Checking In

[Guest guest]

Hey Everyone -

Just checking in. I'm doing ok out here. Definitely happy that there

is no SNOW!!!! I forgot how much I disliked snow and why I decided to

move to California. Woo HOO!!! I called my bro in NY and they had 4-6

inches of snow on the last go round. Man am I glad I don't have to

even think of shovelling that stuff. BRRRRRRR!!!!! Give me 50-70

degrees year round and I'm happy. But I do miss the seasons!!

Anywhoo - Saw my rheumy last week (although my appt was for this

week). Silly me went a week early but still she was able to squeeze

me in. I also got my pneumonia shot (good for 7 yrs). My CPK was 127!!

So I think that I have stabilized somewhat in that area!!! She told

me to decrease the pred by 1mg so now I am at 11mg. Woo Hoo!! Once I

get to 10mg she will start decreasing the methx.

I was kinda achy and congested after the pneumonia shot but no fever.

My arm hurt for 3 days. In fact it just stopped hurting today (Sun).

That's no fun, but I learned to get it in the non-dominant arm(I'm

right handed). So as long as I don't sleep on my left side I was fine.

We had our work Holiday Luncheon at Aliotos (famous seafood place on

Fisherman's Wharf in San Fran). It was DELISH!!!! Seafood sausage,

broiled scallop on risotto w/mushrooms and Salmon in teriayki sauce

w/spinach and white rice. Finished off with coffee and unfortunatley

a really bad tiramasu. But I wouldn't have been able to eat it

anyway......made with flour. My S/O came with me only because out of

habit I invited him. I told him to be on his best behavior or I would

(excuse my french) rip him a new one!!! He was very quiet. My boss's

mom came to the luncheon also. She is about 85 and really, really

nice. She is the grandma that everyone wants to have. I had fun.

Today I am going to babysit Dakota while her Mom gets a bags of toys

from the single parent talk line. (A support group that she really

depends on and is a godsend). So I am going to get Dakota to make a

christmas card for her Mom with stickers and everything. It will be

cute.

I finished the dog sweaters. They are cute also. As soon as I give

them over Christmas I will have pixs taken of Bilie and Rusty

modelling their new duds.

My neighbor Joanne is doing well. You really can't tell that she is

ill except every once in awhile she is a little short of breath. But

I think that is mainly due to her not taking her pain meds regularly.

But she's great. We're going to walk " the boys " in a little while.

My SIL had her stomach stapled on Dec 2 and she came home Dec 6th.

She's doing well but has a lot of pain. Surprisingly they DO NOT give

them pain meds when they go home. The meds would mask any problems

they might have so they can only take children's liquid tylenol. Talk

about messed up. She's got a 6 inch incision across her belly and she

can only take children's tylenol. If that isn't bad karma......I

don't know what is. Not that I would ever wish anything bad on

her....but at least she now knows that there are things out there

that she CAN'T CONTROL. Talk about humility.

Other than that......my best friend Cheryl in NY is doing ok. She is

on tegretol (anti-seizure med)and she hates it. It makes her dopey

feeling all day. She takes it 3x a day. The bleeding in her brain of

the capillaries causes her to hear voices. It's like she is now

schizophrenic because of this.

What she has is called a cavernous hemangioma. And that is a cluster

of blood vessels that is almost always non-malignant but can be

troublesome based on the location. Like in her case, the cluster is

in her brain and some capillaries leading into the cluster started

bleeding. So now when the blood goes past this cluster it is causing

her neurons (or whatever)to misfire and she hears these voices. She

doesn't recognize the voices but they are very disturbing because

they are males and they are saying incredibly foul things all the

time. It freaks her out badly.

She can't go anywhere by herself. She can barely watch TV because of

the voices in her head and she has trouble reading. I'm pretty much

very concerned that she will never be back to normal again. I doubt

she'll be able to work for at least a year if they don't fix this.

They are still waiting to see what they can do about the bleeding.

They don't want to operate unles they absolutely have to because it

is brain surgery and the cluster is close to the part that controls

motor functions and/or memory. I'm not sure and she really can't

remember all the time what the Dr's tell her. It is really sad.

So that's what's going on out here. I'm still pretty depressed about

most things.......go figure. I want the holidays over with real

quick. I gotta find a new shrink but I just don't have the get-up-and-

go for it right now. And I'm pretty lonely. I miss my Mom and my

sister. I cry too much.

But I am thankful that you all are out there for me. Don't worry too

much if you don't hear from me as often. I am keeping up with

everything, but I just can't seem to post as often. I do promise to

post though.

Talk to you all soon,

Melita