Why do I have a Christmas cow? And why is she named Bosphorus?
Well, the first Christmas that Craig and I were married we were listening to that song "Last Christmas" not the WHAM! version, but the Jimmy Eat World version. I'm not sure that matters, except for the fact that we both really love Jimmy Eat World.
Anyways, for those of you who may not know or are too polite to point it out...Craig and I are weird. We're goofy and random and we make up silly songs and dances. We're pretty convinced we had to meet and marry each other because no one else would have been able to handle us.
Anyways, this song came on and Craig started changing the words like he often does. He started singing: "
"Last Christmas I gave you a cow. The very next day, you gave it away. How did you lose that cow?! It weighed over 3,000 pounds!"
I think that's as far as the lyrics ever got, at least it's all we remember. Anyways every year when the normal version came on Craig would start singing the cow version instead.
So a few days before Christmas last year Craig came home and told me he had the best present ever. He handed me a bag and I opened it and there was my cow! I knew right away why he bought it and I thought it was amazing. There was some jumping up and down and exclamations of joy. Since Christmas cows aren't a real thing except for in our quirky household, Craig put a bow on it and we placed it in a spot of honor next to the television. I had just finished a book that took place in old Istanbul so I had the name of the river Bosphorus stuck in my head. I thought it was a cool name so it stuck.
I had totally forgotten about her until I opened the box of Christmas decorations this year. I was so happy when I remembered I had her. It's just one of those silly things that puts a grin on your face. It reminds me of how much I love Craig and how well we understand each other, goofiness and all. So forevermore there will be a Christmas cow in our house. Hopefully the kids will have one too when they grow up. And if we're really lucky, when we're 80 we'll remember how this funny tradition started in the first place. :)
We had the very great privilege of going to a dear friend's wonderful wedding in the Mesa, Arizona LDS Temple the week before Thanksgiving. It was a lovely long weekend full of joy, laughter, good friends, good food, tears, and fun.
Sierra made a stunning bride. We are so happy for her and Jordan. Keegan was thrilled to be reunited with some very good friends of his. We were happy to escape the cold and spend time with people who are very dear to us and like family.
We were lucky enough to be there the day Sierra and Jordan came to the Steven's house to announce their engagement officially and we were beyond excited to be at their sweet sealing.
We enjoyed the warm weather very much. It was so lovely getting to spend Sunday after all of the activities of the previous two days lazing in the sun and playing. We really do love Arizona and hope to make it our home in the future. For now, we will settle on visiting when we can.
Keegan was so happy to be on a plane for the first time and Connor was the best baby by sleeping through both flights.
It was a great start to Thanksgiving break!
We had a lovely Thanksgiving at Craig's sister's house. We had so much fun eating, talking and playing tons of games with our nieces and nephews. We had a bunch of intense rounds of sardines and then taught the kids a really fun card game called KEMPS.
We had so much to be thankful for in November, including the return of my good health after a brief scare with some funky test results. What a blessed life we live.
Crazy, small, creepy airport in Ogden
Stunna!
Amazing food and atmosphere. Location of Rehearsal Dinner.
Beautiful Temple
I love the palm trees
The bride and groom!!!
Lovely reception in the Stevens' backyard
My own handsome groom
Still in love!!!
We sent up lanterns as the couple left-just like in Tangled!!!!
Kaycie and Connor on Thanksgiving
Parker playing pool
Katie Mae
Yummy food
Pie I baked!
The whole family together for once! Lanes, Smiths, Holstes, and Goehrings!
This year it was really fun having two little kids to do Halloween activities with. Craig and I went to the ward get together as Amy Farrah Fowler and Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory. Keegan really wanted to be policeman so he went to the ward party and trick or treating in that costume. Connor was a bank robber with a cop brother at the party but on Halloween went as Steve Nash pre-Lakers. It was a warmer costume and he looked so cute in his jersey.
Once again we hardly got any trick or treaters but it meant more candy for us! Of course, we were also very diligent in "checking" Keegan's candy to make sure it was safe and all. ;)
What's funny is Craig had no idea I was putting Connor in Suns gear. He showed up and was a twinner.
This month has been pretty great! I am beyond excited to be back in school. I am definitely the type of person who loves to study and sit in lecture halls. So far I have been doing well. I was extremely excited to ace my first archaeology exam.
I changed my minor to Anthropology and do not regret it at all. It complements my history studies very well. I am hoping to start doing some volunteer work in the archaeology lab and I was recently accepted into the Boise State Anthropology Club which is the oldest student organization on campus. There are some conferences in the spring that I am interested in attending. I loved my first conference experience in Seattle with Phi Alpha Theta so it would be great to do more.
