Stephany Writes

Categories: Life

A Week of CPAP Therapy

Last night was my ninth night on CPAP therapy, and let me tell you: I think this machine is going to be life-changing for me. I have already noticed a difference in my energy levels after just a week and a half of using it, which feels surreal.

But let’s back up! I received my CPAP machine on Thursday, August 29th. It arrived in a cute little travel case, which contained the actual machine, the humidifier that attaches to it, the hose that delivers the air from the machine through my mask, and some other hookups. I already had a mask—the sleep center sent me home with the masks I used during my CPAP titration sleep study—and I’ve been using the one that fits over my nose. There is also an app that goes along with my machine. The app measures how many apneas I have every night, how long I had the mask on, my mask seal, and some other metrics. It totals all of those together to give me an overall score for the night. And, not to brag, but I’ve gotten an A grade every night—with quite a few 100% nights thrown in there! I’ve also integrated the app with my Apple Health data so it can show trends with how much exercise I’m getting, heart rate variability, resting heart rate, blood oxygen levels, etc. It’s very cool!

Okay, let’s get into some of the nitty-gritty aspects of using a CPAP machine. There have been some highs and lows this past week!

What’s Gone Well

  • A lower apnea score

As I mentioned in a previous post, when I had my original sleep test, I experienced 47.4 apneas an hour. (One apnea = 10 seconds or more where I stop breathing before my brain wakes me up to force me to breathe again.) After eight nights of wearing the mask, my average is 2.2 apneas an hour! I’ve had a few nights where my apnea score was less than 1!

  • Deeper sleep

I try to wear my Apple watch to bed a few times a week to track my sleeping patterns and blood oxygen levels. My sleep app tracks how much core, REM, and deep sleep I’m getting every night. Deep sleep is the most important sleep that we can get. We should be getting around 1.5-2 hours of deep sleep every night, as this is when our bodies repair muscles, bones, and tissue. It’s where our energy is replenished and also helps support immune system function. Before CPAP therapy, I was getting an average of 24 minutes of deep sleep every night. Now, things haven’t dramatically shifted when it comes to deep sleep (my average is still low: 30 minutes) but I am seeing gradual improvements. One night, I got over an hour of deep sleep! Hopefully, things will continue to trend upward and my body can finally start getting more than a few minutes of deep sleep every night.

  • More energy (!!)

Of course, my energy level is the biggest improvement I’ve seen. I don’t have this bone-deep weariness anymore or feel that I can’t get through a day without taking a nap. One day last week, I woke up at 5:30am to go to a 6am HIIT class and typically, I would absolutely need a nap later on in the day. But that day, I didn’t even feel like I needed one! I was tired, of course, but a doable kind of tired. I feel more alert during the day and I am yawning so much less than I used to! Having more energy has had such a transformative effect on my mood, too. It’s hard being tired all the time!

  • Improved symptoms

There are two other symptoms that have improved: brain fog and morning headaches. I used to wake up with a headache on a regular basis (I’d say at least once a week, maybe two or three times). Originally, I thought the headaches were due to grinding my teeth at night. But once I got my sleep apnea diagnosis, I learned that waking up with a headache is a common symptom. Since being on CPAP, I haven’t had a single headache in the morning. We’ll see if this trend continues, but so far, so good.

Another benefit I’ve noticed is less brain fog, which I didn’t even realize I was experiencing. I’ve been having a hard time focusing during the workday. I was really down on myself about it. I thought I just wasn’t disciplined enough. I needed to go back to an in-office job where I would be forced to sit at my desk for 8 hours and work. I thought I was lazy and unmotivated. But I don’t think that was it at all. Brain fog is a symptom of sleep apnea, and I think I’ve been experiencing it because I’ve had a few workdays last week where I was just on my game. I was motivated, I was focused, I was knocking off to-dos one after the other. I truly think I was just dealing with brain fog as a result of my disorder. That’s not to say I am always going to feel motivated and disciplined while at work, but the most likely culprit for the way I was feeling before being on CPAP was brain fog, not my own laziness.

