Advice from a fish... and a few flowers

Last week was a rough week. But I wanted to tell you how the "happy little fish" charm helped pull me through.
 

The happy little fish charm (top left) on my all-silver timebead bracelet.

On Tuesday night my son Mitchell came home from basketball practice with a swollen knee. The next day my husband Mike had an early morning dentist appointment and was out the door before we'd all finished getting dressed. Once our doctor's office was open I called, and they wouldn't be able to see Mitchell (and his knee) til the end of the day. So when my husband got home from his appointment he drove us to the Emergency Room at CHEO (Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario). And hubbie headed back to the dentist - for an emergency root canal! 

My son and I spent the morning moving from one hospital waiting room to the next... triage, registration, ambulatory care, X-ray... and finally a doctor. She said there was nothing broken but Mitchell should stop sports for at least a week and follow up with our family doctor or a sports med doctor.  But he could go back to school.

Add to my crazy Wednesday the fact that Mike was in pain the rest of the day (after the freezing wore off) and had to cancel basketball practice and simply went to bed. Which of course meant I was single parenting the remainder of the day.

So... after such an exhausting day on Wednesday, when the alarm went off on Thursday morning I REALLY wanted to stay in bed. To go back to sleep. And to NOT think about all the things I needed to do! But I decided to listen to my fishy friend here who tells me to "just keep swimming..."

It's kind of like saying, "just keep putting one foot in front of the other," but it's much more fun to picture Dory (from Finding Nemo) and sing along with her! Here's the lyrics so you can sing along too! (WARNING: it might get stuck in your head too)

Hey Mr Grumpy Gills
when life gets you down,
you know what you got to do?

Just keep swimming
Just keep swimming
Just keep swimming swimming swimming

What do we do?
We swim, swim, swim

YouTube video of "Just Keep Swimming" from Finding Nemo 

 

So on Thursday morning, when I woke up, I reminded myself that I already had a detailed agenda on my phone, with lists of all the things I needed to do. So I trusted. I trusted that if I "just keep swimming..." I will get everything done.

Mitchell was allowed to walk around school but needed a drive TO school. I'd have to email the basketball coach and let him know what happened, because Mitchell couldn't play in the tournament that afternoon. And his Phys. Ed. teacher needed to know he had to sit out gym class and couldn't do outdoor skating. His home room teacher needed to know he couldn't do DPA (daily physical activity) and might need a key for the elevator. And he couldn't participate in the ski club that started that night, so I had to send an email to cancel asap so we could get a refund.

But Mitchell's twin sister Taylor was still going skiing, and over breakfast Thursday morning she reminded me that she'd be leaving right after school, so she needed to bring supper as well as lunch. And she needed to find her snowpants. And warm socks. And she discovered that her warm gloves were now too small (she ended up borrowing my husband's.) And she'd forgotten to put skiing on her agenda, so she hadn't told her tutor that she wasn't coming on Thursdays for the next four weeks. Which meant I should email the tutor, and hope we wouldn't get dinged for the appointments because we gave such short notice.
 

And wouldn't you know it, just as Mitchell was getting dressed to go outside, he said, "You have to fill those forms out or I can't go to high school!" Seriously? SERIOUSLY?! 

Needless to say, he went without the forms. But I did send an email to this teacher asking her to please reassure Mitchell that he would in fact still get to go to high school if the forms came in the next day.

And... they are out the door!

OK that brings us to 8:00 am. And MY day begins. Remember, "just keep swimming..."

The agenda says clean up the kitchen, do phone calls and email, do your journal work, do your morning exercises, have a shower and get dressed, have a morning snack, "just keep swimming..."

Get ready for your ten o'clock appointment, get your homework done for Thursday night group therapy, get outside for a walk in the snow, "just keep swimming..."

You get the idea!

This happy little guy got me through last week, and many previous situations, oftentimes much more stressful or emotionally difficult. Such simple, yet effective, advice: "just keep swimming..."
 

In fact, this is what I posted almost three years ago:

I am now 19 weeks symptom-free with my eating disorder - which means no bingeing, purging or restricting. My reward was the "happy fish" charm. I had a bit of a rough week last week - feeling down, discouraged, tired - so the goal was simply to remain symptom-free by telling myself, to quote Dory from Finding Nemo, "just keep swimming..."

When I shared that story about earning my fish charm, someone told me that there will be times when even "just keep swimming..." will feel like too much. At those times, she said, it's ok to simply float!

The large and small blue topaz ribbon flower charms.

And when I think of floating I visualize a flower floating on the surface of the water. It's a little precarious. If you wiggle it too much it will get swamped and go under. If we struggle too much, we can get swamped, go under. Instead. Be still. Just float.

 

And there have been... oh... a few times in the last three years of my recovery when I had to "just float."
 

