Whoa. 3 Years And Counting...!

I have to confess, I ran into log in problems on this site for a week or so, and exercising my temper, which could be attributed to my mother OR my father (and you can imagine what that means about me), I fled this blog for, well, 3 years actually.

I'm back, log in problem solved, for now, I guess.

So, what's been going on?  ... Everything! Life! Chaos! Turbulence! I'll try to summarize here:

Let's start with a good one: I bought a house. Key takeaways about that process: No one told me I needed to take off 2 weeks from work and sleep with my phone, with every piece of financial paperwork I've ever seen stacked around me in perfectly organized piles.  It was crazy.

I've lost some wonderful people who were essential to my happy life: my grandmother, and my very very good friend, one could easily say my best friend of the past 10 years, Emily White.  This one was recent, and unimaginable.  Both of these women were 2 of the best women I've ever known or could imagine.  And they were imperfect in just the right ways.  I miss them.

Almost forgot, I had another minor episode of MS soon after my last post, during that summer of 2009.  It lasted a few days and freaked me out a bunch, and I did a steroid drip treatment for it.  That was an intense couple weeks.  If you ever do that treatment, prepare your friends and family for your mood swings and zaniness.  Heck, prepare your mailman and your local gas station attendant while you're at it because it is going to be an interesting trip, at least it was for me.  It cannot be described.

I healed, and recovered. Since then I've regained a lot of my balance and a bit more stamina that I had lost since my first episode, but barely noticed (or chose to ignore, whatever) until it returned.  I had a phase of getting migraines and found a helpful medication to take as needed. When the migraines started becoming more and more frequent, running a couple days at a time for a while, I started juicing veggies and fruits daily.  It was remarkably effective for me (to the tune of taking only one migraine pill in the last 4 months).  I keep up with the juicing several times per week, and will probably do a cleanse with juicing (I never completely fast, mind you, that's a no-no) soon too.

What else? ... Oh, my husband and I adopted a dog.  He's huge and extremely time-consuming, and a great joy to us, literally complicating our lives right out from under us.  I've traveled to new states. I've survived an earthquake. My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and took up arms against it.  She's finishing a long round of chemo now and will embark on a journey through radiation soon.  She's unbelievably strong, and we've found a new way to stay in touch like we never have before: texting.  My sister fell in love with a boy.  My sibling-in-laws adopted my magical little niece. 

Many triumphs, many failures. A lot of growing up, a lot of searching. 

I promise I'll keep up better, everyone.  I hoped this blog would be helpful to MS people, and others who were lost and needed hope, and just a bit of direction out of the darkness, a bit of empowerment.  It certainly can't do that if disappear!  So I won't.  But just in case I do, expect that its because I'm out living this crazy life with the rest of you.

;)