Ow

I fell in the tub (again). I lost my balance getting out of the bath, landing on the side with all of my weight on my upper arm and a string of obscenities following.

I love a hot bubble bath, but I hate getting in and out. Because my parents live in what used to be my grandparents' house, the bathroom is set up perfectly with bars to help you haul yourself out of the tub. No such luck in my apartment. And most of the time, I don't need it, but the trouble is I don't know in advance whether I'm going to have trouble.

It's strange how we can feel so good doing some things and, at the same time, have such trouble doing others. After I'd finished swearing, I proceeded to get ready for a Halloween party (I was a zebra) and then went out and spent three hours dancing. If I'd had to get up and down off the floor, though, I'd have had serious difficulty. I guess that's part of "invisible" illness: I look like I can do anything.

I am bruised and a bit banged up, but not so very bad in the end. Even so, I think I may stick to showers for a while.

Yoga!

(First of all, thanks everybody for your comments on my last post. My immediate reaction was negative - who loves the idea of getting pregnant in a hospital? - but some of your comments, and the words of some friends I've talked to here at home, have helped me see that this is also a really positive thing. It means I have choices, and it means Dr. Sneakers will be on board to help me have a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby one day. Those are definitely good things. Thanks for helping me see them.)

And now, yoga:

I went to my first class on Monday night. It was a lot of fun, and just the right mix of relaxing and challenging.

The yoga centre I went to is adorable. It's got a little lending library, and you can make a cup of herbal tea and bring it into the class with you. There are little lounges to sit and talk or read in, and the studio is big and bright and quiet.

I talked with the instructor beforehand about my mobility limitations - fused wrists and knees that won't bend all the way are the most problematic for yoga. He told me just to do what I was comfortable with, but that he'd keep an eye on me and if I seemed to be having trouble, he'd come over and help.

I'd been nervous that everybody would notice me modifying the poses when I couldn't do them, but I had forgotten how welcoming and easygoing yoga classes usually are (it's been a few years since I've been to one). Nobody cared; in fact, I don't think anybody gave me a second glance. And I definitely heard a few ouch's from some of the others in the room.

I shoved a blanket under my bum in child's pose when I couldn't bend my knees far enough, and in poses that require hands on the floor, I went down on my elbows and forearms instead. There were one or two times when I thought, "okay, a few more seconds of this is all I can take," but in the end I was able to do just about all of it.

In fact, the only thing I really had trouble with was the 10 minutes of relaxation at the end. As usual, my mind was racing. I'm hoping that comes with practice.

I'm looking forward to my next class!

Messing with my head

This morning I met with Dr. Sneakers, his nurse practitioner, two genetic counrsellors and an electrophysiologist. It was something of a surprise and  very good of them, actually. Dr. Sneakers, who continues to rise in my estimation (especially after he used the word "homies" this morning), thought I'd appreciate a chance to sit everybody down and ask as many questions as I liked.

Of course, it ended up being more about how much they don't know than about anything really concrete, but that isn't anybody's fault.

Towards the end, Dr. Sneakers told me he wanted to ask a strange question. I figured he'd ask whether I'd experienced some oddball symptom or other. Instead, he asked me whether, when I decide to have a family, I would want to know which of my eggs carried my genetic mutation so that I could choose to have the "healthy" one implanted.

Holy. What?

I said I didn't know, and I don't. I have no idea. It's not a decision I'll have to make for a few years, but I think it will be a very difficult one.

What if my parents had had that choice? What if they'd decided not to implant the egg that turned into me? I've learned a lot from illness. But then again, I've been luckier than my uncle and the thousands of other people who die suddenly from inherited arrhythmias.

(Also, if I do choose to have "healthy" eggs fertilized and implanted, the expense is currently not covered under our healthcare system. One round of implantation would cost about $2,000. The genetic counsellor argued - persuasively, I thought - that the government might do well to realize that paying for women to implant healthy eggs would actually save them a lot of money down the line.)

Anyway. As Dr. Sneakers said, "it really messes with your head."

