Hanging with Mr. Cooper

Handsome little man

It's been over 6 years since I've had to write one of these things. I guess there's no better place to start than at the beginning. Back in 2004, I was living in Rochester, MN. I had bought my first house at the beginning of that year, and was working at the Mayo Clinic as a Registered Nurse on a general care floor. I had 2 dogs, Lady and Brie. Lady was a cattle dog mix, and Brie was a pug. For reasons even I can't begin to fathom, I felt I needed a pug friend for Brie. I started working with some rescues, and after a few disappointments, I decided to get a puppy. At this time, I don't even know if Craigslist was a thing, and so I was searching the online classifieds for pug puppies from newspapers all over the state. It was a very laborious process, to say the least. I finally found an ad for pug puppies in a newspaper out of Duluth, MN, which was about 5 hours from where I lived. Turns out the puppy was actually located right outside International Falls, MN, which is basically Canada, and also 8 hours from where I lived. I was undeterred. The woman who had the puppies explained that she had recently adopted a rescued female pug who hadn't yet been spayed, and that this batch of puppies was an "oops" litter. Apparently she had a friend with a young male pug, and neither of them thought that he was old enough to impregnate her female. Well, he was. And along came a litter of pugs. The thing I appreciated the most about her is that she asked me a lot of questions about pugs. Did I knew their breed-specific medical issues, did I have a fenced yard, did I have other dogs for the puppy to play with, what did I do for a job and how long would the puppy be alone, on average. This was truly a person who cared about where her puppy was going to go, and wanted the new home to be a success.

My three loves...Brie, Ladybird, and Cooper

So I drove all the way up to International Falls to get this puppy. This little black ball of fluff with huge brown eyes and tiniest little curly tail. I was immediately in love. He was so little that I could put him inside my shirt to keep him warm, and his little head would poke out right under my chin. The owner had been calling him Beaner, because he looked like a little black bean. I had been going back and forth between Eddie and Cooper as potential names for my new puppy, but I thought Beaner was also kind of cute, so I decided to go with that name. That is, until a few days later when I was in the breakroom for lunch with a bunch of my coworkers and told them that I had decided to name the puppy Beaner. From the end of the table came the exclamation, "You've got to be fucking kidding me. Beaner??" So I stammered something about maybe sounding like a pothead because my brother was always talking about how you have to get the beaners out of the weed before you smoke it, but she interrupted me and basically yelled for all to hear, "Beaner is a racist term for a Mexican!" I was shocked. This is how white-girl I truly was. I had never, ever heard the word Beaner as being a description for a Mexican. To this I asked, "Why are they called Beaners?" because I truly didn't know. "Because they eat beans...duh" was the explanation I was given by this woman at the end of the table (ironic that I was the one being made to feel like a racist in this situation). She was from southern California and never wasted any time telling everyone that; apparently being from that locale also made her an expert about everything (case in point, she pronounced all the S's in Des Moines, even after being corrected; she also withheld Morphine from a hospice patient because she didn't want him to become addicted. Sooo...she was basically an ignorant idiot and a terrible nurse). But I wasn't about to argue with her and sat there shamefully eating my lunch along with all my other coworkers who were also learning about the term Beaner for the very first time. It was an honest mistake. Out of defiance, I almost kept the name, but then I remembered that I lived in a mixed-race neighborhood and standing outside yelling Beaner would probably be ill-received. And truly, I didn't want to be one of those idiots who name their dogs a racist or inappropriate word because they think it's funny/ironic/whatever. So, it was between Eddie and Cooper. I couldn't get the phrase Hanging with Mr. Cooper out of my head, so Cooper it was. It should be noted that I'd never seen the show 'Hanging with Mr. Cooper,' and didn't know that Mr. Cooper was, in fact, a black man and Cooper was a black dog...so apparently I didn't escape some racial ambiguity in the end).  

Empty water bottles were come of his favorite toys

I had barely had Cooper a year before I started travel nursing. Initially I just took the pugs with me, as there were a lot of weight restrictions (most only allowed dogs under 25 pounds; Lady was 50) and 2-dog limits in the apartments I was renting. Lady stayed with my parents for those first couple years. I felt bad leaving her behind, but the pugs were so bonded that I didn't want to split them up, and I didn't want to leave them behind, either. So off we went. Cooper has lived in and visited more states than most people I know. He's been to the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, the Rocky Mountains, the Appalachian Mountains, the Green Mountains of Vermont. He's swam in lakes, he's paddle boarded, he's summited mountains. That little dude had quite the adventurous life. For most of you in Flagstaff, you only knew him as a grumpy little old man, but that little dog used to tear around like a crazed tasmanian devil. He used to run circles around me and I couldn't catch him. He could jump onto every piece of furniture and could even jump over baby gates. He and Brie used to chase each other around for hours; his signature move was diving under the bed and army crawling to the middle to wait out Brie, as by the time she got frustrated enough to crawl under there after him, he was already out and down the hallway, barking all the way. I used to laugh so hard at their shenanigans. He adored little kids, to the point that he would get so excited and wiggly and snorty with his wide open mouth that he would typically scare them away.

At the top of Pinnacle Mountain in Little Rock, Arkansas

Cooper was always an odd little dog. He seemed to always know when I was messing with him and would become visibly disgruntled about it. He would sigh loudly just to let me know how unimpressed he was with my attempts to be funny at his expense. He loved fruits and vegetables. He would do anything and everything for a cherry tomato, a carrot, or a piece of popcorn. I'm actually allergic to dog saliva, so I wasn't in the habit of letting dogs lick me. He picked up on this, and instead of trying to give me kisses, he would put his muzzle up against my cheek and open and close his mouth, the closest thing he could get to giving me a kiss. I always found that to be so very cute and endearing. Every now again he would give me the teeniest, tiniest little lick right on the tip of my nose. He always pranced when he walked. When we were out on walks, he looked like a miniature percheron trotting away, particularly when I had him and Brie hooked up with the double leash to their harnesses...like two little draft horses pulling me along. He was always the biggest dog in the yard, no matter where we happened to be or who else happened to be there. I remember he took down a malamute at the dog park once...he launched himself like a little black pug missile at that dog and knocked it right over. I was so in shock by the whole scene that I just stood there with my mouth agape, and then had to suppress a laugh at the malamute's owner as she threatened me with vet bills if her dog was injured (it wasn't, and perhaps maybe it learned a little lesson about trying to mount little dogs at the dog park). That was, however, Cooper's last visit to the dog park. He screamed through his baths. Just the most terrible sound ever. He hated to be brushed and he hated having his nails trimmed.

The infamous malamute, immediately prior to pug missile deployment

Over the course of his life, Cooper had several nicknames. In no particular order: Little Buddy, Coop, Coop-a-loop, Mighty Coopah, Duder, The Buddy, Montenegro, Coop-a-Troop, Li'l Man, The Grumpus, Little Fuzz Butt, Squish, Squishy. There might be more...he was called all kinds of things by all the people he met throughout the course of his life. 

