Vacation

I had one week of vacation coming to me. So I decided to take the week between Christmas and New Years. It's been wonderful, I needed time to sleep in, read my book and just relax. I have been feeling really good, I've been stiff in the morning but that's it. I'm not complaining one bit.

 I learned about a new app for my iPhone. It's called Instagram, it's like twitter for photos. My son told me about it and I'm hooked. I suck at taking photos but like everything else you learn and get better with time. If your interested I'm jreinke.

 I feel so bad when reading other blogs and updates on the struggle people have with this ugly disease. I hope to stay as positive as I can when writing this blog but I also want to be honest. We all get depressed from time to time and I'm making a commitment to write on those days as well.  Well if anybody's reading this. If anybody is I wish you a Happy New Year and I hope you feel better cause:

Remember You define yourself don't let RA define you.

JR

Merry Christmas Eve

I'm wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Let's not forget what this day is about. Check out this cool RA page, http://www.showusyourhands.com/ .I hope everyone is free of pain and can spend these next couple days with their loved ones.




 Talk to you next year. 



Remember you define yourself don't let RA define you.........




JR  =8^)

A New Day

Well I have to admit I'm feeling better. The cold LA weather is a killer, did I just say that; COLD WEATHER?. The cold weather is very uncommon for us warm blooded folk who usually get about three weeks of what we think is freezing temperatures. I due have to say that I think the supplements I'm taking help extinguish the flares I get faster than normal. I kind of judge how I'm feeling on how many pain pills I take and what sort of physical shape I feel like when I get home from work. I'm taking less pills and I only had two days last week that I couldn't work in the garage at night. Now let me explain that working in the garage still is slow for me. My hands and fingers burn when I work a wrench to long. But I take brakes and try to set small goals so I don't get frustrated. The not so good two days I felt like I had a shallow breath and my chest burned when taking a deep full breath. By morning my joints were sore when I got out of bed but back to work I went and I felt good.

I hope your feeling better and remember, you define yourself don't let RA define you........................  

Buzz Kill

Well I have been taking the supplements I mentioned in an earlier blog since August 29, 2011. I had some amazing weeks were I had very little to no pain. This last week hasn’t been so good. I feel exhausted in the afternoon, I mean like its 2am in the morning tired. I also feel like I got hit by a Mack truck. I’m feeling my shoulders and elbows burn deep inside my joints. I know it’s just a flair up and it should pass soon, but I think the harder thing to deal with is the depression I’ve been feeling.   I think I have two kinds of depression, one is when I’m trying to work with my hands in the garage and I struggle from the pain. I get angry and feel it’s not fair, I think this project should be done already. But my hands remind me that I’m dealing with something out of my control. The second depression is it’s like my life is passing me by while I nap from the extreme fatigue or just sitting there in front of the TV. Either way I guess it just takes time while we learn how to deal with our bodies changing. I have to say I feel lucky to be where I am physically. I’ve been reading some other blogs and websites and I feel really bad for the people’s stories about suffering from RA. I can only read this information at certain times, I want to learn from other peoples experiences with RA but then I think about when will their battles happen to me. When will I be the one describing joint replacement surgeries or talking about my new walking devise.  I guess we just take every little step at a time and deal with today’s issues and problems and not worry about tomorrow. 

I hope your feeling better and remember, you define yourself don't let RA define you........................  

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