“The strength of a woman is not measured by the impact that all her hardships in life have had on her; but the strength of a woman is measured by the extent of her refusal to allow those hardships to dictate her and who she becomes." C. Joybell C.

Ever since I was 14, I've had a chronic illness called Endometriosis. It causes unbearable and debilitating pain. We don't know how you get it and there's no cure. Pretty positive and uplifting, isn't it? 👎🏻 I've had 2 unsuccessful surgeries, 25+ different hormone therapies, medically induced menopause twice, hormone injections for 6 years, pain medication, I've tried it all. The last 12 years, I have chosen to take a very strong medication to manage the pain. I've seen about 50 doctors over the years and I tend to always know more than they do! 

Last Thursday, I went and saw a surgeon that is 1 of 8 total surgeons in the country that can successfully remove all of the disease from inside me. I had been working on getting this appointment since last August, so I was very excited to finally get to see her and get some answers. She spent an hour with me running tests and talking through all my questions. She concluded that I have three things going on, including my first diagnoses of endometriosis. I also have Adenomyosis and Uterine Fibroids. It really sucks, but it's also encouraging to know that I'm not crazy and that my intuition was right! When we were done, she told me to go home and think about my surgical options she proposed to make the best decision for me. There were two different options, a more conservative route and a more aggressive route. Both options are tough and not what I was hoping for. If I chose the conservative option, I'll have to have another surgery again in the future and she can't guarantee it will fix it. The more aggressive option holds a much higher percentage of getting me pain free, it just means permanently ending any fertility I may have. Ever since I was 15, I knew I wasn't even going to think about children until I was married, and we know how well that's going: which is, it's not! 😂 

So, after a lot of thinking, some sound advice and some research, I've decided the best choice is to have a hysterectomy to remove my uterus, excise the endometriosis and remove the large fibroid that is affecting my bladder. My uterus is trying to kill me, so it's time for it to be evicted! It's scary and heartbreaking because so much of what she'll be removing is what makes me a woman, but to be able to live a life pain free is something I can't wait to have! So many of my days are spent in bed, canceling plans at the last minute, taking horrible medication and puking from being in excruciating pain. If this is truly the fix that it should be, I'll be a brand new woman, able to take on anything I want!

This isn't the most comfortable thing to talk about, especially with the men in our family, but I wanted you to be with me during this experience! I should have the date of my surgery by Wednesday and I'll let you know as soon as I have it.

I love you guys and I'm so thankful to have such a kick-ass family! 😀 This road is going to get a lot harder before it gets better, but if everything goes according to plan, it'll be worth it!

Farrell's Re-Visited

I know that i've enthralled all of you with stories of the Farrell's of old. You know, that place where I met your Mom, and on account of that, you folks actually exist! So not insignificant.

Farrell's of the era where your mom was there, and a lot of my friends was owned by a group of local people, with the overall company by the founder Bob Farrell. Well, after a time, the whole kit and kaboodle was sold to the hotel chain Marriott. Bad fit. Under that management, and penny pinching that the chain folded and was extinct for decades.

A new owner in California decided to rekindle the brand and so a few stores opened in Southern California. They have the name, many of the traditional trappings, and they are working hard to make the chain viable again. They even had some help from a CNBC show that works to help companies make profits.

So that's the background.

This weekend while on a trip to said Southern California, I had time to visit one of the stores.  It looked very much like the hayday of Farrels of old. Some differences were noted.

• The waitresses don't wear the skirts and colored garters anymore. Black Slacks instead.
• The waitresses do now wear the 20's hats, something that only the guys used to wear.
• There are many more variations of the Happy Birthday, Adams Family themed, that Spanish Macarena deal that was viral a few years ago and more. Several birthday announcements while I was there, and no two songs were the same. 
• No cashier, you get the check in those little folders to give to the waitress.
• The fountain guys pour wine. Wine is new to the restaurant.

I had a Sarsaparilla instead of a root beer, and a "Bob's Burger". Pretty close to my standard choice back when I was sparking your mom.  Burger was good. Fries were average.