Cooper on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon

Pugs don't stay as physically fit for as long as most other breeds I've encountered. I think Cooper's last long walk happened in 2014. We took him up to Lockett Meadow the day after Brie died and we hiked almost to the top where the trail meets Waterline Road. That's a long way for a little guy. He was 10 years old at the time, and he definitely struggled on the way back down and had to be carried. After that the walks were much shorter, usually just around the block. We took him camping with us a lot, and he was a funny little camping dog. You don't see too many pugs in campgrounds, but he loved exploring and smelling (and peeing on) all the things. He loved going places with us in the camper van, and had his own little laundry basket to sleep in while we were driving. I think it gave him a sense of security to be all snuggled in like that. Cooper's last camping trip was to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon this past fall. I'd like to think he enjoyed it, but he had lost his hearing and most of his eyesight by then, and was mostly content to just nap.

The little camping dog in Madera Canyon, Arizona

It's funny looking back at old photos of him, seeing how black his face used to be, how physically capable he used to be. It's weird how much his face changed through the years...not just the ever encroaching gray hair, but his muzzle became more droopy, his eyes became less bright, his ears and tail became less perky, and his overall stance became more feeble and frail. I remember noticing that he was slowing down, but most of the changes were so gradual that it just kind of became the natural progression of things. The last few years I used to jokingly remark with disdain that he wasn't a cuddler. He hadn't been very snuggly for the past few years, I think mostly because the arthritis he had in his spine and his hips made it hard for him to find a comfortable position, but as I look back in photos, he definitely used to be both a snuggler and a lap dog. He and Brie used to pig pile on top of me, and that was their favorite place to be. It's funny how quickly I had forgotten that about him. Maybe it's a little bit of a blessing that we don't mourn the way things used to be as we adjust to the new normal.

Simon wrangling all the dogs on Fort Myers Beach, Florida

That being said, I remember each decline like it was yesterday. I remember when he wasn't able to go on walks anymore. I remember when he could no longer jump onto the bed, and then it was the couch. I remember when he became too unsteady to use the pet steps and we had to lift him on and off the bed and the couch. I remember when he stopped playing with toys. I remember when he lost his hearing, because he no longer tilted his head when I was talking to him. The loss of the head-tilt was devastating. I remember when it happened to Brie too; they could tell I was talking to them because they were watching me, but they weren't grabbing any of my words anymore. I remember when I felt that first little nubbin of his spine as he started to lose muscle tone to the arthritis. I remember when his back started to arch all the time. I remember when he started to limp as the arthritis moved to his hips, and then after that to his shoulders. I remember how he started to sleep more during the day, and I remember how deeply he slept after he lost his hearing. I remember when he started to lose his vision, how he would stand at the threshold of the hallway if the light was off because he couldn't see well enough to confidently wander to the bedroom. I remember putting a nightlight in the bathroom so he could see to find his water dish. I remember all of those things. I remember him getting old, and along the way I forgot what it was like for him to be young.

Morning cuppa at Kick Stand Coffee in Flagstaff, Arizona

I never thought he would live as long as he did. Brie died when she was 12, and Cooper was 10 at the time. I thought maybe we had about 2-4 years left with him, but he surprised us all and just kept on kicking. Luckily he had always been a healthy young pug, which carried on into his older years. He lost his hearing, he mostly lost his vision, he lost the ability to jump up on things, he lost the ability to go on walks. He lost so much these last few years, but he never seemed unhappy. Grumpy, absolutely, but never unhappy. As long as he had me, his treats, and a comfortable place to lay, he was content.

I adore the little smile on his face in this photo

 On his last two days of life, I did his two most hated things to him...I gave him a bath and I brushed him. And did that little turd fight me every second of it. He had always loathed bath time, which is funny because when he was young, he used to jump into the shower with me all the time. It was funny seeing him tearing around the bathtub, seemingly confused about how he had gotten there, and perplexed as to how to get out of that situation. Had I known he had so little time left, I probably wouldn't have bothered with the bathing or the brushing, but he was getting a little stinky, he had had an accident that he had lain in, and we were going out of town and I didn't want to leave a smelly, sheddy little dog for the dog sitters. 

Post-bath death stare from under his favorite blanket

I'm trying so hard not to feel guilty about the fact that I helped him pass the day before we went on a trip...I didn't want it to feel rash, and I wanted myself to feel more ready. The thing is, despite telling myself I was ready, I don't think I was ever going to be fully ready. Years ago when he started declining, I knew first and foremost that I didn't want him to suffer; this was very, very important to me. The last week of his life he seemed markedly different; more anxious, more uncomfortable, his stance changed to the point that he didn't seem comfortable sitting or standing, he was pacing more than usual, and he even seemed to have trouble getting comfortable while lying down. It took me a week of going back and forth to finally make the decision to help him pass. My worst fear was that he was going to decline to the point that my dog sitters would have to take action on my behalf, and that's the last thing I wanted for them or for him. It has always been very important to me that when it comes to my dogs and their time to pass, it has to be me. I owe them everything but I especially owe them that. When I really stopped to think about things, I had to ask myself if I would be coming to a different conclusion if I wasn't going on a trip. And the answer I kept coming back to was no, no I wouldn't be doing anything different...it was just his time, and this decision had been made long ago. Actually, I would have done one thing different. I would have planned ahead and had the at-home vet come and help him pass here at home. That's the only thing I would have done differently. The at-home vet wasn't available to come out on the day I made the decision, and I didn't want to wait any longer because I could tell that it was time. In the end, it was an incredibly hard decision, but as his person it was one I had to make, and so I did. Cooper has never really had issue with going to the vet, and quite honestly, he rather enjoyed going to the vet so he could pick fights with the other dogs in the waiting area. He was such a tough guy right up until the end. The vet we use has a 'hospice room' that has soft lighting, a couch, treats, etc. It's actually a nice quiet place to spend some time with him to say goodbye. He sat on my lap the whole time while we reminisced about all things Cooper, which was unusual for him given his disdain for snuggling, but I think he knew, and I think he was okay with it. I think he was ready.

 

Camping at Pine Grove campground outside Flagstaff, Arizona

You know, we used to joke about all the things we were going to do with his body after he had passed. Stuff him and put him in a pet bed so it was like he was still there; make a rug, a purse, a fur stole, or a hat out of his pelt; make a key chain out of his tail; get his ashes and mix them with paint to make a painting. We used to laugh about these things because although it was kind of morbid, it was preparing us for the inevitable. In the end we didn't do any of those things. I had him cremated and I elected not to get his ashes. I did, however, find out that that the pet crematorium dumps the ashes along a forest service road north of the Walnut Canyon area, which is a beautiful area in the woods. Apparently there's a grove of oak trees there that turn bright red in the fall, some speculate due to the ashes mixing into the soil. Whether any of that is true, it's a really nice thought to think of all my little buddies giving back to nature in a way for all of us to enjoy. The vet's office will have made a paw print for me, and I'll go pick that up once it stops snowing. I did grab a little ball of his fur from the brushing and put it in an empty pill bottle. I don't yet know what I'll do with it, if anything, but for now that's all I have left of him.

