Ah, genetics. The fault, dear Horatio, is not in our stars, but in our genes.
I don’t gamble; I can’t stand what is, to me, the decision to just throw money away. I’m not a lucky person. I’m a person who will methodically try every possible path in the labyrinth until one leads out. That’s the only thing that has ever worked for me, and I rely upon it.
If our genes can be compared to a hand of cards that we’re dealt in life, I’m screwed destined to life as an autoimmune disorder patient. Every female on the maternal side of my family, myself included, has had Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis, an autoimmune hypothyroid disorder. My body makes antibodies that attack the thyroid, the butterfly-shaped gland at the base of the throat that controls metabolism. I suspect my sister, who won’t get tested, has it as well. My brother has Psoriasis, an autoimmune skin disorder, which comes with its own special version of autoimmune arthritis. So, the Force is strong in my family /end sarcasm.
It’s very rare for autoimmune disorders to strike preschoolers. I chalk that up to the stress of our incredibly dysfunctional family life, which I’ll get to later. Film at 11.
Before my fifth birthday, I became “the fat kid” overnight. That would have been the first of many thyroid crises. They are scary. During one of the scariest, when I was working on my undergraduate degree, I was running 35 miles each week and eating only three small bowls of rice a day, and gaining a pound a day. The terror this generated was what prompted me to insist to yet another gatekeeping GP that I be sent to an endocrinologist. That guy, God bless him, found a goiter that he estimated to be around 20 years old judging by how fibrous it was. At that same appointment, I was given a prescription for thyroid medication and the correct test for diagnosing hypothyroidism. At the next appointment, I learned the test had been positive. I was ecstatic. Finally, what I’d known all along was validated—I had a thyroid problem. I wasn’t lying to myself about how much I was eating, or exaggerating how much I was exercising. I wasn’t imagining a choking feeling in my throat all the time; that was the goiter. I was 25 when I was first diagnosed.
That visit started a long journey toward finding the right thyroid treatment for me. I didn’t feel right on synthetic thyroid medication, but had to fight to get the appropriate dosage and to be placed on natural thyroid. That fight is heating up again, by the way; the company that makes natural thyroid has been having problems with production, and the medication is back-ordered at many pharmacies. Some pharmacies have stopped even ordering it. Others have sporadic shipments. This has created a situation in which some thyroid patients are having to call around to multiple pharmacies to make sure the pharmacy has some of the medication first. What I was doing was calling pharmacies, finding out what they have on the shelves, then calling my doctor, who would write out a prescription based on what is available. Many patients are doing this; there are people taking one-and-one-eighth pills, one pill one day and ¾ of a pill the next, and so on. At present I’m taking a natural thyroid supplement that is compounded at a pharmacy that takes orders for custom prescriptions. That could be jeopardized at any time, though, because as shortages continue, patients on natural thyroid go looking for other sources, and then there is competition for the natural thyroid that is available.
On the scale of Calamities, this one isn’t that bad; much worse things can happen to a person, but this is what’s happening to me, my personal calamity. I have some other medical issues, but those, and how they are being dealt with, well…I’ll wait and address those in some other posts.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
It's About the Knitting!
Gather round, little lambs. At this time of celebrity awarding, in the Church of Fiber, where there is room for All, it is time to talk about Knitting.
To those of you who have been quietly knitting for decades, joyful and unrecognized: you who have been discreetly slipping handmade booties into the hands of new mothers; enclosing the hands of children in warm mittens; sending families out to fight the good fight in handmade sweaters, hats, and socks; and enveloping the generations in that combination of warmth and family history commonly known as the afghan, to you it is given to hold a good portion of all the magic that is left in the world. You have persevered when there were no free online patterns, when the best that could be got was rough acrylic yarn from the local dimestore, an era ere Starbucks had roasted its first bean and legal fights over the right to call two knitters in the same building a “SnB” was unheard of. Because, my sisters, we stitched, but we tried really hard not to bitch too much. And in an era that many don’t remember, when women couldn’t even get credit without a man’s signature, stitching and that afternoon Valium sure staved off the bitching. My children, you have done well; enter into your rest and be seated at the right hand of She Who Spins, where you shall never run out of really amazing yarn. And cast on that little Chanel-style jacket from the 1965 Workbasket that you never took time to start for yourself. Have a cookie. They have no calories in the Otherworld.
To those of you who have been noisily knitting for about eighteen months, joyful and laden with fun fur and teeny tiny bits of exotic and expensive yarns, who watch knitting programs on DIY Network, buy books about what celebrities are knitting, have completed neck and wrist ruffs in every manner of exotic fiber available, and submit
patterns religiously to some of the online fiber magazines: Know that you are loved. We, the tribal elders, love you, love that you are knitting, and love that you love that you are knitting. She Who Spins is well-pleased with you; with your enthusiasm, your energy, and your fierce creativity. It Is Time.
