It Hasn't Taken All Of My Memories Away....

I'm sure that, unless you were a big fan of country music in 1985, you might not know the song I've posted the video for. This song was performed by Dan Seals and I haven't heard it in years but, today when I was reading the headlines on AOL this morning, I saw that Dan Seals passed away at the young age of 61 on March 25th, 2009.
It took me a few minutes before I recognized his name and then I couldn't remember why I remembered him so I searched YouTube for some of his videos and when I saw the title to this song, I instantly remembered who he was and why I remembered him.
In 1985, when this song came out, I was 7 years old. I was the baby of the family out of my cousins, so while they were off doing what teenagers do, I was going to my grandparents house in a very rural part of southern West Virginia with my mom during the summers.
Their house was the greatest place on earth to me as a child. My grandparents, Emma and Clyde lived in the same house that they built together so many years ago, and if you went upstairs to my mom and her sisters old bedroom or to my uncles old room, and opened a closet, you would still find things like their old prom gowns and clothes that were no longer in fashion. There were also countless boxes of photos of people long gone and a box of notes that my mom and aunt had written to each other when they weren't speaking over something. Grandma kept everything.
My grandparents had opened a country store together that sat in front of their house. Back in the "old days", long before I was a shimmer in the sky, my grandparents worked together every day in that store. My grandfather was a postmaster and ran the end of the building that was designated as the post office and pumped gas when a car pulled up to the tanks and ran over a rubber wire that made a bell go off inside the store.
Grandma ran the register at the store and a person could stop by and fill their tank with gas, buy new overalls and workboots, order parts for their tractor or a box of peeps that they would raise for eggs and meat and a few times, people would even order hunting dogs that would arrive in the mail. They would also get their groceries, in bulk of course because it was a long trip from their "hollow" to the store, and they always made sure to catch up on the local gossip before heading home.
In the center of the store was an old gas stove for heat and surrounding it were five or six chairs that were always filled with people who would sit and talk to hear the gossip in comfort.
The National Geographic even came out in the early 50's to do a story on Grandpa's post office. He had an employee that still delivered mail on horsback, the last one in the country to do so and the magazine had sent a repoter and a photographer out to do a story on it. But when the photographer got there to take pictures of the mail carrier on his horse, they fell in love with the atmosphere of the store. I'm sure someone from the city had never heard of going to a store like this and, long after their shopping was finished, the shoppers still could be found sitting in the chairs around the stove, even if it were summer time and the stove wasn't even on, chatting and laughing over the latest news. So, along with the photos of my grandfather's post office and his horseback mail carrier, there was also a picture of the people sitting around the stove talking. My mom is in that picture as a wise girl of probably all of six or seven years old. I was lucky enough to recieve a copy of this picture, blown up and framed, from my mother and it now hangs on my wall. I also have a copy of the National Geographic too. Not many people can say that their mother was in a National Geographic, after all. Of course, I then always have to go on to explain that she wasn't one of those women with the disc in her mouth and the rings around her neck, with no shirt on, and her boobs hanging out.
By the time I came around, my grandparents had retired and sold the store to a distant cousin and her husband who had it still going strong. I remember times, probably when I was getting a little too wild, someone would give me a dollar and send me down to the store to get myself a pop (soda for you city folk) and a candy bar. Back then, a dollar bought both and you still had change left over for a few pieces of bubble gum.
I can still remember being excited, almost giddy, when we were on our way to my grandparents house. Even though it was rural, it was the greatest place on earth to me as a kid. I can remember the smell of the hot country air and the way the door creaked when you went inside the house. I remember the smells inside of the house too. Scents of grandma's cooking, usually something that she and grandpa had grown in their garden, the "squeak-squeak" sound that grandpa's chair made when he rocked in it. The tick-tock and then the chiming on the hour of the Grandfather Clock in the corner. And the always constant, soft sounds of country music playing on a radio somewhere in the house.
That was how I first heard this song. I remember that my favorite part of this song was the way Dan Seals could make his voice go up so high on some notes. I had no idea what the song meant but I loved it.
I also remember the time that we all piled into my grandparents Ford LTD, which was a boat of a car, and drove for what seemed like eternity into the closest "town" which, if I remember correctly, didn't consist of more than a small grocery store, a drug store, a funeral home, and maybe a stoplight.
On one of these trips, Grandpa and I were wandering around the drug store, while my mom and grandmother were shopping for things that didn't interest an older man and a young girl, when grandpa happened upon a cassette tape of the Dan Seals album that this song was on. When we got back to their house, grandpa surprised me with this cassette tape. I was so excited, as this was my first real music cassette. I played this song over and over until the tape just wore out. And even after it quit working, I kept it and I still have it, safely stored away in one of my many boxes of memories. I guess I inherited the trait of keeping everything from my grandmother.
My grandparents are both gone now and even though I always think of them everyday, when I heard this song this morning I was instantly taken back to that time when grandpa presented me with this cassette tape. It's amazing to me the things a song can do.
I have spent so many days angry at my MS and the fact that it robs me of my memory everyday. There are days that I couldn't tell you at noon what I had for breakfast. But this morning, hearing this song, I realized that there are some things, some memories, that my MS cannot rob me of.
I miss those times so much it makes me ache at times, but atleast now I realize that I can take comfort in the fact that MS can't steal these memories from me because they were long etched in my brainlong before MS and it's lesions showed up.
I hope you enjoyed this walk down "Memory Lane" with me. And even if you're not a fan of country music, give the video a try and listen to it. The song really is beautiful and Dan's voice and his ability to hit those high notes are what made it so memorable back then and still today.
RIP Dan Seals. Thanks for the memories.

