Shift in the Wind
My children are with Top for 5 days again, and I'm trying to glide into the idea of being ok with it. I realize it's great for them to maintain a close relationship with both of their parents, and ultimately that is the most important thing to me, so I bid them farewell yesterday afternoon, urging them not to miss me, just to enjoy their lives. Mommy will be here when they return.
So far, they seem surprisingly ok with the status of their parents' relationship. There have definitely been moments of questions, sadness, and longing for the "way it used to be", but Top and I have handled it matter-of-factly and we remain very cordial. We've explained to the boys that we simply don't want to be married, but that we would rather be friends instead. They seem ok with that.
Anyway, I'm on the hunt for a job since I'm soon-to-be officially divorced and will need to support myself. I've been to several interviews so far - some that offered me the job but basically wanted to pay me in cracker crumbs, and a few that didn't offer me the job. I'm still writing on the side, but in a sadistic twist of fate, my finger joints have begun to swell and ache, making typing much more difficult. I do have an appointment with my rheumatologist, but he's in high demand, so it's not for another month, but all signs point to me having rheumatoid arthritis.
For 13 years I've dealt with this diffuse, all-over body pain with no other diagnosis than fibromyalgia. As most of you know, I've always suspected there was more to my problems than was meeting the eye. Over the years, I have had bouts of joint swelling, but only sporadically, and by the time I got to the doctor, the joints were down, and he said it was probably nothing. No rheumatoid factor showed up in my blood.
What I have recently learned is that the rheumatoid factor often will come back negative when the disease is not active, which is when I was always tested before. There is also a new diagnostic blood test for rheumatoid arthritis, called the anti-CCP test. It is described as a "new and exciting blood test to help doctors confirm a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis". I'm not sure how exciting it is to find out you have RA, but yeah, I guess getting some kind of diagnosis would be nice.
The main reason I suspect that I have RA, besides the swollen joints and dry eyes, is that my grandmother had it too. Having a close relative with RA definitely puts me at a higher risk for developing it.
Anyway, blah blah blah, enough about my defective body, right?
Regardless of my physical state, I am determined to soldier on and live an amazing life from this point forward. There's been a shift in the wind, and I'm not quite sure which direction it's going, but I definitely feel a change.
And I think I'm just going to go with it.