Seven Years

Seven friggen years...!!! Been dealing with this now for seven friggen years..... What else is there to say right now...??? Not much.....not now anyway.... Till Next Time......

April showers.......

Arrrggghhhhhh Well, I went from my last post in December....during the winter time, to now..It's April and springtime.. So, what's changed since December and now.... Well, it's now warmer (80+ degrees the last few days with humidity in the upper 80 percentile) Winter...it was too cold...This was one of the coldest winters on record here in NE Ohio....Many days in a row of sub zero temps.. This limited my time outside to very little at a time... I still had to walk my dog which sucked bigtime.....My legs would be burning and as stiff as boards when we got back home... I spent many days wearing my long johns which barely helped... I also got a new pair of boots to wear outside....Nice and insulated....I will admit they were warmer than wearing my mesh sneakers outside, but my feet and legs were still freezing..... It was so nice when the snow began to disappear and the temperature started going up....At the end of March we had one week where the weather and temperature was nice....Mid 60's and low humidity.... But as typical for NE Ohio....once that broke, we basically went right into summer....upper 80's for the temperatures....as a matter of fact, the last two days we broke temperature records, and the humidity has been miserable. Today we have an 80 percent chance of thunderstorms..... Not looking forward to this at all.... I swear, the weather here has to be the most screwed up weather there is......Too cold, too hot, too humid, too rainy, too gloomy.....definitely not too much sunshine... Healthwise.... Status quo..... Pain levels on some days have been pretty nasty.... When I think about my pain levels I always reflect back on the day of my onset.....I think to myself, that if that was a 10....Pain like I've never felt before, then I look at how things feel now and it varies between a 4 on a good day to probably a 7 or so... It's not fun. I still deal with the same old bowel and bladder issues, I still deal with the balance issues, I still deal with leg aches and cramps that wake me up at all hours of the early morning....usually between 1am to 3am.... This morning for example.....1:20am.... I stretch every morning, I do some light exercises to get the blood flowing, I get out and walk my dog multiple times during the day.... I try to stay as active as I can but the fatigue still creeps up on me every day.....I'll find myself nodding off and on, all throughout the day... To add more issues to this whole thing.....I've been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis and proctitis... I come to find out that UC is an autoimmune disease as is Transverse Myelitis.... I thought back and I had my TM onset on May 14th, 2008 and I had an episode of *something* in August 2008...That something consisted of diarrhea, lethargy, no appetite, just basically felt like crap for a week.... Those episodes would come around about once a month... This went on for years.... Turned out one day I was at my family doc and told her about all of this... She had me go in to a gastroenterologist.... He started me on Zantac......Seemed to help some....the episodes weren't coming monthly... As time went on, the episodes started back and seemed to be getting worse... Back to the gastroenterologist and he has me do an EGD, a colonoscopy and a CT scan.... Surprisingly I get a voicemail from my pharmacy the next day..... I had no idea what this was for because I had not ordered anything...I called the pharmacy and asked what the meds were....I was informed that the meds were for UC and proctitis... Apparently my results from the CT scan came back in enough time to get to my doc the same day as I had it, and he immediately called in the meds... So, I've been on that ever since and I've also had to adjust my diet quite a bit....but with the combination of the med and the diet change I have had some luck.... Only a few minor episodes...I did learn early on that my chunky peanut butter was out the window......and I love chunky peanut butter too....Oh well, I'd rather give that up and not deal with those damn episodes.... No fruit with seeds....raw veggies are out the door, cut back on fatty red meat.....and cut back on the fiber like oats... So, between the TM and the ulcerative colitis, it has made life challenging.....but, I deal with it. Lately I've aligned myself with an organization called the Ohio Rights Group that is working on collecting names for the petition to get medical marijuana on the ballot to be voted on in the next election..... I am a huge advocate for this because I am so tired of the pain meds I have been taking....Morphine and Norco (Vicodin) I don't like the way they make me feel....they make me feel all crappy and I also don't like what they are doing to my body... The stuff is poison basically... From all the people that I've talked to that live in states where medical marijuana is legal, they swear by it... it helps relieve the pain, the cramps, aches, spasms.....and also helps sleep...which I need desperately.... So....keep your fingers crossed for me.....Let's hope that this gets passed this next time aroumd... So....let's finish off with an old Doobie Brothers tune..... Daughters of the Sea.... Till Next Time......

No post since August...????

It's so hard to post up everything that's happened since August...... I'll try to remember a little bit... Two primary things..... The first....Those episodes I was having....I went to my Gastroenterologist and had a EGD, Colonoscopy and a CT scan done... The result....Ulcerative Colitis. Doc put me on some meds for it and knock on wood, I haven't had any episodes ever since...Biggest issue, is that I am on a restricted diet.... At one point before my doc had diagnosed me, I had lost a bunch of weight...I was down to 150lbs..... I've been able to figure out how to balance my diet out and have gained back to 165...I guess I can live with that... I'd rather be at 165 than I would be at the 211 that I used to be at..... So...we'll give this a couple more months and if things don't get any worse than I think I'll be satisfied that things are under control.... Second thing....this damn cold weather....Seems that this year has been playing hell with my legs more than it has in years past... I have had a hell of a time sleeping.....I try to go to bed every night by 10pm hoping that I'll get to bed early enough to get some sleep.....but practically every night I am awake by between 2 and 3am..... Tonight was different though.....I went to bed by about 9:45......and all I remember is that my legs were hurting...I wasn't getting any good sleep at all....and then I remember my legs just going on fire..... I must have been hollering out because Lizzie was calling my name to wake me up.... I don't remember what time it was but it seems it was about 11:30....I tried to get comfortable and go back to sleep but that was a no go..... I couldn't go back to sleep for anything so I decided to get up and get some leg stretches in, which usually helps some... My last neuro appointment I talked to him about this and he prescribed me some neurontin to see if it would help and I've been on that now for a couple of months and still have gotten no relief from it yet.... I am getting so, so tired of all these damn meds....the pain meds, the neurontin, meds for Ulcerative Colitis..... As each day goes by I am becoming more and more of a proponent of medical marijuana.....All the research I've done shows that it should help with the issues I have with my legs and also it helps folks with ulcerative colitis and other stomach issues... I've been in contact with the Ohio Rights Group which is a group here in Ohio that has organized to work on doing anything and everything they can to try and get medical marijuana on the ballot for a vote in 2016. I spoke with the president of the organization and he has offered me a volunteer spot of things that I can do from home.....so I am anxious to start on that.....I am ready to medical marijuana to me legalized here in Ohio......after all, there are currently 23 other states right now, that have legalized it.....I think it's about Ohio's turn... Well....I'll leave it at that.... I am tired.....and can't think of a whole lot more to chat about.... I'll try to keep better track of things and update this blog more often.... and for my music track......the younger brother of the great Carlos Santana......Jorge Santana and his band from the 70's...Malo and the song Suavecito... ......Till Next Time.......