of a head teacher, like the agency promised. This means up to a $4/hr difference in pay and needs to be figured out ASAP, as it affects MY decision to stay on with the daycare because I cannot live on anything less than head teacher salary, full time or not.
So unless the agency gets the pay we agreed on and gets it to me in writing, and/or unless the daycare decides they love me so much that they’ll make me a head teacher on the spot, I will find myself in a quandry.

But right now, I am not stressed over it. I’m exhausted. I’m happy – kids make me happy. And I’m covered in dirt and sunblock and sweat. So it’s nice lovely protracted shower time!

And I have three days before I have to go back to work again.

Elliptical: 25 minutes at incline 1 and resistance 1, slow to moderate pace, and I STILL managed to pull a muscle in my left calf. 200 calories burned – I quit 5 minutes before the 30-min mark to avoid really screwing myself up.

Arm/Torso machine: 10 minutes on medium-high resistance. 50 calories burned.

Treadmill: 10 minutes at brisk walk (2.5 on the monitor), which actually helped my calf to feel better. 50 calories burned.

After the workout, I went and washed my car, which of course is upper body workout when handling the soap brush and keeping the power wash hose nozzle depressed. Wheeee!

I really need to clean the inside of my car – not that it’s too messy – it’s just that the upholstery hasn’t ever been cleaned and so it kinda smells like old lady in the car.

But first, I’m recharging with breakfast. I ran out of strawberries, apples, walnuts and almonds, so instead of my usual fruit salad, I blended up yogurt, flax seeds and flax oil, honey, cinnamon, a splash of vanilla extract, a splash of orange juice, and a splash of vanilla almond milk. I’m eating 2 fried eggs on top of two gluten-free waffles for protein.

Note to self: pay attention to how you feel after eating the eggs, as they are suspects in a plot to murder you, along with other known killers; caffeine, wheat, yeast, corn syrup, beans and cow milk.

January 6, 2009 Edit: Sorry it took so long to get back to myself regarding the eggs…what happens is I get racing heart, itchy and anxiety/panic attacks within an hour of eating straight up eggs. I can eat eggs mixed into stuff, like in gluten-free baked goods. But eggs by themselves cause a reaction. I stopped eating eggs on their own permanently sometime around November, 2008.

All better today! YAY!

So I went to the gym:

Elliptical: 30 minutes at incline 1 and resistance 2, moderate pace to Industrial music (my normal music choice for workout). 250 calories burned.

Arm/Torso machine: 10 minutes on medium-high resistance. I want to say 32 calories burned but can’t quite remember.

Treadmill: 10 minutes at brisk walk (2.5 – 3.2 on the monitor). Forgot how many calories burned. I want to say 64 calories burned but can’t quite remember.

Now I eat brekkie – fruit, nuts and yogurt.

I went for a walk up Park Street and back today. I walked around in three stores along the way. So in all, I walked 1.5 miles today at the very most.

This triggered pelvic pain and low back pain – enough that I’m going to take 600mg Ibuprofen firstly to see if that helps, then move on to the Tylenol 3 by 5pm if the Ibu doesn’t help.

And I’m SUPER TIRED. Extremely tired. Oh and emotional. Like, I’ve-already-cried-twice-today-and-I-rarely-cry emotional. So I’m still not back to my old self. I started to cry in one of the stores I was visiting because the greeting cards touched off my already high-emotions. I wanted to get a card for our DJ who just lost her father.

Stoopid hormones. Stoopid illness.

The thing is, there’s no bleeding today. That’s gone. It’s just the pain. Eh, fine. That’s one less thing to have to deal with.

Tomorrow.

Tomorrow I will be all better.

Next month, I get this bullshit TWICE! start of the month and end of the month. But I should be golden for Club Gossip and/or New Wave City with my friends. HAH. GOOD. bastard.

Note to self: just because you are feeling better and there is no physical sign of the do0m, doesn’t mean it has gone away, yet. You should know this by now. Stop trying to LIVE life and be active in any sense of the word for one week out of every month.

Note to the world as to what got me in trouble:

I did laundry, people.

Laundry.

It all came back – the pain, the gross, the weak and shakey. Now I’m on Tylenol 3 and Ibuprofen 600.

