MSfit Momma

My MS-Diaversary!

My 8 year Diaversary with MS (multiple sclerosis) was on Wednesday. Yes, I made cupcakes. It’s a day I recognize. I wouldn’t say I celebrate it. July 22, 2012 was a day my life changed forever.

The Hubs is the part of us that asks questions. I am the one who takes in the information and then figures out a game plan. The night I was diagnosed, I was alone in the hospital. The Hubs had gone home to get our kids from my sister, who had watched them all day while I was at the ER.

The doctor came in and said something along the lines of, “Based on your MRI and CT, you have Multiple Sclerosis. Do you have any questions?”

I just stared at him. I begged my brain to ask questions. The type my husband would think to ask; questions I knew he would ask me when I called him in a few minutes to drop this bomb on him too.

I stared at the doctor. It was shift change and both the day nurse and the night nurse were holding my hands as the doctor had came in to give me the diagnosis. I stared more. Finally, I asked the only question I could think of, the question that to me, made the most sense with a husband, 2 toddlers and a bunch of people who loved me.

“Is MS terminal?”

He responded that no, I could live a normal life with MS with minor adjustments here and there. I had gone to the hospital because my leg had been going numb on and off for months and suddenly, I couldn’t feel my leg anymore at all. It was like it was just gone. It’s an eerie feeling to see it and not feel it.

Then he dropped a second bomb. He couldn’t tell me yet if I’d be able to walk anymore since it felt like I no longer had a left leg. He wasn’t sure if or when the feeling might return. He wasn’t sure if the feeling did come back, if I’d be able to walk with or without assistance yet. They would start steroids and see if that helped. Then he asked if I had anymore questions and I went back to staring at him. He told me he’d be back in the morning. Once he left and I registered what he had just told me, I started to cry. Both of the nurses sat with me until I finally stopped crying. They both gave me huge hugs. They made me feel like I was their only patient in that time.

I called the Hubs. I called my parents who were out of state on vacation. I called my BFF who had spent the weekend with me at urgent care and then came to sit with me at the hospital while they ran tests all day the next day.

After answering every ones questions (which I wasn’t very good at) and digesting this news in my hospital bed, I decided that if Multiple Sclerosis wasn’t going to kill me, than from then on I was going to do my best to LIVE every day.

Except for a very dark time in 2015 (That’s for a different blog post), I’d say I have done that.

I pick my battles, I make honest decisions about if something is worth my time and energy and if it’s not I say so instead of feeling obligated. I’ve gotten very involved with the National MS Society. I advocate for MS awareness. I share my story. I am always available to newly diagnosed people that want to talk and ask a million questions because while I am not great at asking questions, I love talking to people. I also vividly remember how scared I was in that hospital room by myself that first night.

The next day my cousin text me the number for her former boss who had MS and said I could text or call with any questions I had (She is my MS Fairy Godmother now!) A nurse from a different floor also came down to introduce herself because she was also living with MS. We talked for a long time.

If you’re newly diagnosed or living with MS, I encourage you to find someone you can talk to about MS. The National MS Society has Peer Connections. There are so many groups on social media that you can join to ask questions, there are in person support groups. You can leave a comment below and I’ll respond.

Where Have I Been? Uh, Mostly Laying In Bed Watching Hamilton Non Stop. (You Get The References, Right? It’s Ben Franklin With The Key And The Kite…)

I have been feeling like crap for 3 weeks with my leg. I’m not sure if it’s because it got really hot in So Cal or if it means new lesions. You never know with Multiple Sclerosis, I guess. Well until you have another MRI and then you know. My left leg is always a jerk but starting in late June I got this new horrendous pain in both my leg bones. It hurt so bad I needed help doing any movement.

It finally got so uncomfortable and I could no longer walk on my own, that I did call my neurologist last week to talk about my leg bothering me so much. He asked why I let it go on for 3 weeks. I didn’t have a great answer other to say that if I call him every time I have a leg issue, I’d be calling him all the time. He laughed. When he reviewed my meds I take, he said I must have a high pain tolerance because I don’t take anything for MS related pain. The dentist just recently told me this too. I probably do have a high pain tolerance. I am also stubborn as f**k. I don’t like asking for help. I don’t want help and if I’m being totally honest it’s a deep rooted survival instinct I have from my youth. So instead of being perceived as weak, I buckle down until I just can’t take it anymore. It is something I am aware of and am trying to be better about asking for help sooner.

