A New Normal?

Happy Friday! Today is, after all, Friday! April 3rd is the date and Corona is still holding sway over much of the civilized world. Yay!

Still… Corona is BAD (Worthy of all capital letters, in my humble opinion), but are there some positive takes out there during these trying times as well? I think yes! I am just FULL of optimism today… maybe not… errr… well.. maybe sitting down to write has helped me “Rise above” the doom and gloom that we’re all under? What’s behind my new found optimism?

1. It’s sunny outside today and around 75. The weather is supposed to be just like this for the next few days and, just maybe, even a bit warmer! Doesn’t Corona have a harder time surviving in warmer weather? I think I read that somewhere, or perhaps that just one of those viscous urban legends?
2. Ive gotten some small yard work projects taken care of! 🙂
3. People other than my wife and I actually live in our neighborhood!!! That may not be fair to the few couples who occasionally walk by our house, but we have seen people walking down the street that… well.. we’ve never seen in the 2+ years we have lived in our home! Our neighborhood is on the smaller side, so one might think there’d be a real sense of “Community” here… right? Well, most people have done a stellar job of keeping to themselves! If that’s everyones intent, then they are rocking it out! However, if one of the benefits of “Social distancing” and “Quarantining” is that people aren’t running around so much and have time for walks and conversations with their neighbors (From a safe distance of course)… then that’s a very good thing! Right? I just hope these routines continue once the scare has passed! 🙂
4. Kids! As I mentioned in several prior blogs, our house is full to the brim with kids! We have four kids… three “Almost adults” and one elementary school age. Our two oldest have been going through some major “Adjusting” as they are back from college two months before they (And we) were expecting. First couple of weeks of establishing routines and working around strong opinions/personalities have been… challenging for all. However, it does seem we’re getting some good routines going that may help us all keep our sanity! Not to mention, the kids are growing so fast and there is a limited amount of they’ll be around, so we really need to try to appreciate it! It might just be a bit easier if we could get out of the house more!
5. So.. if all of the above are our “New Normal”… would that be such a bad thing? Of course, it would be so much more meaningful if we were doing these things without being told to “Stay home” by the Gov’t! Just saying’!

Is that enough optimism for today? I can tell you one of the tough things about older kids are their relationships during a pandemic. My oldest and youngest sons are in relationships and we are catching a bit of an earful when we have to say things like, “I wish you could see her, but…”, the only word that seems to ring a bell is “But”. My wife (And to some extent myself) have to remind them that my immune system is compromised and that catching Corona could get pretty messy! Easy for us to say, but for the young and hormone driven… not so easy to hear! I think they’ll live though.. or is that just me being insensitive? 🙂

And regarding my immune system, we DID have a virtual visit with my Neurologist on Tuesday! My neurologist is a pretty cool guy and I much prefer in-office visits as my wife and I spoke over each other just a bit during our call. I had hoped he might downplay the risk factors of Corona and tell me that a bit of running around would be OK…. alas… not the case.

First, he told us about the precautions he and his family are taking (I don’t believe they are immune compromised)! For example, not touching the mail for two days or leaving packages on the front steps for several days (REALLY???? Really?)… were just a few. He then went on to say that we really needed to adhere to social distancing and be sure our entire family is doing the same. I mean, it’s only another four weeks right? Good grief!

Anyway, we had a good appointment with the doc. My wife, if she is at one of these appointments…it’s for a reason, expressed some concern over my on-going fatigue and, you won’t believe this, related “grouchiness” (Honestly, I think SHE’S the one who’s being grouchy because she doesn’t like being cooped up… hopefully she won’t read this statement or it may be my last). 🙂 The doctor noted that, while uncommon, a potential side effect of my new drug (Did I tell you it’s called Ocrevus?) can be fatigue and that we’ll need to watch it. Fatigue seems to be one of those things that everyone with MS has, so the last thing in the world we need is a medication that makes us more tired!

Boy… this feels like a really long Blog? Agree? I need to wrap up…. 🙁

So, another “Wait and see how things are going” kind of doctor appointment! I don’t mind that so much this time as I really am feeling pretty good versus the prior 6 months or so (Topic for next blog maybe?). In the meantime, we’ll practice self quarantining and social distancing (As much as possible with the boys) and hope the doctors and scientists working on this Pandemic figure something out!

Stay safe and talk to everyone next week!