Today, we just jibbin…

last week was a blur. I was out of town and the US actually had a holiday so it was a short week.  I blinked and it was over.

my elite group of friends has grown by 1 and I have determined that I have a hard head. Geez, I fell Friday before last week and hit my head on a granite countertop. Sometimes when I fall, I hear the landing (I think) and it sounds so horrible that I can’t imagine what someone else hearing it thinks (especially if they’re in another room or something). I was by G2 for the weekend and Char and I were walking along a corridor when I said to her, “want to race?” Of course she couldn’t say no (cuz according to her mother she runs everywhere) so I’m sure she could think of nothing better to do at the time. She said, “READY?!?” I said, “nope” and continued walking. My plan was to walk to the “finish line” (a table), say “ready!”, slap the table and say, “I win.” Well…I got to the table and leaned to my left to slap it and I have NO idea what happened, but the next thing I knew was that I was falling…to the right! Now if someone can explain to me how one leans to the left and then falls to the right, I’d appreciate it; it makes no sense to me. G2 was standing on the other side of the table and she looked up, got confused about was happening and saw me going down in slow motion. She also almost reached out to grab my earring to help me fus she was confused.

Side note: apparently I never alert anyone around me in any way that I’m going down. It’s always a silent, slow motion fall – cuz almost everyone who’s been around me when I fall say the same exact thing.

on my way down, I hit the countertop. I swear that from what I remember hearing I just knew that things might have been bad. Good news-they weren’t. My head hurt, really hurt (only to the touch; not that I had a headache) for a few days especially when I was combing my hair. It’s still slightly tender but all in all, everything is good. I fell once when OB was here in April but I really don’t remember the last time before that. That is a good thing but it would have been nice if right at this moment in time I could say “I don’t remember the last time I fell”…sigh! I blame MS for all falls. Period!

so I’ve shared before that Lemtrada can affect the thyroid and cause hypERthyroidism or hypOthyroidism-seems so silly to me just choose to cause one or the other not both. Anyway, my blood tests from October thru December showed evidence of hypothyroidism so I’ve been on a daily pill to increase the hormone that is produced by the thyroid. Okay, so all along after that the results have been normal. The last time I went to my endocrinologist, she felt good about what she was seeing, so she relaxed her need to see me. Additionally, even though my blood work came back irregular, I actually had no symptoms of hypothyroidism at all, so she felt okay not seeing me as consistently as before. Last month’s test results were positive for it again and so I have to go back to her and she’s going to increase my dosage of the daily pill.  Great! Was able to eliminate doses of the muscle relaxant but now I have to increase dosage of this other pill. Anyway while talking to her I learned that (of course) little is known about what exactly Lemtrada does to the thyroid. She shared that she had a few MS patients on Lemtrada and their thyroid results are baffling, confusing, erratic (all those words rolled into one). Additionally, most patients are non symptomatic so there’s really no telling exactly how to interpret the results.

She told me about someone whose result was 200something – the normal range is .45-4.5 and he was walking around normelnormel like nobody’s business. Mine was 12.65 last month so it’s high but again – no symptoms.  I’ve gained 1 or 2 pounds but i don’t think it’s fair to blame my thyroid – i should probably blame the beers.

So,I have no symptoms but have to increase the dosage of this pill that luckily doesn’t have major serious side effects. The one “good” thing, at least to me, is that I am consistently hypo and results are not fluctuating all over the place. oh well…wha yuh go do…file this under things over which i have no control.

I gone so.  hol’ it down till next time.

My Elite Group of Friends

I have an elite group of friends within my inner/outer circles. These are the ones who have “thrown me down”.  Of course no one has thrown me down, it’s just a joke. They were the “lucky” ones I was holding on to when my feet got tied up or I lost my balance or who the hell knew what happened and I went down. I’m not going to call anyone out except this person and if I get cuss, I’ll take meh cuss like a man because it’s all about showing my love 🙂

it was labour day weekend in the US (September 4th). G2 and family were here and that Sunday, we went up to lime by the man made beach in Lake Lanier. For whatever reason, we left the apartment early and while on the way, it occurred to me that “shit! I’d forgotten to take my 8am pills” and great! I didn’t even have them with me. Well. Couldn’t do a damn thing, I just knew that moving around might be lil tough. Wasn’t like I’d planned to go in the water anyway, so I’ll just plant my ass in one spot and I should be good. We get up there and truthfully the day was uneventful. I definitely felt the effects of not taking those pills but there was nothing to write home about…until it was time to leave.

I’d taken the walker and the scooter and I was actually walking up the shore to the parked scooter. When I forget to take those pills, taking a step feels like I have 500lb weights attached to my ankles and as I was walking to the parked scooter, I was becoming frustrated because between my feet sinking into the sand and no pills, it was so difficult just to walk a few feet. I asked Lumy to “walk” my left leg for me. Now, understand that I’ve asked people to do this for me in the past…essentially, they will pick up the foot and place it where it needs to go so that I can advance. It doesn’t happen often but those times when I’m having a lot of trouble and there’s a willing participant, I’ll ask for help to get moving. As soon as he picked it up, I knew it wasn’t going to end well. I felt my body lean to the right and I braced myself. I fell (what felt like) straight back…sure did hit my head…hard! There were a number of people around so I wasn’t on the ground for long but it taught me something for next time I ask someone to do that. Truth be told that wasn’t the first time that I took a tumble doing that (writing this made me remember that it has happened before). In the future if I ask someone to “walk” my leg in for me, I need to make sure that we bend it before they lift it. That was the problem both times…if my leg does its normal thing – be stiff and straight – my balance will be thrown off and the risk of plummeting will increase. Not fun for either of us, although honestly I think it’s more traumatic for the other person involved than it is for me.

all in all, it was fine…no bruises, no physical damage. Lumy might have felt lil bad at first but “all in a day with MS” for me. I can also file it away as one of those MS trial and error situations – a learning experience, if you will. If someone ever has to “walk” that left leg for me, I know exactly how to instruct them so there are no mishaps. 🙂

I gone so…allyuh have a great weekend!

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