I had my husband drop me off for my infusion this morning. It went well. I met some new-to-me staff, Kelsey who is a nurse and the clinic manager and Lyndsey, who is also a nurse. Kelsey started my IV and I swear I didn’t even feel it going in. She must be a witch. A good witch, of course.
My ride home was a whole other thing. Per the usual. Spec-tran was really late picking me up, I think 45 minutes from the start of my pickup window (11:29-11:44) and the driver was so apologetic. She said they were really short-staffed, and they kept adding pickups to her manifest. So she had one drop off north of my infusion center, two pickups to the west to be dropped off closer to my house, which was south (like, way south). It was a lot of riding around, getting a thorough tour of the area but eventually it was my turn! I was home at 1 pm. The driver said it was an hour after I was supposed to be dropped off, and she thanked me for being so patient about the whole thing. I knew it was out of her control and I honestly wasn’t mad, just hungry.
When I got home I heated up some leftovers (working on cleaning out the fridge without wasting) and sat to listen to a podcast while I ate. It’s been a tiring day, but it’s also sunny and 65 degrees so I can’t seem to muster any frustration about it all. Just happy to not be in pain from the cold. My body is so relieved to be feeling warmth all the way through (and not in a perimenopause hot flash kind of way). I’m eager to return to regular outdoor running, for real!
Last weekend I ran the Pi Day 5k with my sister, her boyfriend, and a friend of mine (who has run this race with me for the past 4 years). None of us were running alongside each other, but you know what I mean. We all ran the same race and got our pie and medal at the end. This race is local, on trails I am familiar with, so I’m always comfortable running it alone.
I had originally signed up for the 10k, when I saw they had added that option. A few weeks prior to the race, it had become apparent to me that a 10k was a bad idea. I hadn’t been running much over the winter, and I also had developed some significant foot pain. I believe it’s plantar fasciitis, but I’m tired of calling it that. It just feels like two weird words paired together and I always feel like such a poser saying it out loud. I don’t want to sound all hoity-toity so let’s just call it foot pain. I can withstand a little foot pain for 3 miles of pounding pavement, but not six. So, I contacted the race director and downgraded to the 5k, and when she responded in the affirmative, almost a literal weight was lifted from my back. Seriously. Instant relief. The race went fantastic and though I had pain, it was minimal and easy enough to ignore for the majority of the race. I only tripped on my foot a few times, but had zero falls. That’s always a win.
As part of our race package, we were given t-shirts with a cute drawing of a slice of pie on the front and it says “Keep your eyes on the pies.” I’m not generally a fan of t-shirts, but this one is super duper soft. So when I put it on yesterday, I really wanted to love it. Great material, a fun pun, what’s not to love? Well, that cute graphic on the front was not properly centered. I took one look in the mirror and cringed. It’s not super obvious, but it’s enough to drive me bonkers if I keep thinking about it. I considered changing my shirt, but I was so excited to wear it to Bible study that morning that I decided to just let it go and move on with my day.
The problem with this though, is that I believe it set the tone for my whole day. In the morning I was making an egg salad sandwich for my husband’s lunch and as I slapped the second piece of bread on top of the salad, I noticed the shape wasn’t lined up with the bottom slice. Like a savage made it. Later that evening, I was preparing some Caesar dressing with “freshly grated parmesan” (a phrase I love to say). I opened up a brand new wedge of cheese, cut off a piece to shred, then set the remaining wedge down with all the other prep tools on my cutting board. When I was done with my preparations, I moved the entire cutting board to the kitchen sink, cheese wedge and all, and left it there, not having seen my mistake. I only became aware of it after dinner, when my husband was rinsing off his salad bowl and he turned to me and asked, “What’s going on here?”. I got up, looked into the sink, and cursed. “Oh, f*&$!” My precious parmesan was ruined.
