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Mothers Day

Wishing all the mothers out there a very blissful Mothers Day

This Mothers Day give Mom something she will cherish forever 

Help her cover her walls and fill her photo albums with the memories she loves, by teaching her how to use her camera to truly capture everything beautiful she sees.

With my help, the mother in your life can learn how to photograph her children, and create mesmerizing images which she will adore forever.

My Complete Guide For Photographing Your Kids will be on sale through Mothers Day, for only $25, and I am taking reservations for my June Online Photography Class, a seat is only $75, now through Mothers Day!

These are both amazing last minute gifts:)
Contact me an email with any questions, or to reserve a spot in the June online class!

http://click.mesmerizingmoments.com/

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome {CFS}

This post has been a long time coming, and honestly, I will probably have to “save draft” and pause and come back to it quite a few times before I even finish, because my head get’s all foggy when I’m on the computer for a while.  So who knows how long it’s even been since I started it, and now, when it’s being published, haha.  Please ignore any grammer or spelling errors, haha.  Anyone that knows me knows I am the first one to text back with a correction when you misspell or miss use a word! lol  One of my pet peeves, for sure!  But, I’m not that quick with my mind anymore, and now I’m the one messin up the whole thing!  And dang that auto correct, drives me crazy way more than it used to!!  haha  Anyway, I guess I should stop the ramble, before it gets into who knows what, and start at the beginning.

Right after Halloween, 2012, I got sick, and long story short here … I never got better.

It was a typical day for me, got up at 6:30, got dressed and ready for the gym, got Connor up and ready for school, then out the door at 7:25.  Walked him to class, then came back home to eat breakfast, and clean the kitchen, then out the door for the gym.  I spent about 2 hours at the gym, then came home, made my protein shake, showered, and got ready for the rest of the day.  I ate lunch, ran my errands, then picked up Con from school.  Then we made a snack together, went through his school work, and then I felt bad.  A fever.  I hadn’t had a fever since I was a kid, I’m not the type to run a fever, but man, once you feel fever, you instantly know exactly what it is.  I kept going about half strength through my normally busy afternoon routine, and then crashed at night.  When I woke up the next morning I was fully expecting to be sick, the flu or something, but I felt great!  Went on about my day just like I normally do, and was good to go!  A week later, the same exact thing happened.  I ignored it, and kept going, and then it started to form a pattern.  Every 3 days.  A fever in the afternoon, lasting until the next morning, the chills, sick feeling, and headache.  I could mark it on my calendar.  Every. 3. days.

I went through November like this, and towards the end of the month I really started to notice I was slowing down.  Big time.  And I couldn’t stop it.  I already eat “clean” but I cleaned it up more, and kept going to the gym regularly, despite the fevers and fatigue.  I just knew if I could be healthy, I’d push through.

One day in early December I was trying to push through, and I just hit a wall.  Literally, actually, haha.  I collapsed on the bathroom floor when I was getting ready.  My muscles just quit working.  So I knew something was really wrong, and I went to my family Dr.  She ran tests, asked questions, and sent me for a heart echo.  All normal.  She sent me to the cardiologist, he cleared me, normal.  She ran more blood tests, normal. I ended up in the ER one night, I couldn’t breathe (and with a history of PE’s, we freaked).  Chest CT, chest Xray, blood work … normal.  Normal, normal, normal.  I was starting to get really sick of that word … until she started using a new one – “Oncologist”  Ummm, no thank you, I’ll take “normal” back please!  Oh please!!

Mid December I started working with him, he was awesome, and actually already my dr for the hematology side of things, and assured we’d get to the bottom of it.  Fevers were every single day at this point, and they were wiping me out!!  I had to stop going to the gym, and stop running errands like I used to, and save going out for special occasions.  I was struggling with Connor too, just getting him to and from school was hard.  All the lymph nodes in my neck started getting enlarged.  I was getting blood clots at this point too … hello lovenox.

New sets of tests at this point, scary ones.  More serious blood work, full body CT with contrast … bone marrow biopsy.  My bone marrow was “beat up” with inflammation, but that didn’t tell him more than something was wrong.  He sent me to ENT for pockets in my sinuses seen on the CT, but was cleared there with incidental findings.  No cancer markers, thankfully, that was honestly a scary time!  I had to be cleared by OB/GYN as well, I had ovarian cysts, and one ruptured (ouch!), but my lady parts Dr gave me that “normal” word too:)

Through January to get through all of that, and I was getting worse.  I had to cancel our trip back to Cali for Christmas, so I was upset, and at this point they were asking to admit me, but I was fighting it.  I wanted answers, but I needed a break.  What little energy I had was being spent with Dr’s, at the hospitals, being poked and prodded, and not with my family and friends.  Oncologist finally said it was out of his realm, and sent me to Infectious Disease.   The time it took to get me into an appt was a great break for me, and I was refreshed and ready to go.  I mean, ID doc, how cool is that – think House – this guy is awesome!

