Discouraging illness

I haven’t mentioned much about this but Michele is sick again with the same condition she had when we lived in Indiana about 1 1/2 years ago. Her symptoms have reappeared in force and most days she isn’t able to do a whole lot. She has to walk around most of the time with a cane in order to keep her balance. Sometimes the only thing she can do is lie down and wait for the shaking/twitching/jerking symptoms to subside.

This is discouraging for a number of reasons and we are uncertain about how we’re going to cope. The main thing about this that’s discouraging is that last time, Michele’s symptoms, which lasted for several months, gradually disappeared. We hoped they had disappeared for good. Obviously, that’s not the case. It’s also discouraging because as yet we have no more information about what is causing her symptoms than we had previously. Her symptoms closely match common symptoms for Multiple Sclerosis, but it doesn’t mean that’s what she has. She is basically in a period of re-taking all the same kinds of tests she had before (e.g., EEGs, MRIs, blood tests, urine tests, etc.). She has a further appointment with her neurologist this week and we hope to have something more definite to go on in terms of diagnosis after that. We feel good about her doctor and his approach to her condition.

And then there is the fact that yesterday we discovered red spots all over Brinley’s body. Yep, she has chicken pox. So far she hasn’t been acting all that sick, which is good. Yesterday we also learned that my father-in-law has chicken pox, too, at 60 years of age!