Tell Us Something Good- May 23

At this time last week my mom was in the hospital having surgery. My dad picked me up on Tuesday morning at 6:15 AM on his way to the hospital. We spent the morning waiting for the surgery to be over and for Mom to get to her recovery room. I then spent the day with her while my dad went to work. I went home and crashed into my own bed at 6:30 PM, staying there for the night. I had forgotten, apparently, that I was still recovering myself.

What does this have to do with telling you something good? Well, the good news is that Mom is home. She is recovering well. She is starting to walk a little bit and is also doing some chores at home. It looks like she will continue to get stronger and will be on her way to "normal" soon enough. The great news is that when our men are at work, Mom and I get to spend time together so we can watch out for each other since we are both on Percocet and/ or Vicodin for pain management. It's not the best way I would suggest for spending time together, but it works!

There is more good news that starts with some bad. On Sunday I was diagnosed with shingles again. This time it is on the left side of my body. I am still recovering from nerve damage due to the first round of shingles. My husband was devastated to hear the news. I could see how hard it hit him. He's not frustrated that he has to continue to care for me, but he was seriously fearful that we were going to go through the whole thing with worsening symptoms and hospitalization all over again.

This is where the good news comes in. After only four doses on the antiviral medication (I take it five times per day), I was feeling better Monday morning than I have in weeks. My chest pain was non-existent. My headache was not there, and my eyesight was better than it has been since April 1st. I, for the first time in two months, have hope that I will be driving again soon. If this trend keeps up, and if I can stop taking the pain medication, I see myself attempting to drive within a couple of weeks. Yippee! The pain in my feet was even relaxed, and I could walk normally for much of the day. I can't tell you how exciting that was.

Now, this is not a miracle cure. Unfortunately, there was some trade off. I slept for a good part of the day. I think part of that was the medication itself. I did experience some pain, but it wasn't until late in the afternoon, and I did wind up taking a pain pill. I can handle that, though. Getting to 4:00 feeling good was like seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. There IS hope that I will one day be "normal" again. I can even imagine myself running someday. Dare I imagine running the 6K race in the 12Ks of Christmas this year? I do say that is possible!