If you live in a social networking black hole, you may not have heard I broke my ankle doing roller derby last Monday night. This is from Monday night while I was in the ER:

And these next two are from the doc’s office on Friday after the splint came off:

Those purple spots aren’t bruises- it’s pools of blood from the torn ligaments.

Anyway, I had surgery earlier today. While I only cracked the tip of the tibia bone, I managed to tear ligaments galore, including the ligaments that hold the tibia and fibula (the bones in your lower leg that lay on top of another bone to form the ankle) together. That required two screws to be put into both of those bones to hold them together while the ligaments heal. Plus they also went through the other side to repair the ligament some. I really tore the shit out of it.

I’m sidelined for a few months at the least but I’m in high spirits. I’m glad it happened at the end of derby season and not midway through or beginning. I’m still hoping I’ll be able to play my first bout in either Feb or March, depending on which team I get on. I’ll find that out in a couple weeks!

At least I didn’t break a bunch of bones and need plates and screws and pins and whatever. It could be a lot worse. If it had just been the cracked tibia, that wouldn’t take long at all to heal. My bones are strong, woot! My ligaments on the other hand, not so much. C’est la vie!

Also, thank GOODNESS this didn’t happen when I was at my old job. I’m sure I would have been fired for missing work. I’ve missed a week of work, and while it’s a bummer I had to use up my sick, personal and now vacation days, at least I had them to use them. I’m so thankful for my new job and my incredibly awesome new boss, who calls to check on me because she’s genuinely worried about my health and not just when I’ll be back in to work. Seriously, I have one of the greatest bosses in the history of the world. What an incredible reversal of fortune in that department!

Bitty out!

Arrested Development is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. How did I miss this when it was on and the ensuing years it exploded on DVD? Well at least now I’m watching it. I love it. I also love:

My cat Travis Good friends My crazy family Jambalaya Skating Creating Milk When I make people laugh Wit Excitement

I think my cough medicine is kicking in!

Ps. My new job is rad. The polar opposite atmosphere from the last place and it makes such a huge difference.

As this unemployment/no money thing continues, my mom and T’s mom have been lifesavers. Not just financially, but they call to check on us often. They want to make sure we’re not getting depressed and down on ourselves. They’re quick to love and quick to help. We couldn’t do this without you, Pam and Krista. From the bottom of our hearts, we love you with all of ours. We’re incredibly blessed to have the moms we do.

Love,

Bitty and T

Hi, my name is Bitty and I’m currently only partially medicated. You see, I was once fully medicated, and stable and sane and all of that. Then I lost my job, and therefore my insurance. It also just so happened that one of my medications is $140 a month without insurance. Considering my lack of any income whatsoever, this is not an option for me. So, I took the six pills I had left and weaned myself off.

So now I’m quick to anger and snap and I’m getting a little down and just blah. Bear with me. I’m doing my best to control it. It had been almost four years that I had been on meds, so this is a little different to say the least.

So what have I been doing with my time? I spend a few hours daily looking for jobs. I eat a lot of bagels. I started playing WOW. I hide from the sun and go to roller derby practice. I stay up very late and wake up even later. Mostly, I ponder what I want to do with myself. Do I just go into another 9-5? Do I go to grad school? School for something else? Do I want to become an electrician apprentice? I don’t know. 

Ouch. My whole leg hurts. Nothing major, just sore and crappy.

The dive bar I’ve found myself at many years and times before, I once again was there. I looked on the dance floor, the familiar tunes of the decade of my birth ringing in the room. A new theme hit me all of a sudden; a family I always knew I had in my heart, right in front of my eyes. Joined together by a similar fate, a means to enhance the existence. Destiny? Fate? I don’t know. But it’s here and it’s now, and I’m going to live it up. I am head over heels in love with it all.

I have my old school Nike hightops on today. I’d estimate their age to be at least 15 years old; one of my many rad thrift store finds.