We decided to change my anti-depressant to an anti-depressant that also doubles as a pain relief pill. I haven’t started it yet because Sunday night when I went to take it, I thought it might interact with another med I take at bedtime so I emailed him yesterday to ask. I’m sure I’ll hear back today.

I take so many medicines for other things I have developed in addition to my MS that I tend to advocate to not take additional meds unless I really need to, like for high blood pressure. My doctor agrees with me for the most part. I am still fairly young and I worry about the long term effects on my organs. We did have a lengthy discussion about changing from Ocrevus, to what will basically be the monthly version of Ocrevus but in shot form instead of infusion form because of the on-going pandemic. It is supposed to be available in September according to the FDA. It’s called . He said because of Covid, he thinks it would be good to have an exit strategy on my immune system, that if I get Covid, I could just not take my shot and my immune system could try to start rebuilding itself monthly, instead of now where I have no immune system for 6 months and it starts to regrow and we go in a bomb it again for another 6 months. It’s normally stressful having a compromised immune system but it’s very scary when there is a pandemic going on.

I’ve been on 4 other MS DMD’s (Disease Modifying Medications) over 8 years. Like so many, I started on injections. You give yourself painful shots of medicine daily or weekly. I started on Copaxone and my MS continued to progress right away. Then I was on Avonex for about a year and a half until my MS progressed more. Next I was put on Gilenya, a pill I took daily. That was great. No more painful lumps and bruises at my injection sites. I took Gilenya for about 3 years until it stopped working. 2 years ago, I lost feeling from my collarbone to my toes on both sides of my body. An MRI showed my MS has progressed into my spine. (It’s no good when MS moves into your spine) I started Ocrevus. I like going to the infusion center twice a year. I don’t like giving myself shots. I feel really good on Ocrevus 4 out of the 6 months I take it. I also understand my neurologists logic about switching back to a shot if it means it could help me fight Covid if I got it.

I can walk normal (well MY normal) again but mostly I have just been laying around and sitting around the house the past week or so. I have watched Hamilton a million times. I was supposed to go see it twice this year but both times it got cancelled and I didn’t get to go. The Hubs and I also started watching all the Marvel movies in the Marvel order. We are about half way done with the 23 movies. (We already watched all the Star Wars movies in order because my son wanted too.) I swear I have never watched this much TV and movies as I have during this quarantine! I should also have been packing to leave for Hawaii for the first time ever this week. The quarantine has taken a lot away this year but I am still here. So far the few family members that have gotten it have recovered. A friend I went to high school with passed away from it so I’m taking it seriously.

Mostly, I am trying to focus on the unexpected time I get with my hubs and kids. I am not a saint. There are many days I wish they were are work and school so I could have some alone time. I hope in months/years, I look back at this crazy time of 2020 and think back to the late night conversations I get to have with my daughter right now. To the random facts my son shares with me about whatever he is fascinated with at this moment. That even though I could never have imagined being on lock down, that my Hubs still makes me laugh and always brings my drink from wherever I have sat it down and forgotten it so I stay hydrated. I hope you can find ways to cherish this time- to grow yourself, to not take this time for granted, to look at the little things, to learn a skill you always wanted too…to remind yourself eventually this too will pass…

Oh and if you watch Hamilton, first time or hundredth time, pay attention to the background actors- they tell such an amazing story with their movements, it’s mesmerizing to watch as much as the main characters are.

