Lonely

Sometimes the lonliness creeps over me like a fog. I miss the good ole days. I was always a social butterfly and I always loved meeting new people. I use to make people laugh. I was always the girl who could laugh at herself and be ok with it. Now I'm just embarrassed and I try very hard not to draw attention to myself because I feel like I just look sick.

Sometimes it's so hard. Right now I live in a world of planning what I am going to do when I feel better and look better. I have this tremendous urge to just go run. I use to run track when I was in high school and I long for that feeling of freedom you get when you are out on that track. I daydream frequently about going dancing. My best girlfriends and I use to go to this awesome place called Stoney's. I always highly disliked most country music until they introduced me to this place. OMG this place was the best ever! Oh to dance again...
 
BUT I tell you the thing I miss the most is playing with my daughter. She is such a joy! She has this beautiful light about her. She is just beautiful inside and out. For six she is such a strong little girl. She is always there with a smile, a hug, or just kind words for mommy when I am down and out. I know that I am blessed and I can't wait to show her the mommy I was just  two years ago. She deserves it!

Ayanna and me rolling down a massive hill just a year ago! The prednisone allowed this for a short while.





The two of us at the bottom of the hill after I accidently rolled over her..LOL!

Ayanna and me now. This is the love of my life!

Supplements Update

So I have now been on my new supplements going on 5 days and the detoxing effects they have had totally SUCK! I haven't had much sleep in the last few days and I'll be honest I'm getting a little bit grumpy. I've been through this before with other supplements and cleanses so I know what to expect but DAMN if I am not tired of not feeling well. I'm hoping in the next couple of days I will start to actually see some of the benefits of these supplements.

On a more positive note Dan and Suzy have been so good with checking up on me. They have either called or text me every other day since I have started this regime. It is so nice to have such a great support system. They are both so encouraging and I almost have no option but to be optimistic about these new supplements. I keep thinking of all the things I'm going to do as I get better and start gaining my weight back.

I'm not going to lie mostly I think about gaining my weight back. You see I have all these fabulous clothes that I can't wear because I lost so much weight. I look in my closet daily and I daydream about wearing my clothes. I know this may sound a little vain but if you knew me or know me you know that I wasn't always very confident about my looks. It wasn't until I lost everything that I realized everyone wasn't lying to me about how pretty I was. It's a damn shame I couldn't see what was in front of me until it was taken away. Now all I see is this rail thin girl with dark circles under her eyes all the time because I'm always so tired.

I miss the old me. I may have been insecure about my looks but I use to laugh all the time. Now I feel like I laugh so rarely.

I cannot wait to get my life back! Please God let this one work......

Blessing and a Curse

Sometimes I believe this condition can be a blessing and a curse. Before my condition got bad I was constantly on the go. I always had somewhere to be. I was either at work, chasing after my daughter, running errands for my house, or going out with my girlfriends. My life was go, go, go ,go.... I thought this was perfectly normal. As my condition has worsened I have been forced to slow down and sometimes this gets me down in the dumps. I want to get out and go like I use to but this past week my condition has actually been a blessing.

I have been with my husband for nearly 15 years and in all the time we have been together I swear I have never had the time to get to know my in-laws. Now some of this is partially my fault but some of it is distance. You see my in-laws live in Missouri and and we have lived in Vegas for nearly 12 years now so we don't see them very often. Anyways, my mother-in-law was in town last week and for the first time we had plenty of time to spend with each other and what a pleasure it was to spend time with this phenomenal woman. I feel like I finally know this caring, giving, loving individual that I took for granted all these years. I never knew how strong and thoughtful my mother-in-law was until this visit.

Linda (my mother-in-law) helped me rekindle lost loves while she was here. She pushed me to do things I have been afraid to do for the past few months. For instance I was out driving for at least half the week and let me tell you I have been uncomfortable with driving longer than the 5 minutes it takes to get my daughter to school for a while. She helped my to start knitting again and right now I am in the middle of making a fabulous scarf for my daughter. However the most important thing she showed me was that there are more people out there that care about me than I know of. Sometimes this condition makes you feel so alone because no one really understands your fears. They don't know what it's like to get behind a wheel of a car and be afraid that you're not going to find a restroom in time. They don't know about the pain you feel each and every day. The joint aches, the headaches, and the constant nagging in your stomach. I feel like at a certain point even my friends felt like I was making excuses not to go out with them, which is probably why I'm not invited anywhere anymore.

It was so nice to have someone to talk to this last week. I'm already missing the companionship Lynn brought to my life. She is so easy to talk to and doggone if she doesn't make me smile. Lynn just so you know next time you come out I really do hope I'm doing alot better "so we can go Kick It" (LOL).

New Supplements

Let me start by saying I have tried so many things over the last 2 years. I have been on Asacol, Lialda, and Prednisone. I have gone to a naturopath and I have tried various herbs and supplements. I have even tried cleanses through a company called Humaworm. All of these things except the pharmaceutical drugs have helped somewhat but I'm still far from being better.

So after talking to Dan and Suzy I have decided to try their supplements. According to Dan and Suzy, Dan was in a very bad state before he started these products and within a matter of months he started going in the right direction and now its been almost 3 years and he can eat whatever he wants and live a normal life. Hell my thought process is it cant  hurt me to try.

