Skip to main content

10 Things I Couldn't Live Without

Aside from family, friends, water, food, shelter, etc., here are the 10 things I would have a very hard time living without.

1.  My Laptop
     I use my laptop to blog, chat with my online support group, and keep in touch with friends I don't see often enough.

2.  My iPhone
     I use my iPhone for many of the things above, as well as looking up medication interactions on the go, reading or playing games while I wait for appointments, keeping track of blog ideas, and taking pictures. 

3.  Retractable pens
     I refuse to use anything else if I can avoid it.  I click away my anxiety throughout the day.  My coworkers appreciate the "silent" retractable pens, like Zebra or Bic Atlantis brands.

4. Books
    Either on my Kindle or actual books, to read on the go, in waiting rooms, or when I can't fall asleep. I end up reading more than one book at a time usually.

5. Blackout Curtains/Shades
    When I can't sleep at night, I can sleep through the day with these.

6. Gatorade
    Preferably Fruit Punch flavor and not G2, I drink these almost daily to increase my salt intake while quenching my never ending thirst.

7.  MaryLou's Iced Coffee
     I am a coffee hater but these iced coffee flavors taste like candy!  My favorite is Girl Scout Cookie.  These keep me awake when I have to go to work or appointments after a sleepless night.

8.  My really big red bag
     For carrying an absurd amount of things, including medications, injections, snacks, gatorade, kindle, iPhone...you get the picture.

9. Google
    For my blog, email, news, and YouTube.

10. My readers!
      Seriously, I never expected this to be what it is today.  It started as a record for me, then for family and friends to keep up to date with what was going on, and now this!  Thank you so much for all of your support through the last few years.  I wouldn't be where I am today without you!

  


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Talk About the Sh*t you Don't Want to Talk About

I haven't updated this blog in a very long time.  I actually deleted a ton of posts while I was applying for social security disability. I posted about Cushing's Awareness day earlier this week on facebook, so I guess I'm in a sharing mood. Anyway, for anyone who even reads this, I was watching a documentary on Netflix about a teenager with anorexia and mental illness who found meaning in her life through yoga. (It's called I Am Maris). It's kind of the reason for this post. To start - let's go back to June 2018. My grandmother died.  She lived a wonderful long life, but it was especially hard on me.  She was the reason I got out of bed every day, my best friend, and so much more. I actually don't remember how I got through most of the summer. In the span of two weeks at the end of August, my mom turned 60, we went on a family vacation to the vineyard, my best friend got married, and I wanted to kill myself.  Yeah, you read that right. The day after re
Post a Comment
Read more

Yet another health update...

As many of you know, things haven't been that great with my health lately.  I just had an appointment with my endocrinologist at MGH that was very informative, although not very exciting.  My ACTH levels have increased dramatically since a few months ago.  This is to be expected after a BLA and since I likely have tumor tissue left in my pituitary gland, this wasn't too surprising.  She seemed a little concerned about this recent increase and took a look at my MRI from July.  I hadn't actually seen the images, I just read the radiologist's report that said everything looked normal considering the 2 surgeries.  She thought my pituitary stalk looked pretty enlarged (the stalk comes up vertically from the gland and connects it to the hypothalamus).  This could be because I have tumor growth, which would make sense because of the increased ACTH.  She is going to have my neurosurgeon look at the MRI to see what he thinks, at the very least this increases my MRI intervals to
2 comments
Read more

The Challenges of Getting a Diagnosis

I have been asked about this so many times, and talk about it a lot, whenever someone asks me about Cushing's.  So many people have the same experience - KNOWING you have Cushing's, and seeing 5, 10, 20, or more doctors over the course of many years before you officially have a diagnosis.  I would say this is one of the most common links I have with other "Cushies".  We all fought for a diagnosis, heard we were just fat and depressed, waited with hope after every test, until a day came when one test came back high, or a brain MRI showed a tumor in the pituitary gland. I think the reason I haven't written about it is because it's one of the hardest things to sit down and spend time on.  It's painful, and of course, I can't help but wonder what my life might be like today if I was diagnosed sooner.  Would I have needed an adrenalectomy?  Or for that matter, a second pituitary surgery? Would I have as many health issues after Cushing's?  It's ha
5 comments
Read more