June Cleaning Challenge: Getting Down to the Wire

There are two days left in June and I still have 6 things on my official 30 item declutter list to cross off. They are all big, time consuming ones and I don’t foresee me getting in all done by Tuesday night. I am going to try to take care of 2 particular ones on my list by Tuesday because they are ones that are inside my house and that make my anxiety rise thinking about them. One is what I call “The School Box.” It’s things my kids have done in school- art projects, report cards things like that. I need to split our one box into two boxes because my kids have gotten farther along in school and we are running out of space. I could also see if I can thin it out. They don’t need every adorable thing they ever made but I always like when I run across things I did in school now as an adult. The other is my craft stuff. Currently it is jam packed (I need another word but that is the only way I can describe it) in my son’s closet. It is the only place I can currently store my craft items but it isn’t in a very user friendly way. I make wreaths and I buy cute things as I find them. I have so much cute “would look good on a wreath” items that I don’t even know what I have so I need to get that better situated. I think this may take a whole day if not longer.

I did knock out 3 items yesterday- I cleaned out my wallet. No picture of that. Mostly it was used of gift cards and random receipts I no longer need. Took two minutes tops.

I also tackled two hallway drawers that had gotten out of hand.

The top drawer I store school supplies in. It has gotten to where you can barely open it so I wanted to go through it to see how I could reorganize it. I also had things that I had bought for my son’s birthday party school bags but we never used them because school went home-schooled before his birthday happened. I pulled all those things out and put them together in a bag in his closet. It also had my son’s visual cue cards in a mess of little pieces in there so I found all of those and put them in a zip bag. He doesn’t really need them anymore but I don’t know that I want to throw them away either so at least there in an order in there now.

The bottom drawer is where I store our Road Trip Essentials. Pre-Covid, we have always traveled every summer. My kids are great road-trippers as long as they have entertainment for the car. After last summers 3 trips, when I unpacked all, I just dumped everything into the drawer. I went through all the DVD’s and moved them to where I keep our travel DVD players. I threw away coloring and activity books that they had used up. I put the travel card games back in order. It was pretty fast.

I think I’m going to go find something to watch on TV while I go work on the school box for awhile now.

Advocating…Virtually

I was invited to join the National MS Society for California State Action Day at the end of March in Sacramento. We would be meeting face to face with our representatives to share our stories of living with multiple sclerosis.

I was thrilled! I was going to leave late Sunday night and be back late Monday night after spending the day in Sacramento for a quick overnight trip. My husband would get the kids to and from school. My parents would watch them while he was at work. I was going to have to figure out how to do a Lyft/Uber ride from the airport to the hotel. It was all worked out, and I was so excited!

The week before I was supposed to leave, the COVID-19 pandemic was unfolding rapidly before our eyes. I started to feel nervous and emailed my neurologist for his advice on going or not, and he shut it down. I wasn’t really surprised at his reasoning. Northern California had a lot of active cases of COVID-19, and they were the first cities in California to order shelter-in-place. I was heartbroken. Then the next day, the National MS Society emailed us all to say they were cancelling any in person meetings, and they were hoping we could all meet in June instead.

As the pandemic continued on and states shut down all over the country, we received another email that said to mark our calendars because we would now be meeting virtually in May!

I joined the online training meeting to learn more. First, they recapped what they accomplished on last year’s State Action day. The advocates helped get a bill passed to help make people’s homes more accessible, instead of having to have seniors and people living with disabilities move to nursing homes. Early prevention often saves money in healthcare costs in the long term and gives better quality of life to people so they can stay in their own homes.

Ready for the online training meeting!
Next, we discussed the two bills we would focus on help getting passed this year. The first, AB2730, will eliminate barriers to emergency evacuation for vulnerable populations during emergencies. In California’s current disaster planning, the rescue workers know where to take people but not how to get them evacuated to those places. This bill will enable cities and counties to communicate and form partnerships for transportation services during emergencies. The second proposed bill, AB2064, would require all county emergency planning committees to include people living with disabilities to be included in the planning of the California Disaster plans. People with disabilities are two to four times more likely to be injured in a disaster.

I exited the online training excited to see what State Advocacy Day would bring.

I received a text message telling me to wear orange and meet online for our kickoff celebration. There were over 40 advocates on the video-meeting. John Strum of Real Talk MS podcast hosted the kick off. We re-capped what we would be messaging our representatives about, and we took a group photo (and that was the exact moment my computer froze!)

