We met at a camp. On the first night of orientation, literally within 24 hours of meeting Slappy, I chipped my tibia, partially tore my achilles and ripped up a whole bunch of other stuff playing capture the flag and to my surprise, he, that silly boy in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle shirt, was the camp EMT. After that night we began carpooling and one day he asked me if I wanted to go see Shrek 2, since all our campers had seen it. I had no idea it was a date until we were on our way home. And before long I found myself agreeing to another movie and then, on July 9th, in one of the most awkward conversations of all time, we made our dating official.

A year later, a year filled with fears and fun and graduation and med school applications, we celebrated our 1st anniversary at Disneyland, knowing that in less than 3 weeks, he’d be moving to New Orleans for medical school. I remember it being such a fun day, with a shadow of sadness. Which is not easy to see in the world’s worst self-portrait. But if you look closely, I’m pretty sure you can see my brain up my nose.

On July 24th, he moved to New Orleans. On August 30th, he came home after Katrina wiped away his school and much of the city I’d soon grow to know and love. He went to Houston in September and I didn’t see him until he finally came home for Christmas in December. We managed that year apart and in May, we packed up my apartment in California, stopped in Houston to get his stuff, and then moved into our house. It was terrifying and exhilarating. It was the beginning of the way our relationship would eventually be. Just us, no distances, no more moving. Just us. And really terrible humidity hair.

And while there we celebrated Mardi Gras

And medical school proms (where I swear I was wearing a dress, a really pretty one actually)

And where we planned a wedding. And then 2 years ago we flew to California, got married and began the rest of our lives together…in Hawaii. Okay fine, only the first 10 days were in Hawaii.

In that first year of marriage there were about a thousand ups and downs, but we fought hard, for each other and the tears and frustration were always worth it. And the love always won out. It was always stronger, always bigger than any argument, than any mistake.

In that first year, we celebrated major life accomplishments:

And we said goodbye to our fair city, to our home, to the place that gave us the distance from our pasts to let us grow into the people, the couple, that we are.

And we moved to California, nearer to our families, for jobs and school and though the milestones and accomplishments have been a little smaller so far, they’ve been celebrated too.

And most of all, now, after 6 years together, of learning each other, of understanding each other, of growing together and independently, I can say with great honesty, that I’ve never been happier than I am now. I’ve never felt more loved, more cared for, more special than I do now. I can’t begin to imagine what my life might be like if I hadn’t agreed to date that silly boy in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt. I can’t imagine if I had said no to the movie or if he hadn’t persisted despite my giving him no signals as the fact that I too, was totally smitten. I can’t imagine my life without his blue eyes, without his terrible sense of humor, without him. And I’m thankful every day that I don’t have to imagine.

And I’m almost as thankful that now, six years later, we’ve finally learned how to take self portraits. Kind of.

Maybe in 6 more years we’ll finally hire someone to capture some of these moments for us.

The fact alone is somewhat amazing, but more than that, I’ve spent almost two years now trying to get the state of California to fix a stupid typo on our marriage license. You know, the one where my first name is spelled as Kathnyn instead of Kathryn?

I like to think of it as my lifelong handwriting/proofreading reminder.

Despite completing all the steps that the state told us to, despite calling and following up and paying money and wasting hours, the typo lives on. The typo is indestructible. And for years(!) now

And then I had a thought. Because I watch too much tv.

I remembered the episode of Friends where Phoebe changed her name to Princess Consuela Bananahammock (but her friends could call her Valerie) and Mike subsequently changed his name to Crap Bag, and well, I was inspired.

A few weeks ago, I went on the social security website, I printed off forms, filled them out, sent them with a copy of my birth certificate, the typo-filled marriage certificate, my old driver’s license and then I crossed my fingers. And waited. And if we’re being honest, actually totally forgot about it.

Today I got two letters from the social security administration. The first was all my documents back. The second was my new social security card. With my new last name.

I know it’s silly. It’s just a name.

But it feels like it’s even more real now.

This is the rest of my life. And I like the way it sounds.

For the first time in what seems like forever, I slept like a rock. I did not wake up until my alarm rang at 5:30 in the very early morning. And I was surprised because Slappy was supposed to get up at 5 to get some work done before work, but he was still asleep next to me.

I asked him what had happened and he informed me that in my deep sleep, he had been up sick, pretty much all night long.

