Dancing with My Disabilities!: The Bluebird's Broken Wing...

Blog Title: Dancing with My Disabilities! This blog was I Already Gave My Right Arm to Be Ambidextrous prior to Read My HIPS, which is now Dancing with My Disabilities. I am doing some renovating and will begin blogging for the New Year 2024. Please be patient, and please continue to support this blog as well as my other blog Chronically Mommy, which is also being renovated to be more up to date. Pass this information on to anyone that you know may be interested in knowing...To be continued...

Dancing with My Disabilities!

Title: Dancing with My Disabilities! I had my shoulder and both hips replaced, and I am changing things up a bit on this blog! I began belly dancing in 2010! Yes, you read that correctly!! I am going to be blogging about my experience as a woman with several joint diseases and conditions who had her shoulder and both hips replaced who now belly dances, dances hip hop, performs, teaches dance to children of all ages and abilities, teaches belly dance fitness classes to adult women, teaches chair belly dance movement classes to people with mobility issues and disabilities, and takes a Pure Barre class as well! I still have pain, but I want to blog about how I have fun too! Please read Chronically Mommy (chronicallymommy.blogspot.com) for info on health/pain and being a mom to a 13-year-old son. I have avascular necrosis in my shoulders, hips, and knees, psoriatic arthritis, axial spondylitis, Sjogren's, fibromyalgia, hEDS, POTS, MCAS, vascular/ocular/hemiplegic migraines, pseudotumor cerebri, trigeminal neuralgia, occipital neuralgia, endometriosis, and chronic shingles. I found out that I have autoimmune arthritis in my cervical spine and a bulging disk in my lumbar spine. Fourteen years ago, my spine orthopedic surgeon told me I had a small amount of inflammatory arthritis in my SI joint. The question was if the spinal involvement was due to Psoriatic Spondylitis, which is a more severe form of Psoriatic Arthritis or is it a new diagnosis of Ankylosing Spondylitis? Now, they have an updated term, Axial Spondylitis, which fits my symptoms and diagnostic proof. Whatever the diagnosis, the treatment will remain the same. I had my left hip replaced in 2003; my right shoulder replaced in March of 2010. I gave my right arm to be ambidextrous! LOL! Lastly, I had my right hip replaced on May 10th, 2012, and I began belly dancing two years prior to my right hip replacement surgery. Yes that's correct! I began belly dancing in 2010, just after my shoulder replacement, before my son was born. I performed for the first time in 2012, five days prior to my right hip replacement surgery. Pain is still another part of my life. It is just a question of when, where, and how much, but I would like to use this blog to write about my experience as a woman with several joint diseases and conditions who had both hips and a shoulder replaced and now spends her free time dancing, teaching, and performing! I began dancing with a troupe in February of 2014, Seshambeh Dance Company. I now take a Pure Barre class on Monday mornings, teach ballet, tap, and creative movement on Monday evenings to children of all ages and abilities, take a hip hop class with all adult women on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, teach a belly dance fitness class on Thursdays to all adult women, and teach a chair belly dance movement class to people with mobility issues and disabilities as often as I possibly can. Join me in my journey! At times, I take 16 to 20 pills a day. I give myself an injection each week on Fridays for my autoimmune/autoinflammatory arthritis diseases. Just when one thing is doing better, something else goes downhill! My attitude, however, is always going uphill! I am 49 years old, have been married for 24 years, and my husband and I adopted Mick in Dec. of 2010! I have a lot on my plate right now, but I take it one moment at a time. I believe that God will never give me more than I can handle. However, I do need to learn to ask for help sometimes instead of always doing it by myself!

Help, I need somebody,
Help, not just anybody,
Help, you know I need someone, help.

When I was younger, so much younger than today,
I never needed anybody's help in any way.
But now these days are gone, I'm not so self assured,
Now I find I've changed my mind and opened up the doors.

Help me if you can, I'm feeling down
And I do appreciate you being round.
Help me, get my feet back on the ground,
Won't you please, please help me.

And now my life has changed in oh so many ways,
My independence seems to vanish in the haze.
But every now and then I feel so insecure,
I know that I just need you like I've never done before.

Help me if you can, I'm feeling down
And I do appreciate you being round.
Help me, get my feet back on the ground,
Won't you please, please help me.

When I was younger, so much younger than today,
I never needed anybody's help in any way.
But now these daya are gone, I'm not so self assured,
Now I find I've changed my mind and opened up the doors.

