Having a really hard time...

[MaggieRedwings]

Morning Courtney,

I can't possibly add a thing to what everyone else has said and advised but I can tell you that you are not alone out there. The family that is here is the best support we could possibly find and will pick you up when you are down, laugh with you when you pop a joke and cry with you when you are sad.

It has been an extremely long road for me and being a MI, it just might have been a bit harder. I have had to make very dramatic changes with MC from going GF to recognizing my intolerances to giving up being a vegan for very personal reasons and for over 35 years to eating fish and poultry to give me the stamina I need to get through the day. Really - that was my hardest decision.

Also, I was not a person who took meds but this disease forced me to and I am now drug free for MC and will not deal with meds again that did nothing for me. That is a decision we all need to make for ourselves. For me it will be diet alone.

I am finally coming out of the woods for a disease that had me down and out for over 7 years. I hope to be able to post in the very near future that "R" is now my state of life - will not say that word until it happens.

Just lean on us when you need to and we will help carry your load.

Love, Maggie

[Courtney]

Angy, I don't know if that was a joke about lying under the duvet to meditate or not, but I totally tried it this morning. My problem with meditation has always been that I can't make my brain sit still long enough to do that. I am easily distracted. I usually wake up with D about an hour before I have to get up, though, and I usually go back to bed and lie there frustrated bc I can't go back to sleep. So this morning I decided to take your advice and try meditating instead of trying to go back to sleep. Don't know if it helped yet, but it did make me feel like I wasn't completely missing out on sleep, so I felt more peaceful and at ease with that situation. I think I will look into the SAD lights you mentioned, too.

G'ma Mary, I have a yoga mat, block, strap, and DVD, and I did it a lot last summer...and then I got busy, etc. But I think I will start back, bc I'm sure it would help with my circulation (I'm one of those people who has purple fingers and toes) and with muscle and joint stiffness. Thanks for the reminder! I do have a cardio machine that I try to get on every other day. I'm able to get a lot of reading done, and it warms me up (some).

JoAnn, I'm actually a grad student in the final phase of my second master's degree. I'm funded through a fellowship where I teach first-year composition (i.e. English 101). Taking time off at this point isn't really an option for me. Right now, though, I am done with my course work, so I'm spending this semester finishing my thesis. That means that I only have to be on campus on Tuesday and Thursday, which are the days that I teach and hold office hours. MWF are for me to write, which I do at home. It actually feels like quite a break, but my problem right now is making myself do it! I am trying to keep regular hours so that I can have regular weekends. I was doing really well with that until I hit a wall with the brain fog/wrist pain/writer's block combo this week. If I could just make myself keep a regular schedule, it would be a lot easier, I'm sure. I guess I am having trouble too bc I'm trying to decide if I want to keep going, do the Ph.D. and be a full-fledged professor, or do one of the several other things I'm qualified for. There are things I like and dislike about all of it. My first master's is in library science. I was a public librarian and don't really want to go back to that. My second master's is in English. (Yeah, I like books! ) So, with these two degrees, I could be a public librarian or a university librarian (which requires both) or I could teach at a two-year college (although those jobs are becoming rarer) or I'm also certified to be a K-12 school media specialist. So--stress with trying to decide what I want to do, what my health will take, and where the jobs are, etc. I do know that I need the rhythm of the academic year in my life, and it gives me the opportunity for good breaks a few times a year.

I'm fortunate to have a very supportive husband who has been amazingly wonderful about the MC, etc. We've only been married for about two years, so obviously we knew I had some issues before, but we didn't know how bad, so I often feel guilty about putting him through this, but he's really great about the whole thing. Unfortunately, because of our job situations we have to commute about 35 miles each way so we can live between, and that has made it hard for us to form relationships at work or where we live. We have not been happy with the situation, and we will definitely be moving this summer, closer to friends and family.

Maggie, I can't imagine what it must have been like for you to switch from a vegan diet to one that includes meat and fish. While I have eaten fish and shellfish my whole life, I gave up eating meat for Lent about five years ago and never went back to it. It was not really a conscious decision--I never really liked meat to begin with (when we had roasts as a kid I ate all the veggies around it and didn't touch the meat), and I felt at the time that meat upset my stomach. I am going to try to include some meat in my diet, though, because I don't feel I'm getting adequate protein to heal my intestines now that I can't eat dairy or soy. Unfortunately, now I find the thought of eating meat a little nauseating. I tried to eat chicken at Thanksgiving and only got about a bite and a half down. When you started eating meat again, what was your approach? I'm scared it's going to make me sicker for awhile!

