The medicine of a simple visit

December 17, 2011

Knowing that I’ve been stuck at home a lot, my parents came over for a visit today.  They don’t live very far away, but they rarely visit.  Usually when we see each other it is at their house, where I grew up.  Since I’ve been staying closer to home, they came over for a visit with their pooch.

It was a simple visit.  We talked, we took a walk, we had dinner.  I pet the dog.  I played with the dog.  I sat with the dog.  It was an easy visit.  Today was a good day, and I felt up to moving around, which was great.  Having company was fantastic medicine.

When you’re fatigued, in pain, or otherwise stuck at home, remind your friends and family that visits can help.  So many of us get offers of help, but the truth is, I don’t always need help with errands or cooking, sometimes I just need some stress-free, activity-lite time with loved ones.  We all need to be alone at times, but we also all need to be around the people we care about and who care about us.  Sometimes it’s just that simple.

 

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2 Comments | Educating, Expectations, Isolation, Kindness, Limitations, Medication, Pain, Raves, Support, Symptoms, Thoughtfulness, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Getting back the unintentional smile

December 15, 2011

This past month has been a real bitch.  Fatigue sucks.

One of the hardest parts has been feeling so down all the time.  Sometimes I couldn’t tell if I was sad or tired or depressed.  I knew I didn’t have my usual pep.  I’m generally a happy, cheerful person, and that was definitely gone.

Today should have terrible.  I over-exerted myself last night and went to bed too late.  I was woken up very early by outside noise, and forced to get out of bed.  I should have been a mess, but I felt ok.  I actually felt pretty decent.  How odd.  It took me longer than it should have to get out of the house, but I tried not to pressure myself too much, and hey, at least I made it out before lunchtime!  I took a quick walk down the street to the library and CVS, then came back home for lunch.  And I wasn’t exhausted.  Weird….. Good… but weird.  Even stranger, I noticed random people on the street smiling at me.  A few made random comments (Good morning. Did you see what that driver was doing?)  I didn’t feel any happier, but I did feel that the cloud was starting to lift.  Maybe strangers saw it too?

I really needed to do something about Prednisone boobs, so after lunch I drove to a store I like that carries unusual sizes and tried on everything they had that was an option.  I should have been exhausted, but I wasn’t.  I was a bit tired, but ok.  I made friendly chit chat with the woman helping me.  Hmm… that feels more like me.  It felt good to be friendly and pleasant again.  And she was pleasant back.  And hey, I was smiling!

On the way home I stopped for groceries.  It was late afternoon and the store was getting crowded.  I took my time finding the right items, asking a clerk for help, trying hard to make sure I’m keeping a healthy diet (ugh.)  The clerk kept apologizing for taking so long to check in the back, for making me wait, for not having the item, and I kept assuring her it was fine.  I didn’t care.  I wasn’t in a rush.  Woah, it’s like the old me!  Not rushed (unless I had to be) and patient.  The checkout lines were long, but I was in no hurry (though beating rush hour would be nice.)  A new register opened up and the cashier asked me to come over.  I said not to worry, that I was fine waiting, and that the woman behind me with the very full cart and the obviously-bored child go ahead.  She looked incredibly grateful.  I felt good.  Hmm, I wouldn’t have done that a few days ago.  Ok, I couldn’t overlook that one, something was definitely different.

By the time I got home I was feeling it: I was tired.  Still, it wasn’t the fatigue I’ve been feeling lately, just the old kind of tired.  I sat and rested for a while.  I listened to an audio book.  I ate dinner and watched a movie and now it’s about time for bed and I feel… OK!  I FEEL OK!  I want to shout it from the rooftops.

This might not last.  Maybe tomorrow I’ll feel great, maybe tomorrow I’ll feel horrible.  I’m just so grateful for today.  These good minutes, hours, days, weeks, and sometimes months are such a gift and I’m so grateful for them.  Did I say that already?  Well it’s true.  Thank goodness for today.  I would have survived physically, but mentally and emotionally it was getting really tough.  I feel renewed.

I just hope it lasts.

And every day that this lasts, I will use it.  I will cross off items on my to do list, I’ll write, I’ll clean, and more importantly I’ll help others.  Maybe I can’t do volunteer work at a charity or help a friend move, but I can let someone cut ahead of me at the grocery store, and for now, that’s enough.

 

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Leave a Comment » | Expectations, Isolation, Kindness, Limitations, Raves, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Thinking about how to think

December 13, 2011

Do you think?  Do you use your brain?

I used to believe that if I didn’t have a job, my brain would atrophy, that it would grow weaker and weaker and turn to mush.  Then when I quit my job a few years ago, I found out that I was wrong.  I wasn’t using my brain in the same way, but I was still using it.  I was volunteering and reading and having deep conversations with friends and acquaintances.

This time it’s different.  This time I feel lousy.  I watch a lot of tv.  I read less.  I talk to people less because I don’t feel up to it.  I can’t volunteer.  And to be honest, a lot of the time I just don’t want to think.  It feels like too much effort.

