Showing posts with label Josh Groban. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Josh Groban. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Feeling better

In case you're uncertain, that is a new-fangled thermometer up above. The kind you stick in your ear canal area for a nanosecond and beeeeeeeep it tells you your body temperature. Last night I was above 100 and not feeling so well.

I took two Aleve last evening and then slept for 12 hours straight. I am still feeling tired but better and my temp is now below 100 so it looks like we dodged another bullet. That's great because it's time for another Tysabri infusion and that already knocks me out for a day and some change as it is.

I have to tell you how peaceful I feel when I plug in the Christmas tree lights and turn on Josh Groban's CD. I feel as if I am in a church where it's okay to just be quiet and calm and let your mind wander. It is so wonderful that I am grateful every time I do these two little things. I try to do it every day so it can be one of those gratitude items I put on my mental list.

I've pretty much finished my Christmas cards for my friends and have them ready to go out in the mail. I try and work on a few cards each day for the Holiday Heroes program I mentioned a few posts back. If you can help by sending in a few of your extra holiday cards, it would be greatly appreciated by the service men and women and veterans; I just know it. The veterans are especially in need of some cheer every day of the year and now at holiday time I know there are lots of you out there who can help out in this small way. Please consider it. (And no, once again I have no relation to the Red Cross or Pittney Bowes but I think this is a wonderful idea and it's easy to do.)

So the latest MRIs looked better, many fewer brain lesions but I still have so many daily issues that just don't go away. Like I said, I'm hanging in there with the Tysabri to see what happens as I travel down that infusion highway. Working is a passion of mine with teaching but it takes so much out of me. Sleeping in on the weekends doesn't catch me up as most people would assume. I mean here I am not working courtesy of MS and sleeping somewhere in the 10-12 hour range at night plus at least one nap during the day and that's with 200 mg of Provigil in me.

Once work starts up again, Provigil will shoot quickly up to 400 mg which is basically the max dose and then it just stops working. That whole process makes regular work so difficult.

Not to mention the cognitive stuff that is embarrassing to me. Losing words, using the wrong ones, saying things that make no sense, forgetting how to do things in teaching, forgetting where I was supposed to be going with a story, sigh... all that stuff stinks.

Most of the time if I'm in charge of the conversation I am pretty good at keeping it together but if I get off track due to a shiny thing this crow starts flying in circles. I get lost and my blunders are embarrassing to me. I have always been the smart girl, although I hide it most of the time at work. There I am just funny, crazy, mouthy girl. If other people ask me questions sometimes I'm on the time delay thing where I'm not sure what they just said and what the proper response should be. Or if I get the question I am missing a word, a key word. Drat, it's so frustrating!

I used to be fairly good at Jeopardy and now, well not so much. I don't think Alex will take "Who is that one guy?" as an appropriate answer. At least I have an awesome tree and beautiful music and family and friends that help me to be grateful.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Happy Thanksgiving


I love Charlie Brown and his holiday special so this was the perfect graphic for today's post. I wish you safe travels if you're going somewhere and I wish you great patience if many someones are coming to your house for the bird or tofurkey.

Today I had a wonderful reason to be grateful. Some of you know that both my only brother and only sister are stationed in Iraq as proud members of the US Army. Hooah! This is my sister's second Thanksgiving there and the shine of Iraq is wearing a little thin. Obviously, I haven't seen her except in a few pictures and not heard her voice in over a year.

Today I got to "hear" her a little bit as we were both on Facebook at the same time and we chatted through their Facebook chat option. Just seeing her words made me start to cry and I mean cry, with slobber, snot and the whole ugly look going on. We had a conversation for about a half hour about different things but it was like a piece of her was with me. I am so thankful for that conversation.

Not to mention that track three of Josh Groban's 2007 Noel album was playing then which just about metaphorically kills me every time I hear it. If you don't own his holiday album and you enjoy Christmas music I urge you to walk or drive (according to the speed limit) and purchase a copy. It's fabulous and his voice has really put me in the holiday mood, especially with the tree being up. I derive no royalties from this free plug for Josh but if you have this CD and you like it or you get it and like it, please let me know!

Secondly, I got to see pictures yesterday of both my brother and sister in Baghdad because she was able to visit him last weekend (some sort of regulation when you have siblings in a war zone, they get one weekend together). They took some nice pics together and I saw the pics on Facebook before my parents even saw the pictures. My parents are getting a CD of the pics in the mail and I'll show them the Facebook pics tomorrow on Thanksgiving. Yes, it will be the three of us which is always awkward because everyone is sad that my siblings aren't there. Plus, my siblings relieve some of the tension that exists between just the parents and me.

Today, right this moment, I am listening to this lovely music and I feel peaceful and loving and joyous. In this moment I have faith and hope and I wish that for you, my dear readers, as this special holiday approaches.

Happy Thanksgiving.