Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Grandpa's farm
A couple of weeks ago we decided to take a day trip to visit Grandpa and his farm. In the almost 12 years that Jeff and I have been together he had never visited Grandpa's farm! I'm so glad he finally did and I think Grandpa was too. ;)
Sunday, February 07, 2010
The Birdhouse Project
Did we mention that Jeff recently co-wrote a book? Oh, and did we mention that I (fookaDESIGNS) designed the cover for the book? And did we happen to mention that this book came out just two short months ago and so far has really taken off (selling 500 copies) with lots of buzz circulating including newspaper articles and television coverage with demand for presentations and book signings across the state of Kansas??? We didn't?! Well, now we did. :)
It's not that we've been keeping this a secret or trying to hide it from all of you. It's just that, well, we've been working so hard we haven't had a chance to mention it before now. So, we would like to FINALLY introduce The Birdhouse Project - Collaboration of the Heart Mind and Hands.
This first book is a project-based healing book that helps people deal with feelings of grief and loss whether it be from death, divorce or some other painful tragedy. This book tells the story of Jeff's collaborative partner, Kris Munsch, and how Kris found his way to a new normal after the sudden death of his teenage son, Blake. The project gives readers a sense of purpose and direction that can be difficult to find during the emotional crisis that follows tragedy. You can find out more about the book, the authors and the story at The Birdhouse Project website.
And before we fail to mention it, Jeff is currently working on the second book from The Birdhouse Project series. This book will use Jeff's experiences as a teenager as a jumping off point for people dealing with a different kind of loss - the loss of direction and hope - and will be geared towards teens and young adults who find themselves drowning in the consequences of their decisions. Here is a sneak peak of the cover of the new book:
Be sure to keep an eye out for it in June 2010, and join The Birdhouse Project on facebook!
It's not that we've been keeping this a secret or trying to hide it from all of you. It's just that, well, we've been working so hard we haven't had a chance to mention it before now. So, we would like to FINALLY introduce The Birdhouse Project - Collaboration of the Heart Mind and Hands.
This first book is a project-based healing book that helps people deal with feelings of grief and loss whether it be from death, divorce or some other painful tragedy. This book tells the story of Jeff's collaborative partner, Kris Munsch, and how Kris found his way to a new normal after the sudden death of his teenage son, Blake. The project gives readers a sense of purpose and direction that can be difficult to find during the emotional crisis that follows tragedy. You can find out more about the book, the authors and the story at The Birdhouse Project website.
And before we fail to mention it, Jeff is currently working on the second book from The Birdhouse Project series. This book will use Jeff's experiences as a teenager as a jumping off point for people dealing with a different kind of loss - the loss of direction and hope - and will be geared towards teens and young adults who find themselves drowning in the consequences of their decisions. Here is a sneak peak of the cover of the new book:
Be sure to keep an eye out for it in June 2010, and join The Birdhouse Project on facebook!
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
A Long Road with a Final Diagnosis
For those of you who don't know, I just got back from the Mayo Clinic. It was an amazing experience with wonderful doctors, helpful staff and superb organization. The best part is that I came back with a complete understanding of what has been plaguing me off and on for nearly nine years. It wasn't good news BUT it wasn't bad news....so in actuality I guess that makes it good news. After all, I'm not dying so that IS GOOD news.
Where to begin? I guess at the beginning. It all started in 2001. Jeff and I were living in Hays. I had started my first job out of college as a graphic designer. Things were good. Until I noticed I started to lose my hearing in my right ear. It was a gradual loss. Basically, it started out as what I thought could have been an ear infection, but I didn't have any pain and didn't feel sick so I tried not to worry much about it; but it kept getting worse. Eventually, I had a dizzy episode but it didn't last long and I wasn't sure if it was related to my hearing loss. It was enough to get me concerned and go to the doctor. Unfortunately, after hearing tests, MRI's and cat scans they didn't have any answers. Luckily, they didn't see anything majorly wrong (like a tumor) but they didn't have any idea why I had lost my hearing in my right ear. SO I went home and started to teach myself sign language. I seriously thought I was permanently going deaf. Of course I could hear just fine out of my left ear so I REALLY didn't need to learn sign language, but I guess at the time I was in panic mode. Soon I realized that my hearing loss was fluctuating and I went on fine like that for about a year and a half. In that time Jeff and I moved to Topeka and got married.