Probably my most favorite picture of Cooper and I

For almost 19 years of my life, I was the girl with the pugs. It became as much a part of my identity as talking about poop, my refusal to dye my hair, and my penchant for all things Lululemon. I have so much pug stuff...shirts, sweaters, leggings, photos, paintings, books, magnets. Being a pug person is who I am. But now I'm not. I didn't just lose my little buddy as he took his last breath, I lost a part of myself too. So now I sit here and I wonder, Who am I? Where do I go from here? How do I go from here? I have all these moments...moments of good, moments of bad; moments of laughter, moments of sad. They come at me without warning and I'm still working through it. The house is so quiet without him here. I didn't realize how noisy Cooper was until he was gone. He was always skittering about; if he wasn't looking for me he was checking his food dish to see if any treats had materialized in it since the last time he checked, or he was skittering to get a drink of water, or he was skittering to the back door hoping that we would notice and let him out to go to the bathroom. If he wasn't skittering, he was napping. When he was napping, he was snoring. If he wasn't napping or skittering, he was next to me on the couch...not snuggling, god forbid, but close enough so that he knew I was there. I was his true north...if he knew where I was, everything was right in his world. 

Pug pig pile

I moved his bowl out of the kitchen and just about lost it. I picked up all the pieces of food on the floor because he used to just rustle around in the dish to take the treats in his mouth and spit the rest of the food all over the place. How he managed that with less than 10 teeth, I'll never know. It's funny, a few years back before we realized that we had a mouse in the house, I would find dog food in the weirdest of places, and for a while there, I thought that it was Cooper. I remember being so confused as to why he was dropping mouth fulls of food into my shoes. Little did we know...hahaha! The pet bed next to my desk sits empty, and I cry almost every time I look at it, but I just can't put it away because every time I take something away that was his, I feel like I'm erasing him. I guess I'm just not ready to accept yet that he's no longer here. I find bits of his hair on my things, and I can just see in my mind all the last places where he was. Sometimes I think I'm all done crying, that I'm able to just be okay with the fact that he brought me so much love and happiness, and then I see that pet bed and it starts all over again. But I can't move it yet. I just can't. He used to lay on the bath mat when I would shower, and I'd have to be careful not to step on him when I got out of the tub. He won't be there anymore. Sometimes he would push the bathroom door open while I was on the toilet, and he would just stand there and stare at me as if I should have been doing something else with my time. He always had to know where I was, all the time. What's ironic is that in the last year or so, I always had to know where he was too. Because he couldn't see or hear, and he was a frail little old man, I felt this need to always know where he was to make sure that he was comfortable and safe, that he hadn't gotten shut in a bedroom or gotten lost in a corner somewhere.

Being carried back to the car after the long hike at Lockett Meadow

It's funny how a pair of pants lying on the floor or a little blanket rumpled up in the pet bed can look like him when I'm going about my business and catch a glimpse out of the corner of my eye. Or when I get back from taking Kiki for a walk I have this random thought about where he might be laying when we get in the house. He had his few favorite places where he would wait for us to come home. Being the creature of habit that I was, I would check all of his favorite places to see where he was. Sometimes I would wake him up to give him pets, otherwise I would let him slumber on and he would wake up on his own time, seemingly taken aback over the fact that we had materialized out of no where. Over time those thoughts will diminish; I'll stop looking for him and the pants on the floor will just be pants on the floor. Kiki has already claimed his favorite blanket (which was actually a rather expensive Rumpl blanket that I had bought for myself but was letting Cooper have because it was his very favorite), so I guess maybe that blanket will forever just be a dog blanket. The things we do for our pets.

Such a little cutie!!

I think one of the most powerful parts of this whole dying process, was my friend Eli saying to Cooper, "Thank you, Cooper" as he passed away. In my sadness I hadn't thought about all the things Cooper had brought into my life that I was thankful for. It was the perfect sentiment and the perfect goodbye to that little bugger who had given me so very much, in truth he had given me everything he had to give. So many memories, so many laughs, so many opportunities for learning. There are so many things that could have been said, but I think 'Thank You' was the very best of all. 

So, I'll end with that, Thank You, Cooper. Thanks for everything. 

Hiking with Brie in La Crosse, Wisconsin

At the top with Simon in La Crosse, Wisconsin

Pug Pile on Simon

Chilling poolside in Cape Coral, Florida

Simon has been making me pug-inspired birthday cards for years :)

Squishy face

Hanging out with Simon

Such a regal looking little dude

Hanging out with Nora

Camping along the Yellowstone River in Montana

Visiting the Badlands in South Dakota

Paddle boarding in Minneapolis, MN

Lap Time is Nap Time

Camping at Pine Flat in Sedona, Arizona

Hammock time on the Grand Canyon North Rim

Tolerating proximity from his new sibling, Kiki

I'm so going to miss that little face

In doggy jail with his buddy, Brie

In the pet bed next to my desk

Chilling on the couch in our apartment in Flagstaff, Arizona

One of our first pics together in our new home in Flagstaff

On a road trip to Minnesota in the Sprinter

Always so cute

A perfect morning...sunshine, coffee, and my little buddy

 

Itchy McItcherson

Hey all! So there have been some new developments (15 years in the making, so not really all that new) around here. This entire post will be about my journey with dyshidrotic eczema, so if you're not into reading about skin conditions and the myriad of treatments that go along with them, you might want to skip this one. However, if you or someone you know suffer from eczema or any other itchy, uncomfortable, debilitating skin issue, it might be worth the read. 

So, from the beginning. I have had chronically dry skin since before I can even remember...to the point that I've been using medical grade moisturizers since I was about 13 years old. I remember itching so badly at night (always at night) that I would wake up in the morning with blood all over my legs and under my fingernails. I wasn't even aware that I had been itching. I started cutting my fingernails super short and wearing socks on my hands to bed just to try to keep me from ripping all my skin off while I slept. I even tried wearing footie pajamas as a way to keep a barrier between my fingernails and my skin. I had to take soaking baths using colloidal oatmeal to try to soothe my irritated skin. My friends will remember me hauling around my trusty blue-and-white tub of Vanicream with me everywhere I went. Vanicream is made in Rochester, MN and is used by the Mayo Clinic for a lot of their compounded creams and ointments for dermatological conditions. For the last decade or so it's been widely available everywhere, but when I first started travel nursing back in 2006, I could only find it in pharmacies in Rochester and had to stock up when I was home in Minnesota because it was impossible to find on the road. Having to use Vanicream and only Vanicream kept me from enjoying all the lotions and soaps from Bath & Body Works and other fun bath product places as well. So while my friends were going around smelling like candied apples and rose-scented geraniums, I smelled like...well...nothing, really, as my lotion had no scent at all. For a large part of my teens and early 20's, my skin and I coexisted relatively well, with only minor flare-ups here and there necessitating I go on an "elimination" regimen of bath products; meaning I cut out all my regular bath products, switched to medical grade hypoallergenic products, and then added in my regular products one by one until I figured out the culprit of the flare-up. Sometimes I never did figure out what caused the flare-up, which is probably due to the fact that I've also had environmental allergies and asthma for most of my life, which also makes me react to things at random. Do I sound like a mess? I sound like one...on paper, anyway. ;) 

When I was 25, I started noticing this weird, itchy patch of skin on the middle finger of my right hand. It didn't really bother me all that much, but it was definitely something that hadn't been there before, and was also noticeably different from the skin issues I had had in the past. I had recently purchased and started wearing a tungsten ring on that finger, and so I thought maybe it was due to a metal sensitivity, which is something I'd dealt with in the past. As a child and young adult, if I wore any sort of cheap jewelry, whether it was a ring, a watch, or earrings, I would almost immediately break out in a rash in the exact location that the metal was touching my skin. I learned early on that most of my jewelry had to be sterling silver, surgical steel, or gold, which meant having an entire arsenal of cute dangly earrings from Claire's was out of the question. Perhaps that's why I've never been much of a jewelry person, as for most of my life it's caused me considerable discomfort. I had my doubts that the itchy patch on my finger was caused by my tungsten ring, as I had done research on tungsten and it was supposed to be non-allergenic. So I continued to wear the ring and carried on with life, itchy finger be damned. 

