Could be! The Cimzia seems to be preventing new joint & organ damage. After almost two weeks sick with an upper respiratory infection complicated by COPD, I bounced back 4 days ago and have been powering through errands, garden care and miniature projects. I’m still at 99 lbs., but that’s well up from the 93 lbs. that I dropped to, and my Rheumatologist is quite pleased with everything. He asked if I would be willing to speak at various functions about the importance of persevering, the importance of pushing through pain to remain mobile and maintain dexterity despite RA . I could really, really enjoy this!
Speaking at various Arthritis Association? Cool!
August 26th, 2011Happy 4th of July Weekend!
July 2nd, 2011This year (after an embarrassing number of years of planning, collecting and creating stock), I am proudly displaying “1776 – Fireworks Stand and Americana Souvenirs”.
I hope everyone has a safe and enjoyable holiday:)
My "1776" Fireworks standAmericana Souvenirs
Americana Souvenirs
Osama Bin Laden
May 1st, 2011Osama Bin Laden is dead and his body is in the hands of US officials!!!!!!!
They Faxed What To You?!
April 1st, 20114-01-2011
This could be a funny entry, but I think I have lost my sense of medical humor after many years of erroneously trusting doctors staff to use old-fashioned common sense, basic powers of deduction and/or simple reasoning skills. Yes, I know. Trust me, I know it’s a silly (and sometimes dangerous) assumption; I just continue to expect intelligent file handling and proper sharing of the correct information when my physician refers me to another specialist! To be fair, most of the staff get it right most of the time, but??????
At my last appointment with my RA doc (the follow-up appointment which had originally been scheduled for November 2010 and cancelled/rescheduled so often that it took place March 29, 2011!), the in-house lab did an extensive panel of blood tests. Several hours later, one of the nurses called to explain that some of the results were back – my ALP (Alkaline Phosphatase) was sky-high & Doctor W wanted me to see a Gastroenterologist soon. (Hmmm – same story about 12 months ago.)
I’ve put off contacting the Gastro’s office as I am still fighting a nasty bout of IBS. (Actually, I am betting that is why the lab work came back wonky.) Someone at Dr. W’s office sent my lab results and contact info to the Gastro; his nurse called me today to set up an appointment. A hint of puzzlement in her voice tipped me off – - – -something wasn’t adding up for her. Not sure why, but I asked “What is the date on the lab-work you are referencing?” “Uh, erm, it seems to be July of 2010!” No wonder she was confused!
I immediately called Dr. W’s office, went through the customary dance with the automated phone service and managed to snag a real, live person. (Pressing “0″ sometimes over-rides the system and lets you contact a person instead of a “leave a message, we’ll get back to you” recording.) As briefly as possible, I explained that someone at their office had contacted Dr. G’s office and supplied them with July 2010 lab results instead of the relevant March 2011 lab results! I expected some embarrassment and an apology – what I received was a blithe explanation along the lines of “Oh yes, that happens often. The lab results do not reach a patients file for a couple of days ~ if our staff contacts another physician right after we’ve seen you here, the current results aren’t available to them yet.” OK. . . .so this seems to be common knowledge throughout the practice? With that in mind, it doesn’t occur to the staff to seek out up-to-date lab results before contacting another physician? Groan! Somebody, anybody, please tell me this sort of error doesn’t occur with predictable regularity with this clinic!!! (Except, obviously, it does!)
I Kid You Not!
March 28th, 2011I Kid You Not!
3-28-2011
I did the two-week shopping alone a few days ago. That is an activity normally shared with Tom, as it doesn’t take long for the cart to gain enough weight to start pushing me around the store, instead of me pushing it. However, the weekend sort of got away from me. Tom agreed to pick up the “Christy Cripplers” (aka 20 lb. bags of birdseed for the outdoor flock, 27 lb. tubs of cat litter for the indoor herd and multiple 12-packs of Dr. Pepper) on his way home from work so that I could tackle the rest of the list solo.
