Choices are the hinges of the future - Pythagoras

I have impressed myself immeasurably by choosing the most perfect person on the planet to marry. Maybe this is a good time to mention that I am not generally know for clever choices ... my mood generally leads me more down the impulsive, eccentric, down right crazy path.

So having used all my cosmic karma in that one decision I am now reliant on him to make other clever observations. When Lymes started to catch up to me in a seriously debilitating manner he sat me down and advised me to use this time lying around to figure out whether I am on the right general flightpath.

Long ago I gave up travel writing for full time mom + doing two jobs + being a wife + being a family member etc. And lying around in bed made me finally admit that something was missing. The writing me.

Of course the writing me was in for a shock! A six year absence led to me getting to feel like a true artist.... I.e. I was receiving an average of 2 rejecttions a day. Such suffering ... it made me forget about the pain and confusion of my daily life which was nice for a change.

PASS THE CHOCOLATE!!

NOW though, things are happening ... and I am delighted at this unexpected gift (number two, first being the extra time I have with my kids!) that Lyme has given me!!! ... and yes I really must say that this made me stop and reassess.

I am so worried about sounding flippant - it isnt the intention... but it is a bit true that when things are at their worst it can only get a bit better... of course it is a bit quicker if you LOOK for it.

Now on the treatment front - I have been referred by an exLymie to a Dr Zhang in New York - he practices Modern Chinese Medicine... and he could get me all better....

.... another choice ... very scarey ... but then you never know we might be allright hey??

The patient refused autopsy....

... good on her I say!!!

Have been running around funny Lyme sites to keep me focused. There is a lot of hilarious stuff out there ...Actually Lymes is any stand up comics ultimate waffle topping! As you have every pain and every ache and every neurological symptom ever connected to any other disease present in a variety of combinations in this one whopper - Carte Blanche is the way forward!

BUT even better than reading the stuff classified under joke is just going on any site that has anything to do with Lymes ... Now I know we are a certified bunch of neurological numbties... but occasionally a synapse still fires in sequence in my brain.

And although it is fascinating to read in one place that sugar is the seed of Satan I actually am not that far braindead to not see the contradiction when another page on the same site says that eating cottage cheese and maple syrup for 5 years is how to avoid getting cancer AND cure Lymes (o.k. that's using poetic licence just a touch ... but any of you having trawled through the oceans of advice dregs will know that where there is fish theres stink!)

I have been told to use juice fasts and to not have sugar at all... to drink salt/ the salt vitamin C cure is a con/ the water and salt cleanse is fantastic/ dont use salt your kidneys wont survive/ do excercise / dont move/ be positive/ go on anti-depressants/ try to sleep/ dont sleep if your not tired/ take antibiotics/ dont take antibiotics/ take them all the time/ only take them 7 days a month/ take lots of supplements/ dont take any supplements/ have as healthy a system as possible to fight the bacteria/make the environment as tough as possible for the bactiria to survive .... and my favourite deliberate mix-up:

coffee is completely forbidden + coffee enemas are great

= drinking a cup a day is a happy compromise!

In fact maybe that is a bit of a result right there.

Everyone thinks we are muppets - and lets face it we cannot blame them - but we really need to stick stubbornly to a bit of common sense if we want any sense left.

SO I say : Read a bit less about Lyme and a bit more about who you would want to be without Lymes'... for a lot of us it is seriously restrictive and we have less and less freedom in our practical daily lives but we all have a chance to roll over thoughts very carefully at the moment and I firmly believe seen from a different place some of this can be a happy process.

So I am taking my liberty and doing some wild and wacky things:I am now learning one Cantonese character a day (or a week).

Cantonese is a fairly obscure language which I like only because my gorgeous brother lives in Hong Kong - and you dont want to know how many years it will take me to learn it at the rate of one character a day... but guess what. I suffer from Lymes and cant do that much of much else and so ... I can make choices I did not even have 7 months ago. Seven months ago I could never justify something this frivolous....

Now - I'm learning Cantonese ... and I'm refusing internet-answer-autopsy for the rest of the week.

Common sense will do.

... and yes I do have a specific finger in mind in case you were wondering...

thankyou to http://www.sickfromatick.com/ for my image

When I think I'm too clever ....

...I get the Universe to slap me around the ears!

Today it said:

True brilliance, is not a function of understanding one's view of the world and finding order, logic, and spirituality in it. True brilliance is understanding that your view of order, logic, and spirituality is what created your world. And therefore being forever capable of changing everything.

Have a look at http://www.tut.com/ and tell the universe you can do with a bit of wisdom if you wish!

ANOTHER good day - On the http://lymeblog.com/modules.php?name=Blogs_Archive my favourite writer wonders what it would feel like to be normal again. Let me tell you it is another galaxy - suddenly yellows are unbelievably sharp and happy and greens heartbreakingly intense.

