aspir(al)ing

The Enbrel Vlog.

Posted by terri | Filed under health, vlog, watashi

I made a video of one of my Enbrel injections. If you are squeamish about needles and stuff like that, this video may not be for you. Granted, you don’t actually see the needle, but the pain on my face is enough to make you cringe!

I normally take my Enbrel injections on Thursdays and I just on a whim decided to make a video with it with my iMac and my point and shoot camera. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have used Photo Booth to take the footage because everything appears flipped, but I’m pretty pleased with it, considering how fast I was able to put it together. Yay iMovie ‘09!

So you may be thinking, why would I put something like this out there? Well, I just wanted to be a face for psoriatic arthritis and for its available treatments. When I was first suffering from the symptoms, I never would have imagined that it would be arthritis. Apparently my primary care doctor couldn’t think of it either as she referred me to a sports medicine doctor for my swollen fingers, thinking that they were just sprained. It finally took seeing four different doctors over the course of three months for me to finally get my diagnosis for my hand pain. And when I was given my diagnosis, I didn’t even know what it actually meant. I thought only older people got arthritis, but it turns out that there are many young adults, even children, are afflicted with some form of arthritis. I came to the understanding there is no cure for this, only treatments. And if they never find a cure, it’s something I have to learn to treat for the rest of my life.

The idea of having to take an injection every week scared me. I first looked to the Internet to see what others going through the same thing were thinking. It gave me a sense of therapy to see other people share their experiences. Sure there was anxiety seen in their faces, heard in their voices, and expressed in their written narratives, but that just told me it’s normal and that in the end, I’ll be okay.

Making the video turned out to be rather therapeutic for me as well. Not sure if I’ll ever make another one, but I’m glad that I made this one. I definitely welcome your thoughts and reactions.

So What’s New?

Posted by terri | Filed under blogmeta, chub chub, health, heart, watashi

There is so much I want to chronicle regarding my journey in managing my diabetes, arthritis, and just my overall well being. I decided to do it in a microblog powered by Tumblr called terri-is.aspiraling. While that blog is meant to chronicle what’s currently going on, I want something on the record to show what I’ve done with myself for the past year as far as my health goes. I decided that I’ll just do the lazy thing and put nearly a year’s worth of updates in bullet points. If I ever find the time, I may, just may, elaborate. And if you have been reading my Twitter (which I update about 5 times a day) you might very well be up to date already.
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Finally 30.

Posted by terri | Filed under watashi

I have so much to write, but so little time. I just wanted to note in my blog that I have at last turned 30, and really, it’s no big deal. I think I managed to accomplish a lot since my last birthday entry when I turned 29. I certainly want to write an entry celebrating this pretty significant year, but for now, it’s off to Maui!

Short Story Long.

Posted by terri | Filed under chub chub, health, watashi

I lately have been oversharing a lot of bits about my health these past several months. When using Twitter, I have been rather ambiguous about my condition, while being more specific in my blog. Unfortunately, my blog has been rather ignored (per usual) and so all there has been lately is ambiguity as to what I’m dealing with right now.

First of all, let me say that I am not going through anything gravely serious. I am not looking for sympathy or pity, because what I’m going through certainly doesn’t warrant it. I do want people to understand what is motivating me to take better evaluation of my health and why I may seem “healthier” these days when in actuality, I am just trying to mitigate any problems I may have in the future due to my current ailments.
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Mandated to be Motivated.

Posted by terri | Filed under chub chub, health, watashi

I haven’t put an entry in over a month. Anyone who reads or subscribes to this blog would think, “Well, you hardly update that often anyway.” What I am happy to report is that I actually have two good excuses. Today’s entry: Good Excuse #1.

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Back from Vegas!

Posted by terri | Filed under watashi

I just came back from a long awaited vacation to Las Vegas. Almost 30 years old, and I had never been there in my life until a week ago. I spent 6 whole days there, including Hunny’s birthday for the last day. I had a pretty good time because of all the excitement and the great company I had with me (my sister, my boyfriend, and his mom.) I lost about $40, and I’ve come to find that gambling is not for me. Not sure if I’ll ever want to make it back here, but at least I had some awesome pictures to remember this trip! Between the 4 cameras that Hunny, my sister and I brought, we took about 19 GB of photos and videos, amounting to about 1200 pictures and 53 videos.

It’s great traveling with your fellow paparazzo! I hope we can take another trip sometime together soon!

Twenty-Nine And a Half.

Posted by terri | Filed under health, watashi

I had a good friend who once told me that St. Patrick’s Day is a day that I should celebrate because for me, it marks 6 months until my birthday. That was something I could appreciate because that day marked the longest possible time between my last birthday and my next birthday. On the other hand, I hate being reminded that I am getting “incrementally older.”

Today being March 17th, I am now 29 “and a half” years old. I have been thinking about this day for awhile now. I figured when the day came, I would just be thinking about how I can savor the next 6 months of being a “twenty-something.” The big 3-0 seems like a huge deal to me and I guess it has a lot to do with the unrealized potential I’ve had throughout my twenties and earlier. The sensible part of me says that age really is just a number, and that I shouldn’t let a number tell me that it’s too late to follow my dreams or to strive for something better. Then there’s a passionately sensitive part of me that says that I just can’t ignore the significance of two whole digits changing in my age.

