I wanted my marriage to last forever. Doesn’t everyone when they wisk off to their honeymoon? Time changes people, left over baggage changes people. So instead of staying in an unhappy marriage, I got out. I did that to give myself a chance at happiness yet I’m the most depressed I’ve ever been. Maybe until now, until I really thought this through, I did everything possible. I shouldn’t be beating myself up, but patting myself on the back because I wasn’t a perfect wife, but I was a damn good wife.

Everything has to do with attitude. Mine needs a huge overhaul. It would not only help my fibro, but my outlook on life, my future life. I don’t know what it will be like, but focusing on the darkness that may become doesn’t do me any good but will only lead to a self fulfilling prophecy in which my future WILL become that darkness. If I focus on the good things, my writing, my willingness to get better then my future looks a lot brighter than I ever thought it might be.

Only way I know this is I have good friends who have been there every step of the way, like Camille, like Tiffany, and especially my Mother who I know beyond any doubt, loves me unconditionally.

I don’t have to focus on the fact that I’m part of the 50% that failed, but I’m part of the 50% that might have made the right decision so that I can leave room for happiness and joy.

I have a doctors name on a piece of paper sitting here in front of me that has helped so many people I know personally. All I have to do is make the call. I haven’t done that yet because I was stuck focusing on never getting better. I’m going to call this doctor today, and start the journey of getting better because at this point I can’t get much worse. I don’t want to be bedridden next month and that’s where I’m headed. I have to stop this disease in it’s tracks and try to live while I have the ability.

Today, I want to try. I’ll have my days where my goals are fuzzy especially when that day is a bad fibro day, but if I can go back and read this post the haziness might clear a little even if the sun doesn’t shine.

I can do this ..

After saying that you might think of me as an old woman who’s had her kids which left the nest a long time ago and that my days are spent gardening happy humming in my retirement. When I was in high school I used to think that 30′s were the responsible adults who somehow grew lame and boring the minute of their 30th birthday.

To be perfectly honest I still feel like I’m in my early 20′s because I can’t wrap my mind around how time continues to go faster the older I get. I remember hearing this from my parents growing up and being a child there was no way I could understand it until now as I’m experiencing it. Sigh.

I sometimes feel that I hardly see the dust trails before the second lap is halfway through. I know it is something I’ll never catch again, like I could when I had tea parties with the mad hatter when I was once pretending to be Alice.

My friend Chriss used to work at Petsmart training doggies so I think I might enroll Molly into the puppy class so we can get some manners out of her. She is also having problems with separation anxiety. Now that I’m home all the time she’s around me all the time. If I go take a shower or go to the bathroom or go outside where she can’t get access to me she doesn’t even care about toys or food, she just sits and cries until I have the door open or I’m back in the house, or she has some sort of access to reach me she’s fine.

She does pretty good in the kennel. We don’t leave for long periods of time. I think the longest we’ve left her in there was 2 hours. She’s still so small and we’re still working on potty training and her bladder is so small that we make sure to get back home soon to take her potty. She only cries for about 5 minutes and then sleeps. Once we get home she cries and lets us know how horrible it was being left alone. She’s really quite the drama queen when it comes  to that.

Anyway, I’ve been missing out on swimming because I’ve been so fatigued lately. I saw my primary care doc today and he put me on something new to help with the fatigue and took me off even more meds (YIPPEEEEE!!!!) and whatever it was that he put me on really works. I haven’t been this awake in days. Now we need to get my back fixed and I’ll be set.

My pulmonary doctor did my allergy test. There were about 80 different things they were testing for. If it wasn’t so ironic and I didn’t already sort of know it anyway, the one and only thing I’m allergic to is my cats, out of 80 different things. That’s good since I’m in allergy america.

I have tell a funny about my husband. They take me out to do a breathing test on one of their machines so as I’m heading back to room 8 where they placed us in the first place I thought I smelled something foul. It got stronger the closer I got to my room and when I walked into my room, BAM.

