Midnight Meanderings

Yes, I've been a very bad blogger. Lots of reasons, including being just incredibly busy with work, with life, with fighting depression and burn out, but there was more.... it's not about political correctness but some of my opinions on the things that have been uppermost in my mind would possibly hurt some people who read here, people I care about and I didn't need to blog so much that it was a price worth paying. And sometimes it seemed all I needed to say every single day was "please make the (FM) pain stop so I can sleep - or walk" and, well, that's just incredibly boring. All of the above made me pull away from blogging here.

But, anyway, life is normalizing again and I thought I'd look in here and say hello.

Here are the highlights (and some lowlights):

• I've had one good week this entire year when the FM hasn't been 'flaring' (can I even call it a 'flare' when the agony is constant?). Despite that, I was making some headway in the sleep department until the last month or so. Hopefully, with things settling, I'll be able to get the sleep under control again, even if I can't do the same with the pain. Problem is, the pain is often what's keeping me awake now.
• Work has been incredibly busy and will probably get busier still for at least a few more months. Still enjoy it for the most part, though. Like a lot of the people I work with and the public I deal with every day.
• Not wanting to just sit here and whine about being lonely without doing all I could to remedy that so I could at least tell myself I tried, I joined eharmony (encouraged by a friend who had used it) about the time I wrote my last blog entry. I was VERY impressed with how they did things, though I didn't expect any results from it for me for a variety of reasons. Despite myself (among other things, I didn't put a lot of effort into it and wasn't planning to until about now), a connection was made. And he doesn't live on the other side of the world or even the other side of the continent. He lives only about 30 miles away and yes, we've met in person a couple of times (would have been more but we've both been so ridiculously busy it's not been possible). It's been nice having someone who seems genuinely interested in daily contact of one kind or another. He's smart and funny and I'm enjoying it for what it is for now.
• Despite the lack of sleep and the pain and some meds that make it difficult, my weight continues to go down. Sloooooooooooooooooooooooooooowly and I have a long way to go but hey, at least it's going in the right direction.
• A good friend of my son's returned home after two tours of duty in Afghanistan. I can't even describe how moving that celebration was. For six of the months he was away, his parents - amazing people in their own right - had their only other child, a daughter, away in Thailand, traveling the country on her own, staying in monasteries and convents, discovering the people and culture. Scary time for them and great happiness to have them home again.
• MY SON GOT MARRIED YESTERDAY!!! That's the big one and the best one and the reason for the insanity of the last few weeks. It's all been good and one of the best experiences of my own life. To get to know my new daughter-in-law's friends, her mother's friends who have all gone above and beyond to help make this wedding happen and be beautiful, has been amazing and moving to me. Planning and shopping and functions and celebrations and happiness and beautiful weather for the day itself, FUN reception with lots of dancing (me too - OUCH!), tons of their friends from out of town (Canada, U.S. and Costa Rica). And, over the last few weeks, constantly coming in contact with men and women of all ages who told me example after example of incredibly kind and wonderful things they'd witnessed my son do over the years and continues to do, all the people he has helped. He and his new bride have so many people in their corner, so many who count themselves as family and have their best interest in mind and are wrapping them up in love.... what more could a parent want for her child? I'll share more about it all another time. There are a few more things to get done this week to completely wrap it up and I look forward to some return to normalcy so I can recover from the physical and emotional fallout. But, really, I'm just so very happy for them both.

Okay, that's it for tonight. Hopefully it won't be another month or more before I blog again.

The title of this blog is very apt..... Life After Death. It really does exist, in all its messiness and craziness, its ups and downs and fun and tears. Michael's been in my thoughts a lot lately; he'd be very glad I'm living my life.