…and the winner is:
pretty photo for your viewing pleasure first…
…and another.
{{chosen by random.org}}
Yay, you won! Check your email, you’ll have 48 hours to get back with me to claim your prize, otherwise another will be chosen.
Congratulations!
Thank you everyone for entering. I didn’t realize how much I wished I could give everyone a gift card!
I am!!
My first ever and I thought what better way to do it then a big ol’ huge one hosted by the beautiful, soon to be momma, Megan over on Mackey Madness!
{I snagged her picture from her blog..thanks Megan!!}
So head on over to Megan’s blog and see what I’m giving away (its pretty awesome).. and enter!!
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AH! What a weekend. I’m still recovering from it! It was a crazy boozing it up kind of weekend. Ok, not really, I’m not a boozer. But it was a very busy busy weekend for me that I’m still yawning over.
I’m thankful for:
- playing photographer to my sweet friend and her newborn. It was my 1st ever actual photo shoot…that didn’t involve fruit and I have to admit, it wasn’t easy. at all! I know some have asked to see them, and I promise I will show a few once they’re all good and ready…but soon.
- my skin clearing. I know its bad when I tell my friend the name of what I have and she texts back saying, ‘how yuk! The online description sounds terrible.’ …ah, thank you friend for your unabashed honesty. It was yuck..a yuck I dealt with for 8 months since I thought I could ‘treat’ it on my own. Silly me.
- waking up at 3am thinking someone was climbing into my bed only to realize it was my dream instead. A very very bad dream. {in the dream} the guy was about to kill me. Yep, awesome.
- finally bringing my gun back into my bedroom from the living room. {yes, I have a gun..more than one. yes, I had it in the living room for awhile…} After that dream, I knew I needed to bring it back for peace of mind.
- winning Sam’s giveaway. I’m pretty darn happy about it and she really is the sweetest ever. She has killer recipes too, if you don’t know Sam, you have to go meet her.
- a great weekend with my mom and sister. It was chaotic and stressful but so much fun.
- my whiteboard on my fridge that gets me through my ‘want to be down’ moments. Every time I see this, I start singing the song and can’t help but get upbeat.
You know this song, right?
What I’m about to say is going to change my life forever.
have I mentioned I like to be a bit dramatic with news??
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As you know, I’ve alluded to some super exciting news for the past week. Exciting to me, any way. If it makes you excited then shoot, let’s bask in this excitement together, shall we?
I have officially been approved for disability retirement! YAAAAHHHOOOOO!!
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It’s over. No more wondering how much longer it will take.
It’s done. They’ve deemed me incapable of performing my duties anymore.
It’s final. They’ve approved me and filed the forms to medically retire me.
It’s finished. My career, after 6 months of waiting, is over. I’m officially no longer a Correctional Sergeant for the California Department of Corrections.
I can’t believe it’s finally over. It’s amazing how much God has shown Himself to me. How much I’ve learned to trust and rely on Him each and every month for everything. Money, food, strength, faith. Each and every time He delivered. Not to say I didn’t doubt or fear or plain freak out and question how I’d ever get through this time, but there He was faithfully providing for me and showing me He is plenty enough for me each day.
One major thing He taught me was learning to go from living with a $4500 a month budget to living with a $1400 a month budget. It still amazes me that I am completely content living with my new budget and stuns me that I used to spend $4500 each month. (a lot went into savings, I’m not a total spender) but I definitely was very free with my money. Anything I wanted at any time without thought. Now, if I happen to go into a clothing store, I have to figure that $30 I spent is taken out of groceries. I’m very conscious of what and how much I spend.
With this retirement, I’ll now be receiving a disability check and be blessed with insurance for as long as this disability goes on. As you may know, during this whole 6 month process, they weren’t allowing me to work and therefore have gone 6 months without any sort of pay. Knowing I’ll be getting retro paid for these 6 months will be a sweet relief.
Praise God for this. Truly! Once everything is all said and done, and I’m completely healed from this current surgery, I will finally be able to find a new job. (which terrifies me) The next couple months will be a very big transition in my life.
This is the whole reason I ever started this blog. To share the tough times, to ‘hope’ they’ll approve my retirement, to show all that God was doing in my life through it all. It’s been great looking back at some of those posts and seeing His work in my life.
So with this new chapter comes a new blog name and design, and what better way to do it but by winning an awesome giveaway!! I won a new header and button from wild and precious and can’t wait to change it all up. Yippy!! So keep an eye out for some changes in the near future. Kris from behold the metatron gets to change things up for me! I’m still working on a name. I can’t be ‘hoping’ and ‘crossing anymore bridges’ since I’ve crossed it. Yahoo!! But I’m thinking I may keep my URL, though I’m still deciding that. I always need to ‘keep the faith going’ so that just might stay. Any thoughts??
Thanks family and friends and all my new blogging friends for all your encouraging words and support through these past 6 months! I could never have done it without you!
I’m a winner of a couple things actually and I. feel. special!!
First, I’m the winner of knowing I’ll be having surgery again.
Yep, the dr. I went to on Tuesday said a whole bunch of stuff but in summery:
My nerve endings (where they were cut off) are firing neurons all over the place hitting everything around them, which is causing me so much pain and the sure fire way to fix them is by having surgery again.
Only THIS TIME the difference will be, he (the new Dr., Dr. W.) will be tucking those nerve endings into the muscle so the neurons will have a place to go. (something Dr. P. DID NOT do)
You’d think I’d be hanging my head saying, no, please no more surgery. But seriously, I’m looking forward to it. Weird, right? I know it’ll suck. I hate not being able to move, being in the amount of pain I’ll be in for however long, but I truly believe it will be SO different from my other surgeries.
When Dr. W. came in the room, he apologized for making me wait so long. (it was literally 3 minutes). He said he took so long because he was reading my entire history I brought in for him and he felt like he knew me before even meeting me. (I like to be detailed, what can I say)
Though he’s sure Dr. P. did his ‘job’ he doesn’t think Dr. P. did the final step of tucking the nerves into the muscle and instead just left them there ‘hanging.’ AND ALL the injections Dr. P. was doing only made the nerves more angry and stronger which is why I’ve been in so much pain for so long. Injections that Dr. P swore were the trick to fix.
I’m a little frustrated at this. Maybe Dr. P. really believed they would work, even AFTER all the times I told him they made things worse, but at what point do you LISTEN to your patient and set aside the $$ you see in your eyes and stop doing something that’s CLEARLY not working, and not suggest more more more?!?!
Any way, I’m to call the office to schedule the surgery date for both feet. I have to figure out how much it’ll cost first…see if I can reactivate my insurance beforehand or if it’s ‘cheap’ enough to pay the full amount out of pocket. We’ll see.
Thanks for all your prayers with this. I really appreciate all your concern!
Now for the other thing I won. I won a giveaway!! Hip hip hooray. I love that.
Over at sidewalkready I entered for an Africa picture she took, and I won!! I can’t wait to get it. It’s my first giveaway I’ve won. It really made my day.
Isn’t it pretty!? It’s so vibrant, I can’t wait to find a place to hang it. (hopefully she doesn’t mind me borrowing the picture to show you)
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Well today I’m heading to my next friend’s house for her birthday party. She’s turning the big 2-9 this weekend and we’re having a slumber party at her place tonight then wine tasting tomorrow where I finally get to meet her boyfriend! Big deal over here! Can’t wait to show you all the pictures from both nights! Should be a blast. Us and wine = way too much fun.
