Nov 09 Five For Friday 11/8/13

1. Medical Stuff:

• 1 day of PT. A lot of elliptical, arm bike, squats, toe rises, light arm weights, and rib manipulations.
• 1 Day of Home Rehab. I struggled a lot this week with back pain, fitting in workouts, and having late nights at school. One of the hardest things for me to figure out when something flares up on me and becomes really painful is this: a) Is it painful because I am not keeping the area strong enough, so therefore should I work out anyways? ~or~ b) Is it painful because I have done TOO much, my body needs rest, and if I work out, it will just make things worse? Oh, EDS. You can be so complicated.
• I saw Larry on Friday. He spent the whole appointment working on my lower ribs. I had about 6 that would not cooperate. He would put them back into place, and then they would sublux just a few minutes later. We finally came to the conclusion that more prolotherapy may get them to stabilize better and he experimented by wrapping me like a mummy with ace bandages to try to keep them in place.  I actually did get some relief from the ace bandages. Larry also gave me a few new exercises to try to strengthen the area around my ribs. Hopefully my angry ribs will calm down asap, and I will figure out a way to make them happy again…especially because angry ribs do not make a happy Katie.

2.  This was a big zebra work week. I had a website meeting on Tuesday, a legal meeting on Wednesday, and many, many emails exchanged throughout the week having to do with t-shirt orders, benefit paperwork, and performers for the benefit. I have to keep reminding myself that all of this work is a process and takes time. There is no way it will all get done overnight. You know that thing called patience? I am working on it…

3.  At school it is a crazy time with activity nights and parent-teacher conferences. I spent Saturday in my classroom for four hours, and this week I did two days of this: Teach in the morning. Race home, eat lunch, lay down for an hour and a half, and go back to school for the evening for Harvest Night and conferences. I have two more nights of conferences next week and then things should calm down again on the school front for a while. I was amazed by the kindness of some parents who came to school bearing gifts like Icy Hot, Ibuprofen, heat patches, coffee, and Smart Water just to make sure I got through the longer days okay. So kind. And let’s just say I was in bed really, really early last night.

4.   Do you like my Target score? I have decided I may just wear it to Thanksgiving. I could eat a lot in my new comfy zebra get up.

5. I’ve been feeling pretty stoked that last weekend I got to send $8,000 from Life as a Zebra Foundation to help fund EDS, Dysautonomia, and Vasculitis research. That makes $10,020 we have donated to awareness and research in the last two months. That makes me really happy. And makes me feel really, really grateful to so many people who make it possible.

I love you all, zebra friends and supporters. Thank you from all of us.