How Are We Doing? Wellness Health Check In. Please be Mindful in Your post.

@deetoo I will keep you in my thoughts honey and sending you love and light as you continue to heal ?

@deetoo

Sending lots of love and healing energy to you.

@laynara and @lawrence,

Thank you!  ??

@deetoo - hang in there, you know we all love you. Sending you many virtual hugs.

❤️ ? ❤️ ? ❤️ ? 

Add my blessings deetoo.

Today was my birthday. I spoke with my mom on the phone and also my daughter. I received many well wishes and messages of love. I was spoiled and gifted by friends and shown how many care about me.

I noticed that even with so much love and approval from others, a big part of me is dwelling on past pain. I became so used to things never feeling quite right that I now have to relearn happiness. It doesn't feel routine yet. It feels strange in the comparison.

I frown when I could smile. I worry when I could begin to trust. I will go easy and I will go slow and just smile more inwardly and out. I find I am grateful for this ife, even with all of the horrors and sadness and dysfunction around me I can still see the gifts, even in the struggles.

So now it is a few minutes past my birthday.  I get to recommit to the having and believing in happiness, and I get to be loved and cherished by others. I get to accept myself and allow others to do the same. Every day is a choice to be happy. 

I think it's time to take a break from social media. All the bombardment of issues happening in our nation and the world at large and the back n' forth is messing with my anxiety, depression, and making my already short patience even shorter.

It's too much at times.

@ghandigirl Happy birthday! Sounds like you've set a wonderful intention, and it is very true that happiness (a difficult word to define) is a matter of practice. 

@deetoo Sending more & more love and care to you! 

@laura-F  Wishing you protection from illness.

Happy birthday, @ghandigirl!  I'm so glad that you were able to celebrate with your daughter, mother and friends.  Many people love and cherish you, including all of us in this community.

I can relate to so much of what you expressed. I'm experiencing some of those same challenges, especially now, as I approach my 68th birthday.  I find it sometimes difficult to not dwell in the past, because I am living the last chapter of my life.  And I am exhausted.  Recently most of what I have been strongly feeling are the limitations of my body, mind and spirit.  It's okay if allow those feelings to visit, but I don't want them moving in with me.

I love your intention, ghandigirl, and I will try to remember your wise words as I go forward:

I get to recommit to the having and believing in happiness, and I get to be loved and cherished by others. I get to accept myself and allow others to do the same. Every day is a choice to be happy. 

Sending you love and birthday blessings, my friend.

@goldstone

Your story of the fluffy bee touched my heart ... maybe it was what we call a "bumblebee" here in the US. They are larger and look like their fragile wings can't support their size. When I was a child the bumblebees would be all around in my grandmother's garden, on the lilac bushes among old gnarled fig trees. They fascinated me and I believe they may be European in origin...?

I am so happy that you are doing so much better, and have been hoping that you have found some balance in this chaos that we are all experiencing my dear.... a really beautiful feeling is around you.... I am sensing that you have a very strong and gentle ancestral spirit with you, an older wiseman who is very protective of you and always at your back. You are never alone. Tune into this comforting spirit as you navigate your path as he is always surrounding you.

Please take care out there, and don't forget your wonderful paintings for your future Tarot deck enterprise ... that is something I know you would enjoy, and I can see you patiently creating it.... 

Perhaps you could post some of the paintings as you do them? That would be a real treat for us here!

With love to you?

Someone, I don't remember who, spoke about not using the term fighting when talking about the virus which got me thinking today,   Fighting is probably not the best term to use when dealing with pandemic related fear and anxiety either.

My car has been needing service since 2 months before the lockdown.  Today was the day to finally take my car in for servicing.   

I was prepared mentally.  I had called ahead, made the appointment and asked how they were operating during Covid.  I made sure my supplies were ready.  Hand sanitizer, mask and wipes.  I would not be waiting in the lounge, my husband would also drive there and take me home.  I would just need to deal with the fact that the service agents would not be wearing face masks, details I gathered during my call to book the appointment.  

When I arrived on time to my appointment,  my agent was busy on the phone with a client.  So, an attended escorted me to the lobby to wait.  Not in my initial plan.  I managed my Covidphoia by standing, not sitting, by a wall far away from everyone.  There were only 3 of us waiting, it was a large room, but I was the only one with a mask.  The 3rd hour of the Today show began.  They starting talking about Covid of course. At the 6 minute mark of the show, a man who was seated began to cough.  Then cough again.  I kindly told the attendant I would be waiting in my husband's car out front and to please let my service agent know.

