Now... what, exactly?

It's been an interesting few weeks at the Soup house....

D.Soup now has a red meat allergy.

My self proclaimed "meatatarian" husband can no longer eat beef, pork, or lamb.  His hands and feet start to swell, rashes form up his arms, and he has terrible stomach pains.

Also, pork being "the other white meat" is a lie.  Rude.

All because of a tick bite.

The Lone Star Tick has been spreading across the country, and if it bites you there is a chance that you will develop an allergy to red meat.  The tick carries a sugar called Galactose-alpha-1,3-galactose(alpha-gal) in its belly.  It transfers the alpha-gal to you and your body starts to fight it like it would a disease.  Alpha-gal is also found in the fatty parts of all non-primate mammals.  So when your body processes the fat cells of any red meat that you have eaten, you have an allergic reaction.

...That's my very dumbed down explanation of this whole shenanigans.

What does this mean for us?

We will now be a fish and fowl loving family.  We are only in the first week of transferring over to our new lifestyle and we honestly don't know how much he will be affected by different scenarios.  A lot of people with this allergy have issues eating out because of cross contamination.  We will have to take it day by day.  He has been prescribed an Epi pen, and we now have Benadryl stored in every vehicle and multiple areas in our house.


The good news.

He doesn't (so far) seem to have any feelings of his throat closing up during a reaction.

We already eat a decent amount of chicken.  So transitioning isn't going to be TOO hard for a majority of our meals. 

The other good thing is that turkey is much healthier than beef, so it will help us in our weight loss endeavors.

There is a chance that the allergy will go away on its own (3 weeks to 5 years is the "average"), he has to be careful not to get another Lone Star tick bite, because that will bring the allergy back, or make it worse if he is still allergic at the time of the bite.   

The bad news.

D.Soup hunts.  Deer meat is included in the list of no-nos.  We haven't tested it, and some people say they can still eat it so we are feeling hopeful at the moment.  We shall see.

We also have bags and bags of beef - hamburgers, steaks, ground beef, cubes - in our freezers.  I'm going to have to package everything up and give it away.  At least we know people around us that will take it, so we don't have to throw everything away.

It's also possible that we could deal with cross contamination in our own kitchen.  We use cast iron pans to cook a majority of our meals.  Those could very easily have remnants of meat that might affect him.



There's so much more.  I start thinking about it and I end up in a rabbit hole of stress and panic.  We just don't know everything that he will react to so its a strange and slightly scary time for us me.  He is less panicked than I am, at least externally.  I think if I wasn't so stressed about it he would be more stressed, but for now he has to deal with all my craziness so he's taken on his job as the confident one.

I can't believe that a tick bite can do this to people.  Hardly anyone knows about it either. Almost everyone that we've talked to has been completely dumbfounded that this is even a thing.

The allergist that D.Soup saw to get tested for alpha-gal was actually excited (for herself, not for him) that he was there.  She told him "I've studied this but have never actually seen a case of it before!  I'm going to have to do some more research!"

I will continue to post any changes.

Poor puppy

Calli had always been a little crazy.   We have gotten used to that over the last two years.   She jumps even though we've tried to stop her.  She licks.  She gets ridiculously excited if you even look at her in her general direction.  She frantically runs around the backyard at full speed.   She's part off the reason we got this house, because of how great this yard is and how much she loves to run. 

Well last weekend she was doing just that while D.Soup and his brother put his new shed together.  She either took a wrong turn our stepping down wrong.   She has not put her right hind leg down since.  She had some issues a few weeks ago where she would pull that same leg up, but she always ended up back to normal so we didn't think too much of it.

We took her to the vet Monday before we left for vacation.  She was pretty sure a cruciate ligament was torn, but wanted us to check with an orthopedic.   She gave us some doggie ibuprofen to help with the pain and told us to keep her off it as much as possible.

We gave her a lot of down time while at the beach even though we could tell she was getting cabin fever.

When we got back from vacation we took her to see a doggie orthopedic.  He checked her leg and watched her walk, and verified that she had torn her Cranial Cruciate Ligament.  It's like the human Anterior Cruciate Ligament.  He highly recommended she have surgery to repair the damage, because if not she would have really bad arthritis in that leg. 

We said our goodbyes, and went home to make a serious decision.  There are two surgeries that will fix a torn CCL, both are expensive.  The first takes a type of string, and mimics the positioning of the cruciate ligament.  Scar tissue build up over time strengthens this hold.  The surgery is the lesser expensive of the two.

The other surgery is called TPLO, and it changes the angle that the knee sits, removing the need for the ligament completely.  Its more expensive than the first option.  But the vet (and another vet who is a relative) said that it is much more likely to be beneficial in the long run because of Calli's size, age and activity level.  She's almost a large breed dog, just on the cusp.  And she's only 2.

