For the past two weeks I have been barely been able to function. I slept the entire weekend away (4 hour nap on Friday and Saturday, 5 hour nap on Sunday.) and I still woke up on Monday morning feeling like I hadn’t slept in days. The strange thing is that I started taking my new (higher) dose of medication a week ago and instead of feeling better, I was feeling worse.
UNTIL TODAY.
Today is the first day in two weeks that I don’t feel extremely tired. It’s the first day where I have laughed at things I’ve read (as opposed to sitting here like a zombie reading words but truly unable to process what I was reading.) It’s the first day that I actually saw the dirty floor and did something about it! Because I had the motivation and the energy to actually plug in the vacuum! I am so excited about this that there very well maybe tears streaming down my face as I have one fist held high in the hair while listening to “It’s a Beautiful Day” by U2.
These past few days have been awful. I’ve cried more times than I care to admit. My frustration level with this entire ASSHOLE THYROID (Not to be confused with an actual asshole IN my thyroid, Jenn-ay) has reached an all time high. I am willing to accept that it takes time to get my “levels” just right and all of that but HOLY PREMATURE HEARTBEAT, I’ve been dealing with this for over a year now. I would just like to feel semi-normal again. Look! I’m not even asking to be completely normal again! I’ll settle for SEMI normal!
Honestly, I just want to be able to clean my house without it feeling so overwhelming. I just want to be able to go to the gym and not fall of the elliptical because whoops! My knees buckled again! I just want My Horny back.
Last night, my Dad came over for a little unexpected visit (HATE THOSE!) I had just woke up from one of my naps and he could tell I wasn’t feeling well.
I began to tell him how frustrated I was because they increased my medication but I wasn’t getting any better blahblahblah thyroid blahblahblah tired.
“Do you know what it says in Isaiah 53, Mija?”
“No. I don’t know.” I said (which, TOTALLY should know. I spent the entire first 25 years of my life in church.I blame my thyroid! It makes me forget things!)
“It says ‘Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed’ not MAYBE healed, it says we ARE healed. You just need to have faith, Mija. Faith that God has healed you. Believe that he has healed you!”
“But Dad! You don’t understand. My body is killing my thyroid! It’s not going to magically get better! I need medication! For the rest of my life!”
He just smiled and shook his head softly. “Let me pray for you. Will you let me pray for you?”
I agreed to let him pray for me, but the entire time he was praying, I was kind of rolling my eyes because HE DOESN’T GET IT! God isn’t a magician!
But as he was praying, asking God to heal me, asking God to reveal himself to me, to give me faith to believe, I stopped rolling my eyes and began to really listen to what he was saying. And in that moment, I actually envied my Dad. I envied his ability to trust in God and his promises. It’s easy to roll my eyes and dismiss people who have faith, but how wonderful would it be to live life trusting that God will heal you, will take care of your needs? I think there are people who go overboard with the whole “having faith in God thing.” You know, the people who refuse to seek medical care for their sick children because “God will heal them.” I think that’s utter bullshit. However, I also think there is a healthy balance of having faith in God (or a higher power) while doing your part to take care of yourself (seeking medical care/taking medication.)
I don’t know that I’ve ever truly had faith in God. I’ve believe in God, but is believing in God and having faith in God the same thing? Can you believe that God exists and yet not fully trust that he’ll heal you/provide for you?
I want to have that kind of faith and I suppose there’s no magical way of obtaining faith, you just have to like, believe right? HOW DOES THAT WORK? How do you say to yourself “I have faith that I am healed!” and believe it? And if you have faith that God can heal/already has healed you, does that mean you don’t go back in 4 weeks to get your blood tested because “I have faith that I’m healed!” Or, if you do go back to get your blood tested and you find out that you’re NOT healed, does that mean you didn’t actually have faith? Or does that mean that you’re the one person Jesus DOESN’T love? I’m pretty sure that faith is supposed to be this beautiful,simple thing, but to me, it’s the second most complicated thing for me to understand (eternity being the first. Really? FOREVER AND EVER AND EVER AND EVER HAPPY WITH JESUS? That scares me a lot.)
Perhaps it is time that I start going back to church to explore these things because I’m not sure this is something The Internet can solve for me. (See, there I go not having faith again.)

I swore that I wouldn’t drink another drop of liquor for the rest of my life after being saturated with it the entire time that I was on the east coast last weekend. (Wine tasting! Coffee with Baileys! Beer Pong! No, seriously, BEER PONG!!) But! When I swore off liquor, I hadn’t considered the possibility of the words “MOM! There’s a snake in our backyard!!” being uttered from my children’s mouth just two days after my return home.
That’ll make a girl pop open the $2.99 bottle of Wild Vines she’s been saving for that special night when her husband wants sex and she’s like “I AM TOO TIIIIIIRED.” And he’s all “have a glass of wine and just lay there.” And she’s all “Dude, that sounds so awesome. Give me a few minutes to chug some of this shit down and get naked!”
My old neighborhood was not the kind of place I was proud to live. People stabbing each other, people having sex in my front yard, drug deals, restraining orders, rat infested neighbors, tweekers and so on and so forth, but at least I never had to worry about snakes slithering about in my backyard, or fearing for my life when I went to take the garbage out because OH MY GOD RACCOONS! AND COYOTES! AND MOUNTAIN LIONS!
I don’t know if this bottle of wine is enough to calm my nerves right now because Dudes. A snake. In my backyard.
UPDATE!!
After consulting Google, PigHunter is 100% convinced that the snake we found in our backyard is a harmless Garter snake.
And so a cage was built (without my permission) and a new pet was welcomed by everyone (except me) into our family.
Meet Sneaky The Snake.


For “The Record,” I’m SO not ok with this and if I have this crazy feeling that Sneaky just might “accidentally” escape from his cage while the boys are at school.
P.S. DEAR INTERNET,
WE’RE NOT ACTUALLY GOING TO KEEP THE SNAKE. WE WILL SET HIM FREE TONIGHT! So! You can stop worrying about the snake now! Apparently, PigHunter just wanted the boys to experience the snake up close and personal for a bit, but tonight, we shall set him free!

Next time you’re in New York City and you’ve been drinking and you meet up with a bunch of friends to do a little karaoke and Jesse’s Girl comes on and lose your shit because OHMYGOD JESSE’S GIRL IS ON, grab the microphone and proceed to sing 3 steps off key/20 seconds off time and think it would be really cool to do a Microphone Air Drum Move, you miiiiiiiiight wanna make sure that there aren’t any video cameras in the room ahead of time, unless you’re 100% ok with the sober internet seeing it in the future.

Why Can’t I Find a Woman Like That? from mizzjenny on Vimeo.

Tonight while I was blow drying my daughter’s hair before saying goodbye to her, she reached out, wrapped her hands tightly around my neck and said “I’m just so happy for you, Mommy. I don’t know what prompted her to say it, because she’s been crying all day when we talk about me leaving on a plane, but I do know that was exactly what I needed to hear.
I’ll think of that moment every time I feel like crying tomorrow. Well, THAT and also…

This.
I mean, how can I cry when I think of my little Tammy Faye giving me TWO THUMBS UP?
(comments will be held for approval while I’m gone. I don’t want my blog getting killed by spam.)