Carol’s Weekly Roundup: December 15, 2024: Preparing for Christmas in Ohio

Snapshot of My Week

I spent the week working on house projects–painting our living room and game room, making floor plans, and ordering furniture. We put the Christmas tree up, finished Christmas shopping, and worked on various home organization and cleaning projects. I prioritized house projects over work but I did lay out the first prototype for a new photo ethics game I’m collaborating on, and took care of some other work stuff like my UIU syllabus, plans for my upcoming Graphic Design History class, and Blackwater/Lumen stuff.

MONDAY

• Cleaning & Christmas Shopping
• Drafted some rough floor plans of our Ohio basement to help me figure out what shelves to order from Ikea. I was super happy to see they were doing free delivery for a limited time since we don’t have a truck and that deal allowed me to order all the shelves we need at this time.
• Ran to Lowes right before closing for some shelf paper and then worked on lining the shelves in the mini kitchen in the basement.
• Karl assembled a queen bed frame we ordered off of Amazon for less than $150. It’s simple but I’m impressed.

TUESDAY

• Reviewed financial accounts. I used to always manage this and then when I turned 40 I told Karl I wanted to take a year off and him manage it. Well… he didn’t manage it. He just let everything coast so now I’m trying to get everything organized so I can start actively managing our finances again.
• Painted the living room. I started as soon as Karl left for work with the goal of surprising him when he got home. I worked my butt off and got it done. I changed my plans from painting one wall gold to painting two walls cold and then I did a cool artsy primitive tribal vibe patten and texture on the main accent wall. It turned out so fun and Karl had a big smile on his face when he walked in and saw it.
• Laid out prototype cards for a Photo Ethics Game I’m working on.
• Creative Writing, Cleaning, Christmas Shopping
• Health: I’m really bad about not realizing how hard I’m pushing my body. I’m not sure if I hyperfocus so much I don’t notice or if it’s some sort of delayed pain response but I spent the evening in agony on the sofa barely able to move.

WEDNESDAY

Wednesday was an awful day. I was highly stressed and just about everything seemed to go wrong.

• Photo Ethics Game – continued work on first prototype and prepped for a meeting that I ended up missing because my calendar didn’t update when the time was shifted an hour earlier. 🙁 
• Psych talk about AI and open source DIY mental health resources. I’ve decided that I’m going to add designing DIY mental health materials to my ever growing list of things to create to try to help people that our system keeps failing.
• Alex’s VA MH appointment was canceled AGAIN. This is the second time he’s waited 1-2 months for a mental health appointment with the VA for them to call and cancel it the day of. I called and cried to someone at his health clinic about how this keeps happening and that our lives are falling apart in the meantime but they have no control over the mental health care providers (there aren’t enough of them). I requested to be connected with community care so we’ll see what happens from here but in the meantime I am absolutely exhausted from trying to dance with the VA and I need a mental health break from them. Sadly I can’t take much of one because Alex’s life is in limbo until we’re able to get him the support he needs.

THURSDAY (Spirit Date)

• Web updates to Blackwaterbucs.com and other Blackwater/Lumen work.
• Channeling; TikTok Live

FRIDAY

• SNAP Exhibition Reception; Flint, Michigan
  • My photography “Stepfather” is included in this exhibition. We were going to drive up but between falling earlier in the week and feeling disoriented for several days and overwhelming stress we decided to stay home and go to Karl’s work Christmas party. Hopefully we’ll drive up next week to see the show.
• Karl’s Honda Christmas Party @ Leon’s Garage in Marysville
  • Got dressed up in my Santa outfit for Karl’s Christmas Party. It was nice to see a few familiar faces and meet some new people. It made me happy to see Karl light up a bit and express a desire to be social. We walked around and made a few dance videos afterwards then made a supply run to Walmart on our way home.

