Hair Management

I've been cutting my own hair for the last 6 years or so. It was one of those things I decided to try out, when I started college, and I've been doing it off and on ever since.

It started out with me getting one of the best haircuts ever, where this really nice lesbian woman gave me a haircut using only a razor. She made it look so easy, and explained to me that it actually WAS quite easy. All I would have to do was go down to Sally's Beauty Supply store and buy a razor. I could do it myself. She gave me a few quick pointers, and off I went.

Over the years, through much trial and error, I've become pretty efficient at cutting my own hair. Yes, I did say trial and error, though. There have been a few times where I have thoroughly screwed up and had to take my head down to a professional hair-cutting salon to have somebody fix what I had destroyed. Before I'd figured out how to use mirrors, apparently, there was the time I asked my roommate to help me out, in trimming the back of my head, where I couldn't see. She ended up trimming it to about 1/8th an inch on the back of my head, which left me in hysterics. (That was my first year of college, and I was still trying to get married.) Then there was the time where I'd used my thinning shears and gone FAR too thin in FAR too many places, leaving my hair a strange choppy/stringy sort of length. It was pretty terrible.

But overall, my experiences have been good, because I'm still cutting my own hair. For me it has become a sort of stress relief. (Probably a really bad fact, but true.) Sometimes I just reach that point where I figure, You know? I'm ready for a change! and then I cut my hair.

Last night I decided to cut my hair again. I'd trimmed my husband's hair that morning, and I was in a hair cutting mood. My bangs were a little too long to style right, the hair behind my ears and at the back of my neck was getting too thick, and overall, I was starting to look more like one of the Beatles. So I decided to cut.

Everything was going perfectly well, like it usually does. In fact, I was pretty happy with the results. I had the length trimmed all about right, and was going through with the razor, trying to roughen up a few of those rough patches. I was razoring the thicker hair on the back of my neck, and behind my right ear, when I became frustrated with my razor blade. It was old, and wasn't doing its best work, so I decided to replace it. I took off the old razor, safely capping it and throwing it away, then screwed a new razor into place, to begin working again.

I turned to my left ear, and with one quick swoop, took off a huge patch of 3 inch hair, leaving not much else behind!

I laughed hysterically, fingering the massive patch, and cursing my underestimation of the abilities of my new, sharp razor blade. My husband came to investigate. His analysis went from, "I can't even tell." to "It's not so bad." to "Maybe if you dyed your hair..." to "Yeah, that's pretty terrible."

After having gone through this so many times, I've learned to not panic. Yeah, it's inconvenient to have a large bald patch behind your ear, but, as with most things, it'll grow back out. It'll heal. It's not worth creating too much havoc. So yes, now I'm wearing headbands, and trying to dye my hair didn't work, but it's not the end of the world.

If all else fails, just shave it all off, or try going for that "Holocaust Victim" look. Always did want to try that one...

Social Justice

As a Social Worker, I believe in fighting for social justice. It’s, like, in the NASW Code of Ethics that all Social Workers live by. For real. Social Justice. It’s a thing.

It has come, however disturbingly, to my attention, that there are some severe social injustices within the very hospital in which I work. This fact was brought to my attention as I was walking down the hall this morning, passing the Doctor’s Lounge, when a doctor exited, struggling to balance his donut, his coffee, and his bottled water, with his clipboard, all in two hands. He walked in front of me, green scrubs spotless, as he walked, in all his confident struggle, to wherever he was going.

And I realized, then, that life was TERRIBLY unjust.

Did you know that a donut costs $1.50 at the hospital? Did you know that the DOCTORS have a lounge packed FULL of the things, which they can eat at only the cost of their calories?  The Doctors’ Lounge is locked to anyone but doctors, cleaning crews, and food services staff. And trust me. All the doctors just go in there to hang out. There are couches, rugs, big screen TVs, DONUTS, coffees, bottled waters, potato chips, DONUTS, and all of these things laid out like sacrificial offerings to the Doctors of the lounge. They have become gods in our eyes.