So we made our decision to get her the TPLO, and Wednesday morning we dropped her off for surgery.  I was so upset all day, and worried about her.  They called in the afternoon to let us know that she did great, and that she was out of surgery and resting.  We had to wait until Thursday afternoon to pick her up.

Thursday rolled around and we anxiously worked a full day.  Our appointment to pick her up was at 4 pm.  When we got there they were telling us all about how she hates the cone (which we already knew) and how she had broken free multiple times.  The vet even called her "Houdoggie".

They gave us her medications, and instructions to keep her fairly stationary for the next 2 weeks.  We also have to prevent her from licking her leg. 

This was her on the ride home:

Not happy about this situation.

Sad little leg:

Naked leg.

She was much happier when we got her home and settled down. 

Happy now that we're on our bed.

I gave her some food, right in front of her face.  But apparently she was just.too.tired. to eat it.  Which was fine with me.  I also gave her water out of a solo cup, so she wouldn't have to get up and walk over to the water bowl.  She's not spoiled or anything.

Obviously.

We are trying our best to keep her on bedrest for the most part.  She's gotten very energetic the last few days (which they warned us about), almost back to her normal self... but not quite.  She's got pretty much one more week of restricted movement, and then we go back to the orthopedic to get the staples removed.  After that she's on 4 more weeks of restricted movement.  Then we can start physical therapy.  The vet recommended slow walking, for about 5 minutes to start with and building up from there.  He also recommended swimming, if she's not too scared (which is a strong possibility with this girl).  Conveniently there is a doggie underwater therapy facility right down the street from us.  Crazy.  Once we get closer to that we're going to look into it.


****WARNING****

The last picture is of the scar on her leg.  It's not terrible, just a bunch of staples and some redness.  But I don't know how squeamish you are, so I tried to set it up so it would be blurry unless you hovered over the image.  But because I'm new to this it DID NOT WORK.  So be warned, don't scroll down if you don't think your stomach can handle it.  I'll try to keep working on the blur thing, I'd really like it to work :(

Scar.

Crazy puppy.

I have a Short Fuse

I am a happy person.

I smile and laugh and have a bounce in my step. I do not shoot death glares at anyone that moves in a way I don't think they should be.

Normally.

This week has been an exception.

I thought it was maybe just the experiences that I've been having this week.

But I started thinking about it today, and decided it might be part of the symptoms of my potential hypothyroidism.

(Which, by the way, I'm still waiting to hear back on -- Manuel, whoever you are... I know you don't read my blog but CALL ME BACK NOW. kthxbi.)

I have dubbed myself the Hulk.

So I googled, because that's what I do when I need the answer to something. Google knows everything.

Turns out, I could be right. Its most likely a mixture of the hypothyroidism and my complete and utter exhaustion, which are basically the same thing... but whatever.

This whole theory is going to be completely ruined,
if they tell me that my test results came back normal.

More of the Same

Here we are, another day, and I again have nothing really exciting to write about...

I need to come up with some really good stuff to talk about. I'm just not creative at the moment.

Calli has a vet appointment today. She gets her last shots, and then she'll be allowed to start puppy training school. She can also be scheduled for her surgery. She has an umbilical hernia, and usually they get removed when they are spayed, but the rescue we got her from didn't have it done when they sent her to the vet to get neutered. I've been anxiously waiting to be able to schedule it, because I'm nervous she's going to do something and hurt it. So I'm pretty excited for both of those things to happen. We've been working with her at home for some things, and she's gotten really good at "come", "stay" and "sit"... most of the time, and sometimes lay down but . So hopefully she'll do well in puppy school.

I'm anxiously awaiting the results from my second blood test. I have a feeling its going to come back the same as the other, because I'm still tired all the time. I didn't get to take a nap yesterday, and I walked around the grocery store like a zombie. I also couldn't find my keys, which were in my purse the whole time. Then I went home and made dinner, and told D.Soup (who had just finished playing an entire game of soccer - 1.5 hours ish... without a sub) that I was "hurting" because I hadn't got a nap in.

He laughed at me.

Good news though, we made a bunch of awesome food this weekend: Chicken Enchiladas, Taco Dip, Chicken Parmesan. Now I don't know if I used too much of something, but if you are not so much a heat fan, be careful with the Chicken Enchiladas... they were very spicy.

My friend at work introduced me to the Glee station on AOL Radio.... I have been listening to it for 3 weeks straight now. I am a giant Gleek, have been since the show started. I've been dying for it to start back up again. The fact that Glee Radio started playing the songs from the new episode makes me so unbelievably excited that said new episode airs TONIGHT!

All I can say is: It's about time.

I need a profile picture.