The fires are burning. The drums are pounding. The Secrets are about to be revealed. Hear, my children, the words of the elders:
It’s about the knitting. Knitting is tangible love that you can wrap around those closest to you. It will protect them, as sure as the strongest magic, because Love is the strongest Magick, and knitting is love. Every pirate skull sock, every baby hat, every lace scarf, every man-sweater…is love. Of the purest and most unadulterated kind.
It’s not about being hip, slick, and cool. Nobody out of high school cares about being hip, slick, and cool. In the grand scheme of Time and the Universe, hipness, slickness, and coolness mean nothing. What is hip, slick, and cool today will be laughed at tomorrow. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Victorian bathing suit, the poodle skirt, and the strategically ripped sweatshirt, and there rest my case. But, we have a higher calling.
You may never be on television. Your fabulous design may never be printed in a magazine. You may never be knitting the exact same project as some celebrity. Knitting is beyond all of that. Knitting is about supplying essential care to those closest to us, and using our own talents and creativity to turn that care into an art form. There are remnants of knitted fabric that have been found in gravesites dating to the time of Christ and before. We don’t know who knit them. It could have been a noblewoman (celebrity) or a slave. But we know what inspired a pair of socks that someone would want to spend eternity in. Love.
You may never be famous for knitting. But you can knit famously. And you can be forever enshrined in hearts as a bringer of warmth and comfort to children, working people, and sick people. You can be forever deified as a bringer of beauty and solace. You can forever serve Love, which has no red carpet but bestows many awards. You can take your place in history with those who have united kings and peasants under the simple need to be clothed. You can be a knitter.
To those of you who have been quietly knitting for decades, joyful and unrecognized: you who have been discreetly slipping handmade booties into the hands of new mothers; enclosing the hands of children in warm mittens; sending families out to fight the good fight in handmade sweaters, hats, and socks; and enveloping the generations in that combination of warmth and family history commonly known as the afghan, to you it is given to hold a good portion of all the magic that is left in the world. You have persevered when there were no free online patterns, when the best that could be got was rough acrylic yarn from the local dimestore, an era ere Starbucks had roasted its first bean and legal fights over the right to call two knitters in the same building a “SnB” was unheard of. Because, my sisters, we stitched, but we tried really hard not to bitch too much. And in an era that many don’t remember, when women couldn’t even get credit without a man’s signature, stitching and that afternoon Valium sure staved off the bitching. My children, you have done well; enter into your rest and be seated at the right hand of She Who Spins, where you shall never run out of really amazing yarn. And cast on that little Chanel-style jacket from the 1965 Workbasket that you never took time to start for yourself. Have a cookie. They have no calories in the Otherworld.
To those of you who have been noisily knitting for about eighteen months, joyful and laden with fun fur and teeny tiny bits of exotic and expensive yarns, who watch knitting programs on DIY Network, buy books about what celebrities are knitting, have completed neck and wrist ruffs in every manner of exotic fiber available, and submit
patterns religiously to some of the online fiber magazines: Know that you are loved. We, the tribal elders, love you, love that you are knitting, and love that you love that you are knitting. She Who Spins is well-pleased with you; with your enthusiasm, your energy, and your fierce creativity. It Is Time.
The fires are burning. The drums are pounding. The Secrets are about to be revealed. Hear, my children, the words of the elders:
It’s about the knitting. Knitting is tangible love that you can wrap around those closest to you. It will protect them, as sure as the strongest magic, because Love is the strongest Magick, and knitting is love. Every pirate skull sock, every baby hat, every lace scarf, every man-sweater…is love. Of the purest and most unadulterated kind.
It’s not about being hip, slick, and cool. Nobody out of high school cares about being hip, slick, and cool. In the grand scheme of Time and the Universe, hipness, slickness, and coolness mean nothing. What is hip, slick, and cool today will be laughed at tomorrow. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Victorian bathing suit, the poodle skirt, and the strategically ripped sweatshirt, and there rest my case. But, we have a higher calling.
You may never be on television. Your fabulous design may never be printed in a magazine. You may never be knitting the exact same project as some celebrity. Knitting is beyond all of that. Knitting is about supplying essential care to those closest to us, and using our own talents and creativity to turn that care into an art form. There are remnants of knitted fabric that have been found in gravesites dating to the time of Christ and before. We don’t know who knit them. It could have been a noblewoman (celebrity) or a slave. But we know what inspired a pair of socks that someone would want to spend eternity in. Love.
You may never be famous for knitting. But you can knit famously. And you can be forever enshrined in hearts as a bringer of warmth and comfort to children, working people, and sick people. You can be forever deified as a bringer of beauty and solace. You can forever serve Love, which has no red carpet but bestows many awards. You can take your place in history with those who have united kings and peasants under the simple need to be clothed. You can be a knitter.
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