Per Dr. M’s instructions, I spent today doing nothing (I knew – despite a long, long To Do list, that I was exhausted).  I messed around with photos on the internet.  I drank a delicious soy chai.  I watched the first two episodes of “And Just Like That.”

And then I found myself staring at the ceiling in my gym, not quite paying attention to a Peloton guided meditation while testing out my new infrared sauna blanket.

PS.  I know that whole last sentence is ridiculous.  In fact, I thought about it while lying there.

As I lay there, trying desperately to listen to Anna Greenberg’s instructions to tense and release all the muscles in my body, I thought about what a weird wacky road I’ve been on.  I’d say the last nine years or so, but it’s really just life.  Not just MS.

There was a moment in my life that I was so broke I was crashing at a friend’s apartment, eating her peanut butter out of a jar and making biscuits with Bisquick and water (things readily available to me that cost zero dollars).  I remember spending my last five bucks on a pack of Parliament Lights and going to a bar where I knew the bartender so I could get a drink.  I ate fast food or whatever I could scrounge at the restaurant (I never worked anywhere with staff meals, but man that would have been nice).  I slept odd hours if I slept at all.  I had shitty friends and dated shitty guys.  I mean, if you could call it dating.  Or friends.

Today I have an infrared sauna blanket, a Peloton, a full fridge and a plethora of NA beverages (because I quit drinking almost two years ago and smoking many many years before that).  I sleep 7-9 hours a night and drink massive amounts of water.  And green smoothies.  With things like spirulina in them.

It’s a far cry from that lost twenty-something.

When I think about it, I often wonder how I got to where I am now.  I wonder how I didn’t lose my way completely and fulfill all the expectations of the little rich American girl.  (I never thought I was rich.  My parents would balk at that description.  But as a nearly 42-year-old I can say quite plainly that I grew up really well and my life was very different from many many other lives from age zero to about eighteen.  And my life today is very nice and we live very well.  The difference?   John + I earned this stuff.  It makes it feel different somehow).   How did I end up figuring it out when I felt completely lost most of the time ….  Truth?  I couldn’t tell you.

Anyway.  Back to the infrared sauna blanket.

It’s a funny thing to just keep hoping that something will be *the* something.  The discovery that makes the aches and stiffness of MS go away.  The something that makes having MS less hard.  I keep searching and trying and getting discouraged but trying again.  Because if I stop trying then I’ve given up, right?  And the MS will never go away.  So I have to keep trying.  I have to keep doing all sorts of odd things that other people swear are their saviors.  I have to keep trying things like infrared sauna blankets.

Because otherwise, it’s over.  And I don’t want it to be over.  I don’t ever want to admit defeat to MS.

Anyway.  I’m all over the place.  I told you I was tired.

Xox, g