Tales from the Brain Fog

The worst, worst, part of my illness is the cognitive dysfunction. Everything else I can handle- the strange itch can be ignored, the droopy eye (eyebrow) can be hidden, the freaking pain can be eased with medication. But the cognition problems are truly doing me in. There is nothing I can do to make it better. Nothing. I’m stuck.

Tonight in psychology I was trying to explain what I meant when answering a question. It was about negative reinforcement and what that can mean. I had no problem imagining the concept. My problem came when I tried to vocalize what I’d imagined. I couldn’t get entire phrases right. I finally had to break down and admit I couldn’t find my words. Though my professor is a Doctor of Psychology he still looked at me like I was high on crack. He kind of cocked his head, squinted and nodded as if he were going to say “Uh-huh, how’s about trying some different meds then, nutso.”

Of course, he didn’t say that. He just looked like it took a lot of effort for him not to say that.

There used to be a time when I could go toe to toe with intellectuals. I used to be one. I used to have a killer vocabulary. I used to be able to explain things extremely well- even to people who were clueless. That was then. Now I know and I can comprehend and I can get the damned answers right on the test. But I can’t participate and I can’t explain myself. And I can’t help anyone without making their situation so much worse.

I told my husband tonight that it’s getting worse. I know it’s getting worse because last semester when I took speech I wasn’t this bad. I just kind of stuttered and somehow managed to keep it going. Now when I falter my tongue refuses to go any further. It’s like my body is telling me to stop until I can get my mind back under control. But I don’t know how that’s possible. I think back on last semester and I miss that woman and she was many times confused and addle minded. But she was able to somehow keep going and she was able to write words without transposing letters and she was able to finish a damned sentence without embarrassing herself. She was able to be a part of the class. To speak like a coherent adult.  She’s gone now.

I don’t think this is supposed to be getting worse, you know. I’ve read that it’s not a progressive disease and this is how it’s always going to be. But that’s not true for me. It is getting worse. I’m afraid of it now. I wasn’t before, but after tonight I am really, really afraid of it.

I just want my mind back.

Keeping the Car Maintained.

We had to take the car to get serviced this week. It’s a real chore to which none of us look forward. After the warranty’s up we’ll probably start doing all the work ourselves. That ought to be really funny. Steve worked on machines in the Army, but he’s lost when it comes to cars. So, if the radiator ever needs changed, it’ll be up to me to do it. That goes for the breaks too. But if the tires need changed we’ll be out of luck.

I noticed that you can buy auto parts online too. That’s pretty convenient, especially for me. Usually Steve doesn’t get home until everything is closed and I can’t drive to pick them up. Why not have them delivered? Seems like a good idea to me. I think I’ll run that idea by my uncle. He owns his own service garage and he might be looking for some deals. And he might need a niece to help him find them. We can get them at a low rate and make a little bit of a profit.

What do you say, Uncle?

Math was good

Math class went a little better last night. He did ask the group of chatterboxes to quiet down and that was nice. The lady who sat beside me all semester decided she might do better in the back of the room, though. She said the noise was distracting and she hoped she wouldn’t hear it back there. The lecture hall is pretty big, so that might work for the women, but it might make it harder for her to hear the prof too. I’m just glad that I didn’t have to listen to them yap their traps for two hours last night. Honestly, I don’t know how that whole group managed to get this far in their college careers.

Now I just have to figure out a way to get the lectures to imbed themselves into my brain.

The Elavil seems to be working, though I do have some pain. It’s a strange kind of pain right now, though. A little different.

Tactical Boots

I was looking around for something to buy my brother-in-law for Christmas and 5.11 Tactical has the perfect assortment of gifts. My brother-in-law really likes to show off his various acquisitions to his friends, so this stuff would be perfect for him.

They offer jackets that are preprinted with “Police” or “Sheriff” as well a field ops watches, which are durable and fit over gloves. The 5.11 XPRT Tactical Patrol Boot comes in light brown and is sweet. I can actually see those on my feet. Check out the 5.11 Tactical blog for product overviews and general news. They have really good descriptions of the various items there.

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No one Reads about Drupal?

I did an article about Drupal recently. My goal was to get some writer’s together to share what we know with each other. I failed miserably at that, but I thought I’d share my article anyway. This is one of my worst performing babies on the list. It needs some love.

Funny, though, my article on Chronic Pain has been my blockbuster hit as far as AC is concerned and that was PvB only. How funny! I would write a decent one along the same lines and submit for upfront, but it’s starting to look like AC doesn’t want to pay upfront anymore. That sucks.

Recently I decided to develop a community driven website. This just means that members/users of my website will be able to produce content, vote on content/polls and make site decisions. I decided to use a Content Management System (CMS) to keep things easy and, since I’m on a budget, it had to be affordable. After test driving several, I decided to go with Drupal.

What is Drupal?

Drupal is an open source web content management system, which means that it’s a completely free way to set up and manage your web site. That fit perfectly into my budget. The only expense then is the price of hosting. Drupal runs with PHP programming, so it’s important to make sure the web host you choose is reliable and offers plenty of Mysql database space as well as storage space. Drupal uses quite a bit of space for its core functionality and you’re probably going to use more for adding on modules and themes. Modules are extrasthat are added onto the core to increase functionality. Themes are just “skins” that change the look of the site.

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Things I should be doing right now

I’m not a very prolific writer. It’s hard to get things done with a three year-old yelling that the dog is trying to eat her crayons. And then I have, gulp, homework to do. Oh, yeah, HOUSEwork too. I feel like that octopus mom you see in those air freshener commercials. I have to get a lot more organized, I think, or there’s going to be a lot more last-minute scrambling (Sorry about that late assignment, Mr. K, won’t happen again!).

Wendy Piersall of Sparkplugging (formerly eMoms) offers the Monday Motivation. Today we’re to make a “to-do” list for today. I think that’s doable. My list:

1. Finish my Intro to Web Tech project 7.
2. Get a post on all of my blogs.
3. Work on theme for friend.
4. Make dinner.
5. Rake leaves.
6. Wash child.
7. Write some articles.

My motivation for getting these done?

1. Child needs food and care.
2. Get good grades.
3. Make some money.

So far I’ve written a post for one blog and 2 abstracts for Brijit. Unfortunately only one got published, so I need to do another. This counts as a post for one blog and I’ll be out doing leaves in about 5 minutes. See? I am making some progress.

Here’s my abstract:

Does ‘Heroes’ Need a Lifeline too? -
Collins critically examines the ailing ratings of last season’s break-out hit Heroes as well as of television in general. The outlook may not be all bad, he writes; when Nielsen doubled their sample size of homes with DVRs, the rating dips were marginal. The snag is in commercials, as advertisers are saying they’ll only pay for viewings within 75 hours of the original airing. Meanwhile, networks have a potential writers’ strike to worry about as well. While Collins jumps around too much to provide thorough analysis, he pens a decent primer for the impending TV shake-up.
in Los Angeles Times by Scott Collins, 28 October 2007
This abstract was edited by Brijit. Read more here…