A Hangover

We all have had a hangover or few in our lives. Admit it, unless you are a lifetime non-drinker you have had a hangover. Alcoholic hangovers happen. We all know the feelings - dehydrated, headache, general crappy feeling.

But with RA and fibromyalgia there are other hangovers - activity hangovers. This happens when I, or anyone with these diseases, attempts to be a normal person. You act normal for one day and then spend three days paying the piper, so to speak.

Someone else wrote about activity hangovers the other day which made me feel like I am not alone. She writes about going to a party and then feeling the pain. I, on the other hand, don't even have to go to a party, I can just have a good day, try to be normal, and then spend a day in bed. If I'm lucky, its not multiple days in bed.

I am not sure what I have done for the past few days but yesterday I took a 2.5 hour nap and then slept for 8 hours last night. My pain management doctor says that sleep is good and very beneficial. It allows my body to heal. But I will still discuss it with my primary care when I see her.

Anytime I try to be normal I end up taking naps and then have bad days with 'activity' hangovers.

I Was Only Trying To Be Normal

Yesterday I made a big mistake: I tried to be a normal person. A nice spring Saturday is the perfect day to contemplate the garden and take care of other things around the house. We started by cleaning out the garage of gardening items and moving them under the porch. I pointed, my husband picked things up and put them down. He then set up the hammock stand so I had to try it out for a bit. (Very comfortable. I will make good use of it this summer.)

I then went into the garden and cleaned out some invasive weeds (I swear the previous owners considered dandelions to be good plants). Then I pruned away at the dead branches on the bushes and the ones which were broken in the heavy snow this winter. So far so good. I probably spent an hour in the garden.

Later I set up my loom and warped it (put the longer strands of yarn on it) so I could begin weaving. I was about to start weaving when I realized that my back hurt a lot and was starting to spasm. At that point, I decided I was done for the day and my husband cooked dinner while I lay in bed.

I thought I was okay with a pain pill and went to bed. I did not sleep well (second night in a row) and my back is still pretty sore. I am waiting for my next pain pill to kick in.

But I was only trying to be normal and do normal things. And today is not going to be a good day. Too bad I have plans for lunch out and then a museum. I will start with lunch and see how well I actually do. I probably will have to nix the museum as I am not sure how I will do standing so much. Grrrr....

I just wanted to have a normal day. Is that too much to ask?

Are you normal?

So are you? After cancer, we are supposed to reach a 'new normal'. That means I am on my third normal at this point. I am not sure how normal that is. And I have completely lost track of what normal is supposed to be anyway.

This is the yesterday's Prickly City. For some reason it resonated with me. And I don't believe that 'new normal' crap anyway.

Muddling through life

My life is not that exciting. I am not that exciting a person, period. I can actually be pretty boring. I spend a fair amount of time reading, knitting or watching TV - partly because I need downtime to keep going through the week before I get too tired out. I harbor my energy until something exciting comes along.

My one exciting event that occurs regularly are doctor appointments where we play "what's wrong with Caroline now". This week, for example, I have two doctor appointments - Monday I had my rheumatologist, Friday I have the eye doctor. I think I have at least one doctor appointment next week. How exciting. Not really. Just leaning towards a bit stressful.

Unless someone is an epic tweeter or celebrity, I don't think most of us live exciting lives. This is fine with me because I just want to be a normal person who muddles through life. That's much better than being a patient, because that gets too stressful.

Some portions normal

Yesterday I had one of those oh-so-fun medical adventures at the hospital to follow up on some symptoms. I was chatting with the technician during the test and at the end, I asked her if I was normal (for the test results) and she said 'some of it was normal'. What that means is that the doctor has to go read it and figure out what parts of it were normal, what was due to previous known issues and what is a concern.

For once, can't I just be normal and have normal test results? I think I would need to be healthy for that.

But anyway the doctor should have the results today and if I don't hear from her by next week I can call and get them. But I can also just swing by the medical records department and pick up a copy of the results next week. (I am a big fan of the medical records department since I have learned that I can go there at any time and get test results or appointment notes whenever I want.)

[I'll provide more information on the actual test and results sometime later when I know more. And its nothing that significant.}

Are we looking for the wrong thing?

As all cancer patients are told, after treatment you will find your 'new normal'. Basically you get to go back to being yourself again and regaining your life. But it never seems to happen.

A friend sent me this article from the New York Times on a young woman, after cancer, is looking for her old self, and being lost in transition from cancer land to her new self.

It made me think (a dangerous proposition at times). What if you are a non cancer (or non any major ailment) person, you go through life and you evolve slowly and your life changes, and its no big deal, its normal. Maybe you grow apart from some friends, gain new ones; start yoga and stop running; quit eating red meat and white sugar in order to be healthier; redecorate your house, or kept trying to lose those same damn 10 pounds. These changes happen over time but if you look at yourself from last year to this year, have you made changes? Probably. And unless you stop and think about it, you may not notice them.

With cancer (or insert any life changing diagnosis), you are yanked from your nice calm life and shifted into cancerland, riding the cancer roller coaster while holding hands with your friends, family, and oncology team who want to know about every sniffle. Then poof, you are pronounced 'cured',  get a little certificate from your chemo nurses, and your doctors don't want to see you for six months, instead of every week or month.

You are supposed to find your new normal by tomorrow morning and move on with your life, go back to work full time and be healthy, instantly.

Instead, you stumble around and wonder what a new normal is. You might be depressed, anxious, and still clinging to the cancer roller coaster at every ache and pain. Slowly you stabilize, still gasping from the whirlwind you went through for the past year.

You have lost some friends or even family who went running from the word cancer, in case it was contagious, but you gained some new ones. You got some new clothes, your work schedule changed, you bought yourself a present for surviving cancer treatment (I got myself a new watch), and you are still trying to lose the same damn 20 lbs (10 from before cancer and 10 from chemo).

And what if this is the new normal? What if its harder to find because you didn't evolve slowly but were yanked from your life to cancerland and then thrown back to your life? You have to pick away at the layers of changes to see what you like and don't like and try to get a handle on everything. Some of the changes that happened may not be the ones we want to keep but we have to learn to accept them.

We can never go back to the way we were, no matter how much we try. Who was it that wrote 'you can't go home again'? Its true, especially with cancer, we can't go home again, no matter how much we try.