By Lene Andersen. Health care writer, RA and disability advocate, wheelchair user and camera nut. Author of Your Life with Rheumatoid Arthritis: Tools for Managing Treatment, Side Effects and Pain
Chronic Christmas on Fashionably Ill
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I was thrilled when Jessica Gimeno of Fashionably Ill asked me for an interview. We talked about my story, Chronic Christmas, and I shared three tips to survive the holidays with "Today, I am interviewing Lene Andersen, author of Chronic Christmas: Surviving the Holidays with a Chronic Illness (paperback and kindle versions available).
The holidays can be stressful for anyone but they can be especially
stressful for people with chronic illness. Lene Andersen’s blog, The Seated View,
is chalk full of inspiration and practical advice you can use all year
round. Lene is 54-years old but says she feels like she’s only 42!
Jessica Gimeno: What is your official diagnosis and when were you diagnosed? Lene Andersen: I was diagnosed with juvenile arthritis when I was nine years old, although the symptoms started five years prior to that. I also have migraines which started in my teens, and was diagnosed with fibromyalgia 12 years ago.
Lene Andersen, author of Chronic ChristmasJG: How long have you been living with illness?LA: I’m coming up on half a century. It’s a very long time to live
with pain and illness, but it also has a positive aspect. This lifetime
of chronic illness has given me a lot of experience that I can use to
help others in the same situation."
The Seated View has moved . I am still bringing you the information and support you need to live a better life with RA and chronic illness, just on another site. I'd love for you to visit my new website ! - Lene If you want to leave a comment or question about weight gain, RA, and Biologics and are looking for answers or feedback, please jump to this post on my new site . It has the capability for direct replies, this site does not. You can also reach me at leneATyourlifewithraDOTcom. - Thanks, Lene I’ve known from the beginning that Biologics can affect your weight. When I was on Enbrel, I couldn’t keep weight on, and looked anorexic despite eating like a horse. When I switched to Humira, I started gaining weight. I, who had never before spent much time past a size 6, became a 10. After years of being literally skin and bones, it suited me just fine. And then the gaining continued, until finally settling around a weight that requires a 16 pant. Never havin...
So, where was I…? The last time I posted, I had the flu and was pretty miserable. It was the precursor to a roller coaster ride into a very dark place. The flu turned into pneumonia, which sent me to the hospital in the middle of March. There was a trip to the ER, admitted into isolation, and then to the ICU with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS — only click on that link if you enjoy chills going up and down your spine). Interestingly, this may have had more to do with my asthma than my being immunosuppressed. Anyway, I was put in an induced coma on a ventilator, and had an emergency tracheostomy . Photo credit: Ken Allen Soon after, I came as close as it is possible to dying, and actually flatlined for 10 seconds during another nerve-racking event. We figure that officially makes me a zombie. What? Too soon? I remember none of it. Well, that’s not entirely true. There is a blank space between the several days before I went to the ER an...
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about living independently in the community and how that can be facilitated by attendants. These are people whose job is to be your hands and feet, doing things that you cannot do yourself or that would take an unreasonable amount of time or effort to do. In Ontario , some people receive such assistance through agencies, others get direct funding from the Ministry of Health to hire and manage their own staff. Life with staff can be interesting. Once you learn how to direct you care - in other words, you don't ask somebody to cook you a pork chop, you direct them through each step of the process - it's pretty easy and as long as you and they remember to be polite and interact as decent people, things are relatively painless. Relatively. Because there are snags that come from dealing with people and their individual foibles, snags that come from being pulled into agency/staff politics, snags of a different sort that you may get to experience if y...
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