Migraine

I recently got a migraine and took Sumatriptan for the first time since my doc had prescribed it.  After an hour of taking it, I started feeling ill, heaviness in my chest, tightness in the back of my neck, pain in my jaw the whole shebang. I called H and we decided to go to the ER and they thought I was having an allergic reaction to the triptan and gave me prednisone, benadryl and pepcid, all via IV. So, I got to go home a few hours later all groggy and hopped up on the meds.  Its been a few days and I am still recovering, I have terrible heartburn to the point that I cannot get comfortable. I have at multiple times been scared that I am actually having a heart attack, the heartburn pain is that intense, then I calm myself down saying I don't have any other symptoms of heart attack, like sweating or dizziness and also my EKG was perfectly normal.

All this incident has done is take my migraine and make it worse (not only the headache but other problems as well). So I have decided that I am going to keep a super detailed notebook to see if I can track the cause of this migraine and also have decided to try and use only more natural remedies. For example for this intense heartburn I have been taking a pinch of Ajwain and chewing on it for a few minutes, also making jeera and mendayam kashayam (Boil some cumin and fenugreek seeds in water and drink it).  It has seriously helped.
I have also stopped drinking my much needed much beloved afternoon cup of coffee and replaced it with lemon ginger tea.
I have also joined the yoga collective  (www.theyogacollective.com). It hosts a collection of yoga classes online for all levels. So far I have watched only one class and so more on that later!!

I am hoping that by making these small changes I can be less susceptible to migraines and all the other crap that they bring with them.

Wish me luck! and if you have any other changes I can make (that does not involve me eating meat or spending a crap ton of money)-- I am all ears!

Toodles,

S

My new planner

In my previous post, I had indicated that I was super excited about this new planner, so as promised here is more information.  A few months ago, my friend HRM, a fellow postdoc, but newly appointed faculty mentioned to me that she was dropping a lot of money on the Day Designer (http://www.daydesigner.com), which she thought was very suited to her needs- a planner for "adults", she said.  I looked it up and while it looked pretty, it was too blah for me.  So I went on Etsy and obsessed about day designer printables for a week and figured out that either I liked everything or nothing. I have to be honest - in total I spent about 40$ on putting this planner together and also none of the actual pages are mine (except the front page)- they were all bought on Etsy, I just put together the planner based on what I knew I would find helpful.  This is the finished product.

I designed the cover on Adobe Illustrator (the infinite hours spent on working on paper/thesis figures comes in handy!!). I got it spiral bound at office depot for 5 $ and it took like three minutes for them to do it. For every month, there is a monthly calendar to give me the overview of that month. This is followed by a monthly budget for the house, because lets face it, while I am scientist and we are not supposed to actually have a home life,  I am also a wife and the home organizer :).

The monthly budget pages are then followed by overview of the week- which helps me plan meals. 

The week pages (four of them) are followed by the daily schedule. 

The list of steps in an experiment I am doing is listed under lab work, along with another other major work-related activities.  The gridded section at the bottom is for any pre-existing appointments so they are front and center and I can see them throughout the day.  I also have a section for what I am making for dinner that day. Along with any reminders I may need for any personal errands etc.,  This particular day looks relatively less crazy, but I have noticed that things get added to these columns as the day progresses.  I also decided to bind together only work days of the week for every month (this does include holidays, as we all know that both the hubs and I often work on holidays!- sad but true).  This led to about 300 pages for just 6 months, so I decided to do it in 6 month installments, so my current planner goes from July-December and I get to do this again for Jan-June.  I thought it would be awkward carrying it around, it hasn't been- it probably helps that I am totally in love with my planner now. Talk to me in a few months :). Also here are the links for where I got the original pages in case you guys end up liking it: https://www.etsy.com/transaction/1045002401 and https://www.etsy.com/transaction/1041058681.  I would like to state that Miss Tina's unplan planner pages are the best! they rock!. They are just so pretty!!. 

Toodles,

S

First Post!!

Let me introduce myself- I am a 33 year old female scientist living in Dallas with her husband (also a scientist). What really defines me is that I love books, I love to travel and I love my family! I used to write another blog then I stopped and then I started and then I stopped. So let us see how this one goes. The compelling reason I am starting this new blog is because I have all these thoughts bouncing in my head and I thought that maybe posting it out into the "inter webs" might help me process some of these thoughts or at the very least get rid of them! The topic of today's post is well to introduce myself --yada yada--- and then also to talk about how I was doing tissue culture (for the non-science peeps that just means I am growing some cells in a dish for experiments!) and suddenly an image of the road to the Chennai International airport flashed through my eyes and needless to say it brought tears to my eyes and then I rationalized it by saying that it was because I miss Amma and of course my Appa. Does nostalgia strike someone so weirdly? I mean I wasn't even thinking about India- of course the converse of this is when I am actually in India I miss my house in the US- so I feel like this back and forth is so very annoying! In other news, I am super excited about this planner I have "built" by compiling a few different planner pages that I bought at Etsy..but that will be another blog on another day!!

Toodles!

S