I overdid it yesterday. How, you may ask?
I did my stretches and yoga. I threw a turkey in the oven. I folded TWO loads of laundry. And I roasted some vegetables.
My sweet 13-year old daughter hugged me after dinner and said, "Boy, you really did a lot today, Mom."
*sigh* This is why the type-A person inside of me is climbing up the walls.
Close on the heels of my root canal, I came down with the flu. It has wiped me out completely. You know, prior to this, I never really connected that CFS "feels like" a bad case of the flu. But this time, I noticed how the flu has amplified my CFS symptoms -- CFS on steroids! -- and I can now see the similarities.
I've been a lump on a log. No writing. No blogging. No tweeting. Barely any Facebook. I'm hoping this week is a little more productive for me, but I still plan on taking it easy.
Getting the flu has also made me curious about the immune deficiencies of CFS. I've heard about it but never really understood how it works. I have noticed that although my throat and sinuses hurt, my body doesn't seem to be trying to get rid of the germs -- no mucous. I've been doing a daily nasal rinse to compensate, and I think it's been helpful. Hm. I guess, after four years, there's still more for me to learn and understand about this disease.
Hope you all are doing well -- as good as can be expected, at least! Enjoy your week of Thanksgiving.
Words that strike fear in the heart of any PWC (person with CFS): I have a tooth ache.
It started Monday night, innocuous enough, but by Tuesday morning, it was raging. I called my dentist, and they were able to squeeze me in yesterday at 3:30 pm. Right in the middle of my scheduled rest. :(
I was told I needed a root canal. Hm, that's interesting, because the dentist I went to about five years ago was supposed to have done a root canal on that tooth. Rip-off artist. I guess that's what you get when you are in a new community and don't know how to get referrals to the good guys.
The procedure took about an hour and a half. Luckily, I was able to ask for and receive nitrous oxide. Ah, good ol' nitrous oxide. At least it minimized some of the stress of the situation. Hopefully, it will minimize my crash as well.
Because crashing I am! I took pain medication last night before bed, but I woke at 2:15 am in agony. Took more pills, but I awoke again at 5:15 am and had to wait another hour before I could safely take more pills. I was grateful for the pain management techniques I had learned during my childbirth years. I took another pill at 6:30 am. Now I have to wait another hour before I can take another pill. :(
Luckily, my kids are out of school for the long weekend, and I have no responsibilities I need to muddle through. Just rest and recuperate. I hope the crash is minimal and short-lived. A root canal for a healthy person is traumatic enough; for PWCs, it's brutal.
Many of you know that I started a website, Chronic Fatigue Community, about two years ago. I spent a lot of time developing it, adding pages and articles about various topics related to CFS. I was especially proud of the blog roll I had which included many of your blogs. That list was the most visited page on my website, and it had the most repeat visits as well.
Well, my health deteriorated, and I was unable to keep adding to the site. And although the site was a labor of love, and not expected to generate much income, I found that the annual $299 maintenance fee was too much for me. So I made the decision to not renew it this year.
I just received an e-mail from the parent company, Site Sell. They've made me a tremendous offer. They want to reactivate the site and take over management of it. They will monetize it and maybe add a few more articles to it and make it profitable. They will split the proceeds with me 80/20 (I'd get 20% for doing nothing). I have the option of renewing the website again at any time and taking it back over, keeping the benefits that they've added to the website.
They made the offer based on the website's content and potential. They said they make an offer like this to only about 15% of the websites that choose not to renew. I'm so excited that all that hard work won't go for naught, and that the information I've collected and shared will still be available to the public. I'm also excited that the referrals to your blogs will still be accessible for people who are looking for support through the blog community. If it ends up being profitable, well, it would be exciting to be able to add to the family's income for a change.
The site is www.chronic-fatigue-community.com . It will still be down for awhile until they get it up and running again.
So, I called VIP Dx to see how things were going with the testing. For some reason, I was a little panicked since I hadn't heard anything from them. I thought maybe they hadn't received my samples, or they got there too late, or they had been rejected for some reason. I didn't want to drag the wait out longer than needed.
None of the above had occurred. Instead, they're backlogged, and instead of four to five weeks, it will take six to eight weeks to find out the results. Hey, I've waited over four years, what's another week or four, right? At least I know that something is happening.
It made me think of all the activities that are backlogged in my life. All the have to's and ought to's that are piling up because I just don't have the energy to get to them in a timely manner. And then, all the way at the back of the line, so far back I can't see most of them, are my want to's. Backlogged into oblivion.
Maybe I should throw caution to the wind and escort one of those end-of-the-liners right up to the front of the line. If I could only remember what they were.
Tuesday was a Very Big Day. I thought I had it all planned out. Parent/teacher conferences for four of my kids. I went to the boys' conferences first. They were back to back, one at 1 pm, the other twenty minutes later. Less than an hour total, not bad. A little more walking around than I'm used to -- it's a pretty big campus for an elementary school, and parking was atrocious. Still, I felt pretty proud of myself for weathering it well. I took a long, deeply relaxed rest. Geared up for the evening conferences.
I thought I would be able to finish in an hour. I was so sorely mistaken. Lines were backed up to see each teacher, and it dragged on for two hours. I came home exhausted, wiped out, fearful, and angry. I hate what CFS does to me sometimes. I was just trying to be a good mom. I wouldn't have put myself through that if there weren't important issues to discuss.
I went to bed, tossed and turned for about an hour, and finally drifted off to sleep.
I felt the effects immediately the next day. Good news? I didn't dare hope. I defiantly recuperated. I didn't stretch or yoga or make my bed or do laundry. I read books, played on the computer, and watched TV. I rested a little more than usual. My afternoon rest was deep, to the bones.
The next day, I could still feel the effects, but not quite as bad. Hm. Still, I forced myself to do nothing. Except I think I made my bed. Yesterday, I could tell I was doing better. I made my bed and added a load of laundry. And today? I've already made my bed, started a load of laundry, and I'm contemplating folding the two baskets of clothes that have been neglected for a week. Plus, I had enough energy to boss the kids around and have them tidy the house. My front room is ready for a little decorating. I think I need to find the animated haunted house I've kept in storage.
I so worried that this would be a big event, one that would kick my sorry butt back to square one. Instead, it seems like I'm having a very normal post-exertional malaise reaction. Bouncing back to baseline already. Whew. I'll let go of some of that anger now.
Still waiting on test results. VIP Dx says it takes five weeks to get results back. Five freaking weeks. I guess if I've waited four years, I can wait another five weeks, eh?
