I finally received my speech-to-text program, Dragon, from work. What an amazing thing this is!!! My hands are starting to feel better - not 100%, but I am not in the agonizing pain that I once was. (I'm also having fun using Dragon to type this for me). I have to sound like a total dork to use this program because it is necessary to enunciate perfectly each and every word, but it is able to keep up with me. I also have to correct myself as I speak so that it understands what I want to see in print.
Every time that I am speaking into the headset in order to work and cannot walk spy and here's me he starts giggling and says that I sound completely stupid. I can't even imagine what I sound like even though I'm the one speaking, but I really don't care seen as a Marty up to four reports a day as compared to the one that I was doing not even a month ago.
So, to catch up on everything that has been going on in this house, let's start with Ken and Sean winced on an overnight hike to Joshua Tree. They had a great time, and Sean really enjoyed spending some time with his dad during his Spring Break.
Then it was time for Easter. It was so weird to me that Easter came in March - I don't even care that it was the last day of March, it still needs to be in April or it throws the entire Spring out of whack. The girls dyed their eggs:
And then the Easter Bunny made his rounds.
The girls really liked the earrings that I made for them. Jordan didn't take them out all day.
I was - once again - very disappointed in my Easter dessert. I don't know what it is about this holiday that takes my baking skills and sends them straight to hell. Nothing every turns out as pretty as it should. At least it tasted great!!
The girls did a simple egg search around the house. Apparently, there is just so way for them to have "Easter" without an egg hunt.
Wow! And then it became April, and Jordan turned 9. Where, exactly, has the time gone?? Jordan received the customary spankings by Daddy before school. She always loves it when he "loses count" and has to start over.
Ken and I were not able to pick up the girls very early from school, but we were able to get them and take them out for Jordan's birthday supper. She chose Red Robin for her meal. She had a great time and totally played everything up with the waitress to be sure she got her Birthday Sundae.
The next morning, she had to wear her new outfit to school:
This is what my life looked like the afternoon that I received the Dragon program: I was finally able to go through all of the hundreds of emails and get things sorted so I knew what reports needed to be done, what was scheduled, etc. It took me 3 hours alone just to go through the emails, and sorting through the piles did require a beer by 5:30 that afternoon. I was just so close to being caught up that I didn't want to stop, but the stress was a bit much.
I am happy to report that I am now up to 4 reports a day rather than 1/2 a report a day from a month ago. Wow! What a difference being productive makes!! I'm hoping that my co-workers will have less stress now that they can finish up their portions of these IEPs and get back to their own lives.
Because I have not been using my hands, I'm feeling a little better. The girls were bummed that I had all of the makings for their bracelets, but I hadn't been able to complete them. I had them help me over the weekend since there wasn't intricate work on these like there it for the earrings, and they loved how the bracelets turned out:
I'm still spending about 3-4 hours a day doing the exercises for my hands along with the heat and ice. I'm going back and forth with the Worker's Comp people because I want to see the doctors at the VA, but they keep arguing that the VA is not in network. The first choice for an orthopedist is known in my area as "The Butcher" so I totally refused to go. Unfortunately, there are still times when I use ice that my hand gets that Raynaud's Phenomenon:
Instead of going bluish/purple, my fingers have been turning completely white while the rest of my hand stays it's normal color. The pain from the pins-and-needles tingling is rather unbearable especially after I shake it out. This last time, it took almost an hour for my fingers to return to their normal color, so I am making the decision to not use ice until I can see a doctor who knows what the hell is going on. I have never had this problem before, and I'm not comfortable with the fact that I am having it at all.
And finally!! I was able to get myself together enough to purchase cupcakes for Jordan to blow out a candle for her birthday. She loves Monster High, and the only cake I could find was huge, but I was able to find cupcakes. Perfect!! She loved them, and I do mean LOVED them.
Jordan was so busy smiling that she never noticed that she had cupcake in her teeth until I took the picture.
I am glad that I have begun to get my life back. I can't do everything that I was able to, but I'm also not dropping glasses on the floor and breaking things because I suddenly can't grip them. I am able to do some light cooking again, and I have been able to actually stitch so long as I wear braces on both hands. It's incredibly cumbersome and it really slows me down, but I'm able to relax which is great!
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