It wasn't long after getting the tungsten ring that I started travel nursing. As most of you know or can imagine, travel nursing entails a considerable amount of stress. Driving across the country, moving into a new apartment, learning a new city, learning a new hospital, meeting new coworkers, making new friends. I was doing that every three months. The little itchy spot on my middle finger turned into big itchy spots on not only my middle finger, but also the ring finger and pointer finger on my right hand. I started to get a little concerned, but I continued to moisturize frequently and I bought an over-the-counter steroid for really bad flare-ups and that seemed to keep things relatively calm, most of the time. What I didn't realize at the time, and wouldn't realize for probably a decade after I first noticed that initial itchy patch, is that the flare-ups were cyclical, and definitely followed a pretty distinct pattern, stress level being a major contributor. 

I remember going to see a doctor in St. Paul, MN when I was 27, as the itchy spots were no longer just itchy spots...they started out as little tiny water blisters that were horrifically itchy...like nothing I'd ever experienced before. The water blisters would then pop, the skin would be open and raw, and then it would dry out and look like a callous, at which point the skin would crack open and bleed. It was a pretty terrible progression, and I wasn't prepared for how to deal with it. At this point I had resorted to wearing bandaids on all my fingers and had switched to using Neutrogena Norwegian hand cream, which was more of an ointment than a cream, and I was applying that so often that I was going through almost a tube a week. At that time it seemed like the only thing that was kind of working. The doctor, who was a GP (general practitioner) and not a dermatologist, diagnosed me with atopic dermatitis, one of several types of eczema, and prescribed me a steroid cream that was stronger than what I could get in the drugstore. I didn't know it then, but I had been misdiagnosed. It turns out there are many different types of eczema, and while I would come to find out later that I had one of the more rare versions, I was initially diagnosed with one of the more common versions. It turns out that treatment matters, but for the time being, the steroid commonly used to treat atopic dermatitis was mostly working.   

When I was 28, Simon and I started travel nursing together, and our first assignment was in Denver, CO. The eczema went completely off the rails within my first week of being there. I thought maybe it had something to do with an allergen that my body wasn't used to, as previously any time I had spent in Colorado had been very brief. The blisters on my fingers this time were huge, super painful, and so incredibly itchy. The blisters were now on multiple fingers of both hands, leaving me with incredibly painful open wounds. Once again my fingers were covered in bandaids or soft cotton dressings as the adhesive on the bandaids was too painful on my open skin, and there was no way to keep the adhesive off the open areas, since they were everywhere. I had to miss three days of work as I could barely stand to get my hands wet, let alone use hand sanitizer or wash them with soap and water frequently. I was also concerned about being in a hospital environment with open wounds; we come into contact with a lot of different infectious organisms in the hospital, and I didn't want to make myself sick. Off I went again to the doctor, but this time I made sure to see a dermatologist. He took one look at my hands and diagnosed me with dyshidrotic eczema; still eczema, but the treatment was going to be a little different. I was prescribed a different topical called Clobex, which was still a steroid, but a different steroid. Within hours of applying the ointment I had relief of the pain and itching and noticed the blisters shrinking. It was actually pretty amazing to experience. For the next several years, I would suffer occasional flare-ups, but the combination of the Clobex and the Vanicream mostly kept things under control. 

The hardest part about having dyshidrotic eczema during those early years of my diagnosis was that there really wasn't much information out there about it. All of the information was mostly centered around atopic dermatitis, which is the most common form of eczema. Unfortunately, dyshidrotic eczema and atopic dermatitis are just similar enough that while some of the treatments have some overlap, they are just different enough that some of the treatments are ineffective. I frequently Googled dyshidrotic eczema, trying to find other things that might be contributing to my flareups. Was it something I was eating? Was it my hand soap? My laundry soap? Was my trusty Vanicream failing me after all these years? Were my environmental allergies contributing? Years later I would come to find out that yes, all of those things, yes. But in the meantime, I continued to navigate flareup after flareup, hoping that maybe someday it would just go away. There is some literature out there to suggest that dyshidrotic eczema typically affects people (mostly women) from their mid-20s to their late 30s/early 40s. As I neared 40 I got more and more optimistic that maybe the eczema was on its way out; I'm currently 41 and it's showing no signs whatsoever of vacating the premises anytime soon.

So just a little tidbit about eczema...eczema and all its variations (including dyshidrotic) is considered an autoimmune disorder, which means that for whatever reason, the immune system starts attacking your body, resulting in unfavorable, uncomfortable, debilitating, and sometimes life-threatening symptoms. Type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, Hashimoto's, multiple sclerosis, celiac disease, and lupus are some of the more commonly known autoimmune disorders. There has been some recent research indicating that asthma is also an autoimmune disorder, as it responds to immunosuppressive therapy. There is a lot of research out there indicating that once a person has one autoimmune disorder, the probability that they will suffer additional autoimmune disorders is highly likely. I've had asthma since I was about 9 years old, and I've read several articles indicating that individuals with asthma frequently also suffer from eczema.  Some only have the eczema as children and outgrow it, but some people suffer from it their entire lives with varying severity. My brothers and I all have asthma, which we have mostly outgrown, but we also all currently have or previously had eczema of one form or another. I find that very interesting.

In 2012 Simon and I moved to Flagstaff, AZ. Cue up the eczema, which again went right off the rails. While the blisters themselves stayed relatively small this time, nearly all my fingers on both hands and the upper parts of both of my palms were covered in them. Which then lead to cracking, itching, pain...all the usual suspects showed up for the party. I found a wonderful dermatologist here in town, who truly changed my life with regard to my skin. I was prescribed a different steroid, which I still use to this day. At this time, there was still very little information related specifically to dyshidrotic eczema, so I continued to carry on with life as usual, using the steroid ointment as necessary, which as the years went on, became more and more, to the point that I was using it almost daily earlier this year. 

In late February/early March of this year, I again had a really nasty flareup that caused me to miss a whole week of work as I sorted things out. I went to my dermatologist again, and this time she had some new information for me, along with a new treatment regimen that included using CeraVe lotion, which has ceramides in it, which promote health and healing of dry, damaged, reactive skin (funny story, Simon's mom had told me about CeraVe years ago, but I had been using Vanicream for so long with good results that I hadn't been interested in changing up my regimen at that time...had I only known!!). I don't leave home without a little tube of CeraVe in my purse, and I even have a tube of it that I use at work. I apply the lotion after every hand washing, and in-between washings when my skin feels dry. I use CeraVe cream on my hands at night, along with CeraVe healing ointment, which feels like Vaseline. Since March the eczema has been better, but still not as in control as I would like. 