“Did you fart?
“About a min after you left, you can still smell it?
“You can smell it all the way out in the hall!!!!!!!”

So here I am with two magazines wafting the air, hoping the smell either goes away or just gives up and stops stinking.

I saw my doctor coming so I put away the magazines really fast and sat on the bed. He walks in, looks around and says,

“Um, lets use the room next door, I’ll get one of the nurses to do your allergy test”

My husband cleared a room. With his butt. I was so embarrassed at the time, but the minute I walked out I was laughing. I told him he couldn’t do that and to go to the bathroom next time. He’s the only one I know who can have scentless farts so you never know what your going to get. Not that day. That day, he literally cleared a room.

They did schedule an endoscopy on me for this Thursday to look at the blockage in my airway and take a possible biopsy. They will put me out for a small time and my boss told me if I need to take the day and work from home that would be fine. I told him we’ll see.

Yesterday the majority of us went home because the A/C wasn’t working and it got to be 90 degrees in the office. I was sweating like a whore in church. I hope they have it fixed today.

Not sure why I’m up early but it feels good and I slept in the recliner last night so I don’t have any sort of backache. I give my MRI scans to my pain doc next week. I want to try and scan them all first tho, even if they are a little big. What’s a good stitching program?

When it rains, people here in Georgia people loose their ability to drive. Its like they reverted back to the first time ever got in a vehicle for the first time accidently putting it into reverse and driving through the garage door, as their parent in the passengers seat tries not to blow a gasket knowing it was only a mistake.

You’ll see drivers driving 15 mph and others (usually in trucks) that are going 15-20 miles over the speed limit slowing down only when they start hydroplaning.

The doctors office was right above the Lung Clinic that I go to. We were 15 minutes late due t the weather and the street lights being being down. We also had to wait for a train. I filled out all the necessary paperwork and nearly 2 hours later I actually got to see the doctor.

Even tho my labs showed my thyroid was low she wants me to stay off my thyroid meds. She said I would probably gain all my weight back that I lost and she wants to get a blood test in two weeks. Right there was enough to make me upset. Nothing has worked to help me lose weight except this so I wasn’t thrilled with this idea. I started crying and she turned to my husband and said “since she isn’t comprehending what I’m saying can you write this down” like I wasn’t even sitting there in the same room. I’ve lost so much weight and it feels damn good. When you have 65 pounds less of your body and knees it’s indescribable. Thinking of gaining that back just isn’t remotely ok with me.

After I gained my composer a bit I started asking her the questions I had planned to ask her before I went in. She didn’t answer a single one of them and told me come back in 2 months to do some blood work and see where we were with things.

I think I saw her for about 10 minutes. Maybe 15.

As I passed b the desk to check out I gave them my slip and when the nurse went to schedule my appointment I told her I wasn’t coming back. Once I got home I called my PCP and told his nurse of my experience and they suggested another doctor for me to see.

Its rare to see a doctor with any type of bedside manner anymore (or nurse for that matter, not talking about you Hillary Gayle, your going to be the best nurse ever!)

So, I’m back to being extremely discouraged and frustrated. How much longer can I do this?

Things started off on a good foot on Monday when I was ready for my Doctors appointment hours early. It always feels better to be ready for upcoming plans than to remember at the last minute and be rushed forgetting your head along the way. I met my new doctor with heightened anxiety as I’ve had such bad luck in the last year heath wise and doctor wise. I didn’t let myself hold high expectations for this guy like I had for the other worthless pill pushing, money stealing, non-helpful SOBs I’ve encountered within this last year. The only problems I can remember is having a little bit of difficulty in finding the actual office when it was in a medical park where the buildings all look alike only with different names on the front doors. When I finally found the right office I had my new patient paper work in hand and ready to turn in. When I finally met the doctor I didn’t let my guard down. I brought him up to speed of all the falls I’ve taken over the last year, everything I had been diagnosed with and how my health and body on our this downward spiral with no one to help me. I explained to him the mis-haps of the other doctors and I was finally validated when he told me that the Fibro and Fatigue Center was raping me for all the money I had, putting me on pills and medications that were completely un-needed and ordering tests that weren’t even in the same planet as to the actual illness at hand. It upset me to being duped, but at the same time I felt better knowing I had made the right choice in leaving.