Of course, laundry is still going, so I must finish it, and my man is off at practice. When he gets home, he will have less than an hour between practice and game night, so he can’t really assist with the laundry. Must finish.

Saturday morning I awoke from nightmares of gushing everywhere and as expected, upon awakening, I really was starting to gush. Thankfully I awoke before bleeding through to the bed.

I was bleeding heavy throughout the morning, and at one point turned pale after breakfast of yogurt and fruit. I staggered to the bedroom and curled up on the bed. I wasn’t in much pain – it was just that I was bleeding a lot.

I had run out of Ibuprofen 600 on Friday, and so I took 3 regular Ibuprofen pills in case the pain came back.

We had a cake tasting and engagement photo shoot scheduled yesterday. I cancelled the photo shoot. I took a nap until around 1pm and then decided I’d try to make it to the cake tasting. After all, I’d get out of the house for a bit and I’d only be sitting in a bakery shop – I wouldn’t be doing anything strenuous. So I hopped in the shower and got ready to go.

We made it to the cake tasting in time, and I was not in pain. I had even stopped gushing. I was just very tired. But I was so glad to be out of the house!

Unfortunately during the cake tasting, I ingested a little cake (my man tastes the whole piece of cake, while I poke at the cake and just taste the icing, or I DO taste the cake but spit it back out in a napkin). As a result of accidental ingestion, I felt a bit sugar-crashy and my ears got plugged up. That’s what happens when I have gluten. Thankfully it didn’t last long and thankfully I didn’t ingest enough cake for the yeast ingredients to have an effect on my body. Otherwise I’d have been in the bathroom all afternoon.

After cake tasting, we decided that since we were so close to wine country, that we’d hit up a few of our favourite wineries and price out cases of Cabernets, Merlots, Chardonnays and table wines. I was slow in my walking but I soaked up the outdoors and the sunlight. I was happy to be out with my man, even though I was admittedly grumpy after the cake tasting (the woman there was attrocious – she wouldn’t shut the hell up about HER wedding, about how her husband is a FRENCH pastry chef and only uses REAL ingredients. And she wouldn’t leave the table so we could taste alone in peace. So we simply ignored her as much as we could and talked amongst ourselves while tasting. I asked for buttercream and piping. She said no. I asked for a gluten free side cake. She said they don’t know how to do gluten free. We pointed out certain designs we liked. She wasn’t sure they could do it. We WON’T be going with that place. And then there’s the fact that I had a bit of an allergic reaction, so I was grumpy afterwards.

Anyway, so we went to our wineries and did some tasting. It had been a few hours since I’d had any meds, and my last meds were over the counter Ibuprofen, so I tasted some wine. I didn’t do my usual tasting, where I finish the glass. Instead, I took only small sips, up to three sips, and dumped the rest in the whatever it’s called.

When we got home, we went to Boston Market to get an easy dinner. On the way, however, we passed an accident scene. Apparently there’d been a fun birthday party for a little girl dressed in what looked like a wedding dress; sparkly white poufy dress. There was a bouncy castle and a side street was blocked off for the festivities. She and other children and adults were standing on a corner looking aross the street as we approached the intersection. We got to the intersection and turned left to go to Boston Market, and we saw the problem. One of the children from the neighborhood was lying in the street with his head propped against the curb. His eyes were closed and his brow furrowed. There was a cut on the right side of his forehead. There were police in the street but they’d not blocked off the street. I don’t know why we were able to drive right past the scene like that. Some people were holding each other and crying. It was so sad.
I lost my appetite but we continued on to Boston Market, just a block away, anyway, and got our food and left. When we left, a fire truck and ambulance were there, assessing the boy. I hope he’ll be okay. I couldn’t find any news on it last night. I still can’t find any news on it today. :(

After dinner last night, my man and I started designing our wedding cake, so the next baker we go to, we can have designs ready to go instead of hemming and hawing and trying to verbally describe what we want. Should’ve done that from the beginning but oh well.

I’m off to do housework. I feel better today. Barely any bleeding and no pain.

I was really out of it this morning and felt VERY weak. My friend came over and we went out to the backyard and sat in the sun for a bit. It felt really nice.

I had no pain or very little pain for much of the day!

I was very tired and weak but so happy to not be in pain, so around 4pm, another friend and I went out to Beverly’s. She drove me there in my car. While ambling through the aisles, I felt a gush and said ‘oh no’.