Stuff like this happens to me a lot due to my low vision. Most days I can laugh about it but there are times when it really angers me. This was one of those times. I had just had enough of it. That whole day felt whackadoodle. Some kind of low-key curse was upon me and I blame that damn shirt. But at least we still had pie.
Every time I make a frittata, my husband likes to jokingly call it Nelly Frittata (a play on the singer, Nelly Furtado). Last night I made a frittata for dinner. It had bacon, potatoes, green peppers, onions. It turned out so great, my husband and I both went back for seconds. There were zero leftovers! I didn’t use a recipe, I just followed my gut. I cooked with my heart. I was so proud of the dish, I’m renaming it: MELLY Frittata.
I have had an aversion to sand and flour for as long as I can remember. I love to bake, so I have always avoided recipes that call for rolling and kneading. If I had to touch the flour with my hands, it was a deal breaker. Drop cookies and batter breads were the lanes I stayed in.
This changed in 2020, after a trip to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula when I stepped into the sand and surprised myself by uttering, “oh, that feels nice”. I know, I was just as shocked as you. Ever since then, I’ve been playing around with recipes that were formerly taboo. Cinnamon rolls, pizza dough, breadsticks, and my latest favorite: calzones.
I made calzones for the family last week, but my pizza dough recipe was more than we needed, so I left it in the fridge to use later. A day later my sister texted me and my husband with a picture of a menu item that strongly resembled a treat she had made for us many years ago: beer nuggets. Now, this wasn’t her invention. This was something my husband had told her about, and she recreated it for us. His stepbrother went to college in Dekalb, Illinois, and this is where they were born (according to a quick internet search I spent no energy in verifying). All I remember is that he would talk about these beer nuggets as if they were the best thing since sliced bread. So when we received this text I started asking if there was a recipe, because as we all know I’m an expert with dough and can make these sorts of things now. Apparently, it’s just deep fried pizza dough. Which I had in my fridge!! Hot diggity dog, we’re having beer nuggets for dinner, folks. No beer required. I think they just call them that because I’m sure in a college town like Dekalb the nuggets were always consumed with beer.
So, lacking only one ingredient for this dish – a crap ton of vegetable oil – I sent the hubster to the store. I filled a pot half-full with the oil and started heating it up while I fashioned my dough into nuggets. Once my oil was up to 350, I started dropping the little guys into the oil and watched them cook. This was so much fun! I wasn’t sure how long to keep them in but I kept watch on the color (what I could see) and followed my gut instinct before pulling one out to check for doneness. The first one was a teensy bit underdone, but no worries, I’ll just leave the rest in a bit longer.
Easy peasy, within minutes I had a dozen beer nuggets hot and ready for consumption. I prepared a simple green salad because seriously, we can’t just eat pizza dough and call that a meal, can we? Warmed up some leftover pizza sauce from calzone night and announced, “Time for dinner!”
These beer nuggets were so easy to make and turned out so delicious, in the following days my brain went down some rabbit holes. What more can I do with this newfound super power? What else can I fry? I’ll be honest, I didn’t have to go far down the rabbit hole to arrive at my next planned adventure: fried donut holes. Stay tuned!!
Fair warning: Today I’m gonna talk about running. I’m not obsessed or anything. It’s just a hobby I’ve become quite passionate about. Not an obsession. Seriously.
I get emails from our local running store about sales and new items. I recently received a notification that the particular model of running shoe I wear, Saucony Kinvara, were on sale. It had been many years since I had been fitted for shoes so I was more than overdue. Also, one of my current pair of running shoes (I rotate between 2 pair) has well over 300 miles on them and need to be retired.
My tiny left foot.
Now, I have been wearing a size 7.5 normal shoe, and an 8 in running shoes. It’s always good to go up half a size with running shoes because your feet swell. I ran for years in a 7.5 and it caused so many blisters. However, at this trip to the store they sized my feet and it turns out I am now an 8, but only the right foot. The left foot is a 6.5. I took pictures because I couldn’t believe this fact, but it’s true. I went home with a fresh pair of size 8.5 running shoes.