I had with me all my blood tests and all other tests that I had gotten copies of. For any doctor I’m sure it had to be overwhelming and he wasn’t hiding that fact but he was also extremely concerned. Maybe it was my emotional self or maybe it was because he saw something between the lines, like some sort of pattern that alarmed him, but whatever the case he wanted to go over the stack of papers I gave him and didn’t want to wait to see me again so we could sit down and figure out what was going on. He scheduled me in for next week so he could get my medical records from the other doctors. Before we left he said he would always be upfront in the process of making me well and he would always make sure I was fully aware of any tests or medication or treatment I would be going through. He said he was honest when it came to that and he would never go through until he knew I fully understood. Just from his blunted honesty at the beginning of the appointment I knew he was telling the truth. He didn’t seem like he had any reason to lie, but he said he would get to the bottom of it, and reassured me of that. So now I have a new doctor, who feels he couldn’t wait to see me and wants me to come back in a weeks time. That’s pretty impressive. I was impressed.

Today I saw my lung doctor too. After my 6 minute walk around the office it was determined that I do not have to be on oxygen anymore and I’m allowed to go back to work, in the actual office instead of here at home. Instead of calling my boss I’m going to make a surprise appearance tomorrow. One of my tech’s called me tonight just to see how I was doing. I have a good team of guys that work hard, it makes it easier to be their boss.

Finally, I was able fall asleep and it took a full 24 hours for my health bar to regain its full strength. The bad thing about this is it’s 3:30am so there isn’t much luck going back to sleep after I’ve already woken up. I tried, didn’t work.

I did however take another fall in the bathroom. I think my shoes were still wet from being out on the back porch trying to get my dog to come back inside I landed square on my right knee. For people with Fibro, falling has to be the worst. It’s not just a fall. It’s a total body flare up so not only does my knee hurt but my body feels like its just been through the meat grinder. Ouch.

My plan is to work early and go see my new doctor at 1pm. I hope he helps. I’m really tired of this doctor hopping. Mom keeps telling me there is a doctor out there that will help me and after a year my 8 ball is saying that things are looking grim. I’ll keep trying. What else can I do at that point?

I’m looking forward to the 31 days to a better blog challenge.

THIS SHOULDN’T BE MY LIFE!

But it is. This is how it is day in and day out. The basics of caring for myself have been taken away for me. It makes me angry in so many ways that’s it’s changed who I am. Luckily my husband still loves me and supports me 100%

When I was in the hospital a few weeks ago my Mother was picking up some meds from CVS. My Mother is the type that talks to EVERYONE, god love her. It used to be annoying as a kid because I had ADD so bad I wanted to go go go, not wait until Mom stopped talking to people. Well, this talk she had with this woman at CVS her experience and struggle was shockingly similar to mine. She had gone to all the doctors I had until she found the right doctor to help her. She gave my Mother his name and where he was located so both Mom and I googled him this morning. He sounded wonderful on his web site. There was even a link that said “Update me about your condition” like he really cared how his patients were doing. You could imagine my shock at that. When I called the office I talked to the receptionist. I explained to her about my fibro, arthritis, and hypoxemia and asked her if this doctor had any experience dealing with that. Her answer was “oh yes Ma’am” .. then I asked the hardest question of all. I told her I had really bad luck with doctors just pushing pills at me without actually fixing the underlying issue. She said “he’s not like that. If he can’t fix what is wrong or if you are too severe of a case he will tell you who can”

SOLD!

I’m trying not to keep my hopes up. I’m trying but my hopes are high at this point and I just don’t want there to be any sort of let down. I keep thinking every doctor I see is going to be my miracle and every doctor thus far has been my downfall.

So here’s to new found hope. Oh, I forgot to say, he’s getting me in THIS monday. That’s fast. Wish me luck.