What’s Been Challenging

  • Using the mask

It has been challenging to get used to sleeping with a mask on my face. It’s just awkward, you know? I have had to figure out the right way to position my pillows so that I can sleep on my back or my side comfortably while still having a tight mask seal. I love to sleep on my stomach, too, but that’s no longer an option. (Which is good news for my sciatica, ha.) I’m learning how to sleep comfortably with my mask, but there have been some growing pains for sure.

  • Skin irritation

Oh, the skin irritation. This has been frustrating. The way the bottom of the mask presses against the bottom of my nose and my philtrum hurts so much, and I wake up with those areas feeling so sore. I even had to take out my nose ring because the mask pushed on it, and it started to get irritated. (I couldn’t even touch the nose ring without my nose throbbing, which was NOT fun.) I bought a pack of covers for the mask that I hoped would help, but they just irritated my skin more. Finally, I called my sleep center and asked if I could try something else. I know that finding the right mask can be one of the most difficult parts of CPAP therapy, so I’m not special in this. While I wait for the new mask to arrive, I have been putting medical tape on the bottom of my nose and my philtrum, which has been helping a lot! Unfortunately, it gives me a bit of a Hitler-esque look, so that’s unfortunate.

Oh, and I’ve started waking up almost every day with whiteheads popping up on the inside of my nose or on my septum, as if I’m not dealing with enough! Argh.

  • Falling asleep

It’s been hard to fall asleep with my mask on. I love falling asleep on my stomach and that’s not possible with a CPAP mask (or at least, I don’t have the right setup for it). I have to sleep on my side, but propped up in a specific way to make sure my mask remains tightly sealed to my face. The easiest way to position myself is on my back, so that’s generally how I’m falling asleep these days.

It’s also hard to get used to breathing through my nose and not my mouth! Since I have a nasal mask, the air is coming directly into my nose through my mask and I have to keep my mouth closed (it actually feels really weird to breathe through my mouth when I have the mask on, which makes it a lot easier to keep my mouth closed). Sometimes I feel as if I’m not getting enough air so that’s when I’ll push the mask up a bit so I can take a few deep breaths through my mouth. Once I’m settled down, I don’t have an issue with it and I think I will gradually get used to falling asleep this way. (Putting on an ASMR video on YouTube to help me fall asleep helps a lot!)

  • Blood oxygen levels

My blood oxygen levels are still pretty low, averaging around 92%. One night, it averaged 88% with a record low recording of 80% at one point! So, things are still not great in that department, which is something I’ll talk about with my doctor during our next appointment (sometime later this month). When I had the CPAP titration study, the tech mentioned that my blood oxygen levels stayed low throughout the night and I might need additional therapies. So, we’ll see if these numbers keep trending low.

Ellie thought my CPAP machine travel case made a great little sleeping spot.

Moving Forward

So that’s how things are going! It’s only been a little over a week since I started CPAP therapy so some of these insights may feel a little premature, but I want to have this real-time view of how things are feeling and what I’m struggling with. I’ll probably do my next post about my progress at the three-month mark. By that point, I’ll hopefully have found a mask that works perfectly for me and have longer-term insights to share about symptom improvement. But I am so thrilled to be where I am after just a week of using my machine! It’s incredible to feel as if I finally have a regular amount of energy, and I’m really interested to see if this also improves some of the troubling bloodwork numbers I had earlier this year. (I’ll probably wait until the new year to get bloodwork done again, as I want to have been using CPAP for a bit longer to know if the benefits extend to my glucose/hypertension numbers.)

If you’ve made it to the end of this very long blog post, congrats! This is the sort of blog post I want to have for my own records so I can see where I was when I started CPAP therapy, but I hope it was somewhat interesting for other people. I have gotten so much support from you guys when I announced my disorder with so many people telling me how CPAP therapy has helped people in their lives so much. Right now, I’m feeling very hopeful that the same is going to be true for me because so far, the results have exceeded my expectations.