Walk Like an Egyptian

D.Soup is going to game two of the Capitals playoffs tonight... That's hockey playoffs, if anyone -miraculously- ends up reading this who is not our friend and doesn't know our love of the sport. I often ask him why he doesn't take ME to the games that he ends up going to... and he never really gives me an answer (hurumph)... Lucky for HIM, these tickets were some that someone ELSE had, and invited HIM...

What this means though, is I have some time to myself. This also means I'm going to try to avoid having a panic attack every time I hear a noise in my house until he gets home...

I'm going to give the freezer paper stencils a try tonight. I picked out my first visual... Three ballerina images across the bottom side and front, with pointe shoes hanging down the back. I'm not describing it very well, but I have a good picture of it in my head. I pulled these images from the interwebs:
I was a ballerina for almost 15 years, so pictures like this always make me happy. I actually had a really hard time picking out just a few... but since the first three images all look at least similar I figured they would make for a good combination. I thought it would be a good first attempt.

I'm pretty excited to see how it actually works out. I drew the stencils last night, but forgot to take a picture of them when they were finished. I have to stop at the store today and pick up an Xacto knife.

In other news, went back the the doctor yesterday... and gave more blood. Ugh. Apparently the blood tests came back with information that needed retesting. The other test I had on Monday came back normal. Double Ugh.

The doctor said that I might, MIGHT have hypothyroidism. Which was on my list of options from before... but they like to retest to be sure, because sometimes it comes back "off" one time and then the next time comes back normal. So if this next test comes back low, then she's going to put me on a low dose thyroid and see if it levels me back out again. The test they did was called TSH, and shows how much thyroid stimulating hormone is in my blood. She said the normal amount for TSH is anywhere between 0.4 and 4. Mine was 5.6, since it's high that means I might have an under-active thyroid. She said it isn't terribly high, so she's not sure if it would be causing me to be this tired... but we'll see. Considering I have more than half of the other symptoms, I'm just going to stick with the idea that is actually what's wrong with me. We shall see.

Hopefully that wasn't terribly confusing. Apparently I looked COMPLETELY confused yesterday when the doctor was trying to explain everything to me. She asked me about 15 times if I understood what she was saying.

---

Are you sure you followed all of that?

Yes, YES I understand. I read all about this a week ago when I was deciding to make this appointment.

*uncertain look*

---

...I almost wish that I could have seen my face, because apparently - to her - it was the epitome of "durrrrrrrrr"... I'm imagining it to look sort of like this...
I think that might be my listening face... which means I look confused almost half of the day. Awesome.

The title of this post has nothing to do with anything inside it.

And I'm done.

Happy (Rainy) Hump Day!

It's Wednesday.

That's about the extent of my insight.

I sat and stared at my blog yesterday for about 4 hours, trying to think of something interesting to write about. Obviously I never came up with anything, since there was no post. I finally decided that nothing happened Monday that was worthy of talking about. Other than my doctor's appointment. I figured it was better if I DIDN'T talk you through that, as it was a mildly traumatic experience for me and I didn't want to put anyone else through that without being face to face with them. The story involves a lot of whispering and face making, and is much better and less terrifying in person. I should find out today if anything came from the tests.

It WAS decided yesterday that I am trading the "my husband" for D.Soup. I guess that makes me A.Soup... or Mz.Soup. That makes me happy.

One of my friends at work sent out a link to a post at The Oatmeal this morning. She then turned around and informed me that THIS:

reminds her of me. Which is completely accurate. That's actually the exact list of terrifying things that goes through my brain if I have somehow managed to end up at home, alone, when its dark out. So thanks to The Oatmeal for portraying my terror so accurately.

On a different note... Calli had a playdate yesterday. With a half grown Bull Mastiff. Which means he's about 8 times her size and that his back came up to my waist. It was a little overwhelming, for all of us. I took a few pictures of them when they finally calmed down and were distracted by chew toys with D.Soup's phone. But since I fail at this whole "I'm going to upload pictures to my computer" concept, we'll see how long it takes for them to get here.

The girls in my office have been doing Weight Watchers. It's really been working for them. They talk about it all the time and have me looking at websites with Weight Watcher friendly recipes. So I talked to one of my friends about it and we've decided to start "Fake Watchers." Most of the information that you need from the real Weight Watchers meetings is available online, for free. The other part of WW that is really helpful for most people is the weekly weigh-in and support group. We are going to be each others support and record weekly weigh-ins where we both can see the results. We just started yesterday, so we'll see how it goes. I think this will be good for me, because I obviously don't have energy to work out after work and all I want to do is sleep all the time, so I'm gaining weight even though I'm not eating any more than before.

I picked up my loom to work on the infinity scarf a little more last night. Got about 10 lines in, then curled up in a ball on the couch and went to sleep. It was 9 pm. Doug woke me up about an hour later so that we could go to bed.

