Sun Shine and Rain

I don't really know where to start with this. It has been a long time since I have posted and so much has happened since November. I have been home from school since December and it is great being home but I miss Hawaii. I had a great last semester. I worked nearly 50 hours every week between my two jobs and managed to get good grades. I was not able to get my stomach issues figured out while I was there so I was not feeling my best but I had a good time hanging out with Anna on the weekends and relaxing on the beach. I was sad to leave at the end of the semester but I was also excited to come back home and be with my family and Tim.
After the holidays I started my internship at Child Protective Services. I was working 40 hours a week (for free) and had some school work that I had to do on line in order to get the credit for the class. I learned so much about my self and social work with CPS. Every day I learned something new and I discovered that I really do love working with children and I enjoyed the investigation part of CPS. Also I was able to really connect with the social workers in the CPS unit and they all thought that I was the best intern that they had had in a long time. I was really excited to hear that because I was working hard to learn everything I could from them and I was trying to be as helpful as possible. The supervisor really liked me as well and even said that I could have a job on her team as soon as the hiring freeze lifts off the department. I saw a lot of scary things working CPS. There are so many family here in Whatcom County that are struggling with mental illness, poverty and drug abuse. I never would have thought that it would be this bad here. Pretty naive of me to think that but there is so much that we don't see living in my middle class bubble. Over all it was a great learning experience and it is defiantly a job that I could see my self doing and enjoying. I worked with CPS for a total of 470 volunteer hours over three months.
My stomach, yep it gets a paragraph all to its self. In Hawaii the doctor could not come up with a solid reason for my symptoms so he prescribed me some antidepressants and said I had IBS caused by to much stress in my life. I guess he thought that moving away and going to school full time and working full time was to much for my body to handle and the antidepressants would help my colon function regularly. HA! I really did start laughing when he said that. He doesn't know much about my past obviously because I am not stressed out (I was living on the beach.. really) and being a serious athlete all my life my body has endured much more. Any ways I tried the medicine just to prove that he was wrong and it actually made everything worse. I took that for about two weeks and then decided that I was better without it. When I got home I made an appointment with GI here in Bellingham. I was so tired of dealing with this issue and feeling sick everyday that I decided to do whatever it took to get this stupid thing figured out. The doctors here decided that they needed to do a colonoscopy. The worst part about this was drinking that terrible nasty jug of goo that "cleans you out" it was a really fun 12 hours. They didn't find anything wrong with my colon and decided that I would need to have a cat scan done. So I did that and again the worst part was drinking the nasty goo that makes your insides glow. They didn't find anything wrong in that either. I was pretty sure they wouldn't because I don't think it is something that is physically wrong with me, I think I have some sort of bug that I caught in Haiti three years ago. After all these test I talked to my doctor about putting me back on the antibiotics that I was on for a few weeks last summer that made me feel great and normal. He agreed and said that long term on this particular antibiotic could kill whatever was in me. So I was on that medication for two months taking a pretty heavy dose three times a day. I have been feeling great! It started working about a week after I started taking it and I have been off the medication for about a month now and I still feel really good so hopefully I can be done with that. I don't want to say that I'm cured because I am still worried that it wont last but here's hoping that it does.
Home life! I have been living at home since mid December. When I moved out after high school three years ago all the rooms were rearranged and I no longer had one. Then after coming home after my first year away at school I used the old office as my bedroom but that has since been turned into the girls room. This year when I came home it was decided that I would be sharing the big bedroom with Kelsie. This has been working out pretty good. Kelsie and I get a long good and haven't had any real problems with sharing a room and a bed. We are both looking forward to Katie leaving for school though because one of us will get her room for a few months and I wont have to tell people that "yea I live at home and even better I share a room, bathroom and a bed with my 14 year old sister!" It has been nice being at home and a part of the family. Also having food that I don't have to buy is great too.
School! I officially graduated from college on April 9th 2011! Graduation was a lot of fun. It was great to see some of my old friends and teachers and to show my parents and Katie around the school and Laie. The graduation ceremony was really good and I was able to shake Elder Nelsons hand. It was also great to spend a week in Hawaii after being home in the rain for three months! I really hope that I will be able to go back there again soon. I really love the people there and I fell like I fit in really well. When I was showing my family around the area it was like I was showing them around my home, I would love to live there and work as a social worker there at least for a little while.
Now...
I am a 20 year old college graduate with my bachelors in social work, working the same summer job that I have had for the past two years; living at my parents (sharing a bed with my sister). I am not really sure what I next for me but I have a little bit of time to figure that out. I know that I will be going to graduate school in the near future but I don't know where yet, I will have to start that application process over in about a month. I'm thinking about applying to UW and UofU again and applying to UH because honestly who wouldn't want to go to school in Hawaii. I also need to look for a social work related job so that I have some field experience to put one my applications.
Tim :)
Long distance really isn't fun it makes the phone bill really expensive, luckily for me my parents still pay that one. When I was in Hawaii Tim and I texted constantly and we would spend hours talking on the phone whenever we could. We really got to know each other and I love talking with him. There where some days that we would talk for three hours and the time would go by so fast. It was great for me to have some one I could talk to about everything. I also loved getting to know him and hear his stories. I think that we got to know each other better being a part for that three months than we would have if we were together because we had to talk and learn how to communicate with each other. It was been great since I've been home. We hang out every day for at lest a few hours. Everyone in my family really likes Tim too and he loves my family which is a great plus. He also was baptized the last Saturday in February so that was super exciting as well. He has really taken to the church and I love having him there with me every week. We have been dating for ten months now. He is amazing.
Well that's all that I have for now. I will be bored at work so hopefully I will be able to blog more often even though there isn't much going on right now.