I received a text message that I just simply needed to enter my personal info, and it had an already generated email that once I pressed send, would go directly to my representatives. You could also edit the email to make it more personal before it was forwarded on. I chose to edit it. I believe both of these bills would be helpful to the people in California, and I shared why. We had a really bad fire season a few years back, and after the fire had ravaged homes and they were searching the debris, they found numerous people who were disabled who died because they couldn’t get out for various reasons and that had stuck with me.

I hope I get to go to Sacramento next year. But if not, this was a really easy way to advocate and participate to help bring changes that may improve the lives of people living with disabilities.

I guest wrote this post for the National MS Society’s blog, MS Connection.

My MS Teeth

I remember when I was younger my Granddad told me, “Always take care of your eyes and your teeth because you only get one set of each!”

I went 5 years without going to the dentist once because I couldn’t afford dental insurance through my job or to private pay for services. When I finally got dental insurance, they only found 1 cavity. I was so relieved it wasn’t worse.

On Friday, I was eating and suddenly felt something “POP” off my tooth. I looked in the mirror and couldn’t see anything but I could definitely feel a hole in my tooth. I called my dentist’s office and they said the soonest they could see me was Wednesday because they are only taking emergencies in first come, first served order and seeing regular patients half day to keep the waiting room to a minimum. I said Ok and took the appointment for today. My tooth hurt really bad on Friday but by now, it’s just more annoying that I can feel the hole on the side of my tongue. I also have to remember not to chew with that side of my mouth or it does bother me quite a bit.

I was a little scared to go today. Just being in a waiting room with other people and have my mouth exposed without a mask while they looked at my tooth made me really nervous. I have gone to my current dentist for 7 years; I trust them it’s just the social anxiety of Covid lurking now.

When I walked in, they had every 2 seats roped off so you couldn’t sit directly next to someone. They installed plexi-glass windows above the counter now to talk to the intake staff. There are signs every where that masks are required or they will not see you. There was only one other person in the waiting room when I got there.

They took me back for x-rays. Then the dentist came and looked at my tooth. He asked me how much pain I was in. I garbled my reply. He said, “WOW! You must have a really high pain tolerance, because this should have hurt you enough that you came in months ago. You need another root canal!”

Yes, another! I have had 3 in the last 6 years. I get a cavity and it morphs into a root canal later down the road. I am not sure if it’s because of MS or because of my meds for my MS but my teeth are definitely not in the best shape anymore.

Since I was there, I got my cleaning that I was due for in July. I said goodbye to the ladies up front and when I was back in the lobby, there was only one man there with a face mask on.

Medi-Cal won’t pay for root canals so the dentist has a grant program that will cover it at no cost to me so they said they’ll call me back in a few weeks so I can come into get it patched up. I think it’s weird Medi-Cal won’t pay to take care of your big damage to your teeth. Studies have shown not taking care of your teeth leads to so many other health issues. Has MS (or another autoimmune disorder) messed with your teeth?

June Challenge..I’m Finally Caught Up! Day 18,19,20,21 & 22!

I have to get creative with kitchen storage. This is an odd shaped cabinet.

I am going to try so hard not to bore you with 5 cleaning up entries even though this is one post that covers 5 days worth of cleaning but I completed 5 over the weekend and today so I am back to being caught up on my little June Cleaning Challenge!!

Over the weekend I worked on stuff in my kitchen. These 3 cabinets have gotten so out of control over the course of lock-down. I’m not sure the before and after pictures really show that much progress but I can tell and I think ultimately that’s what matters for my sanity!

I love baking cupcakes. I have also tried to get in to stacked cakes but I am VERY not good at those. I make really fun cupcakes but once I am done baking, I’m pretty fatigued from it so many times, I just shove it back into this cabinet (#18). I went through it and separated it by items. I threw away old chocolate and sprinkles. I reorganized my supplies into smaller bags to be kept together like liners, cake pop sticks, piping tips and assorted candy baggies. I put all of my molds into a basket because that just made sense. I also put my kids cooking utensils together and closer to the front so they can pull them out easier. I think it’s hard to tell from the “after” picture but the stuff in here, doesn’t come as nearly to the edge as it did.