I Found A Little Something

When I first started this blog, I got two huge welcomes: one from Lisa at Brass and Ivory and another from Braincheese. I can't tell you how much I appreciated both.

But I do remember that Braincheese welcomed me onto the "Shortbus" so when I found this today, I found it fitting to show all of you and I'm also going to put it in my sidebar. I would love it if you feel free to do so on your own blog.

Because we really do have all the special people!

I'm Not Ashamed To Admit When I'm Wrong

If you read my previous post, you know that I sang the praises for Montel Williams going on Oprah and telling his story about his battle with MS.
I guess I should have actually watched the show before I started my singing.
One of my favorite bloggers is Bald Ben at Did You Know Montel Williams Has That? He writes with humor, honesty, and he has a way of opening my eyes to things I would not have seen before. I admire him for writing and sharing his feelings and opinions in a way without sounding bitter or like he's giving up his "manhood" to do so.
After writing my post, I read Ben's comment and found that he disagreed with my take on Montel's appearence on Oprah. He, too, wrote a post about it but it went in a much different direction than mine. His post was also a bit more informed than mine as he actually watched the show and I wrote after reading the recap on Oprah's website and from other peoples opinions who watched it.
Montel had a great opportunity to tell all of Oprah's viewers the hardships that we have to deal with on a day to day basis while living our lives with MS. Instead, he failed. He was there to sell his book afterall.
The video I'm posting with this post is one from a cartoon called Chowder that my kids love and the pepper spray bit is one that my middle child used to act out for us millions of times a day for months.
But, somehow, I feel that it's fitting for me to use for this.
Chowder thought pepper spray would be delicious until he learned the horrible truth.
I thought Montel would shine a light on real life when you're living with MS. But, in the words of the ever wise Chowder, "I was wrong, I was horribly wrong!"