Along with the usual milk, butter (well. . . .almost butter), paper products and ingredients for 14 meals, there were the finally-ran-out-of items such as horseradish sauce, lemon juice. . . .and Tom’s deodorant. I knew what aisle it was on (they haven’t shuffled the store recently – I hate it when the market decides it is time for that selling gimmick!), I knew what it looked like……. or did I? I stopped the cart at the appropriate location, reached for the item, and – Oh, wonderful! Someone thought it would be a great idea to change the packaging design of the entire Old Spice line! Instead of grab-and-go, I found myself staring at a sea of unfamiliar labels, attempting to locate Old Spice High Endurance Fresh Scent! Finally found the item in its new ‘uniform’, and proceeded to the other items and aisles on my list.
Today, Tom pulled out the new dispenser and paused to study the label; I assume his first thought was “this isn’t right” 
Then he started laughing and showed me the reason why: on the front label, in very small letters, are the words “Same Stuff: Different Label”. Cute, but it pales in comparison to the new verbiage on the back label! I can only assume that Proctor & Gamble hired the writers at www.thinkgeek.com to “spice up” the text: “Contains odor-fighting “atomic robots” that “shoot lasers” at your “stench monsters” and replaces them with fresh, clean, masculine “scent elves”. I kid you not! Wonder if the powers-that-be at Old Spice/Procter & Gamble are sitting at their desks waiting for the first commentaries to arrive? LOL – at least someone on the team has a sense of humor
Welcoming 2011 in the ER
January 1st, 2011We planned a quiet, laid-back New Year’s Eve; a home-cooked meal, a DVD and “maybe” staying up until midnight. Thomas (IV) had been fighting a migraine for two days, and truly only wanted peace, quiet & reduced pain; he retreated to his space after dinner, hoping sleep would help, and we decamped to our bedroom.
By 10:15 or 10:30pm, I had opted for sleep while Tom (III) was ready to watch the rest of the movie we’d started. I may have been asleep for 10 minutes when Tom woke me up. Thomas had made his way downstairs for help; he was cold and clammy to the touch, extremely pale and heaving up lunch/dinner/ et al. We arrived at the local ER around 11:45 pm and it took several exams and two doses of a medicine “cocktail” to make the nausea subside and the headache recede (not disappear). By 2 am on New Year’s Day, we were on our way home. Thomas was surely “seeing stars” through most of this, but it wasn’t the traditional (and illegal) fireworks being set off to celebrate the begining of 2011!
All is well now, except that his headache is still lurking like a beast ready to pounce. I’m hoping he got the last of 2010 out of his system and 2012 will be healthier for him! (Note:I must have still been tired when I wrote this! As Shannon pointed out, I’m hoping 2011 will be a better year for him!)
Physical therapy – that’s a surprise!
November 3rd, 2010Before my follow-up appointment with the hand surgeon (today), I fussed and whimpered and fussed some more; the “brave Christy” simply went into hiding, leaving a complete coward in her place!
My last encounter with stitch removal was two years ago, when the male nurse (aka Attila the Hun!) removed all of the surgical wraps on both feet (including the ones which had adhered to the incision) briskly, efficiently and painfully. He then proceeded to SCRUB the incisions with great zeal and particularly rough-textured gauze! I have a witness – I think the marks of my fingernails are probably still dimly visible on Tom’s left hand! The actual stitch removal was done by a very sweet, empathetic nurse, but she still had to dig for stitches within a rather deep V-shaped area on both feet and somewhat overgrown by new skin. . . . every time it hurt too much for me to stay silent and stoic, I felt guilty for making her feel guilty about hurting me! All of this, of course, was on my mind while Tom helped a very reluctant me to get dressed for The Appointment before he left for work.