It’s no great secret that stomach viruses are pretty much my biggest fear. I would walk to the end of the earth to avoid vomiting. Just last week a kid I was working with puked right before my very eyes and I cannot tell you the germophobic tailspin it sent me into. And then today I woke up sleeping next to the very germs I fear.

And a weird thing happened. I wasn’t worried about myself, or the germs. I know that makes me sound so painfully self-involved (and it probably should), but despite my germ phobia, I was concerned for my husband today. I was worried about if he’d be okay alone all day (a headache sent me home at lunch, so that worry was somewhat relieved), I was worried about him missing work. The bottom line was that I was worried about him, and not so much about his germs.

I might be growing up after all. Or so I thought.

Not long after I semi-conquered my germ fears, I found myself in tears. The tears were partially for my own headache which seems to grow more relentless by the hour, but more because it was really the first time I have ever felt so incredibly helpless. We were miserable, in pain, not feeling well. And no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t fix either of us. I had gatorade, I had crackers, I had soup, but I had no fix. I couldn’t make his fever go down, I couldn’t settle his stomach. I couldn’t make my head stop pounding.

And we laid on the couch, miserable, together. Frustratingly unfixable.

As the day drew to a close, Slappy’s fever dropped (somewhat ironically I got one of my own, I’m really hoping that doesn’t mean anything), his stomach settled some and though my headache is unchanged, we’re okay. Slappy may end up staying home another day, I may not make it through a full day of school yet again tomorrow, but we’re okay. We’re going to be okay.

I keep finding that sometimes it’s so incredibly tough to not be able to fix everything, to be so out of control that the world spins around you. But with patience, and love, and a lot of gatorade and nagging, things slow down and life begins to focus on normal once again.

I’m sort of neutral on it. I love my husband with every fiber of my being. He is what keeps me relatively sane, keeps me grounded. He loves me even when he probably shouldn’t. He puts up with me when I can barely stand myself. And if I’m being honest, I really like having a day set aside to celebrate that. Yep, I’m that asshole.

But this year is a little different. You see, our (controversial) trip to New Orleans got sidelined by mother nature. I was only going to stay until Monday, so when Delta rebooked us for Sunday morning, I knew it just wouldn’t happen. With less than 24 hours in NOLA, I wouldn’t make it to any parades, I’d barely get 2 meals and that’s just a lot of pressure changes in a short period of time.

I’m bummed because I was looking forward to the trip, to seeing friends, to being in the city that I love, but it’s out of my hands (I’m actually sort of getting good at relinquishing control. Someone call my shrink and tell him that I don’t need him). My trip was scheduled to end Monday so I could be back at school, but Slappy doesn’t have to be back at work until next week. He chose this week of vacation so he could go to Mardi Gras, and at my insistence, he’s there now. He didn’t want to leave, but though he might not ever admit it, he needed some time away. He has picked up so much of my slack lately, I just wanted him to go have some fun.

So we did Valentine’s Day stuff last night. We went to dinner and a movie (Avatar, which I saw because I lost a bet, but surprisingly really enjoyed. I just can’t imagine how every many who’s ever seen it doesn’t feel totally ripped off for spending 3 hours in a chick flick) and just spent time being with each other. It was exactly what we needed. I can’t even begin to tell you how lovely it was.

And with all that said, I can see why as an in love asshole, you might not understand why I’m not all rainbows and unicorns today (besides the fact that really? have I ever been unicorns and rainbows about anything?) The real reason I struggle with celebrating Valentine’s day is because it has another memory tied to it, one less lovely than the dinners and dates and gifts that have been exchanged in my 6 Valentine’s with Slappy.

Four years ago today, I was diagnosed with Chiari Malformation. Four years ago, I started this battle with my brain.

I’m not a huge anniversary keeper most of the time, but this date is hard to forget. It’s hard not to remember that on Valentine’s Day 2006, I drove to my ophthalmologist’s office to get the results of my MRI. It’s hard not to remember the way the doctor sounded scared for me. The way he told me to call a neurologist as soon as I got out of his office. The phone call I made to Slappy who was 2000 miles away.

Even with the panic, the diagnosis wasn’t the end of the world. In fact, I felt relieved. We knew what was wrong. We knew the options. We new the next steps.

I thought we knew the fix.

