I met with Dr. Moore last Friday to discuss my most recent MRI. Another surgery is not needed at this point. Please pray for me and offer good vibes so I will be able to endure this pain… even with the current remedies in place, it is a constant, dull, and gnawing ache that I feel in the back teeth of my lower jaw I’m not sure how I will be able to live with this pain too. I suppose there is no other choice. Please pray for me!
Author: Jen Rios
April 2018 Faves
So, I’m in the time warp right now. It’s 2007 and I am living in my two bedroom apartment with my son. I would live there for two more years and buy my house in June of 2009. I’m not sure what caused me to remember this album or even which song I remembered first but this album was my soundtrack as I filled my crockpot and did my dishes pretty much every day. Here are some songs that I completely forgot about until the music started and I sang all the words! These songs shed light on the fact that my life was so much different in 2007. I was still able to walk with Canadian crutches and the, “Steady feet, don’t fail me now” line really got to me because it was then that I realized my feet were not being so steady and we’re on the verge of failing.
Here are the songs I dig. Some didn’t get much, if any, radio play:
Poetry Slam
I can’t sleep. Typical. I have been falling asleep lately to my Dad’s Play list on Apple Music. I fall sleep to that music often. Sometimes I cry sometimes I smile to myself. Tonight, as I heard this song:
I didn’t cry as I put his songs on shuffle and remained wide awake in my bed in my dark room. I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately! Especially today because I would like him to be here for Seanie’s milestone of passing his road test and would like to hear what he thinks of his glasses. I miss him!!!
As I heard this song, Oddly enough, I thought my African-American literature class during undergrad. Our assignment was to perform a poetry slam to something written by an African-American poet. My professor gave the class a lot of freedom in deciding which poet’s work we would use. It had to be an African-American poet and we only had to check in with Dr. Pollard, my professor, to get approval before we could perform our poetry slam. I chose this song to recite:
I thought it was strange that I was nervous before it was my turn but this song meant a lot to me! Sean was about 1 1/2 at the time and I really had to fight back tears as I spoke the lyrics to the song in front of the class. I remember one guy was kindof a jerk said something about not liking the sentiment of my performance but I didn’t care because I got through it without crying and got a good grade. I chose this song for Sean. I still think the words at the beginning of this song ring true for him and me. Back then, I placed more importance on getting married but I haven’t yet so I don’t know about the end of the song but for Seanie, this song still makes me cry.
*License*
Sean had his road test this morning. I could not accompany him because 1. It was raining and 2. I would not be able to get into the backseat of the car. I wrote a note for my mom to serve as my proxy to accompany him and the evaluator on his road test. He called me at 11:27 AM and told me that he passed. Of course I had to scream and be excited for him! When he and my mom got home, he loaded me up into his car and we drove to Secretary of State to get his license.
He signed in and we were in the line to check all of his documents when the announcement was made that they were having computer problems. We decided to leave and get something to eat. My mom called me a little while later and told me that it was a statewide problem with the computers so I told Sean we would get his license tomorrow.
I told him that we could eat wherever he wanted and he wanted to go to Tubby’s drive thru. After he placed the order, I’m not even sure what we are talking about but he raised his fist and smiled and said, “License” and started to laugh. He said just like the dad in Phineas and Ferb. ( A show from his childhood).
I vaguely remembered the reference about some guided tour in a museum but I laughed and bumped the side of his fist with the side of mine. I don’t think that he thought I would latch onto that as much as I did but I said that the rest of the day until his eye appointment.
He needs glasses. Not glasses like I have classes which I’ve had since I was a child and is a -6.5 in both eyes. He does not need to wear them all of the time but it is a very slight prescription to, “sharpen it up a bit” when looking at the board at school or a computer screen or driving. Here is what he chose:
I texted my mom and my brothers this picture and added the words, “It’s Daddy!” He chose them on his own and when he looked at me with his choice, I am mediately thought of my Dad!
😍
My morning routine for some months now is to wake up and get out of bed while Sean is getting ready for school. Before I put my contacts in, I turn the TV on to Good Morning Football. I could feel myself dragging this morning, not as much as yesterday because it wasn’t raining but dragging nonetheless.
