I know it’s been a while since I last updated the blog. Life has been a little hectic to say the least! Hmm, where did I leave off? I came back from chaperoning the eJournalsim trip to Bethel and was pretty excited to start doing the Insanity program. Everything was going great - even work - last year I had a great idea to organize every Unit I taught for all 6 classes I taught. This is a lot of work, considering we had a brand new curriculum, but it has made this year 90% easier. I get teased because I tend to be over-the-top organized, but hey, when I get to go home after school, I’m not the one laughing!
Mid-February came along and I had a couple of days where I was just lethargic, dizzy, and had really bad headaches. I would wonder how on earth I could find the energy to workout when I could barely life my arms. It took all of my strength just to get through a workout. So I finally gave Insanity a rest and took two days off, but the dizziness didn’t stop. So I was planning a sick day, and when I woke up that morning my left eye had a gray line “stamped” across my line of vision. I kept expecting it to go away but it never did. It was pretty worrisome and disorienting, so I booked a flight to Anchorage to have it checked out, and of course the weather turned so I couldn’t go anywhere. I made the appointments and Brandi was able to save me a few hundred dollars with an air-fare program. After a few days when the weather cleared up, I went in and was impressed at how fast the doctors would refer me and get me in. I went to the eye doctor, who did some tests and sent me to a specialist. The specialist ran more tests and sent me to the hospital to have an MRI done. I went to do that, and within a couple of hours they read the results and ruled out a bunch of concerns they thought it might be. So I was pretty thankful that it wasn’t anything too serious, but all the same I wish they had an answer.
I had a few friends that are pretty active and they’ve broken blood vessels, and they say they lost vision and it returns in a couple of months. I didn’t break a blood vessel, but one doctor did say he would give it a couple of months to clear up. If it’s not better by then I should go back to Anchorage and figure out something else. It’s times like these that I wish I lived in a city, because it costs me around $1,000 just to make the trip.
What really aggravated me, though, was when I finally got to Anchorage, Paula called and said 2 eye doctors came were in Newtok! No one knew they were coming and in my four years here they have come only once. What are the odds?!? Kevin called a coach he knows back in Louisiana and picked his brain about the matter, and he said that sometimes happens when you strain your eye in physical activities. I personally don’t think it has anything to do with working out - my form is good and I don’t hold my breathe. I do a lot of jumping around, pushups, and things of that sort, but I’ve been through strenuous activities all my life. And like I reasoned, I took two days of rest before my eye actually got bad.
Anyway, about a month in the grayness went away and it was replaced by blurriness, but it’s still pretty much useless. A couple of days ago the headaches returned and the bad eye burned pretty bad, but I’m hoping it was just because I was cleaning my classroom and the dust or something irritated it. It was a little better the next day, and back to it’s normal blurriness the next. So anyway, I’m just hoping it doesn’t get any worse because I don’t want to spent a ton of money just to hear another doctor say he doesn’t know what’s wrong. Really I wish I could fly to Texas, but that would cost even more. I guess if I have to go in again, though, I’ll try doing that, because there are more doctors down there than up here.
I really appreciate all the prayers yall have said and continue to say; even though it’s pretty scary I know everything will be okay. I mean, it’s just an eye and there could be worse things wrong. But all the same, I’m hoping it won’t last much longer.
Other than that things have been good. We had a talent show in early March where I recruited Brandi, Boo, and Betsy to sing / play Fishin’ in the Dark with me. That was a lot of fun.. Boo’s uncle came to visit for a week and it’s always fun to see someone experiencing the Bush for the first time.
Muskox tags were sold last semester and villagers have been hunting a lot recently. I was asked if I’d like some meat, and I said I’d love some! So during my first period class, he comes in and hands me a big, white, frozen package that says “Muskox neck 2013” Haha.. so I had to carry it around with me until I had a chance to run it home and stick it in the freezer.
It’s getting that time of year where I want to make sure I use everything in the freezer so it doesn’t get ruined over the summer (every break the freezers inevitably go out and we lose all our food). I don’t have a lot, so it won’t be any trouble to finish it all off before summer gets here.
State tests are next week and I hope our students don’t stay up too late enjoying the increasing daylight. The sun sets about 10:00 now and it’s pretty nice!