The mystical, “magical gauze strip with important healing qualities” hadn’t been removed when my neighbor (aka Ace Nurse) or I did my own dressing changes, mostly because it was obviously well adhered to the surgical site by the rather important red fluid that flows through my body! I was fussing because I had mental images of the surgeon (or nurse) calmly ripping the “magic strip” off. In point of fact, it was the nurse who did the deed, and then proceeded to dig around and remove twelve stitches before leaving me to my surgeon’s tender mercy. OK – I survived that, the incisions looked good and I was sent off to physical therapy to be fitted with a ‘figure-eight’ brace and given a sheet of exercises to be done five-times daily. (According to the surgeon, “We had to remove a lot of extraneous bone.”) and released to return to the therapist’s clinic on Nov.10th.
Excuse me? (1) The center of said figure 8 brace rests across all three incisions, with no padding between brace and skin! 2) I can perform the range-of-motion exercises much better without this infernal appliance constantly shifting and 3) ”OK, Chris. . . .give it time. Calm down, do the exercises, breathe deeply & give it time. . . . well, I’m trying, but. . . .!
Off with her head (erm, hand)!
October 26th, 2010O.K., confession time. With the guys off at work all day and ”The Hand” sending out post-surgical messages I cannot repeat in polite (or even semi-polite) society , my “plan” was to escape boredom and pain by napping as much as possible. However, my self-appointed ‘nurse cats’ have decided it would be a good idea (and very helpful, of course) to keep the injured hand warm if I happen to doze off! This ‘good deed’ consists of either Diva or Cassidy draping their considerable weight over the elevated hand , centering themselves over the bandage, and falling into a deep, virtuous sleep!
I’ve started fiddling around with the bandage. Hey! The surgeon did say we could move to a smaller bandage after 3 days! I’ve re-wrapped the Ace bandage several times and in several unorthodox ways , as well as cutting away a few parts of the ‘cotton batting’ which had become rather frayed and disreputable. None of this activity has produced much in the way of comfort or improvement 
The biggest problem is that some subconscious portion of my brain has decided that the main discomfort is a result of having the ring finger firmly bound to the little finger by layers I’ve been way-too- chicken to delve into. (Actually, I had worked my way down to three layers of ‘cotton batting’, all of which are firmly attached to me by post-operative bleeding. Nope – no way am I fooling around with that! By the time Tom arrived home from work, I had latched onto a much better plan; catch my delightful neighbor/Ace Nurse at home, if I could, and have her redo this whole mess, hopefully leaving only the ring finger bandaged!
I’m thrilled to report that the Ace bandage is now banished, best neighbor/nurse freed me from the layers of felt/batting/whatever and released the trapped little finger! There’s a strip of “magical gauze with mystical healing & anti-bacterial properties” (that’s an extremely loose quote from Nurse Kathy) that she left in place directly over the incisions . . . . .I was rather relieved, as said strip seems to be firmly attached to me by the aforementioned bleeding! Still, with a fresh gauze wrap and bright pink cohesive tape wrap, I’m feeling freer and somewhat stylish. LOL!
Good morning – rough evening!
October 21st, 2010Tom and I had to report in at the surgical suite of The Hand Center of San Antonio at 6:00 this morning. Ugh! Granted, it didn’t give me a long time (thirsty and hungry) to wait or become nervous, but we were sure doing a lot of yawning!
Everything went like clock-work, and I’ve seldom met a warmer, friendlier group of clerks, nurses & technicians. The in-take clerk (usually the worst of the “just-the-facts-ma’am, sign here..here…here, and there, “go sit and wait to be called” crew) was warm, welcoming, and even shunted some of the lengthy paper-work towards Tom to be filled out once she noticed that the pen & I were engaged in a small battle of wills. (I try to have a Christy – friendly pen with me at all times, but I didn’t even bother to take a purse with me; just my ID, insurance card and med list.)
