Health Update

I already had all this info when I posted about my Dad's party, but I didn't want to add this info there. I like to keep certain parts of my life compartmentalized. It helps with the coping mechanisms. I like to deal with the negative aspects of my life and then try and move on. I like to keep all the positive elements separate too, so nothing is marred with the negative. This is, however only possible when the negatives and the positives don't blend over, making the lines blurry......ahh, but I digress again, I'm so good at that.

I went and saw my Rheumatologist on Friday, to hopefully finally have a diagnosis for this chronic pain I've been suffering for years. She was lovely and checked me over thoroughly and came to a diagnosis rather quickly, without thankfully submitting me to yet another battery of tests. She seems pretty convinced that I have Seronegative arthritis, an inflammatory arthritis which attacks not only my joints but my tendons too. She has prescribed me with Sulphasalazine, which will help with the pain but also help my joints from further deterioration. I just about floated out of her rooms, even after I was hit with the $220 bill lol...... Relief from pain, I'd barely dared hope that this could be a possibility. I have started on the regime of meds, and even with the side effects of yet more headaches and a queasy stomach, I'm feeling positive. It will take four weeks before I'm on the full dosage, and I will need a blood test in two weeks time and then once a month. My specialist will keep close tabs on liver and kidney function and also that my inflammatory markers will come down.

I have been walking on the treadmill and have been feeling good. This week I've been lax though with the kids home from holidays I seem busier than ever. Yesterday I finished cleaning out Sammy and Mickey's room. I think it's the first time in 9 years that I've got the room to where I want it. I've done the cupboards of all toys and clothes. The room looks tidy. We moved beds and vacuumed and cleaned walls, Sammy and I had cleaned the day before and the fan and blind was cleaned too. It's so cool that the kids help me nowadays. I also went through all their old school stuff and culled much of it. I like samples of their work, but with three kids it's impossible to keep everything they bring home. I'm happy with what I've kept now. I need to get stuck into Billy-Joe's room. His room is the one they spend so much time in and yet it's in dire need of a face lift. The walls desperately need painting as does the ceiling as it still has those awful little stars and planets on the ceiling from the previous owners. My kids think they're great, but they look quite old and daggy now, and are going to be a huge job to try and prise off the ceiling.

It's Mickey's birthday on Monday and the he and Sammy are doing a golf clinic next week, so it will be Billy-Joe and I at home together. I should go into Daisy's one day and play with my markers. I can't get distracted there and decide all of a sudden that the bath mat and toilet mat need washing, or that the sliding door needs windexing lol....... I could just sit and play!!

We'll celebrate Mickey's birthday on Sunday. We are going to order KFC buckets and just have a take away feast. It's something we don't do very often, and as I've got a couple of busy days ahead with my business course starting, I felt this was a good way to go. I would have liked to go out somewhere for lunch but this actually works out to be very reasonable.

I'm currently sitting in Laserzone, a dark building where the kids go off and shoot each other with lazers!! They're having a ball. It's noisy, the coffee is crappy but I've got my MacBook and the internet and the kids are having a ball, so all is good.

Tomorrow I start on my e Commerce course, so I'm looking forward to that. I'm nervous actually but I think I have enough knowledge not to be 'lost' with what I'll learn. I want to learn stuff, so that our site makes a sale. Can't believe the site has been live for two months, has good traffic, but yet no purchases have been made. I know that people are going into the store after reading the site info, but that's not all we want. I'm getting paid money to make money.......and at the moment, it's not enough coming in from it.