A Tale of Two Tities

Father Ted, trapped in Irelands largest lingerie store – I know how he feels

No doubt the title of this blog post is also the title of some sleazy soft porn film. Anyone having done a google search and found this post, expecting it to be a bit…”oh er missus, how’s your father”…is going to be a bit disappointed (although there is a shot of my big fat arse in another post).

No, indeed, this post is about the trauma of badly fitting bras, of which I am a sufferer at present. As readers of this blog will already know, I am now the size of two baby elephants who’ve been eating too much cake and my boobs are like the heads of those baby elephants. None of my bras fit me, wearing them is like wearing some sort of medieval undergarment designed for torture. I can’t, not wear a bra, otherwise, well, people would notice and it’d be VERY embarrassing, so I have to go buy some new ones…and therein lies the problem.

I hate going to the shops. Even as a fit and healthy person it was a bore and I would put it off at all costs. However, I am also a lover of clothes and fashion. I have several wardrobes full of them (my babies). One is a large bank of them in the bedroom (poor Steve has a tiny portion of one of them and even that is squashed in against my clobber). I have another overflow wardrobe in another part of the house and in the attic I have a rail of 80s and 90s clothes that are either too small, or too ‘young’ for me, but which I can’t bear to sell or give away. I admit it, I am an addict, I can’t help it, I prefer however to think of it as a hobby.

My mother was a dress maker, a brilliant one, you should’ve seen the amazing elaborate wedding dresses she would make. She didn’t even have to measure people, she just looked at them and knew what size to make. So I blame her. I was surrounded by fabrics and clothes from birth, it obviously affected my cognitive development.

To service my obsession, I buy online. And I don’t mind buying second hand. As long as the item is good quality and not overly worn, it’s fine by me. I’ve bought some beautiful pieces from eBay, one woman’s cast off’s is another woman’s dream dress: I bought a Missoni dress for a tenth of the price if bought new and it is worn, but still beautiful. I’ve spent quality time learning my size in different brands so that I can almost, without fail, get a good fit, even when buying without trying on.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t extend to bras. I have failed to buy bras online that fit me, I just can’t get it right. So…this means a trip to the dreaded shop to try on and buy bras. The boredom of it all sweeps over me and makes me want to become a 1970’s feminist and burn the damned things.

I’m going to go with my daughter on Friday and just do it. We will go for a vegan breakfast at a lovely cafe in Newcastle first and that should bolster me for the onslaught. Wish me luck, as you wave me goodbye, a tale of two tities will hopefully have a happy ending.

And now for a bit of mirth – the bit in Father Ted where the priests get trapped in ‘Ireland’s largest lingerie department’ (said in an Irish accent please!)

The ‘down’ side of tapering prednisolone

Curtesy cure4lupus.org

I was started on 50mg a day of the corticosteroid, prednisolone when I was first diagnosed with dermatomyositis in early June of his year. Well of course, I can’t stay on that dose for too long because of side effects such as osteoporosis. So since around  late August I’ve been tapering the dose and factoring in the steroid sparing drug, methotrexate. It has worked pretty well. My disease is in remission because of those drugs.

So here I am, nearly 6 months into taking prednisolone. It has had it’s ups and downs; It has gotten the disease under control, but it has made me look like an advert for moonpig.com with a big round moon face. I’ve put on over 2 stone in weight. It has given me stomach pains. I’ve got osteopenia in my hips. I’ve had heart palpitations and tachycardia because of the steroid. My sleep patterns have been adversely affected. At one point I was also borderline diabetic, but got that under control through dietary changes. My once excellent long vision, is now very blurred.  I have lumps and bumps in the strangest of places. It has also left me prone to infections, which, so far, touch wood, Ive managed to avoid.

On the plus side, I’ve felt pretty happy. Steroids like prednisolone are mood elevators and for the past 6 months, considering I’ve had a pretty awful illness, I’ve been a happy, chirpy girl. Until now that is…

This week I’ve tapered down to 20 mg one day, 0 mg the next. Suddenly my mood isn’t so positive and the dark has set in. I feel lost and angry about my life and how it has turned out. I feel like I’m the worlds biggest underachiever. I’ve got to get out of this funk and think how fantastic it is that I’m now on an average of 10mg of prednisolone a day after being on 50 for so long. I’ve got to keep that positivity and remember how I felt when I thought that this disease might take me, but it hasn’t. It isn’t easy though, when you look in the mirror and you hardly recognise yourself from a year ago. How do those positive people, keep so positive?

Another Chemo down . . .Thank God !!!!

Today was chemo number five.  I only (hopefully) have one more to go.  I have no reason to think I will need more but with the way things have gone this year I don’t want to assume anything !!!

So today . . . well I’m glad that’s another one out of the way – even the smell of walking into the hospital this morning started to make me feel ill.  I think it is all the smells I am starting to associate with illness and chemotherapy.  I keep thinking about this time last year  when I kept thinking about all the things I had to look forward to with work, travel, relationships etc – how wrong could I have been?  I actually do find it hard to think how wrong I could have been – makes me wonder about my own judgement sometimes.