I turned 24 Labor day weekend. We had a nice quiet day at home. Craig bought me a great history book on women crossing the plains and the boys bought me two really sweet little Willow Tree figurines depicting brothers. My big exciting gift was front row seats to Les Miserables. I had been waiting an entire year for the tour to stop in Boise and had told Craig that's all I really wanted this year. He went above and beyond and bought us front row seats!
I started working again. I got a job with the Boise State Foundation/University Advancement working on updating alumni records and helping do the fundraising work for the various programs on campus that need funding-particularly the scholarship funds. It is a fun and rewarding job. I enjoy it a lot. I work in the evenings 4 days a week and Craig is able to be home with the boys.
Craig is still working two jobs and interning with men's basketball, women's soccer, and women's volleyball at BSU. He's busy but enjoying himself. 8 more classes and he'll finally graduate! Then it is time to hopefully find a paid GA spot at a good school so we don't have to pay for his Master's degree. So really we're not positive where we're going anymore. It's in the Lord's hands.
The renovations to the Boise Temple are almost complete. The Open House begins in two weeks. I am so excited to see the changes and be able to go and spend time there once again. It's still a bit of a shock driving by and not seeing the grey marble any longer.
On the 20th, we went to the BSU vs. BYU game. Man, was it frustrating! I couldn't believe how tense I felt during the whole thing. Honestly, neither team played their best but it was fun being there and trash talking with my little brother a bit. We did go and wish the BYU players well afterwards. It was fun getting to be in the student section with Craig and act like normal students while the kids played with Claire at our house.
"Scary" Bronco Game Faces
Saturday the 22nd we had a VERY busy day. In the morning I ran my first 5k at the St. Luke's Women's Celebration in downtown Boise. It was a ton of fun. It's the largest 5k of it's type in the country. I was pretty worried about it due to all of the smoke in the air but I did a lot better than I expected. There was a huge hill but I made it through the whole race without having to walk at all. I did it in around 35 minutes. Not to my high school XC standards but not too shabby for having had a baby 4 months ago and not doing a 5k in 3 years.
Heading over the to start line
At the Finish Line! Keegan had lots of love to give me.
That evening my lovely friends Claire and Camie came and took care of the boys so Craig and I could go to Les Miserables at the Morrison Center for the Performing Arts at BSU. Our front row seats were even more incredible that I could have hoped for. I really loved the new set designs based on Victor Hugo's art work and the special effects they employed were just magnificent. It really came to life. I cried so hard during key points of the show. The talent was superb. The actor who played Marius and the actor who played Thenardier both looked right at me and waved. I was so excited. I also received tweets from the actors who played Jean Valjean and Enjolras. I jumped up and down and showed Craig.
Connor was pretty sick this past week so I stayed home with him and we took it very easy. After a very busy past several weeks I think this last weekend of September is going to be a relaxed/quiet one. I am excited for the Relief Society General Broadcast and the dinner we're having prior to it but other than that it's probably going to be a couple of days of napping, reading, studying, and just enjoying some family time. Both of the boys are doing very well. Connor always get the biggest grin when he sees Keegs and loves when Keegan gets on the floor and plays with him. For his part, Keegan has only asked us to "take Connor back" once in the past almost 5 months.
I'm ready for October! Cooler weather, boots and sweaters, and HALLOWEEN! We're already having fun planning costumes and I've started putting up the fallish decorations.
I've been debating for a couple of weeks whether or not I could write this post. It's so intensely personal and difficult to talk about.
Some of you will be familiar with this but most of you will not. I have thought long and hard about it but I feel like it just really needs to be shared.
Those of you on Facebook may have noticed that for the last week or so I have been posting links to World Suicide Prevention Day (9/10/12) and National Suicide Prevention Week which is occurring right now. Some of you may be sick of those posts. Some of you may wonder why it matters so much to me or even in general.
Five years ago this month, I attempted suicide. I was 19 years old and had just graduated high school that June. In a misguided cry for help after struggling with intense feelings of depression, anxiety, worthlessness, and despair, I swallowed a bottle of pills.
Crying hysterically I called my Mother and best friend to ask for forgiveness. Finding it more difficult to stay coherent I realized what I had done. Slipping in and out of consciousness I heard a voice saying "Jessica, NO."
Alone in an unfamiliar place, I then managed to call 911 and was transported to a Seattle area hospital where I went through the difficult and disgusting process of swallowing charcoal to rid my body of the toxins of the pills I had taken.
I was able to go home that night but the feelings of hopelessness were still there. I spent several days shaking, crying, and wondering whether or not I should have bothered calling 911. At that point I asked my parents to take me to another Seattle area hospital so I could voluntarily check myself into the Psychiatric Ward and undergo emergency treatment consisting of therapy, consults with social workers and psychiatrists, and finding a decent medicine regimen.
It was one of the best decisions I ever made... during a time when even the simplest choices were so difficult for me.
