Long time - no see...

I knew it had been awhile since I'd posted, frankly I forgot I had a blog, but this says it's been since Nov. of '08. Wow, that's a crazy long time! It's been a full year (+).

Riley is doing well. What I early took to be a good transition to my home was actually just his minimal ability to cope with the situation he found himself in. However, after 6 months and spending a lot more time together he really started to turn the corner of belonging to me and this family. He started to get excited about our routines. He started to anticipate our activities. He recognizes my "family" ring tone on my cell phone and has associated that with getting dinner and "treats" from the table. Now that he's been here just over a year I'm realizing that he's starting to wag his tail. I hadn't noticed its absence, but once he started doing it I realized that I had not yet seen him wagging his tail like a happy dog, but now he does it all the time. He is sweet and clever and a good companion.

One of my previous posts was about my arms and hands being asleep. Shortly after my Nov. '08 post I went for physical therapy which made a world of difference for my arm/hand problem and now it's almost fully resolved. If it crops up because of posture or time spent at the computer I know which exercises/stretches to do to recover. My back gave me a few achy days after that Nov. '08 post also and then went back to feeling great for a few months. Then it went out completely and more severely than ever before in my life. I spent 6 months seriously out of commission with back pain. I saw my chiropractor more than 100 times, saw my Dr. (osteopath) multiple times, saw several back specialists, had steroid injections at a pain clinic a few times and then finally went to physical therapy for 8 weeks (3x a week.) The physical therapy made the biggest difference of all and proved to be the thing for my best recovery. Now I am back to functional and can do almost anything I want, but I still need to build up my stamina. I can stand upright for about 15 minutes at a time, I can walk for about 20 minutes. I can do both of those in combination and extend my total time on my feet a little bit, but after that I must lay down and stretch. I can fully relieve my pain with stretching for which I'm thankful.

During my time off due to my back things slowed down at work. When I was ready to return to work they had to put me on lay-off instead. A couple months later we tried again and I worked a few days, but my back wasn't fully recovered at that point, so I had to go back on disability (at which point I started the PT.) When I finished my PT and knew I was ready and able to work they had to put me straight into lay-off again, this time for an indeterminate amount of time. I have now been laid off about 2 months (not been at work for 8 months) and at last check-in with the office there is still no work. I have been using my down time to search for new work, including opportunities in different careers. It's been discouraging to discover that 8 years at my job have only provided me with that claim to longevity which seems to be far outweighed by the fact that my work environment has not allowed me to expand my ability set into things that current employers now require.

It's been over 2 yrs since I've been on a date and because of all the discouragement over my back trouble I had basically decided to give up on marriage. Being flat on my back for months only added to my weight problem which makes me feel even less attractive then ever and now I have lost all confidence in my ability to bring anything good to a relationship. How can I think I could be a wife when I can't even keep up with the minimal housework of my apartment? It takes me days to do my own laundry. I can barely walk long enough to run my own minimal errands. I've had to give up babysitting my nieces because I can't keep up with their energy or handle all their needs because I can't lift them. However, my friends have tried to encourage me to stay positive and not give up all together. I had to go through a lot of hassle to get signed up to e-Harmony again. They don't have an easy system for previously expired members who would like to sign up again at a later date. After week of exchanging e-mails with their customer service department I was finally able to start fresh and take their long quiz. It only took me a couple of hours to take their quiz and then I sat to wait for their calculations and to see my first matches. Instead of matches I got a screen with a message that stated my quiz results did not fit well within their matching system so they could not guarantee that I would get any matches so they would not allow me to sign up. WHAT? I guess that's one way to keep your success rates high - only take people that are easy to match. What a crock!!

Recently I saw an ad for a Christian matching site along the margin of my FB wall. I clicked on it and looked it over and decided to try the free version just to see if there were any locals on there with current accounts. There were actually quite a few so I bought a one-month membership. After a week on there I'd had about 30 guys check out my profile and I'd checked out a lot of profiles and it seemed like an okay start to things even though no one had attempted to contact me. I was doing okay with these results until an acquaintance posted on their FB wall that they had finally decided to try the online matchmaking thing and after 3 days had over 500 matches and more requests for communication than she was able to respond to. I know I shouldn't compare myself to her as we're very, very different people but it was still discouraging. However, I've tried to press on. I've "smiled" at 7 or 8 guys but they have not responded in any way. I've attempted to start an IM chat with a few and they have not responded either. I tried joining in to a chat room conversation but it was a very antisocial environment. I'm also battling not only the lack of connection but even my basic feeling like I'll have anything to talk about if a connection happens. I'm finding it hard to be positive when the last year consists of terrible work stress, then my back being out, to now being laid off.

So, now my life consists of sleeping late, spending time with my dog and my Dad and helping Dad around the house with his projects. I keep pointing out that every now and then he could help me with some of my projects, but that never really happens. Also, every now and then I look at different churches online to try to talk myself into going to one. I haven't been to my old church in over a year. Some things changed there that I don't agree with and it never really felt like the right place for me anyway, so I just stopped going. But, not having a church to go to means I rarely leave the house, I'm not meeting anyone new, not making any friends and not filling my need for fellowship. I'm in a rough cycle right now and need to figure out how to break out.