Categories: Life

Monthly Recap | August 2024

Books

In August, I read 8 books. My favorite was What My Bones Know by Stephanie Foo and my least favorite was All That Is Mine I Carry With Me by William Landay. Some other stats:

  • 88% fiction, 12% nonfiction
  • 3 print, 3 e-books, 2 audiobooks
  • 3.8 average star rating
  • 25% diverse
  • Abandoned books: 2 (The Duchess by Sophie Jordan and Here We Go Again by Alison Cochrun)

Act Like It by Lucy Parker (print, owned)  ★★★★★ | What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma by Stephanie Foo (print, owned) ★★★★★ | Margo’s Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe (audiobook, Spotify) ★★★★☆ | All That Is Mine I Carry With Me by William Landay (print, library) ★★★☆☆ | His & Hers by Alice Feeney (audiobook, library) ★★★★☆ | An Island Princess Starts a Scandal by Adriana Herrera (e-book, library) ★★★☆☆ | I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith (e-book, owned) ★★★☆☆ | The Rachel Incident by Caroline O’Donoghue (e-book, library) ★★★★☆

Media

  • Big Brother – We have been blessed with such a great season of Big Brother, and I am enjoying this cast so much even if I don’t really have a favorite right now.
  • The Circle, season 4 – The best part of this season of The Circle was when two of the Spice Girls were playing as a catfish and then the other players found out and had to figure out which of their fellow contestants might be playing as the Spice Girls. Iconic!
  • Master Chef, season 13 – Another super fun season of Master Chef. This time, they chose five home cooks from each region of the U.S., which was an interesting way to break up the teams. My favorite home chef didn’t win, but it was a great season overall.
  • Billie Eilish, Hit Me Hard and Soft – I listened to this album in August to try to get back on track for my music listening goal! I didn’t love this album (the breathy style of singing isn’t my favorite), but there were a few winners here, specifically Lunch, Chihiro, and L’Amour De Ma Vie.
  • The Crossbow Killer – This BBC-produced true crime miniseries came out a while ago, but I like to keep a bunch of these miniseries in my back pocket when I need something to listen to. This is about a man in Wales who is killed by a crossbow one night while he’s at home. It’s a weird weapon and a weird murder, and I really enjoyed the way this story was told. Plus, you can’t go wrong with all of those Welsh accents!

Buying

  • Sport headbands ($15 for a three-pack) – I have very fine hair, which makes wearing headbands of any sort difficult when my hair is up. They just always slip off my head, which is the opposite of what I need. I was looking for headbands that would a) stay put and b) keep sweat from pouring down my face during workouts, and I think I found a winner with these headbands! They come with non-slip velvet sewn into fabric and an adjustable back to keep everything in place. It does slip a tiny bit during a workout but not as much as other headbands do.
  • Back brace ($45) – I’ve mentioned this back brace already and it has been such a gamechanger for my HIIT classes. Before I had the back brace, my back would start hurting doing the simplest moves, like squats, but now I can get through an entire class without my back aching. (Bonus: This back brace is FSA/HSA eligible!)
  • Clear organizing bins ($6-$8 per bin) – I love these clear bins from Target. They are stackable and affordable and I purchased 11 of them last month. OOPS. But now I have a much better organized bathroom closet and I am very pleased about that.

Moments

I kicked off August with a really fun evening with my book club. We went out for Mexican food and then came back to a friend’s house to make custom picture frames. We had all given my friend the book club picture we wanted framed and she had printed them up for us. What a beautiful keepsake. Looking at my frame and this photo makes me super happy.

This is what happens when I go to a library “just to look.” The stack of books on the right are library books that I plucked from the “New Books” section. And then the stack on the left are the books I found from the library’s bookstore. I only paid $14 for that stack, four of which are like-new hardcover books! It was a successful library trip, is what I’m saying.

A gratuitous selfie but I was feeling myself, okay?! I took this right before I went to a going-away party for my boss who left the company in mid-August. To say I’ve been devastated is an understatement because my boss was so much more than that. She was a friend, a mentor, and someone I felt fully comfortable with both on a personal and professional level. While I know we will continue our friendship after this, it’s been an adjustment for sure. The party itself was fun, though! I stayed for five hours, got to snuggle my boss’s baby, and really enjoyed chatting with coworkers I only know virtually these days.

Not trying to brag but… my family held our annual fantasy football draft in August and ESPN gave me an A for my excellent picks. Thank you, ESPN. I’ll use this as bragging rights even as I lose every game.

I already talked all about my first experience coloring my hair at home. I’m so happy with how it turned out and I’m even happier that I’m going to save myself so much money by not going to the salon for color every 2-3 months.