In my first appt with him, we closed down the office.  He spent 2 hours with us in the room, face to face, going over EVERYTHING, and then he ordered some more blood work for some crazy off the wall things.  Back in one week.  The only markers in my blood work were ones he said he would expect from somebody getting fevers everyday.  Everything else was normal.

He gave us the term “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” and asked us to do some research.  He didn’t diagnose at this point, but went over a few CFS markers that I clearly had.  Brain fog, fatigue, fevers, “crashing” when I try to do too much, headaches, insomnia, swollen lymph nodes, cognitive/neuro issues, collapsing after pushing myself, which sucks by the way, haha.  He finished with it doesn’t just have a cure, it takes years, about 5.  Back in two weeks.

I knew at this point that was what was wrong with me, and it hit me hard (way harder than when I hit the floor after collapsing).  I wasn’t going to get better, not any time soon at least.  One day I cried on the shower floor for at least 45 minutes.  I couldn’t stop, I was so upset, I wanted my life back.  The next few weeks I got worse, cognitive/neuro wise, and when we went back that worried him, so he wanted a spinal tap.  We put that and a brain MRI on the books, and kept going day to day.

 The spinal tap itself was fine, didn’t hurt, but holy hell to the week following.  That night I got the worst headache ever, and it felt like there was a 100lb weight on my upper spine (not even where they did the tap) It was crazy, my vision was getting really blurry, and I began to be incoherent.  We went to the ER the next day, per the request of the radiologist, for a blood patch, but they wouldn’t do it at first, because of all my symptoms, and I spent 12 hrs there for testing and I don’t even remember it really well, I was completely out of it.  I finally got the blood patch after all of that, the patch itself was horrible, but instant relief!  It was amazing, I could see, and think, and I walked out of there just over an hour later:)  Unfortunately, 12hrs later my blood patch began to fail, and all of those symptoms came back slowly, until I got to a breaking point again, and was incoherent.  James called the radiologist again, and they scheduled for me to come get a new one at their facility, so off we went.  This one was much better, and same thing, instant relief.  After being carried in, I walked out all better.  I was so sooo worried, but that one held, clotted up, and BAM, take that spinal fluid leak! haha  Took a couple days hobbling around from pain, after all they did shove a TON of blood in my spine, and it needed to work itself out, but back to moving on:) 

Last results day.  Back at the ID doc.  Brain MRI normal.  Spinal fluid testing normal.

My opening spinal fluid pressure was really high, so I have to go to Neuro for that now, but he diagnosed me with CFS, and now we are moving forward with that…

So, that is the really short version of my story to get to that devastating diagnosis, of CFS.

I really needed to share it, to explain why things have been slow around here, why I had to clear my books, cancel all my photography sessions the past few months, and why I am closing down the session side of things, and making some business changes.  I will not be offering any sessions for the next year, but I truly hope that all of you will keep this blog bookmarked, and come back to it often, because I do have some awesome things in the works, and I can’t wait to share it with all of you!

So, this blog is going to be making a change.  I won’t be featuring sessions for a while, but I of course will have the occasional “session” that I shoot for myself, and I will be happy to share those!  I am going to move this blog into a catch all, for everything I love, web/blog design, interior design (when we are working on our house), and of course, photography still plays a major part in my life, so photoshop tutorials, photography tips and tricks, all things photography really, and I will still be offering my online photography class, and mentoring others in the community!

I will also still be selling my “Complete Guide For Photographing Your Kids” and “FlipIt” and I am actually working with an amazing digital designer that you all know and LOVE, to bring you fun fresh new ProPhoto Blog Themes – which will be available very soon!   (Like a few weeks now, totally awesome, right?!!)

