138 | What I'm Thankful For

This year has been a really intense, rough one… but there has been a lot that I have been grateful for as well, and I’m reflecting on it!

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TRANSCRIPTION

Hi there everybody. Welcome back to the uncurated life podcast. I have been kind of cranky lately fuels into my bad art friend podcasts. You probably got a good like heaping helping of that, but in general, I've been a little cranky. And I think that a big part of that is. Just being stressed from all sorts of things going on in my life.

 

And a big part of that is my usual ambivalence towards the holidays, even though it has been so great having family here and our new puppy and everything else, but like, I tend to be very ambivalent at best towards the holidays because of all of my fucking unresolved and unrelenting grief about both my parents passing away when I was in my twenties.

 

Not feeling great about the holidays when my kids were small, because my marriage was not in a good place, et cetera, et cetera. I'm also really grateful for so many things right now. And I thought it would be appropriate as it is the end of November to talk a little bit about them. Not because I think that, you know, you need to go through a day feeling super grateful.

 

I was hate watching some Rachel. Stuff like recent stuff. And she said that it is impossible to be anxious or depressed if you're feeling grateful. And I'm like says fucking who, Dr. Hollis. So there is that. I'm not going to tell you that a gratitude practice is going to make you feel like a million bucks and that you can manifest your fucking best Elon Musk lifestyle or whatever.

 

I'm not saying that. But it is nice sometimes to reflect on those things, especially if you're feeling them, but they're being kind of drowned out by like the grumpiness or the whateverness to just bring them to the surface and hold them in your hand, like a pretty rock or something you found when you're walking on the beach and just like, look at it and let it be for a second.

 

And then you can set it down. But you'll have that memory and that feeling in you. So even if it doesn't magically cure you like some Dr. Hollis's might say at the very least, it'll brighten your day a little bit. And that's what I want to do right now. But before I get into that, because marketing is a thing I wanted to let you know, if you hadn't figured it out already that my series two of my fuckery flowers, which are my flagship art print that I sell on at sea, they are beautiful botanicals flowers.

 

I've got some herbs in this newest series of 12. Um, they're beautiful mixed media paintings that I create prints out of that have naughty words hidden in them. And the latest series a is not going anywhere. However, the shop is not going to be open for. Uh, much longer. It'll be open for another couple of weeks.

 

I believe I'm going to close it maybe the second week of December, because of the way that shipping is going right now, the slow downs and everything else. I just want to make sure you're not going to order anything and want it there by a certain timeframe. And then have that get all fucked because of shipping.

 

So my best way to control that is to just shut the shop down till the end of the year. But my goal is to reopen it. But if you would like to get your hands on those prints along with anything else that's in there. Before then I would just suggest you check it out and you can find all of that information in the show notes.

 

Now that I've said all of that, I would like to reflect I've done this before. This is not the first time I've done an episode like this. I would just like to reflect on some things that I'm grateful for. And maybe by listening to me talk about those things, it will help you reflect on some things you might be grateful for.

 

Maybe save this episode for a day when you're feeling extra fucking grumpy, but you want to listen to something that will help you maybe think through some of those things to just help ease a little bit of that, even if it doesn't change it. Now, of course, if you're really grumpy, sometimes I am and I listened to an episode like this.

 

I'd be like, fuck you, Cindy. I trust that you know yourself and that you would know the best time for something like this. So let's get into it. What am I grateful for? One thing I'm grateful for, which is probably one of the most complicated things that I'm grateful for is having my kids with me basically.

 

Full-time this is. Amazing for me. I have not had my kids with me full time. For the most part, since RJ was three and Kat was five when Russell and I split up and I've had them with me full time since August, because they moved to Denver with us. Now, the reason this is complicated is that I am divorced and I share custody of them.

 

And up until we moved to Denver because of Jesse's job, the kids had a 50, 50 custody split with their dad. And by. Doing this by making this move, we gave the kids the choice of where they wanted to be. Full-time because it was important that they have agency. They're both teenagers. Kat actually turns 18 at the end of December.

 

Holy shit. And RJ is 15, be 16 in March. And so they really do have agency in this and they wanted to come with us. And so they spend most of their summer with their dad and, um, their breaks, like fall break, winter break, spring break with their dad. So it's complicated because I am so happy to have them with me full time for a number of reasons, a because they're with me full time, it's easier to see certain things that were going under the radar when they were doing the 50 50 custody, because the vibe at each house was so different, which is now it's natural, right.

