Precious Boy

We spent Thursday afternoon with my precious grandson, James Shepard.

He is sweet and funny and breathtakingly gorgeous.

Mary Kate spent about a half an hour pumping up the little pool we got him. After it was filled with water, he primarily played with the box, a broken hose nozzle, Bella (“Bluh Bluh”, with lots of accompanying spit) and his lunch.

His mom had sent a drink box of ice tea with him. After I gave it to him, he took a few sips. Then he took the straw out and put it back in. Out and in. Made goofy faces with the straw in his mouth. In and out. Out and in. Then proceeded to squeeze the box, creating geysers of ice tea. Then proceeded to turn the box upside down and squeeze, creating cascades of ice tea down his bare tummy.



I found these actions hilarious and made no attempt to stop him. The more I laughed, the more he clowned.

Mary Kate sternly told me I was a bad influence. Hey, what are Grandmas for?!?

I mostly sat and watched (and encouraged anti-social behavior) while Mary Kate was running around playing with him. I didn’t even think he was paying that much attention to me. At one point I got up to go in the house and get a drink. He stopped what he was doing and ran after me calling “Nana! Nana! Nana!”.

Be still my heart!!!

I am trying to take good care of myself for several reasons. But he is a big one. Twenty years from now, I want him to know me. I want to be sure he knows how much I love him.


I want him to still miss me when I walk away from him.

The Dreaded Steroids

I am having a flare up of Transverse Myelitis, which was the condition I developed that led to my diagnosis of MS.

Ugh, what a bummer.

I am one of the lucky ones. Although TM initially paralyzed me, I responded to IV steroids and got better. Better-ish. It left me with lots of deficits, dysfunction, numbness and weakness. But some people never recover at all and are crippled forever. Some even need to be on respirators.

This scary stuff is caused by lesions on the spinal cord that strip the nerve cells of their protective coating, the myelin. It’s called demyelinating. Your level of illness depends on where your lesions are. My biggest one (yes indeed, I have an entire collection back there) is on my cervical spinal cord. That causes just sooooo many things to malfunction. Ahhh well.

An intravenous steroid, in this case Solumedrol (IVSM), is the thing that will calm the lesion down and make me feel better. But it comes with a price.

First, after a few days of steroids, I am, let’s see, how can I put it? A raving lunatic. No sleep, non-stop talking, non-stop activity. A VERY clean house. Let me tell you, this is not fun to live with. The one child (a 22 year old CHILD; oy) who still lives with me (who I am trying to pry out with a crowbar; does anyone want her?) just rolls her eyes. This will be my fifth course of IVSM in three years, so she is used to it by now.

Then there is the physical stuff. A hep lock in my arm for days, no showering, nasty taste in your mouth, potential kidney damage, potential bone damage, potential diabetes, aching all over like you have the flu and feeling like you have been hit with a truck when it is done. The first time I was on IVSM my blood sugar went so high I was on insulin for three weeks. Some people develop a ravenous appetite. Amazingly, I don’t. I actually lose my appetite. Cool.

But it usually does help, so there is that.

Maybe, as I am up all hours with steroid induced energy, I will write dozens of brilliant and witty posts for my blog!!! Now that is something to look forward to.

This is a short video related to Project Restore at Johns Hopkins, which is doing research to develop a cure for demyelinating diseases like Transverse Myelitis and Multiple Sclerosis. Alysse describes exactly what it is like to develop TM and the losses we experience when we have it.

Talking Food

I have been back on track, mostly, with food that is good for me. Mr. Spickles supervises.

Of course after being on oxycontin and going without so much as a glass of wine for ten solid weeks, I did have to treat myself to a martini. Ok, two. Hey, vodka is made from potatoes. It was a vegetable.

I have this for breakfast most days:

Special K, a banana, some pecans and blueberries. It is around 350 calories, it’s super easy, it tastes really good and it fills me up. So sometimes I have it for lunch too. Then I have a piece of chicken and salad for dinner. So far I’ve lost two pounds.

But Fourth of July morning, the blueberries started complaining and said they would much rather be wrapped up in something really high calorie that would require slathering with butter. So I made these:

Blueberry scones.

Excuse me, have YOU ever tried to argue with a blueberry?!?! I thought not.

The Lake

My first born burst into the world, took a deep breath...and peed on me. Ahhh, motherhood.

That was 31 years ago, but the moment is as vivid as five minutes ago. That is what 31 years are. Five minutes.

Ryan is, of course, a big boy now. He is getting married in a few weeks. He is handsome and smart and charming. Everyone adores him. He is a lawyer.

Did I mention he is a lawyer?

He and his fiancée, Claire (a lawyer too), have just bought a lake house in the Adirondacks where her family has summered for almost 100 years, in the same adorable cabin. They invited me, so I took a ride (a FIVE HOUR ride) up this weekend.

Did I mention Claire was a lawyer?

I am not a piney-woods sort of girl. I am more of a Westin Heavenly Bed, with a spa a few floors away sort of girl. But the charm of this place is inescapable. Stepping out of the car, you are submerged in the scent of pine. The sky is almost blocked by the height of the trees. It is lovely.

Claire's family (I think there were 1000 of them, but I may have miscounted) welcomed me with overwhelmingly open arms. I felt as though I had grown up there.

The connection going back decades is so precious to this family that it just absorbs you. I walked down to the lake Sunday morning thinking, this will be my grandchildren’s summer home. They will know every tree, rock and turn in the road. So I better too. Because five minutes goes by very, very quickly.