At those times I needed to tell myself that the only goal is to get through this situation. Like a get-together with family members that push my buttons. A difficult medical procedure. A confrontational meeting. A funeral. And at those times I gave myself one of these blue topaz "ribbon flower" charms - just the kind you might want to gently lay in a bowl of water and let it be still. And just float.

Now when I have to get through something difficult I wear these charms, and give them a spin. They remind me that sometimes it's ok to just tread water, just keep your head above water, just don't drown. Be still and just float.

The ribbon flower charms on my Beat the Winter Blues bracelet

Pandora bras and butts, oh my!

Sometimes you just buy a charm because you like it. You haven't "earned" it. You don't have a "meaning" for the charm. It's just pretty. Maybe one of your favourite colours. And you'd like to have it. And sometimes the meaning comes after you buy the charm, as it did for me with the teal "studded lights," on the bangle above. It's similar to the other "whimsical lights" except it has the extra bumps or "studs." I think I can wear it with all three bracelets in this photo.

One of my favourite stones is the dark blue topaz. It hasn't been used in very many Pandora charms, but it's in the daisy dangle, top left on "My #1 Son" bracelet below. So, when Pandora released the teal studded lights, I really wanted it. But I already had a teal bracelet - my Lucerne Recovery bracelet. And I have a turquoise bracelet (below), my mother-son bracelet, with the turquoise enamel on the #1 blue ribbon, butterflies, Zen, and mother-son dangles. I couldn't justify another whole bracelet just because I loved this teal charm. So I didn't buy it. And every time I saw a photo of it on someone else's bracelet I yearned for it.

Then, last week, I saw a photo where a woman had a single pendant, the treasured hearts, on her bangle. I had the same pendant! And I was never quite happy with it's placement on my rhodolite "Treasured Hearts" bracelet. So I tried it on my bangle. Perfect! It's not heavy so it doesn't flip the bangle so that the charms are always under my wrist. It slides around and doesn't get stuck on the threads because it's not threaded. Perfect! I even took a picture!

This opened up a whole new world of Pandora possibilities. I could use openwork charms on bangles too! I had been using some on leathers and liked the effect, but I don't typically buy a charm that hasn't been planned, as part of a vision of a full bracelet. Now there was the opportunity to have some random charms. And then, as luck would have it, the teal studded whimsical was for sale on one of the Pandora buy~sell pages on Facebook.

And wouldn't you know, it was being sold by my friend Shauna. I've never met Shauna in person. We've never even talked on the phone. But we are Facebook friends. And we're both Canadians. And I really enjoy her company. She's a hoot. Over the last three years, since I started collecting Pandora, some of the funniest conversations I've had have been with Shauna on the Pandora pages, mostly on Pandora's Angels. We had a very silly talk one day about the "hypnotic" clip (below). She called it the "tittie" clip, because it's shaped like the famous "cone bra" that Madonna wore in the 80's - thus revealing both my age and Shauna's! Although not our maturity level!

There was also the time Shauna said the "puffy heart" charm always flips upside down when you're wearing it on a bracelet, and it looks like a bare butt - like someone's mooning you! My husband, by the way, has also thought it looked like a bare butt, but didn't say anything until I was writing this post! So immature! You can see below that Pandora does make some pretty cute butts!

I was reminiscing with Shauna about this the other night, and Shauna said, "my gawd, there were times when we burned the midnight oil, chatting and laughing on the boards... not suitable for younger audiences" to which I replied "Yup very silly! And inappropriate!" And she came back with "and proud of it..." 

So when I saw the charm Shauna had for sale I commented on her post saying, "I'm interested in your teal studded." Well, that was what I meant to say! The autocorrect on my iPad left the comment, "I'm interested in your real stud." To which - of course - Shauna asked, "you're interested in my real stud?!" She later told me, "because it was you, I thought I would have a bit of fun with it." After some banter back and forth I told her I would never buy a "stud" sight unseen!

When this charm arrived in the mail I was so excited! It will always remind me to not take life too seriously! How could I, when I look at this charm?! Thanks to Shauna it will make me think of bare butts and titties and studs! It will also make me smile when I think of the friends I've met through Pandora, and of the fun I've had with them on Facebook, especially that crazy chicka from the prairies!

Shauna has always had lovely things to say about my "stories" when I shared them on the Pandora fan page, even asking me to tag her so she doesn't miss any. And as you can see below, she even complemented me on my stories in the card she sent with my new "real stud" charm! Shauna is not just a funny friend, she is also one of my biggest supporters. And I know she could take the word "supporter" and run with it!

 

The teal studded lights also matches the stones in the dangle fish and sea star charms on my "Gifts from the Sea" bracelet, as well as the faceted teal and sea glass muranos.