Thank you all so much for your love and understanding.

Love,

Courtney

[tex]

Courtney,

Hmmmmmmm. Your remarks about "eating around a roast", raised my eyebrows. I was the same way, when I as growing up, and I still don't care for roast beef. While I was reacting, beef seemed to be the only meat that I reacted to, and though it never actually caused me to have D, it gave me most of the other symptoms, (bloating, stiff neck, headache, etc.), and I still avoid beef, for the most part, but I don't believe that it actually would cause any symptoms, now. Thinking back, to when I was growing up, I don't recall that the roast beef actually caused any symptoms, (if it did, I never made the connection) - I just assumed that I simply didn't like it. I liked beef steak, (or hamburger), just fine, so I don't know if there were any early clues there, or not.

Anyway, regarding meat, I never had a problem eating lots of pork, while I was reacting, (lean pork is probably better if you're having problems with fat absorption). It's the "other white meat", you know, (as the ads say. ). To me, it seems much easier to digest than beef, and much more flavorful than chicken. Try grilling pork with garlic salt as the only seasoning. Done right, it's a dish fit for a King or queen. If there is any food that I would hate the most to have to do without, it would be pork, believe it or not.

By the way, since you mentioned fellowships, one of the things about grad school that really ticked me off, (back in the stone age), was the way that scholarships were tax free, while those of us who worked for our money, (by way of a fellowship), had to pay taxes on the money. I always considered that to be a grave injustice. Is that still the case today? IOW, do those who work for their money still have to pay for the privilege of working for it, while those who get free money, get a free ride with the IRS, to boot? If so, does that suck, or what?

I have to agree that the academic environment does have it's appeal. At one time, I enjoyed it so much that I became a professional student, until I finally overdid it, and got burned out on it. Those were the good old days.

Love,
Tex

[JLH]

When DH invited his Dad to his graduation for his PhD, Dad said "What again?"

[MaggieRedwings]

Hi Courtney,

As a child I did the same as you - clean up the veggies and even ate my brother's and sister's veggies and gave them my meat. Could not stand the chewing sensation. When I was 20, I gave up meat as part of my religion and continued it throughout my entire adult life until I turned almost 60. Last Spring or early Summer it was decided that I had to start getting more protein since soy was out for me the dead animals and fish were the only thing left - beans as protein do not really work for me. At that point I was trying Paleo and I probably now eat closer to Paleo than I ever did.

The decision was hard as I said but with the doctor's advice and talking with my religious "leaders", it was deemed that it was the best course for me to live a better life. Buddah does understand situations and the cow is not always a sacred being. The first weeks were very hard and I felt totally guilty and did not enjoy it but came to terms with it and now it is my way of life. I also got nauseous at the thought of eating it and still cannot eat ham, beef or god awful lamb. If it gives you the stamina and strength you need, it just might be the best course for you.

Love, Maggie

[Courtney]

Hmm, Tex, your approach to beef is really weird, bc it's exactly the same as mine. I always liked hamburger, sausage, bacon, and other ground or processed meats (As my DH puts it, I only like meat that doesn't look like meat), but I really did not like it closer to its natural state, unless it was really well seasoned or mixed in with other foods, like in a soup. As Maggie said, "the chewing sensation" was a problem for me. I managed to do okay with a few pieces of bison sausage that DH made from ground bison a few weeks ago, but then I tried a piece of pork sausage and that definitely upset my stomach. Probably bc it's much higher in fat. I'll keep trying just a little bit at a time of lean meats, but maybe I should leave the beef alone for now.

Significant scholarships are now mostly reserved for undergrads. I know mine were tax free as an undergrad. With my MLIS, I got a tiny honorarium type scholarship, but I was supported with a taxed fellowship. I don't remember if the scholarship was taxed or not. It wouldn't have made much difference. And I know my fellowship is taxed now! The reason they have switched to mostly fellowships (or the one I'm aware of) for grad students is a new trend toward making professors learn how to actually teach. They found they were graduating a lot of people who might (or might not ) know a lot, but couldn't communicate any of it. Now, it's almost impossible to get into a Ph.D program, much less get a job, unless you already have several years of teaching experience. I don't know of many grad programs that don't require teaching. Of course, that probably also has to do with universities trying to cut costs. They get cheap teachers with grad students, and English departments need lots of them because they have to teach composition to just about everyone.