 

Two different households, but the kids would adapt to that. And because of that, There were certain ongoing problems, especially with one of my kids, both physically and mentally that were harder to gauge because you didn't have the context of them. Full-time and you had to depend on them reporting to you.

 

And as I'm sure many of, you know, especially those of you who struggle with mental health things, I struggle with mental health things that I can tell you flat out that self reporting is not accurate. But the, sometimes it's the best you have to go with. But when you have somebody with you full time, not only do you have their self-reporting, but you have your own observation, which is much more consistent.

 

And then on top of that, then you also don't have the transitions happening so often. So things kind of stay a little bit more mellow on the home front. So it really allows you to see what's happening. And that has been extremely helpful in so many ways. So there's that. And I mean, there's also just like the joy of having them here full time, but I recognize that while I'm grateful for that, it comes at a cost.

 

It comes at the cost of my ex-husband knocking to spend anywhere near as much time with them, which I can't even imagine if I was in the same situation. And on top of that, my kids don't get to see their dad as often. And that's an entirely different thing and they moved, they moved from Napa to Denver, like.

 

Another big cost as part of that, like Jesse and I had to make the move because of his job, but they didn't have to do that. And they did. And I'm grateful that they did, but I recognize that the gratefulness comes with a price. And so that is very much something that I have been reflecting on this year.

 

It's it's, bittersweets not even the right word. Complicated is basically kind of where I'm feeling with. Another thing that is a complicated feeling is low-key my cat, who we had to put down at the end of September, was at the end of September. It was in the fall, like, which we're still in, but like we had to put low-key down.

 

He had terminal. Failure. We think it was cancer, but it came on quickly enough. And it was so devastating to a system that even if it was cancer, there was nothing we could do. Like his kidneys were destroyed. So we couldn't fix that. Even if we stopped whatever it was, he still wouldn't have any kidney function.

 

I'm so grateful for the time that we had with him, because not only was he the sweetest leukemia, but on top of that, if it wasn't for me having him and. Realizing that my anti pet stance was outdated. We wouldn't have Lou who is our other cat who's two and is an absolute little wackadoo, but I fucking adore him.

 

And we wouldn't have gotten our new puppy, Layla, who is an absolute sweetie. So I'm grateful for our time with him, but again, it's complicated, both because I'm sad and I miss him, but also having and watching your cat fail that quickly with kidney problems and seeing his decline and seeing what it went through as somebody who also had.

 

Kidney failure. Like I am in chronic kidney disease. I cannot my kidney disease. There is no healing from it. I will not get better from it. A transplant will help as a treatment, but it will bring its own set of situations. And my diseases, genetic, I will never be better. I will never be better. And so seeing my cat go through kids like Jessie, Was struggling sometimes with how I was reacting to him dying, like being in that place before we put him down.

 

And I realized it was like, this I'm really close to this. Like I'm not a cat, but I'm in kidney failure myself. And so seeing his decline and seeing a once vibrant kitty, like really, really go downhill fast as somebody with kidney failure that really sucked. On, like, not just the, I love my kitty, but oh my God.

 

I also am sick kind of a situation. So like I said, I'm so grateful for the time we had together, but like the first point I made very complicated and I will say. On a very uncomplicated note. I am so grateful for our new house. I love our new house. I love how much space there is and that we can have family here.

 

And it gives me more time to enjoy them before I start losing my shit, because I have house guests. I love that there's room for my cat and my puppy to have space from each other, for my kids to have space from us. And yet still the arrangement of the house makes it so that we have places like the kitchen and the family room where like we can.

 

Come together as a family and not feel so lonely. I love having my nice big office. I love having our beautiful backyard. I love our neighborhood. It's another thing I'm grateful for our fucking neighbors. Our rad, I had that later on my list, but it just basically came in. We have rat ass neighbors. We love our neighborhood.

 

We love our location, very close to like a target and a Costco and an awesome Asian supermarket and just all sorts of things. I'm very, very grateful for it. And some of the things that have happened, like low-key passing away and some of the things we're going through with the kids right now, a little bit of that is mitigated by being in such a peaceful and beautiful and comforting new setting.