If you close the door fast enough, things don’t puke out!

It still looks disorganized because of the white bucket but once you move that it’s in a much better order.

The cabinet where we keep our pots and pans (#19) has been very well used since the Hubs has been home and cooking for us daily; sometimes multiple times a day. I also have cooked or baked things on and off. This cabinet has one door and goes in deep to the side so things in that back corner are hard to get to. I took everything out to put it back in a better use of the space.

My big stock pot was in the dish drain (hence the big empty space.) I made the Hubs clam chowder for Father’s Day lunch.

Better side organization and space upfront of the daily used items.

This cabinet gets used daily. The stuff in here gets used often enough that I feel like it needs to stay in the house and not out in the garage or pantry storage area. I moved my Pyrex dishes in a better order since if I cook I use them a lot. The pans I keep upfront because we use them every day. (Side note, I just hosted a Pampered Chef party and earned a ton of new kitchen gadgets and I have no idea where I am going to store them all! But that’s a problem for 6 to 8 weeks from now…)

Next, I worked on our upper corner cabinet (#20.) Same issues- lots of used often items but a weird storage space. I worked shelf by shelf to rearrange and clear things out. I kept a hand on my daughter while she stood on the counter and handed items down from the 3rd shelf to me. During this clear out, I found some Tupperware items that are in great condition but we don’t use so I’ll list them for sell on Mercari.

I wanted to straighten up the items we use a lot in this cabinet in to a better use of space. I also can only reach into the bottom shelf with out my trusty step stool and now that it’s getting warmer, I don’t trust my leg to hold me safely on the step so I wanted to move things I need more at arm’s length.

I hardly ever watch reality TV but I found a show called “Married at First Sight” and was intrigued. I watched the whole season over this weekend.

Around episode 5, I told myself if I was just watching TV, I may as well 3 hole punch and file that pile (#21) over there in the bottom corner and then put them in the storage folders they need to go into. So I did. I think it took about 3 episodes. I’m not sure I would go out of my way again to watch “Married at First Sight” on the regular but if Netflix puts on another season and I’m short on things to watch or I want background noise I’d play it again. I found a box to put that stuff on top of my “house walker” to have the Hubs take to the thrift store. I found a place for all those science experiments my parents dropped off at the beginning of lock down for the kids. Summer school is over next week. My daughter wants to take July off to have a little bit of summer feeling. She will still have saxophone lessons and math tutoring but no summer school means she can sleep in and relax more. My son opted to do it again in July. We will probably get into those kits sometime in July though.

Today I went through the cords in a box that is in our hallway (#22). I was brutal. If it was a cord that had no obvious use, I trashed it. The stuff in this box has probably been in here over 5 years and we haven’t seemed to miss it yet, so off with it’s head so to speak!

I did throw away one of those remotes that’s pictured. I kept 2 HDMI cords and an extension cord because those seemed good to keep on hand. I am sure we won’t use most of what’s still remaining in this box but I am glad to not have random cable lines and adapters just lurking in it.

These are not in any order to complete but the last 8 on my list are: Hallway Top Drawer, Hallway Bottom Drawer, Scrapbook Box #1, Scrapbook Box #2, Kid’s School Box File, Craft Area, Craft Box in Garage, Clean Out Wallet. 7 out of 8 are monsters!

June Challenge 14, 15, 16, & 17….I got so much done today!

Oh man you guys. I woke up early with a burst of energy and I knocked out 4 challenges on my list all before 1pm! It’s a refreshing June-Gloom type of day so it didn’t even start getting warm until noon.

The Hubs and I cleaned out the fridge and freezer (#14). We went to town! We pulled out and washed all the shelves and drawers. We threw out expired stuff and we reorganized the items in the door into a better system. It’s all sparkly shiny again.

Then I went ahead and straighten out the cleaning supplies that are under the kitchen sink (#15). It’s not that they were messy as much as I wanted to reorganize the bottles that we use the most when we clean so we don’t have to dig around through numerous bottles to find the one we want. Window cleaner and surface cleaner get used way more often than carpet cleaner for example.

