So, I’m sitting here having a text message conversation with someone who I used to work with. She is 4 months down the “just diagnosed” trail. Prednisone for 4 months, MTX for 4 months. She just switched to my Rheumy and seems to like her better than the guy who wouldn’t listen. She’s looking at starting Humira very soon. She is understandably scared.
Talking to her got me thinking. I do that on occasion. AND when I do, I tend to ramble for a while after it rattles around in my head.
I wonder, sometimes, if maybe there isn’t a reason I’m me. That I had the experiences I’ve had. that some of the people who have been put in my path are there because they are supposed to be there.
Was I scared when I started Humira? I was scared when I started Enbrel. I was MORE scared when I started Humira. I was scared less because I was scared of the medication than because I was terrified of germs. I mean, the one thing that was stressed with me about Humira was that I NEEDED to avoid all germs. ALL of them. Everywhere.
I bought a glass of lemonade when I was out on a walk one day. The sales man was about 5 and lived in our neighborhood. I bought it. I drank it. When I got home, I cried for an hour because I was so scared of what might happen because there was a dog there and there were kids and I know the cups were handled at the rim or on the inside and they probably licked the spoon after they made the lemonade and what if they tasted it with the same spoon twice and… and… and… and…
Yes, it was scary. It was DAMN scary. But it was a tradeoff. I know what was going on in my body at the time. I know what the outcome of that could have been. THAT was even scarier.
So here I sit. Ruminating. Contemplating. Feeling the floor with my feet and my feet with the floor. Feeling my breath in the deepest part of my lungs.
I read a new blog today (new to me… not really SO new) http://spoonshortage.wordpress.com and it got me thinking even more. Lots of things do that.
Am I glad I have RA? No. If I were to pick something it probably wouldn’t have been RA. Mostly because I was scared shitless as a child by a great aunt with fingers that were RA fingers. Fear makes things stick with you for a long time. I will live with that in my mind forever.
I write. I type. I crochet. I walk (very fast) in half marathons. I would not pick this.
But it’s mine. I don’t get to pick and chose. I just need to learn to bloom where I am planted. And do my best to keep my body as healthy as I can. And hope that I get pushed into remission as far as I can push myself. And I can try to make a difference. I may only be one but I am one. I can’t do everything but I can do something. I chose to try to make my something matter to at least a few people.
And if, in the process, I can my my own journey a little brighter (a few more flowers by the side of the rill… generated by one severly cracked pot) then I am doing a little better at the end of the day.
Or it might be the over abundance of coffee and Aleve.
Either way… I chose to walk on the bright side of life.
It really doesn’t cost anything to look on this side, and someone has to do it. If not me, then who?
A Figment Of Fitness 