One of our former book club members who moved away a decade ago just moved back to town, which has been such a delight! We had dinner with her to catch up and it was a really good time. And I got to indulge in my favorite pizza and cheesy bread, so I was one happy camper.

I was on dog-sitting duties for Chip and Lucy this month. While it’s hard to be away from my girls when I’m dog-sitting, these doggos make it all okay! They are just so easy to hang out with. We did a lot of cuddling while reading and cuddling while watching TV. There were lots of time spent outside (well, we went outside a lot but didn’t stay outside for very long because it’s just so hot) and games of fetch played with Chip. We had a good time together!

I did a little apartment hunting in August, and it was soul-crushing quite honestly. Apartments are so expensive, you guys. Most of the places I looked at are around $2,000 for a two-bedroom apartment, and it’s not that much cheaper for a one-bedroom. In the end, I’ve decided that I’m going to stay for one more year in my current place. I went into my leasing office last week to inquire about my lease renewal. At first, I was told that my rent would be increasing $100 a month, which was my threshold—I told myself if my rent increased by $100 or more, I would move out. So I told them that I wasn’t going to renew and then left the office. They stopped me outside the office to tell me that they could work something out! In the end, I somehow negotiated (a term I use very loosely, as I did nothing to warrant this change of heart) a $50 per month increase, which is much more doable for my budget. So the new plan is to stay for one more year and start to gradually increase how much money I am putting into savings so when I do move out and do have a much more expensive rent to manage, it will feel less burdensome. (Plus, all that money will help to pay for moving expenses + new stuff for the new place when the time comes!)

The most exciting part of my month! (I am such a cool person, I know.) My CPAP machine finally arrived and while it’s been a massive adjustment to figure out how to sleep with this thing, I already feel a difference in my energy levels and the way I feel. A full recap of my first week using the machine will be coming next week!

Tell me a highlight of August for you!

Categories: Life

Where Do You Keep That?

I’m stealing today’s post idea directly from the Girl Next Door podcast. They had a great episode recently where they talked about their habits at home and played a game aptly titled, “Where Do You Keep That?” It was really fun to listen to and I thought it would make for an interesting blog post. The first list is all of the things they talked about on their podcast and then I have a bonus round of some other items that I’m curious about. Feel free to play along in the comments or on your own blogs!

Kleenex

There’s a box under my bathroom counter that I was using the last time I had a head cold, and I also have some travel-sized packets stuffed into one of the bins in my bathroom closet. I don’t typically have Kleenex on hand, though, which means I usually have to panic-buy boxes whenever I have a head cold.

Medicine

I keep my medicine stored in my bathroom closet and I try to go through it once a year to get rid of expired medications. I just reorganized my bathroom closet and threw away almost all of my medications because they were all expired. Damn. I keep it stored in one of my plastic bins.

Bandaids

Bandaids are also kept in my bathroom closet in a plastic bin (my “first aid” bin). I have so many damn Bandaids because for a while, I kept forgetting I had Bandaids at home and would buy a new multipack whenever I needed them. Now I have literally hundreds of Bandaids that I’ll probably take with me to my grave. (Maybe I’m exaggerating.)

Heating pad

I have multiple. The heating pad I use the most is the one that has to be plugged in (annoying) and I usually wrap the cord around the pad and tuck it in this empty space between my dresser and a wall. It fits perfectly! I also have a heating pad I keep in my fridge (it functions as both a cold pack and a heating pad).

Nail polish

I have this beautiful nail polish organizer that stores all of my nail polishes perfectly! I rarely do my nails these days, but maybe one day I’ll get back into it. The organizer sits on a shelf in my bathroom closet.

Winter hats/gloves/accessories

I keep it all stored in a small container that’s on a high shelf in my walk-in closet. Honestly, here in Florida, we don’t need any sort of winter accessories unless we’re traveling out of state. The past few years, it hasn’t gotten cold enough to warrant much more than a medium-weight jacket.

Scissors

This is a funny one because up until a year ago, the only scissors I had in my house were a pair of kitchen shears that came with my knife block. But now I have three pairs of scissors: the aforementioned kitchen shears and two “regular” scissors. I keep one set tucked in my pen cup next to my work desk and another set in an organizer on a counter near my front door.

