Whatever, Forever.

-I passed my level one minimums and am now contact eligible. For non derby people this means I have passed minimum skill assessments for a number of different ...skills (fuck it’s early and I’m not a thesaurus!) that are required to show you can manage to skate safely and effectively and maintain stability on wheels and can move onto full contact. This is huge for me because it’s taken me 3 seasons to accomplish due to: Achilles and peroneal tendonitis, I had an open tib/fib fracture requiring two surgeries and hardware, and then this season I had developed significant masses on my ovaries due to endometriosis and was in so.much.pain. and ultimately had to take more time off skates for another surgery and recovery. Also I am so solid on these skills that I have a lot of the level 2 skills (lateral jumps, jump height, balance on each foot for 30 secs etc) cemented and will likely play this season. I’ve also been reffing more and it’s a lot of fun and really helpful in understanding the game.

-I’ve been transitioning to a new role at my job and have gone from working intake to becoming a full time clinician. I have built my caseload to ~30 from scratch. It is a tremendous amount of *new* paperwork and also requires a lot of case management sort of tasks to help stabilize people with high needs and also requesting records etc. also I’ve had some ***really*** high risk clts and have caught a lot of flack but a colleague of mine told me that our clinical director told her last week that I am one of the best clinicians our agency has ever had and how good I am at my job and how lucky they are to have me and that really made this all feel worthwhile. ESPECIALLY after how they treated me at my last employer. Also I’m on my 4th intern. All three of my former interns are successfully employed in the field and one has gotten her LMSW & the other just passed her LMHC exam!

-I started working out again but also I finally weighed in under 200lbs

-pretty sure I’m getting engaged soon (nails did just in case)

- I ran into a friend that I met through derby who is a photographer and he has asked me to do some modeling for him or at least if I would do makeup for models for him, because he loves my looks (just tfp but I’m totally self taught and really an amateur i just play makeup for funsies so I’m ultra flattered.)

-I got a raise with retro pay and did on call and have a small gig serving food at a party for my boss and have been able to pay all my bills and start Christmas shopping without any real stress (and pay off a vet bill I just got for Brody’s second episode of double ear infections that was totally not expected)

Things aren’t awful. I’m trying. It’s hard because I’m having a really difficult time managing the stress even on medication, mostly due to the lupron and other hormones they put me on after surgery and quite frankly, I don’t do well with hormones. But I’m making it and think things are finally swinging in a more positive direction.