But I tell you God keeps working on me. I made this decision and I ordered the products and I knew they were suppose to be coming today by mail. I was sitting on the couch with my husband after a wonderful day with the family at the farmers market and I was telling him hey I think my supplements are coming today. And I promise you no sooner that the words were out of my mouth there was a small thud at the door and a ringing of the doorbell. I feel like God was listening in on our conversation and I take this as a good sign. Huh my supplements are here...time to text Suzy and get started tomorrow.

Meeting the right people

I have been told a time or two that God puts the right people in front of us at the right time. Well I am a firm believer in this and I believe that God sent me another angel to point me in the right direction about a month ago.

So..I'm walking through Whole Foods doing my weekly grocery shopping as well as trying to prepare for Thanksgiving. I have been running errands all day and my poor little body is so run down from the ulcerative colitis that I was starting to get exhausted. I was on the phone with my mom and I was starting to breakdown. My stomach was starting to hurt and my joints were starting to ache and my mom says to me honey, "you are almost done we'll just keep talking until your done". I was so frustrated I couldn't find this stupid organic corn syrup for a recipe I wanted to try and I had been looking for it for about 15 minutes. Damn Whole Foods..the setup is so not logical sometimes. Anyways I finally find my corn syrup and as I am grabbing it this nice older gentlemen says to me something along the lines of "I wish I could find what I was looking for" and me being me I took pity on the poor guy. I say to him what are you looking for and he says turmeric.Now we are in the spice aisle after all and I thought well this should be simple, well.....we are in Whole Foods so it took a minute but as we are looking we start chatting.....

I asked him what he was using the turmeric for and he says with a smile I'm not sure my wife says she needs a cup of this stuff to make me a soup. As a sufferer of ulcerative colitis who has done a ton of research I know a turmeric soup is something people use to bring down inflammation. So I slyly ask him if he had a digestive issue and low and behold he has ulcerative colitis too! WHAT!! In the 2 years I have been sick I have never met anyone with my condition. I was so excited. We chatted for about 20 minutes in the aisles of Whole Foods and we exchanged numbers with the promise to keep in touch.

Well I have to be honest as the depression weighs me down I'm just not so good with these things. But thank God for people like Mr. Dan! This man called me frequently leaving messages and trying to check up on me. He was so desperate to help me because he had this product that helped him. Apart of me kept thinking he's just trying to sell me his crappy products but the other part of me remembered how genuine this man was when we spoke and I knew he just wanted to help.

So finally according to his wife Mrs. Suzy, he was ready to give up but she asked him one last important question, how old is she? Dan tells her my age and she goes well Dan she is the era of the text not the telephone (haha so true for me) and Mrs. Suzy text me. And finally we got together for a nice lunch and instantly I knew these people were here to help me. AND SO THE NEW JOURNEY BEGINS...I'm trying something new once again.

The Beginning

This is me before UC(P90X Baby)

My name is Kyoko and I want to share a story with you. I am 33 and two years ago I thought I was living the American dream. I had a good job, a wonderful family, a nice house and plenty of money in the bank. Then I hit a brick wall. I was diagnosed with something called ulcerative colitis and in the beginning it felt like it wasn't going to change my life. Well......then the stress hit!

Where to begin..Lets see...In 2010 I was laid off from my very first job the day I announced that I passed all four parts of the Certified Public Accountants (CPA) exam. This was suppose to be a day of pure joy. I passed this exam while working full time, taking care of an infant and being a traditional wife. BUT OH NO...someone had to go and ruin that. Oh joy(lots of sarcasm here) they gave me a severance package. I actually found another job within a week but I was already on a downward spiral that I didn't see coming. I was a nervous wreck all the time after being let go from my first job. My stomach was always upset but I always attributed that to nerves. I worked this job for about 6 months and then I was offered a job with what  I believed was my dream CPA firm. Let me tell you for about 2 and half years this place was great for me. I was actually diagnosed with UC a few months after I started working here and everyone seemed to be very understanding.  AND THEN THE INEVITABLE...we got a new partner in the firm and boy did that change the dynamic. The dynamic changed so much that I became more and more stressed everyday and the more stressed I got the sicker I got. I won't give you the gory details of what was going on with my body but those of you who may be reading this that have UC let me just say I had the worse of the worse (you know what I mean).

Eventually everything came to a head and I was let go. The truth of the matter is I don't really understand why I was let go but hey perception is reality.

But this is where my world started to crumble.  I come from a background where people didn't go to college and we have kids having kids. I worked my butt off to not be like that and to be a good role model to the 30+ grandchildren that are younger than me. I lost my job and I was too sick to really land another. Now don't get me wrong I tried at first and was actually offered a job or two but I realized that God was trying to tell me something and it was time to start listening. So for the last 7 months I have been doing some serious soul searching. I have done life coaching, I have been working on dealing with the depression that this disease brings, I have been working on gaining back the 40 pounds I have lost (so far this one is the biggest downer), and I have been working on Getting Back To Happy. Let me tell this journey has been the hardest thing I have ever been through but let me tell you my faith in God and myself has truly grown.


So this is the cliff notes version of me obviously there is alot untold but hopefully as this blog goes on we will get to know each other a whole lot better.

And this is me now :(