Tweezers

Hmm… do I even have a pair of tweezers in my apartment? I’m not sure. I don’t tweeze anything, not even my eyebrows (sounds painful and I feel like I wouldn’t be any good at it). If I have a pair of tweezers, they’re most likely stuck in one of the bins in my bathroom.

Slow cooker/air fryer

I store my slow cooker on top of my fridge and my air fryer tucked in a cabinet. I literally cannot have any other huge kitchen appliances because I am out of space.

Dirty towels

I have a laundry basket in my bedroom walk-in closet where I keep all of my dirty towels. This includes all of the washcloths and reusable pads I use when doing my skincare routine as well as bath towels and kitchen towels. I probably should switch out my bath towels + kitchen towels more than I do, but whatever, this is my house and I do what I want.

Tape measure

I have one of those soft tape measures (I guess it’s for body measurements but that’s not what I use it for) that I just throw in one of the fabric bins on my TV stand. I feel like I am forever pulling it out to measure this thing and that, and I need it handy but also stored away when I don’t need it.

BONUS ROUND

Gift bags/tissue paper/wrapping paper

I always save any gift bags I get so I can re-use them in the future and I store all gift bags and tissue paper in a fabric bin in my walk-in closet. (I keep a four-cube bookshelf in my closet for extra storage.) I don’t usually have wrapping paper around unless I’m wrapping Christmas presents but if I do, I store it in my linen closet.

Library books

I usually stack my to-be-read library books on the side table next to my reading chair and books that need to be sent back to the library sit on the counter near my front door so I know to grab them before I leave.

Bookmarks

I have so many bookmarks and I keep buying more. Oops! I keep them all stashed in a mug that sits on top of a bookshelf.

Extra pens

I have a pen cup next to my work desk where I store the majority of my pens, and then any overflow goes into a zippered pouch that I store in one of the plastic bins in my bedroom closet.

Suitcases

I only have one suitcase right now and it stays in my linen closet! I also have some larger bags that I can use if I’m going away for a weekend and I keep those stuffed together on the top shelf of my linen closet.

How many pairs of scissors do you own? Is it weird that I don’t own tweezers?!

Categories: Life

Monthly Recap | July 2024

Books

In July, I read 8 books. My favorite was This Spells Love by Kate Robb and my least favorite was What Lies in the Woods by Kate Alice Marshall. Some other stats:

  • 88% fiction, 12% nonfiction
  • 3 print, 2 e-books, 3 audiobooks
  • 3.9 average star rating
  • 12% diverse
  • Abandoned books: 3 (The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict, God Spare the Girls by Kelsey McKinney, and Family Family by Laurie Frankel)

This Spells Love by Kate Robb (print, owned)  ★★★★★ | The Last Chance Library by Freya Sampson (audiobook, library) ★★★★☆ | Five Little Pigs by Agatha Christie (print, owned) ★★★☆☆ | Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert (e-book, library) ★★★☆☆ | Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles Duhigg (audiobook, Spotify) ★★★★★ | Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez (e-book, library) ★★★★★ | What Lies in the Woods by Kate Alice Marshall (audiobook, library) ★★☆☆☆ | The Housemaid by Freida McFadden (print, owned) ★★★★☆

Media

  • Big Brother – It’s summertime so I am all about Big Brother once again! I am loving this season so far. It’s been delightfully messy with lots of complex houseguests—and there’s even a local guy on the show, so that’s been fun!
  • The Paris Olympics – Like the rest of the world, I’ve been enjoying the Paris Olympics! I have been deeply invested in gymnastics and it’s been really fun to watch Simone do her thing. Mostly, I’ve been watching the primetime coverage on Peacock, although every now and then I’ll turn on a random sport to watch (like women’s rugby). And now it’s track and field’s time to shine, and I am really enjoying watching those races!
  • Survivor: Tocantins – I’m trying to watch older seasons of Survivor to familiarize myself with people and storylines that are still talked about today. I decided on Tocantins (which is season 18 and released in 2009) because one of my favorite current Survivor podcast co-hosts, Stephen Fishbach, was on that season and it was so much fun to watch him play!
  • Two Guys, Five Rings (podcast) – This has been a pretty fun podcast to listen to! It’s hosted by Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers and talks about all different Olympics topics. It was a little more active before the Olympics surprisingly, but has a fun, light-hearted feel.

