The Time of My Life



Ah… The bliss of long weekends. Today is Canadian Thanksgiving and although I never really got into the habit of eating turkey, I do like the part where you remember about gratitude.

I was talking to my naturopath the other day about stress, its physical manifestations and ways to manage that. I talked about being overcommitted - it's something I started recently, this talking about the madness that is my list of commitments in the hope that admitting I have a problem will be the first step in solving it. We went through the various things on my list and most of them are interesting and meaningful - like for instance Show Is Your Hands! and by the way, have you seen our new website? It's beautiful.

And that's when I realized something enough to say out loud to another human being. I'm having a blast. I don't remember another time in my life that was so completely about the joy of doing wonderful, useful things and having the energy and ability to (mostly) do them.

And sure, I'm exhausted most of the time and really need to get enough of a grip that I don't work until shortly before midnight. And I need to remember that having a chronic illness means maintaining a careful balance of doing and rest because otherwise you can't keep doing and blah, blah, blah…

But tell me this: how do you get off the roller coaster when you are having the time of your life?

I am lucky, lucky, lucky. I found a medication that helps my body have the ability to do what I want. I have found people and places with whom to do things that captivate and fascinate me and which make (almost) every day a joy. Yes, even when I'm exhausted and hurting because I've done too much. Even when I feel like my life is going by in a blur and I have no idea how it got to be Thanksgiving already and know that I have a problem with workaholism, but…

Wheeeeeeee………….!
 
Life is good. 
  

Comments

AlisonH said…
Go Lene! You made my day, reading this. Thank you!
4:58 PM
Diana Troldahl said…
It's worth it to rediscover teh joy. The sad part of the posts over the past year was that the joy seemed overshadowed by the fatigue. I think that is another good reason to find balance, so that the joy can shine through.
11:11 PM
Anonymous said…
I'm in the exact same place, minus the meds that actually work. I'm working with my counselor trying to decide which of my activities that bring my joy, meaning, and fulfillment.....which one do I eliminate? Such a good place to be in, yet such a hard decision to make. If only we could find a med that actually worked, maybe I could do more. Even then, I'd probably have to give up a few things though. My cup is simply overflowing with good things. Rebecca
2:28 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Weight Gain and Biologics: The Battle of the Pudge

Image
The Seated View has moved .  I am still bringing you the information and support you need to live a better life with RA and chronic illness, just on another site. I'd love for you to visit my new website ! - Lene If you want to leave a comment or question about weight gain, RA, and Biologics and are looking for answers or feedback, please jump to this post on my new site . It has the capability for direct replies, this site does not. You can also reach me at leneATyourlifewithraDOTcom. - Thanks, Lene I’ve known from the beginning that Biologics can affect your weight. When I was on Enbrel, I couldn’t keep weight on, and looked anorexic despite eating like a horse. When I switched to Humira, I started gaining weight. I, who had never before spent much time past a size 6, became a 10. After years of being   literally skin and bones, it suited me just fine.  And then the gaining continued, until finally settling around a weight that requires a 16 pant. Never having been thi
Read more

Real RA: It's Not Just About the Jar

    The drug commercials like to show couples walking on the beach with a dog (it's always a beach with a dog), but real RA is not like that. The image of remission is a return to sparkling health with no lasting effects, but real RA is not like that. This is the first in new series of posts about the ways RA affects your life, the unvarnished version.   Last week, Kelly over at RA Warrior tweeted a link to a post about the silly things people with RA say . It’s a brilliant list of the overly optimistic things that come out of our mouths, such as committing to being somewhere early in the day (impossible because it takes a while to get going when you have RA) or the "me do it" ridiculousness that inevitably brings about a flare in symptoms. Opening jars - or rather, the inability to do so - is often mentioned as the ultimate example in frustration, smacking into your limits and plain humiliation. For Kelly, it's not a jar, it's a set of heavy blinds.
Read more

Farber’s Disease: Could Your Child’s Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis Be Misdiagnosed?

Image
Joint inflammation or contractures. Nodules (small lumps under the skin or in other tissues). A weakened or hoarse voice. Children with these symptoms may have been diagnosed with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) or other types of juvenile arthritis . But do they actually have JIA or do they have Farber’s disease? An equine digression When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras. This is an adage in the medical world that encourages doctors to not wander off exploring rare and esoteric reasons for a patient’s symptoms. Because most of the time, that hoof beat of a rash likely isn’t the plague, the joint pain more likely a type of arthritis than the bends (especially if the person has never scuba dived) and you get the picture. But once in a while, it actually is a zebra. And even if it’s first identified as a horse, eventually, the stripes come through. It took five years of my parents running around to different doctors before one finally recognized that I had
Read more