Wow, what a difference a few hours can make on a perspective

How strange, last night before I went to bed I had sent a friend an e-mail telling her how I was so bummed about loosing my hearing in my left ear. As I'm typing right now it's 4:00 in the morning and I have been awake since 3:00. I woke up quite suddenly from a splitting headache and am feeling just generally awful. I was sleeping on my tower of pillows, but I think I must have slept on my back and had my head turned to the side, which is always enough to make my head hurt, especially if it's that way for more then 15 minutes. I'm also so nauseous, that's it's a bit of a struggle to keep myself from throwing up. Yuck! Crazy thing, if I was giving a chance at the moment to give up my hearing in my ear to feel better right now, I'd do it in a heartbeat! It's times like this that it's very clear to me that this thing in my head is not a little thing and really, loosing hearing in 1 ear is not that big of deal compared to how awful I feel right now.

Fast forward to 7:30....
So I ended up falling back to sleep around 5:00, after I did get sick. It's so yucky! I did finally manage to keep 2 Tylenol #1's down as well as 2 Advil so the headache did get a bit better. My dear children totally cooperated this morning by either just stayed in their beds, or sleeping until 7:00. I did still wake up with a dull headache, but nothing that 2 more Tylenol #1's can't fix. It's so weird though, I have some mornings where I sleep better, but wake up feeling terrible. This morning, even though I'm tired, I actually don't feel too bad...likely the drugs. My balance is off again (I kind of feel tipsy on this chair) and as I'm typing here, my vision is not great. The upside is that even though I'm feeling better this morning I am still feeling OK about loosing my hearing. As I mentioned before, feeling so terrible last night makes me realize how serious this thing is and to give up an ear is a small thing. I just keep thinking how very fortunate I am to live in this day and age and not 100 years ago (or even less). For people who would have had this back then, it would have been a pretty lousy way to go.


I do need to mention 2 other things. First I want to mention my friend Julie. This girl has been an amazing friend to me. First, when I was getting married she arranged so much for me (including our stag and doe). Then when I was 8 1/2 months pregnant and moving into our new house, she and my friend Diane, drove out from the GTA to help us move and basically unpacked almost everything for me. Then when our first baby was born she filled my freezer with meals. The latest amazing thing this dear friend has done for me, is when she found out that I had my appointment with the Neurosurgeon, she sent me an e-mail from London England (where she is now living) and told me that when she came home for Christmas she's going to drive up and watch our kiddies for me. I don't know how I'll ever pay her back, but her help has been so wonderful over the years. Love you Julie!

I next have to mention how I'm feeling sad. As some of you may know, my beautiful Niece (not just in looks but in the woman she was) and her fiance passed away in a car crash on Dec 4th. They were both supposed to come to our house for Christmas, as they had last year. As the time gets closer as to when they would have arrived, it gets a bit emotional. Having said that, I also keep thinking how awesome it must be for them to be able to celebrate Christ's birth with Christ. It sure makes the thought of celebrating this time of year with Aunts and Uncles a pale comparison. There will definitely be 2 empty spots in our house, which makes me think of how very hard it is for my Sister, Brother-in-law and their kids as well as Gavin's family. To my sister and family, we love you so much!