Anyway, the chemo – feel quite sick this afternoon and very tired.  I also think I sort of ‘worked myself up’ for this one – anticipating that it would be a bit more difficult. The nurses are all so lovely and supportive and have explained that it is just the build up of the chemo in my system.  They have assured me though that it is really good for the cancer, ie it kills it !!!!  I’m hoping it has and that it won’t come back – don’t want to do this again.  The funny thing about the cancer I have is that it shows signs of both slow and fast growing cancer types so until we get through the chemo and subsequent tests I don’t think I will really know where I stand.  And then, assuming I go into remission,  the next 18 to 24 months will be important in terms of monitoring how things progress.  Hopefully it won’t ever come back !!!!!

So tomorrow the community nurse comes to give me my neulasta and then its predisolone (high dose0 for the next five days  – all hopefully for the second last time.  At least now there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  I’m looking forward to feeling better and getting on with my life.  I am hoping that all the good things that I anticipated this time last year, present themselves again.

 

Tapering Prednisolone, Urggggg

Waiting for my drugs at the RVI

I went to the specialist dermatomyositis clinic at the Royal Victoria Infirmary the other day. I am incredibly lucky to have a specialist clinic, so close to where I live for such a rare disease. It is probably because my neurologist has a special interest in myositis: Whatever, I feel quite lucky.

And with dermatomyo-shite-is you get two for the price of one, so I see both a neurologist and a dermatologist. The dermatologist checks out my skin for any signs that the derma part of the disease, i.e. the rash, is causing any trouble. Fortunately for me it is almost gone, apart from some faint traces of it still visible on my hands: Apparently, the hand rash is usually the last to go.

The neurologist tests my muscle strength and also decides upon any changes to current treatment. And it’s the neurologist (bless his cottons) that has decided to taper the prednisolone, so I now have, 30mg one day and 0mg the next.

I actually shouted “YIKESY!!!”, when he announced I would be taking 0mg every other day, at which he exclaimed, “why yikesy?” To which I said “because it’s scary…MAN!”.

Anyway, Ive been on this regime for a few days and I can report that I seem to be getting a delayed effect. On the day I take 0mg prednisolone I am actually not too bad, but the next day, urgh, Im incredibly tired, have more significant pain and feel nauseated – pretty bad when my sister in law made the most amazing vegetarian, gluten free, trifle for us, which I have named ‘The Trifle of Delight’ as it looks so good.

However, I will persevere. It’s not like the last time where I was incredibly ill and had to go back up to the higher dose, that must be a sign I’m improving too. The good thing about this dosage is that it is under the magic number of 20mg a day (averaged) so I’m hopeful some of the side effects of the steroid will abate, in fact the neurologist said some of them should, not all, but some – let’s hope that means bye bye Moon Face.

Moon Facebook

It’s about time we talked about the horror of waking up one day to see you’ve turned into a pig, well sans curly tail, but it’s only a matter of time before the full transformation is complete.

One of the side effects of taking high dose corticosteroids, like prednisolone, for more than a few weeks, is the appearance of ‘moon face’. It’s kind of hard to describe and all you’re going to see of mine is that shadowy image above, but I’ll try to describe it (I know it doesnt look ‘too’ bad in that picture, but that’s why I choose it – don’t want to scare the readers!). Before I start, I should point out the not everyone gets this side effect, there are some lucky b^%&&rds who get away with it.

Your face becomes quite taut. Im not sure if it’s caused by oedema or fat redistribution, but it also feels lumpy in certain areas too, but the lumps come and go, very odd.

I do look a bit like the moonpig.com logo – my cheeks certainly resemble that adorable piggie wig, except I don’t look adorable, I just look weird.

I look (not very often these days) at myself in the mirror and it really doesn’t look like me. Well it sort of does, but sort of doesn’t. A kind of shadow of who I was.

I’m certainly not brave enough to bear all, as a full frontal in this blog post, as Suz did with her ‘Bald as an Ostrich‘ outing of her chemo induced bald head. Anyway, Suz actually looks lovely and people can honestly say to her she looks cool and beautiful. Whereas with the ol’ moon face, really, honestly you can’t, it’s certainly not cool and really NOT attractive.

It can be funny though, I am able to take the mickey out of myself and make people laugh about it. And my friends and family are very kind. They keep saying it looks like it’s going down – it isn’t, but it’s really kind of them to say so.

My niece, a medical student, who has promised to find a cure for dermatomyositis, suggested I take photo of my piggy face every day, to the point where it has eventually gone back to normal (i.e. as my dose of prednisolone tapers, the magic number being under 20mg a day, apparently) . Then make a flick book out of the photos so I can see the transformation. A great idea, but I don’t think I will do it, as once this is over, I really just want to forget it.

On the positive side and you do have to find a positive in things like this, otherwise you’d end up very down indeed. My nose looks much smaller (compared to the expanse of my cheeks) and my skin is very clear and probably the best it’s ever been. Also because of the tautness of the skin, I have no wrinkles whatsoever, wooo hoooo!

Oh and a final idea, how about Moon Facebook. It would allow me to have a current photo up without embarrassment, as it would only allow people with Moon Faces to become a member, we could then moan on about our fat cheeks without any feeling of guilt or shame: Damn, we could even have a competition on who’s cheeks are the biggest.