 

I had to take a pause for a second and put the lotion on my skin or else I get the hose again, because my knuckles are so dry. One thing that comes from the relocation is the desert atmosphere of Denver and goddammit. If my knuckles are not just raw. And so I'm also grateful, unplanned, grateful for trader Joe's moisturizing, hand cream, not sponsored.

 

I'm very grateful for the new transplant center being close to our house. So I dunno, I think I've said this in a few places, but for context, when Jesse and I shopped for a house in the burbs of Denver, we had some specific. Things we were looking for, like there was a school district we wanted to be a part of and distance from Jesse's potential new office and just various things like that, as well as like the aspects of the actual house we were looking for, there were like needs and wants that we had there.

 

But another thing that we put into our search that our realtor put into our search for us was that we wanted it to be within half an hour driving to. Of the new transplant center. And the reason for this is because when you get a kidney transplant, you have to make a bunch of appointments to the transplant center in the pre-transplant timeframe, like the workups and everything like that.

 

But then once you get the transplant for. You're in the hospital for several days. My sister was in the ICU for like five days. And the reason she was in the ICU is because they have to keep an eye on you to make sure that you're getting the right levels of immunosuppressant so that you don't reject the new organ.

 

And because you have something foreign in your body, your body's starting to produce an immune response, which they need to take care of, blah, blah, blah. So it's nice. And I know this from experience because we stayed in a condo five minutes from the hospital. When my sister got her transplant, it is very nice to be close enough to the hospital, to be able to go back to the house and take a shower and like have some lunch or whatever, and then go back and see someone.

 

So there's that. But then on top of that, a, when you have a transplant, you need to stay within. An hour of the center for the month after the transplant, both because you're going back there multiple times per week for blood work and everything else. And also because you, in case you have an emergency or anything going on with the transplant, they want you to come to the transplant center to deal with it.

 

They're not to some random hospital, so you need to be close enough to be able to get emergency care at the transplant center. My sister lives three hours from her transplant center. So like I said, she got a condo that thankfully one of her congregation members, the church that she's in the you use has a condo within five minutes of the hospital and they loaned it to Amy for the month.

 

But we weren't going to know people who were going to be able to do that for us in Denver. So, and in San Francisco, when we lived in Napa at that transplant center, On a day with no traffic, I could possibly make it there within an hour, but probably not. And so we were going to be doing the same thing.

 

I'm like looking for somewhere to stay and you know, it's just not the business. And especially when you're recovering from surgery, you don't want to stay in like a hotel room for a month. I mean, you might have to, but that's not like. So we very much wanted to be close to the transplant center because we knew that that was going to be something that we needed.

 

Well, the reason I'm so grateful for it is because as I have started going for my initial appointments and everything else, as well as other doctor's appointments, because I'm getting the rest of my medical care through the same university health system, I've had to go there so many times, both for me and for my kids.

 

And it is not. To live like 13 minutes from the transplant center. And I can only imagine how much nicer it will be once we actually get into the whole transplant situation. So yeah, I'm fucking grateful. We made that choice because it is already paying off on top of that. And like adjacent to that, I am so grateful for all of the medical professionals that we have been seeing for my kid.

 

One of my kids is dealing with some as yet undefined. Medical problems. They have, they have physical problems, they have mental health issues. And then they're also dealing with some issues surrounding food. They're all playing off of each other. And we are trying to basically unravel a rat's nest of cords, and we have no idea where to start.

 

So we're just sort of picking at them when we were in Napa, our pediatrician, who had been our pediatrician for like 12, 13 years since we moved there. Was wonderful, but because it was the pandemic and B Napa is a little isolated from the rest of the bay. It was hard to get in, to see specialists when we got here, because we're in a Metro area and we're close to like the university health care system.

 

We got referred fairly quickly to children's hospital. And since getting into that particular system, we have seen multiple different specialists. And even though we're still trying to unravel that rat's nest, we are making slow and sure progress and the medical professionals that we have been seeing, the doctors, the residents, the nurses, the, even the people like the administrative people, everybody that we've been seeing through both children's hospital and our pediatrician's office have been nothing but accommodating and helpful.

 

They have been just amazing in all sorts of ways and communicative and gone to bat for us, with insurance and all sorts of different things. And so it has been. Relieving as well as something I'm super grateful for because as a parent, you want to be able to fix the problem, but when you can't figure out what the problem is, it can be so frustrating.