Pre-Op was fairly empty when I was taken back to be prepped. All of the nurses were sweet and “un-rushed” (If it isn’t a real word, it ought to be) and I drew Christy (yep!) as my prep-nurse. Went through the standard litany of questions (designed to avoid errors, so I don’t mind them at all!), but Christy didn’t employ the usual Drill Sargent approach Got “comfortable” in my surgical gown (yeah, riiiiiight) and another nurse came along to start the requisite IV; lucked out again, as she slid the needle in and taped everything down without a twinge! I was handed a marker and initialed the area Dr. Rust would be working on – LOL! Met my anesthesiologist, who was a tad surprised to hear that all he’d be using the IV line for (aside from the standard Ringer’s Lactate) was a light bit of sedation; Dr. Rust & I had agreed on local injections at the base of the 2nd and 3rd fingers.
One of the pluses of avoiding general anesthesia is that I went straight from the OR to Level 2 Recovery, where I spent a very short time being monitored for wonky blood pressure (it does it every time!) and a little longer sipping dark roast coffee and sitting in a recliner before Tom came in to take me home! I was settled on our bed by 9:30 am.
That’s a good thing, because my surgeon encountered more than she expected. After she removed the cyst, she found a large rheumatoid bony growth that had to be cut away (remember my “things can hide in x-rays” note a couple of posts back? Bingo!) . Hence, I apparently have a V – shaped incision instead of the small, straight cut she’d planned to make. It also means that the pain level is several notches higher than I expected; when bone-cutting is involved, it definitely ramps up the Ouch Factor!
I won’t be making miniatures for a couple of weeks, but I’ll feel better in a couple of days
Run up to surgery # . . . whatever!
October 20th, 2010Back on September 1st, I met with Dr. Stace’ Rust about the knot/lump/whatever which has been forming on my left hand ring finger, palm-side and just below the first knuckle. It has been growing for several months……..not actually sure how long, as I have a bad habit of trying to ignore “little things”, even when they get in the way of normal mobility or make tasks harder. (It’s called Surviving RA!) I finally quit ignoring this one when it occurred to me that I might not be able to remove my wedding ring or engagement band without having them cut off by a jeweler! Tom accomplished the removal with liquid dish soap, a great deal of pulling and some mashing of the knuckle; that was enough to convince me I needed to find a hand surgeon! ( The wizard who performed three reconstructive surgeries on my right hand, the last one several years ago, has since switched to the more lucrative field of plastic surgery!! )
During my mid- August appointment with my rheumatologist, I asked him who his favorite hand surgeon was. I was lucky on several counts; her practice is located close-by, she was accepting new patients, and I could get an appointment with her relatively quickly! At the first visit (Sept. 1st) , she had several x-rays taken to rule out a bone chip or other solid mass. Nothing there, except a rather crooked finger. (Take note . . . .things can hide from an x-ray!) Examining the finger, she posited three possibilities; rheumatoid nodule, benign tumor or cyst. We could confirm or rule out door number three by having her attempt to use the typical, rather large needle & syringe to drain it. Yes, I let her – yes, it is a fairly uncomfortable procedure – yes, it was a cyst. Caveat: it could still return, at which point we would need to discuss surgery.
September 2nd, when I removed the band aid, the cyst had refilled and enlarged a bit! Rats! Back to Dr. R’s ~ time to get me on the surgical schedule. I saw her on Sept. 13th and my calendar turned out to be much more of a problem then hers! Sept. 17th-19th was the Society of American Miniaturists (SAM’s) Wonderful Workshop Weekend. I was signed up for two workshops, haven’t been to a real Miniatures Show in over a year, this was the firs Workshop Weekend at the new Temple, Texas venue and I Was Going! Sept.21st & 22nd were appointments I had already booked with medical appointments and Sept. 24th was our last round-trip to Houston & Baylor University for follow-up on Tom’s injured left eye (we’re rotating him back to the excellent medical team here in San Antonio, and I was not going to make that drive in surgical bandages)! Finally settled on October 21st, which sent me into an energy-draining quest to complete everything on my “You need two hands” list before the chosen date. I almost finished everything on the list, too!