Stress:

Geez louise... How much stress can one person handle before their body just gives up? I guess we're going to find out!!!

Lots of tests tomorrow, lots of things to take care of at home, lots of things on my mind.

To be honest, I've been thinking a lot about therapy. I've got some real issues I feel I need to deal with. Mostly regarding self esteem and self worth. My mom pointed out an interesting paragraph in a book she was reading:

"Through this experience I learned that whenever someone values us more than we value ourselves, we tend to sabotage our relationship with that person. Secretly, we don't want them to get close enough to find out that we aren't as good as they think we are."

 That's when the light bulb went on. It was almost astounding. And the concept can be applied to areas outside of relationships. For example, if I don't think I'm smart enough to pass paramedic school, I might try to sabotage my success in the class. I found the concept interesting. Fascinating, even.

That's my thought for the evening. Time to get back to studying.

New addition:

Meet Ferndinand, Fern for short.

He's a hanging fern and is the first of what I hope to be a lovely and flourishing plant collection. The end goal is to have a nice setup of plants on the balcony (hopefully a small table and a chair, as well. I'd love to be able to sit outside among some greenery and study as well as having several indoors. It's probably all in my head, but I swear I'm already breathing easier!

I spent a good hour at The Home Depot looking at plants and then looking them up online to make sure they weren't considered toxic to animals. Unfortunately, many plants are, so options were limited. All true ferns are generally "animal friendly", which is good to know. In the coming weeks, I hope to compile a list of plants I like that do well in low light and are animal safe. I figure I'll need to head to an actual garden center (like an Armstrongs) so I can talk with some plant experts.

Fingers crossed I don't kill Fern... I've been known to forget to water plants in the past... This time, however, I hope to have nipped that problem in the bud. Fern has his own "water bulb". As long as I check it to make sure its full, Fern should be able to hydrate at his own pace.

This weekend has been great (date day, birthday party, Fern), but it's time to get back to the real world of life as I know it.

I love Taylor Swift:

"Don't you worry your pretty little mind, people throw rocks at things that shine. Life makes love look hard. The stakes are high, the water is rough. But this love is ours."

There is a Taylor Swift song for everything: love, revenge, youth, anger, sadness, apologies...

Sleep? Who needs it!

Who doesn't want to spend their Saturday morning having their butt handed to them in the gym?

*raises hand*

Too bad.

Oh well. Maybe I'll sleep in tomorrow...

Ha! Silly Nestle!!

Cookie dough is the best part!!

New Link:

Hello Blog World!

I made a "Paramedic Intern" blog for things relating specifically to my experiences and thoughts regarding class. It's called "Life As I Know It." I will blog on both, but one may get more "attention" than the other. My advice, check them both!!!

To Be Perpetually Happy:

As I'm driving to my doctors appointment, I notice a young man walking on the opposite side of the road and he had the biggest smile on his face. In the nicest way possible, this young man looked like he was born with some type of mental deficit (I don't mean any offense by this statement). He was smiling at everyone. He waved at me and I waved back and it got me to thinking: what must it feel like to be genuinely happy almost all the time? Seeing him made me remember how blessed we all are. It was a reminder to me that even though I'm super stressed out and feel like I'm losing my mind, I still have a lot to be thankful for.

When the lights go down in the city...

Hello Blog World!

I know it's been a long time since my last update, but sh*t has been crazy!!

I started school in August. We just finished our 3rd week. It ended with a bang! All of San Diego County, parts of AZ, NM, Mexico and Orange County lost power for between 6 and 12 hours. That was Thursday, September 8th. They canceled school for all of SD County on the 9th, including our paramedic school. I had planned to spend the day doing something productive and useful, but I ended up doing fun stuff.

Class has been pretty intense so far. We're almost through our Intro block. Next is Medical block, which will be even harder. I had a scare on one of the tests and I scored really low. I decided to delete my Facebook account to eliminate distractions. I'm having a hard time focusing on studying.

I came down with pneumonia a little while back and it seems to be back for round three. This isn't helping anything. I'm in bed right now and I'll probably take a nap before I go nanny a little tonight.

I am blessed in having friends and family to support me both emotionally and financially. I'm basically learning how to live on nothing, which is definitely not fun!

There is this video on youtube of Palomar College's 39th Fire Academy that I watched this morning and it reminded me of how much work is left to do and how much more I need to prepare. But it also made me want to work harder.

http://youtu.be/0xLSL_Mq4Tk

I was super amused to see familiar faces. A couple of guys I used to work with and a few guys from my medic class are in the video.

I know this is a really crappy update, haha. I'm sure it's lacking information and coherency. I think it's time for my nap!!