My new shoes, newly laced for maximum comfort
After getting some fresh orthotic inserts to accommodate my pronation, I was good to go. Or so I thought. I went on a long run last weekend and halfway through my run the top of my left foot was feeling some serious pain. Yikes. I’ve experienced this before. I forgot to relace my new shoes. See, there are different methods for lacing your shoes. If your shoes are hurting you – try changing up the lacing. It can make a world of difference. I’ve learned so much about this through trial and error and it’s quite fascinating. I always thought running was a simple sport. Just throw on some sneakers and go. Nope. There is so much more to it. But, I always love the learning, and seeing myself improve with every tweak in my training and gear.
Back in May I was part of a challenge to do 100 push-ups every day. I only joined because my sister said they could be any variation of push-ups in any increment. You could tailor it to fit your fitness level. So I did. I started out the month doing 10 countertop push-ups at a time, 10 times throughout the day. And when that got too easy I increased the number of reps and then moved to a lower surface. I finished the month being able to do 5 sets of 20 push-ups using my fireplace cabinet. When the month ended I vowed to continue the daily habit, and I’m now at 3 sets of 33 at the fireplace. I’m hoping to progress to using the ottoman, and eventually I want to be able to do your traditional on the floor push-ups.
The thing that has amazed me though, is that since doing this daily habit, my run pace has increased significantly, without much increased effort on my part. Also, I can sense that my core is stronger. I notice when I’m walking up and down my stairs that my balance is somewhat better. Now, none of this is concrete. I could just be imagining the improvements. Heck, maybe my Garmin is old and not accurately tracking my speed. I don’t know, but I do think the push-ups are helping in more ways than I had anticipated. And it always feels good to feel stronger.
I have been training for a 10k at the end of this month, and am really hoping to be able to beat my 10k PR that I set in 2020, when I ran a virtual race with my sister. I’ve run several 10ks since, and none of them have been close to catching that time of 1 hour, 18 minutes, so I’m trying to keep my expectations realistic. But I do think this core strengthening with my daily push-ups will help. Fingers crossed!
That is all for now. I still have some books to recap (I think?) and I’m working steadily on writing my memoir, so like I said I’m not obsessed with the running. Just passionate. Reading and writing help to keep me balanced. Oh, and food. I think it’s time for lunch 🙂
You guys, I’m so proud of myself. Tonight I made a pizza from scratch. I know that doesn’t sound like a huge deal but for me it kind of is because I’ve been intimidated by any recipe involving yeast and historically have avoided having to touch flour. Cuz flour has always given me the heebie jeebies. Until the spring of 2020, when I had a miraculous moment on the shore of Lake Superior when I stepped into the sand and immediately said, to my utter shock, “this feels nice!” Ever since, sand and flour and sugar no longer bother me.
But back to the pizza. Nothing special, I put ham and onion on half and extra cheese on the other. It could use work, more sauce next time for sure, but the FamSquad agreed it was good and they would eat it again. I was surprised at how easy and inexpensive it was to make and will be sure to add it to our meal rotation. Next to tacos, pizza is my favorite food, so I’m definitely excited that I can whip one up easily whenever I’m craving it!
My son turned 18 on Saturday. Our firstborn, our baby boy. This kid. Not a kid anymore. He’s dressed up in this photo because Saturday was also the night of his senior prom. I got a teensy bit emotional as we watched him drive off to meet his friends. The end of an era, as they say. I wanted to do something really special for his birthday. Traditionally I’ll make a cheesecake because he LOVES cheesecake. But, I had a recipe for copycat Crumbl chocolate chip cookies that I had been wanting to try, so I threw that in as an extra. I spent all day Friday baking, which wore me out of course, but it was worth it. The cookies were an instant hit. The cheesecake had to wait to be enjoyed, so we didn’t dig into that until Sunday, after his official birthday dinner (a family tradition). At the time of this writing, it has been less than 24 hours since we cut into that cake, and it’s almost gone! And here I was worried we wouldn’t eat it all before it went bad.