This is unjust. The windowless office in the ER that the crisis workers and myself live in is no larger than 7 X 12 feet. There are two of us, now, and soon they’re adding ANOTHER worker to our office. Three of us crammed at our work stations, unable to see the daylight, struggling to get lunch, some days, before 3:00.

And we get yelled at by doctors. That’s the fun part. They act all entitled in front of us, think they know everything there is to know. Heaven forbid that you should ever have to disagree with them, or correct them on their insensitivity to patients. (No, it’s not alright to call all of your patients “douchebags.”) If you do that, you have proven yourself to be an ignorant fool in their eyes, and they will treat you accordingly.

So they went through more university. And they think this gives them POWER over us?

Now, they’re not all bad. That’s important to say, and I must admit, our ER docs are much nicer than the floor docs. ER doctors stay in the ER, wading through the same blood, guts, and gore as the rest of the nurses and staff. They are a part of us. A couple of them will even brave coming to set foot in our office to talk to the crisis workers. Sometimes they say thank you, and look grateful. And yet, even they are in a different league than we are.

I’m not just talking about salary. I’m not just talking about their scarcity, and the fact that nobody will ever fire them. They know it, in their own hearts, that they are better than us – and it irks me to my core.

What about Social Justice? When will we all finally be equal, and how will I, as a Social Worker, insure that Justice is served???

When do we ALL get free donuts????

Undeserved

As a newlywed, of course, my husband would be one of the things that I want to blog about. For all the pondering I do, I’ve come to a slightly disheartening conclusion – I don’t deserve him.
Why do I say this? Well, here’s the evidence:
One time, when I was far too grumpy for reason and all I wanted was ice cream, Nathan drove us out of our way to stop by Wendy’s and get me a frosty. He didn’t crack a single joke at my hormonal expense, nor did he look bothered or annoyed by the detour. In truth, he looked completely chill, and, even, quite satisfied that he got to be my knight in shining armor in that moment. He was my provider, and he provided me with a frosty, which was my heart’s only desire.

Nathan does the laundry every single Monday. It’s his day off, and he does all of it, while I’m at work. He also insists on coming to my work to eat lunch with me. He vacuums, he puts away the dishes. When I was writing thank you cards for the wedding, he wanted to sit down and help me. (When even I didn’t want to sit down and help me.)
When I’m cooking a meal, Nathan will help me – boil potatoes, put on rice. Whatever I ask, he’ll do it. And when I cook interesting things, he’ll try it. When I made chocolate truffles, the other night, he tried one for me. He doesn’t even like chocolate, and, let’s be honest, I completely spaced an essential ingredient, leaving the truffles dry and powdery. But he didn’t complain! He tried it and said it was great, which made me beam in pride.
He’s a go-get-er. If something on the car isn’t working, he’ll fix it. If the water heater won’t start, he’ll investigate it thoroughly. He’s weird, just like me, and we never get tired of talking – whether it be about the latest bill going through congress, or about how we should start a Gigolo support group for a population at risk. He’ll tell me, with loving forwardness, when I’m nagging him, and humbly accepts my suggestions as well.
If I’m having a bad day, he wants to hear about it, just to listen. He’ll listen to my rants, my personal battles, and obsessions, without judgment or annoyance. He is understanding and patient, and can make me laugh through any drama. If I have to teach a lesson which makes me nervous, and distressingly pass him a note, he’ll change “I’m gonna die!” to “I’m gonna bake a pie!” and take my worries away.
He’s a dreamer, a philosopher, and a passionate writer. He dances outside with me, whenever we leave the house. He’s let me read to him, juvenile girl stories about princesses, dragons, and wizards. He fights “You’re pretty.” battles with me, and will never let me win. He serenades me with Michael Buble, singing to me that I’m his Everything.
When I have a bad dream and wake up, even in his sleep, Nathan reaches out to put his arms around me, unconsciously checking to see if I’m okay. One morning I even woke up to a donut and a hot chocolate for me on the kitchen table. He's the kind of guy who will walk with me in the moonlight, find a romantic place to sit, then tell me not to be embarrassed when we're walked in on by a group of skateboarders.
He's confident and self-assured, righteous and humble, and so it’s really quite obvious. I don’t deserve him.
But you know what? I’ve never been happier.