My return to work after a delightful weekend in Boston was everything I imagined it would be and more; as I reflect on the day from the comfort of my home, I realize this:

• My job robs me of motivation
• I feel very, very stuck
• it also is a direct cause of my latest depression
• It leaves me running far away from a computer once I get home, therefore I haven’t worked on a resume/reel because of the general feeling of barfing I get when on a computer after spending 8 hrs of a day on one at work
• It does reignite that fighting spirit I had in high school- the spirit I had that made me want to be an investigative journalist, bringing down the jerks from the highest rungs. Unfortunately, I know I stand pretty much alone on any kind of actual action. Apathy + job security = no action beyond bitching. I can’t blame people too much, but then again, maybe a few things would change if there was a better sense of unity among the grunt-workers. 
• The fighting spirit quickly dies because I see very little point; that same feeling of death I had when I realized I hated Journalism.

I also almost re-posted the article about how to achieve mediocrity in the work place. Which makes me think:

• I’m mediocre
• That article hit the bullseye of my heart
• I feel the need to shout it from the rooftops, as if doing so would make something change

Truth: It won’t. Nothing will change. Just like the article said, if anything ever were to change, it will be long after I’ve moved on from that place.

I’m sorry. I know I’m lucky to have a job in my field, etc etc. I’ve been contemplating other career paths though. I like editing and shooting- but this routine, corporate type of video work? Definitely not what I want to do for the rest of my life. Thinking about doing it for the rest of the year kind of makes me want to cry into my glass of water.

That article… DAMN. It’s like they spent a week at my office. Oh, and PS- if the head honcho keeps saying how the last two years has produced the best work of the company in the history of said company, the employees have continually done a fantastic job, gotten everything done on time or faster, and helped to bring in over 10 million bucks in revenue… and it’s the same team, plus one person… do you really have to add more inane rules to the plethora? Why buckle down on stupid stuff that never mattered before all of a sudden?

Power is a worse addiction than crack, that’s why.

Not however a facepalm to the forehead. Just slapping for the sake of staying awake, or even just as a reminder that I am not In a dream and am, in fact, alive.

I note to myself on a daily basis that I’m failing at blogging. Two reasons: I don’t have a lot to say and I don’t have a lot to say because my mind is on autopilot. I’m just going through the motions during the week. Come the weekend, I’m so happy to be free of the 9-5 routine that I am never in a downtime to write. The weekend is over before I can recharge completely and the soul crushing routine is back at it.

I realized and noted to T the other night that I think I’m depressed.

It’s not the kind of depression I used to get premeds, which is why I didn’t recognize it as depression for a while. I can still make it through the week, I can motivate myself enough to do what I have to… But the only time I have joy Monday thru Friday is when I’m home or at derby.

I’m being a major bummer right now, I’m sorry. Um… Know what still makes me crack up to this day? People falling down. Call me whatever, but people biting it makes some primal part of my brain fire off endorphins at a rate crackheads would hope to have off a hit.

Shine on you crazy moonbeams. Ol’ bitty will work thru this.

There hasn’t been much to talk about. Firstly, this article is floating around the office:

http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/109519/5-ways-to-ensure-mediocrity-in-your-organization?mod=career-leadership

4/5, way to go work! You make most of us here very depressed and unfulfilled! If the job market and mountains of student debt didn’t suck… Well at least I have a job. I keep telling myself that but it’s getting less and less encouraging.

Yes I realize if this was discovered I would be in trouble at work. But, I also get in trouble if I’m “not in my seat and working at 9 am on the dot.” I get passive aggressive scolding for trying to politely correct some of the myths my boss was spewing forth about pitbulls. Nevermind I volunteer at an animal shelter and work with pitbulls.

Get the idea?

On a lighter note, roller derby is worth the bruises. I wake up everyday with cheerful kitties lying next to me and in between my beautiful boy and myself. I have great friends and a beautiful house. So yay for me!

When I wear heels, T always comments on how well I walk in them and how many women look stupid trying to clomp around in 4 inch heels. That makes my feminine side beam and my masculine side go “HA EAT IT YOU STUMBLING WENCHES! But only to those ladies who think they’re awesome in their heels.