So here's the elephant in the room that I had been overlooking for far too long...my worst flareups are almost completely related to stress. When I go back and look at all my worst flareups, I was stressed out. I was moving, I was starting a new job, I was traveling, I was having oppositional work relations with a coworker, etc. When I'm stressed I don't eat well and I don't sleep well, which just causes more stress. And what was happening in March of this year? COVID. At baseline I can be a high-strung, reactionary person to even the tiniest of stressors, and I try my best to manage it as well as I can. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. It's the times that I don't that I notice the eczema popping in to say hello. Of course my flareups are always worse on my workdays; in part due to stress, in part due to all the hand washing and hand sanitizer use. Being a nurse is stressful (exponentially so during the pandemic), and I wish there were better ways for me specifically to manage my work-related stress. I've tried having soothing essential oils for me to sniff periodically; I've tried deep breathing; I've tried stepping off the unit periodically to get away from the beeping IVs, the call lights, the interruptions, and the noise; I've tried keeping a special little snack in my lunch box for me to have when I need a little uplift (no, not that kind of snack...like a piece of chocolate or a bubbly water). I stepped down from the charge nurse role in May after a series of (in my opinion) questionable institutional changes in the midst of COVID added a considerable amount of stress to my job and left me in tears three nights in a row. Until those shifts, I could count on one hand with fingers to spare the number of times I'd cried at work; three days in a row is unprecedented for me. The stress level has been better since leaving the charge role, but it's more than I'd like, and is probably more than is healthy for me. Periodically I consider a change in career. Not necessarily outside of the nursing profession, but maybe outside of the hospital setting. Doing nothing but giving flu shots all day long sounds like a dream to me. Seriously. I've been working hard as a floor nurse in the hospital for over 18 years. Maybe it's time I took a break from all that. I think that would help considerably with my stress, and probably my eczema as well. 

I stumbled upon some new research on dyshydrotic eczema the other day that seems promising. Apparently there have been some new studies exploring the relationship between foods and dyshidrotic eczema; previously I was able to find all kinds of diet modifications for atopic dermatitis, but nothing specifically for dyshidrotic eczema. This is literally the research I've been looking for, as I've suspected that in addition to all the environmental triggers I was trying to manage, there had be to something that I was eating that was also contributing to my flareups. Studies have shown that foods high in nickel contribute in general to eczema flareups, and more specifically to dyshidrotic eczema flareups. Remember way back in one of the first paragraphs when I talked about my sensitivity to metals when I was young? It was the nickel I was reacting to (which I'd known about for a long time, and have been intentionally avoiding for decades). Having a nickel sensitivity isn't a rare thing, I'm sure you've seen jewelry that says nickel-free or low-nickel content on the packaging...there are a lot of people out there who have a physical sensitivity to nickel, which is typically found in low-quality jewelry. There was no way I would have ever correlated my skin's physical sensitivity to nickel with the nickel-containing foods I was eating, and I was so elated to find this new research. I about swung from the rafters with joy; that is, until I saw chocolate on the list. There are actually a few of my daily faves that made the list of high-nickel content foods to avoid. Briefly (in order of foods I enjoy most to least): chocolate, whole grains, raspberries, nuts (including nut butters), seeds, shellfish, brown rice, pineapple, beans/legumes, leafy greens, soy (which is in pretty much anything and everything that's processed), and pretty much anything canned (there is nickel in the metal of the cans, and the heating of the cans during the canning process causes the nickel to leech out into the food). I'm trying to not be devastated as I remove those items from my diet for the next month or so to see if there's any difference. Those of you who know my affinity for peanut butter cups (and peanut butter in general) know how difficult this is going to be for me, but if it works, it'll all be worth it, and hopefully maybe down the road I can start adding things back one by one to see if I react. Thankfully coffee and wine didn't make the list of things to avoid...I might have had a complete melt down. I was a little surprised to see that dairy and non-whole grain wheat products didn't make the list of foods to avoid, as those products have been shown to have inflammatory properties as well. I'm going to use those sparingly here in the beginning just to try to hedge my bets.   

I started keeping a food diary again, documenting everything I eat. I'm also documenting any symptoms of blisters, itching, or skin cracking to see if there are more foods not on the low-nickel list that I should try eliminating. Typically symptoms of sensitivity can show up anywhere from an hour to 24 hours after the food has been ingested, so keeping a daily log of food and symptoms might help me to narrow down what it is I'm reacting to. I've switched up my skin care regimen to only using Aveeno body wash, which was recommended by the Eczema foundation, and Cetaphil Gentle Daily Cleanser, which is a non-soap cleanser. I'm not sure how a non-soap cleanser works, but it's way less caustic to my skin than other hand soaps I've been using. I no longer use bar soaps, as bar soaps are more harsh than liquid soaps due to the ingredients used to keep them in bar form. I've eliminated all products containing lanolin, as my dermatologist said that lanolin has inflammatory properties that trigger eczema flareups, and I've actually experienced my skin being red, raw, and itchy after using lanolin-containing products (it was shocking to me to see how many intense hand creams recommended for nurses had lanolin in them). I'm also working on using up/throwing away all my personal care products with added fragrance, which in addition to being almost a little overwhelming scent-wise, is also known to contribute to allergy symptoms. I'm going to use up most of the Monat shampoo, conditioner, and facial skin care that I bought, and once that's gone I'm probably going to switch to Beauty Counter products, which have less additives and less fragrance. I'll probably continue to use the Monat hair styling/treatment products, as my hair has never looked as good as it does now, but if I find something a little more gentle yet effective in the coming months, I'll probably switch that out as well. Perhaps Monat will start removing/decreasing the added fragrance to their products, which would be wonderful as I like their products but don't necessarily appreciate all the fragrance, and I don't think my eczema or environmental allergies do either. The EWG app/website has been a great resource for me in finding products that are non-toxic/low allergy. It can be a little overwhelming at first, but with a little help from my friend Rita (a Beauty Counter associate), I've been able to figure out some products that might work for me moving forward.

I'm taking a daily antihistamine (well, taking being a relative term...I'm terrible at daily medicine regimens) to help curb my environmental allergies as well. That should hopefully help. Not having pets in the house would also probably be a big help as I'm allergic to them, but that's not going to happen. Some dog-shaped allergens are worth keeping around for my mental health and overall wellbeing. 

So yeah...I'm hopeful, I'm optimistic, I'm hoping that maybe these recent changes will help and I can kick this dyshidrotic eczema on its butt once and for all. And if I can't kick it completely, my hope is that at the very least, maybe I can make it a little more bearable. If you have any experiences with dyshidrotic eczema or you have something that has worked for you, by all means please share! And of course, if any of you have questions about my experience specifically, including the topicals I use, the dermatologist I see, the personal care products I've had luck with, please let me know. I'm happy to help and it would be nice to know that all my trial and error could benefit someone else. :)

Be well my friends!

 

It's Been Quiet Around Here

You might have noticed (but maybe not, and that's okay) that I haven't been much of a presence on social media much these days. Or rather, not on Facebook specifically. These past few months have been hard for so many people for so many reasons, myself included. Navigating a pandemic while being a front-line worker is almost, almost starting to feel normal. I don't want it to feel normal, but at the same time, a bit of normalcy implies expectations with hopefully somewhat measurable goals, and during this time of things changing everyday, sometimes by the hour, it's helpful to have expectations and goals, fleeting though they may be. More on that later. I've also been pondering my position of being white during the largest period of civil unrest in my lifetime thus far. There have been lots of conversations, sad moments, angry moments, frustrating moments, helpless moments. I've been holding off on writing anything about it because I still don't know how I personally feel about it, what my role is, how I can help. More on that later too. But first (and at the end), the light-hearted updates, because I think we could all use some lighter hearts these days. 

