Minor delay

Hi all, I will be there on Thursday. Just had too much I wanted to get done today - and no energy to rush through it. I'm just about done now and ready to leave out in the morning. I'm still looking forward to seeing you all.

I wish you all...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Dear family, if all goes well I will be joining you on Wednesday afternoon/evening. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone again!

Love,

Carole

Hooray!

I've survived the workweek! This week has really been rotten. Long slow days at work, and short restless insomniac nights. Grrr. Last night I FINALLY get to bed at decent hour (9:30) am sleeping good then starting to get restless again, but could've pulled off at least another hour when half the dern fire station drives down my street with all sirens! Dogs think this is WONDERFUL, run to the front room and sing along at the top of their lungs! Apparently it was a false alarm, as they left quickly, but it took me 15 mins to calm the guys down and another 30 before I (sort of) fell back to sleep!

Oh well, I still got enough sleep and that's the main thing. Carole without sleep is not a nice person. My fangs start showing, and I get an evil glint in my eye.

My new drugs are having some interesting side effects - but tolerable I suppose. At least until I can find another drug - lol.

I'd better get going - I have many gifts to wrap before I hit the road tomorrow. My friends Carla and Scott have invited me for Christmas supper (lasagna - yum!). She originally had said 1 pm, but forgot that was Bekah's nap time, so it is now supper. I'm actually happier to have it supper. That way, once I get home tomorrow I can hole up and vegetate for a solid 24 hrs. :D I found the Kenneth Branagh production of MacBeth at Big Lots for $3, so I bought it. Have no idea if it's any good, but loved his production of ... heck, I can't remember the name of it! It had Emma Thompson, Denzel Washington, Keanu Reaves and Kenneth Branagh as some of the lead actors. :( Memory is crap lately. Oh well - it was really good, and for $3 I took a chance on it.
I'm also pleased that I found a foam, eggcrate style full size mattress topper for $9. Hopefully it will help ease my aching joints. I had one once before for my twin bed, and seems like it really made the mattress more comfortable.

Frustrated

Ok, I hate to whine (no, not really - but I do try not to inflict it on you too often!) but I am so frustrated. It seems like I've been under the weather since Thanksgiving. :-( Despite Rhinocort and Allegra D I feel like I've been battling sinus drainage forever, and suspect that without those drugs I would've had the sinus infection from hell by now.

The gut is overall feeling better, but the rest of the body aches almost all the time. I don't know if it's from the Crohn's or the new medication. I don't mean to say that it hurts all the time, but if I push myself at all - my legs ache. I even broke down yesterday while at work and bought a new pair of shoes from the uniform shop, with the hopes that the aching was from bad, worn-out shoes. (I don't think it is, but am sure the old shoes weren't helping.)

I had a reasonably easy day at work yesterday, though my gut was a bit upset from the chicken stew on Sunday. I KNEW I should've left the veggies out. (d'uh). I took another two hours of PAL and left at 5:15, ran one errand and got home at 6pm. By 8:30 I was asleep and nothing got accomplished (again!). Grrr...

It's not that I can't function - I just seem to get tired easier. Good news is that I sleep REALLY well nowadays. LOL I was noticing that even over Thanksgiving. When I was tired - wham! It would just hit me.

BTW, Mum and Dad, at this point, I think the trip on Friday will be okay - I'll be able to sleep in, and driving is not exactly strenuous. LOL I've been invited to Carla and Scott's house for Christmas dinner (1 pm) and expect that that will be the only thing I do on Saturday, and no plans for Sunday at all. The laundry is caught up so if I can just get the kitchen clean I'll be in good shape.

Well, I'm awake, not hurting and my nose is running like crazy so I guess it's time to take the Allegra and get something done. Yippee.

Here I am again!

yes, I know I've been a very bad Blogger - it's been over a week since my last update.

