Well the good news is I got a hair cut and it was at an Aveda spa for uber comfort and relaxing (and wine for the asking); I also don't look like Laura Ingalls Wilder anymore.

Also, Thursday I saw India Arie in concert. Please see her; she is the voice of women and exactly what I needed. I only saw her for about 30 minutes because I was just tired, but it was perfect. Her positive and spiritual message is beautiful; it just seems like the answers the world needs, especially women. After all of the weight gain (put on over the past 6 or so years, being sick and not knowing it) , listening to India sing songs like "This Too Shall Pass" and "Video" was perfect. At the beginning, she prayed that the concert would touch everyone in exactly the way they needed.

The other news is my health has very much spiraled as we attempt to figure this tumor thing out. I can barely get out of bed sometimes; it's unbelievable- we are talking tired to the point that I'll have B drive me some place to "get out of the house," and by the time we pull up, it's not worth getting out of the car for me, and I sleep right there. I've never felt anything like this. My work and family and friends (although I rarely am social these days) have been fantastic. My mom flew out here when B visited his mom (dealing with chemo!), so I was not alone. My work has given me the space I've needed, including the wonderful parents of my classroom; I don't like to discuss work in detail, but I will say that 12 parents attended our final field trip! Sadly, I just haven't had the stamina/physical stability for the past two field trips. It's been hard. I so identify with my role at work, being good at it...and, although I still stand proudly behind my teaching, there is much that I just can't do. I love being with my students. I love teaching. Missing the last field trip was unbelievably hard; the humility of watching a sub and 12 (very kind- I don't know what I'd do without them!) parents load my students onto a bus because I couldn't do it all just hit me at once, and I went to my class and just cried.

Thank God for the people I work for, the people I work with, the kids I teach and their parents. Thank God for B, for my family, for my friends who put up with me never ever calling. I know this too shall pass. I know it's all good in the end. I know I will see it. I have enough wisdom to know it will come, I just don't have the wisdom to see it right now.

Wednesday I visited my infinitely wise gp (message me if you are a Cliffie and need a fabulous THINKING, non-egoic gp!). I knew things were much worse, but it's one of those things in which I've felt so exhausted for so long that I'm not sure what's what these days. She looked at my cortisol labs and said, "Your life is hell." I had this instant feeling of validation-- for people going through something that no one can seem to figure out exactly, the LAST thing you want is a normal lab or a dr to minimize things! She tells me I'm approaching total adrenal failure and I need to get into a good endo in "days, not weeks." I think only a handful of people will understand why this was good news to hear (as was the tumor!).

The endo, I'm working on. My last endocrinologist was, well, we're not going to work out. I cannot wait out the left-brain logical-sequential approach to this. I'd like to get into someone that specializes in pituitary issues; I'm wait listed right now but some say they can see me if my gp asks for an urgent referral (working on).

I have researched cortisol levels that are this low, and it seems that these people wear medical bracelets-- you need cortisol to live. If you're in an accident or ill and your body can't make cortisol, that's a life or death thing. I'm not certain if this applies to me-- I tend to think we just don't know if it applies to me. We don't know how or why my cortisol has tanked, if its related to the tumor or no.

I'm getting a little, not worried, but wondering if this is going to be something more serious. When you step out far enough, there are only a couple of things that would make sense and encompass the breadth of lab results and clinical symptoms. One is not very good, and one is pretty bad.

I cycle between acceptance of my new normal and then desperate fantasies of coming back to next year's school year as if I've been 'watered,' energetic, thin again, healthy and strong. And then there are the darker times in which I wonder if this is the beginning of some kind of end, of what's nature I don't yet understand. I know I'll come to terms with whatever I need to reconcile, but I'm finding myself grasping onto the structures I've so intentionally built into my life. I want them to be permanent; I love them. Intellectually I'm aware of the ephemerality of things, and yet intellectually, I grasp. Another day, another paradox.

:)