Sometimes I realize that I write about something and then I never, ever come back to it. So, if you’ve been following along (poor thing), you may suddenly ask yourself, “Wonder what ever happened to that parking ticket?” Well, today’s post is going to put an end to some of those cliffhangers.

OUR LANDLORD WOES

I am happy to report that our landlord woes have come to an end. After a not so pleasant email correspondence (one with us in the right) we won. It ended with a sweet-as-can-be phone call. Here’s the short story. We agreed to a three month out two years ago. (We’ve been here for four years. We’re awesome tenants. I mean that.) The clause was written into our lease just incase we made an offer on a house. Well, this year, out of the blue, our landlord said they didn’t want to give us that option (but didn’t tell us they removed it) and that we’d either have to sign an year lease or get out. We don’t want to sign a year lease because this is going to be the year we buy a house. There was some back and forth, some really bad logic on their part (not wanting to find tenants more than once a year, and in the winter, which, unless Al Gore’s projections are right, will be the case always since our lease is up on December 4th.) We pointed out their bad logic. (This is getting too long.) Nutshell: We were right. They agreed to it. They told us we have been awesome and they simply don’t wish to lose us.

Good news all around. Plus, we’re going to be homeowners by this time next year or I’m going to move in with you.

MY UNFAIR PARKING TICKET

Remember this? I got a $65.00 parking ticket accusing me of a being a dealer selling our ‘75 Volvo. They were wrong. I was right. I contested the ticket. It’s been 3 months. On Friday of last week, I got a letter stating that the judge agreed with me. I do not have to pay the ticket. (I did have to pay the one I got while giving birth, however, for an expired registration even though I had it registered but failed to put the ticket on the windshield. Ah well.) So that’s taken care of. And the Volvo has since been donated to Autism Speaks of New York City. (I miss her.)

THE HOUSE HUNT

Looks like we’re going to settle in New Jersey. We’re looking at houses this Saturday. Yay! I can’t wait to have a yard, a hose, and a floor that touches the ground.

THYROID STUFF. ANOTHER AHA! MOMENT

(This is an oldie but a goodie!)

I wrote about my shins turning themselves inside out back in 2004. We were in San Francisco at the time. The itchy, bumpy mess has happened since then a few times, usually when I’m under a lot of stress or I’m depressed. It flared up even worse right after Emory was born. I complained about it nonstop to my mother and TobyJoe. Well, check this out. (From the Grave’s Disease page Mayo Clinic Web site.)

Graves’ dermopathy

An uncommon sign of Graves’ disease is reddening and swelling of the skin, often on your shins and on the top of your feet, called Graves’ dermopathy.

Have you ever seen Chasing Amy? Remember when Banky is at the bar with Holden and he has that moment of clarity when he realizes it’s actually a lesbian bar and that Holden’s new crush is batting for the other team? Well, that’s been what I’ve been doing the last couple of days. I’m going back in time and realizing that a lot of symptoms I have had could be related to Grave’s Disease (or high thyroid levels). I have asked four doctors through the years about the skin problem on my shins. (Most recently, I talked to my dermatologist about it, the same woman who discovered the basal cell carcinoma.) Not one doctor has suggested testing for Grave’s. I have complained about heart problems (mainly palpitations and my heart rate fluctuation) and not one of them has checked my thyroid levels. (I even had a stress test done in 2005 to check out my heart.)

Crazier? The doctor who finally did test my thyroid levels actually asked me, during our first ever meeting in 2005, if I have Grave’s disease because, “your eyes are kind of buggy.” (I wrote about that meeting here but for some reason I can’t find it. My mother left a comment reassuring me that my eyes were lovely. That’s all I remember.)

What I’m saying, Internet, is this diagnosis could possibly change everything for the better. I’m manic with the possibility that I might not have to continue living the way I’ve been living for so long, which is to say erratically unhappy and happy, confused, lonely, and sometimes filled with doom. I don’t use this site to write about the dark moments. I did during my postpartum, but even then I held back. I’m hard to live with. On Monday, whenever the doctor called to say my thyroid levels were high, a moment of clarity swept over me.

On Monday I realized that I’ve been at the lesbian bar all this time. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)

So, today I have a meeting with a endocrinologist. I am not sure what that entails, but I do hope he can make sense of all of this for me. Perhaps he can make me understand myself a little better. I’m not saying I do have Grave’s Disease, but something is askew and now I’ll get a chance to figure out what and why.

And maybe then I’ll learn how to feel normal again even though I’m not even sure what normal is.

THE WRAP UP

I suppose that’s it. If I’ve missed something, please let me know. If you’ve had some unanswered question, if I’ve left cliffhangers, let me know. I am not a fan of cliffhangers.