Forgot to tell you!

So I was doing my Yoga this evening and trying hard not to let my mind travel away from the moment and what pops in my head? The fact that I haven’t written in awhile and a few things have occurred lately that I thought was worth mentioning. First let’s talk about the World Series. Most of you reading know I grew up in Key West but am originally from St. Louis so I still like to represent STL especially when one of their teams are in a series. So at first I really didn’t think that they had a chance at winning the World Series because Detroit has got so much hype this year, but after watching 3 games and currently listening to game 4 I think we have a chance at winning this. What do you all think? Think the Cards may actually win this year? I sure do. I know I am surrounded by Padres fans here in San Diego so I have no support here but I sure do hope they win just so I can throw in it my coworkers face. J

Last week sometime I went to Del Taco (probably the wrong place to go on this new lifestyle of mine but it was the closest thing to my home for lunch). I ordered a taco salad but it really wasn’t even that because I had to hold the cheese, guacamole, and sour cream. It really ended up only being lettuce, taco meat, tomatoes and hot sauce. Far from a taco salad if you ask me but hey I was hungry so it worked. Anyway I pull up to the window; there were two people in the window with my order. The guy tells the lady “They wanted me to wear one of those but I never did.” What he was referring to was my oxygen; I had it on which I’m not sure why because I usually don’t need it when I’m driving but it was on for some reason. Anyhow he smiles at me and then says to the other lady and me “They told me I had this lung disease.” I smiled at him and said “Yes that’s why I have to wear one. I also have a lung disease.” He was a very sweet guy, Spanish of some kind, I’m assuming Mexican since we are surrounded by Mexicans in San Diego but you should never assume, but he did have an accent so probably was. Anyways he smiles at me and says “They told me I had Pulmonary Fibrosis, and so they wanted me to wear one because I was having trouble breathing. It wasn’t so much during the day but at night I still will wake up from a sound sleep not able to breath.” I nearly cried when he said that because at that moment I don’t think he really knew just how serious this disease is. I just smiled at him and then said “That is what I have. It’s not fun being young and having to walk around with an oxygen tank trust me. But it helps. You really should use one at night if the doctor ordered it because it may save your life.” He agreed with me, smiled, told me to have a great day and gave me my salad and extra hot sauce. I drove away and that way the end of it. I went home though with a knot in my stomach. What I really wanted to do was shake that guy silly and tell him “Take this serious, this disease is deadly. Do what ever you have to do to save yourself.” I know that everyone that has this disease has it different and maybe he’ll live for 100 years but I thought that too when at first I just had a little windedness while walking around and stuff. Shit I thought I just had exercise induced asthma. I mean looking back just two years ago I was able to walk 3 miles with no problem at all. Now I can barely walk 90 feet with out having to stop to catch my breath. That’s how serious and fast this disease progresses. Hopefully it won’t get any worse for a while but this disease is just a mystery. You simply just never know. So hopefully every time I go to Del Taco I will see him and I can hint around more for him to go back to the doctor and get checked again.

Dr. Grumpy finally called me back the other day and if you can believe this (I still have to make sure I wasn’t dreaming) he was actually friendly in his own way. He told me that my heart is working faster than normal but that that was normal for someone to have had a long life with Scleroderma but that it wasn’t as bad as he thought it was. He even gave me the ok to continue doing alternative medicine as long as I am proactive in my health and if I ever feel sick to get to a hospital right away. He said he has had a few patients of his decide to do alternative medicine and do very well for a few years and then take a nose dive because they wouldn’t go to the doctors when they were sick. So I promised him that if I felt that I was coming down with anything ever to call him and/or Dr. Shah. Dr. Grumpy (Yung) said he thought the diet was an excellent thing for me to do and to keep up with the herbs until I felt I was getting any worse. He told me that we wouldn’t start any new drugs (chemo/steroids) or the other medicine for my heart just yet because every medicine they want me to take will have “SEVERE Side effects” and at this time he wants to hold off until I really need to take them. So I guess Dr. Grumpy really isn’t so grumpy. I actually almost (key word) feel bad calling him Dr .Grumpy because he was nice on the phone and I even think he sort of chuckled when I said I hope I never see him again because that would mean I was doing well enough that I wouldn’t need him. I still went and got my cat scan he ordered and I will get my PFT (Pulmonary Function Test) done for him like he asked just so that we have a base line if for some reason I do need him later on. Plus I also want to see for myself if things have improved with my alternative medicine. I haven’t got any calls from any doctors regarding my cat scan but I won’t call until next week; that way Dr. Shah has time to get them and look them over. I’m sure things won’t look any different since my last one but who knows maybe they will say things have improved.

So see I had a lot to share with you that I totally never had time to sit and write until tonight. Well I need to get off of here and send my Cardinals positive energy it’s the bottom of the 2nd and they are already losing 1-0. Got to go.

Until I can think of something else to write,
Carmen San Diego