Just in case I have stumbled on the magic snake-venom category of possible cure...

I have just been had by the stuffing my system with salt and Vitamin C cure ... I couldnt find the catch - most probably because I really didnt want to find it???Desperation can certainly lead us on some interesting journeys. Hey ho!

There is one small problem with my current spate of decent health... I am too scared to go to sleep. Lilly livered me worrying about waking up in hell tomorrow.

Fingers crossed.

Eyes closed.

Wakeup and dance to the cymbals.....

O.K. - much better now... following a morning of giving an Oscar winning Lyme patient performance I have had a night and a day of normal (yes allright for me!) behaviour.



I've been really cross at everyone telling me to buck up. Amazing how complex your interactions with people become when your sick ... I feel sorry for myself when friends dont visit ... but then I feel bad that I am not entertaining enough when they do. I feel awful when they dont ask how I am .... and I hate having to repeat the clever story about how I blacked out next to the sausage shelf in the shop, but it was fine as it gave a couple of amused Chinese guys the chance to read the Cantonese tatoo on my back. Sorry-for-myself sorry-for-myself ....



And then it hit me! Something cool about having this odious disease - it has redefined my relationship with my kids.



I never in a million years thought I would take to staying at home 24/7 and I am now adoring every moment. Trust me children are just the very best thing to have around when you are sick ... and I'm starting to think that they can be pretty handy the rest of the time too...



Think about it: When they ask you to do something and you cant (because for instance if you got up to jump in the pool with them you will most probably pass out and drown...) they just get mad at you. They dont pretend that everything is fine - cos its not bloody fine. So I never stress about them being good about things to try to make me feel better... Honesty simply rules.



They also dont ask about how sick I feel when they dont feel like talking about it - lets face it, it is also bloody boring being unwell. You just dont have to second guess children ... and even better - you get to worry about THEM ... which makes a nice break from being worried about yourself.



So all in all they give you the goods straight up and make sure you never take yourself too seriously!!!



Here's to making sure you still have someone around that you can learn from ... and not necessarily the hard stuff. Fun stuff will do....



.... and you might find this in the most unusual place ...



and best of all - its all a matter of perspective and if you can simply get to a good vantage point it is:

Possible TO DO today:

Take the most complicated relationship battle and broker a kick arse peace accord

Lets Navigate ....

I have recently been accused of not being positive enough and giving in to this Lyme thing. The point of these ramblings is to make a couple of people a little less morose and maybe to help them use their addled brains to locate and then even grab a bit of a hold of their sense of humour with their arthritic hands. So even though I am no less sorry for myself - which I think is a great service to humanity ... after all it makes it completely unnecessary for anyone else to do the tedious job... the point that I am missing the levity boat is well taken!

So what is fine about Lyme??

1. You get to understand a lot about how difficult illness can be.
2. You learn to appreciate the little things enormously.
3. Priorities are re-defined.
4. ..... no no no this is not funny at all.

I just dont feel like being funny today.

Bad mood! Bad bad mood - just want to shout ... which might rate for funny peculiar.

will try to fly straight and level tomorrow ...

Alice in Lymeland

Lying in bed unable to lift my head I certainly have enough time to think back to happier times. But practical considerations gobble up my energy ... I'm thirsty but I dont want to drink too much - because it will result in the inevitable 5 meter assault on the loo... this might be a touch personal but there you go.

Nothing like falling over your feet in front of all of town to break down a couple of barriers. In fact I can almost prescribe a touch of debilitating disease for society in general.

Khalil Gibran said "your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding"

Slightly irritating and reassuring that I always agree with him but YES I am understanding so many things I am rambling ... many many things to understand at the very same moment that I dont have the energy to assimilate any of them to my satisfaction.

There is the big picture - and the stories are grim almost unbearably so... and then there is the smaller picture. Just one life. Just mine. It is a slippery road of fighting and acceptance and defiance and defeat. Like in a real life war there is no big victory - as you slowly unlearn your mortality and your invinceability you know that you will never need it quite as much again. But you also understand that it will never be yours ever again either.

I started with life before Lyme - and ended very quickly in the co-morbid depression that IS Lyme. This aberration should be added to the list of symptoms really. What Alasdair Crockett referred to as "the depth of ignorance" before he committed suicide is all around me.

I was diagnosed far too late to save my dignity ... but now I keep hearing stories of misdiagnosis of Motor Neuron disease and Multiple Sclerosis and ... there seems really to be an absolutely frightening lack of any co-herence.

We really are a great secret funny society... lunatics every one of us - read the blogs... we all sound like the mad hatter.

Indeed Lewis Carol could have done something with this Lyme!