A New Symptom

This (bleep)ing disorder never fails to confuse me! A new symptom crept up about two weeks ago: vision blurriness. I was sitting at my desk at work and all of a sudden my eyes got really blurry and it continued to be blurry the entire day. All I wanted was eye drops in hopes that it would make things better - but it didn't.

It turns out this is another lovely symptom of dysautonomia. I can often deal with the nausea and feeling out of it but COME ON! My eyes?? WHAT THE HECK!

A woman in my dysautonomia support group recommended I look into Sjogren's Syndrome. Someone else recommended checking my BP because my blood pressure could be low.

I'm stressed out, as is, so this just adds insult to injury for me today. Wish me luck, I'm off to make an appointment with an ophthalmologist.

Adventures While Healthy

It's been a while since I wrote anything substantial and I didn't want to write anything on the days where I feel gross and defeated. So, I thought I'd wait until I had a streak of healthy days. Well, folks, that time has come!

A few weeks ago, the hubs and I headed to New York so I could attend a marketing conference (read: speak at) and he could experience the Big Apple. We found some time to hang out together and we walked, a lot! Having various health ailments makes it hard to travel and even harder to walk around big cities but being Israeli, I know the only way to enjoy a big city is to do it by foot. When I got tired, we hopped on the subway and went back to rest. While we were in New York, I did get sick but not from my dysautonomia - I caught a cold (thanks, kids!) and lost my voice a bit. I made sure to pick up some cold meds at the drug store, drink lots of tea with honey, and keep my hydration up.

I need to give thanks to my awesome nephew and his fantastic girlfriend for giving us time to make that trip happen. They watched the kiddos while I learned and the hubby toured. Without them, I would have been alone in a big city probably napping when I wasn't at the conference.

Fast forward a few weeks - I told the hubby I want to go apple picking. This is the FIRST year in my entire life that I could actually eat an apple without having an allergic reaction and boy did I go for it! We took the kiddos to the apple orchard and they had a blast. My oldest got upset when a goat ate his apple (my bad, I told him to give it to the goat but I didn't think he'd listen!) and my youngest enjoyed taste-testing everyone's apple ciders while refusing to drink his own. I can honestly say that this was one of the best days I've had in a long time. It started out rocky but it ended with two happy kiddos and a bag of 30 apples.

I've been granted some amazing opportunities lately. Yesterday I drove two hours to the middle of the state to guest lecture at Central Michigan University. Seeing college students get excited about public relations and advertising gave me such a rush - I can't tell you! It was amazing to see their enthusiasm! But, by the time I got home it was 9pm and I was exhausted. The universe granted me enough energy to get there and back in one piece and, thankfully, I'm not paying for it today.

I hope my adventures while healthy continue and I'll keep praying for my divas and dudes that are affected by this disorder - may you have more healthy days than not.

Wear Blue for Dysautonomia

Are you wearing blue today? I AM!! I'm wearing blue to help spread awareness for dysautonomia patients like me and millions of other people around the world. Unlike breast cancer, most of the world doesn't know that dysautonomia exists. Patients are often told it's all in their heads and they need to see a shrink. Many patients have a hard time being functional every day and their families just think they are being lazy and anti-social.

This is a real illness and it's an illness that's covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act. It's a chronic illness (read: reoccurring) that happens to also be an invisible illness (read: we look fine on the outside but feel like hell on the inside). So, today, wear blue!

Wear blue. Take pictures of it. Tag me on FB and Instagram. Show me and the world that you support us.

I'll be taking videos all day, so feel free to friend me on FB and share them!

The Cold That Won't Die

Every once in a while I get an awesome VoxBox from Influenster. Sometimes it contains beauty care, other times it contains nail polish. This time, it contained the Braun Thermoscan and I got a chance to play around with it at the perfect time!! Seriously. We're all sick. The kids have had a cold for about 10 days now and I'm at the tail end of it, too. This is the kind of cold that knocks you on your ass.

I keep coughing. When I cough, I look up easy remedies on pinterest. I hate taking more meds than I need to. That's the thing about dysautonomia patients, many of us take SO much medication that we hate taking more of it. Bring on the homemade (read: old school) remedies.

And the nausea won't die. My tell-all symptom that I'm not feeling well comes in the form of debilitating nausea. Which means I don't want to eat. All I want is tea...which isn't good because I need more water than tea. Too much tea brings on the tachycardia. Which  makes me weak. And that makes me cranky.

So this thermometer that I got for free really came at an awesome time. I hate taking my temperature and my kids hate having theirs taken, too. Plus, it gets germs all over it. When you have dysautonomia, you really want to steer clear of extra germs. That's what makes this thermometer perfect. My normal body temperature is actually not 98.6. It's closer to 97.7. The downside of this thermometer is that it takes my temperature at 96.8 ... which doesn't seem right. Still, it scans my kids at 98.6. My oldest had a slight fever on Saturday, which was 99.8. That lasted about two hours, he napped, and he woke up totally fine (albeit completely cranky because he's 3). So at least I know it works.

Got any tips for knocking this cold out of my system?

Disclaimer: I was given the thermometer to review but I was not paid to write anything and the opinions are all my own. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to eat more chicken soup...which is delicious because I made it. I wasn't paid to say that either.