Things were good (again), when my hearing loss had gotten bad enough in my right ear that I decided to go get a second opinion. I saw a great doctor here in Topeka. Dr. McKnight, who I would recommend to anyone in the Topeka area with hearing loss and vertigo or balance issues. After a thorough appointment with many tests and questions to answer, he diagnosed me with Meniere's Disease. FINALLY an answer, but what is Meniere's Disease? I had no idea. He gave me lots of literature on it and told me while there is no cure there are ways to mange it. In short, Meniere's Disease is a disorder of the inner ear which causes episodes of vertigo (room spinning), tinnitus (ringing in the ears), a feeling of fullness or pressure in the ear, and fluctuating hearing loss. The best way to prevent these episodes is with a low salt diet with no caffeine, no chocolate and no alcohol. So that's what I did. At the time I was only 23...he said I was the youngest patient he had diagnosed with Meniere's Disease (the majority of people with Meniere's disease are over 40 years of age). But he was confident that's what it was.
So I went on with my life now as a Meniere's patient. Luckily, I was able to manage it fairly well and I went on for nearly four years without any major episodes. Life was good (again). It was October 2005 when Jeff and I had decided we wanted to start a family. So I got off birth control. We went over a year before we found out I was pregnant. We were ecstatic!
Unfortunately, we lost the baby in February of 2007. We were absolutely devastated, but soon found out that this sometimes just happens early in pregnancy. We should feel lucky that we were able to get pregnant at all, and we did. We felt confident that we would be able to have success the second time. Unfortunately, throughout this time we were noticing that my Meniere's episodes were happening more often and getting worse, AND now my left ear was affected also. It had gotten to the point that it was time to put having kids on hold and find out what was going on with my ears. I, of course, went back to my doctor who originally diagnosed me with Meniere's. When I told him that I now was having fluctuating hearing loss in BOTH ears he was almost in disbelief. He already had a difficult time diagnosing an otherwise healthy young woman with a rare condition - he could not believe that I would have bi-lateral (both ears) Meniere's, an even MORE rare condition that almost NEVER happens in younger people. SO he sent me to a specialist in Kansas City. Another great doctor, Dr. Cullen, was surprised, too.
Here I was, a 29 year old who appeared to be healthy, but with numerous hearing tests showing that my ears would fluctuate hearing loss, sometimes on a daily basis. It just didn't seem possible. So he went on a mission to find out what was causing this. Within months I had what seemed like gallons of blood drawn, test after test coming back normal. I felt like "a regular" at the lab but nothing was coming back with an answer. Dr. Cullen finally decided to have another CAT scan and MRI done. Since I never actually went back on the birth control, I thought I should just be safe and make sure I wasn't pregnant before the scans. Low and behold, I was pregnant again! Of course, we immediately canceled the scans and went into baby mode. Even my ear doctor wanted me to put everything he was doing on hold and do whatever the baby doctor said to be sure I had a healthy pregnancy.
Unfortunately, I had another miscarriage in November of 2008. Now we were starting to worry that there was something VERY wrong. While we soon found out that my miscarriages were probably due to a low progesterone level that should be easily fixed in my next pregnancy, we still had lots of questions and doubt. Were these two issues (low hormones and hearing loss) related? Was it an autoimmune disorder they hadn't tested for yet? All of my doctors were frantically working together to figure out how to help me. But I was getting worse. My Meniere's episodes were getting BAD. Jeff was having to scream at me in conversations and I still couldn't hear him. I was getting terrible headaches with a feeling that I was going to pass out. I was literally having to lay my head down on my desk at work because my head felt too heavy to hold up anymore. I was dizzy ALL the time. My face felt numb. Every morning I never knew if I was going to be able to hear in my left ear, or right ear or at all! I was shutting down. I didn't want to make any plans with friends for fear that I wouldn't be able to hear that day. I was afraid to talk on the phone, worried that I wouldn't be able to understand what they were saying. I was getting depressed and only isolating myself even more. This was not a good combination.
