Life

 I’m starting Humira tomorrow. Which means I’m going to my doctor’s office in the morning, and the nurse and I are going to stick four needles into me and make sure I can do this on my own next time.  That’s more dramatic than it should sound…these are just automated pens, and after this first month, I’ll be down to a pen every other week. Thank God for PPACA….my student health insurance appears to no longer have that ridiculous (and now illegal!!) $1,000 prescription annual limit. Healthcare reform is saving my life, and that’s not an exaggeration. I’m hoping Humira will be my miracle drug….it has been for so many other people. I finally found a book on homeopathic care for Crohn’s that’s not written by a quack (i.e. it stresses the importance of listening to your doctor and complying with your traditional medical treatment plan, while incorporating some alternative approaches). I’m going to spend some time brainstorming disease management stuff, and coming up with a wellness plan that balances all 5 dimensions of health. Y’know, since I have a degree in public health and all….watch me come up with process and outcome measures too.
That’s not really funny…it’s just that I have a great skill set that can solve lots of problems, and I want to solve mine too. And I don’t know what else to do, so I research and make spreadsheets.

In more cheerful recent happenings, last week I attended the sweetest wedding reception ever (which deserves an entry of its own) and this past weekend was my ten-year high school reunion. This is surreal….considering that it seems like just moments ago I was reading my classmates document our prom  and high school graduation on this same website. At any rate, I’m amazed by how much putting on a pretty dress and doing my makeup does for my mental health.

Here’s J and me – photo courtesy of the college friends we stayed with. Husband played photographer for the rest of the night, so this is the only one he’s in.

And here are the peanut gallery girls. We spent most of the evening drinking and making snarky comments about the popular people. 

Until ducking outside for a game of corn hole. Because this is Tennessee, after all.

And here I am with my twin. Even after all these years, I’m not sure where I end and she begins. We’ve been through everything together…. driver’s licenses, first loves, organic chemistry, moving halfway across the country. 

When I was in high school my parents (particularly my stepmom) complained that I spent too much time talking to my friends. They told me this was a bad idea, because "Your family are the only ones who stick around forever." Well…most of my relationships with my immediate family members have been burnt to a crisp, but my high school friends? We may not talk often, but they’re only a phone call or a text away, and they can make everything better in a way no one else can. I’m quite proud of my high school self – I may not have realized how toxic my family was, but I still knew enough to invest in my healthy relationships rather than the unhealthy ones.

J and I went to the church I attended during college the following day (and chatted a bit with my HS librarian, and a couple former college professors, both of whom have been fired from said college). We got Mexican food with another HS/college friend (not at the reunion, because she was a couple years ahead of me) and then stopped by the high school to see the construction. The high school building I attended classes in will become a middle school, and a new high school is being built.   I pointed out all the sights…."here’s the faculty parking lot where I learned to park for driver’s ed….here’s the spot where we did the mitosis dance in biology class…the owner of that gas station left my dad’s church after he started selling beer….that thing wasn’t here when I lived in this town…" And once we got back on the interstate I told high school stories all the way home. J told me there could have been a soap opera about my high school and college experiences. I asked him if he had watched Dawson’s Creek.

It was a good trip. Disorienting in some ways….I always forget that there *are* people who have known me since I was 15. Perhaps I should try to remember this more.