Tomorrow I'm meeting with the director of the school and stocking up on all my medications.
Spent Shabbos with a lovely YU family. Good food. Good conversation--some over my head. Most positive people to be with on Shabbos. I had lots of fun and I showed Igor a great side of Washington Heights, the YU side.
4 dayssssssssssssssssssssssssssss!
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Saturday, June 24, 2006
Thursday, June 22, 2006
6 Days til Israel
Wow! In six days, I will be in a foreign country. Aside from Canada and the Dominican Republic, I've been to no other foreign soil either. This will be the farthest I've ventured from my time zone.
Meanwhile:
Panicking about how I'm going to survive on disability but now EVERYONE at work knows my plans are to fill out the paperwork when I get back from Israel and start the whole process. Six months of disability.
Broke my CD player, got a new one, that one was broken and had to be replaced with the third and final and more expensive DVD player. i hate it but i have to read audio books of everything i can now.
I'm supposed to be trying a new arthritis medication. Current side effect is stomach problems. So far, not taking effect.
ISRAEL IN SIX DAYS!!!! I just packed all my neatly folded freshly laundered by someone else clothes.
Devora says I have to write a book and she will help me. Do I have enough material? Hmm.
Meanwhile:
Panicking about how I'm going to survive on disability but now EVERYONE at work knows my plans are to fill out the paperwork when I get back from Israel and start the whole process. Six months of disability.
Broke my CD player, got a new one, that one was broken and had to be replaced with the third and final and more expensive DVD player. i hate it but i have to read audio books of everything i can now.
I'm supposed to be trying a new arthritis medication. Current side effect is stomach problems. So far, not taking effect.
ISRAEL IN SIX DAYS!!!! I just packed all my neatly folded freshly laundered by someone else clothes.
Devora says I have to write a book and she will help me. Do I have enough material? Hmm.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Boy, you work fast...
So, here I am, feeling a mentally better today if not physically better. I informed the principal that I was going on disability in September because there was no way, I could come back with this pain problem. (On a sidenote, the rheumatolgists has me on a new med that MAY cause stomach bleeding. Hmm.) I was already about an hour late for work when I arrived to deliver this news. I had apparently missed a proctoring assignment. I had no minutes to speak of with which to call in so when the teacher arranging the proctoring assignments asked where I'd been (at home, trying with my sister to get all the students grades together), I told him the truth: "I was at home having a nervous breakdown."
Of course, he didn't have any response. The principal cried about my decision. I told a couple of other coworkers and some students I won't see because I leave for Israel on the afternoon of the last morning I should see them but I know I would be totally out of it if I tried to go into work AND flew out the same day. I mean, I can't even make it in on time.
Meanwhile, a lovely man did my laundry for $36...all 49 lbs of it. I busted my CD player during an attempted reading of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe and was forced to purchase another. My aunt is recommending a cleaning lady. An angel lent me her cellphone for use today so I could speak to my boyfriend, doctors and family members that I hadn't been able to speak to in almost two days because of the phone crisis.
Now, I have a one page paper and a five page paper to get through so I don't forfeit my master's. Plus, I have to coerce my sister into making dinner.
Of course, he didn't have any response. The principal cried about my decision. I told a couple of other coworkers and some students I won't see because I leave for Israel on the afternoon of the last morning I should see them but I know I would be totally out of it if I tried to go into work AND flew out the same day. I mean, I can't even make it in on time.
Meanwhile, a lovely man did my laundry for $36...all 49 lbs of it. I busted my CD player during an attempted reading of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe and was forced to purchase another. My aunt is recommending a cleaning lady. An angel lent me her cellphone for use today so I could speak to my boyfriend, doctors and family members that I hadn't been able to speak to in almost two days because of the phone crisis.
Now, I have a one page paper and a five page paper to get through so I don't forfeit my master's. Plus, I have to coerce my sister into making dinner.
Monday, June 19, 2006
In pain for seven months
I have officially been in pain for seven months straight with few days in-between where the pain was officially gone for a couple of hours. Meanwhile, I'm trying to get my things together before I leave for Israel. Laundry, medications, packing. I have a one-page paper to write and a five-page paper due by the 21st, the last of the assignments for my incomplete for my graduate school class.