We got in to the habit of unpacking the groceries together so the pantry has been a bit disorganized because things were just thrown where they fit. I have it labeled on the shelves where to keep stuff. Not because I am super-organized but it helps remind me of what we need when I do grocery shopping (or add items to the Hubs grocery list.) I also went ahead and threw out expired pantry stuff.

So since I was already cleaning out the pantry area I thought I better just go ahead and clean out the storage area above it (#17). On the very top shelf are some cooking gadgets – my instant pot, a Minnie Mouse waffle iron, our George Foreman grill that I don’t want to part with but rarely gets used. The shelves that the kids and I can reach tend to be much more messy. There is a basket of snacks for the kids. We have extra lunch bags because the kids are notorious for leaving their lunch pails at school. Much of my entertaining and holiday plates are on that shelf. I spent time putting all the random plastic utensils in one big bag so they aren’t just in 4 different half used boxes. I reorganized my baking pans into a more practical set up because I use them very often, especially since I’v been home on quarantine, I’ve been baking quite a bit.

By my count I am only one challenge short for being back on track to 18 (since today is the 18th of June.) I’m not planning on doing anything more today and I’ll probably just double up again one day in June. Almost all are BIG, time consuming projects so I’m not sure what I’ll pick to do next. I am feeling relieved to be crossing off these things that have stressed me out for the past 6 months and I am glad I am taking the time to take care of it now. ‘Cause for real, what else do I got going on?

Today Was a Great, Productive Day!

I don’t sleep well when it’s hot but last night I slept all night without waking up multiple times and then slept in this morning too!

While the kids were doing summer school, I decided to email Governor Newsom and my local representatives about the proposed California budget and asked them not to cut K-12 education at the school site level. I wrote to our school district superintendent as well to ask the same thing. I feel like the pandemic has amplified how important schools are to children and the emotional safety net they provide whether it is food or social support, schools are so much more than just learning subjects. For my own children, at the beginning of the pandemic when it was big and scary, their teachers provided structure and routine that they desperately needed. Both of their teachers went above and beyond for their students in many different ways.

I received a reply from my superintendent within an hour and a half of sending my email. It was personal and addressed my concerns. I understand cuts must be made but I hope they really try to cut other places first; teachers already put some much of their own money into their classrooms.

I have been in my house 97 days now but we do leave for occasional drives and today my Hubs said, “Let’s go for a drive!” So we headed off to our local mountains. It only took us about an hour and a half overall but it was really nice to cruise with the windows down, feel the breeze and to look at nature.

On the way back down, my Hubs pulled over and he and the kids got out to look at the creek below. I sat in the car.

I did start reorganizing my pantry this morning for a Cleaning Challenge but so far I haven’t completed it. I’ll work on it more once I finish this post. If I get it done before bed time I’ll count it for today. It’s a BIG one so we’ll see…

Where Has Customer Service Gone?

When I worked, I was a shipping supervisor and customer service rep for a manufacturing plant. Occasionally I got calls from angry, frustrated customers for all various reasons. I know the customer is NOT always right but for the sake of doing business, most of the time customers need to feel appreciated when they are frustrated. There were a few times the problem was so big, I didn’t have the authority to fix the problem in the way the customer wanted so I would have to go to the GM to get approval on something I had worked out to keep the customer happy or for us to fix our error. There were even times, when the GM wouldn’t budge on certain things the customer was asking for but for the most part we always tried to maintain the RELATIONSHIP between us and our customer.

I have spent literally my whole day from noon on hold with Expedia to try to get a refund that Hawaiian Airlines agreed to give me but says Expedia has to process as we bought through them. I held for 3 hours to speak with a supervisor since they are the only ones that are authorized to refund me. This is after multiple calls and emails to Expedia and Hawaiian Air regarding this matter for weeks now. I finally hung up after the 3rd hour because I needed to get dinner ready for the kids. My (very nice) customer service rep called me back right away and asked me to hold on 15 minutes longer because I was “almost” next. I agreed. After 45 minutes longer, I told the Hubs, I would wait 15 more minutes and then hang up again and could he please start dinner while I waited.