On The Friendship Paradox, we came back from our summer break with three great episodes in July. We released episodes about the Predictive Index Assessment, subtypes of the enneagram, and how personality plays into our food choices.

Buying

  • Cordless vacuum ($100) – This purchase was so worth breaking my No-Spend July rules. I am so happy with it! It’s so nice to be able to zoom around my apartment with it and collect all of the cat hair and dirt that accumulates in my little apartment.
  • Can opener ($8) – A boring purchase but when my can opener broke near the end of No-Spend July, I immediately purchased a new one on Amazon. I really like it – and I got it in a fun color (pink).

Moments

In July, I met up with two friends twice for hair color night! The three of us have been going to the same (very expensive) salon for many years and it’s time to start cutting back on expenses, so we decided to learn how to color each other’s hair. It’s been so fun! Our first time around, we messed up so many things. We didn’t have a proper cape to protect K’s clothes, we only had one pair of gloves to use between two of us (so we left with very stained hands and arms!), we didn’t have clips to keep hair separated. We had a lot of learning to do, but judging from the photo above, we had a lot of fun doing it! Plus, K’s hair came out great and I might have a new future as a hair stylist? We decided that my name would be the Silent Stylist because you could come to me and just read your book while I colored your hair. Ha! I am hoping to get my hair colored at our new “salon” this month, so hopefully it goes just as well!

I love this picture of the three of us! For my mom’s birthday, we went to The Candle Pour to make candles (I made a coffee-scented candle that smells divine) and then went out for dinner and ice cream. It was such a great afternoon/evening with my favorite people!

I had a fun day at the dog beach with my favorite doggos! They are not huge water dogs so we brought out the float so they could hang out in the water but be protected from the scary ocean! Lucy spent most of her time on the float barking at all the birds. While on the beach itself, Chip enjoyed exploring and meeting all the other dogs. Lucy stayed by our setup and barked at any dog who tried to get close. (I’m more of a Lucy than a Chip.)

I had my CPAP Titration Sleep Study done in July and my doctor has ordered an APAP machine for me to use at night. APAP stands for automatic positive air pressure and differs from a CPAP in that it adjusts the pressure automatically throughout the night as my breathing patterns change. I am still unsure if this will also help the blood oxygen issues I had while on the CPAP machine at the sleep clinic, which is a question I need to ask my doctor about. But at least I have some therapy headed my way soon!

Mikaela treated me to my first pedicure in over a year! I used to get them regularly but then I started dealing with ingrown toenails, which made getting pedicures very unpleasant! While I still hate when they scrub the bottom of my feet to remove all of my dead skin (I’m so ticklish!!), but it’s so nice to have painted toes again.

What’s the best book you read in July? What was a highlight of your month?

Categories: Life

Julys of Years Past

I’m continuing my series of going through photos of previous months of my life. This time, let’s take a walk down memory lane with July photos of years past. I was able to go all the way back to July 2010 (but then couldn’t find anything for July 2011, so I had to skip that year). Let’s recap!

July 2010

Sweet little Dutchy boy. I love this photo of us! I was 22 and Dutch was 7. Such a cute little goober. This was obviously taken at one of our game nights. We were playing Mad Gab, which is always a supremely funny game. Have you ever played it?

July 2012

Ooh, check out that old-school Instagram border! Remember when all our photos had to have a specific border? Ha! I believe my mom and I took this photo on her birthday right before going into a restaurant.

July 2013

Gah, I look so young here! I was firmly in my bang era and loving it. I was 25 here but I feel like I look way younger. A month after I took this photo, I would quit my job as a marketing assistant at a very small company (10 people total!) and join the company I still work at today. I was likely going through the interview process at this time and still remember one of the bosses taking a look at my employment history and making noises about how it looks like I never stayed in one place for very long. Joke’s on him!

July 2014

I am pretty sure I took this picture after my mom and her boyfriend (now husband!) came home from a week-long cruise. We were living together at the time and I missed her a lot while she was gone. This was our reunion shot, and it felt so good to have her home again.