SATURDAY

• Karl spent the day sick in bed. His temp was all over the place and he felt dizzy when he tried to stand.
• I spent the day painting the Game Room. I layered several colors to create a fun ship interior vibe fitting for a game room.
• Began designing a mental health journal
• Health: Once again, delayed full body agony…despite taking breaks.
• Channeling: UFO/Drone stuff (Annunaki Scout Ships)

SUNDAY

• Worked on cleaning my bedroom and cleaning out my closets for a donation run to Goodwill. I got rid of at least 3 bags of clothes and made a good dent in cleaning up our bedroom.
•  Shopping:
  • Goodwill: Dropped off a bunch of donations and then found treasures inside–including a very nice flute for $10. Hell yeah!
  • Lowes: Floor staining supplies, more blocks to create porch steps with, and supplies for my paper mache clay projects.
  • Dollar Tree & Walmart: It’s amazing how much I can spend in a Dollar Tree. 😅 So many fun and useful things for a great price. People that don’t shop at Dollar Tree are missing out.
• Alex helped Karl and I unload the car and put things away. Then Karl assembled some blocks to make us porch steps and hung up our Christmas lights on the porch. I only had to ask and insist at least six times today.
• Dinner: I slow cooked my first Frenched Pork Roast Rack (rib bones included), made some rice, and a green bean casserole and everything turned out great. I wanted to smack Karl when he stood beside me sharing his way of making the casserole. I appreciate when he shows interest in things but it sucks when he gets pepped up when I’m worn out and then he doesn’t understand social cues well enough to give me my space and not make me feel like he’s nitpicking me…especially when I’m exhausted and in pain. I had to tell him four times to get out of the kitchen before he finally left. Gah!
• TV: Continued watching a little of the new Anthony Hopkins movie ‘Mary’ on Netflix
• Health: I slept in but was tired and in pain all day. It was a struggle to keep going while we were out doing our shopping errands. After dinner, I took some Tylenol and then passed out in pain .

Creative Corner

• My photograph “Stepfather” is in a show called SNAP in Flint, Michigan. The opening reception was the 13th and it will be on display until early January.
• Painted our living room and game room.

Moments That Mattered

(Highlight 2-3 significant experiences, interactions, or personal moments from the week.)

• Wednesday was a really rough day for me and for Alex (missed and canceled appointments). We are going to have to talk to another veteran service officer about what to do since the VA is failing Alex so catastrophically.
• Getting the living room painted was such a big thing. It feels so much more homey now and it’s been nice being able to relax in the living room without thinking about the walls needing to be painted. I’m so glad I was able to do this before Christmas and I’m proud of myself for doing it all by myself.
• It was a nice week at home with Karl and Alex. I am really excited about us sharing our first Christmas together and I am so happy that everyone is getting along well and that we’ve all been able to help one another in various ways. We got a bed put together for Alex and are making plans to frame in his room–hopefully in a few weeks. Having him staying with us has given us extra motivation to get a lot of house projects done and an extra pair of hands to help with them. 

Questions for Reflection

• What inspired you the most this week?
  • Getting ready for Christmas. My second Christmas in Ohio and my first Christmas with both Karl and Alex. I want to get the house cleaned and functioning well so that we can enjoy a lovely holiday together next week.
• What’s a lesson you learned this week that you want to carry forward?
  • Twice I experienced delayed pain responses. I still don’t understand why my body doesn’t let me know it’s hurting until it’s in complete agony and I don’t think the work I was doing should have caused the amount of pain it did but I can see from these and my other experiences especially in the past year that there is a pattern. My best guess is that I lose touch with my body when I hyperfocus on activities or that this is some sort of autistic delayed processing response. I intentionally went slow and took breaks when working on painting the game room but still ended up in just as much pain. I will continue to try to be more mindful, to pace myself, and to document my experiences so I can figure out how to cope for this.
  • I also slipped and fell while dancing (had recently mopped the floor) and hurt myself pretty bad. I didn’t hit my head but I felt like, and still feel like, I have a mild concussion. What I learned is that the floor is a lot slicker after being mopped and to be more careful.

Looking Forward

• Our shelves from IKEA are being delivered on Tuesday
• We’re tentatively planning to drive up to Flint, Michigan next weekend to see the exhibit my art is in and do a bit of exploring.