I told my friend we had to go – that I’d be in pain Real Soon Now.

I popped a Tylenol 3 on the way home, and when we got back home, I settled in on the couch, but my stomach was upset. I began to shake and feel nauseous. I told my friend that usually this is a bad sign.

I’d say within half an hour of being home, the pain set in (This is a long time compared to what happened to me last month when the pain slammed me).
I had gush first, then nausea, then slowly ramping up pain. Then the pain got worse and I got down on the living room floor to do the yoga ‘child’s pose’ like I’m instructed to do for the pain. It helped for mere seconds, then I’d have to sit up and slowly stretch out my torso so to avoid the pelvic and stomach region from clenching from the pain.

The living room floor was too hard, so I went into the carpeted bedroom and laid down on my back. This is when the pain level went through the roof, and my body began to really shake and quiver, and I nearly hyperventilated from the pain as tears streamed from my eyes.

My friend sat with me the entire time, holding my hand, asking if I would need anything, talking with me, BEING THERE.

She knows – she has Endometriosis, too. She had the same surgery I did and has had relief from it, thankfully. Although she’s got a cyst again, she says she’s not anywhere near the pain she used to be in.

I popped another Tylenol 3 and continued to just talk and breathe and cry. Finally after about half an hour, the pain passed and the drugs kicked in, and so we just laid there – she on the bed and me on the floor and then slumped partially on the bed – just talking. I thanked her for being there for me.

When my man came home from work, we deliberated on what food to get for dinner, since I’m in no shape to make dinner. My friend said she should get home, so my man drove her to the train station and went to pick us up some food from Boston Market… but they closed for the night! :(

So now he’s home and we’re trying to figure out what to do. We have plenty of food in the house but I can’t think up a meal – I’m in no shape. Food. I just need food. I’m so hungry I could eat my cat. DOOD JUST MAKE ME SOME FOOD SHEESH :p

Gah. Men.

George is a tricky bastard. He arrived on May 6 around 10:30pm. I medicated with Ibuprofen 600 and felt moderate cramps come on before the meds fully took effect. I went to bed.

Woke up on May 7 (yesterday) in moaning pain, and took a Tylenol 3 and went back to bed. Woke up and george was gone. But I still had cramps. I had really bad low to mid back pain all day yesterday. But no george. WTF.

I took Ibuprofen 600 before bed last night. Woke up in the middle of the night and there was george.
I woke up this morning to moderate cramps and popped a Tylenol 3.

I’ve only had fleeting moments of feeling pain-free despite the medication. today. I’ve popped an Ibuprofen 600 two hours after the Tylenol 3 and STILL the pain is enough to make me want to cry.

I’m not comfortable in any position. I’m not comfy with a heating pad. I can’t sit up to do the yoga because my back is in screaming pain. I just want to lay here and cry all day.

The pain is not the severe pain that landed me in the hospital last month. It’s different but it’s what would be in the realm of ‘normal’ pain for me. :(

It took all my strength just to make breakfast of yogurt, sliced apples and strawberries, chopped walnuts and almonds, and the flax seed and oil mixture.

I want a massage.
I want a warm blankey.
I want a wheelchair ride in the sunshine but the wheelchair has to have such awesome wheels and shocks that I don’t feel any bumps.
I want my mommy and a colouring book. And when I say ‘mommy’, I don’t mean my ultra-whacked out christian fundamentalist biological mother. I mean I want the idealised mommy you only read about in happy fairy tales.

Blah. gonna go cry now.

Elliptical: 30 minutes on incline set to 2 and resistance set to 1. I had fat burn going, and sometimes reached into the cardio area, and generally sweated my ass off. I burned 250 calories.

Torso/Arm rowing: 10 minutes on medium to medium-high resistance. 64 calories burned.

Now it’s T-minus one day til bleedy doom, and I’ve only had very minor symptoms. Much better than some months, when I’m feeling crampy, cranky and rundown a week beforehand! Some months, I’d swear I was 80 years old, my body feels so broken right before the do0m.

Although today at the gym, I could feel the uterine cramps coming on. They were minor but they were there. And I have been SO extremely tired today.

Here’s hoping my descent tomorrow isn’t harrowing.