The worst thing about fibromyalgia is the stress and stress, indeed does make pain worst, despite not being psychosomatic pain. At a meeting today, people were clapping and it hurt so I had to sit there with my noise reduction headphones on, looking fairly silly, knowing that people will talk behind my back but trying to keep a brave face.
On the way home, I lost my prescription from my allergist and realized she failed to give me refills on two prescriptions but since I get confused easily now, something called "fibro fog," the situation just escalates to all levels of stress. I call her to tell her to fill the missing prescription and another one but forget to remind her I need two refills (so hopefully a pharmacy in Israel will refill it). Then, I remember that I have a third medication that needs two refills as well. And again, I'm reminded that I have no cellphone minutes for two days so I can't make any phone calls so every minute is costing me a fortune. Tomorrow, unless I reread this blog or write it all down (it hurts more to write than to type and typing and speaking software fall somewhere around the same level of pain), I'll completely forget most of this situation.
Meanwhile, I have to ask other people for help more than I've ever before and that hurts physically, but mentally. A friend said to me the other day, "You're really unreliable, you never call back" and I don't think she realizes how hard my day is. At work, we're packing up for the end of the year and a co-worker has to help me tape a box close. I have to bring this box home and healthy, I could have done it, even up the five flights but now, I can barely pack the box and I have to figure out how to pay to have it sent home or coerce a friend to help.
Laundry is one of the most difficult things for me to do because it quickly causes my fibromyalgia AND chronic fatigue disorder to flare up. So, my sister is supposed to help me with it but she helps me with so much else she hasn't gotten to it in almost three weeks. Grades are due tomorrow and she has to calculate those. Meanwhile, my living room is a mess because we had to clear out my bedroom to make it allergy-free for the asthma-like symptoms my dust allergies now create. Now, the only room I can breathe in easily (or fairly easily) is my bedroom. On top of four medications for allergy, two medications for fibromyalgia (sleep and anti-inflammatory), I have to carry an asthma pump.
Oh, and did I mention that sitting down and not being a mathematical whiz and all, trying to calculate all I need to get to Israel, to take to Israel, trying to convince pharmacists to GIVE me the medications in advance (doesn't work), is arduous. Expenses keep cropping up. I'm too exhausted to go to Kmart at 7pm to buy the plastic pillow protectors to help my allergies and....
I feel so overwhelmed. Some of my colleagues today, not the English department, which treats me like a pariah with the exception of one, told me that I'm a great teacher, exactly what the kids need, and I wince at the compliment. I know that after this school year and two months in Israel, I will be unable to return unless some miracle happens and right now, I have a hard time believing in miracles for myself.
So look, if I am a bad friend, if I seem curt or out of it, well, this is the new me. My goal most days is to get home and have the strength to make myself dinner...even a sandwich is difficult...and most days, I can't. I need help making a sandwich. The work day takes all the energy out of me and Shabbos isn't enough to recover. I am not strong, I'm no survivor. Indeed, I am very weak. I ask G-d to put me out of my misery with every other breath that I ask G-d to help me make it through the day so I can have the life I thought I would have because things were finally going so well.
Oh, yeah, and did I mention the rabbi I've been working with isn't on "the list" so I've been urged to call a rabbi in Monsey to discuss the situation? It's hard to call my friends, it hurts to dial, but now I have to call someone I don't even know and explain why I want to convert on a day when hopefully it doesn't hurt to talk.
The worst thing about fibromyalgia is the stress and stress, indeed does make pain worst, despite not being psychosomatic pain. At a meeting today, people were clapping and it hurt so I had to sit there with my noise reduction headphones on, looking fairly silly, knowing that people will talk behind my back but trying to keep a brave face.
