OK Eyeballs, You Need to Chill

If you've been reading my blog then you'll know that I've been having issues with my eyes since my cancer diagnosis. It started the second or third day of my lovely hospital stay at then MD Anderson (now UFHealth Cancer Center). As a side note, the room next door to me was haunted. My mother and I would hear someone dragging one of those heavy hospital chairs at night around 10:00pm (bedtimish) only to be told by the staff that no one had been in that room for a month. So...yeah...but back to my eyes (creepy music). 

My vision started to slowly get blurry from starting from the peripheral (my temple or side of my face) vision. It was slowly creeping along my vision towards my nose and I started to complain loudly about the fact that "HEY, I like my VISION check me". Since I also have MS they decided that I might have optic-neuritis, which is when your optic (vision thingy) nerve gets swollen (this can also happen with diabetics). So, sick me who can't breathe well, cause I was having a reaction to the medication no one knew of yet, with a mask on, because I had one gimpy white blood cell trying not to kill itself left, had to get shoved into a tube the size of a toilet paper roll for am MRI. 

MRIs don't bother me usually but as the table slowly started to slide in I had to stop them. Something about the mask on my face threw me over the edge. So, risking my one depressed gimpy white blood cell, I took the mask off. We find out it's not ON and the nothing else is done for six weeks until I get to see an eye doctor when I'm released from the hospital. 

First eye doctor says I have diabetic retinopathy and my vision is 20/200 which means I'm legally blind. I argue that I don't have retinopathy. Why you ask? Because I have MS and I have a Neuro-Ophthalmologist that checks my eyes out. I also wear glasses and have yearly exams. See look glasses. 

This is me looking psycho before a run. I had been up since 4am and was feeling a bit loopy.

My hematologist (he's a hematologist who specializes in blood cancers) says he doesn't think it is (yay someone else that agrees with me). Diabetic retinopathy is when the blood vessels in your eyes leak due to damage from blood sugar issues. My leukemia was causing all my blood vessels to burst (hence coughing up blood) and he thinks my eyes were also affected by the leukemia. 

Wanna know what the treatment is? Having needles jabbed into your eye once a month to treat them. YAY I'M SO EXCITED (blink blink). It does work. I'm now seeing about 20/20 to 20/30 depending on the eye but I still have monthly injections. 

My November injection is next week but for some reason my left eye is spazzing out. It's blurry, I can't read small text, and I won't even attempt to drive. WTF IS GOING ON!? I even called my ophthalmologist but he's not that worried. I really enjoy the nonchalant attitude about MY vision but I need him to be a little more proactive with this. 

So, my eyes and I are having a come to Jesus talk. I really want the horrible injections to stop and I think they would also enjoy that. I promised them the best eye-drops money can buy if they just chill out. Think it will work? 

Diabetes - She has it (Weight an Health Rant)

I'm sure some of you have heard that Paula Deen has Type 2 diabetes. If not you can find a news article about it below.

Paula Deen

Why did she hide it for three years? I believe it was to keep her cooking show a float. I also believe that she would not have discussed it if she were not employed by Norvo Nordisk. A drug manufacturer Deen is partnering with to help them promote diabetes awareness.

I believe that everyone has a right to live their lives how they see fit with one exception - celebrities.  You choose to be in the spotlight and if you're popular you are paid well for that. You are now out there and your decisions and the things you do will be in the spotlight.

If you are a chef that cooks everything with butter and eats as unhealthy as she does as well as consumes a lot of alcohol how do you not let people know you have diabetes? Yes it's a personal choice yadda yadda but then don't then decide to be an advocate for the disease.

A big part of being an advocate is not being perfect and not being 100% the queen of your disease management, but you are now looking to be a role model for others. At this point you need to be making healthy life choices and living well.

How does anything about how she eats or live portray that?

Butter, alcohol, more food, and not exercising is her whole life. I know we would all love to believe that we can eat and do whatever we want and not have any ill health effects. Well guess what? That's not true.

Being obese will hurt you, eating butter all day long with sugar and whiskey will hurt you, and that is that. Am I perfect? Nope I gotta lose weight and I should be exercising more and sometimes I don't make the best food choices. I am not however trying to sell a cooking show where all I cook is fried butter and then promote myself as a healthy diabetic.

I'm really tired of people who lie to themselves and everyone else. Ya know what sometimes what you're doing is NOT healthy and you should NOT be doing it.

I have MS and because of that I have to make life choices for myself. I could sit on my butt all day and do nothing but how would that help me? I'm an MS advocate and I would be a LIAR if I told people that MS was livable and then I crawled into a huge hole of denial. I would be a LIAR if I told people that I worked out to help my fatigue and that I take my medication because I feel like it's a way for me to fight my disease, and did neither.

So Ms. Deen, excuse me if I find this ridiculous but pin a rose on yourself because this lady sure wont.