Domesticated Lady

Last week was one of the hardest weeks of my life. That is, with regards to my health. I had mouth sores that made it impossible to eat. A stomach ache that left my dry heaving. Sores in my scalp that were bloody. Swelling in my joints that caused a pain that left me grounded. And fatigue so severe that I felt confused for most of the week. I'm used to these symptoms. You see, they show up every time I have a LUPUS flare. Sometimes the symptoms are mild and relatively bearable. And then there are times like last week, where I'm certain that death is hovering over my deformed body. And if I'm totally honest, there are days when I know that going with Grim would require much less effort than fighting him off, again.  Flares like this last one leave me terrified of the arrival of the next one. And I promise you, there will be a next one.  Most people have no clue what Lupus is. So I'm going to take a moment to fill you in. Lupus is an autoimmune disease. This m...

Today is my mom's 48th birthday!!! WooHoo!!! She gave birth to me when she was 16 years old and then gave me two sisters by the time she was 18. This means that she gets to enjoy her empty nest and her grandchildren before reaching menopause.  That is not something that will happen for me, so I think it's pretty darn cool. In celebration of my mom, I will shine a little light on a lesson she worked tirelessly to instill in my sisters and I: Excellence without Excuses. Now, she didn't call it that. Her language was a bit more colorful back in the day. What she called it is irrelevant to what she meant and how it's still relevant. If my mother told us to clean the kitchen, simply washing the dishes wasn't going to cut it. We had to wash dishes, clean the counter, stove, table and floor nightly. Once a week we were required to clean the inside of the refrigerator. Of course, we also had to handle the trash. Anything less meant we had failed to do what we were...