Introduction & Early Stages

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December 2007

Tuesday, December 04, 2007

I don’t want to say it. I don’t even want to think it. I want to just live it. These past few weeks I have felt _____! There, I almost said it. I just don’t want to jinx myself. Exactly…it’s that good! But when things are going well, especially when you live with a disease like arthritis, the last thing you want to do is harp on it. Instead you want to just get out there, and live!

Somehow that magical switch – the one that keeps the constant, 24-hour reminder light blinking in the back of your head – is turned off (or at least dimmed considerably). And the clarity that comes with it, that feeling in the morning when you wake up and don’t feel so crappy, feels so invigorating.

When you have arthritis you know quite well that this is not going to last forever. You don’t want to think about the future, you don’t want to remember the past. You want to just live in the now.

I think I’ll go for a nice long walk this morning. I wish I could take you all with me. More than you can imagine.

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Turns out that the jinx kicked in – as predicted. Those long, ache-free walks and stiff-less mornings (an awkward way to describe waking up without morning stiffness) were relatively short-lived. I say “relatively” because after 13 years of arthritis, a month doesn’t feel that long. But for an old soul like mine…beat up and exhausted by a chronic disease like Spondyloarthropathy…we’ll take what we can get. If only it lasted longer.

These past few weeks have gone by so quickly that I almost knew it wouldn’t last. I was really on a roll – I woke up feeling great, I went to bed feeling great, and everything in between felt great. One thing I passively ignored was the gym: “things are good, don’t mess it up” I’d tell myself. Which, in retrospect, was probably the opposite view I should have taken. This time last week I could have spent an hour on the elliptical trainer. This morning I could only handle 12 minutes. I’m proud of those 12 minutes nonetheless. Should have gone to Vegas last month. I didn’t realize how lucky I was.

And here we are, sprinting – or limping – towards the finish line of 2007. At least we’re headed in the right direction.