July 2015

My mom and my stepdad got married in July 2015! Helping to plan my mom’s very low-key wedding was such a highlight of my life. We had a friend officiate, found a quiet area of downtown St. Petersburg to have the ceremony, and then took up the back area of an Outback Steakhouse for the reception. This was the last big event my grandma went to (she would pass away three months later). She was battling cancer and had just had a chemo appointment before the wedding. But she rallied and hung out through the ceremony and reception, and even managed to eat most of her meal. It was a true testament of her strength; she wasn’t going to miss her daughter’s wedding for anything.

July 2016

Just another photo of me and my boy! He was 14 in this photo and not a single gray hair to be found. People were always shocked when I told them how old he was because he looked young and acted young. He was my bestest friend.

July 2017

More Dutch photos! He was so much fun to photograph. In July 2017, things were okay on the health front. Dutch was starting to slow down a lot and there were more appointments at the vet’s office. He was on medication to help him calm down at night because he got very restless and wouldn’t settle down easily. But he was energetic during his walks and eating fine, so it was not something too concerning yet. I spent a lot more time at home because he needed more supervision and frequent walks.

July 2018

In July 2018, our book club took a fun weekend trip to Anna Maria Island, which is about an hour south of us. We worked together to make it also a surprise bachelorette weekend for Bri who was getting married in November. Bri is a classic enneagram 2 who will go all out for other people but hates having the attention on her, so it was fun to make sure she got some good, old-fashioned love showered on her during our weekend away.

July 2019

I have a fairly large extended family, but it’s rare for everyone to get together. Even in this photo, there are people missing but we got a good amount of us together for a 4th of July party on the beach and it was a lot of fun! It was our first big family gathering after Pops’ death in October 2018, and it was really nice for all of us to be together for something happy.

July 2020

For my mom’s pandemic birthday, we went to a nail salon to get pedicures and then went to an outdoor restaurant. Pandemic birthdays (especially during the height of things!) were so weird, weren’t they? And the pandemic in Florida was much different than other areas, of course. (Well, the pandemic itself was the same, but the way our state approached it was vastly different.) Salons were open for business in July, but this salon had a very strict policy about masking, hand washing, social distancing, etc., so I felt comfortable being there.

July 2021

There is a lot of emotion behind this simple photograph. This is where I got a text from Mikaela with a video of Olive ringing the bell after successfully finishing cancer treatment. (And she’s had clear scans ever since—after another clear scan this month, she’s graduated to yearly scans rather than every few months!) This is also where I went on a date with a woman, a relationship that I could feel had a lot of potential. It was my first queer relationship and I remember being so excited about where it was going but also a little insecure because we had been on a few dates at this point and neither of us had made any ~romantical~ moves toward each other. “Does she think she’s just hanging out with me as a friend? She does know we’re dating, right?!” I remember texting Mikaela. Being a baby queer in my thirties was a weird experience.

July 2022

The beginning of July 2022 was such a difficult time for me. I started my One Line a Day journal in 2022 and reading over the entries from July took me right back to that period. On July 1st, I took a Covid test and tested negative for Covid, which was great because I had been testing positive for a few weeks at that point. But then I found out that my mom got Covid, then my brother, and then my stepdad, and I am pretty sure I was patient zero there. (I followed the CDC guidelines at the time, but I definitely should have continued isolating until I was testing negative.) I felt terrible and my mom had a really tough go of it, which of course, led to my own panic attacks. I even had a dream one night during this period where I was Facetiming my mom and she answered from the back of an ambulance! Stupid subconscious. Anyway, it was hard and I felt like the worst person, but everyone recovered.

July 2023

A much better July! My mom and I took a weekend trip to Charleston for her birthday, which was a ton of fun. We went to a fancy steakhouse for her birthday dinner, walked all around Charleston, and spent way too much money at their outdoor market. It was a good time!

July 2024

Last weekend was my cousin Rachel’s baby shower! Her baby boy is due in September, and we’re all so excited! She found out she was pregnant mere weeks after her father died of cancer. She was deep in the depths of her grief and it was almost like it was a sign from above. It felt special and also omniscient. With death comes new life, and all that.

If you had to show a photo from a July in your life, what year would you choose and what would picture would you show us?