Thanks for letting me share the start this new journey with all of you!  I have been quiet for a long time now, and the emails I receive about it are so flattering, you guys are all amazing!  Thanks for sticking by me so far, I’m sharing everything now, it was too hard when we didn’t have any answers, and I hope you can all respect that:) I definitely know I don’t want to lose my place in this amazing artistic community, so I hope that all of you will follow my journey still, and be a part of it, as much as you can!  I will be using this blog as my outlet for it all, everything creative in my life, so make sure you come back and visit often:)

AKP Photography - Im so sorry to hear this! I can relate to some of the things youre saying… I have had fatigue for 7 years beacause of food allergies like celiac Disease and various other foods :( But im getting better every year though :)

I hope you feel better soon ♥

James - I love you do much my dear. Through everything you have been so strong and amazing. I promise to be there with you every step of the way! You mean the absolute world to me.

Kendal Knowles - Hi there!!

So your story is extremely similar to mine! It’s amazing what we have in common! I went to school for ID and its a huge passion of mine and I love photography!! I have CFS as well! (Unfortunately we have that in common, Hate It) Been struggling for years with health and after having my son bam! CFS reared its ugly head hard core!!! I have always wanted to connect with someone with the same issues bc well frankly no one understands the daily battle!

I would love to chat sometime and tell you what I have found to be helpful… Not sure you are up for that but I know I could use a battle buddy! :) please feel free to email anytime!!

Mom - Wish we were closer so we could help more. Hoping, slowly but surely you will feel your old self again and return to the things you love so much. Love you, Mom and Dad

Lauren - I love you, sister! I was teary eyed the whole time reading this. You have gone through so much, you are so strong and you have taken this a million times better than I or many people I know could have.

Online Photography Class

I’ve actually been offering my online photography class for about 2 1/2 years now!  Wow … time flies, haha

I took a short break from it this past winter for personal reasons, but I just wanted to let you all know that it is back, and tell you all about it:)

I start at the very beginning, and teach it all!  We open with shutter speed, aperture, ISO, focusing, and learn how your camera does what it does, and why!  I feel learning exactly why your camera functions the way it does is the key to being able to make your camera do whatever you want!  When we move into manual mode, and I get you out of that horrible auto mode option, you will begin to see how much that nice camera is really capable of!  And I know you are going to love it!!  After that, we go through lighting, (and I mean every lighting situation possible), touch on external flash, jump into posing, and composition, and then close it out with a little basic photoshop, & showing off your work.

The class is all set up online in a private forum, where, once a week, for 4 weeks, I will post a lesson and assignment.  The great thing about it being online, is that you don’t ever have to be logged in at a specific time:) You can sit down to get your lesson and assignment whenever it is convenient for you!  That might be 2am, or 10am, Monday, or Friday, whatever works for you!  But, I will log in every day, so I will always be there to answer any questions you have, help you critique a photo, or just help explain something further.  I am an open book during the course, so you can ask me anything you want:)

I’ve been asked quite a few times from beginning photographers if the class would be right for them, and while I ask some more questions as to how they are personally shooting, the general answer is if you aren’t 100% confident in manual mode, in any lighting situation, and know exactly why your camera does what it does, then you would definitely take away a lot from this class:) But, if you have any questions to whether this class is right for you, please don’t hesitate to ask!  I will definitely be honest and open with you, and wouldn’t want you to sign up if you weren’t going to learn anything:)

Here is an example from one of my past students!  I’m like proud momma bear sharing this photo, she did so great!

Before my class / After my class!

 

My next class is starting on Wednesday, May 1st!  The 4 week class is only $75!  Please email me if you are interested, or have any questions!  I love teaching this class and working with all these beginner photographers, and mommies that just want better photos of their kids, and I am very personable, so please don’t hesitate to ask me anything before signing up!  I look forward to working with you!  Thanks:)

Jen Gentry - Thanks! I just sent you an email :) Congrats too!! Exciting!

s.lopez - is there a certificate of completion at the end of your class?
do the subjects have to be children….mine doesnt pop out til june lol :)
if i dnt make the sign up for this class when is the next class and will the rate be the same?
i took a photography class in college but still find myself guessing on how my pic will tyrnout since

Mini Sessions

Just wanted to blog some mini sessions from this past Holiday Season  : )

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And some fun ones too, of course right?!  You know me  : )

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Hope you all had a fabulous Holiday Season!

Now, I don’t know about you, but I am totally ready for Spring!!

HS Senior sessions are already lining up, and I can’t wait to work with the class of 2014!

AKP Photography - Stunning sessions!!

winners!

Congrats to ……

stephanie olsen  &  natasha

You’ve both won the giveaway!

Contact me and I’ll send over the guides, and I hope you are thrilled and love them:)

Happy New Year everyone, thanks so much for helping spread the word about my guide!!  I wish you nothing but the best in 2013, with photography, and all your endeavors!