The Seated View

Biologics are notorious for increasing your risk of infections, especially those of the upper respiratory tract. In other words, sinus infections. Cue headaches, a feeling like your head is filled with cement, post-nasal drip, nausea, debilitating fatigue, thick brain fog, plus that awful smell that no one else can smell. There is nothing like it to convince me that I will feel like it for the rest of my life. But there are things you can do to prevent sinus infections or, if one shows up, reduce the impact. This rarely involves antibiotics. Medical science has discovered that sinus infections mostly resolve on their own — yes, even when you’re immunosuppressed. In the past two months, I’ve seen my GP several times, as well as an ENT specialist and neither handed me a prescription for antibiotics. However, I have picked up a number of tips on how to prevent and treat sinus infections that I want to share with you. We’ll get to those shortly.  How sinus infections happe

Writing helps me in it many different ways. When I'm writing regularly, my dreams are a little less weird. It also helps me organize my thoughts, work out how I feel about things when I'm confused, and it helps me cope with my chronic illnesses. And I'm not the only one — research shows that expressive writing is very beneficial for people with chronic illness and chronic pain. I share more about this on my new post for Mango Health : "I started journaling in my teens. My juvenile arthritis had exploded around that time, and I spent a lot of time in hospitals. I was lonely, raw with homesickness, and overwhelmed by everything about a very active state of inflammatory arthritis. So I started writing, and I never really stopped. Once I was out of the hospital and back among my peers, I was still feeling fairly lonely, with an extra dollop of teenage angst like a nuclear cherry on top. Writing in my journal helped me express how I felt, and in doing so, also

“Do you have any change for the homeless?” He asked this over and over again, of almost everyone who passed. To a person, they kept walking, only a few acknowledging him, saying sorry, they didn’t have any change. So did I. And we were all lying. Sure, most of us pay for purchases, even small ones, with debit cards these days, but don’t we all have some change rattling around? The point wasn’t that we didn’t have any change, it was that we weren’t willing to give it to him. This man who didn’t have a home to go to, didn’t have a bed to sleep in, and was depending on our change for his next meal. Or his next fix. Or a bottle of cheap liquor. That seems to be a problem for many. People don’t want to give money to the homeless because they don’t want them to spend it on intoxicating substances or other things they deem worthless. So they don’t help. Or they help by buying a homeless person a meal at the nearest fast food joint. I couldn’t disagree more with this.

Bonnie Raitt and I were in the same room on Friday. Along with 3000 other people, but I wasn’t paying much attention to them. As she was singing, a variety of thoughts occurred to me. When live music is actually live I’m a sucker for singer-songwriters. People who have something to say and know music and musicians well enough to say it in a song. The joy of watching them perform their music live with no lip-synching is something truly special. Sure, there is some wandering/dancing around on the stage to give the audience something to look at as well as to listen to, but it is not a dance performance. It is about the songs.  As Bonnie gave an instruction to each song, telling the story of where it came from, who had sung it or inspired the writing of it, her stories ranged 50 years. It was like a masterclass in country blues. Her band was also absolutely phenomenal and opener Royal Wood was excellent, too. I walked out of the Sony Centre feeling invigorated and f