So, to start with, overall I'm feeling much better. For those who've been in touch - thank you for your concern. :-) The doc had me stop medicine for a few days and then restart it at a lower dose. My gut is still a bit irritable, but most days I'm feeling myself again. I can still tell when I've pushed too hard - Thursday ended up being a very long day - I was for about 19 hrs, and on Friday I could really tell. Despite a good nights sleep I was still very achy when I woke up. I took it easy on Friday and read/dozed most of Saturday morning as well. Now I'm pretty much back to normal.

I have accomplished very little this week - LOL Julie called yesterday and got my butt out of bed, and I did get most of the laundry done. I've got the last load going now. I have a pot of chicken stew on the stove and it smells so good! That's the real reason I make it - not for the taste, but the smell. (grin)

My big concern this week was whether or not I would have a job. There were the first set of job "reallocations" done this week. http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_60017.asp After I thought about it for a bit, I thought maybe this wouldn't be such a bad thing - and then when I saw what the severance pkg was, I wanted to know where to sign up! My only stipulation would be that health insurance would be continued for at least a year. Did a lot of dreaming about what I could do with that money. I'm now almost hoping that they do offer me one on the next go-round. That should give me time to get house refinanced. I think I'd take the money, use it to upgrade automobile to something more practical, and invest a portion of it in the most essential for resale value home repairs.

I need to do some serious thinking about what I want to do with the rest of my life. They say to do what you love. I love nursing and making a difference in people's lives - but my body doesn't love it so much. I think I'd enjoy learning to be a general contractor - learning the right ways to restore my favorite old homes. Or being an architect - for the same reasons. Of course I'd LOVE to be a photographer-and actually know what the heck I'm doing, instead of winging it -. Research is also a definite option - as everyone knows, I can bury myself in reading material for hours on end without any difficulties at all.

As you can probably guess, I'm getting restless. I'm bored and lonely and looking for things to fill my time. With all this hoopla at work I think about moving again sometimes - it would be nice to be closer to the family - but then I remember the stifling heat in the summer, and wonder if I really want to deal that again.

I think maybe I'll go research photojournalism and see what the opportunities/training/salaries might be for that. See ya on the net!

Dealing...

The human memory is an amazing thing. Did you know that you are incapable of remember pain? You can remember BEING in pain, and how you described it at the time, but you cannot remember the actual feeling. I've decided that this is a wonderful thing - otherwise the species would have killed itself off years ago. Most women would've had one kid, said "I don't think so!" and never done it again! LOL

Yesterday was NOT a good day for me - my Crohn's snuck up and whacked me good. :-( It's so easy to forget how debilitating this damn disease can be - until it rears it's ugly head again. I can handle the diarrhea and the sore butt, but the joint pain gets me every time. It started yesterday around noon - and by 3:30 was pretty much non-stop in my lower back and knees. (Sorry Noel - I tried to get your call but missed you - then never called you back.) It finally started easing up around 10:30, thank God, and I was able to get some sleep by midnight, though I woke up around 3 freezing to death and with my shoulder aching like everything else. That's a new one - it's never gone for my shoulder before. Around 7:30 last night I actually called my doc's answering service - something I've never done in the 10 years I've been diagnosed. He's going to touch base with me today and see how it's going. I am so lucky that he was on call this weekend and not one of his partners. They're great too, but they don't know me.

On other fronts, today is two very special anniversaries. My parents have been married for 39 years now - amazing! And, I can now claim four years cancer-free. :-) I'm pretty happy about that too.

My Tylenol is starting to kick in and take the edge off of the remaining pain - so I guess I'll go work on some of this stuff I need to do for the party tonight. I hope I can pull it off...

The Christmas tree that Daddy decorated for me, being guarded by my regal King and Queen Bear.

Personal property of Carole Lee. May not be used without her permission.

These were all taken at the Chattanooga Chrismas boat parade, Grand Illumination, and fireworks show on Nov 26, 2004. This is a night shot of the fountain at Coolidge park, with the carousel in the background

Personal property of Carole Lee. May not be used without her permission.

After the boat parade, which was great, the boats pulled in closer and lined up to see the firework show



and here're a few firework pictures...





Personal property of Carole Lee. May not be used without her permission.