Luckily, my wonderful husband was always there for me. With his encouragement we decided that I should apply to the Mayo Clinic, order hearing aides and get back on birth control. And in that order that's what I did. While the application was in at the Mayo Clinic and the hearing aides were on order I started birth control again. All of the sudden I was feeling better! I was feeling better physically and emotionally. My hearing got better (not normal, but a lot better) my dizzy episodes were going away. I was actually happy again. Could we have been right that everything happening to me was related to my hormones that were regulated with birth control? My hearing was so much better that I ended up sending back the hearing aides. While I was feeling good we knew that this wasn't the answer. We still wanted to have a family and needed to know for certain what was wrong with me. Within a few months we found out I was accepted to the Mayo Clinic. Of course, the timing wasn't the greatest (it's like when you take your car in to the mechanic it stops making 'that noise' that you took it in for) but we thought if they can't help me than nobody could. So we went.
My appointments were January 18th and 19th. They were amazingly thorough. I had appointments that lasted over 4 hours. I saw 6 doctors in two days with a conclusive diagnosis in the end. I have bi-lateral Meniere's Disease with migraine headaches that can trigger my attacks. Okay...so what do I do with that? Well, we can aggressively fight the migraines with medication and/or diet. But there is still no cure for Meniere's. This is something I just have to live with. I can regulate it with diet, and hopefully by minimizing my migraine attacks my hearing loss won't seem so bad. I will always have fluctuating hearing loss with the risk of losing it completely some day. I will always have ringing in the ears that drives me completely crazy sometimes. I will have episodes of fullness in the ears and probably the occasional vertigo attack. I can always get hearing aides again if I decide I need them, and there are medications to help vertigo, but for the most part, that's it. I am a person with bi-lateral Meniere's Disease. I get migraine headaches. I won't let it bring me down. Of course, I will have my bad days but I can get past them. We still hope to start a family some day and we'll figure that out too. But at least now we know what we are dealing with and we can move on.
It's been a long road and I never would have got through it without the continued support of my family, friends, co-workers and members of our fellowship. Thank you all for your patience and understanding over the years. Thank you most of all to my husband, my best friend, my rock through all of this....I love you. You are all blessings in my life.
Where to begin? I guess at the beginning. It all started in 2001. Jeff and I were living in Hays. I had started my first job out of college as a graphic designer. Things were good. Until I noticed I started to lose my hearing in my right ear. It was a gradual loss. Basically, it started out as what I thought could have been an ear infection, but I didn't have any pain and didn't feel sick so I tried not to worry much about it; but it kept getting worse. Eventually, I had a dizzy episode but it didn't last long and I wasn't sure if it was related to my hearing loss. It was enough to get me concerned and go to the doctor. Unfortunately, after hearing tests, MRI's and cat scans they didn't have any answers. Luckily, they didn't see anything majorly wrong (like a tumor) but they didn't have any idea why I had lost my hearing in my right ear. SO I went home and started to teach myself sign language. I seriously thought I was permanently going deaf. Of course I could hear just fine out of my left ear so I REALLY didn't need to learn sign language, but I guess at the time I was in panic mode. Soon I realized that my hearing loss was fluctuating and I went on fine like that for about a year and a half. In that time Jeff and I moved to Topeka and got married.
