Hello, world!  (Although my audience is much smaller unfortunately.)  Today I have decided to just not worry about it anymore.  I don't have any money so I can't put any in the bank...there's nothing I can do about it.  I am tired of sitting here crying about it.  So, it's just the way it is and I am not going to sit and cry about it anymore.  If anyone does read this and is considering quitting work because they are sick, this is what you are in for if you do...no money, bills piling up, your bank account in the red...all of it, while they decide your case.  Either you have to have tons of savings to carry you through this difficult waiting period or you struggle like I am doing. 

My case is in Austin at DDS right now being decided upon.  Yesterday, I mailed the looooonnnnnnggggggggg questionaire they sent me with all of the questions filled out.  It's funny...they ask you a question that requires a full explaination and give you a teeny, tiny space to answer. Like this:

"Explain how your health problems prevent you from working:______

__________________________________________________________"

HELLO! How in the heck is someone supposed to fully answer your question if you leave them no place to answer it in?  Well, I got around that...I wrote on the side, I wrote on the bottom, I wrote on the back.  They are going to be truly sorry they asked me anything!  LOL!  If there was an empty space on the paper, I wrote in it.  They may deny my claim for alot of reasons but it won't be because I didn't fully answer their questions.

I also sent them a copy of my resume', which includes all of the past jobs that I did very well, but can no longer do because of the fibro.  It is sort of depressing reading the resume' because I used to do so many things and have so many skills.  Now, they just seem to have disapeared, along with my verbal skills, managing skills, training skills and my patience.

My claim is based disability due to Fibromyalgia with Complicated Vertebral Basilar Migraines; however, I asked them to consider the fact that I also had aluminum poisoning.  I hope they take the time to do some research and learn about how al. poisoning makes a person sick and the effects it has on a person's body.  It may help my case.  It was because of the al. poisoning that I lost all of my upper teeth and my eyesight declined severely almost overnight.  I lost all the weight that I lost in 8 months...87lbs. because of the al. poisoning.  I just hope they consider it too.

One question they asked seemed very strange to me and that was, "How do you react to criticism?"  OK, I wonder what answer they are looking for?  I mean, what would be the answer that would support a persons' claim, rather than support a denial?  I sat and looked at that question for a long time, trying to decide how I was going to answer it.  Finally, I decided that I would answer it honestly, just as I had tried to answer all of the other questions in the questionaire.  My answer was, "I always try to accept criticism gracefully and learn from it but that was easier before the fibro, the dementia and the constant pain.  Now I just tell people to bite me and that I don't really care what they think!  I would gladly give anyone this body for a day, let them live with this constant pain and then see how harshly they would judge me."  What do you think?  Good answer?  Well, regardless of whether it helps my case or hurts it...it was honest.  That's the best I can do.  What kind of question is that anyway?  I referred back to that question in my "remarks" section, commenting that I thought it was ridiculous that they are asking me questions like that when to me, the huge question that I have to ask myself everyday is, "Do I really want to live, having to deal with severe, chronic pain everyday, for the rest of my life?  When I am dealing with those kind of issues on a daily basis, who the f#$% cares how I deal with criticism????  Are they on a different planet or what?  I just don't get it. 

Speaking of the big question, or at least the biggest one I am dealing with right now...Do I really want to live a life that forces me to deal with chronic, severe pain?  Do I want to have to take strong narcotic drugs three times a day for the rest of my life just to be able to tolerate the pain, unable to work, struggling like this?  My grandmother had Alzheimer's and now my dad is showing signs of the disease.  I am 44 years old and have to take Aricept, a medication for treating Alzheimer's.  It doesn't look good for me.  The odds are even agaist me with it running in my family.  Chances are, I will eventually turn into a "green bean".  Everone says, "Well, you don't really have a choice!"  WRONG!  I do have a choice and I consider it EVERYDAY!  Would you criticize me for considering the alternative?  Well, sorry but I have already explained how I accept criticism so you already know what my response to that would be...

It's not easy to deal with this disease.  The constant pain makes you edgy and aggitated all of the time.  The meds help but it never totally goes away.  It gets old to wake up everyday stiff and unable to move.  The side effects of the meds don't help with the dizziness, nausea and IBS flares.  One med constipates you and another causes diarrea...you just can't win.  Worse, it's not like a cold or flu that you know will eventually run it's course and go away...it will always be there and there is no cure.  No cure.  Well, that is encouraging isn't it?  Call me a coward but I don't want to live like this.  This is no quality of life.  This is hell.  To make matters worse, noone understands just how bad it is.  No matter how hard I try to make people understand, they just cannot comprehend how bad it is.  My X-husband lived with me for 23 years.  Nobody knows me better than he does, yet he didn't even realize how much pain I was in, pretty much thought that I was lazy or didn't care enough to take care of the house, my car or him.  He told himself that I wasn't really that sick, that I was just overstating the whole situation.  The result was we ended up divorcing, largely due to the fact that I just got so sick I couldn't take it anymore and I felt like he was ignoring the fact that I was sick because he didn't care enough to face it.  People just don't get it.  If you have fibro, noone will grasp just how much you suffer - even those closest to you.

Well, that's my two cents for today.  If anyone reads this, please pray that my paperwork gets to SSA in time to be included in my decision consideration process and that the DDS personnel approve my disability case.  Thanks and take care all...

Tammy Elaine