Marshal Lake with the San Francisco Peaks in the background

Simon and I recently became the proud owners of not one, but TWO Amazon Alexa speakers. I am nothing if not a sucker for a deal, and SirusXM finally reeled me in with a deal of $5 per month satellite radio service with unlimited access anywhere on any of my devices, assuming of course I am in view of a satellite or have a decent wifi connection. To sweeten the deal, they added in a free Echo Dot speaker. And not only that, but a week after receiving my free Echo Dot, they offered me another Echo Dot for $10! You mean I can listen to the same music on different speakers in multiple rooms? Or I can listen to one station in one room, and Simon can simultaneously listen to another station in another room? And the options for stations are seemingly endless? What is this sorcery?? Seriously, my GenX roots are showing via my technological ineptitude. This technology has existed for years and here I am, so excited about my shiny new toy, too distracted to fully comprehend the fact that not one, but two speakers are now constantly listening to and ultimately spying on me 24/7. But with Alexa always listening, I'm never truly alone, right? It's okay to drink an entire bottle of wine by myself on a Tuesday night because as long as there's someone listening, I'm not actually drinking alone (not that there's anything wrong with that; I drink alone all the time), thereby bypassing this cultural judginess that would have us believe that drinking by oneself means that we have a problem controlling our liquor. What did I do last night? Oh, not too much; Alexa and I just shared a bottle of Rose and we ate an entire brick of cheddar whilst watching [insert current favorite TV show]...it was great. Nevermind that Alexa won't help me with that bottle of wine or that brick of cheese, nor will she help me with the hangover the next morning or have a poop later that next day (seriously, I eat so much cheese), but that can be my little secret. But wait, she can help! She can probably hook me up with a quick fitness routine and can order me some laxatives post haste! Free one-day shipping? Sounds like a plan. 

She's always listening...

All guile aside, Simon and I have been using our speakers spending our time listening to a lot of 89.3 The Current, our favorite radio station out of Minneapolis, and I tell you what, it's like falling in love all over again. With each other, with music, with the state we came from and the city where we met, and still love so very much. I hadn't actually heard of The Current until I met Simon back in 2007. He had been listening to that station for years when we met, and truth be told, I think he loved listening to that station almost as much as loved making art. When I met Simon (well, after he decided to start talking to me, which was actually months after we met...hahaha), he was one of the most interesting people I'd ever met. He was into this indie music scene listening to artists I'd never heard of, he was an artist using a medium (pastels) with which I was unfamiliar, he rode a Harley but also a fixed-gear bicycle (I'd also never heard of a bike like that...no gears? What does that even mean?), he kayaked, and he ate the weirdest food. Seriously, I was instantly curious about Simon not because I wanted to date him (that came later), but because I couldn't figure out what in the heck he was eating out of those little containers at work in the wee hours of the morning; that weird period of time when the patients are all asleep, there's a half-hour (or more, if you're lucky) where not a single IV pump is beeping or call light is chirping, when you can really get to know the person you're working with, because at that point, you're doing everything you can just to stay awake. It took me months of pestering to get Simon to talk to me during those moments of near cognitive collapse, where a standing-upright nap almost seemed plausible. One of the very first conversations we had that wasn't him answering my endless stream of questions with a clipped 'yes' or 'no' was about music. Glory be, he was capable of conversation, and turns out, he wasn't the angry gay man from rural Minnesota who had moved to Minneapolis to escape the scorn of his ultra-conservative and unaccepting family (this was the back-story I had made up for him in the months before he starting conversing with me like a normal human being). To be fair, he was dealing with some of his own things that had nothing to do with being angry or gay, and his lack of interest in befriending me had nothing to do with me at all. Unfortunately at 2am, it's easy to take literally anything personally. We laugh about it now, especially my back story for him, which couldn't have been more wrong. In March of 2007, I called out sick to work one night and we met up at the Happy Gnome (gone but never forgotten) in St. Paul where we indulged in Dead Guy Ales and for hours, talked about all the things. The rest, as they say, is history. Our history. And a big part of that history is to the tune of The Current, which we would listen to for hours. Check it out if you're unfamiliar with that station, it's seriously one of the best, and we've so been enjoying listening to it again.

13 years later and he's still my favorite 

Man, it feels good to write. I sometimes forget how much I enjoy writing. It's so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day rush of life, the news, the political climate, the social unrest, the hospital environment, and the seemingly endless online shopping. Yep, still got that problem. I wish I could say that it's better, and I guess in some ways it is, but I still buy all these things that I don't need because shopping, for me, is self-soothing (it's part of the American Dream, is it not? Buy buy buy...). I've been making better choices (in my opinion, of course) about what I'm buying. I've been trying really hard to support small and local businesses, now more than ever as they've been the ones hit hardest by the pandemic. My jewelry collection has exploded these past few months after discovering that my yoga teacher Sarah is also an incredibly talented craftsperson of all things dangly and sparkly. Check out her shop here. Don't say I didn't warn you, her stuff is incredibly beautiful. I have all my earrings and such displayed on a wall hanger, and sometimes I'll just sit there and look at them...they're so pretty! It's ironic that after all these years I have the motivation to dress up and accessorize, and I've no where to go because either everywhere I'd like to go is still mostly shut down, or I've just lost interest in being around the general public. The other day Simon and I ran some mundane errands in town and I wore a dress, dressy sandals, and dangly earrings; just because I wanted to feel like a normal human being doing normal human being things and looking cute while doing it. It was brief, but it was nice. For a moment there things felt like they used to...and then I sneezed into my mask and was instantly brought back to our pandemic reality. I try to wear normal-people clothes as much as I can, but some days (ahem, Tuesday) the bathrobe stays on well into the afternoon. I refuse to feel bad about it. And also, I had just worked four night shifts in a row...I'd earned that bathrobe time.

Some of my pretty things

So let's talk about the pandemic and where it's at for me. Like I said earlier, it's starting to feel almost normal, which is a love-hate situation for me. Knowing it's out there, knowing that we're doing more testing, knowing that our healthcare providers are better equipped to treat patients with coronavirus is all very well and good, but I'm exhausted. I'm not even treating the sickest of the sick and I'm exhausted. I'm also incredibly disappointed in the way the so-called leaders of our country have been handling this situation. They've managed to politicize a health crisis, which is absolutely disgusting. They seem to think that pandering to a very vocal minority will get them re-elected this fall...I guess we'll see about that, won't we? Some of them (far too many of them, in my opinion) seem to be under the impression that if we just carry on as usual and pretend that the virus doesn't exist, that it'll fade away into obscurity and things will just go back to the way they were. Try telling that to some of my patients who have lost multiple family members, who have spent weeks alone in the hospital, some of those weeks lost and gone forever because they were sedated and on a ventilator, riding the wave of 'Will they make it? Will they not?' Imagine waking up from something like that, in the throes of hospital-induced delirium, and being told that while you were sleeping, your entire family died. There's no one left to take care of you when you're ready to be discharged, so you'll have to go to a nursing home or a rehab center. In the meantime your house has fallen into disrepair, you've defaulted on your loans, your pets have died, and you have no one to contact regarding getting your affairs in order because you don't even know where to begin. You don't even have the ability to grieve with those family members who are left because visitors aren't allowed in the hospital. How fucking tragic. These are the things that are exhausting for me. Yes, there's physical exhaustion there, but it's nothing compared to the mental and emotional exhaustion that comes along with helping my patients understand and cope with some of the biggest losses of their lives.

