The Sunday Salon: Lupus sucks

The Sunday Salon

So last weekend‘s feeling a bit bleh turned into a lupus flare and I have lost half my week to the black hole of SLE. Which sucks.

I’m afraid I’m going to vent a little bit about being ill now. It is not my most interesting topic. In many ways I should be grateful that my major lupus symptoms – fatigue and brain fog, with added dizziness and double vision if I push myself – are not painful. Even my lupus symptoms that do hurt – headaches and joint pains – are quite low-level pain. My specialist called them “irritants” once, which is probably accurate but also a little demeaning. Because pain or not, lupus can (and does) still incapacitate me. When it flares I can’t think, I can’t make the most basic decisions like what to eat, in fact I get panicky if faced by a choice. I can’t hold a conversation. I certainly can’t read a book. Standing up long enough to shower completely drains me.

It passes. I am lucky that I only get really bad for a few days at a time now, thanks to medication and fatigue-management techniques. I am lucky that Tim knows me well enough to spot the danger signs and make me rest (if I can be persuaded). But it never goes away. I am always tired. I am always one push-too-hard away from being “lupus tired”.

Rant over.

Seek the truth

While I have not read much this week, I do have a small backlog of book reviews so I was still able to post about Balthazar and Mountolive. Yesterday Tim took me to the cinema to see Cabin in the Woods (which I knew nearly nothing about beforehand and that was totally the best way to see it so I will say nothing other than “it’s great”) and to Foyles bookshop, because the TBR is always hungry. Today I will be mostly sleeping.

How was your week?