A Year Ago Today

Last year, to the day, I crossed the threshold into my childhood home in California, with all my possessions from Colorado waiting patiently to be unpacked in the rented yellow Penske truck in our driveway. My dog was howling happily as she reacquainted herself with our other two dogs and my parents were bringing in …

May Linkup

A while ago, I found the blog called "A Chronic Voice." I loved the articles the page shared on Facebook and after looking into the website further, I found these Linkup Parties, where chronic illness bloggers write about certain prompts each month. This will be my first time participating in a Linkup, and I'm excited …

Illness Doesn’t Have To Be A Scapegoat

Sometimes I find myself blaming all the problems in my life on my illnesses. However, there are things in my life that are just parts of life, parts of post-grad life, parts unrelated to my chronic illness, and yet complicated by it at the same time. But throwing all these problems into the bucket of …

But You Look Fine

Fairly recently, I had this weird experience where a person with a chronic illness threw the “but you look fine!” line on me. I am pretty certain I didn’t respond. In fact, I don’t really recall what happened afterwards because I was in shock. Isn’t it chronic illness code that we don’t say that to …

Identity Crisis Round Two: Ways to Find Yourself

A few months ago, I went through an identity crisis. Again. The first one was when I was becoming ill; when I was losing so many parts of myself to my illnesses. This crisis, however, was different. I'd come to a point in my chronic illness recovery (or whatever the heck you want to call …

I’ll Be Fine

I've been more active lately, as in I've been more social. I'm doing things. Things after work instead of lying on the couch, fatigued and in pain. I've been hanging out with friends. Plus, thrift shopping last week and to the dog park this week. And the poppies last weekend. I've been experiencing much fuller …

What’s Working For Me Right Now (March 2019)

Last March I wrote a post about the medications, supplements, and treatments that were working for me at the time. A year later, I feel much more knowledgeable about what living with these illnesses look like for me and how I want to manage/treat them. Since May 2018, I've moved back home to Southern California, …

Is Two Better Than One?: The MCAS & POTS Connection

I was looking for quotes for this blog post when I came across this one from the movie  Contact, "Why build one when you can build two at twice the price?" Translated to chronic illness terms, I think it could go something like this: Why have one syndrome, when you can have two with twice the …