They were talking to coaches and general managers at the annual meeting and Peter was in Florida interviewing them. I sat in my kitchen listening to my TV as I slowly drank my ginger water (I drink this for health reasons as well as my garlic tea). I’m not even sure which general manager they were talking to when he told Peter that Kay Adams is their favorite. I picked up my phone and tweeted the show:
I finished my ginger tea and rolled over to my refrigerator to get my protein shake. I drink my breakfast as well. I shook my shake and rolled it into my shirt so I could wheel myself to the living room to watch the show. I plugged my phone in to charge at the plug by the door and put my phone on the end table.
During the next commercial break, I wheeled over to my phone to check and see if I turned the ringer on after putting it on the “do not disturb” mode at night while I sleep. I could tell it was going to be a LONG day!!!
But then, I look at my phone, and Kay Adams replied to my tweet!!!:
Even though I could feel myself dragging and was barely awake, I screamed! I love that show so much! I am made to feel special every time they interact with me, whether it is Will Selva or Kyle Brant liking my tweets, Kyle mentioning my tweet on the show, or Nate Burleson following me back on Twitter. Kay has liked and replied to my tweets before but, NEVER WITH HEART EYES!!!
I didn’t feel well and my knee hurt through the night and continue to hurt in the morning so I knew it’s going to be a rough day but that reply made me feel SO special!
Simple Pleasures man 😍!!!
ALMOST Forgotten Tune #17
Do you ever hear the first bars of a song that makes you pause and let out a deep breath that you didn’t know you were holding and as the lyrics begin, you’re flooded with 1 million memories? Well, that’s this song for me! I don’t even care that it shows my age but I haven’t heard it in so long and makes me think about how I thought my life would turn out and how differently it is now. It’s a good tune! ☺☺☺
I will have to fact check my blog to see if I’ve already posted this song but it was really cool to hear today.
Books I’m Reading 3.24.18
I received this book in the mail today.
I’m so excited to read it! I read about it in a Facebook post friend shared. I reposted it and ordered the book that day!
CLICK PICTURE TO READ ARTICLE:
I TECHNICALLY have not started reading it yet but I plan to very soon but I’m still recovering from “sunbathing” in my kitchen yesterday. I enjoyed the the sun so much yesterday but only for short time! Apparently, it was not short enough, I’m still resting and trying to recover so I can read this book!
Sunshine
My cousin, Kimmy, texted me some affirmations this morning because she read my blog post from yesterday and I seemed a bit down! Yesterday was a bit of a low point for me I suppose. My mom came over this morning to help me get ready for the day and I was laughing when she came in. I’ll post later about why I was laughing but with Kimmy‘s texts and my laughter, I wanted to make today a better day!
I checked my Facebook alerts on my phone when I was ready for the day and the admin of my favorite MS support group posted this:
She wished us a happy Friday and I listened to it as I was got my things together to make my garlic tea. (I drink it for health reasons). This song brings back a flood of memories from high school, when I was carefree and able-bodied. I played the song a few times as I got my garlic tea together. I chose not to think negatively today so I allowed myself to just think about all the happy memories from high school as this song played. The radio play for this song some 18 years ago was this version :
I remember driving around with my friends and yelling the part, “Karen, I love you!” as we drove. I don’t drink coffee so I continued to remain seated in the sun that shone through my kitchen window as I waited for the water to boil.
I could feel the sunshine on my face! I normally hide from the sun because it will melt me but, in the safety of my home, I Just allowed myself to enjoy that feeling for a little while. It was warm and I could feel my skin tingle as the sun kissed me. I miss that feeling so much! I knew that when I get too exhausted from that, I can just pass out in my wheelchair so that sun-kissed feeling was worth that. It was a bit overwhelming and I cried happy tears at feeling that feeling, even for just a short time.
As I fished the garlic out of the boiling water and added the lemon and honey, YouTube continued playing on my phone; a couple of really good songs from the 90s came on and I dug it! If I have not already, I will definitely post those songs as well. But right now, because I’m done with my tea and I’m feeling a little exhausted from those few minutes in the sun, I’ll have to close my eyes for a bit…
Hummus, Popcorn, and Carrots
I have established that I am old because of my last birthday. I don’t mind it at all but I KNOW that I’m old because, on my birthday, I bought myself a present. I ordered a food processor from Amazon. Well, it came a while back and I got so excited! I ordered myself a food processor because I saw a recipe for hummus not too long ago.