Things were good (again), when my hearing loss had gotten bad enough in my right ear that I decided to go get a second opinion. I saw a great doctor here in Topeka. Dr. McKnight, who I would recommend to anyone in the Topeka area with hearing loss and vertigo or balance issues. After a thorough appointment with many tests and questions to answer, he diagnosed me with Meniere's Disease. FINALLY an answer, but what is Meniere's Disease? I had no idea. He gave me lots of literature on it and told me while there is no cure there are ways to mange it. In short, Meniere's Disease is a disorder of the inner ear which causes episodes of vertigo (room spinning), tinnitus (ringing in the ears), a feeling of fullness or pressure in the ear, and fluctuating hearing loss. The best way to prevent these episodes is with a low salt diet with no caffeine, no chocolate and no alcohol. So that's what I did. At the time I was only 23...he said I was the youngest patient he had diagnosed with Meniere's Disease (the majority of people with Meniere's disease are over 40 years of age). But he was confident that's what it was.
So I went on with my life now as a Meniere's patient. Luckily, I was able to manage it fairly well and I went on for nearly four years without any major episodes. Life was good (again). It was October 2005 when Jeff and I had decided we wanted to start a family. So I got off birth control. We went over a year before we found out I was pregnant. We were ecstatic!
Unfortunately, we lost the baby in February of 2007. We were absolutely devastated, but soon found out that this sometimes just happens early in pregnancy. We should feel lucky that we were able to get pregnant at all, and we did. We felt confident that we would be able to have success the second time. Unfortunately, throughout this time we were noticing that my Meniere's episodes were happening more often and getting worse, AND now my left ear was affected also. It had gotten to the point that it was time to put having kids on hold and find out what was going on with my ears. I, of course, went back to my doctor who originally diagnosed me with Meniere's. When I told him that I now was having fluctuating hearing loss in BOTH ears he was almost in disbelief. He already had a difficult time diagnosing an otherwise healthy young woman with a rare condition - he could not believe that I would have bi-lateral (both ears) Meniere's, an even MORE rare condition that almost NEVER happens in younger people. SO he sent me to a specialist in Kansas City. Another great doctor, Dr. Cullen, was surprised, too.
Here I was, a 29 year old who appeared to be healthy, but with numerous hearing tests showing that my ears would fluctuate hearing loss, sometimes on a daily basis. It just didn't seem possible. So he went on a mission to find out what was causing this. Within months I had what seemed like gallons of blood drawn, test after test coming back normal. I felt like "a regular" at the lab but nothing was coming back with an answer. Dr. Cullen finally decided to have another CAT scan and MRI done. Since I never actually went back on the birth control, I thought I should just be safe and make sure I wasn't pregnant before the scans. Low and behold, I was pregnant again! Of course, we immediately canceled the scans and went into baby mode. Even my ear doctor wanted me to put everything he was doing on hold and do whatever the baby doctor said to be sure I had a healthy pregnancy.
Unfortunately, I had another miscarriage in November of 2008. Now we were starting to worry that there was something VERY wrong. While we soon found out that my miscarriages were probably due to a low progesterone level that should be easily fixed in my next pregnancy, we still had lots of questions and doubt. Were these two issues (low hormones and hearing loss) related? Was it an autoimmune disorder they hadn't tested for yet? All of my doctors were frantically working together to figure out how to help me. But I was getting worse. My Meniere's episodes were getting BAD. Jeff was having to scream at me in conversations and I still couldn't hear him. I was getting terrible headaches with a feeling that I was going to pass out. I was literally having to lay my head down on my desk at work because my head felt too heavy to hold up anymore. I was dizzy ALL the time. My face felt numb. Every morning I never knew if I was going to be able to hear in my left ear, or right ear or at all! I was shutting down. I didn't want to make any plans with friends for fear that I wouldn't be able to hear that day. I was afraid to talk on the phone, worried that I wouldn't be able to understand what they were saying. I was getting depressed and only isolating myself even more. This was not a good combination.
