First Stick and Bartering

Friday, October 5: This morning, my fabulous nurse friend, Gina, came over with her son Jack (who just turned 4) to hold my hand and help teach me how to give myself injections of Rebif. Like most things that scare the heck out of me, this wasn't so bad. I had to go in the bathroom to pray and cray and pee just before doing the whole stick thing, pretty sure that I wouldn't be able to do it. Gina assured me that I could do it, and sat next to me while organized my supplies, put the meds in the injection pen, cleaned the injection site, and stuck myself. It was actually quite anticlimactic after all the build up. I wasn't even sure the needle went in until Gina showed me the empty syringe. Wow. So now, I get ready to do it again every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I can do this! I AM doing this!

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. - Eleanor Roosevelt

I also finalized a fabulous bartering deal today. I traded the Buick for housecleaning and laundry. My amazing friend Christina (I am so blessed with great friends!) gave me housecleaning as a gift which was very, very helpful with my initial MS fatigue. Merry Maids did a great job but it's very expensive (MY CONCERN, not Christina's), and they don't do anything "extra." So, as soon as we are done with whatever payments Christina made to Merry Maids, Sandra will be cleaning my house once a week for 13 weeks, as well as doing a couple loads of laundry, folding it, and putting it away. I feel like I died and went to heaven! So now my dilemma is: Do I tell my dad that I took his Buick gift and traded it in for a gift of housecleaning and laundry? Thoughts?

I had two separate, but almost equally embarassing things happen since I last posted. I would like to include them in the book which means I should probably include them here but I think I might die of embarassment if anyone else (I had to share each story with one person). Maybe I can just be somewhat vague and save what little face I have left:

Embarassing incident #1: I left a rambling message for a work colleague yesterday (MS Cognitive Malfunctioning? Tiredness? Middle-Aged Social awkwardness?) that ended with me inadvertently saying something that could have been miscontrued in a sexual way. Thank Goodness, I remembered that, if you press pound, you have the option to erase and rerecord the message. I pressed all the appropriate buttons and thought I was successful. Then, last night I received a weird email from the colleague that makes me think the erase/rerecord didn't take. I chose to ignore it and I'm thinking I'm gong to have to continue to do so until/unless he says something directly to me, in which case, I will DIE.

Embarassing incident #2: I broke the toilet (the tank lid AND the internal mechanisms) and flooded the bathroom at Zane's child care center this morning. While I was trying to rectify the situation with a sink-size plunger and an almost empty role of toilet paper, a teacher knocked on the door. Nuf said. If I had more energy and I didn't think it would be traumatic, I would change child care centers. I am DREADING picking Zane up in about an hour.

Still trying to sell the minivan. Loving the Volvo wagon although I really need to get the code for the stereo and order a manual so I can figure out how to do things like turn on the heat. The good news is that the weather will be 80 degrees all weekend and the Volvo has working AC!!!

I'm feeling a little guilty that I played the MS victim card a couple times this week....or did I? When I couldn't go to the workshop at work and someone told me that my employer would be charged money even if I didn't participate, I told her I had MS and wasn't feeling well.

Then, when a committee at the UU church signed me up to host coffee hour on Sunday (without checking with me first), I said that I could bring food but would have a hard time setting up and cleaning up with Ruby and Zane in tow and, when the committee members (not to be confused with MY committee) insisted that everyone who was assigned needed to fulfill their responsiblity or find a substitute, I said that I would try but that I was starting a new MS drug and wasn't sure I would be at church.

Did I HAVE to use MS in these situations to say "no?" Hmmm. Is finding the way to say "no" another gift of MS?

I want to buy Eat, Pray, Love. Oprah (Ok-yes, I'm laying on the couch watching Oprah on my day off!) is interviewing the author and it sounds like this is an amazing book and right up my alley. Ok-I'm a beat or two (or 36) behind the rest of the reading world, but, hey..... I have MS! :-)