I think I've squeezed everything possible out of my brain.

Monday You Could Fall Apart

This weekend was busy.

Friday I went to my doctor's appointment. And then immediately left after the nurse at the desk told me that the wrong test had been scheduled (my fault) and that the prep was different for what I actually needed. Meaning that those 6 hours I starved myself were, in fact, unnecessary. I am going back today, and just need to drink 32 ounces of water an hour before. Hopefully they figure something out soon because I'm over feeling like I've got a knife sticking out of my abdomen.

Saturday I went to the movies with some friends. We saw Lincoln Lawyer (which was awesome) and HOP (which was good, but not what I had expected). I then went to Michael's and bought some of the craft stuff that I needed for the weekend. I then went home and took a nap because I was so tired. I actually remember at one point waking up to Calli barking at me/my husband, and actually starting to cry because "all I want to do is sleep and you keep waking me up." I obviously reverted to about 6 years old. This is what my exhaustion has forced me to become.

Sunday I got up, without any pain (victory!). I then had to wait for my husband to get up so I didn't have to leave Calli alone. She gets lonely. So finally I set off to the grocery store, and spent $50 on juice, cake mix and half of the ingredients for dinner that night. I think there was more in there, but that's all it felt like I had when I got to the register.

So I spent all day slaving over Cake Pops. Which are super cute and DELICIOUS. But quiet tedious to make. Not difficult, tedious. I took pictures of the process... but I think I forgot to take pictures of the finished product, so I fail. But I only made about half of them, so I have more to make soon! I'll be sure to do a better job with the finished product pictures next time. I'll hopefully get a chance to post them tonight, I was too lazy last night.

UPDATE... Here's the pictures, finally:

Started off with WAAYYYY too much cake

Rolled into ballsFinished Product

We also made an awesome dinner, which I took pictures of too. It was Salmon and Pasta with Asparagus and it was AMAZING. It was so amazing that we even sat at the dinner table instead of sitting on the couch with TV trays. That's saying something.

Action picture of my husband helping with dinner.

Hello lovelyClose up of the awesomeness

I also finished my newest pair of fingerless gloves, which I'm going to post on Etsy (tonight hopefully). So that will force me to transfer all the other pictures from yesterday to my computer. I was wayyyy too lazy to do it last night. I'll make sure to link the pictures of the new gloves also. I want to start working on a matching infinity scarf tonight also. It will be my first try, so we'll see how that goes.

Alas, I woke up this morning and got ready for work. When I got in my car, my abdomen started hurting all over again, and it hasn't stopped all day. I'm starting to think it's work related. Hah.

I need to come up with a better name for my husband.
I'm tired of typing "my husband."
I tried Hubby, and it just doesn't feel right.

Randomness

I was going to write this big long post of random junk this morning. And I was very excited about it. But then I had a meeting at 10, and then stuff to do out of that meeting (boo!). So I got distracted and never got to start...

Let's see if I can remember everything.

Numero Uno:
I went to the doctor yesterday. They took SIX VIALS of my blood. It's the first time I ever thought I was going to pass out while having blood drawn. The girl did an awesome job thought, and she was very worried about me the whole time (I get panicky around needles). I don't even have a bruise! That's unheard of for me!

So basically the doctor had about 1,290,584,376,904,819,327 things that could possibly be wrong with me, since now I have two problems - the exhaustion (mentioned before) and a new pain that started on Wednesday in my lower right abdomen. My body is falling apart for some reason, awesome.

Some of the things that I had already discovered MIGHT be the cause were on the list of things for the lab to check in my blood, so that was kind of neat. I also have to go today to get an ultrasound for them to check my (overshare) ovaries for cysts. I haven't been allowed to eat anything since 10:30 am... luckily I'm not starving today.


Numero Dos:
The government is still working on their decision-making. If they don't figure something out today/this weekend, I won't be working on Monday. I'm torn between being fairly stoked about this, to being nervous. I would really love a few days off to get my house back in order and to KNIT and to just generally get my life back together. But at the same time I don't want to not work. I also don't want to get excited about having some time off and then wake up Monday and have to come in... that would make me sad.


Numero Tres:
I'm thinking about making these this weekend, they look so delicious:

Numero Quatro:
Reading through other peoples blogs makes me want to be a more crafty person. I think I am going to go out this weekend and buy this book SouleMama:

Numero Cinco:
I also want to give freezer paper stencils a try and make some t-shirts. Maybe I can post a few of them on my Etsy site if they come out cute. That would be an awesome summer addition to the knitting stuff. I've been trying to think of something to make for the summer. I'm kind of excited.

But.. look at how cool this is! I really want to try it.

I need more time to be crafty.
And a bigger house to store my crafts.