75-DAY FITNESS CHALLENGE TO BE LESS FAT!!

Join me on this new fitness quest for the next couple months! C’mon, it’ll be FUN. And stay tuned for the STRUGGLING WELL mug! Coming soon to the all new TMZ store.

I’ve Never Weighed as Much as I Do Now

I’ve gained about 20 pounds from my autoimmune disease, now sitting just 3 pounds away from “overweight.” My whole life I’ve never been insecure about my body weight – until this moment.

This Disease from Up Top

It’s unnerving not knowing where you are. Like I’m on the bottom level of a parking deck (garage) with no idea how long or far or deep or wide or harrowing this thing goes. Was this last month of infusions a definitive leap toward healing or a total wash? Do I move on to the next phase, or do I start over with something else?

I Have an Autoimmune Disease. How You Can Help.

After spending a week in the hospital last month, I got diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease: a form of vasculitis called granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA), formerly Wegener’s disease. Now begins the long journey toward remission.

‘Twas the Night Before Treatment

Tomorrow morning, bright and early, I set out on a new quest. A new quest within an already new journey of the last couple months – this unforeseen journey with an autoimmune disease. Tomorrow begins this new quest for healing and recovery. Remission. Or so I hope.

Teach Me How to Live

Of course, I want to travel again one day, set loose to wander once more. I want it badly. But for now, I do have this strange desire to be settled. To stay home and enjoy safety and solitude. And I don’t necessarily feel relegated to this reality, forced into it against my wandering will. For all this restless angst I’ve had since childhood, perhaps I’m finally stumbling onto the cure?

A Time to Refrain from Embracing

Looking down at my precious niece in my arms, I realized it’s really something, how we need physical touch to survive. Need to be swaddled. Need to be held. Need to feel the warmth of another human emanating against us, if only to affirm to one another we are not alone in this desert. To embrace for my soul or not to embrace for my body? Life with an autoimmune disease during the pandemic of the century: one calculated risk after another.

Not So Wonderfully Made

I don’t feel wonderfully made right now. My autoimmune disease makes me feel newly flawed. Like my Designer forgot to quality-check my body before He sent me to the womb, apparently knit with this broken strand.