Luckily, my wonderful husband was always there for me. With his encouragement we decided that I should apply to the Mayo Clinic, order hearing aides and get back on birth control. And in that order that's what I did. While the application was in at the Mayo Clinic and the hearing aides were on order I started birth control again. All of the sudden I was feeling better! I was feeling better physically and emotionally. My hearing got better (not normal, but a lot better) my dizzy episodes were going away. I was actually happy again. Could we have been right that everything happening to me was related to my hormones that were regulated with birth control? My hearing was so much better that I ended up sending back the hearing aides. While I was feeling good we knew that this wasn't the answer. We still wanted to have a family and needed to know for certain what was wrong with me. Within a few months we found out I was accepted to the Mayo Clinic. Of course, the timing wasn't the greatest (it's like when you take your car in to the mechanic it stops making 'that noise' that you took it in for) but we thought if they can't help me than nobody could. So we went.
My appointments were January 18th and 19th. They were amazingly thorough. I had appointments that lasted over 4 hours. I saw 6 doctors in two days with a conclusive diagnosis in the end. I have bi-lateral Meniere's Disease with migraine headaches that can trigger my attacks. Okay...so what do I do with that? Well, we can aggressively fight the migraines with medication and/or diet. But there is still no cure for Meniere's. This is something I just have to live with. I can regulate it with diet, and hopefully by minimizing my migraine attacks my hearing loss won't seem so bad. I will always have fluctuating hearing loss with the risk of losing it completely some day. I will always have ringing in the ears that drives me completely crazy sometimes. I will have episodes of fullness in the ears and probably the occasional vertigo attack. I can always get hearing aides again if I decide I need them, and there are medications to help vertigo, but for the most part, that's it. I am a person with bi-lateral Meniere's Disease. I get migraine headaches. I won't let it bring me down. Of course, I will have my bad days but I can get past them. We still hope to start a family some day and we'll figure that out too. But at least now we know what we are dealing with and we can move on.
It's been a long road and I never would have got through it without the continued support of my family, friends, co-workers and members of our fellowship. Thank you all for your patience and understanding over the years. Thank you most of all to my husband, my best friend, my rock through all of this....I love you. You are all blessings in my life.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Happy Thanksgiving!
Jeff's favorite day of the whole year! This was our very first, on our own, REAL thanksgiving meal....just the two of us. It was AWESOME!
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Winter Toys
Shanon and I are anticipating some rough roads on our journey ahead (only literally) and we weren't willing to be snowbound this winter. We retired the old Chevy (she's been a good girl) and stepped up into ManLand with this V-8, F-150. I'm in love all over again. . .
And winter may have leap-frogged over most of fall, but I wasn't willing to admit defeat just yet. I rolled out the bike, feeling like the bundled up little kid in "A Christmas Story" and took off for an afternoon. I think Shanon thought I was insane (again).Western Kansas
Life had gotten pretty crazy, so I took some time out to go west to visit my grandmother. I made sure I took my time getting out there because I just wasn't willing to be one more rat in the race anymore, and there were just too many reminders of a slower time for me to get in a big hurry.
The Field Boss. Shanon and I both thought he'd make a great Disney character.
I'm always trying to convince Shanon to go pet the cows, but she thinks I'm crazy. Since she wasn't there, and I know she really wants to pet a cow, I took these pictures for her.
Small Town, USA. There is something so honorable about this lifestyle. But don't let me romanticize it too much, I'm sure there's B.S. everywhere.
"And yet, and yet. . .And yet, someday
This new road
Will be the old road, too."
Take heart.
Fall Day in the Flint Hills
It was a beautiful fall day, so we loaded up the fam-damily and headed out on the Native Stone Scenic Byway, both looking our respective bests.
There were some really beautiful limestone structures along the way, but certainly the most amazing sights were the fall colors that surrounded us.
Anybody who says Kansas sucks has no sense of appreciation for history or adventure. But keep hating it - they only need ten more of your kind in California before the whole damn thing drops off into the ocean. I kid, I kid. . .
Still Kansas, bitches.
In all seriousness, this beautiful, but simple monument was just outside of Eskridge on the side of the road, and we couldn't help but think how fortunate those buried here were to be treated with such kindness and reverence. What a wonderful place to rest for eternity.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
