I’m throwing down my crutches.
Maybe I still have Lyme disease, but hardly.
Over the last few weeks I have realized over and over again how much better I feel this year compared to this time last year.
Last year at this time I had just learned I had Lyme disease. I couldn’t garden because I couldn’t bend down. I couldn’t carry anything because my arms and hands hurt too much. I couldn’t make the bed because the mattress corners were too heavy to lift and because it hurt my fingers to tuck in the sheets. If I went to the grocery store, even for one item, I had to use a cart. I couldn’t carry a basket (ow), and I had to use the cart like a walker. Some of my yoga practices consisted of lying down and raising and lowering my arms.
A helped me with everything readily, kindly and lovingly. He never expressed impatience or annoyance at my limitations. B did the same when he was home. My friends and family helped me with enormous amounts of love.
This year I can garden, I can do almost all the yoga I could do before I got sick, I can make it through the day without a nap, I can carry bags of groceries, put dishes away in the cupboards, wash vegetables in cold water without my hands stinging, and lots more. I still have a little weirdness in my shoulders and hands, but nothing like what I had last year.
I am so grateful.
All of the following helped:
- Lots of physical therapy
- Herbal regimen for Lyme disease (still following this, from Healing Lyme, by Stephen Harrod Buhner)
- Massage once a week (still doing this)
- Special help from my chiropractor
- Arthritis medication (plaquenil) from my rheumatologist
- Yoga
- Walking every day I could
- Water exercise
- And most important, kind thoughts, prayers, blessings and love from many dear people