And so the reason I feel conflicted today is that it’s been 4 years now, and even though we’ve jumped through every hoop we can find, we still don’t have the answers. After one brain surgery, 10 bajillion MRIs and 3 lumbar punctures, I still have pain that we can neither treat nor fix. The frustration is great and it’s gotten really difficult to keep my chin up and hope that by next year, things will be different. It just seems unlikely. Impossible.

And so this day is a double-edged sword, a wonderful victory and a deafening blow to my life.

Today I celebrate love, because imperfect though it may be, it is the thing I treasure most in my life. It is what keeps me going. And at the same time, I mourn the loss of normal, the onset of pain, the thing that stops me dead in my tracks. And I cling to hope that next year, I’ll be able to focus only on the good and that the 5th year from the day of diagnosis will be the first year of real relief.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Happy Holidays.

It’s not that I don’t have much to be grateful for, because that’s not true. Even I’m not that self-involved. I am so blessed in so many areas of my life and for that I am endlessly thankful. I just feel like I’m only able to see these good things because of the myriad of bad. And I hate that. I want to be thankful for things, not in spite of others.

But I am thankful anyway.

I am thankful for my friends and most of my family. Because I’ve gotten to witness, even today, how crappy some people can be. And without the other good people in my life, I would not be able to get up in the morning.

I am thankful for my husband. Because he is the only thing keeping me from quitting everything in my life. Because he is the only sure thing I have right now.

I am thankful for my medical care. Because even with thousand dollar medical bills sitting on the table, and sore backs and spinal headaches from lumbar punctures, I know that without the doctors I have, I’d be nowhere (which, I know is actually NOT ANY DIFFERENT from here, but at least we’ve sort of ruled some things out now, right? RIGHT?) Because I know that others can’t get the medical care I can and they suffer for it.

I am thankful for the roof above my home, the couch under my back, the heat from my vents and the food I’ve over indulged in. Because I know others are without a home and the luxuries within it.

I am thankful for the internet. Because without you, I would be fighting so many battles alone, if I would even be fighting them at all. Because without many of you, I don’t know how if I could’ve come as far and survived as much as I have.

I don’t feel the way I have some past years. I don’t want to fall to my knees in thanksgiving for this year. I don’t feel like weeping with the gratitude over the things I have in my life or the great things that have happened. But I am clinging to the good for dear life. And I am trying to be thankful for the fact that in the midst of all the badness I can still find these blessings.

That in the midst of the darkest time in my life, I can still see that there are things worth living for.

Happy Thanksgiving.

I told the groom on what was the second to last dance, that this wedding, his wedding, reminded me of how much I love my husband (leave it to me to find a way to make his wedding about me, I know). But it’s true. Being at that wedding reminded me of our wedding, of our love. And it didn’t hurt that we got to dance to Baby Got Back either.

I know you know that my life has been a bitch lately. Read any of the last ten (thousand) blog posts and it’s there. See the look on my face at the end of the day and it’s there. Things are a mess. I am, categorically, a mess.

But this life that has become mine has not just changed me. And I tend to forget that. Slappy’s life is different too, and though he’d never say it, it’s not fair. He hasn’t had a home cooked meal in literally weeks. He does the laundry, he does more than his share of the cleaning, and he has to pick up my pieces and put me back together almost daily.

On Monday afternoon, I came home from school and cried for a solid 2 hours. Big gulping snot-filled sobs. I wanted to quit school. And he let me cry, he held me, he rubbed my back. And then when I asked, he was honest with me. He told me what he really thought about it and ultimately, he told me what I needed to hear. He helped me calm down and find the right path again. I’ve fallen off of that path eleventy billion times since then, but he’s been there to guide me back each time.

He is not without his bad days and those are hard for both of us. He is human and he is suffering from this too and sometimes it’s easy for me to forget that. (And sometimes it’s easy for him to forget to ask his wife if his brother can “swing by for a beer” at 8:30 on a Tuesday night when the house is a sty. I mean, theoretically, of course.) But we work through those hard days together.

I’m certain that there are days where he wishes he wasn’t doing his own laundry. And days when he wishes that his wife wasn’t lying flat on the couch, doped up on pills and miserable with pain. I’m sure this wasn’t the life he imagined when we began dating, when we got engaged, when we got married. But it is our life, and he is here with me.

I don’t know what next month, next week or even tomorrow will bring. I don’t know how many more tests or surgeries lie in the future. But I know that he’ll be there, with a sometimes obnoxiously even keeled and unpanicked response to guide me to where I need to be.

