Tension Headaches

I never had headaches until after I had William. And even then I didn't have headaches on a regular basis until I started grad school. My life must be stressful or something.
I didn't know I was having "tension" headaches, I just thought they would regular headaches. Actually, for a while I thought that maybe they were a result of my TMJ or that maybe my C1 vertebra was out of alignment again (see this post for more details on that lovely experience.) On Thursday night I was in so much pain I needed a doctor's opinion so I took myself to urgent care. The doctor felt the muscles on my back and neck. This was our conversation: 
"So, are you in school?" "Yes." 
"Do you work?" "Yeah, part-time." 
"Are you married?" "Yeah, I am." 
"Do you have kids?" "Yep, a toddler." 
"Wow. You've got a lot goin' on." "...yeah."
Turns out, the muscles that run along the shoulder blades are connected to other muscles in the neck which, when tight, cause pain along the head and into the eyes. He prescribed me some pain pills which I am only allowed to take at night. He also told me to use heat and massage therapy to get those muscles to relax.
Last night I took a pill at about 9:00pm because the pain caused by a knot on my left shoulder blade was unbearable. It was causing radiating pain through my elbow and my wrist. The pain in my wrist felt similar to what I feel when my carpal tunnel acts up. I got out my rice pack and Tyson massaged that sore spot for probably 30 minutes. IT DIDN'T WORK! Eventually I fell asleep but my back is STILL sore today. What the heck, man?! Pain meds, heat, and massage with no luck. Psh. Dumb.
I'm doing my best to stay calm and stretch my back. Child's pose is my life-saver. 

Winter Cold

I caught a winter cold over the weekend and it's only getting worse. I'm keeping up with my classwork okay but I'm struggling. I don't get sick often but when I do, it's bad. Monday is a holiday which means I won't have my copyright law class. That will be a nice break and maybe I'll have the extra time to recover. William has been a good trooper while I've been sick. The last two nights he's been staying up until 9:30pm or later and waking up early in the morning. I hope he's not getting sick too.

Speech Therapy

Next Thursday William will have his first speech therapy appointment. When the early intervention people came to evaluate him, they assessed his speech at 1% and his received communication (what he understands) at 7%. Obviously, those numbers are really low. Alternatively, his fine motor skills are at 95% which isn't much of a shock. William is an intelligent, curious boy and he loves to be active.
William babbles a whole lot. In fact, he's hardly quiet at all! I just wish I knew what he was saying. Right now these are the words he says fairly regularly (some are more clear than others): ball, car, shoes, apple, milk, please, yes, oowie, up, hide, go, and hat. He also makes sounds like follow the pattern of "ready...set...GO!" which I say almost every day when we're running around our apartment. Other people say that they've heard him say "mamma" and "papa" but I won't believe it until I hear it for myself. Isn't that kind of sad? He's almost two and a half years old and I haven't heard him call me "mamma". One time he said "orange" but I have never heard him say it again.
I hope that the therapy sessions help him. When he turns three in August, if his speech hasn't improved enough, he can qualify to attend a "special needs" preschool twice a week for a total of five hours. While I'm sure that he would love to attend preschool, I would prefer his language improve without it. He will have speech appointments every two weeks for a while and then we will re-assess the frequency. Wish us luck!

Why I Would Never Do Grad School

But wait, aren't you in grad school? Why, yes. I am. Let me sum up.

I am not a great writer. Sure I write on my blog 'cause it's fun and I get to talk about whatever I feel like but I'm not a great scholarly writer. Last semester of school was awesome because the writing we had to do was short and to the point. This semester I have to write a 2-page, single-spaced paper every week for my copyright law class. Last week I had to do TWO papers for that class in one week. I'm not good at filling up space. I say what I want to say, cite my sources, make a decent argument for my point, and then I'm done. But it's not enough. I don't have enough to say about copyright law to meet the weekly quota. It's so frustrating!

And this is why I never thought I'd do grad school. Thesis? NO FREAKING WAY. Okay, my program doesn't make me do a thesis but it's still killing me softly with weekly papers. I just want it to be Fall semester so I can take my "fun" track classes, like Book Design!