Modern day nursing feels like...

Back in May, I stepped down from being a core charge nurse. What does that mean, exactly? What it means is that rather than being a leader on my nursing unit, I've gone back to working side-by-side on the floor with my coworkers. Faced with some grim numbers, our administrators made some changes to our staffing that greatly affected the way I had grown accustomed to doing my job. I had reservations about making such changes in the midst of a pandemic, but I thought I could handle it. In the end, it turns out that I couldn't. It was too much stress, too much change, too far a departure from the nurse I want to be, the nurse I'm proud to be. The changes didn't play to my strengths, which is a person with almost two decades of nursing experience, a person with the ability to support and educate those who are less experienced. The changes took me away from my patients, and it also took me away from my staff, and that's just not who I am as a nurse. I want to be involved, I want to be in the thick of it, working together for the better of our patients, our staff, and our hospital. The changes that were made caused me to feel vulnerable, helpless, abandoned, and betrayed, and they were causing me to hate the very profession that has been so important to me for so long. That's not a good place to be, and truth be told, I just don't have the right personality to truly be a leader; I'm too sensitive and I'm too emotionally reactive. People who are good at their jobs are not necessarily good at being leaders; going through this has definitely shown me that. Leaving the charge role was a bit of an ugly exit, to be honest. Fits were thrown, tears were shed, emotionally charged text messages and emails were sent. I honestly felt like a crazy person. Thank goodness this didn't all coincide with my period or I might have just burned the place to the ground (think Heath Ledger as the Joker in the Dark Knight, walking away from the burning down hospital in a nurse's uniform...that's what I picture in my head when I think about it...funny not funny). I was left feeling that for the good of my working relationships and my own personal mental health, I needed to step down. Overwhelmingly, I was supported by my peers, which left me feeling so grateful, and helped me to feel like I was making the right decision, for me and for them. In the end I think it worked out. I think I'm more suited to be a helper; and I really like being a helper. I'm still able to be a resource for my coworkers, and I'm back to working directly with patients, which is something that I mostly enjoy; the reality is that nursing isn't always an enjoyable profession, but for the most part it's good for me and it's something I feel I'm good at. I still fill in as a charge nurse from time to time, but only on my terms; I've definitely had to learn to set some boundaries with my employer, which is something that has always been a struggle for me. Sometimes it's hard to say no, but sometimes you have to.

Wildflowers in the garden

Ready for more light stuff? Yeah, me too. I got two more orchids on Tuesday. Call it hubris, call it stupidity, call it a misunderstanding of reality, but a friend of mine approached me wanting to re-home two of her struggling orchids, and I immediately jumped at the opportunity. Apparently having one orchid survive for almost an entire year (with a lot of help from my friend Jesse, who I call my orchid guru) has given me the confidence to take on a couple strugglers. We'll see how it goes. Orchids are tough. Oddly enough, it appears that I'm better at keeping orchids alive than I am at keeping my outside plants alive. To date, the death count of my outdoor plants is as follows: 1 lavender plant, 2 Icelandic poppies, 3 creeping thyme, and 1 oriental poppy. Doesn't sound like much, but I tried so hard to keep those buggers alive, and it was heart-breaking to watch them die. Also worth mentioning but maybe not my fault, 4 of our little aspen trees got the fungus and had to be cut down. Sad. We still have one aspen left, and I haven't found any fungus on it yet, so maybe that one will live. Currently on death watch: 1 basil, 3 columbines, 2 snow on the mountain, 1 peony, and 2-3 periwinkles. It's a good thing I'm not reliant on my gardening abilities to survive or I would have starved to death long ago. I do have a decent amount of perennials that the previous owner of the house had planted, and those are all doing really well. I have some lamb's ear that are tall and beautiful and typically covered in bees. My Russian sage bushes are getting big and are so very fragrant. I had a can of wildflower mix that I bought a couple years ago at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix when they were having their plant sale, and those are doing really well. So many pink and purple blooms! I was expecting mostly orange and yellow, since those seem to be the colors of the desert, so the pinks and purples have been a nice surprise. It seems like there's always something new blooming in the wildflower bed, with oh so many bee butts sticking out of them. I also recently planted (albeit relatively late in the growing season) 2 hot pepper plants, 1 sage plant, and 1 rosemary plant. Those four are all still alive, but I'm not getting attached. My indoor plants are currently crowding out all my east-facing windows, since those are the two windows that are best suited for plants at the moment. 3 aloe, 2 cactus, 4 orchids, 1 bromeliad, 1 jade, 4 miscellaneous succulents, 1 amaryllis which refuses to bloom (maybe next year?), 1 crown of thorns without the thorns (which desperately needs to be repotted...it's huge!), 1 persian cyclamen, and an impulse-buy Plumeria which will probably not survive because it's an outdoor plant and it won't survive the winter here, so I'll have to bring it inside when it gets cold, which it probably won't like. This morning I wandered down the hill to my friend Sadie's house, and together we repotted two of my orchids and one of hers. It was great to be out together in the sunshine, drinking coffee, and getting our hands dirty. She sent me home with yet another orchid, so now I've got 5. Well, maybe 4.5...upon repotting, I discovered that one of my newly acquired orchids had almost completely rotted roots, so that one is on death watch. Sadie's husband Andy, who is also quite the orchid whisperer, helped me repot it and told me it's got about a 1 in 3 chance of surviving; it's survival completely dependent on its ability to grow an entirely new root system. Yikes.

The struggler

The van is coming along splendidly. To date we've installed the fan, all the electric, reupholstered the headliner, built the bed platform, installed two large drawers under the bed, put in the subfloor, and installed pine board on the ceiling and one of the walls. Still left to install is the cubbie wall, which will be in the back of the van on the wall opposite the bed. We also need to install the cabinets that we got from the scratch-and-dent section from IKEA, and the counter top that we still have yet to purchase...there's still time for that. It'll probably be butcher block or something like that. We elected to skip the sink this time around, as we found that we rarely used the sink in the Sprinter. We're also not planning at this time to have a fridge, as they suck way too much battery juice. Maybe in the future we can add a second battery if we feel like we absolutely need a fridge (which would most likely be a situation where we're traveling for an extended period of time without access to freezers to re-freeze our water bottles), but for now we're just planning to bring a couple coolers and call it good. We've got the van set up to add solar if we feel that's something we'll want/need in the future. We're also planning to paint it, put a small lift on it, and get some off-road tires to tackle some of those hard-to-reach camping spots off of dirt roads. The roof rack is back-ordered, so that will hopefully be installed sometime later this summer. Simon and our friend Efren have been doing such an amazing job building out the van. I haven't been much help outside of paying for half of the build, and ordering the things that Simon tells me to order. I did pick out the fabric for the headliner and reupholstered that, and I also painted some of the interior wood yesterday afternoon. It felt nice to help. 