Thanksgiving Update

Well, guess you want to know what else has been going on? LOL A whole lot of cooking, for one thing! Mum and Dad arrived the evening before Thanksgiving and were able to stay until the following Monday, so we had plenty of time to hang out. We stuffed ourselves silly on Thanksgiving, enjoying a really tender turkey and tons of side dishes, while using my good china and Granny and PawPaw's furniture. I remember eating several holiday meals at that table when I was young - though most of the time I got shunted to the kids table. Invariably I was the kid Granny snagged to set the table - and I remember her showing me where the basic silver went when I was 8 or 9 and had set it all out backwards. (I AM a leftie after all!)

On Friday I started my Christmas decorating -with Dad patiently handing crates up and down the attic ladder for me. Poor guy - nearly every visit he gets to visit my attic! I think he's seen nearly as much of it as I have. We took a break and went down to see the Chattanooga boat parade and Grande Illumination which I had never seen. What fun! The fireworks were spectacular and I got a few good pics. I'll post them next. If there were any good boat parade pictures then Mum probably has them, as most of mine were crap. On Saturday I finished decorating the living room and dining room and on Sunday I decorated the parlor. Daddy decorated my miniature tree in the dining room for me - and it looks spectacular! I even found some little 'rice lights' to put on it so it lights up and everything. I'll post a picture of it too.

Dad caught a cold while he was here :-( so he spent a lot of time resting his eyes in front of the TV, while Mum decided she wanted to sew and made herself a totebag from some leftover awning material that I had. We went to an estate sale, and though it was slim pickings, I did manage to pick up a nice bedspread and scarf.

For the most part we just hung out, puttering around the house, reading and dozing. The boys entertained us several times with a 'sing' - which my parents had never experienced - lol. It was nice having them here - especially since they'd never before seen my home decorated for Christmas!

Since they left, I've been busily keeping my doctors in business. (sigh) As you may know, the Remicade infusion that I had been taking to control my Crohn's disease stopped working for me and I've not been on any medication since my last infusion in September. Dr. Yates did a bunch of blood work and studies and was strongly considering putting me on cyclosporine. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/medmaster/a601207.html - for information on cyclosporine. When I met with him yesterday, he told me that he'd discussed my case with several other physicians, to see if they had ever had patients similar to me - with rectal/perianal Crohns that just doesn't seem to respond to all the normal treatments. We're a small and select group, apparently, but I am NOT the only one. Gee what a relief! LOL All the docs recommended trying Tacrolimus. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/medmaster/a601117.html - for info on tacrolimus. While there are not yet large group studies, small group and anecdotal evidence shows a strong positive response to tacrolimus. Cyclosporine does not have the same type of success rate. Dr. Yates is leaning strongly towards using T instead of C, and after discussing it, I'm game to give it a shot. If all goes well, I'd start it next week. He is still determining the best dosage for me as he's never used in in a Crohn's patient before, though he's very comfortable with it with his liver transplant patients. I just want my butt to stop hurting. One fellow IBD'er on the IBD sucks board used to call it 'taco butt' - so appropriate! ROFL

By the way - I would not be taking either of those drugs at the levels shown in the information. The drugs were originally developed to stop organ rejection in transplant patients - obviously I won't have need of that high a dosage.

On another front, I was really disturbed when my bloodwork came back showing worse blood sugar values than before I started on medication! Talk about frustrating - I saw Dr. Large today about that, and he is inclined to leave things as they are and recheck it in two months. He suspects (and I agree now that I've thought about it) that the higher levels are due to the Crohn's flaring up - not a worsening of the 'metabolic syndrome' - aka pre-diabetes.

I'm 37 and my body is falling apart on me - sigh. What will 67 be like at this rate?!

On an upside - Mum and Dad will be happy to hear that I found the outdoor lights I wanted at Target! Hooray! The spacing was right and everything - so I didn't need to hang more hooks or do more than shake the lights out, hang 'em up and plug 'em in. All done! And Bob called me a few hours ago and left a message that Rebecca Audrey Meier arrived this morning just after 10:30 am, at 20 inches and 8+ pds. Congratulations and love to the new parents!!!