When the supervisor finally answered almost an hour later, he read back to me the notes that were in my account and said that while he see’s that Hawaiian did offer to grant my refund, the code they gave was invalid and “honestly, I shouldn’t expect to much to be resolved.” So I came back at him with the same tone of voice and firmly asked him to contact Hawaiian if there is an issue with the refund number they gave because all I could go off of what the email Hawaiian gave me and it sounded like an internal issue. I have since been on hold another hour with the supervisor while he is supposedly talking to Hawaiian to resolve this for me.

I had lot of time to kill while I have just been sitting here wasting time on hold and found so many forums of people upset with Expedia via Facebook and Instagram. It is unfair that people are not getting their money back on travel related stuff due to Covid especially after the airline government bailout said airlines needed to give money back to consumers if they asked. I also found lots of email addresses for Expedia’s higher ups if this supervisor won’t refund me. A friend told me to dispute it with my credit card because services weren’t rendered. Another said to email the Attorney General for Washington state and file a claim with the Better Business Bureau.

For as many people who need/want their money back, there are others that are totally fine with a credit. In fact we have airline credits with 2 other carriers from trips that got cancelled that we were happy to take the airline credits with. This particular trip to Hawaii, we want our money back for the flight.

I’ve been typing this as I was on hold, so good news, they refunded it (as they should of since HA already said they would!) Phew!! It took all day but it’s resolved! Hopefully I don’t need to worry about it anymore but I got his name and ID number plus my confirmation number for the call. I guess you’ll know if I suddenly have a follow up post in 6 to 8 weeks!

Oh, again, no challenge completed today because this mess took all day to take care of!!

Do you think Y2K Saw 2020 Coming?

20 years ago today, I graduated from high school. Class of 2000!

I remember when I was set to walk across the stage, I just kept hoping I didn’t fall in front of everyone because I had on ridiculous platform flats that at the time were the hottest shoe style. 20 years later and I am like, “Why on earth would I ever have worn those and thank god, I never sprain my ankle with them!” Ick. I sound so practical now.

I was having a blast with my friends and we were getting ready to head off in all different directions. There wasn’t Facebook yet. We all wrote our cell phone numbers in our yearbooks but texting cost a $1 a text and I was prohibited by my parents to use it unless I was in an accident. Aww the 2000’s! Remember Y2K was supposed to end the world when the computer dates reset at midnight on New Years Eve?

I (hope) am laugh-smiling in this picture

We were supposed to have our 20 year reunion this coming up weekend but of course, it got cancelled due to the pandemic. It’s cool. I was also supposed to go see Hamilton that same night with my kids, so I was trying figuring out how to go to both things at once. Except, then Hamilton got cancelled too. So I guess now I’ll just be hanging at home Saturday night; the same thing I’ve done the last 95 days. Maybe I’ll ask the hubs to pick me up a mojito and we’ll listen to late 90’s- early 00’s songs.

I didn’t do a June Challenge yesterday. I was so fatigued all day. It’s gotten really hot in California pretty fast and I just get zapped in the heat and turn into a slug. I haven’t done one so far today either but it’s not bedtime yet so maybe I’ll still make it. I’d like to say at some point I’ll make up the ones I miss but I’m not holding myself 100% to it since it’s basically summer. And I am totally going to play the MS card if I don’t do 30 total by the end of June because it should be treated as a “Get Out of MS Jail” pass. I wasn’t and (am not) being lazy. My body is just working against me and makes everything so much harder.

My hubs literally caught me sticking my head in the freezer to cool off.

I can’t think of any cute way to end today’s random thoughts post. I don’t have any stories to tell; I’ve been inside 95 days. I don’t have any MS wisdom to share. I guess I’ll just continue to say, CUT YOURSELF SOME SLACK!! WE ARE IN A FREAKING PANDEMIC. My 17 year old self did not see this coming 20 years later. If all you manage to do is take a shower, gold sticker! If you change from night jammies to day jammies, gold sticker! Whatever you accomplish these days, GOLD STICKERS!!!