Simon and Efren building a drawer

 

Last month I completely changed up my hair care routine. Ever since moving to Flagstaff my hair has been a bit of a mess. It's naturally wavy, kind of dry, and hates both the climate (dry and arid) and altitude (7,000 feet) here. I had to get my hair trimmed every 8-12 weeks just to keep the split ends from taking over my entire head. I've literally tried almost everything you can try as far as hair care products...Redken, Aveda, Trader Joe's, Burt's Bees, Jason, Bead Head, Moroccan Oil, Alba, Aveda, Pantene, O Way, Paul Mitchell, Nexxus, about every natural hair care line you can get at Sprouts...the list goes on and on. I'd really rather not know how much money I've spent on my head in the past 7 years. If my hair had its way, we'd be moving back to Minnesota or Florida where humidity was its best friend. I thoroughly enjoy traveling to humid climates, because my hair is huge and curly and soft and so shiny. So that's what I've been trying to replicate here in Arizona via hair products. A couple years ago my cousin told me about a hair product line called Monat. It's not sold in stores or salons, and you can only get it online. The caveat is that you need to initially go through someone to get started. Yes, it's a multi-level marketing (MLM) company, much like Amway, Tupperware, or Pampered Chef. The reason I waited so long to try Monat was because of the MLM aspect, which in the past felt a little scammy to me. My thought had always been that if their products are so great, why can't you just get them anywhere? So my skepticism about the MLM business practices kept me from giving Monat a chance. Earlier this summer, out of desperation, I decided to give it a try; my hair was dull, dry, had split ends for days, and to be honest, I was just tired of spending so much money getting my hair cut all the time. What's the harm in trying something new, right? If it works, awesome, if it doesn't, it'll just get added to the list of products that my hair has refused to accept as a suitable substitute for the humidity that it craves so much. I was still skeptical of the MLM aspect, but then I thought about the fact that I have been using Pampered Chef for years and I love their kitchen products. I still have my original garlic press that I've had for 15+ years and it's still the very best garlic press I've ever used. I've bought similar kitchen products from Target and such, and none of their equivalent counter parts have ever measured up to my Pampered Chef ones. So, I did a bunch of research, talked to some people I know who use Monat, read a bunch of third-party reviews, and decided to try Monat with that same mind set. You guys, I don't know what's in this stuff, but my hair has never looked or felt so good. I don't want to sound like I'm drinking the Kool-Aid, but it's been like a miracle for me. I have finally found a way to have Minnesota hair in Arizona. I should also mention that I'm picky about my products...I try to buy products that not only are free of the chemicals on this list, but it's also important to me that the products that I use are cruelty free. If the test version of a product isn't suitable for human testing, I'm not interested; animals shouldn't have to suffer for my cosmetological well-being. And honestly, animal hair and skin is so different from human hair and skin...I don't understand how the results of animal testing are even accurate or relevant for humans. Is this product line for everyone? Probably not. If your hair is rocking it with your current products, by all means stick with them. I'm not here to influence anyone into trying this stuff if you've already got a regimen that works for you, nor do I benefit in any way from sharing my experience with these products with you. I just wanted to share because after several years of frustration with my hair, I'm finally super happy with it. :)

Having a good hair day. :)

I don't know if I have the mental or emotional energy to delve too deeply into the current civil rights climate in this blog session. I'm still processing how to feel, how I can help, and ways that we can all affect change together to make this world a better place for everyone. I'm going to ruminate on it for just a little bit longer, and trust me, you'll be the first to know when I'm ready to share my thoughts about it. I will share that one of my friends on Facebook recently called me a racist because I wasn't being active enough in the pursuit of social justice. It left me feeling like I needed to document every single interaction I've ever had with a person of color, just to prove that I don't exclusively surround myself with entitled white people. And the thing is, I know for a fact this person never would have said that to my face, but the impersonal barrier provided by the internet and Facebook encourages people to engage online in ways that they never would in person. Just know this...I have, and will continue to have, a safe place in my home, my workplace, my life, and my heart for people of color...and not just people of color, for all people. And just because I'm not blowing up my Facebook page with all the ways I'm promoting change, doesn't mean I'm sitting here doing nothing about it. Before you go calling someone a racist simply because they didn't black out their Instagram page on #BlackoutTuesday, get off your screen and look around you at all the ways people are out there promoting change. You'll see it. 

Sunset at Lake Mary

In the meantime, I'll probably continue to stay a little distant from Facebook. I hate their algorithms, which exist solely to promote division and to promote negative emotional responses. Have you guys noticed that? I'll get blasted with article after article about Trump and all of his tomfoolery, but all I really want to see are Tasty videos, pug photos, pictures of my friends and family doing awesome things (awesome being a relative term...scaling a cliff wall or enjoying a cold drink on your deck...all awesome in my book), people doing good in the world, and articles about cool places to travel. Unfortunately, I more frequently see posts from friends and family members whose mindsets are completely opposite of mine, which causes us to negatively engage over it. And let's be honest, I'm happy to sit down with anyone whose mindset differs from mine and have a conversation about it, but Facebook just isn't the place for those discussions. So, I'm kind of done. I'm unfollowing people who don't positively or intelligently engage with me. And before this gets labeled as 'cancel culture,' I realize that not all my online interactions have to be all roses and puppy dogs (wouldn't that be nice?), but if mutual respect and compassion isn't something that I can find on Facebook anymore, then maybe I don't need to spend so much time there. It's a struggle, because for me, Facebook has always been such a great way to keep up with my friends and family who live all over the place, and I would miss that if I were to stay away for too long. So I'll continue to check in from time to time, but I'm definitely setting boundaries. Life is too short and time is too precious to be wasted on negative online interactions. And maybe we can all try to do better to make Facebook a better place for all of us to interact. Maybe we can apply these three rules of interaction to our Facebook posts: 1) is it true? 2) is it necessary? 3) is it kind? Imagine what a different place Facebook would be. I get that those three criteria don't leave a lot of room for social awareness...that's definitely something to work towards, for sure. Right now, I just need balance. I need to be reminded that the world isn't burning down, that not everyone is dying in a pandemic, that people are still living their lives, having fun, and treating others well. I know that isn't reality all of the time, but it's reality most of the time, and I think we need to remind ourselves of that from time to time.

Goofing with this goofball

And last but not least, Cooper is thriving! And by thriving, I mean not dead. Okay, that was a little dramatic, but recently he had a little event where he collapsed in the yard and I thought he was dead. I mean, the poor dude turned 16 yesterday (shit, I forgot his birthday...whoops), so it's completely logical to expect that he will continue to decline. And truth be told, I'm ready. Not ready as in "ready and waiting with baited breath," but ready in the sense that if I wake up one day and he's passed on in the night, or if he goes outside some morning and doesn't come back in, I know that he's lived a good life and he's passed on having been loved and cherished for the time that he was here. Life is definitely more of a struggle for him these days...he's got arthritis and a chronic cough; sometimes he coughs and farts at the same time which is simultaneously gross yet funny. But he still loves to eat treats and sit next to me (but not touching) on the couch. He enjoys no less than 8 naps a day and a full night's sleep. I love taking pictures of him while he's sleeping...he's so cute and squishy and I'll miss that little bugger like crazy when he goes.

The little dude

Anyway, I think that's it from me. Again, it's a lot. I need to work on writing less more often, so my posts aren't so long. I hope you all are enjoying this beautiful Thursday.