Depression was nothing new to me. I had been struggling since I was 14. I had spent several years undergoing invasive medical testing and procedures to try and determine what was causing me severe pain and recurring sickness. The lack of answers and the continued pain largely contributed to my feelings of depression and hopelessness. I missed 1/3 of my senior year of high school by being in and out of the hospital, I had to quit running Cross Country and Track which I loved and had been good at. I stopped playing the cello. I often stayed home locked in my room. I put on a happy face with friends.
I didn't ask for help or admit how much I was hurting emotionally apart from the physical pain. This led to my spiraling out of control in September of 2007.
Fast forward exactly 6 months and I was back in a hospital. This time I was in Rexburg, ID attending school and had just become engaged. Severe pain and odd symptoms had led me to the ER when I couldn't make it to class. Finally a doctor recommended I see a gynecologist after noticing strange results on a CT scan. Within 24 hours of seeing this OB/GYN I was having emergency surgery. When I woke up he had the answers I had been looking for. I was diagnosed with Endometriosis. It explained the horrible pain I had been suffering and I was able to seek treatment to minimize it's effects on my day to day life.
A few months later I again went through a deep depression but with the help of a loving husband I found a good therapist and again adjusted my medications. I went about four years without having another really bad bout of depression. It was being managed carefully and even though some moments were a struggle I was okay overall.
This June everything changed. I began to slip. I had not been on any medication while pregnant fearing what it could do to the baby. Despite that and suffering from a high risk pregnancy my moods were in check apart from the normal hormonal related quirks. 5 weeks after he was born (this June) my doctors reintroduced my body to my medications. It takes weeks for the body to adjust to them and to see a difference. They were not helping. Sometimes I would leave the house only once or twice a week. I took care of the boys and that exhausted all of my energy. I had none left to care for me. I was suffering panic attacks, general anxiety and feeling very low.
My doctors scrambled to try to help me but nothing was working. I had postpartum depression. I had not had it after my first pregnancy and had been warned before that because of my history of clinical depression I could develop it. This time, I did.
I felt so guilty. I had two beautiful sons, a fantastic husband, a nice home, good friends and family...but I was miserable. I could not even articulate how I felt. I didn't sleep, I didn't eat. By July I was unraveling faster and faster.
One night I couldn't sleep at all. I knew how much medication was in the cabinet in the kitchen. I knew that a high enough dose of one in particular could be fatal. I never left the bed but I couldn't stop thinking about what was in the other room and that maybe it would be better to feel nothing at all. Surely nothing was better than the intense emotional pain I was experiencing.
Intellectually, I knew it was very wrong. I knew that I never wanted to leave my husband or my children. I knew that it would cause pain and devastation to those around me. I knew it wasn't really the answer. I knew I needed help but I was scared to admit what was going on in my head.
I feel like there is still such a sense of shame and social stigma surrounding depression and admitting one has it or needs to be on medication for it. It can be embarrassing and difficult to talk about. People are often judgmental. People want you to just "snap out of it" or "go for a walk" or "deal". Depression is a disease. Like other ailments it needs to be treated. Left untreated or when treatment doesn't work we run into the cruelty and heartache of suicide.
I told my husband I needed help. Within hours we were on our way to Seattle so my parents could watch our boys and I could seek treatment again with the same specialists I had trusted when I was a teenager.
I spent five days in the hospital going through the same kind of rigorous treatment I had experienced almost five years prior. The doctors, nurses, therapists, and even the other patients were amazing. It was a safe zone. There was no judgment. There were only people wanting desperately to help and once again give me the will to live and have hope.
Having depression means sometimes taking things day by day. It means learning to speak up. It means knowing when to get help. It does not make you a bad person, a broken person, or incapable of happiness in life. We all deserve to love and be loved.
I sat in my room in the hospital one night. I had requested a radio so I could try some meditation and writing. Not having lived in Seattle in quite some time I could not remember what stations were good and didn't really know what I was in the mood for. Idly flipping the dial I came across the middle of a song. I didn't know who was singing it or what the title was but I went completely still and just listened as tears fell down my face.
I had turned it on just in time to hear these words:
I don't wanna be someone who walks away so easily I'm here to stay and make the difference that I can make
Our differences they do a lot to teach us how to use the tools and gifts we got Yeah, we got a lot at stake And in the end you're still my friend, at least we did intend for us to work We didn't break, we didn't burn We had to learn how to bend without the world caving in I had to learn what I've got, and what I'm not And who I am.
I won't give up on us Even if the skies get rough I'm giving you all my love I'm still looking up Still looking up...
I won't give up on us God knows I'm tough, He knows We've got a lot to learn God knows we're worth it
I now know that it was Jason Mraz and the song is "I Won't Give Up". I believe hearing that song at that moment was a tender mercy from God showing me that I was not alone, that I was worth it, that we are ALL worth it. There is so much we can learn every day if we open ourselves up to it.