Copycat Crumbl Cookies – chocolate chipMy world famous cheesecakeExtra creamy, and perfect crust
This age, 18, is a strange one. He vacillates between moments of maturity and goofing off. One minute he’s reviewing his work schedule, and almost in the next breath he’s making jokes about cheesecake for breakfast. I both love and hate that he hasn’t grown up too much yet. I think he feels ready to leave the nest, and I’m sure he’ll do great when he does, but I’m thankful that I still have a little more time yet. Four more days of high school, a quick summer, and then he’ll be off to college.
Happy birthday, Luke. Mom and Dad are so proud of you.
I’m getting ready to go back to bed for a nap but wanted to hop on here real quick to humble brag about a meal I made last weekend. I had bought a pork tenderloin on sale – mostly because it was such a good sale and I couldn’t pass that up. We don’t eat a lot of pork around here because I have never been able to cook it well, so it’s usually dry and tasteless. I have *never* made pork tenderloin so it was completely foreign to me. However, I saw this sale while preparing my grocery order online and did a quick search for what to do with a pork tenderloin, found an easy and tempting recipe for a spice rub, and went ahead and bought the meat.
I also had a bunch of russet potatoes I had leftover from Easter. I had ordered a 5 pound bag, they were out of stock so they gave me a 10 pound bag. I had commented that I didn’t know what I was going to do with all those potatoes. This led to a discussion with my mother-in-law about all the wonderful things you can do with potatoes – au gratin, scalloped, cheesy, etc. – and that conversation was still rolling around in my head a week later.
This is when I had the bright idea to make a Sunday feast for my family. Pork tenderloin with au gratin potatoes. I was so excited! I would prepare the potatoes early so all I would need to do is put them in the oven. I would take my sweet time preparing the tenderloin, trimming the fat and applying the spice rub. It was going to be great.
“But so much food, Mel. So much. And you have picky eaters, they may not like pork and potatoes. Maybe you should invite a friend or two to join you, to help you eat this feast.”
And that is exactly what I did. I invited a few friends over, friends who were safe and kind people who would not mind if the pork and potatoes were terrible and we ended up resorting to frozen burritos instead. But you know what happened? It turned out amazing. Yep. It smelled so good in my house I wished I could have taken a picture, but since that was obviously not possible I was thrilled there were people on their way over to smell it for themselves. And we had a wonderful time. It was informal and relaxed and everyone ate and enjoyed themselves – even my family of picky eaters.
Y’all, I have always had such a low view of myself in this area, of cooking and hosting, this day was a major confidence booster for sure. It was a memorable day and I’m so proud of myself for stepping out of my comfort zone and trying something new. I’ve always marveled at others who get such joy out of feeding other people and now I feel like I’m starting to “get” it. It makes me more eager to keep trying, and I look forward to more feasts. What should I make next?
Many years ago I had an epiphany about laundry. All the time, laundry. It always needed to be done and I used to grumble under my breath how much “I hate doing laundry”. And then one day I decided to stop saying that, and to replace it with, “I enjoy having my clothes folded and placed where they belong.” Every time I started to hear myself say I hate to do laundry, I would stop myself and replace it with why I liked it when it was done. I’m sure this bright idea did not just appear out of nowhere, it was probably from a podcast or a book. But it doesn’t matter, wherever it came from, it stuck with me.