But then over the last few days I’ve really used my brain and it feels GREAT!  First, I read a book (well, listened to the audiobook) about the dumbing down of American women.  Men are being dumbed down too, I’m sure, but this book focuses on women.  The author made a lot of great points and really got me to think about things.  It was wonderful.

Then today I helped a friend with some basic accounting.  He started a small business and didn’t know how best to keep track of his income or expenses.  Since I’d done some accounting before, I volunteered to help.  Last week got organized and I showed him the basics.  He entered all of the data into his system, and today I showed him how to do the rest.  It was so wonderful to be using that part of my brain again!  I hadn’t thought about anything accounting-related in years (unless you count my own finances, which are sadly very simple.)  Every now and then we came across an issue that I wasn’t sure how to handle, so I had to think, to reason it out, and to come up with a solution that was easy for my friend to continue in the future, made good accounting sense, and of course was straightforward and legal.  It felt so good!

I’m still going to watch way too much tv as I sit on the couch feeling weak, but I know that I also need to find more time to really think  about difficult situations, to reason things out.  I’ll have to start doing crossword puzzles or sudoku or something.  It really doesn’t matter what I do, but I have to use my brain.  I’ve only been out of work for a couple of months, but I can already feel the decline.  I hope we can all find things that work for us, things that make us think!

 

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2 Comments | Expectations, Isolation, Job, Limitations, Raves, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Prednisone boobs

December 12, 2011

They should add “boob growth” to the warning label on Prednisone.  It can’t just be me.

This is just plain wrong.  Our society seems to think that women should aspire to have the largest breasts possible, but that’s just absurd.  I will never understand why women get risky plastic surgery just to get bigger boobs.  And why is there so much pressure on a part of our body that we can’t control naturally?  It makes no sense at all.

When I was in high school, my bra size was a very natural 34B .  This worked for me.  I could go bra-less if I really wanted to, and I could easily wear a strapless.  This was good.  Near the end of high school, my period got so heavy that one day I passed out from the loss of blood.  The doctors put me on birth control pills to regulate it.  Of course, if they had tested me they would have discovered that I had PCOS, but I had a crappy 1990s HMO that didn’t bother with silly things like thoroughness.  But that’s a story for another day.

Suddenly, because of the Pill, my size went up to a 34C.  This was surprising, but not too bad.  I knew that I was too large for my petite frame, and I felt awkward about it, but what could it do?  Eventually I got used to it and I stayed a 34 C for many years.

Then several years ago I went on Prednisone.  I’d been on it before, but this time, for the first time, I gained weight.  I grew in my stomach, my ass, my thighs…. and my boobs.  I flew past 34D so fast that I almost missed it, then landed on 34DD.  Well, that was weird.  It was also uncomfortable.  I was annoyed, but glad that I hadn’t gotten any bigger.  I was shocked to find this size laid out on store racks when I was in London around that time; over here it’s much harder to find.  Still, there are some stores that sell it for prices that won’t break the bank, and occasionally I can even find one that isn’t black, white, or beige (though I still miss my collection of pretty colors, lace, and satin from back in the days of 34C.)

After a lot of hard work, I managed to lose most of the Prednisone weight, but my boobs didn’t shrink.  When I went on Prednisone again earlier this year, I gained back all of the weight and them some!  I’m too fatigued to exercise, so I’m not losing it at all now.  Still, I had accepted the temporary (I hope!) weight gain for what it was, and I was ok with it, until my bra size changed again.  I thought 34DD was difficult, but now I’m a 34F!  That is just wrong, so very very wrong.

They’re heavy, really heavy.  My bras are huge.  The straps pull on my shoulders.  Shirts are hard to fit (because of our society’s ideal of big boobs, shirts are designed to make small women look bigger, not to make big women look smaller.)  The bigger they are, the more they sag.  If you’re big, you know about boob sweat.  If you’re small, be glad you don’t know about it.  (A smaller friend of mine thought I was making it up, until she got pregnant.  She immediately told me she was grateful for the smaller boobs she’d always complained about, and was glad when they returned.)  And then there’s sleeping.  They really get in the way when I’m trying to sleep.  I wake up during the night sometimes, because I’ve rolled over and my boobs have gotten in the way.  It’s harder to breathe (though that could be the extra weight in other areas too.)  Men stare at them more, and those probably aren’t the men that I want attention from.  And then there’s sex.  With others or by myself, it is just wrong when a boob is too big to fit in a person’s hand.  Boobs are an important part of foreplay and sex (at least, they are for me) and it’s much harder to do what I want to be done when they’re so big that they can’t fit in a hand!

Now I’ll be honest, if I manage to lose the Prednisone weight, losing it in my boobs wouldn’t be my first choice.  I’d like to lose it in my stomach first.  But boobs come second, even before my ass and thighs.  Those may not look good now, but big boobs are just inconvenient and annoying!  Damn you Prednisone!

 

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46 Comments | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Rants, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

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