Sometimes The Truth Can Be So Refreshing

I am not an avid viewer of the Oprah Winfrey show. It's not because I don't like her, it's just that her show comes on right after The Hubs gets home from work and takes control of the remote, usually while grumbling something like "I'm not watching any of this woman shit". In other words, Oprah just has really bad timing for my house.
But my Mother-In-Law called me the other day and told me that Oprah had Montel Williams on her show last week to talk about his life with MS (I'm sure you all are surprised to hear that he actually had MS, right? Nobody's ever mentioned that to you before, right?).
Montel told the story of how he was diagnosed, how he took the news badly, how he deals with pain everyday (and to think that doctors will still tell us that our MS doesn't cause pain) and, of course, he was also on there plugging the new book he just wrote.
I haven't been able to find the video of the show online but from what I've read on Oprah's site and from the recap my Mother-In-Law gave me, Montel gave a very honest and open interview about his ride on the MS ride.
It turns out, that in the beginning, he didn't take it too well. You know, because the rest of us took it like someone just handed us a ticket to a place where unicorns run free and it rains gumdrops and the rivers are made of chocolate and all of the vegetation is made of candy.
No, wait, I'm thinking of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory.
According to Montel, he took the news so badly that he attempted suidcide by throwing himself in front of an oncoming taxi. The taxi driver stopped, just in the nick of time of course, and jumped out of his cab and started to apologize to Montel and saying things like "Your show has made such a difference in my life. The world is a better place with you in it" you know, yada yada yada.
Even though I'm not so sure that I believe his dramatic movie-esque suicide attempt, I will admit that I found it refreshing that he admitted that this horrible disease drove him to that point.
I'm not suggesting that we all start throwing ourselves in front of taxi's to find our "epiphany" because I'm pretty sure that, even though we're "blog world famous", I've never gotten a comment from a taxi driver telling me how I've changed the world with my ramblings and complaining. So, I'm pretty sure that my taxi driver would just mow me over and keep on going. I'd end up as just another notch on his "pedestrian speed bump" tally.
I will admit though, there have been times, especially in the beginning of my MS ride, that I thought "Something HAS to give because I can't go on like this much longer." The alternative almost seemed like a vacation compared to what I, and I'm sure most of you, have dealt with and still are dealing with.
I have always had severe pain, mainly stationed in my lower back, hips, and legs. I battle fatigue, migraines, loss of balance, foot drop, limbs deciding to take the day off without giving me any notice. And then there's the changes that have slowly started and gotten worse over time. I now have the attention span of a gnat. I once prided myself on being so well spoken and now I find myself searching for simple words while in conversation. I'm forgetful, and while it bothers me, it bothers those around me much more so. Especially my husband who goes to work everyday and doesn't always have the time to make phonecalls to schedule doctors appointments, vet appointments for the funny farm animals, and other things like that. So, he asks me to take care of these things. And I have the best of intentions when I tell him that I'll get them done.
And then I'm surprised and hurt when he gets angry at me the next day for not doing these things for him. And the next day, and the next day, and the next day.
I've had people give me their advice on how I should handle these things. I have daily planners in every room, multiple calendars, notebooks, "To do" lists. The Hubs even surprised me with a gift one day that was one of those personal recorders, you know, where you can leave yourself messages to remind yourself to do things. The only problem is, it doesn't remind you where you put it the last time you used it and it also doesn't remind you to listen to the messages you left yourself earlier. That can be problematic.
I have met a few people who have MS and they've been lucky to find the right therapy right away and haven't had a flare in ten years. I'm honestly happy for them but people need to know that it's not always like that. In fact, more than not, it's quite the opposite.
So, while I sometimes find it annoying that the first thing that people say when they hear that I have MS is to say either "Oh yeah, you know, Montel has that" or "Oh that's horrible! My great aunts nephew's sister has that and that poor thing is in a wheel chair and drools all over herself", I am greatful that Montel is out there, spreading the news that having MS sucks, even if he is plugging his book along with it.

Just Wanted To Make Sure You're Aware

According to the National MS Society, March 2-8 is National MS Awareness Week.

I expect all of you with Ms to get out there and make sure the world knows it.

Hit them with your cane, bump them with your scooter, whatever it takes, do your part to make sure that everyone knows about MS!

I know I'll be doing my part!

Just so you know, that man in the picture is not me. I borrowed this image with love from here.

One Of Those Days

Ever have one of those days where you wake up and you just know that that day is going to be shit and you should stay in bed, but you get up anyways?

Today is one of those days for me.

And I should have known better too because, yesterday, I had a fantastic day. I felt great, got a lot of stuff done, actually cooked a meal. The kids were happy.

That was the calm before the storm.

I hate my new(er) local neurologist and am considering going somewhere else. And I don't think that it's me being irrational here.

For example:

Last Friday was my #2 Tysabri Infusion (which is going great!) and I'm in my little infusion room, watching Snapped (makes the hubs nervous), when my doctor walks in looking for samples of something.

I said "Hi, Dr. Goober" and she said "Oh, yes, well, hmm, hello."

I then said "I'm glad I saw you today, I need to ask you a question if you have a minute."

After that, I'm pretty sure that I witnessed her having a mini-breakdown. She was running her hands through her hair, and she said "No, no minutes today. There's never enough minutes! Where are those samples? I don't have time, make an appointment."

And she whisked out the door just as fast as she came in.

Odd, I thought.

But then the infusion nurse, who is really cool and a fellow Alabama dweller, tells me that she's like that a lot because she can't handle it being so busy.

