So long away, so much to say, still just a short post.

So many things have happened in the past year, my mom and step dad dying, Brad's mom dying, my health with one step forward to two steps back. Moving once, and soon to move again, garage fire and other misc life events... so much else.  I have most of it in my personal writing files, just not out there for everyone to see.

So now to the reason I am back.  I finally have some health good news to report.  I have Lyme disease.  This sounds like bad news but after 8.5 years of not sure and we think it may be and who knows it is good news and treatable.  What started with a bout of "mono" was mostly likely the early stage of Lyme disease (the symptoms are pretty much the same).  I am now over halfway into my 8th year of infection and though I am high functioning (and off all the steroids) the arthritis pain and body aches were getting to be very bad again.  The fatigue has always been there and the brain fog comes and goes and the IBS has been my constant companion once I was back off the cortisol.  I just learned to live with and work around that.  By far my biggest complaint has been the Lyme Arthritis pain, which is starting to limit my mobility in my back and my hands.

This diagnosis is a good thing and gives me more hope than I have had in many years of going back to a more normal life and being able to live with less pain and more energy and less IBS.  I have started part of the treatment already with an anti-malarial drug called hydrocholorquine which has already helped with the body aches, I still have to take anti-inflammatory NSAID's for the back and hand pain.  Tomorrow I will start on the antibiotics (just waiting for them to get here from the mail order pharmacy).  I am not sure how long the treatment will last, but the starting therapy for late stage Lyme (which is where I am at now) is a month of antibiotics.

I am told to expect a Herxheimer reaction which means I will be worse before I am better, so I am gearing up for that, preparing to rest a lot and eat well and get plenty of water.  I am nervous but hopeful, I am willing to feel really crappy short term if it means I can feel better in the long term.  Mostly, I am just glad to finally have a real reason for why I have been so sick for the last 8+ years.