Mama Always ~ L.A. Brown, Author

Eeyore is what I have called my down days for quite a while now. You know how he is, always in a gloomy mood, a little black rain cloud following him around. Well, Eeyore came around about Wednesday, really was gloomy on Thursday and is still hanging around, but he's been pretty quiet for the most part. Let's get this straight; I don't like being in the dumps. I hate depression. When I'm in this phase, it usually accompanies a nasty flare-up and I'm so weepy and short tempered that it scares Mouse. Thursday, I had to cry in the shower so I wouldn't alarm her and I was in there for a good hour. The water had gotten cold by then and quite honestly I wasn't finished, but I was better enough to function. I don't know how others function with this part of the fibro, to me its debilitating. I can't function beyond the basics. I'm short tempered, weepy, in short, I'm a mess. The only  way that I got through Thursday without curling up in a corner...

It has definitely been a banner year for me, well, me, Chris and Andrea. We came off of 2011 with the loss of our beloved Aussie, Draco in November to foster a soldier's dog in January. Angel was not allowed to go home to Korea (where she was born) with her family who was being relocated there because she lacked a blood titer. We fostered her for two and a half months, getting her the necessary titer and shots; getting the proper sized kennel and finally getting the necessary passage and escort to get home. We could not have done it without the help of many friends and their friends and of course, United Airlines who waived the normal fees to get her home to her soldier and family. My many thanks to Sandra, Janet, Christopher, the Air Race family, James Bear Branch Animal Hospital and Home Again for getting her back to her family. I am sure that there were so many, many more who were in the background that helped with this endeavor, God knows who you are and I'm sure that He ...

...that fibro fog is responsible for a lot of things that go on with me lately. I walk into a room and not only do I forget what I went in there for, sometimes I'm disoriented enough to wonder, even for a nano-second what room I'm in. That's happened a couple of times. I've also seemed to have forgotten that depression is a constant companion. Sometimes it stays way in the background, but other times, like today, it is sitting in my hip pocket, poking me and letting me know that I've been kind of useless lately. That tends to work on my last nerve and so when Chatty Cathy is released, which most of the time I can tune out except for the necessary phrases and words, I have the ability to go nuclear. That in return brings out the tears, puppy dog eyes and/or the temper of the Mouse who was just being herself. Of course, this works on the depression more by making me feel like a bit of bug spittle. **sigh** I can't turn the bugger off, either. It just sits ther...

There are days, I presume, that you wished that you had never put your feet on the floor. Today is one of those days. After sleeping for eleven and a half hours, I feel like I still haven't slept and have been run over by a Mack Truck. Which begs the question.....how does one know what being run over by a Mack truck feels like? I mean, would there be anything left of a person after being run over? Seriously, if I don't find the humor in days like today, then I am a sorry case indeed. I am still wondering how does a person know what the run over-ness feels like? I mean, we can assume that it is incredibly painful, but....wow...still....I would think that every bone in the body being broken, being pressed flat as a pancake, yeah, that's pain. Every nerve on fire, walking on pins and needles, no feeling in the extremities, head pounding, OK, I acquiesce, the feeling could  come pretty close. Then, there's the pounding headache like someone is taking a sledge hammer to ...

Apparently, I've been slacking. So sue me. =o) Seriously, its been a busy month around here. Since my last post, I suppose that I've been a little shocked and dismayed at the events of November 6, but I'm over it now. I did manage to go into a two and a half week flare up, complete with flu symptoms that lasted a good four days, but, again, I'm over that as well. Hopefully, this post finds all of y'all happy, healthy and full of stuffing, the bread kind. Personally I had two kinds, bread and corn bread and I must say that they were purely yummy. Chris, Andrea and I went to El Paso for Thanksgiving to spend the holiday with his recently widowed mom. This was the first real holiday without PopPop...I know that his presence was missed. It was strange not having him there, but it felt even more odd to not have my Punky and her family there, even if she hasn't been home for at least two years for the holidays. I mean, everyone else was there, for her to not be the...

Just like a number of other things, fibromyalgia is unique in everybody. Just because one person suffers in one way, doesn't mean that this is a cookie cutter disease, syndrome or whatever you want to call it. Personally, mine, while pretty much controlled by a very good pharmaceutical developed specifically for fibromyalgia, still has quite a few times when it rears its ugly head. I also have carpal tunnel syndrome in both arms, arthritis in both hips and knees, so when it hits, it seems to hit those areas that are more prone to pain in the first place. Right now, I have limited feeling in my pinkie and ring finger of my left hand, which makes things like typing difficult since I type by touch, trying to find the letters a, s, z, and x are fun. On occasion I have the pleasure of feeling like my skin is being washed off in the shower, although that has only happened a couple of times, and the "fibro fog" and dizziness are more of a problem than I would care to admit. ...

OK, so maybe I'm a bit of a masochist here, but I am finding out that the universe doesn't like to be called out and have pointed out that it can't win. Yesterday after I wrote my blog, I found that little stuff was popping up. Mostly stuff to annoy me, but its the stuff that annoys me that usually gets me to forget my Walk and gets me to stray off of my goal of staying on Jesus' path. For instance: I was making desserts for my friend's auction yesterday. I saw what looked like an amazing recipe being made on Paula Deen's cooking show the day before so I decided that I would make it. You know, something different than basic cake and frosting, after all, if they're sitting there and "oohing and aahing" over this on the show it must be good, right? Well, after making the recipe and having a taste (I made cupcakes instead of the cake) I could imagine her taking a dishtowel to her tongue to get the taste out, it was that not good, and I followed the ...