Life getting in the way of your sleep again?

It's been an eventful week. I probably won't go into a lot of event details, because although there's been a list of them, they aren't at all interesting to you (take my word for it). BUT, let's just say that it's only Monday (Tuesday in about a min and a half) and I'm exhausted.

SO... One Tylenol3 with Codeine and one Trazadone later... here I sit, wide eyed and racing.

Let's start here... Saturday I woke up with swollen gums on the left side of my mouth. Last time that happened, it was Shingles. (Adult chicken pox... who knew?) I swished Listerine about 6 times that day, took an Excedrin every few hours, and tried to chew my food the best I could, hoping it wasn't the same thing.

Sunday I woke up completely unable to open my mouth, swollow, speak, eat... any of those necessary functions we all take for granted. After about 20 minutes of struggling with the intense pain (which had traveled to the roof of my mouth and behind my left eye), I decided it was inevitable... Another wasted Emergency Room day. This is no joke, people... A visit to the emergency room on post is guaranteed at least 4 hours, more if you have a sick child (no rhyme or reason to that one... just works out that way).

After 3 1/2 hours in an empty ER, the doctor walked in and announced they'd misplaced my chart and forgotten about me. I had taken a Xanax to survive the visit, because I was irrationally terrified they were going to inject me with things, so I had spent the entire 3 1/2 hours struggling to stay awake - I woke up over and over because I was falling out of the chair they'd parked me in. After a check-up with an attractive but extremely useless Special Forces guy (who never actually labeled himself as a doctor or anything of the sort), the real doctor appeared. A quick look in my mouth and he announced I needed to see a dentist for x-rays. He says it looks like a dental abscess which has gotten infected - No surprise to me, since I haven't seen a doctor since before Asher was born 3 years ago.

Sent on my way with a bottle of Acetaminophen, a bottle of Tylenol3 with Codeine, and a bottle of Penicillin, I went home to bed. There I have been, basically ever since.

Today was a better day (sort of), but I'm still in pain. I missed my therapy appointment (NOT GOOD, PEOPLE!) and found myself writing in my journal at 9:30 pm. (Why do I still make that mistake? I know if I write past 8 pm, I won't be able to stop until at least 3 am and I'll be a zombie the next day.)

TO THE POINT:

My mind is racing because I'm suddenly completely aware of how close we are to going home to Utah for good. This thought makes my stomach twist and jump like a swarm of butterflies I haven't felt since I met my husband. I'm downright giddy about going home. It makes me feel:

1) Nervous because there's about a zillion things to do between now and then, and I have no idea if I'll get them all done in time, and

2) Outrageously happy because I will finally be escaping the nightmare that is Kansas and re-joining my fellow Utahns in the land of NORMAL. (I know a LOT of people would disagree with that statement, but I'm referring to normal for ME, not normal altogether. No need to get all up in arms over it.)

3) Proud of us, for surviving it!!! Very few people believed we could (including me, I think), and somehow we have! Not without our set-backs, that's for sure... but now that it's so close, I know for sure we're going to make it through to the end. The contract we thought would never end is ACTUALLY GOING TO COME TO AN END. THERE IS LIGHT AT THE END OF THIS HORRIBLE, DARK, MISERABLE, LONG, WRETCHED TUNNEL!!!

Now that I have this newfound hope, what do I do with it? I've got a monster list of things to do, including:

1) Magically finding a chunk of money we can use to get home when the time comes,

2) Selling our house in Abilene (nice house... bad market),

3) Finding a new place to live, a new job for Steve, a job for me, schools for both of us, schools for our kids...

I'm overwhelmed with the list of things to do in order to live once we get there, but most of all I'm excited! I'm excited because once I get there, Steve and I will finally have something in common! We will be living in the place we want to live, with our families and friends and careers and lives in front of us! In general we have the same goals when it comes to those things: same general area we want to live, we both want to go to school ASAP and acquire successful careers, raise our kids near our families...

Now I'm faced with the decision of when to come home. Steve's contract ends in April '09, 12 months from now. (See the countdown on the right!) He's going to do his best to qualify for a chapter in the Army which will let him out something like 30 or 60 days early... something like that. If that's the case, we could be out as early as February. Here's where it gets tricky. Do I:

A) Go home before Joshua starts school, so I don't have to switch him in the middle of Kindergarten? That's so much earlier than Steve gets out of the Army, I'm not sure either of us will want to be away from each other for that long... not to mention the kids being away from Steve (and Steve from the kids) that long. That would be 6-8 months apart before Steve could come home.

B) Start Aesthetics school at the American Academy of Beauty in Manhattan (that's Manhattan, Kansas, folks... not New York. I know, disappointing) in June. The program lasts 5 months, so I could go home to Utah in November when I finish that and have a marketable skill to go home with. Then I could find a job, find a house, get the kids in school and get settled before Steve got out of the Army and came home. Or,

C) Get a job working nights somewhere, saving every penny I earn, and go to regular college courses during the day (I can only manage one class at a time), on post, for free. Then I could go home in January and start getting set up for Steve to get home in February/March.

The ultimate goal is to go to school for a 4-year degree in English/History. I want to teach either/or/both... some combination of the two subjects. Aesthetics is something I'm interested in, but it would mostly just be something to help me pay my way through school for the 4-year degree. (Weber State, probably.) I guess I'm just driving myself crazy trying to think of which is the best course to get to that ultimate goal, while taking advantage of the time we have left.

If only it hadn't taken me the entire 3 years we've already spent in the Army to figure out what my actual plan for my future was!! But it did, and I'm just happy to finally have a goal in sight. :)

As Josh says, "Find the x that marks the spot and start digging." Wish I knew which shovel to use....