In that moment I began writing every little thing I was grateful for, every little thing no matter how silly or small that makes life worth living. The list got to about 120 things and it really hit me how much I have and how much really is at stake. My list covered everything from my family, my friends, my religion, to sparkly toe nail polish, polka dots, bubble baths and chocolate satin pie. The big and small all add up to a life and experience worth having.
I am doing so much better now. I am on the right dosages of medications, I started running again ( I even plan on running a 5k next week), I am back in school studying what I love most (history and anthropology), I started writing again, I got a new job, I have the right doctor, and will begin counseling again soon. My doctor last week was very pleased with what she called 100% progress.
It doesn't mean I am "cured". It doesn't mean I don't struggle still. It means there are days when I have to fight to have the motivation to do what I need to do or even to get out of bed. It means being able to communicate my feelings and letting people help me.
That is why WSPD and NSPW are so important to me. Because I am alive. Because there were people who did not give up on me. One organization holds a special place in my heart and that isTo Write Love On Her Arms. I discovered them while I was a teenager and attending Warped Tour and listening to bands that are active participants in their cause. They are geared towards helping young people in particular overcome addiction, cope with depression, and in raising awareness to the issues of suicide and mental illness. They have many universities involved as well in providing support and awareness to the students of those campuses. In fact, I am in the process of seeing if we can get a TWLOHA UChapter at Boise State.
I hope that by posting this at least one person will be helped. At least one person will find the courage to admit they need help and seek it.
Today, the challenge presented by TWLOHA for NSPW was to change the stigmas of mental health. I hope that this post can help in that.
This week I heard a new song that I felt was so fitting for my experience with music and for the feelings I have dealt with.
None of us are alone. Face your fears, embrace your dreams, and remember to always have hope.
Once again, I have been a blogging slacker. I will try to sum up the past three months as best as I can.
Keegan is a busy, busy 3 year old. He is almost totally potty trained finally.
His vocabulary is rapidly growing. His current favorite phrase involves putting his hands on hips and yelling out: "I am BOSSY!!!"
His love for trains is undeterred and his collection just keeps growing. He spends a lot of time with his train table and can name all these different varieties.
He loves his baby brother so much. He likes to hold him, hug him, kiss him, and play with him. He is always saying that Connor is his baby.
He loves to read, his favorite books right now are about ladybugs, the only bugs he can tolerate. He is the only little boy I know who hates bugs.
He loves to sing and dance. His favorite songs right now are "Call Me Maybe" (ugh) and "How Bad Can I Be" from The Lorax.
We went on a brief trip to Seattle in July. My parents took care of the boys while Craig worked in Boise and I went back to some specialists I had seen in high school at a hospital there to make sure a medical condition I have was fully under control and that my health was 100% after the difficult pregnancy with Connor. We didn't have much time to do anything but we did take Keegan and Connor to the lake which was a lot of fun and we got to spent a bit of time with my family.
Keegan testing out the water
Connor totally slept through the whole beach experience
Splashing around with Daddy
Feeding the ducks, they ate right out of our hands
I loved getting to go on the Seattle Temple Grounds
Connor is almost 4 months old now.
He is teething super early. His poor little gums are swollen and he gets so cranky.
He can roll over and lift his head and shoulders up like a little champ.
He is mostly sleeping through the night now which is soo nice!
He can grasp and hold a lot of his toys now which I think is so cute.
He grins so much. His smile is beautiful.
He is starting to laugh as well which is the best sound ever.
Birth
1 month!
2 months!
3 months!
Our big exciting news is that after working extremely hard the last several years, Craig was accepted to Arizona State University. It's been his goal since he was a little boy and I am so proud of him. He is going to finish his last year of his BA and then pursue his Master's degree. This means we'll be moving right after Christmas to Mesa, Arizona. We just got back from a trip out there to look at the campuses (there are three) and look at housing. The Polytechnic campus in Mesa has married housing and is where most of my classes will be (I am in the process of applying). We checked out the houses and they are simple but will fit our needs perfectly and save us a significant amount of money. We were not sure until this trip if we were going to take the leap and move but after much prayer, reflection, weighing of pros and cons, and spending time in the temple we know it is the right choice for us.
So happy to finally be a Sun Devil!!!
As for me, I just got back into BSU now that my health is back to being 100% and I am thrilled! Since Arizona State does not have a Canadian Studies minor (few schools do) I switched to History with an Anthropology minor and am excited about that. This semester I get to take Introduction to Archaeology which I think will be really interesting.
This weekend we finally blessed Connor. It was Stake Conference so we did it at home which was a very neat experience. It was wonderful having my family and Craig's family there. Connor didn't cry at all and looked so handsome in his outfit.
Good things are happening and we are so grateful for our blessings and the new opportunities that are being presented to us.