 

And I'm just, I'm so grateful that the team of people we have been working with has been accessible and helpful and communicative and, and kind and funny and just so much. It's exhausting and stressful to see so many doctors, both myself and my kid are so over it, but it would have been so much worse if we had not been seen by such an amazing group of people.

 

And so if anybody from children's hospital in Colorado is listening fucking rock. With your cock out. And on that same note, the school has been so helpful. My kids are at a great public high school here, and they both have gotten nothing but great support from the counseling team, from the nurses. We've had appointments with teachers to talk through some stuff, and it's just been, it's been really great.

 

It's been really great to come as a new family, to a high school with neither kids during, as a freshmen one as a sophomore, one is a senior to be able to come in here and be able to get as much support as we've gotten, especially considering some of the obstacles that have been in one of my kid's way.

 

It's just been really great. It sounds like I'm doing like an Oscar speech, but I'm not it's if you guys can understand that as a parent, like for me, It is really, really stressful when your kids have things that they're dealing with that you can't fix. And so having a supportive network in a new place where we don't really know very many people has been just it's it's I am so grateful.

 

I can only imagine how frazzled I would be if we had been running into like obstinacy or shittiness with some of these people and we have. So knock on wood that continues now. Any grateful list, any gratitude list I have would not be complete without my family on it. But I'm so grateful for my family, both in being able to see some of them in this last month, but also just in general, being able to talk to, or to, I am not the best communicator when it comes to my family.

 

Like, I, I am hard to reach by phone and I'm terrible at returning phone calls. And I am just, I can be an island of myself and my family calls me on my bullshit, but also. It's just so amazing at being there when I need them and to interact with my sisters, especially as adults with our like complicated adult lives and to be able to feel so comforted when I'm with them either physically or on the phone is just so soothing to me.

 

And so hilarious to imagine what my parents would think of all of us, but like, I just, I wish I could just snuggle all my family all the time, but that's just not the thing. Well, there's the family, that's here in the house, my kids and Jesse and Lou and Layla. And I am so grateful for all of them as well, but, but sometimes like, it's like my sisters, my grandpa, my uncle, my cousin, like all my peeps, just so grateful as Jesse's family to Jesse's family is awesome.

 

Yeah. Family. Totally a good thing. And then finally, the biggest thing I'm grateful for right now, I'm gonna have the biggest, but one of the most present things I'm grateful for is all of you, my community. And that sounds hokey, but it's not. And I could tell you why, because. I have had some times in the last couple of months where I've had like major migraines or been feeling like shit and the amount of support I get from you all in the DMS and whatever, it, I'm not great at always responding, especially when I have migraine, but I see them and it, it helps.

 

It's like Excedrin for migraine, except I'm allowed to have it. Cause I'm not allowed to have Excedrin for migraine. Cause my kidneys. And then when I reopened my shop in October, I wasn't expecting much to happen because I hadn't released like my calendars or the new series yet. And there was so much support and so many people interested and I just, you guys, it means a lot.

 

It really does. It really, really does. And I just, I need you to know that I need you to know how grateful I am for you. If you're listening to this. And you're in my community and I'm grateful for you. And if you feel unseen in your life, or if you feel taken for granted, or if you feel just blahzay or whatever, or even if you don't know that, I appreciate you.

 

And I mean, it I'm getting like teary-eyed because I'm fucking weepy ass fool, but like, I really appreciate you. I'm glad you're here and I cannot wait to see what else we can do together. And now I feel a little bit better. I'm not quite so cranky. And I started this with like some complicated gratitude stuff, and I was like, Cindy, you might be going about this, the wrong way for what you were hoping for.

 

But you know, I do feel a little bit better. I'm still cranky. I'm still terminally ill. I guess I did not cure my depression, Dr. Rachel Hollis. But what I did do was put a little bit of Alovera on it and that's what I needed right now. And I hope that that at least a little bit help. Don't forget, check out series two, fuckery flowers, and please check out my Patrion.

 

Even if you're not interested in becoming a patron. If you see one of my patrons in the wild, thank them because they sponsored this, they make this possible, and I appreciate the shit out of them. So very much everything I said about appreciating my community. They get double. Anyway, I hope you find something that you can reflect on today that maybe puts a little Alovera on.

 

Feelings you have at the moment. And until next time friends, peace out.