Smoker? Who Me?

Well, here we go! Monday was my official start date for the smoking down to nothing. I normally smoke about 1 pack a day (20 ciggies) and so Monday was my "full" day. I did pretty good and actually only smoked 16. So yesterday was a 15-smoke-day and today has been a 14-smoke-day. So far so good. I think I'm mostly doing okay. I don't really have a choice as I AM quitting, but I'd like to do it with as little pain as possible. The gradual cessation has been somewhat difficult in that everyday, I freak out a little bit at smoking one less. But I think I've been overall doing well. It's funny because by the end of the day, the last couple of smokes are pretty awful. Saw my GP yesterday and he's happy for me and suggested nicotine gum to help with any cravings I might have. I'm really not having that many and it just passes if I give it some time. I've been trying to hold off for as long as I can before having the smoke, and have done pretty good. I really don't want to get the patch or the gum, because that just means I have to rid myself of the nicotine addiction twice. Once for the smokes and once for the replacement therapies. If I find that it's really getting to hard to continue cutting down, I will do it though. Anything to quit!

I need lots of positive reinforcement right now and Paul (as always) is very helpful. He's my smoke pusher and gives me my allotment of smokes for the day in the morning. When I first told him on Sunday, the first and only thing he said was "Oh...your car will be so much cleaner." Yeah, he's pretty much in the doghouse for that one! Right this second I'm chewing on a bit of a straw that seems to help with the holding off. Technically, I "can" have one, but I like to see how far I can go before I get wonky.

This isn't going to probably be getting any easier anytime soon. So send your happy non-smoker thoughts to me and help me get over this hump! I'm not a person who says she's going to quit all the time so this is the real thing and I am a non-smoker now (okay, technically two weeks from now). I'm hoping once I get down to only five or four a day, I'll just throw in the towel and quit forever. Seems silly to be smoking only a few a day. Might as well go all the way and just stop. So anyway, just thought I'd share this and beg you all for some good wishes and positive thinking. God knows I'm not getting enough at home! I need MORE!!! :)

Love,
B

Driveway is dead sexy

Yesterday, we had our driveway paved! Very exciting stuff there. Attached some pics. My first thought was..."holy shit, has our driveway ALWAYS looked that BIG?" Really improves the joint I think!




Also, promised some pics of the garden and here those are. There is some arugula gifted to me by Linda (a co-worker). Her and I share seeds and tips all the time! She also gave me some garlic to throw in the garden come Oct. She did it last year and got some wonderful garlic in May.


Lettuce blend-grow bitches...grow!


Overview of the "fall" garden. Forefront is bean plants, then everything else. The blank spot is for the lettuce blend.


You can see the bean plants and the spaghetti squash and the cukes well. The tiny little sprouts are broccoli and cabbage.


Here's the arugula. Basically, a form of lettuce as I was told.


From the back, peppers, on the left is radishes, then okra. Right is spinach, then eggplant (yes, they're tiny).


Here you can really see from right, the cukes, squash, okra and radishes. I don't know why, but I'm always surprised when I get nearly 100% germination. But this time around (unlike in the Spring) I took into account how small the garden is and tried to plan accordingly.


Oh my. Does anyone else get such pleasure from seeing all these beautiful peppers as I do? Just tells you I've become a serious gardening nerd.

Not as fun stuff, but I went to the specialist on the 6th. In looking at the blood tests I most recently had done...still hyperactive thyroid! Shocker there. I was reeling from it. Okay, not really. I was totally expecting it. Although, there was this stupid, small optimistic part of me that hoped the blood might have gotten better. Alas, not to be. The endo (super nice lady) told me it was mostly likely due to Grave's Disease (which for any who might be wondering) is an auto-immune disorder. Thanks mom and dad for the defective genes! Hehe. But the good news is, no eye involvement. So, we decided on a course of PTU (anti-thyroid meds), a beta-blocker (makes your heart and blood pressure be low and hopefully more stable) and birth control pills. Ha! Yeah, funny. But she's pretty freaked at the thought of my possibly getting pregnant while my thyroid is still out of control. So, to placate her, I agreed to go on them. With the caveat that it will be short-term. I told Paul I'm just saving my eggs :)

Got all the meds and started the night of the 6th. Got a swanky little pill carrier too to help me remember when to take what. I go in for another round of blood tests next week to see if there's been any improvement and, if not, I think we'll probably up the PTU. If there's an improvement, I go in two weeks for more blood taken (vampires), and then see her a week after that to discuss where we are and if we're seeing anything good. We'll make more decisions at that point. The fun thing about the meds is that the beta-blocker suppresses your BP so you have to be careful standing up so you don't pass out cold. I told the people at work that if they find me laid out on the floor, it's just the drugs. How often in your life do you get to say that and it's NOT illegal? I'm hopeful that the meds will wrestle my perky thyroid under control. Also, because of all this crap, I will be quitting smoking. None of my doctors want the cold turkey approach, so I'm to ease myself off of them, to avoid stressing my thyroid and making it be all wacky again.

Enough of THAT boring old crap. Still have heard nothing about that job. Aw well. The more time goes by, the more I'm getting anxious. I was all existential about it at first, but now I'm freaking!!!! No...no. I am NOT freaking...*trying to convince myself.

Been dreaming of the new iMacs. Yikes. 24-inches of beautiful computer. Dual-core. Tons of bank...sigh. Maybe next year! Well, I think that's about it for now. Big ol' update here. Not really, just lots of pics of my pretty garden and new driveway. Hope ya'll are doing well! I'm off for Nebraska and school this weekend.

Love,
B