After my parents went back home I had my Remicade treatment which included a visit with my Rheumatologist and finally getting the results of my knee x-rays. Well, it wasn't good news. I have arthritis in all 3 compartments of the knee. Both of them. The weird thing is the right knee hurts the worse but the left knee is the worse. The left knee doesn't even give me grief! She told me that I was headed for a double knee replacement. I about flipped out! I asked her about doing the Synvisc injections and she said that we could try them and see how I did. I told her that I had to do something because it was becoming impossible for me to drive. She could not inject the knees that day because she said that insurance will not pay for treatment of a 2nd diagnosis. Welcome to the beginning of the flippin O'Bama care! She told me that I would have to come back the next week. So I scheduled my appointment and went and got my Remicade treatment.
Needless to say this slapped me right up the side of the face. I can remember when Mark had his knee replacement telling his surgery that I didn't have any knee problems. No wonder he was quiet. He knew that it was coming. For some dumb reason I figured that because I am so in-active that I would miss having bad knees. Oh no! Over night they start hurting and I'm bone on bone in all 3 compartments headed for knee replacement surgery. And get this my Rheumatologist told me that there are surgeons who would do the surgery at my size. No way am I going to take that risk.
So since then I have struggled with my eating. Not binging but not recording my food, eating out a lot, not eating mindfully, not eating on schedule. I have been a day here and a day there and every week Anna and Kathy have heard my woes about my weight. I really flipped out one day when Kathy told me that I needed to start making some healthier choices. That flipped me out. When she said it, I told myself "I knew the diet would come!". I was pissed! I really rebelled! Another thing that was going on was we were working on Susan Albers "Mindful Eating" book and workbook and that workbook was kicking my butt. It was showing all kinds of things wrong with me. Things that I never ever thought about. I could see where some improvements have been made but more than anything I could see just how bad my self-confidence was. It is really bad. In the workbook there was a 14 question self assessment based on your self confidence level and there was only one that I could leave unchecked. The others were huge issues in my life.
This sent me on a emotional roller-coaster ride. You would have thought I was not taking any anti-depressants. I would be o.k. one minute and losing it the next. I remember one morning as I was finishing up Mark's lunch I just lost it standing in the kitchen and I just grabbed my face and laid on the counter crying that I couldn't take it anymore. Mark didn't know what to thing. I just bawled my eyes out and emptied my heart out to him. I felt like a worthless piece of crap. I felt like I was and always had been a huge burden on him and I did not know how he could even stand living with me much less stay married to me. He just held me in his arms and told me that I was going to be o.k. and that we would get through this. He told me that he wanted me to get well and we would get me there. I knew he had to get to work so I held things together till he left and I spent the day crying my eyes out. I felt so alone. No friends, no one to talk to, no one to understand, it was the loneliest place that I have ever been. I never want to go back to that day. I truly feel that I hit rock bottom.
As days went on I was just on a emotional roller coaster. Kathy and I weren't getting along very well and Anna was working her butt off to help me. Kathy finally found some compassion and backed off and started try to help stabilize me and encourage me to get back on track. All I heard her say (in my mind) was "diet" and I was so confused because I had worked so hard to get rid of the diet mentality and worked hard on accepting that there were no bad foods even though there were times of struggle with that.
Days turned into weeks and my eyes started opening up to another side of me. With no self confidence I didn't like what I was beginning to see either. You'll have to wait till tomorrow to find out what happens next. I would finish but it is late and I have Remicade in the morning. If I can stay awake when I get home tomorrow afternoon I'll finish the story and have you all up to date.
Some of you have written the sweetest emails checking on me and you are right when things get real bad I can't write. I'm a mess. So with this journey as hard as it is going to be bear with me. I will never not come out here and no fill you in. Besides, who knows when I get to recovery, I may write a book. I'll will need all these notes.
Thanks for hanging in there with me You all mean the world to me. Thanks for coming back again and again to see if I've written. I promise I will try really hard not to let so much time go by. These last two things have been tough ones.
Much love!
Laura
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