Burning for you

Was I a Visigoth at the Sacking of Rome? A Viking invading Eire? Did I pluck the wings off of flies? There surely were evil deeds that I committed in a previous life. It is the only thing I can think of to explain my string of calamities.

Last night I went to make, as I have a million times before, a pitcher of iced tea. I do this for several reasons. One, I am cheap. I don't see the point in buying it if I can make it just as easily. If I had a churn and an abattoir, I probably wouldn’t be buying butter or hamburgers either. But that is debatable.

Number two, it's just so freaking easy. Water. Tea bags. The end.

Number three, I like the way I make it. I just like it plain. I don't use sugar or anything.

So I never expected that I would pour in the boiling water as usual, add the tea bags as usual and pick up the pitcher as usual, to have it shatter and shower me with the aforementioned boiling water.

It splashed into my face and chest and onto my left arm and thighs, soaking my clothes. I ran to the shower and jumped in, clothes and all, letting the cold water run all over me.

This is what saved me from being burned even worse, according to the Nurse Practitioner in the Emergency Room.

That’s right, the Emergency Room. Again. I swear, they are going to reserve me a room.

The left side of my face is burned from my eye brow to my chin, including my eye lid. My eye itself is fine. I apparently reflexively closed my eyes when it happened. My left wrist is burned and there are splash marks on my chest. My thighs are burned where the water soaked through my leggings, in lengthwise stripes.

Fortunately, they are only first degree and superficial second degree burns. Painful, but not permanently disfiguring. I have kept cold compresses on everything, especially my face, and it has really helped. I am swollen and blotchy, but it mostly looks like I have a bad sunburn. On one half of my face. Very attractive.

My friends have offered to dance naked around a fire to dispel evil spirits on my behalf. Now that is what I call devoted. Or perverted, depending on your point of view. Especially since there has also been mention of tequila and absinthe.

But despite their love and commiseration, here is what I have to say:

OY VEY!!!! ENOUGH ALREADY!!!!




Blue Oyster Cult. If this music video doesn’t make you laugh, nothing will.

Bye, George

Oh, George Carlin. Sigh. The comic idol of my youth. He inspired me to be funny. I cannot believe there will be no new laugh out loud observations on the absurdities of our culture.

I didn’t love the Seven Words stuff but I know he was really proud of that work and the impact it made.

I did love the everyday humor that was so relatable.

He was a latch key kid who frequently, because he was a kid, was latch-key-less. For which his poor mother would subsequently tan his hide. (Can you imagine being George Carlin’s single mother? Equal parts laughter and tearing your hair out.) All Catholic kids know that St. Anthony is the patron saint of lost things. George did a hilarious bit on losing his house key for the millionth time. He knows he’s going to get it, so he’s frantic. He prays to St. Anthony, finally saying, “God, if you see St. Anthony, would you please tell him I’VE GOT TO FIND MY KEYS!”

On the difference between Baseball and Football: In football you wear a helmet. In baseball you wear a cap. Football is concerned with downs. Baseball is concerned with ups.

Here it is:



And driving. Being stuck behind a little old lady for miles going about 15 miles an hour with her turn signal on. At first it appears no one is actually driving the car. But no, he says, I definitely see knuckles on the steering wheel.

And pets: Remember, every time you buy a pet, you’re purchasing a small tragedy.

And of course, my compadre, the Class Clown. (Are any of you surprised? I was passing notes to make people laugh in graduate school.)

Funny stuff. Funny guy.

Thanks, George.

Direction?

The original idea of this blog was to create a site of mutual support and encouragement in being good to ourselves, especially with weight loss. My accident has morphed it into something a little different and I am feeling somewhat uncomfortable about that.

I am trying to tell myself that it still is addressing issues that others can relate to. I am not completely sure though.

I was not particularly good to myself after I got hurt. (Although I did eat an awful lot of ice cream. It was quite delicious. :) ) My typical denial in the face of incontrovertible facts slowed my acceptance of the truth: that I was terribly injured. And would be in recovery for a very, very long time. Possibly up to a year. Now that this is finally reality to me, I am doing my best to nurture my body and take my recuperation seriously.

I am eating well, I am scrupulous about doing my home exercises and attending my three times a week Physical Therapy sessions, even though they are so grueling I want to weep. Ok, I do weep. Physical therapy is really, really hard. Although Mike, my physical therapist, couldn’t be nicer or more encouraging. I have gone back to the gym and have gingerly done some pool walking and stretching, although I can’t actually swim for a while. I am resting when my body says I need to rest. I am listening to it for a change instead of telling it to shut up, it doesn’t know what it’s talking about.

When my MS symptoms flare up, I still get angry and feel sorry for myself that I am not the active person I used to be, Super Woman, capable of doing it all. But I also try to acknowledge, rather than ignore, yes, my legs are like jelly today, or my feet feel as though they are filled with lead, or I am so dizzy I have to hold onto things to get around the house, the Furniture Crawl.

Bottom line, I am not sure where this blog is going. I don’t want it to be all about me (that is a TOTAL LIE!! I would love it to be all about me. Isn’t everything?!? :) ) I want to post things we can all relate to in ways of being good to ourselves, even if it is just a moment to stop and think about things that are important to you. Or seem interesting. Or to simply have a giggle. Because if nothing else, everyone needs to laugh now and then. And I am a sucker for a good audience.

So for right now, I will probably write about random things, but I will also remember what I started out to do. The title “Nourish” really can be expanded. Because that actually is what life should be about. Nourishing precious moments, nourishing our precious selves and nourishing our precious others.

I would love some feedback as to what you all think.