Joan, that's hilarious! Sounds like my family!

Love,

Courtney

[tex]

When I was growing up, we grew and processed all our own meat - beef, pork, chicken, ducks, geese, mutton, etc. - you name it. Farms were pretty diversified, back in those days, and we could raise pretty much whatever we wanted, back before the coyotes and bobcats moved in to effectively remove chickens, ducks, geese, and the smaller animals from the family farm program. Hogs were always fat, so pork sausage contained a lot of fat. We usually dried it and smoked it, though, so much of the grease was removed before it ever got to the table. Over the years, consumers began to demand "healthier" meats, so hogs were selectively bred for leanness. Eventually they got so lean that you almost had to add grease to the pan, in order to fry bacon. (Not really, of course. )

Anyway, the commercial processors took advantage of the situation, and as hogs got leaner, the processors began to add fat to pork sausage, (they figured, "what the heck, everyone was used to fatty sausage anyway, so no one would notice"). I doubt that I'm the only one who noticed, but anyway, consumers got cheated out of lean sausage, for the most part, because it's quite profitable to sell fat for the price of good, lean meat, (just as it's very profitable to sell the "tenderizing solutions" that make up about 12 to 15% of most "injected" poultry meat these days, for the same price as good meat). I still don't understand why consumers fall for that bs, and continue to allow it). Of course, sausage needs a certain amount of fat, for flavor and texture, but it surely doesn't have to be half fat.

I'm glad to hear that the universities are finally getting around to putting some value on teaching skills. When I was in school, I had a lot of brilliant profs, who really knew their specialty, but they couldn't teach for beans. Trying to lean from a teacher like that, is a pretty substantial shock for a lot of kids straight out of high school, especially the smaller schools. Looking back, the prof responsible for indelibly branding the most persistent memories into my brain, was a guy who taught internal combustion engine design, (even though I had no more than a passing interest in internal combustion design). He had a sign hanging in his office that said simply, "You can't teach what you don't understand". I looked at no telling how many signs hanging in dozens of offices during those years, but today, I don't have the foggiest idea what any of them said, except for that one sign. Why? Because that guy knew how to teach, so he left lasting impressions on me. Or, maybe I'm just nutty.

Regardless, thanks for the encouraging info. Maybe there's still hope for this country, (at least there could be, if the cost of tuition wasn't so ridiculously high these days).

Love,
Tex

[Liz]

Hello Courtney,

You feel free to complain as much as you want. It does you good to get it off your chest, especially to people who understand what you are going through. We all have experienced similar things & have our own horror stories & have had a pretty good whinge about them at times. I was close to your age now when I started having problems & it is so frustrating when doctors treat you as though it is all in your head & put you on sedatives and such. It took a long time for me to find a doctor who understood & really did something to help me. There will be a solution for you down the track I am sure. Different things work for different people & sometimes it takes a bit of trial & error to find your own solution.

Love

Liz

[Courtney]

What's funny in a sad way, Tex, is that all that meat you produced on your farm was probably about the healthiest meat around. I think, in trying to make a number of foods "healthier", we've probably taken a lot of the health right out of them...or put a lot of unhealthy stuff into them. I think consumers put up with it because, in general, they don't know about it. I would love to see us, as a nation, begin to care more about where our food comes from, and about the people who produce it as opposed to just letting the corporations get rich, but that may be a pipe dream.

Glad to give you some hope for higher education. I agree with you about the cost of tuition. If higher ed doesn't watch out, they're going to hang themselves with their own rope. I don't know what the solution is, although there is lots of talk about it, but I do know that if you make a degree so expensive that many people will spend half their working lives paying it back, you're gonna lose a lot of customers, bc the cost-benefit analysis won't hold up. One reason I get very annoyed w/ the academic world, is that there is so much rhetoric about education for all and about how important it is, etc...and about how elitism is bad (slap wrist here ), but the academy itself remains a very elitist institution that excludes many people on the basis of all the things it says we shouldn't exclude people on (ability to pay being the biggest one these days). And there is so much internal snobbery that limits the real good higher ed could do. And the assumption that everyone agrees on education for education's sake. The reality is that some major changes are going to have to be made, in order to prove the real benefit. The academy is going to have to prove that it exists for more than its own sake. The rhetoric about education for all and the reality of what it costs to get an education just don't match up. (My mentor says that my realization of the need for change is why I need to stay in, because very few people do, and it really is becoming a change or die situation. )

Love,

Courtney

Liz, thank you for your encouraging words! It means a lot to know that others know what I'm going through.