Having grown up in East Dearborn, it’s haraam (“forbidden” in Arabic) to buy store-bought hummus and I refuse to do so! I knew I could make it myself! The recipe I found, called for a food processor, hence the reason for my present! Based on the ingredients, I knew that if I just followed the recipe, I could make some good hummus!
Well, I did! My friend (she gets my groceries for me) had just gotten a 5 pound bag of carrots from the grocery store and I was excited to peel and cut them so I could eat them with the hummus. I washed and put the food processor together and started the hummus this morning. By the time I was finished making it, it was around lunchtime.
I popped some microwave popcorn, Homestyle is the best! and decided to eat that for lunch because I could feel myself getting tired. Imagine that, getting tired after washing the parts and loading things into a food processor and turning it on. Well, I have slowly come to the realization that sometimes, more often than I care to admit, that happens. I get too tired!
So, I made the popcorn. Whenever I do this, have popcorn for a meal, I feel like Olivia Pope (without the wine because I don’t drink anymore).
So, I sat in my kitchen eating the popcorn and getting myself prepared to peel the 5 pounds of carrots and cut it up to have them ready to eat with the hummus. Well, of the 5 pounds of carrots, I was able to peel six.
I remember it being so much easier to peel carrots when I was younger, before MS! It’s not anymore. I hated coming to that realization today. I got on my phone and put prepared carrots and celery on my grocery list for next week. I can no longer peel carrots on my own.
Because I was tired after peeling and cutting those 6 carrots, I thought I would get on Facebook. A friend shared this article and it peaked my interest:
CLICK PICTURE TO READ ARTICLE
I reposted the article on my story. It’s a pretty lengthly article but worth the read! As I read it, I cried the entire time! It was a completely true article as I have firsthand knowledge of the situation. After reading the article, I looked around at my kitchen floor and saw carrot shavings that missed the garbage can and popcorn that missed my mouth and I started to cry even more!
There is even a piece of cardboard from the food processor packaging that I had not even seen until I looked at this picture. All of these things that are on the floor will remain there until someone (most likely my Mom) will sweep them up. This realization made me cry even more! As I put the carrots away in the refrigerator because I was too distraught to eat them and the tears continued to flow, I realized that my knee hurts! I remember being told as a basketball player in high school that, “Everything always hurts more when you lose!” and at this point, I felt very much at a loss because I have lost so much in the past 17 years since my diagnosis… maybe I will have the carrots and hummus tomorrow…
Dread #2
So, I had my MRI last Saturday, on St. Patrick’s Day. I paid attention to everything and wanted to make a joke about having to change my pants and wear the hospital-given paper pants for my MRI. Sean made fun of them when I got home until he realized that they had pockets! There was no music but I was given those foam earplugs to lessen the sound of the banging and clacking from the machine.
I had never been in this room for that MRI but I knew what to expect. I closed my eyes for the first part of it and thought of the movie, Juno because Sean is getting his braces off next month. I thought of Michael Rhoades because he was the first person I told about Sean needing braces and how much I was going to have to pay. I don’t know where he is now but I thought about telling him that Sean is getting them off. Anyway, my teeth have really shifted and the 23 years since I’ve had braces. I’m going to have to fix them because Sean will have perfect teeth.
I would have to do the Invisaline thing because I am a chain gum-chewer and I’m crazy about flossing my teeth so metal braces wouldn’t do! Plus I’m old! So, I thought about that guy eating the orange TicTac’s. That’s what I would have to do because I would have to lay off the gum with braces I think. Anyway, I had all kinds of random thoughts while doing my MRI and my left leg was spazzing out like crazy but my right leg was locked into place so it didn’t move while they took the pictures.
Since my MRI I’ve been really thinking about the fact that there is something wrong with my right knee. 18 months later, it still hurts! I don’t go to Dr. Moore’s office again until March 30th but what do I really want? To have surgery AGAIN or not? I don’t know! All I know, is that knee surgery ain’t no joke! Even the non-surgical tendon scrape really stunk!
It is excruciating when my knee pops out of its socket and my Mom has to pop it back in. Even my son has felt it when it pops out sometimes upon transfer and he thinks it’s gross, because it is! Can this be surgically repaired? Am I just stuck with a bad knee that pops out all of the time? I don’t know.
I’ve been trying NOT to think about this so much because it stresses me out and stress and MS are not friends but, it hurts! I dread what Dr. Moore will say on the 30th. It already hurts without a third surgery but recovering from surgery hurts a lot too! This just stinks!