Image by Hans Braxmeier from Pixabay I know I'm not the easiest person in the world. And I'm fine with that. I wasn’t put on this earth to be easy. To acquiesce, be amenable, soft, gentle, a peacemaker. I’m here to rock the boat. To push. To express my views passionately. To be direct. To feel deeply. To … Continue reading Not Easy

Photo by Tim Wildsmith on Unsplash I’ve always had perfectionist tendencies. As a child I would start the same drawing over and over again until I was satisfied. In middle school, when completing a writing assignment, white out was my dearest friend. In high school I practiced my gymnastics routines over and over until they were as close … Continue reading Good Enough

Photo by Calle Macarone on Unsplash Whenever I become healthy after a period of illness I am tempted to forget I was ever sick in the first place (I also convince myself that I will never be sick again). Now that I have regained some energy I find myself wanting to utilize every precious unit of it. After … Continue reading Oxygen Mask

Image by Rudy and Peter Skitterians from Pixabay If you happen to be friends with me on Facebook you may have noticed a recent flurry of posts showing my family and me enjoying adventures in NYC and Martha’s Vineyard. The posts tell the gratifying story of a vast improvement in my symptoms and energy over the past few … Continue reading When The Skies Open

Image by kropekk_pl from Pixabay As I mentioned in my last post, it can be incredibly challenging to uncover the root causes of illness. Chronic illness is usually a murky brew concocted of several conditions, most of them complicated and well-hidden. Finding the source(s) of each condition in the brew is like peeling back the layers of an … Continue reading Testing, Testing

Image by Mario Hofer from Pixabay “Even though 130 million people suffer from chronic illness in the United States alone, we live in a culture that repeatedly suggests that, with proper diet and lifestyle changes, no one need be sick and no one need be in pain.”  -Toni Bernhard, How to Live Well with Chronic Pain and Illness … Continue reading One Size Fits Some

Image by Lockie from Pixabay I was a bit of a goody two shoes as a child. I followed the rules and worked hard at school and at gymnastics practice. I wasn’t perfect; I pilfered the odd cookie from our kitchen snack drawer, snuck out of the house (once) as a teen (and got caught), and got drunk … Continue reading Rule Breaker

Photo by Dawid Zawiła on Unsplash Some days I’m so sick that I don’t have the energy to exercise the dog, prepare food, or spend time with my family. Even reading or watching TV feels like too much. I spend hours in bed in my shade darkened room, and when I’m up I stumble around in a stupor, … Continue reading Lost Days/Happy

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay I have a secret that I haven’t shared with anyone. Some days I’m not 100% sure I want to get better. Huh? Why wouldn’t I want, more than anything else, to be healthy? I freely admit to being sick of spending so much time in bed, not seeing clients, cancelling on friends, … Continue reading Dirty Little Secret

My husband Harlan and I have been together for 22 years, married for almost 17 of them. We met in college and started dating our senior year, when we discovered that we were both Art History majors and had nearly all of our classes together. We fell in love quickly and were practically inseparable until … Continue reading Monkey In The Middle (Of My Marriage)