Help me if you can, I'm feeling down
And I do appreciate you being round.
Help me, get my feet back on the ground,
Won't you please, please help me, help me, help me, oh.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

The Bluebird's Broken Wing...

The other day, I was trying to get my toothbrush and toothpaste out from the medicine cabinet. I have one of those monster big handled battery-operated toothbrushes because I have no more connective tissue in my hands, so it's hard to hold onto small things like normal sized toothbrushes. Well, anyway, the toothbrush fell out of the medicine cabinet hard and broke my ceramic bluebirds right wing off! I wanted to cry. I've been overwhelmed with everything ya know. With a right shoulder replacement, I didn't realize how limited I would be. Although I choose to write most of the time with my right hand, I can do just as much with my left hand because I'm ambidextrous. Except of course, my left thumb has been extremely messed up for about 3 months, so it's a bit harder to do things with my left hand than my right. So, I've been more emotional about things too. I've also been clumsy, sooooo clumsy. I cannot tell you how many times I've run into the door frame WITH MY NEW SHOULDER ARM! What is wrong with me. Just today I hit my right elbow in the doorknob. I still have the bruises on my elbow from my shoulder replacement shoulder, and now I have a brand new lump on top of that.

So I got to thinking after the poor innocent ceramic bluebird's wing was shattered...

Was there a deeper meaning to it? Was there something to it that it was it's right wing that collapsed, and it was my right shoulder that collapsed? Did it mean anything that a bluebird means "happiness," and I broke it? Not only did I "break" "happiness", but I symbolically kept it from flying and being happy. Was my shoulder collapsing keeping me from being happy? Did I feel broken? Was I unable to fly?

OK, I have a lot of alone time, true...

But ya know when you have a disease like I have, you can't just superglue my collapsed joints back together. The blue ceramic bird you can. The ceramic bluebird can't even fly. Although it is in a still position of it being in flight, it still cannot really fly. Although, I cannot really fly, I can take flight in my goals, in my wants and dreams. I could soar. I want to soar. There is so much I want to do...I want to soar. As a matter of fact the name of my Walk Team is AV'N Fun "Psorin'" Above Arthritis! I spelled it that way because I have psoriatic arthritis. Get it. Yeah, I know, pretty creative--the other part is short for "having fun", but stands for AVN (avascular necrosis). Yep, I just keep 'em coming!

So, although I'm at a rough spot right now in my life, I'm working hard to get back in flight again. I need to soar again! I'm really only that bluebird of happiness when I can fly, and when I can fly high! The pain is really not too bad, at least not in the shoulder. It feels more like muscle pain. I'm working to rebuild the muscle that they cut through to place the new shoulder. Now, my knees, feet, ankles, elbows, wrists, neck, back, and hips are another story. I'm due for my Remicade infusion next week Thursday, so my body is letting me know by swelling, being hot, and showing redness. But it's all my normal routine stuff!

To help with that happiness, we are going to see Iron Man 2 at the drive in movie theatre tonight with friends! I think I will really enjoy that! It's too bad we can't fly there! LOL! I guess driving is fine, and relaxing in the car with lots of snacks and candy that's really bad for us!!!

MMMMMM!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...: You're going to the drive-inn?? We don't have any of those anmore in these parts!

My Dad was ambidextreos, we thought it was so cool. His handwriting was totally different right or left.

Sorry about your little bluebird.

xoxomo; May 8, 2010 at 8:39 PM
Dana Asmara Morningstar-Marton said...: Yes,Mo we have a drive-in. It was so much fun. I write w/ either hands as well. When you look at my notebooks from school, some days the writing is one way, and on other days it is completely different. It is pretty cool; I guess--just part of the norm for me. I glued my bluebird back together. He's OK!

Blessings,
Dana; May 10, 2010 at 12:23 AM
Wendy Burnett said...: Dana,

Was it the drivein on Moreland, or is there another one in town I don't know about? If it was the one on Moreland, you were only a couple of miles from where I live. . .; August 16, 2010 at 2:31 AM

It's Time You Understood.

I want you to understand that your arthritis is not the same as mine if you tell me "I have arthritis too in my knee sometimes." That is not what I have. I have autoimmune arthritis. I have fatigue, pain, and stiffness in every joint in my body, take very serious medications like biologics which is in IV form every 4 weeks at the hospital's infusion center and chemotherapy pills. The type of autoimmune arthritis diseases that I have affects my eyes, my lungs, my heart, my skin, my ligaments, my tendons, my salivary glands, as well as my joints. Please visit www.causes.com/WorldAutoimmuneArthritisDay to donate $5 for the cause.