Happy Happy Joy Joy

What makes a Saige happy? The answer to that is anything that simplifies my life and cuts out any annoying crap.

A little over a year ago I purchased a brand new, shiny satellite radio from BB and had it installed... or at least that was what I thought was going to happen. I picked up my car from the install bay to find this:


Talk about jerry-rigging! Check out the three cords coming out of my dash vents, as well as the one to the side of the stereo. I kind of knew that was what I was going to get, but what I really didn't expect was that when the temps outside warmed up my car on the inside, what I would get is this:


Oh yeah, that's right. My satellite radio had been "stuck" to my dash with a sticker. The installation guy had said that he was sure his installation was good and that it would stick on there. Ha! Moron! So for the past year+ I have been fighting with sticking this thing back to my dash upon entering my car every single time, only to have it fall off after I have exited the car. The past few weeks the connections have started to come loose due to the inability to stay stuck, causing the sound from the right speakers to be non-existent.

I finally decided I had had enough. It was time to buy an in-dash stereo that came complete with the satellite in it, as well as get a stereo with a working CD player (since my CD player called it quits shortly after the satellite was installed [I guess it felt a little butt-hurt]).

Today I had this little ditty installed.


Now don't get all excited and think it is anything worth stealing, because it isn't. Its pretty much bottom of the line, but it fits the bill perfectly. The sad thing is, the installation on this unit cost more than it did just because I had to pay for the installation of the unit as well as the installation of the satellite upgrade kit. I am pretty happy with my decision though because as you can see, I no longer have three lines streaming out of my dash vents to deliver power to a device that is no longer temporarily stuck to my dash. The sticker that seems to be an ugly reminder of the fight I have fought over the past year will be gone in the next few days. Thank you to the makers of Goo.Go.ne!

Turn up that satellite radio baby!

Nicknames

I am a person of nicknames. Have you ever seen the TV show Lost? If so, you know the character, Sawyer. Like this character, I like to give out nicknames, but unlike him, I only give them to people I like or care about, and usually they have nothing to do with the way the person looks or acts. There is only one exception to my rule and that is my mother. Firstly because I don't think she is big on being called anything other than some form of mother, and secondly because a nickname for her never sprung to mind. She is too proper for one. Everyone else in my life I care about, however, has anywhere from one to a dozen or so.

I do need to add a caveat here. I care about a great many people whom I do not give nicknames simply because I am not comfortable enough with them to do so. Would I rescue them from a burning building? Absolutely. But I am not on enough of a friendly level with them to hand out a badge of Saige-bestowed honor.

Let's take for example, my baby. How many nicknames could one baby have, you ask. My answer is many. I call her: munchkin, munchkie, munchk, munchy munchk, tweet pea, sweet pea, babsie, sugar, sugar boogar, as well as many variations on her name. I realize that some of them are variations on the same name, but they are nicknames nonetheless.

I never understood why parents wanted to name their children something that couldn't be shortened into a nickname. It takes away the ability to create something a little more intimate in your relationship with them. My husband's mother was one of those people. I showed her though. My husband has a range of nicknames himself: sexy beast, hot stuff, and sweetie are just a few.

Coworkers and close friends usually only get one to two nicknames, and I have to have a friendship with my coworkers that I feel comfortable giving them a nickname. One of my teammates at work has his PhD, so I call him Dr. Butchie. Another went through a phase where he was trying to grow his hair out for his girlfriend that made him look like characters from movies and cereal boxes, earning him the nicknames Rufio and Count Chocula.

Before my grandmother died a couple of years ago, I used to call her Granny B. I didn't realize that the name had a different meaning to her than it did to me until one day she asked why I called her that. I told her it was because she was always baking goodies and it reminded me of Granny B's cookies. You know, the sugar cookies with pink frosting and sprinkles. She got the biggest smile on her face and seemed to be really pleased with being called Granny B after that. When I thought on it, I realized she thought I was calling her Granny #2, as opposed to Granny A, or #1 Granny.

Do you assign nicknames to people, or are you anti-nickname?

The Beginning

Hello, my name is Saige. A few years ago my husband and I realized that we were having a hard time trying to conceive. We then embarked on one of the toughest journeys of my life, infertility. I spent countless hours in the infertility clinic, flushed thousands of dollars down the drain, cried enough tears to flood the world, underwent numerous treatments, and eventually went on to conceive the most incredible little munchkin ever.

I thought that once my Munchkin was here the emotional trauma of infertility would be over and that life would be the happy story I always imagined it would be. In the days following her birth I had some serious post partum depression. Not the kind that made me want to abandon or hurt my child, but the kind that made me sob and dread the passing of each and every minute. I hated going to sleep at night because I was afraid I would wake up the next morning and it would be 16 years later in the morning. As a result, I couldn't and wouldn't sleep, which compounded the depression exponentially.

I fought it with everything I had to keep my doctor from prescribing an anti-depressant or from landing in a shrink's office. I thought I was fighting the good fight and that I had overcome, but every month I would experience major setbacks. Things that would normally only bother me for a day or two sent me careening over the edge.

Finally, at the request of a husband desperate to save his wife, marriage, and the mother of his child, coupled with the pleadings of a father desperate to save his daughter, I sought help. At first I tried visiting a counselor, but by the end of our third session I realized she was not helping me the way I had hoped. Our fourth session ended 15 minutes early.

I tried to go on my merry way, informing my loved ones that I had tried, but that apparently I was fine. Then I experienced another setback. Next up was my GP. I asked for a prescription, told her what I had previously been on, and asked for a specific anti-depressant, which she did not give me, but instead gave me what I did not want. She told me it could make parts of my PPD worse, but that she wanted to try it anyway. She is no longer my doctor.

Seeking help was only causing me more upset than it was helping. The number of hoops I had to jump through with the insurance coupled with the fact that no one seemed to really want to listen or help even when I was paying them to do so was more than I could handle.

Again, I told everyone I was fine, put on a happy face, and went forward with life only to have another major setback a couple of weeks ago. It was at this point in time that I realized I needed to be playing in the major leagues. No more counselors, no more GPs who could care less about me. I did the unthinkable, the unfathomable... I went to a psychologist with a PhD.

I was and still am embarrassed to be there, but I realize now that I need to be there for my husband, my daughter, and my family. This isn't about me anymore and what I am comfortable with, its about showing the ones I love that I love them and will do what I need to do to be here for them. If I have to talk to a shrink and be on anti-depressants to show them that I love them very dearly, then I will do it, no matter how degrading it feels to me.

I have post partum depression hand-in-hand with left over baggage from years of infertility. It feels to me like I just can't catch a break. But I realize that everything I am handed in this life is a test. I can choose to roll over at every crossroad, or I can choose to learn from it and become a stronger person.

I choose to become a stronger person. So I am picking myself up, dusting myself off, and seeing my life the way I want it to be. Doing so will make it a reality.

Welcome to my journey to recovery from PPD and IF.