I knew pregnancy would be hard, but I thought most of the big decisions would involve choosing to accept a risk or a burden myself, not choosing whether to pass one on to a child.

I guess it's a good thing I'm starting to like Dr. Sneakers. I think I'm going to need him.

Is pain making me antisocial?

I had a lovely Thanksgiving weekend. Lots of good food, time with family, Henry-time, and sleeping in.

But. I was sore. Really sore, and really tired. And sometimes I was a bitch.

We had Thanksgiving dinner at my aunt's house along with relatives I hadn't seen in several years. It was great to see them, but I often found myself wanting nothing more than to sneak away from the table and curl up in the spare bedroom. I took every opportunity to excuse myself from the action to pace around in a dark hallway or even to slip outside and distract myself with one of the neighbourhood cats. When dinner had finished and everyone was sitting around with coffee, I was out in the yard, stiff and aching and wishing I could crawl out of my own skin.

I wondered later what they must think of me, and then I thought about all the other times RA turns me into a hermit (or worse, makes me snippy and impatient). Even my Mom notices how snarky I can get when I'm really feeling rotten. "Pain makes you depressed," she told me on the weekend, "and that makes you grumpy."

What pain really does is make me selfish. It turns me sour and makes me impatient with anyone who doesn't get it. It makes my bed or my bathtub seem a million times more attractive than a night out with friends. I suppose that's natural; when our bodies hurt, it's a lot harder to look outside of ourselves.

When I'm being reasonable, I just give up on trying to be nice and focus on being quiet. It's the Bambi philosophy: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Sometimes I think we need to be alone with our pain. We need to separate ourselves, even momentarily, from family and friends who wish they could fix it. We need to let ourselves think the worst, because putting on a happy face when you feel like shit is exhausting.

Sometimes I need to go into my bedroom and soak a couple of tissues. Once I've done that, I can tell myself to buck up. I can remind myself that there have been, and will be, many days of feeling better. (There will! And this week, there have been.) And then I can be nice.

Happy Thanksgiving, Canadians!

I hope you're all eating something yummy.

Toronto

Uh oh. Every time I go to Toronto - especially in the fall - I want to move back.

I stayed with my friend N. She lives in the neighbourhood surrounding Casa Loma, a Gothic Revival mansion-castle-thing which is itself kind of odd-looking. The neighbourhood, though, is lovely. Its streets are quiet and lined with Victorian row houses, old trees and little front gardens. N walks everywhere - to amazing restaurants, used bookshops and little independent grocers. Being there even made me miss the subway; living in a small city, as I do now, doesn't enforce a sense of community in the same way Toronto and other larger cities do. Sigh. I miss it.

I did a lot of walking this weekend, and I'm happy to say I held up really well. I've also been easing myself back into an ellyptical routine, trying for 10-15 minutes a night.

We handed in our first papers at school yesterday, and now I'm scrambling to catch up on the reading I let slide while I wrote it (and obsessed over it). But, I have no classes on Fridays and it's Thanksgiving here, so I've got a four-day weekend in which to do it. And sleep in!

Fall weekend rambling

I'm off to Toronto today for a much-needed girls' weekend. I love Toronto in the fall, and I'm hoping the rain holds off so we can do lots of wandering.

I'm gradually settling into a school routine that's allowing me to get my work done while still getting a bit of time to myself. I had a good talk about study methods with my constitutional law prof, and we looked at ways I can get around using my hands too much. As for school itself, I really, really like what I'm learning. I'm finding legal history and philosophy especially fascinating, and I'm excited to get into the upper years where I'll be able to choose courses like Literature and the Law, Roman Law and Canadian Legal History.

I'm still swollen, but not any worse and maybe even a bit better. I've also had another lung infection that's left me feeling a bit wiped out, but this time I started using my inhaler right away and it seems to be clearing up. It was nevertheless a wake-up call - now that I'm spending 8 hours a day cooped up with two hundred other students and professors, I'll need to be careful about catching things.

For now, though: nap, some work, and then to Toronto. Happy weekend, everyone.

                   An evening walk near my parents' place. Fall is my favourite.