I decided to splurge for dessert, after all it's an Ice Cream themed place, and figured what I remembered as a small sundae, I ordered the Hot Fudge Sundae. It was huge, and different. In the bygone days, you;d get the ice cream with a metal cup of fudge to top the ice cream as you went. And it was a 'normal' sized sundae. Here, I got the ice cream, fudge, a hefty portion of whip, nuts and a cherry all in a super-double glass. It was a very big sundae. Not a super sized Pig Trough (Double Banana split), a Mount Saint Helens (used to be Rainier), or a zoo, but pretty big. I made it. 

All in all, a nice trip down memory lane.

Dad

 

Waiting for burgers

I'm waiting for a burger and there's a few people in front of me so I better kill some time blogging about stuff. I'm at Rain City burgers on 65th and Roosevelt. It's a Seattle sports themed restaurant, a lot of Mariners, Sounders, Seahawks, UW decorations. I got the Mariners burger, it has bacon, avocado, cheddar, lettuce, onion and sauce. Woops, burger just showed up, blogger out!

Morning with an Astronaut

This morning, (Valentines Day), Mom Robs and myself went to an invitation only event at the Boeing Future of Flight center here near Paine Field. The before opening of the museum event was to introduce the Destiny Module trainer, and to visit with a NASA astronaut, Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper. Heide was a Navy Captain before going to work for NASA. She flew 2 space shuttle missions, and performed 5 EVA's (Space Walks) during those missions. She is (in)famous for working with a tool bag, removing some grease that had gotten loose, when ah shoot, the tool bag turned out to not be tethered to anything and drifted away.

We were in the module with her, sometimes with others, and even just us. She had a lot of great answers to peoples questions. She was pleasant, a little prone to tech talk, but very informative. Some random memories of things said.:

• It was funny on my second mission to see the first time spacewalkers perform the same movement that they needed to do in the water pool trainer, not yet realizing it wasn't needed in zero G. 
• Each astronaut has just a locker for everything that keep. They are urged to bring several toothbrushes.
• Yes, astronauts are human, and disagreements happen. On the station there are lots of places to get away from the others for a while.
• The Russians select teams with similar, compatible personalities, the US program doesn't. 
• It's pretty important to keep things clean. The "bathroom" and other spaces can really stink up the place, and at least some astronauts, are not really fastidious. Food (crumbs etc.) are a big bother to others in the crew as they drift through the station.
• If you lose something, check the intake vents to the circulation system. Likely that's where you'll find it. The air needs to be moving all the time, or else in zero G, your CO2 that you breath out will create a bubble around your face and at best cause a headache.
• You lose bone mass on orbit. Some astronauts have a hard time returning to the gravity of earth. One man said that on the landing he was so weak, that if the vehicle wa son fire, all he'd be able to do would be to watch.
• The view on an EVA of earth is more than spectacular.
• In an emergency the Soyuz can be on the ground (Somewhere)  in as little as 4 hours from undocking.
• Hedie's son is in the Navy as well. Explosives detonation specialist. Payback to mom being away so much(?) Oh, and her mom said when she was selected for a second flight, 'Couldn't they find anyone else'? Mom's are Moms!
• She took a book with pictures of family and friends, than took pictures of her holding the pictures as keepsakes

In the bottom picture, Hedie is on the Left.

Blog Tweaks

I added a few things to hopefully make the blog better and more user friendly (That sounds like what my apps tell me every twenty minutes when a new update comes out) but nevertheless it should improve things.

1) There's an email subscription input on the right so you can put in your personal email if you want to be updated when a new post is published.

2) There's a "greatest hits" section on the right.

3) I changed commenting to anyone, so if you want to leave a comment now you don't have to login, just comment, put your name in the drop down button and do the robot-I'm-really-a-human test. It's easier I swear!

That's pretty much it for now. I'm trying to find a calendar widget to add to it so we can have important dates all in one place but all the ones I've tried are riddled with adds. So if you find a good one feel free to add it or send it my way and I can. Cheers!

-Patrick