A not so good, kind of bad day

I have two words that come to mind right now. Murphy's law.


Wikipedia defines Murphy's law as an adage that is typically stated, "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."


I don't know who Murphy is. I do not know how this adage came to be. All I know is that on Thursday of this past week it was all too true for me. First I must back up a little bit though.


I am the kind of person who requires sleep. I'm sure you know at least one person who at one point or another you would say, "They woke up on the wrong side of the bed." If I get less than 6-7 hours of sleep, I feel like I am not worth 2 cents. That being said, I believe that God is trying to prepare me for motherhood. I have many friends who have newborn babies and would give their last cup of coffee for 3-4 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Well, my UNborn baby thinks that 3:30am is a WONDERFUL time to kick and play. He kicks, rolls, twists and then kicks some more. This is an amazing feeling, I am already so in love with this little baby boy. I have always wondered what it would feel like feel a baby kicking.


Before I was pregnant, I used to be a very sound sleeper. Not so much anymore. These wonderful kicks (that I would not trade ANYTHING for) are keeping me up at night. Its probably a combination of factors. Most days I still cannot believe I am pregnant. Its all so surreal to me. So when I feel him kick, my mind cannot shut down. I am overwhelmed by love, joy, excitement, etc. Then just when my mind stops racing long enough for me to relax and maybe fall asleep, he kicks again.


My lack of sleep is the back drop for my not so good, kind of bad day on Thursday. For about 3 nights in a row, I averaged about 3-4 hours of sleep each night.


For just a minute, I have to rewind a little further. Back in August, I became an Independent Consultant for The Pampered Chef. I loved the idea of having my own business and of course I love the products. I am glad I made the decision to become a consultant because I ended up having to resign from my regular full-time job due to pregnancy-related medical issues. My favorite part about being a consultant is doing the cooking shows. I LOVE going into peoples' homes and cooking for them! Its a win/win for me and the host because I get commissions and the host gets free/discounted products. I apologize for this small plug. http://www.pamperedchef.biz/amyethel



As much fun as these cooking shows are, it requires some preparation. At one of my cooking shows in November, I met a very nice stay at home mom who was interested in having her own cooking show. She was very busy and wanted to wait until after the holidays, so I booked her for the 3rd Thursday in January. Yes, I had 2 full months to plan this cooking show. Did I procrastinate? Why yes, yes I did. (NOW can you see why its so hard for me to blog? I hate admitting these things about myself!!) I waited until the WEEK of the party before getting all the paperwork ready. I was at Office Max the NIGHT before getting a new ink stamp printed out. Worst of all, I did not plan or think ahead to practice the recipe until the DAY OF the party!! So yes, I will go ahead and tell you my bad day on Thursday was completely preventable. There, I said it. But here's how it went.

I woke up on Thursday morning feeling REALLY bad physically. It could have been the lack of sleep for the last several days or just overall pregnancy woes, but it was bad. I was nauseated. I began the day by taking anti-nausea medicine and chewing on Tums. I then had to choose the products I was taking to the party and start packing them up.


In the interest of saving time (and saving you from boredom) I will try my very best to shorten this very LONG bad day. Here's what happened, the short (er) version.


Packed up products, realized some were dirty, ran dishwasher. Realized apron was dirty, did a load of laundry. Went to the store to get recipe ingredients, Walmart did not have puff pastry dough. Went to Kroger, Kroger did not have puff pastry dough. Searched all over Tri-state area all afternoon for puff pastry dough. Finally found it but could not practice recipe due to wild goose chase. While pulling out of the grocery store, a toothless man knocked on my window and I screamed. Turns out I left a gallon of milk on the roof of my car while putting away groceries. Apologized to toothless man and thanked him for saving my milk. Made it back home, unloaded dishwasher, packed products, put clothes in the dryer. I was frazzled, nauseated, and perspiring. Took my second shower of the day, got very dizzy while in the shower, then realized I had skipped lunch. After my shower went in the kitchen to get crackers, stumped my big toe on the entertainment center. While eating crackers, glanced at the clock. I should have left 5 minutes ago were I to be on time. Tried to finish getting ready, leaned over to get my hairbrush and hit my head on the nightstand. Cried a little bit while drying my hair. Prayed to God while I put on my make up to PLEASE help me get through this day. Tried to load up the car, had to stop to dry heave. Grabbed my cell phone as I was leaving and saw it was almost dead. Finally left my house and all of a sudden, snow began to POUR. Cell phone died on the way. Unable to charge cell phone and use GPS at the same time. Tried to get to Host's house without the GPS, ended up getting lost. It was pitch dark and snowing. Unplugged cell phone, plugged GPS back in and finally made it there. 40 minutes after I told the host I would be there. Guests were already arriving while I was unpacking.

**Deep Breath** Okay so I survived the day and made it to the party. My host was very gracious, I'm sure it was obvious that I was not an expert or professional chef, but we made some very delicious Strawberry Amaretto Pastries. (If you would like this recipe let me know and I will email it to you!)