Ok.  So for me, going out in public can be a battle.  It is like a fight.  I take my war gear, and protection with me. I have plans made in my head.  I way the odds. Maneuver around others. It isn't a game because it could mean life and death.  For me or my community members.

But, that is such a stressful way to live. Such a stressful mindset. So, as I was standing against the wall in the lobby as the 3rd hour of the Today show began, I got to thinking.  Maybe management is a better way of looking at things.  I am not going to concur my fear.  I can however think of dealing with my fear as management.  I managed to get my car to be serviced during a pandemic.  I managed to enter the lobby and wait.  I managed to leave to a more secure location when someone coughed.  

Healthy management.  The car needs to be healthy.  So does my family, so dos my mind and so does my body.  So,  I am going to try to think of living in a pandemic as "healthy life management" for a while and see how that goes.   

@lovendures

Great way to reframe!

I think managing is a great word. I am managing my asthma. I am managing my anxiety, the bipolar, the depression. And the anger of no masks and no social distancing from others...I am managing that too.

I managed to walk in a nearly deserted park this weekend. I managed a car ride to see the sights of spring with the windows up and my mask off.  I managed not to panic or nag when the bf sneezed. 

This fear has me all seized up a lot of times. I am starting to believe I won't get sick. I am managing some optimism. 

I wish my fellow Americans would do better, take more precautions, keep ME safe by wearing masks, but I cannot manage anyone else but my own self. 

Welp... got my CV-19 Antibody blood test result back from Quest Labs: NEGATIVE.

This is not helping my anxiety, but either way it wasn't going to change my levels of self-protection.

Also, the tech and my doc agree I should wait about 6 months and get a different blood test elsewhere, as by then the tests will have more accuracy.

I just wonder - what the hell did so many of us get so dangerously sick with this winter that wasn't the flu?? and not COVID either???

In a related story - Snohomish County in Washington State has confirmed CV-19 antibodies in 2 people who were sick before Christmas. Neither person was in an at-risk category - no travel, no contact with the sick, no underlying infections. This does support the argument it was circulating everywhere much earlier than anyone thought.

(Tagging @Bluebelle - in case you haven't seen this yet)

@laura-f

No, I hadn’t heard this news out of Snohomish County.  It’s sobering, but not altogether surprising.  I’ve been suspecting that the East Coast Had COVID in December, too.  

Good to see your post.  I’m always interested in how you’re doing.  Retest in a few months!

@laura-f, my husband and I also received our results from the CV-19 antibody test:  NEGATIVE.  Our  internist expected that.  He said that everyone he has tested thus far have been negative.  As I mentioned in a prior post, my husband and I were pretty sick with respiratory symptoms in mid-December, and my hubby got sick again in January.

I just heard that my senator Kaine and his wife recently tested positive for the antibodies. He said that after testing positive for the flu, he continued to experience symptoms. In April, he and his wife were told they could have mild cases of coronavirus, but were not tested because of a shortage in testing in Virginia. The symptoms went away in mid-April.  Kaine said they will continue to follow all of the CDC precautions.

Meanwhile, Rand Paul, who also once tested positive for the virus, refuses to wear a mask, claiming that he now has immunity and is "about the only safe person in Washington."  

No further comment is needed.

Sorry to everyone in the forums for being unresponsive lately. I've been trying to recuperate myself mentally as of late due to the last few months been hellish for me, where I think early in April was hitting a dangerous breaking point for me. I almost lost myself, both spritially and physically, at that time.

My mind is still in the dark forest, so I can't engage myself into social affairs yet, especially with the recent troubles outside of the world. (I hope everyone else is ok, especially in HK, Brazil, Europe, Uk, US and the rest of the part of the world.)

I felt the troubles that occurs in 2020, have not only shine the glaring cracks and flaws of the greater part of the global stage, but even the little things in our everyday life that we've taken for granted. Recently, I've seem to managed talk my friend out of engaging a "friends with benefits" with his ex, who has propose that to him. I didn't tell him bluntly or anything like that. I've simply asked him if he's feeling comfortable about it. When he said no, I've simply told him that he shouldn't go through it if he doesn't want to.

