CIDP Bye-Bye

[COLOR=”Blue”][SIZE=”3″][FONT=”Comic Sans MS”]Hello all. It’s been quite a while since I posted my story (probably 2 months) but I came back with some good news!:)

For a quick recap – I’m 33 now and I was diagnosed with CIDP when I was 25 years old. From the time I started having my symptoms to the time I was diagnosed was very short, about 6 weeks. I consider this to be the reason I had a good outcome. When my regular doctor couldn’t figure out what was wrong he was able to get me an immediate appointment with a neurologist at the UW Medical Center. My doc (Dr. Krause-he rocks!) was great because he explained the CIDP in english and gave me lots of good info. He immediately put me on prednisone (60mg/day). I ended up taking this drug for about 3 1/2 years – we reduced the amount very slowly over this time period. Once I was off the pred, I felt really good. It has taken me a long time to get my muscles back in good shape but I sure do appreciate my body more than I did before!

Fast forward to more recently. Last winter I started not feeling very good. Tired all the time and kind of weak. I didn’t notice any numbing or anything like I did before. So in the spring I decided I probably better go back and visit my neurologist whom I hadn’t been to see in 4 years. I made my appointment and a few weeks later I visited UW Medical again. He ran the usual reflex tests and I had to walk on my heels and stand up from a crouching position, blah blah blah. He looked back on notes from my previous illness and said I was in much better condition than when I was sick before so he wasn’t sure why I wasn’t feeling well. We set up an appointment to do an electro…..I can never remember what that test is called!!!! I came back a week later and he ran that super fun test where they poke you with needles and shock you to test your muscles. It was great :confused: ……if I ever have to do that test again it will be too soon! 😮 Needless to say the test came back very positively. Not only am I not suffering from any current issues of CIDP but I have zero residual damage from my previous bought with CIDP.

So you may be asking yourself (as I did) what the heck was wrong with this girl that she was feeling so bleh all winter. My husband and I talked about it and we came up with a few things:
First I increased my gym use quite a bit last winter and I think for one, I over did it. I read a story about over training which had a check off list of symptoms to tell if you’ve overtrained…..I had 7 out of 10 symptoms! I was trying to get in good shape for waterskiing this season and I simply over did it. I don’t think this is due to CIDP because as my doc said, I have no left over damage from before. Anyone can over train, you have to listen to your body and you can only do what it will let you! I need to build back up slowly……Rome wasn’t built in a day!
Second we had a very stressful winter. My husband was spending about 3 -4 hours a day on the road getting too and from work. Our gas bill was killing us and we were having troubles buying food and paying the bills! He’s since found a job that’s a 10 minute commute and is much happier at his new place of business (yeah!!!)
Third – Oh my god we need a new bed! Our bed is in pretty bad shape and we both have all these aches and pains when we wake up in the morning. Sometimes it’s so umcomfortable that it wakes me up in the middle of the night! We’re trying to save money to buy a Tempurpedic bed (our dream bed) but I don’t know how much longer we’ll make it on this one. We’d probably be better off on our blow up camping mattress!

So we surmised that all of these things just basically built up and caused me enough stress that I was fatigued, grumpy and just all around didn’t feel good. Stress can really take it’s toll on a body! Not to mention I was so tired from not sleeping through the night (due to old bed and stress).

Anyways – I wanted to share this so people out there know that there is hope! I can’t believe how good I feel. I skied in my very first sanctioned water skiiing tournament this summer! I have a couple more coming up this weekend and I’m so ready! Waterskiing (on a slalom ski) uses every muscle in your body and can really work you over. I’m so blessed and so happy I’m able to do this. I encourage everyone to have some kind of goal, something they can look forward too. Waterskiing is my thing I look forward too! I’m going to keep doing it as long as my body will let me! Then once I can’t do it, I can still be a boat judge or a tournament driver.

Thank you for taking the time to read my story.;) [/FONT][/SIZE][/COLOR]