On the way home, I lost my prescription from my allergist and realized she failed to give me refills on two prescriptions but since I get confused easily now, something called "fibro fog," the situation just escalates to all levels of stress. I call her to tell her to fill the missing prescription and another one but forget to remind her I need two refills (so hopefully a pharmacy in Israel will refill it). Then, I remember that I have a third medication that needs two refills as well. And again, I'm reminded that I have no cellphone minutes for two days so I can't make any phone calls so every minute is costing me a fortune. Tomorrow, unless I reread this blog or write it all down (it hurts more to write than to type and typing and speaking software fall somewhere around the same level of pain), I'll completely forget most of this situation.
Meanwhile, I have to ask other people for help more than I've ever before and that hurts physically, but mentally. A friend said to me the other day, "You're really unreliable, you never call back" and I don't think she realizes how hard my day is. At work, we're packing up for the end of the year and a co-worker has to help me tape a box close. I have to bring this box home and healthy, I could have done it, even up the five flights but now, I can barely pack the box and I have to figure out how to pay to have it sent home or coerce a friend to help.
Laundry is one of the most difficult things for me to do because it quickly causes my fibromyalgia AND chronic fatigue disorder to flare up. So, my sister is supposed to help me with it but she helps me with so much else she hasn't gotten to it in almost three weeks. Grades are due tomorrow and she has to calculate those. Meanwhile, my living room is a mess because we had to clear out my bedroom to make it allergy-free for the asthma-like symptoms my dust allergies now create. Now, the only room I can breathe in easily (or fairly easily) is my bedroom. On top of four medications for allergy, two medications for fibromyalgia (sleep and anti-inflammatory), I have to carry an asthma pump.
Oh, and did I mention that sitting down and not being a mathematical whiz and all, trying to calculate all I need to get to Israel, to take to Israel, trying to convince pharmacists to GIVE me the medications in advance (doesn't work), is arduous. Expenses keep cropping up. I'm too exhausted to go to Kmart at 7pm to buy the plastic pillow protectors to help my allergies and....
I feel so overwhelmed. Some of my colleagues today, not the English department, which treats me like a pariah with the exception of one, told me that I'm a great teacher, exactly what the kids need, and I wince at the compliment. I know that after this school year and two months in Israel, I will be unable to return unless some miracle happens and right now, I have a hard time believing in miracles for myself.
So look, if I am a bad friend, if I seem curt or out of it, well, this is the new me. My goal most days is to get home and have the strength to make myself dinner...even a sandwich is difficult...and most days, I can't. I need help making a sandwich. The work day takes all the energy out of me and Shabbos isn't enough to recover. I am not strong, I'm no survivor. Indeed, I am very weak. I ask G-d to put me out of my misery with every other breath that I ask G-d to help me make it through the day so I can have the life I thought I would have because things were finally going so well.
Oh, yeah, and did I mention the rabbi I've been working with isn't on "the list" so I've been urged to call a rabbi in Monsey to discuss the situation? It's hard to call my friends, it hurts to dial, but now I have to call someone I don't even know and explain why I want to convert on a day when hopefully it doesn't hurt to talk.
Wednesday, June 7, 2006
I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack....
Hello, guess what? I don't have really bad carpal tunnel. It's only mild. That's the good news. Instead, I'm battling the forces of evil fibromyalgia and Dragon Speaking Software and doctors who know diddly squat about my pain. Oh, more good news, I can withstand more pain (physically and mentally) than I ever thought I could.
Alas, I must be brief because I can no longer dilly-dally on the internet for longer than 20-30 minute sessions. So here are some soundbites for you....
Those rainboots everyone wears really do keep out the rain.
My new portable DVD player looks like a "stormtrooper" according to my sister.
Accupuncture rocks.
Some of my students learned to write this year.
Dragon Speaking Software is only intermittingly possessed by the devil.
Going to Israel in 3 weeks....
Alas, I must be brief because I can no longer dilly-dally on the internet for longer than 20-30 minute sessions. So here are some soundbites for you....
Those rainboots everyone wears really do keep out the rain.
My new portable DVD player looks like a "stormtrooper" according to my sister.
Accupuncture rocks.
Some of my students learned to write this year.
Dragon Speaking Software is only intermittingly possessed by the devil.
Going to Israel in 3 weeks....
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