Have a happy birthday (OR ELSE)

My mom and I think we've discovered why I am having tremendous headaches and all other physical symptoms: TMJ.  It makes a ton of sense since when I originally started not feeling well, it was what I thought was my wisdom tooth acting up on the left side of my mouth (and that's where I've been feeling most of the pain).  I looked up symptoms online here and would say over 50% of those apply to me.  A friend of my mom's brought up today that her daughter had the same problem I was having where she had a headache for a month that doctors were calling stress-related and it turning out being this.  I'm kind of hopeful now and will be a little upset if this isn't it.  It's sad when you cross your fingers something is wrong with you.

That's all for now I guess!

THE THINGS MY MOTHER SAYS

I decided that my mother needs her own blog. Not in the sense that she will actually be the one taking care of this blog, but in the sense that it revolves around her and the ridiculous things she says. For instance, take a couple of excerpts from the past week:

Tuesday Morning
Me: I have no idea what to do for my birthday.
Mom: I know! We should hire a male stripper!

This Morning
Me: (examining an envelope I got from NYU where my street name is spelled wrong) Quinton? How do you mess up Clinton as Quinton? That's like having a lisp or something.
Mom: Yeah well, you only need a PhD for that, right? (walks out nonchalantly)

oh ear we go...

I generally don't think I am a dumb person or lack any common sense. My sister has always been the one a little slower in that department (i.e. when she told her counselor at camp a few years ago she had "selective hearing" and thought it was an actual disease) but this kind of takes the cake.

So I went to an ENT today because I have been having tremendous headaches for the past two weeks and a week ago the pain and pressure moved to the insides of my ears... which was a little worrisome, since I didn't have any signs of a sinus infection. Basically I am fine but it might be due to allergies so I have to start taking more meds on top of my pre-existing allergy meds. ANYWAY, NOT THE POINT. He asks me if I know how to pop my nose and says to plug my nose, and to then press my ear. Apparently he meant try to blow out through my nose to pop them like you do on an airplane, but when he said the word "press" I thought he meant stick my finger inside my ear and actually press on it...

Doctor's reaction: "Well, THAT was a first..."

Needless to say, I am probably the office joke of today, tomorrow, and the day after that if they are open weekends.

Happy New Year.

Or at least I am hoping it will be.

I actually went out on NYE, which was a surprise to all.  Best friend Willa had a party at her house where many of my closest friends gathered, so I pushed myself for some dinner and drinks and all-around good times.  It was fun.  I left early, though, before the ball dropped.  When the clock struck midnight, I was sitting in my room strumming my acoustic guitar.  In other words, I was chillin' just fine.  The day after, I went to a dinner party at my friend Jess's house that her parents were throwing.  Lots of delicious Italian eats and even better alcoholic whipped cream.  The better part of the night consisted of a Dunkin run and finally obtaining photographic evidence of Eddie's crop circles named Scully and Mulder.

However, being out on New Year's Eve and seeing everyone else's pictures on Facebook is making me miss my lack of sobriety.  I have barely had a sip of alcohol since being on meds, save for a glass of wine on Thanksgiving and perhaps more than one the night after my finals were done.  Oh, and a SIP of sangria.  But that is basically... 3 glasses of wine in the past two months?  Though, I'm not really missing cigarettes as much as I thought I would.  But perhaps that is because I enjoy smoking most when I am drunk and I haven't been.  Now there is a thought to think.

I'm still physically feeling really sick, still mentally trying to convince myself that it's all in my head.  I wish my brain wasn't constantly trying to play tricks on me and pushing me to believe that the physical manifestations of my stress are really my aching chest, my throbbing head, my nausea and my dizziness.  Sometimes I blame myself for making poor decisions or deserving it for being a bad person.  Sometimes I blame a higher power that just wants to get me down on my luck, to have me practically begging for being better on my knees, that just likes seeing miserable right now.  I told my doctor the pain in my head has moved to an aching inside my ears and I had low grade fever over the weekend, and he prescribed me a Zpack.  What about everything else, doc?

I don't even know what to do for my birthday.  It feels unreal that I'll be 20 in less than two weeks.  My mind hasn't been able to even concentrate on what I want, besides getting better.  In a me-like fashion, however, my ultimate worry in regards to my birthday has become what I am going to do on the day of.  I hardly even want to do anything at this point, though a lonely birthday is always a miserable one.  I just hate taking the chance of planning some event and then not feeling well and having to cancel it anyway.  My mom even offered to let me have a party here (one at which I will not drink, naturally, but my friends can - save for a glass of champagne in celebration I have made it thus far).  Birthdays, schmirthdays.

I made my phone calls to NYU today to request a medical leave of absence and to cancel my trip to London.  It really sucked but my desire to get better outweighs my desire to go and try to persevere through all of the physical and mental pain.  I've spoken to my friends and if I am well enough, a trip during their spring break will ensue.  But my doctors are all home and so is my major support system, so that's where I'll be this coming semester.  I'm going to try a clinic next week and hopefully it will cure me.  If this is the trick, then perhaps the past few months will have been in vain but maybe it will add towards the help that they will, pray tell, give me.  

But a few good things I guess, on top of the bad:

• I've started playing acoustic guitar again, and I haven't forgotten much

• Began re-watching Arrested Development with Jess.  Huzzah!

• My Creative Writing teacher decided to raise my grade from a C to a B, making my GPA from this past semester a 3.0.  And, a little LOL-worthy, my best semester of school so far.

• Ummm.... that's it, really.