Dancing with My Disabilities!: Who Is Dana Morningstar?

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.

Who Is Dana Morningstar?

First of all, I have my blogger name as Dana Morningstar. ""Morning Star" is actually the meaning of my first name "Dana." A morning star is strong and bright! I think the name is very appropriate for my struggles with pain, disability and fatigue. I have my Bachelor's degree in Nursing, and worked as a Diabetes Educator until my hip replacement in 2003. I now dedicate my life to helping others with chronic pain and disability. I was the co-chair for the Young Professionals Group with the Georgia Chapter Arthritis Foundation, and I will soon be starting a support group in the Atlanta area after my training with Arthritis Introspectives. I blog about my journey with pain and getting a shoulder and hip replacements. I am part of several social networks where most of my friends have chronic pain, disability and fatigue like I do.

I have been asked to write my personal story for a pain website for patients-- www.painaction.com. I wrote my Personal Story that was in the back pain and neuropathic pain areas. The goal of the site was to encourage users to become better self-managers of their pain conditions. The site was developed with funding from 4 grants from the National Institutes of Health. At the time, it focused on back pain, neuropathic pain, and migraine pain. Within a few months of my article, the site received funding so it could add content on Arthritic pain. The website receives unrestricted educational grants from pharmaceutical companies to keep the site going. They have no influence over the content, and it is totally non-branded and non-commercial.

I had finished my training with IAAM (International Arthritis Autoimmune Arthritis Movement), and I had begun my volunteer work with them online. I have been in the process of training with AI (Arthritis Introspectives). My goal is to be able to make the young adult arthritis group in Atlanta able to reach all the needs of the young adults in the area. I want to have a support group (after the AI training is complete) and work with a mentorship program with children with autoimmune arthritis and young adults to help them to transition from being a kid into adult life easier. Also, I would like to work on education, as well as being a resource for young adults and children with autoimmune arthritis. I am so excited about all of this and can't wait to see how it all turns out and fits together.

The Arthritis Foundation Georgia Chapter suggested that I should be contacted for a story about men and women with various arthritis ailments and how they function day-to-day with their conditions. This is for Arthritis Health Monitor, a patient education publication that is distributed in doctor's offices.

You can read the article online: Health Monitor

I also was contacted by the Arthritis Foundation National Office to make thank you videos as a patient advocate to all those who sent in their Everyday RA Victories. People shared everyday victories at everydayravictories.com

Coming this fall...you will see my son and myself in another Arthritis Foundation video. You will have to wait and see!!! I know you will just love it. It is worth the wait!

Please listen to my Blog Talk Radio Show with the same title: I Already Gave My Right Arm To Be Ambidextrous! Now my show is Chronically Mommy and Now Read My HIPS!http://www.blogtalkradio.com/danamorningstar

Listen to internet radio with Dana Morningstar on Blog Talk Radio

All of this from my itty bitty little blog!

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.