That triggers him in breaking off with his ex, this time perminantly, while causing him to question of the toxicity of the current culture and impression of masculinity ideals. He felt disgusted about his ex when he realised her attitude towards him, that she never thinks of him as a person in the first place, but as someone to fool around with because in her eyes, he's a man with urges.

I think that's a dangerous viewpoint and philosophy to follow though on both ends. I think it's for the best if the Age of Aquarius mosey right in, even though it's painful, we need more feminine energy more than ever. More reason and empathy.

@stargazer

I was moved when you mention about about someone watching over me. I've tried not to cry. I guess that explains why I felt comfortable in most places, or how despite the situation was falling apart, I have a strange sense of feeling that "everything will fall into the right place at the end" and "I'm going through this as another lesson in life, so when the actual hard times came, I'm more than ready for it."

The only few times where I'm not actually comfortable, were felt like a warning that I should leave or avoid the area. Unfortuately, that feeling is true. There's this one time where I felt like something is pushing me to stay away from Flinders Street. Either by distractions and such, that lead me to a detour to my regular art shop. Even then I have a strange push to get out of the shop earlier, instead of doing my normal browsing at the art supplies and talking to the shopkeeper.

Later that night when I was watching the news, there's a manic was mowing down dozen of people in his car in Flinders Street on that very day. I was terrified and shocked, not at the loss and truma of lives, but also the fact I've narrowly avoided that, due to that something holding me back on that day.

(The people in the shop were fine though).

I guess I have to try to remind myself more often that I'm not alone, especially in the very dark times such as this.

As for the cards, I've been planning some things for them, especially with the minor arcanas, as they have an interesting narrative journey in each of those suites. Unfortuately, I'm still working on my uni assignments, but once that's out of the way, I'll be starting the fool's card first. I thought that card is appropriate to start this journey/project endevour.

Again, typos that I can't fixed from the last post. What I meant was in that last post where I can't edit was I felt sad and sorrow at the losses that occured, but I missed the word "only". Sorry about that.

@jessi1978

Replying to you here so we don't keep hijacking the "Great Turning" thread.

Had not heard of the procedure you spoke of. I'm leery of anything involving surgery, so it's not something I would look into.  I don't have chronic migraine, I get 1 or 2 a month, and they last anywhere from 6 to 72 hours, depending on the trigger.  I'm pretty successful at "nipping them in the bud", which keeps them typically at 24 hours.

Interesting about the blood aspect you mention. For me, I know when it's a migraine because I can actually feel irritation in the arteries on the left side of my neck/head, and I know that the Left Basilar Artery is one that can cause migraines when it's inflamed.

In the last few years, I have read a lot of research that indicates migraines may be closer to epilepsy than other disorders. Sorry, no time to find links for you today, but if you google "link between epilepsy and migraine" you'll find stuff.

Of course everyone is different. For me, my regimen involves a lot of pill popping and other stuff, but it works to resolve the migraine more quickly than in the past.  Here is my personal list:

1. Magnesium Glycinate - 500mg
2. Taurine - 500mg
3. Aleve - 550mg
4. CBD:THC 4:1 ratio cannabis drops
5. Binaural Beats for Migraine music thru noise cancelling headphones (my fave is:  https://youtu.be/5jmrIggwCXc )
6. Lay down in a dark room, preferably with a cat next to me (I do have a reiki-emmitting cat).
7. Cool damp cloth with peppermint oil over the forehead and eyes.
8. Lavender drops on neck and wrists.
9. Progesterone topical BHRT cream 5mg.
10. If it's late in the day, Benadryl 12.5mg, or before bed the night of a recovering migraine.

I find the cannabis really tamps down the nausea well (throwing up never made me feel better anyway), in addition to helping with the pain, and I suspect it also reduces the inflammation in the arteries/brain.

Be well!

@lovendures. Boring is good. :)

@lovendures. Boring is good. :)

Re: Migraine Synchronicity -

OK, so we counted 3 or 4 of us on here that had migraines in the last few days. I had an email exchange with a non-facebook friend, he told me that I was the FOURTH person today to tell him I had a migraine that I'm just recovering from. That got me thinking, so I put it out to my FB friends. So far, 9 people have said YES, I had a migraine in the last 3 days. Some still have it today. Of those 9, 2 are pagan/wiccan priests, 2 are high intuitive types, and 1 is a full fledged medium (not Jeanne, someone else).

VERY interesting. There's definitely a disturbance in the Force. Hope it's not the giant asteroid speeding towards Earth...