Happy Birthday to Me!

Ah yes, another birthday has come and gone and I'm now 29+++ :)

It was a good birthday even though Scott was out of town until 6pm on Sunday. Mom & Dad were here visiting and helping out with Josh which allowed me to go out and party with the girls on Saturday night. Boy did we have fun at a piano bar and wow did I pay for it ALL DAY SUNDAY!!!

Here are a few pics from over the last week:

Family picture with the yummy cannoli cake from Florentine

Josh helping Grandma rake up leaves

Julie, Me & Susan @ Charlie Murdoch's (piano bar)

My birthday flowers from Cioci Joan and Scott

I promise...

... that this will not turn into a blog solely about my health and about MS. I greatly appreciate everyone's concern about how I'm doing and will keep everyone updated but honestly there is much more interesting stuff to talk about.

So first, the health update. I started on my medication (Rebif) last Thursday evening. We had a nurse come to the house that morning to show both Scott & I how to give the injections and to answer any questions that we had. She is a great resource and gave me some good news - I don't have to give up alcohol completely for the rest of my life! (I know, it seems like such a small concern in the grand scheme of things) The medication is rough on your liver and can cause problems so they encourage you not to drink and put more stress on the liver but an occasional drink here and there, especially on days that I don't take my med, isn't completely frowned upon. I'm on a very low dose of the med right now (8.8 mcg) and will gradually work my way up to the full dose (44 mcg). So far I've done 2 injections, one with just the syringe and one with the injector, and prefer the injector just like I thought I would. Something about having to put the needle in my skin and push down the plunger freaks me out. No crazy side-effects yet, just a little fatigue. Hopefully this means that I will tolerate the medicine well and get on with my life.

Now on to other news...

Last weekend Nana & Papa came and took Josh for the whole weekend so Scott & I could have some alone time. Go figure, we spent the whole weekend shopping!!! I'm super excited though because Josh has a totally new wardrobe for fall & winter. Now that we live up North, Jimmy's hand-me-downs aren't all season appropriate so Josh needed pretty much everything from top to bottom. We got him a ton of long-sleeved tees, sweatshirts, jeans and sweatpants and mostly all on sale! He also got 2 new pairs of sneakers at Stride Rite and lots and lots of new blanket-sleeper pajamas. It was nice to be able to go shopping and not feel rushed but we did miss him the entire weekend and talked about him constantly. And of course, as soon as he got home he turned the whole house upside down and had us on our toes again.

Josh wants to be Scooby-Doo for Halloween so we picked up a costume for him. As soon as he saw it he wanted to put it on and it's a good thing he did. It's sized 2T-4T but is pretty snug on him even though all he had on underneath was a diaper. It seems my boy has a long torso. So, I'll take it back and get the boys size 4-6 and will surely have to figure out what to do about the legs being too long. He's so excited about Halloween this year and I'll admit so am I. This is the first year that we're taking him trick-or-treating and Nana & Papa are going to come up to go with us. He's already carrying around a plastic pumpkin and practicing how to say "trick-or-treat". He's adorable!!!

This weekend is the PSS National Meeting in Dallas, TX. Scott leaves on Thursday afternoon and due to budget cuts I'm not going :( But the good news is that Grandma & Grandpa are coming to visit! They get in tomorrow around dinner time and will stay until Sunday morning. We have lots planned as long as the weather holds out... the zoo, a fall festival, more shopping. I'm excited too because they're bringing food from back home and a birthday cake for me!!! It should be a great family weekend (instead of one with my drunken co-workers)!

Long time no post...

It's hard to believe that it's been almost a month since I last blogged... I'm not even sure who still reads this since I'm pretty sure everyone (including Mom) is now on Facebook. I guess if you're reading this you should post a comment so I know that I'm not writing just to myself.

Anyway, it's been an eventful month to say the least. Shortly after I blogged the last time I was formally diagnosed with MS. Needless to say my life has been turned somewhat upside down. The disease affects everyone differently so there's nothing to read that will give me a good idea of how it will progress and what symptoms may affect me. What I do know is that I have one lesion on my spine (which is causing the numbness in the left leg), but what is more scary are the "cloudy areas" in my brain - many of them and some are quite large. It amazes me that there are so many "quiet" areas of the brain - we really dont use the majority of it! I was too stunned and hysterical at my last appointment to ask my neurologist anything about the brain lesions being close to "active" areas of my brain so I will definitely ask at my next appointment. For now I will be starting a drug called Rebif to slow down the progression of the disease. Yeah joy fun now I get to give myself injections three times a week, may have flu-like symptom side effects and I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to ever have alcohol again because of problems it can cause to liver function. I'm not a boozer by any stretch of the imagination (any more) but I dont see myself giving up alcohol for the rest of my life. There are also lots of other things I'm not supposed to do/eat/etc and I'm sure I'll blog about it as I learn more. I'm still going through the range of emotions and have recently just been in denial and trying not to think about it. I start the meds on Thursday so no more denial, time to face it head on. I hope that the meds slow down the progression of the disease so I dont have any more symptoms, that the side effects from the meds are very mild, and that this disease does not alter my life completely. In an ideal world I want this disease to cause me a minor inconvenience 3x a week when I have to do the shots.

I guess that's all for now. Please forgive me if my blogs are few and far between for awhile as I learn to cope and adjust to everything.