Now, before I go on, I want you all to understand that I think a woman can do anything she sets her mind to.

But......

For me, I don't like my doctors to be women. It's a personal preference.

I just think about how I kind of get a little...well....crazy when things are hectic and I just don't think I would be good being in that stressful position.

I mean, think about it, if say, you were allergic to nuts, would you go to work for Planters where you're handling the nuts and putting them in the little tins?

I wouldn't.

If you were once a woman but switched yourself to a man, but kept your nether organs, and then have a baby with your wife and you say "We don't want this baby to be picked on because of a different lifestyle", would you go on TV, magazine covers, countless interviews announcing to the whole world?

Well, that one wasn't a good example, but you get what I'm saying, right?

But then I start thinking about starting the whole, painful, long, drawnout process of starting over again with another local neuro.

There are a million other painful things I would rather have done to me than to have to do that again.

Here's my wish:

I would like to find a MALE neurologist who is on the cutting edge of everything with MS, have the compassion of a woman but the stability of a man, and who doesn't want to bother me with driving to his office, he'll just come to mine! And best of all, ALL SERVICES WOULD BE FREE!

What are the odds?

This One Might Get A Bit...Well...Bit%cy...Consider Yourselves Warned!

I have had so many reasons to get up on my soapbox lately. The problem is, I haven't had the energy to climb up there, nevermind unload all of my ramblings once I get there.

I guess my first gripe would have to be about that lady that just gave birth to eight babies, making her offspring total a whopping 14 children.

Here's my thing and if I offend you, I do hope you forgive me sooner or later and come back. I'm usually not this serious but there are just times when one needs to bitch and my time has come.

I had a doctors appointment this morning and as I was sitting in the waiting room, trying to control the weemonkey, I overhear on CNN on the TV, that the lady that just squished out eight babies is planning to support her family with her food stamps.

Listen, I know that times are tough and everyone hits a rough patch and you've gotta do what you gotta do to put food in your babies mouths.

But from what CNN said, she's had this plan since she went in there and told them to put every live embryo within a 100 mile radius in her uterus and to wish her luck!

I have no problem with the fact that she's a single mom. Sometimes a womans life doesn't go the way they planned but they still want to be a mother, husband or no, and science has given them a way to do that. I was actually raised by a single mom from the time I was 12 until I married and move out on my own. My mom had no college degrees. She was a beautician in the 60's but she really couldn't fall back on that since nobody was looking for a sky high teased beehive in the early 90's. Oh, if only Amy Winehouse had come along sooner!

So, to make ends meet, my mom spent her days working as a secretary in a Real Estate Office and her evenings were spent working at a Wendy's. You should have seen our dog go nuts every night mom came home from her evening job! That dog would barely let mom in the door before she started licking every inch of mom's shoes, lower pants legs, and when mom changed, the dog tried to devour her shirt and hat. The point is, my mom suddenly found herself divorced, unemployed, raising a rebellious teenage daughter, living in a house that had a mortgage she didn't think she could pay, and she was scared to death.

But instead of doing nothing and running to the government offices (I honestly have no idea who passes out the food stamps) mom went out and filled out applications for any place that had employees. And she was exhausted by the time she got home from working her second job of the day, but she was making it on her own. I can only imagine what the must have felt like.

** On A Side Note: You know, I bet that's why food scented perfumes have never been big. Guys probably loved it when their ladies smelled like a nice New York Strip, the problem was, dogs loved them even more!**

Amyway, the single mom thing is not my problem.

My problem is that the government will pay for this woman to help support her growing family. The more she pops out, the more money she gets. It wasn't like she accidently got pregnant with eight babies. It was all very much planned. And now she has 14 children, her mother seems to be a bit of a psycho, and our tax dollars are paying for all of it.

On the other hand, here I am, diagnosed with MS, unable to walk most of the time, unable to get a job, and paying an arm and a leg once a month to get my Tysabri infusions. That's ONE medication. That's not even counting the Provigil for fatigue, the anti-depressant to treat the depression that comes from MS and the depression that comes from the medications that I'm taking for MS. Then there's pain medicine, baquelofen (spelled that one wrong) for spacsticity, co-pays for the endless doctors visits, the walker, the scooter, the cane, the handicap accessible bathroom renovation.

The government didn't offer to help us with that.