I was still frazzled and nauseated, but relieved to have just made it there. After the party was over, I was enjoying listening to the sounds of my host's children playing. She has 2 year old twin girls and their laughter was so wonderful to hear at the end of my long day. As I was leaving, one of the little girls said, "But I need a hug and a kiss!" Too precious.

When I pulled out of their driveway there was no less than 2-3 inches of snow on the ground and it was still pouring. It took me and hour and a half to get home.

The next day, I was talking to my grandmother on the phone, recounting the events of my horrible day. She was very empathetic as I told her, "Maw Maw it was such a bad day, I'm so glad its over. I want to hibernate for days, blah blah blah" She then replied, "Don't worry honey, the next party will be better. You'll do better next time. I'm sorry there were only a few people there and you didn't get very many sales" Then I paused. I told her, "Well actually there were quite a few people there, about 20 or so." She said "Oh! The way you were telling me how things went, it sounded like you said only 2 or 3 people came." That really made me think. I was going on and on about how terrible my day had been, that I forgot to look at the outcome. I ended up with over $700 in guest sales and my host got over $210 worth of free products!! She was so thrilled and told me she thought the party went great. Hopefully she did not know how bad my day was going, and won't know until she would happen to read this blog one day! She is even thinking about becoming a Pampered Chef consultant too, so I could not have done SO BAD as what I had imagined.

So even the worst of days can end up just being a "not so good day" or even better than most days, depending on how you look at it!

Let's try this again....

Okay I admit it, I am a failed blogger. I could give a long list of excuses, but I won't. Instead I'm going to make an honest to God effort to redeem myself and become a reformed blogger, whatever that is! Okay maybe I should give a short list of probable causes for my lack of blogging, not to make excuses, but to offer some sort of explanation and also catch up anyone who is interested in my life.


Probable cause #1: Beginning in June I worked an INSANE amount of overtime at my job. No exaggeration. I was in need of an intervention. In the month of July I only took 3 days off (and they were not weekend days). Most days I went to work at 10:00am and did not clock out until 1:00am. On the upside, this dedication to my job made me very GOOD at my job and my employer took notice...which leads to:


Probable cause #2: In August, I was promoted to a Supervisor position. This was a big deal for me. I worked very hard for it and was very excited. However, was I prepared for it? Probably not. It was a very stressful job. The call center environment is in itself very stressful, but when you're a supervisor you have to take phone calls from customers who, more often than not, are EXTREMELY upset. They have asked to talk to a supervisor because they did not like the answer the previous rep gave them. So I would then proceed to roll my eyes reiterate what the previous rep had told the customer, that this is in fact the correct information, company policy, etc I'm sorry for the inconvenience, we value you as a customer, blah blah blah. Apologize, apologize. Customer would proceed to curse me and hang up. Okay now I'm rambling and I DO NOT want to ramble. So you get the picture. Lots of stress, but August had yet another surprise for me...


Probable cause #3: On August 27th, I found out that I am PREGNANT. Yes, pregnant. A baby conceived the good old fashioned way. No fertility medications or procedures. A miracle! (My infertility struggle was extensive and will be covered in another blog to come... Stay tuned!) DH and I were shocked to say the least. Shocked and thrilled. So now we've made it to September.


Probable cause #4: Here come the pregnancy symptoms! I will try to keep this as non-graphic as I can. Let's just say from about 6 weeks pregnant moving forward, I threw up almost every day. I've been in and out of the hospital several times since then. The first hospital stay was in Mid-September for a 3 day visit. I want to spare you my complete medical history so I will just tell you I had a pre-existing stomach condition that has made this pregnancy alot harder for me that what it should have been. I am 23 weeks pregnant now and still struggling with these symptoms. I have had to go to the hospital about every 1-2 weeks to get IV fluids. For this reason I had to step down from my supervisor position at work and take medical leave. Which leads to my last point...


Probable cause #5: I have a hard time being transparent. I tend to be a little insecure and so when I start to talk about my personal life, I get anxious about what people will think of me. For example, regarding probable cause #4, my inner dialogue would go something like this: "Wow, I sound like such a wimp. Like the only sick pregnant person who ever lived. People will think I'm a slacker because I'm not working. 'Suck it up' they will say. 'We are not really THAT interested in your life. Why are you complaining? Haven't you wanted a baby your whole life? Haven't you whined and cried for the last 3 years about NOT being able to have a baby? What are you going to do now??' ETC ETC ETC. Sheesh, talk about low self-esteem. I promise I'm better than I used to be and I AM working on it.

The truth is, I don't have all the answers. However, I feel that I have a very blessed life and it will be a terrible shame to keep it to myself any longer. Its not my intention to turn this into a Mommy Blog, though I'm sure many times it WILL be one. I am interested in so many different things and have many stories to tell, few of which are baby related as of yet. So here I go on my journey to be a reformed blogger. Wish me luck!