Evolving...

Had a ridiculous anxiety moment over the weekend over meeting the doctor again this week.  I take heart in knowing that my reaction is normal.

The basics from the appointment.

One, my Hughes Syndrome tests came back negative!  No more aspirin, if I want.  He said with my family history of heart disease it can't hurt to take an aspirin a day.  We are questioning not taking it, only because several of my muscle symptoms did seem to improve upon taking the aspirin.

The blood says it is NOT Lupus.  No way, no how, he said to close the door on that one.

What he says I do have is low Vitamin D and ''evolving fibromyalgia''.

First, the question of my vitamin D.

It seems my body just doesn't know how to synthesize sunlight anymore.  And unless I consume huge amounts of dairy and fatty fish, the number is not going to rise.  All this California sunshine is a waste on me, how sad!  I was told last November that my vitamin D numbers were fine after the eight weeks of 50,000IUI.  A mere six months later and levels are at a twenty-five!  Last June it was a twenty-seven.  Dr. Reuda explained that the range is thirty-two to sixty-five with the optimum number being a 50.

I was prescribed 2000IUI daily for 6 months.  He wants to see how many of my symptoms go away and which stay.  I pulled the list below off of webmd and don't actually suffer from all of them.

There is no clear pattern of symptoms. In fact many people remain asymptomatic despite low levels. But here are the more common symptoms

• Fatigue
• General muscle pain and weakness
• Muscle cramps
• Joint pain
• Chronic pain
• Weight gain
• High blood pressure
• Restless sleep
• Poor concentration
• Headaches
• Bladder problems
• Constipation or diarrhea

I highlighted the symptoms that bother me the most.  Several other websites and articles name depression and anxiety as well.  I am curious to see if the vitamin D treatment lifts my need for Prozac or makes a reduced prescription level possible.  Rich is against this right now and I'm trying to see it from his point of view.  In order to ensure continue matrimonial harmony we have tabled this discussion for now, to avoid a ridiculous argument over a theory being tested and not proven yet.

The only thing left is to see where the fibromyalgia goes, how it develops.  I have six of the eight trigger points and overlapping symptoms with the vitamin D deficiency.  Dr. Reuda's theory is the symptoms left after six months are the primary or secondary disease we are working with.  Auto-immune disease evolve over time, mine isn't finished with me yet.

I continue to tweak my diet.  No artificial sweetners, no soy, no sodas, no dairy, reduced beef consumption, reducing processed foods, and working on reduced gluten intake.  I have noticed a strong correlation to carbs/processed foods and muscle pain/fatigue.  There is a list of the 52 superfoods on my fridge for reference.  I try to incorporate two superfoods into every meal I eat.  

The last ten months have been running head long at testing, MRI's and the revolving doors of medical offices.  We've gone through testing for the scariest, most complicated diseases to come back to the simplest possible answers.  I've learned to go with the flow, accept my daily life as it is, and wait to see what the future is.

What It Feels Like

Going to preface this with....Not looking for sympathy here, not down about life, just trying to put into words how my world has changed.

Two and a half years ago, I was in a terrible mental state after months of not sleeping, anxiety and a depression that hit so hard I could not function.  I do not hide this, my journey thru that darkness is here on the blog.  All that therapy time with Anne brought my passions and life back into focus.  I could see the future clearly and what I wanted.

That battle was fought and won, then the carpet was pulled out again.  Emotionally, that is how I feel.  

Months of doctors throwing all these complicated diagnosis' and treatment protocol at me.  Me trying to absorb all the information and assimilate how it affects my life as a mom and wife.  I had JUST gotten my life back, my husband had just told a friend ''he'd hadn't seen me this happy in years.''

So I lost my marbles again, because my weakened brain couldn't handle the anxiety and stress.

Most mothers will agree, we envision moments with our children in the future.  The day Nora marries is a hazy picture already forming in my brain.  What she will look like, what I will say, the tears of happiness we will cry.  I can see Trent chatting it up with his father on the back porch like two good friends.  My love for these two is held tightly at the center of my soul.

As a mom you want to do EVERYTHING with your kids. Go, go, go!  Daily adventures to stores, playgrounds, museums, art groups, music, ballet, the beach, etc.

Inside of four months last summer, all of that was changed.  So how do you adjust as a mom?