And to make it worse, until I became a mother, I went to work at some sort of job from the age of 16. At 21, I was blessed to become a mother and married to a man who had the same family values and thought it was important for me to be a stay-at-home mother.

In the beginning, it was a hard road to travel. The baby had all these allergies and needed a special formula that was $25 a can and she went through a can and a half a day. I was clipping coupons for everything on my list and if I didn't have a coupon, that item didn't make the list.

When I quit working, I got a pamphlet in the mail saying that I had all of the required credits if I should ever become disabled. Imagine my surprise when I called a few months ago and was told that since all but two of those credits were earned BEFORE I turned 21, they didn't count. Magically disappeared. And now, I've got nothing.

I can't get any kind of government assistance at all. And yet, this woman can choose to have more children and she gets foodstamps, not to mention that she'll probably get WIC while those eight babies are little. Then she'll get a book deal or a reality TV show and have more money than I'll ever see in my lifetime. And I'll still be sitting here, worrying about how I'm going to pay for my next prescription.

Liberty and Justice For All....You don't say......

Another thing that's been bothering me is that I've been getting told from all different angles that I need to find a daycare for my 2 year old son for my "bad days".

For a while, I tried to convince myself that I agreed with everyone.

But then I sat down and thought "What do I want and what would be best for the weemonkey?"

I decided that I couldn't make any kind of informed decisions without going and checking one out. The place was run by the owner/only employee and she seemed really nice. She only takes in 8 kids at a time and I thought a small group could be good. The place was clean, the toys were newer and seemed to have all parts intact. There was a lot of natural light, great views out the windows. Healthy snacks and meals were served.

Maybe this could work.

Then I stood back and watched the dynamic of this facility. Well, I was told to stand where none of the kids could see me "Maybe it will help you and your son finally cut that cord!" she said.

I watched as every half hour to 45 minutes, the owner/only employee would open on of the second story windows where she already had the screen popped out. She would then lean out the window as far as she could and smoke 1 or 2 ciggarettes. Her back to the kids, she didn't know that a lot of them noticed what she was doing, hanging out the window like that, and by the looks on their faces, they thought that looked like fun.

Then it was snack time. She brings out 10 cups of juice and sets them on a child height table. Then she leaves and returns with a tray of fruits and veggies and a bowl of ranch dressing. She leaves this on the child height table with the cups. Then she remembers that she was supposed to take one of the kids to the potty twenty minutes ago and rushes him off to the bathroom.

I then watched in horror as these two kids, who were obviously sick, meander over to the table and drink out of every cup. Then on grabbed a carrot. He sucked on it for a minute and then stuck it in the ranch dressing bowl. Then he sucked the dressing off of the carrot twice before putting the carrot back on the tray with the other carrots. The other child kept sticking his grubby hands in the ranch dressing, licking the dressing off, and then repeating about a gagillion times.

When the owner/only employee finally came back, I told her about the food bandits and she laughed and said "Oh, you must have just thought they did that! They wouldn't take a flea if they thought it belonged to a dog! hahahahahhahahahaha"

I coyly walked over to my enormous purse/bag and grabbed a bag of fruit snacks, some animal crackers, and the weemonkey's sippy cup and that was his snack. I'm sure he's the only one that was there that day that doens't have a stream of neon green snot coming out of their noses. YUCK!!!

Now, I know that not all daycares are like this. And I do understand that some people have no choice but to use daycare so they can work. But I have to say, I was ashamed at myself because the reason I was looking at a daycare was because sometimes I have bad days and need to take naps to make it through.

Then I started looking back over those bad days and realized that they weren't so bad.

The weeman loves to nap so when I took a nap, he was right beside me, snoring away.

And while on a normal day, I read six or more books to him, on these bad days I always read atleast two. He was given snacks and lunches that hadn't already been tasted, and he was the only one drinking out of his cup.

We still practiced writing and did his ABC flashcards that he loves. And he always seemed happy, never cheated.

So, why do I need to take him to a daycare where someone isn't going to watch him as well as I do or know what he's trying to say when he's speaking caveman?

All of that being said, I've decided that, while I do have MS, it hasn't taken my ability to be a mother away from me.

No daycare for us. Thank you for the concerns but it's just not going to happen.

As I've said before, sometime MS might get me down but don't ever count me out. I'm still kicking ass here!