The bottom line is that, no matter what is going on, or how broken I am, I know that he’ll be there. And I know that even though this isn’t the life we set out to live, it is one that we will live together.

And ultimately, that’s all that matters.

p.s. Okay, fine, I got unconditional love too.
p.p.s. And a lot of student loans.
p.p.p.s. But mostly love.
p.p.p.p.s. So maybe we don’t know for sure that it’s swine flu. But Slappy has been MORE than exposed and he started this. And it’s not cute.

Hold me.

This morning I got up much earlier than I wanted to on my last day of vacation and drove out to the student health center.  The goal of the day was to check in with a physician to make sure that I wasn’t having a stroke.  And, of course, to get a referral to a neurologist.

I arrived 45 minutes early (seriously Los Angeles traffic, you and your unpredictability can suck it) and thankfully they let me in early.  The doctor (who was gorgeous, but not nearly as gorgeous as my live-in physician) asked a few questions and as soon as I said the word Chiari he was done.  I believe his exact words were, “whoa, we don’t treat that here.  How about a referral?”

So basically I drove 30 miles, one way, to get a referral.  Which really, is fine.  Except that when I called the neurology office to make an appointment, the referral hadn’t actually been sent.  So I have to go back tomorrow.  I really shouldn’t be surprised by this, and yet, I am.

I went home and lazed around the house for several hours.  When Slappy got home from his 33 straight hours in the NICU, I fed him (not literally.  I mean, I provided him with food.  He has hands.) and tucked him into bed (yes, we’re gag-ably cute.).  As I was leaving the room, I ran into the new desk chair mat.  You know, the thick plastic kind with all the spikes?  That kind.  Ran into it with my right foot.

And I fell to the floor.  Considering the pain, I expected that half my foot would be missing when I finally looked at my foot.  But to my surprise, there was nothing.  Hardly even any blood.  (I might have even uttered something to the effect of, for all that pain, I should get a war wound).  I went into the bathroom to apply a bandaid and realized that, holy crap, about 80% of one of my toenails was NO LONGER ATTACHED.

And then I died.

Seriously y’all.  That shit HURTS.  I couldn’t bear to pull the whole thing off (it looks like a loose tooth still barely attached) so I trimmed it and band-aided it.  In case you wondered, being married to a doctor who is grossed out by toenails is WORTHLESS.  It’s now bled through like 3 band-aids and throbs whenever it’s not elevated.  And it looks CUTE too.

But, on the upside, this totally answers the question of whether I should I wear flip flops or tennis shoes to my first day of grad school.  Because, I’d rather amputate my toe with a chainsaw, with no anesthesia, in my wedding dress, in front of a large audience, in a pool of acid, than put a shoe on.

Or, you know, something slightly less melodramatic.  Whatever.

The first week was, at least for me, pretty uneventful. Slappy was not on call and he had a 3 day weekend (4th of July). Basically he had a 9 to 5 job, er, maybe 7 to 3 and perhaps it was a little more involved than the typical 9 to 5. But still, not anything that would seem outlandish.

And then we began pager call. And I say we because pager call is not an individual event. Frankly, the sound it make is practically a zip code event.

While on pager call, Slappy does not actually go to the hospital, he just calls in and orders treatments or tests or things. Because he’s in the newborn nursery, any real emergency matters are handled by the NICU and for the most part, we are in jaundice hell.

His pager shrieks at decibels that make my brain quiver and some nights it goes off once (or that one night, not at all) and some times it goes off like 5 or 6 times. Never close together, always like an hour apart, that way you have time to go back to sleep. And every time he has to get up, read the information and at least call and give orders. At worse, call, get information, do some research, call back and give orders. It’s a circus.

But dude, all that aside, pager call is HOT. Because whenever he gets paged he has to call in and deal with the problem. And when he calls, he identifies himself. And everytime I hear him say “Hi, this is Dr. McBigbrain” I get weak in the knees.

I’m not sure why. I mean, I knew it would be his name, but dude, be still my heart. And I’m sure that the novelty of this will wear off in a few years when the pager sings its shrill song at 3 in the morning and all I want to do is sleep, but for now, well, be still my heart.

And the other night? Just as his pager went off, he put a dirty dish in the dishwasher. I swear I don’t think I was ever more in love with him than I was in that moment.

The quickest route to a woman’s heart is through the dishwasher, and apparently, being in a position of authority.

All I can say is, rawr.