Sensory Processing

It was brought to my attention, yet again, that I am not like everyone else I know. (That sounds conceited, but it's not meant to be.) I experience the world differently than everybody else.
I have a type of sensory processing disorder. (Sounds good, doesn't it!) In short, what this means, is that I'm Superman.
Do you remember that scene in the newest Superman movie, where he's huddled in the corner, at school, being bombarded on all sides by SOUNDS? He can hear everything, and it's all amplified to his supernatural hearing senses, and it's driving him crazy!
Yeah, I have that.
This was first brought to my family's attention when I was a child, and refused to wear jeans. I wore sweatpants - what I called "soft pants" - until I was probably about 10 years old. I also remember being truly, 100% annoyed by tags in clothes. It was like having someone rubbing on the back of your neck, over and over again, with the bristles of a used toothbrush. It was a nightmare! So we cut them out!
For the most part, I've gotten over being annoyed by tactile senses. (Occasionally a clothing tag will annoy me, but for the most part, not anymore.) Now, my number one Processing issue is Auditory.
I cannot tell you how many times I've wondered if I have a significant hearing loss. Sometimes, I can't hear ANYTHING. Having an audiologist for a father has given me the opportunity to get my hearing checked out MANY times, however, and each time, my hearing checks out with gold stars. (Well maybe not as many gold stars as it used to have, after spending some time being a DJ, going to loud concerts, having screaming contests with friends, etc.) I have great hearing!
My issue is the Superman issue. My brain hears EVERYTHING, and can't differentiate to hear only the important things. Everything comes in at the same volume. Right now it's the sound of the keys being typed on my computer, the traffic driving by on the road outside, the humming of my refrigerator, the fan in my computer, and the clock ticking away on the table over to my right. (Ohp! The neighbor next door has just started taking a shower. I hear that too.)
I know everybody else can hear these things. They can hear that the upstairs neighbor has just sat down at the table, a car door slammed shut outside, and that clock is still ticking, and the cars are still driving by outside. I know everyone else with decent hearing can hear all of these things, so I'm not special in that. But everyone else has this unique ability I don't have. They can hear the person having a conversation beside them without all those sounds being an annoyance. They "tune it out." They don't focus on it, so it's something they eventually come to not even hear anymore at all!
I can't do that. I can't "tune it out." It's all the same volume.
It is for this reason that, to save time in telling my story, I tell people that I have hearing loss. If I happened to be stressed out, it only feels that much worse. My inability to hear only what I want to be hearing makes it grow frustrating and unmanageable.
If I'm at work, sometimes I'll turn one set of light switches off in the office, because there's a light right over my computer that hums, sometimes. Annoys the heck out of me. If I'm having a more stressful day, I'll often make my work related calls only when my co-workers are out of the office, so that I can hear the person on the other line better. If somebody walks in, I'm that person turning the volume up on the phone to max, and shoving my palm over my other ear, to make the sounds louder from the phone. I can't have whispered side conversations at times like this, because I can't hear the person on the phone line then. I worry, at times, that this makes me look like I'm hateful of the other people in the office - but I'm not. I am, in truth, totally thrilled out of my mind, when that nurse comes to visit. The reason I'm turning my back to you and covering my ear and jamming my phone closer to my other one is because I REALLY need to hear everything this person is saying, so I can get off the phone and talk to you faster! You're not annoying me! I just can't concentrate with everything that's going on, all at once.
So I went to Stake Conference, for church, a couple weeks ago, and didn't get anything out of it. It wasn't that I wasn't paying attention, or trying, but the Sunday session of Stake Conference is packed full with so many babies. It's impossible! I tried to take notes, but all I ended up with was this:

So yeah. I didn't get much out of it.
For awhile, I let this Sensory Processing stuff bother me. It's a huge indicator of Autism, but I just don't fit the bill on any of the social things for the Autism Spectrum.
I've comforted myself, now, in just accepting the fact that I'm a mutant with super-human powers.
And, you know, I'm okay with that.