Watching and Waiting

My life has been incredibly busy these past few months due to a dear family member who had been ill. It took a comment from a reader of this blog for me to realize that I hadn't updated in a long, long time.

An update on what has happened since I found out about my syrinx:

I started having crazy jerking motions all the time preceded by strange, strange sensations. The neurologist finally figured out I had herniated disks in my neck and sent me to physical therapy. The PT cured the pain.

The docs didn't know what was causing all of the jerking motions my neck, chest, and legs were doing. They ran a bunch of tests and determined that I wasn't having seizures. 2400 mg of gabapentin and 30 mg of baclofen per day have made the jerking motions manageable.

I no longer have hundreds of them a day. They are called myoclonic jerks, and are harmless. They make me tired when I have them, but are not anything more than a hassle now.

The biggest news is about the syrinx. I had my 6 month MRI, and it hasn't gotten any bigger. The neurosurgeon said that it isn't big enough to be a concern, but that he wants me to have another MRI in a year. In fact, in this most recent MRI, the syrinx didn't show up in most of the MRI views like it had in the MRI I had six months ago.

My vantage point is becoming clearer now that I have found some relief. I'm hoping the fog continues to lift.

Contrast

My MRI with contrast came back showing no tumors, as I mentioned in yesterday's post. I will need to go back in another 6 months to have another one done to make sure there still aren't tumors.

My mood today has been one of extreme contrast too. I'm happy there are no tumors, but I have anxiety about what is going on with me.

I wish I knew the cause, especially when my medicine wears off and I start the jolts/spasms/twitches all over again. I'm tired today.

But, I don't think I'm supposed to know the cause yet or I would already know it. Trust. I must tell myself to trust. Trust God. Trust the doctors. Trust my own knowledge of my limitations.

Of course, I saw contrast a lot today too. The following were from my drive home. I left work somewhat early because today is my husband's birthday.

Today's lesson, I think, is patience. I'll know when I'm supposed to know. In the meantime, I'll just need to learn to weather it out.

The other lesson is that I can't ignore God anymore. He's everywhere. I ran away from Him for a long time. But, as these images show, He's made Himself hard for me to ignore. I felt like the sky was opening up with brightness. I had to pull my car over to watch. The tug at me was too strong to continue driving without stopping.

Peace and hugs,
Jen

The Sun Sets on My Anxiety Over Some Things

I found out today that I don't have tumors in my cervical spine.

Yay! This was a, "just in case," MRI. Now, I just get to go back in 6 months to make sure I STILL don't have tumors and that this is a so called incidental find that I have fluid inside my spine where it is not supposed to be.

Amen.

Round Things are Good

I like this picture because it pretty much sums up the last month of my life. Lots of electricity, lots of fire, and lots of trying to keep myself centered, bright, sunny, and aligned.

Last night, I went to the store. I purchased a CD as an impulse buy and was all excited about it. It has been ages since I have bought a CD, both because of the advent of mp3s and because of life happening. I was excited to put it into iTunes and whatnot and then I stopped dead in my tracks.

In order to put the CD into iTunes so I could share the disk with my hubby but still have it in iTunes, I would have to eject the disk of my MRI showing my spine. I have ejected the MRI disk before. I took it to chiropractor, for example, and I will take it to the neurologist tomorrow to discuss it in detail, but I froze. Could I stop obsessing about the black and white pictures that have put a reason behind the tingling, pins and needles, spasms, ticks, pain, and sleepless nights long enough to put the new music into iTunes?

I ended up just taking the music CD into my car and called it a time crunch to go visit my friend who lives an hour away and has dogs and cats she offered up for me to pet. They do make me feel better. I recommend pet therapy.

I still have the CD of my MRI in my laptop, but since I have to take it out in order to bring it with me to the neurologist appointment tomorrow, I'm going to chew on this tonight. Stop obsessing over the damn pictures of my spine.

But how?

Since today was a good day, I'll try to stop obsessing by thinking about the fact that I only had tingling and pain. No electric jolts. No spasms. No ticks. I was able to go and visit my friend and then go and visit my family tonight. I heard some live music by way of a dear family member. I forgot about the disk for most of the day. I will try to do the same tomorrow.

Breathe.

Live and just breathe. I will tell myself this and hope it sticks like gum on the bottom of a sneaker minus the fuzzy stuff that inevitably gets picked up on the bottom of my shoe along the way.

Peace and hugs,
Jen