It’s almost 2010 and each year I like to look back at the year I’m exiting to sort of assess what went on and what I accomplished (or didn’t), then set myself some goals for the next year.

2009, for me, was a year a LOT of both highs and lows.

In my day job profession, I weathered a lay-off that was scary but served to get me out of a toxic work atmosphere I’d been trying to leave for a while. The economy tanked, unemployment grew and grew but I worked hard and picked up some freelance technical writing, a contract technical writing position and am now back to a full time programmer writer position in a team I really like. It was a bit hard, emotionally, but it worked out well for me.

In my writing other-job, I wasn’t as productive in 2009 as I’d wished. I think I overloaded myself and took too many things on at once until I could only focus on those things instead of on my long-term goals, whether or not those things helped me toward my long-term goals. I did start moving more at that direction near the end of the year, though.

In my family other-job, I actually had a decent year. My youngest son is doing well and I was a very supportive (if cold, wet and tired) football mom as he played peewee football in the fall. I managed to put aside my worry over my oldest son (US Army, deployed in Iraq most of the year) and sent lots of care packages. He was injured and is now in Germany, recovering from knee reconstruction. My husband and I are doing well also. Wish the house was cleaner but it’s a bit lower on my list unless the cats magically turn into mini-maids in the middle of the night.

My health has suffered the most this year. I think this is partly because I have a tendency to push my own needs to the side in favor of those of other people and partly because my day job had been so stressful and toxic for so long that it took its own toll as well. This year I’ve been getting a lot of medical testing and some treatment done and I need more. One of the things I’ve discovered I have is Obstructive Sleep Apnea and now that I’ve been on treatment for that for about 90 days, I am finally feeling like I have some energy again and can contemplate more than the bare minimums it takes to get by. But I really need to lose weight – a lot of it.

The world in 2009 has been really scary though. The economy, the job outlook, the number of crimes and then all the officer shootings. Those hit me really hard because my brother-in-law is a SWAT Sgt. I have skin in that game. Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of control over much of that.

For 2010 I think I see my goals as:

• Lose Weight - I am going to do my damndest to lose 100 lbs in 2010. This will be partly via low carb diet and a lot via exercise. I have guidelines from my cardiologist and a gym membership now, sports bras and shoes on the way. And a naggy gym partner :)
• Investigate Food Allergies – I have a lot of symptoms of celiac or at least gluten intolerance. I’m setting up a doctor appt to investigate it and will make whatever dietary changes I must to accommodate whatever we find.
• Sell to New York – I am going to keep my eye on my prize of selling to New York. This means not taking on any more side tasks and sticking with my writing better. I am going to set up a weekly wordcount goal and work to it.
• Nurture Myself – I’ve taken up photography as a way to get myself into a totally different creative place from words and it will help me get outside more often. I have a photoblog (Focal Changes) set up and will be doing something called the 365 Project where I take a picture a day and post it. I also want to learn more about the aspects of photography that interests me – so I might take a class or two.
• Ace the Day Job – I want to earn a promotion in 2010 and wow my boss with my brilliance without killing myself or spending all my time and energy at the day job.

As you can see, a lot of 2010’s goals are around me. I realized I need to improve my health and take some time out for me before I burn out.

As some of you may know, I’ve taken up photography as a creative outlet that doesn’t involve words. Since I don’t want to bore people who come here to check out my writing, I’ve set up a blog for it separately.

Focal Changes

I’m going to participate in the 365 Project starting 1/1/2010 – with a goal of taking a picture a day and posting it as a way to learn more about photography and to see what my year of photos chronicles.

You’re all welcome to join me and I might post a weekly summary of links here, but will try not to drive you all crazy.

My sister-in-law is very much into Christmas and especially into the art of present wrapping. Every year she puts me to shame and, I will admit, that since my nickname is “The Mad Taper”, it’s probably not too hard a task. This year, however, I decided to try a little harder and had extra things to put on the packages to dress them up, pretty paper and coordinating paper. I think I came up with presents that were really pretty.

I told Mr. Maura that his sister had thrown down the wrapping gauntlet last year and this year I was responding in kind. He gave me a very odd looked and asked if his sister and I had entered The Martha Stuart Christmas Throwdown without his knowledge. It cracked me up.

Then today we got to my sister-in-law’s gorgeous house and started putting our presents under her lovely tree and I was shown up — bad…. My presents didn’t look bad or anything but I think my sister-in-law outshone me.

I think I have to declare her the winner this year. I’ll be back to compete again next year, though!

There’s a challenge called the 365 Project where the goal is to take a picture a day to both learn more about photography and to document a year in your life. I’ve been considering doing this for a while because I’m really trying to learn more about the camera I have.

So, I’ve decided to take the challenge starting January 1st. To help facilitate that as well as to have a home for all the photos so this blog doesn’t get too unfocused, I started a new website to house my photographic journey.

The blog is up, though I’m still messing around with parts of it. You can see it here.

Otherwise known as CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure).

I’ve snored most of my life and now have been diagnosed with sleep apnea. This means that I stop breathing while I’m asleep. It doesn’t sound awful until you start reading more about it and realize the lack of oxygen and the lack of real sleep can kill you over time. Even before it kills you, it can wreck havoc on your life.

For myself, I’d been going to bed earlier and earlier and still woke up exhausted and usually with a headache it would take me most of the day to get rid of, only to have a headache the next day as well. I had no energy and kept forgetting things all the time. I would constantly be in danger of falling asleep at my desk and there were times I’d take a nap in the car before driving home, lest I fall asleep at the wheel. What I had been putting down to stress and a toxic Evil Day Job turned out to be something more – sleep apnea.

I went for a sleep study where they hook you up to all sorts of monitoring equipment and then you get to (try to) sleep while they monitor what’s going on. They woke me up partway through the night and put me on a CPAP machine for the rest of the night and adjusted the pressure until they got rid of most of the incidents of apnea and hypopnea.

I went back a week later and picked up my diagnosis and a rental machine plus mask and various accouterments. I’ve had claustrophobia for years and thought I would really suffer but there’s only been one night in the three months since I went on CPAP that I didn’t use the machine and it sucked so badly, I never missed another night. Now it’s almost pavlovian – I get into bed and put on the mask, turn on the machine and read for about ten minutes then go to sleep.

Now I’ll be the first to admit that it’s NOT sexy. It’s not noisy but having a big mask tied to your face with a hose leading off the bed is sorta… weird. Mr. Maura does say that the breeze from the mask is much easier to cope with than my snoring.

I highly recommend everyone look at the symptoms of sleep apnea and, if they feel they might have it, get tested. There are several treatment options but I chose CPAP because it was non-invasive and pretty well proven. I know a lot of CPAP users hate the fact they are using a machine but I guess my pragmatism shows in that I feel liberated by getting real sleep and rest rather than imprisoned by a machine. The reality is that I do have sleep apnea – I can choose how to treat it or even not to treat it, but a price is associated with every one of these choices. The CPAP is my choice and I’ll make the most of it.

I’m also going to work at losing weight but there’s no guarantee that it will help my apnea. It may make no change at all. The idea that sleep apnea only affects the overweight is a huge myth that I think encourages people who should be checked to not do so because they aren’t overweight. It’s all about individual anatomy and muscle/sleep behavior.

I’m already doing much better. I really sleep and I wake up on my own. I no longer wake up with headaches and I don’t try to fall asleep at my desk anymore. Now when I’m tired, it seems to be a more normal tired – not exhaustion.

I’m really tempted to be-dazzle my mask, though. I wonder if that would make it feel any sexier?