A week ago, I got a HUGE wake up call about how I’ve been living my life these past 5 years. At this time, I won’t go into details except to say that it has to do with going to the doctor for the first time in 10+ years. My outlook on life, in a matter of a 15 minute visit with the doctor, ended up changing entirely. In this past week, I’ve gone through a range of emotions such as embarrassment, disappointment, and sadness. Perhaps a sense of relief came over me as well as I have finally gotten explanation of what was going on with me as mentioned in an earlier entry. I’ve approached the news with humor and also with anger, but I have no choice but to look my situation in the face and just deal with it. So today, instead of thinking of unrealized dreams and lamenting on the past, I ended up thinking of the future — knowing that my situation presents an opportunity I have NO CHOICE but to take.

In realizing my mortality, my thirties are definitely going to be different. It definitely takes something like being told that you can die if you don’t change that can motivate you to realize your potential. I know it’s not going to be easy, and so I’m very grateful for the support system I have and for those who haven’t been so supportive because of their lack of understanding, I won’t take it personally nor will I let it set me back.

I know 30 is really just a number, and when I get there, I probably will think it’s not such a big deal after all. I have friends who are already there who say that ends up being the case. So maybe this news comes as a coincidence coming near my “29 and a half birthday.” Whatever the case, I have quite a road ahead of me.

De-Scrooged?

Posted by terri | Filed under heart, home, natsukashii, watashi

We are at last in December and with Thanksgiving done and gone, it is time for the Christmas spirit to come into full swing. For about 10 years or so now, December hasn’t filled me with any Christmas spirit for a variety of reasons. I am, however, hopeful that this year will be different.

Kicking off Christmas: Happy December 1st!

Without going into too much detail, I want to say that life this year has definitely been more settled as opposed to the past 10 years, and I think it’s finally time to embrace the Christmas spirit. I’ve been thinking of ways that I could “de-scrooge” myself as I have normally been “bah humbug” about the entire holiday season. I came up with a couple of things, some of which I probably WON’T go through with.

Christmas Tree: The last time I had a Christmas tree in my house was in 1996. Every Christmas tree we got years prior were awesome, though our decorations were a bit ghetto fabulous. It definitely brought a spirit of Christmas that not even the most tricked out gift could. As much as I would love to welcome that wonderful, nostalgic scent into my home, it certainly is not practical enough for me to get one. I won’t have much presents to put under the tree and the electricity bill at my house runs high enough as it is. I admit, I feel a bit of the “mommy pangs” when I think about Christmas trees, because I think I can only justify getting one if I had a child to enjoy it. Not gonna happen this year.

Christmas Baking: I definitely take joy in baking and creating stuff in the kitchen, but my success rate has never been good and so I find that I have not been doing it much lately. I think Christmas time is as good enough a time as ever to start again. I’m thinking of cookies and other desserts that I can try my hand at to give out at Christmas time. And if Hunny volunteers to do the dishes, I can be even further motivated!

Christmas Party: I mentioned back in July or so that I wanted to do some kind of housewarming party to celebrate the closing of the “sale” on the house. I’ve made the house a little more inviting with the removal of a lot of clutter and the addition of a new TV, but I have to admit that I am still a little shy about bringing people into my house as I still feel it’s a bit messy and dare I say it, perpetually 汚い? Well, we shall see… I won’t rule it for this holiday season…

Photo Christmas Card: This tops the “most likely to do” list. It was actually Hunny’s idea that we do one this year. We haven’t discussed execution, but we don’t anticipate it being a huge production as I have seen with other people I know. And I think being the  geeks that we are, we probably will do it with iPhoto.

So my hope is that I will at least do one or two things to for the holiday season. My iTunes library has been rechecked with Christmas songs, and so I’m ready to get this season started…

Worth the weight?

Posted by terri | Filed under chub chub, natsukashii, watashi

I spent my day off alone today, so I figure I might as well do something productive that I can do myself and that of course was cleaning my house, namely my old room. I am ashamed to say that my old room has not seen a cleaning in more than 10 years. It has mostly been used for storage of all my stuff. Up until lately, I’ve been kind of a pack rat, but in my recent housecleaning frenzy, I’ve learned to get rid of stuff — not keeping things just for the littlest sentimental value. You can imagine that it in 10 years, a lot of stuff accumulates and rummaging through it becomes this wonderful trip down memory lane. And though there are so many things I could write about for the sake of nostalgia, I think it’s more appropriate to write about what I realize I need to do for my future.
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Is there a doctor in the house?

Posted by terri | Filed under health, watashi

Anyone in my closest circle knows what I fear doing the most: going to the doctor. I have indeed gone to great lengths throughout my life to avoid going to see one. It has a lot to do with my self-consciousness and my strong belief that the body can heal itself just fine. On top of that, my very few experiences with the doctor were rather horrible ones. It has probably been ten years since the last time.

I can only hold out for so long.

Lately, I’ve been feeling sluggish and fatigued, and what’s worse is that I find myself having trouble concentrating. Hunny has been telling me time and again to get my thyroid tested as these problems with functioning are symptoms of hypothyroidism. Seeing how he knows what he knows and reading about it on the internet, I am inclined to believe it.

Though I am nowhere near death’s door, I certainly am feeling a sense of my mortality these days. And so, the white flag is raised, and I am making the commitment to finally see a doctor. Hunny has an endocrinologist I can go see, but I also need to make the commitment to find a primary care doctor. Hunny knows first hand that not all the doctors are the same. The problem is, I don’t know where to begin in finding a doctor that is right for me. Best start is my insurance provider, of course, but it still won’t help me narrow it down.

I am open for ideas as I figure this out. I am so down for feeling better.

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Aloha!

Hello from the island of O'ahu in the beautiful state of Hawaii. I am terri, a local girl who at 30 is trying to make sure that life doesn't entirely pass her by. I've recently become engaged and am enjoying living a great life in paradise.