Fast forward all these years later and I still have negative statements that need replacing. Cooking, for example. I have always said I hate cooking. I’m not good at it. I’m a terrible cook. But when I think more on it, none of that is really true. I may resemble Amelia Bedelia in the kitchen sometimes, but for the most part I can follow directions and make a decent dish. And I don’t really hate it. I just don’t like being rushed to put meals on the table. So over time, I’ve started trying to look at this differently. I do as much prep work ahead of time so that I don’t have to feel rushed putting a meal together. I take shortcuts when I can (although this is where my inner Amelia Bedelia shows herself). I’m growing more realistic about my energy levels and what I’m capable of doing, and I avoid those tasks that are not for me. And best of all? I thoroughly enjoy eating. Like, way more than I love having my clothes folded and put away. Food is awesome. And when I pull off a delicious dish? That’s just the best reward.
Converting these negative messages into positive ones has been a really slow process but I like what I’m left with. There’s a lot less tension in my shoulders and in my spirit and I sleep well at night. I *think* I’m less irritable around my family and quicker to let things roll off my back. I have courage to try new things, and my family – bless their hearts – are super gracious about it as long as I don’t throw too many new things at them at once.
Last week I had defrosted a bunch of chicken breasts and I divided it up to make stir fry but had two breasts left over so I found a recipe online – with a video! – showing me how easy it was to just season it, bake it, then slice it up to use in salads. So I did it, and it was so delicious I couldn’t believe I had made it. It felt silly but I was proud of myself. Anytime I can make something from scratch I feel like a boss. *Pats self on the back.*
Baking has always been easy for me. Cooking, not so much. Cooking has always been a bit intimidating but the more I succeed at new things the easier it gets. If I keep this up and get really good at it, they won’t just be saying at my funeral, “she made a really delicious cheesecake.” One can hope, anyway!
So I’m working on changing the way I think about my daily tasks, and I really think it’s helping. Waking up with a feeling of dread and overwhelm used to be a daily thing. It’s happening less and less these days. I’m starting to wake up and look at the day as an opportunity with wide open potential. What can I make today? What are the most important things that need to be done? How badly do I want that laundry put away? If it’s bothering me, I do something about it. Otherwise, I let it go.
Take the laundry for instance. No really, take the laundry! Just kidding, I’ll get to it this weekend. It’s been sitting long enough.
I had my monthly infusion today! Also, it’s my 26th wedding anniversary. I was telling my infusion nurse that I should probably be more excited about the latter, but it’s hard to feel like celebrating when you can barely move your legs. So celebration will just have to wait until my energy returns. Thankfully my husband is very understanding, and also not super into these types of annual celebrations anyway. He’s just happy to be able to spend any time with me, and it doesn’t have to be on the exact day. What can I say? We just aren’t romantic people. It works for us.
When I came home from my infusion I considered all the things that need to be done: laundry, cleaning bathrooms, clerical household tasks – told them all they can wait – and then ate a robust and delicious salad and took a solid nap. The weather was beautiful today and I really wanted to go for a run but that has to wait too. Because the effects from the infusion aren’t immediate. I’m hoping I feel up for running tomorrow. Even if it’s at a turtle’s pace, that’s fine because that happens to be my specialty.
I’ve been doing a lot of reading to keep me occupied while dealing with this damn fatigue. I have a really hard time sitting still, so reading makes me feel like I’m “doing” something, even if I’m not always fully comprehending what I’m reading. I finished a couple books this past week and am onto a few more. One of the books was about running – Let Your Mind Run by Deena Kastor – and I absolutely loved hearing about what goes through her head while training for and running major races. I’m a big fan of all of the female professional runners and have read several others’ memoirs. I was surprised that I actually felt a kinship with Deena as I read her stories of dealing with fatigue and injury. I felt like I’ve learned a lot of those same lessons while dealing with MS, and maybe that’s why I’ve come to love running so much. Even though I’ll never be considered fast, the challenge of running with MS will always drive me. I have a 10k coming up in June that I definitely need to start getting ready for, and I’m hoping to run a half marathon in the fall. Reading Deena’s book brought back my own memories of training, and I realized how much I miss it. I’m just praying that my health and legs can remain stable and allow me to continue.
Deaf and half-blind runner with multiple sclerosis
Little M.S. Runner 