My Life Be Like...

I definitely blogged twice in one day, which is like breaking some unwritten rule.

Oh well,  I had to write this before I forget how ridiculous it was and for your entertainment.

Once upon a time this last Sunday, I ended up a lot like that pig (for lack of a better visual) in the picture above.

After I convinced you all that I am healthy enough to go across the world, every once in a while I have an incident. I have never in my life passed out like this before.

I woke up on Sunday feeling just fine. I hurried along, and running late because I was making pani po po for a meeting for my committee. As I was driving to church I felt a little off, but I know my body pretty well and knew that it was not enough to be worried.

I got to my ward conference, sat down among the crowd, sang the hymn and all of the sudden started to feel my heart slow waaaaaay down. I am your usually tachy (or really fast heart rate) kind of girl and have never in my life had it go so slow. I knew that I was all of the sudden not feeling right and started doing some deep breathing (I'm sure I looked nuts). I was not sitting by anyone that really knew my history and saw my friend Cody sitting a few rows up. I knew if anyone could stay calm if something happened, he could.

I told him I was not feeling well and I felt like I was going to pass out. He offered to help get me out, but I knew if I stood up again, I was going straight down. Chair to floor was definitely better than standing to floor. He got up, got me a drink, and his sweet girlfriend helped me stay present for a little. Next thing I know, the curtains over my eyes started to close. I heard LOTS of chairs move really, really fast and when I come to, I am in a whole other part of the church surrounded by what looked like 30 people all yelling for me to breathe and calling 911.

Wow. I'm an idiot.

Don't worry that it was ward conference and we had a packed house....embarrassment is an understatement.

I felt so loopy when I woke up and like everything was in slow motion. Next thing I know the ambulance is there. Always a nightmare.

Long story short, I had a medication change a couple of weeks ago and put on a beta blocker that slows your heart rate and blood pressure down. It has worked wonders so far, so I have no idea if I took it wrong and took one too many, or if I got some kind of flu bug, or dehydration and stress got the best of me. My levels all looked good when I got to the ER, so it was just what they call vasovagal syncope and they really don't know if it had anything to do with my heart. It may have just been a temporary shift in blood pressure that just took me down.

My ward is SO amazing, and if you didn't know it, I go to a Polynesian single's ward. So ya, those brown boys hoisted me up really fast and got me the heck out of there.

So I kid you not when I say, I looked a lot like that picture above. Does a girl have to pass out to get that many boys to have your undivided attention all at once? Apparently.

However, if there was ever the kind of attention NOT to be had, this is it.

Not my finest moment, but not my worst either. My life, can and has been, one embarrassment after another.

Big shout out to my ward! All the prayers and help was more than I can even thank you for. I know I scared a lot of people and shrug it off as embarrassing, but it is only my way of coping with the ridiculousness of the things that happen to me.

Luckily, I am doing just fine! Just a little bump in the road that looked scarier than, gratefully, it was.

More later!

Sayonara.

I have no idea where these 7 months have gone and why I have had such severe writer's block.

Actually...I take that back. I do know where it has gone, and that would be school. Writer's block is also to be attributed to a massively packed schedule, difficult/demanding classes, and a complete lack to do anything and everything.

I have been kind of grumpy with these last couple semesters because being as smart as I am, left all of the classes I didn't want to take til the end. It was smart because with the way my health was behaving at the time these classes would have been unmanageable, but stupid because some days I have enough to do that I want to punch someone or something.

I have a lot of great things coming too. People have been asking me what is going on because after posting so much of my life on the world wide web and then taking a hiatus, I guess it seems like I dropped of the planet...or the digital planet that is.

Life has been going pretty alright and I am looking forward to some big events in my life.

Hard to believe that last time I posted I was longing for the day that I could go back to Africa. Somehow I was blessed enough to be accepted into the PEAT (program evaluation and assessment team) program at BYU to go to Malawi for 3 and half months this summer. I will be working with NuSkin to evaluate their SAFI (School for Agriculture and Family Independence) program and see how things are going for them. Basically it is one big research project designed to see what improvements the program and curriculum can make so that farmers in the area are able to bring better crop yield and nutrition to their families. I am so excited and have also learned very quickly that research is maybe not the area I would prefer to work in. All I can say is I am learning so much in the process with such a big learning curve, we the realization that maybe I would rather be the one being evaluated than evaluating.

I know what you are asking yourself...how in the world are you going to go with your health?! Well, lucky for me, I am doing MUCH better. That is why I am never online anymore, because for once you won't find me in my bed day in and day out with nothing to do but blog and surf the web - lame. I definitely have my days and we have had some events here and there, but I don't have a lingering heart condition that would be of any real danger to me. There are also some reasons why I would go to Malawi over many other places. For example, it is extremely rural so you don't have the same kinds of diseases that places like the slums of say, Nairobi would.

Never heard of Malawi? Well, see - that's because it is NEVER in the news. You won't find much conflict here and it is truly one of Africa's safest countries - another reason I feel good about the place. We also will be in a pretty controlled (for Africa) environment because NuSkin owns a very nice campus there with good lodging.  And finally, I am just going on prayers and faith because we all feel like it is the right thing to do.

Honestly, if I let my health control everything...I would be absolutely NO WHERE with little of what I have today.

I believe that the more I keep telling myself I can do, the better I will be. And maybe, just maybe, my body will keep up with my spirit and will to keep going. It's worked thus far despite how difficult it has been, and I have almost made it through graduation... a huge goal of mine. I know it is hard given my history, but the more people have faith in my ability to heal and make big steps like going across the world to remote area all Summer, the more I will be able to accomplish it. Ha ha.

I am making big progress like doing things like yoga every day, gaining greater stamina, more energy, and less sickness besides catching whatever BYU decides to throw around.

I am so excited to go and just keep living out my dream. My mom and I have a deal that I can go as long as she doesn't get any call from an African telling her that something went wrong. I feel great about that. And so does my doctor. Dr. Hwang knows his stuff, and if he says I'm clear...I have faith that there is no great concern.

So wish me luck blog-o-sphere. It's going to be an amazing summer!