Love,
Courtney

[tex]

Courtney,

Very well stated. All I can say to that is "Amen, sister". You probably will have a hard time believing this, but to show you what I think about the elitism problem that you refer to, (and, of course, to remove any doubt about how nutty I actually am, LOL), I was a Ph.D. candidate, with all of my course work behind me, (and approved by my committee), I had passed my foreign language exam, passed the qualifying exam, and all that remained to do was to finish my research and write my dissertation, but by that point, I was so turned off by the attitude that prevailed among the academic prima donnas that surrounded me, that I said to hell with it, and bailed out. A lot of the guys who took the qualifying exam with me, for example, seemed to feel that the main reason for getting a Ph.D. degree, was so that everyone else would be obligated to call them "Doctor". I kid you not. It's hard to visualize someone with so much education actually being a childish ass, at their core, but these guys were serious about it. And when I looked in the mirror, I could see it happening to me, too, as I got closer to the finish line, and that scared the hell out of me. I simply couldn't stand the thought of ending up that way myself. Weird, huh? But guess what? I've never regretted it. I've sometimes wondered where I would be now, if I had jumped through that last hoop, but I still can't convince myself that I should have done so. I have a hunch that the "Good Old Boys Club" attitude that prevails in the medical world, is just one more example of the same pathetic problem.

Love,
Tex

[angy]

Courtney !! no i wasnt joking when i said i love to lie under my duvet and meditate im a lazy so and so lol!! It helps me immensely..especially when i feel a cycle of depression and feeling physically low.

Hope you make the right decision on the path you take with your academic career and go where you want to be. I wish you all the best with your choices and hope that there will be light at the end of the tunnel..

Regarding the meat issue...i was a vegetarian for 6 yrs then when i got ill and discovered i was intolerant to wheat and gluten i decided to eat chicken for protein.. This was because i had real problems trying to hold down veggies to which i ate tons of..raw and cooked .I have to say i like chicken!!especially in a stir fry or added with garlic..but im not that keen on eating othe meats,,such as red meats cos i always had indigestion in the past when i ate red meat...im now starting to eat some ham and as long as its a good cut and lean ill eat it on toasties...

take care xx

[JoAnn]

Hi Courtney, how interesting to hear all that you are doing and involved in. I have a little idea of what you are going through. My oldest son is going to George Washington University in a grad program and is on a fellowship. He also teaches there. He is getting a masters/phd (somehow it's combined) in political science.
You are one busy girl! There's no one busier than someone involved in an English major and an English teacher. Making the final decision on what to do in life with your education is a huge one. I wish you the best in making your decision, in all your work, and especially in gaining good health. JoAnn

[Umber]

Courtney bless your heart!

I know exactly where you are at. I was there too. My doc had me on the highest doses of anti-depressants (2 of them) and it didn't help my depression. Most of the time I felt I could go to bed, stay there and DIE and be totally fine with that. When your thyroid is out of whack it effects EVERYTHING.

[Umber]

Courtney bless your heart!

I know exactly where you are at. I was there too. My doc had me on the highest doses of anti-depressants (2 of them) and it didn't help my depression. Most of the time I felt I could go to bed, stay there until I died and be totally fine with that. When your thyroid is out of whack it effects EVERYTHING. The only thing that is going to help your brain fog, extreme fatigue and depression is getting your thyroid working properly. What kind of medication are you on? Lots of thyroid docs make the mistake of only checking the TSH levels which is NOT an indication of how your thyroid is working. I am on a compound of T-3 & T-4. It has taken me 3 years to get here but my life is 300% better. My heart breaks for you. I know how desperate you feel. You can't imagine living your life like this and you can't see any light at the end of the tunnel.

Please let me know if I can help you in any way. I am more than happy to help.....I have loads of experience and would love to do what I can for you. You can get better, I am proof of that.

Hugs

Lori