Ohio visit

Here are some random pictures that we took while visiting my parents in Ohio.

Tayla being a big girl on the bouncy horsey at the park. She loves all things bouncy.


Curtis and Xander swimming in Grandpa's pool. Of course Xander has to accessorize his outfit.

Tayla isn't too happy about swimming and she got pretty cold. Better luck next time.

Backpacking: Pictured Rocks Lakeshore

Curtis and I left the kids with my parents for 4 days so we could go on a trip just the two of us. (It was our first trip together -- we never got a honeymoon or anything.) We went backpacking in Pictured Rocks Lakeshore National Park. It was along Lake Superior on the upper penninsula of Michigan. The trail pretty well follows the coastline for 42 miles. We hiked all 42 miles in 4 days, carrying our 25-40 lb packs the whole way. It was quite the workout, but the scenery is beautiful. There was pretty much a great coastline picture at every turn. After a while, we just got tired of taking one picture of the coast after another. Here's just some of our pictures:

Walking the trail. And no we didn't hold hands the whole time, we were just having fun with the timer on our camera. It kinda looks like we love each other though.
ha ha ha

Here's the Au Sable Lighthouse. Surprisingly, there were a bunch of shipwreck remains right on the shore under the lighthouse. They must have forgot to turn on the light on those occasions or something. You can't tell, but we had to stand out in the rain to get this picture.

Here's the Hurricane River that runs right into Lake Superior.

The third night we were alone in the campground and the campground was full of mosquitos. So we went down to the beach and spent most of the evening there. It felt really good to walk around in the sand barefoot.

This is "Chapel Rock." Had to take a picture there because it is one of the landmarks people go to see.

It was so cold this morning. But we still managed to get a picture at the Miner's Castle. Although this is just shoreline.

Don't look down! There were many places where, had I passed out or slipped, I would have fallen right off the cliff. You can kind of see the colors on the rocks, that's why they call it "Pictured Rocks Lakeshore National Park."

Curtis is doing some filtering of the water. No we didn't pack enough water for 4 days, we drank water from nature. Ooh exotic! And thanks to the filter, we didn't get any diseases.

Curtis GPSing! Even though the trail was pretty much idiot-proof. You have no idea how much we used the GPS. Whether it just be for the time, or to give us an idea of how much farther we had to go. You have no idea how happy we were when it started measuring in feet rather than miles to the car.

Pretty beach shot. This was the first day about 3 miles into the hike. It was actually a perfect day for hiking. Not too hot, not too cold and absolutely beautiful.

Little waterfall. We had fun taking pictures with the timer on the camera. Using downed trees or even our packs to set the camera on.

Curtis looking rather 'studly' if I do say so.

The trail wasn't always flat and easy. There was mud to manuver around. Trees to walk across. Hills to climb. Sand to scramble through. Cliffs to avoid falling off.

talk about mental illness

My cousin has a blog designed to talk about mental illness, especially bipolar disorder. She has recently been diagnosed with bipo and she shares her story here. It's really interesting! Her blog is designed to talk openly about mental illness and destroy any misconceptions that people have. You should check it out and read her story. http://halfbeautiful.blogspot.com
She would love some more followers in order to get the word out, so to speak. She has a natural gift for words which makes this a beautifully crafted read. You'll be missing out if you don't check it out!

Some of you may or may not know about my struggle with depression. When Curtis went to Iraq just two months after we got married, I got caught up in a whirlwind of emotions that nearly destroyed me. I learned to suppress them, therefore becoming almost robotic and ultimately depressed. Pretty much the day he got home I got pregnant with Xander. Without a chance to deal with my emotions before being pumped full of hormones, I was doomed for disaster. Instead of all the physical discomforts associated with pregnancy, I got stuck with the mental symptoms. I suffered pre-natal depression throughout my pregnancy. I was so depressed that I stayed in bed a lot. Curtis and I has some pretty messy arguments that resulted in lots of pain on his part. I was a horrible mess and even stopped eating for days at a time. By the end of my pregnancy I began to stabilize as my doctor and I found a correct dosage of antidepressants.

Then the day came when I gave birth to Xander. Anyone who has given birth knows how exhausting a whole day of labor can be and how hormones and emotions run high afterwards. Well, combine that with suddenly going off your antidepressants! I was in the hospital for 2 days (we forgot my meds at home) and since my routine was out of whack because I was hospitalized, we completely forgot about them until the symptoms all came back. I had the worst episode right there in the hospital. The nurses we pretty freaked out. They called in the hospital psychologist. He pretty much admitted me to a mental hospital immediately.

It absolutely broke my heart not to be able to go home with my newborn baby. And the hospital was a horrible place. They take away all your personal belongings (even your shoe laces to keep all the patients from committing suicide.) You have to ask for everything. Even for soap to wash your hands; after which they come out from behind the glass to unlock a giant cabinet to give you the smallest little bottle of hand soap. There were so many other traumatic memories of that place, but I don't want to get into them right now. Basically I spent the weekend there until my medications could stabilize me and I could convince them I was safe to go home. They finally allowed me to go home after I set up an appointment with a counselor "on the other side" and promised to go to counseling.

The counseling worked really well and soon I was able to go completely off my medication. I live a normal life now, however I'll never forget what I learned from this experience. Every time I see myself slipping back into depression, I use the techniques and skills the counselor and my books taught me. I am determined not to go back to that low ever again. I was scared to death that I would when I found out I was pregnant with my second child. However, I lucked out and just got the morning sickness and other physical symptoms instead.

After my experience, I empathize with those suffering mental illness. When it's serious enough, it is possible for chemicals in the brain to imbalance and make it impossible to fix without medication. Mental illness is not just "all in your head" so to speak. It is not like you can just choose to be happy. It can be really messy and unpleasant. I believe everyone knows someone who has mental illness or someone who has dealt with depression at some point in their life. It's more common that people think. What is your story?