I finally have my bling back OR Why have I not been hit on in the past 4 months?

I haven't worn my wedding band or engagement ring since August and finally, finally was able to put them both back on last Friday. I feel like a newly engaged girl: I literally can't stop looking at my ring finger and admiring how lovely, shiny and sparkly my rings look!

Why this ring wearing hiatus? Well. It really is an embarrassing story. Back in August we flew home from the Democratic Convention in Denver (that was really just a gratuitous link to remind you that I was there!) and went straight to my parents' house to pick up Lucas. As a thank you for watching him for the week, Abel was going to replace their two old and ugly ceiling fans. So, we all trooped to Home Depot. While we were there, my rings started feeling really tight and I couldn't get them off my fingers. Long story short, I totally freaked out and we spent about an hour back at my parents' using every trick in the book to get them off. Now, remember, I was just recently off prednisone which had made me balloon up like a marshmallow woman, I had just flown, it was hot hot hot and humid. Looking back, I am certain that had I just been able to chill out and leave my finger alone for a few hours the rings would have slid right off. But. No. I was obsessed. And with each attempt (Yes! Crisco will work!) my finger got more and more red. More and more swollen. And, I got more and more panicky.

Finally, I gave in to my mom's suggestion that I go to their trusted and close-by jewelry shop to have them cut off. Extreme? Yes. Warranted at the time? Yes.

It was a truly awful experience, not painful, just awful to have them CUT off. Yet, when they were off, it was such pure relief. And, as suspected, in just a few hours my finger was just fine.

My rings? Well, those were cut and mangled.

At first I relished my bare left hand. After all, I was securely married. Who says I need the rings to prove it? Then, I started to desperately miss my rings. I felt so bare and empty without them.

Yet, I never got myself to a jewelry store to fix them. Partially this was because, while my plain band and solitaire diamond are modest in comparison to many others, that diamond is, by far, my most expensive piece of jewelry. I didn't know where to take it!

So, over Christmas I took it back to my parents' jewelry store to have them fixed. And, um, sized up just a tad.

And now I have them back -- perfectly fixed, polished and looking like the day I first put each of them on.

Oh how I missed my bling!

Yeah, and I'm trying not to let my self-esteem get too hurt by the fact that after more than FOUR months without wedding rings I was not hit on once. Not once. (Let's just blame it on the diaper bag, okay?)