Changing course

When I first started this blog I was a woman who wanted to write about my experience with multiple sclerosis and I did. I spent most of the first year telling my story as I bounced from Copaxone to Rebif to Tysabri with some steroids thrown in for good measure.

So where am I now?

I've been on Tysabri for almost two years now and I am in remission. I haven't had a flare in a long time. I do have some symptoms daily but they are minor, mostly muscle twitches called fasciculations all over my body. Sometimes other people can see them as my skin ripples along. They don't hurt and I'm used to them.

I also have fatigue issues which tire me out easily. During the school year I medicate with Provigil which is a medicine for narcoleptics. It keeps me awake and alert, especially since I rarely sleep all the way through the night.

On occasion I'll get some terrible cramps in my legs that can last for a long time. I also am very heat intolerant and spend most of my time indoors by a fan or in air-conditioning. That's the gist of my MS at the moment.

The diabetes however is not in control. I'm on three medications and testing my blood twice a day. I have had mostly high numbers with a few readings in the 100s. Then I got my period and the numbers have gone high again. It's frustrating.

I have cut the frappes down to one small once a week. I have cut out the Dunkin' Donuts except for once this past week. I stopped ordering out from Canale's and they probably think I have dropped off the face of the Earth as I used to order from them every other day.

I'm working on the diet and the exercise (which I will admit has been few and far between this past week which is an anomaly). I am taking my meds. I am testing my glucose levels. I am looking at the carbs in food. I am drinking my water. I want my diabetes to get under control now and it just doesn't work that way. (Imagine me pouting.)

When I started all of this writing I was a very angry, very fat, very inactive and sad person. I had been in therapy for about eight years when I started this blog. Now I am out of therapy, out of the anger that fueled me for years, exercising, down twenty-five pounds, and able to see a better, healthier future.

What a difference a year or two can make! I am actually looking forward to a new day, a new month, even turning 40 in September. Even with obstacles in the way I'm not giving up; I'm just changing my course.