Well, first you get ticked off!  How do you accept limitations on your life because your body is attacking itself?  Most people get pissed, I know I did.

You slow down, take a step back.  Then you go talk to Anne again.

When I talked to Anne this past fall, our focus was on redefining my roll as mom and what that meant with a chronic illness.  My expectations are and were very high, we had to reset that bar.  First she had to help me process all the changes that were being asked of me....I entered a very recognizable cycle of grief.

Denial.  ''I'm fine.  They have meds for things like this.''

Anger.  Pissed. pissed. pissed.  Don't tell me I CAN'T, I will!  How dare this happen! Let's just say, God and a lot of people came under fire.

Bargaining.  Played a lot of 'IF this...then that'' statements with myself.  If this can just be something that doesn't confine me to a wheelchair, I'll be good with that.  God, you hear me....anything where I still walk, and talk, and paint, and sew, and think, and, and, and....oh, I can't have all of that.

Depression:  Enough said.

Acceptance:  So life is going to look different.  What's the plan?

With every new symptom comes challenge, how does that change my day, how do I work around that or compensate.  What I learned from Anne, with a chronic condition you will go thru the grief cycle over and over and over again as the disease progresses.  There will people that readily accept your illness, those that deny it because they themselves are scared.  Let them be scared, you keep marching forward until they find you again.

Don't every let go of family and friends, you will need them.

The bad days can be, well, bad.  Joints feeling like they will explode, muscle spasms that feel like 9-volt batteries zapping me, stumbling over simple vocabulary and ideas, fatigue and dizzy spells.  My basic BAD day.

On these days, I had to learn to do the minimum so I could do the maximum with the kids.  This might not make sense to some of you.  What is the activity that makes me use the minimum amount of energy or muscle that still gives them the best of me?   I don't like telling my kids, ''mommy can't''.  This disease will not be my excuse.

Bad days. Lay in the yard and blow bubbles. Snuggle the kids in for a book.  Pull something from the freezer for dinner.  Have Nora paint my toes.   Play 'patient' with the kids.  Be a bumpy road for Trent's cars.  Read a book for myself.  Skip a play date.

Good days.  Most days are good days.  Feel the sun on my face. Park with the kids. Go to the YMCA. Make a culinary mess of the kitchen. Fly kiddos on my feet. Play monster. Cover the patio with chalk drawings. Put the kids to bed.

Both days end snuggled up to the hubby, both days are good days sung to a different tune.

Dust Wrangler

Oh, great bagless vacuum cleaner, how you challenge me!?  You are my tornado of cleaning happiness.  Every domestic goddess will profess to having a favored chore, one that they actual get glee from.

For me, it's vacuuming.  The anti-thesis would be laundry, how I loath laundry.

Maybe it's the purr of the machine that I find so calming.  Or the idea that in thirty minutes of my time I have cleaned almost 1800 square feet of living space.  Think about this.  You can spend thirty minutes scrubbing your shower grout and have very little to show for the effort.  A broken nail, hands that smell like Clorox, and a toothbrush formed in the 'splech' formation after being smashed into crevices.

The canister must be filled with debris and dust, kitty furr and dust, dried bits of food and dust.  Did I mention the dust here in California?  A veritable dirt devil blows in my open windows about every three days.  It's a catch twenty two living out here on the edge of the desert and mountains.  Great weather equals shutters thrown open to the sun and breeze.  Eh....Georgia had it's pollen too I guess.

Is it just me or is the vortex of yuck being suctioned up just mesmerizing?   I vacillate between feeling victorious over the grime and disgusted that it fills my lungs.  Granted, I'm not just picking up dust.

There is the occasional Barbie shoe or light bright that finds itself getting a vacuum swirly.  I've long past the point of caring to extract these items.  Just like a pretzel, so dies the Lego that stabbed me in the foot at midnight.  The Lego was asking for it.

The kids know mommy is on a mission when I turn the machine one.  The living room will be cleared like a tornado ripping through the prairie.  Declarations of 'move it or mommy sucks it up'' are made as a warning before everything is wisked away to the Land of Fuzz and Dust.

I am ruthless, even Nora's Strawberry Shortcake swimsuit met it's demise when the brush snared a strap and shredded it.  The suit had to die as a warning.

Nothing motivates kids to clean better than recalling the wreckage of toys.

If only I could find a way to intimidate dust.