Things here were…interesting. I have changed meds and finally gotten on something that is working for me. And in that time I have been told that I am no longer in remission for my lupus. Sucks, but hey, it happens. I have done a lot of knitting. And I have done a lot working. I am planning to start blogging again – I have a couple cool things I want to review on here, so that will get me started again. I have a couple new designs that I can talk about (and a few that will be coming out soon!).

Mostly, I have been trying to take care of myself and not let everything fall apart – but things have been good for a bit now, so that’s good

First, before I get into that, I would like to thank Erin! If you notice, I have a new layout theme and stuffs – Erin did all of that for me. She is also working on getting the podcast up and running again. We loves us some Erin. I am going to stay at Erin’s during TNNA this year in June, so while I will miss her at MDS&W this year, at least I get to see her soon! Erin does a little bit of freelance work on blogs and webstuffs (she is going to help me with a couple projects) so if you have something stumping you – give her a shout – she works pretty cheap while her finance is laid off and she wants to buy a spinning wheel.

(Erin and Me and MDS&W Ravelry party last year!)

Oh and since I started writing this – she got the podcast to work!!! Yes, people, the podcast – which means I will start podcasting again. For now you can access past episodes here and next week I will work on iTunes getting updated again! I have episodes 1-14 up and I will have the rest up later tonight or tomorrow!

OK – so now to the downer. I had to go back on meds. I am not back on Cymbalta, but I am on something else. I don’t consider myself a particularly angry person at all – in fact, I get pissed off like most people and then get over it, like most people. But every.little.thing. was setting me into a rage and that just isn’t me. never has been. So last Wed after a partihttp://fairieknits.com/blog/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=312cularly bad incident, I called and back to the doc I went, crying my little eyes out. We talked and we are trying something else. I went off Cymbalta because I felt like I just wasn’t being helped on it – apparently the many years on it either made me forget or just changed my brain enough that by day 16 totally off, I was toast.

At least Rozz still loves me, though.

Other than that – I am doing better. So much better. I went to the doctor yesterday for a follow up and while I have an increase in pain, my lupus is still in remission. let me shout that from the roof tops – REMISSION!!!!!! I have a vit D deficency which is pretty significant, but other than that, I am doing well. I am not being eaten slowly from the inside by rouge white blood cells. YAY!!!!!

I have been out more. Knitting more. Interacting with people more. It has been nice! Awesome even!!!

I should throw a pic of Rozz or Eva or some yarn up, but hey, that is a little more work than I can do at the moment What? you want pictures every day? *sigh*

You may wonder why I am telling you this. I think that it is important to be honest, for people to understand how these meds work and what they can do when you go off – I am doing this supervised – if this was unsupervised I would be in big trouble, but at least I have a fantastic doctor who is able to really help me.

Yep – I bought a new car. Well, new to me! I got a 2007 Mazda 3 in perfect condition – it is awesome!!

Fully loaded! Sunroof!

Pretty dials!

And she has already made a trip to the Coach outlet in Gaffney!!

I loved my Toyota Corolla, but she had been paid off for 2 years, I had been driving her for 7, and it was just time. Besides, I was doing my part to stimulate the economy.

Thank you everyone who left a comment – you are all so sweet and supportive, and I should have remembered that you all would be. I can’t tell you how much your comments meant to me.

And – tomorrow I will either have knitting related content or something else. Probably knitting. Who knows!

I have never made it a secret that I have depression issues. It has been something I have struggled with for a long time and about this time last year, they started to get really bad again. There was no specific thing to point to, just a lot of things. I went to the doctor and said I didn’t think my meds were working. They said nothing. I went to a specialist – someone who ONLY prescribes anti-depressants (and other such fun meds for crazee people like me). I said – Dr. Specialist – I don’t think I should be crying EVERY DAY if I am on Cymbalta. His answer – up the dose. That was in July. By September, it was worse. In October, the split happened. I attribute none of my depression to him – it didn’t help, but I have to own this and I do.

Flash forward to last week. I started going to a new GP thanks to Dani.. I told her I didn’t think the meds were working. And I mentioned (as I always do) that I don’t sleep for more than 2 hours at a time ever. I am always tired. Her solution – take me off Cymbalta – she offered several solutions including getting off completely or going on something else – I have to admit, I didn’t think I would ever be OFF anti-depressants – the first lupus doc told me I would never go off, but it turns out that after a period of time Cymbalta plateaus and stops working. I passed the number of years they recommend you staying on it solid (you can go off for a few months and go back on and it will work again) by like 3. yeah. they really weren’t working for me anymore. I am tapering off now. AND I am on a new sleep med which, unlike ambien, helps me sleep instead of stay awake and just not care that I am not asleep.

I have been taking a sewing class, knitting like crazy, working a lot, traveling all over, I have some exciting things coming up, I plan to start podcasting again. I am happy. Well, I will never be a ray of sunshine, but I feel better. And I have been back in the gym and have lost 9.4 lbs in the last 3 weeks! Things are looking up.

I am thankful to my good friends who have kept me from the edge and made sure I was alive. Who asked me if I was “going to do anything stupid” (for the record the answer to that is no – I had stopped cleaning and I can’t do anything dumb and have people come to my house and be like she was crazy and liked in a mess! no way!). I had one of the best New Years ever thanks to a great friend in AZ who flew me out for the week for a visit. I had a great opportunity to do something fantastic for a good friend. I have 2 lovely kitties who love and adore me because I have thumbs and feed them.

Not that I think anyone is still out there, but I am here – and I am planning to have a great rest of the year!

Anyway, I do have some knitting content, I swear it, but I will hold off on that until later because it is on my camera and I am WAY too tired to mess with it at the moment. I did have a FANTASTIC time with Dani this evening when I got home – her and her mister met me for dinner at Kabob Grill over on East next to the new home of Charlotte Yarn (I had to get my key because I am working on Saturday morning!) and I love the new shop – I will share more on that later. I swear. I am going to be better. no really. there will be pictures and everything.

Seriously though – I haven’t had a chance to respond to most of the comments from yesterday’s post, but thank you all. I am thankful that my knitters are such wonderful, kind and supportive people. For those of you I will see this weekend at SAFF – forgive me if I see you and then get a bit weepy, you have really moved me with your kind words.

And so I give you a random pic of Rozz because you deserve something nice for listening to all that crap up there.

The good news is that I will be at SAFF on Sunday – I am getting there on Saturday night, though so if you are staying at the Holiday Inn, you may see me there. Also, Charlene Schurch has agreed to do an interview for the podcast – so if you have some questions you would like me to ask – post them here by Saturday and I will ask them. We haven’t ironed out all the details, and you know how these things go, so we are going to cross our fingers.

The bad news is that Tattoo Boyfriend and I have called it quits after 3 years. While we still care greatly about each other, the distance was hard and we weren’t much closer to me moving out there – we just decided that it wasn’t working. We are going to stay friends – I mean he is my like BFF after all – but we are no longer together.

Once October is over and the whirlwind of weddings, work travel and all overness is done, I will have some time to get back to podcasting and getting the site here fixed up the way I want it. So that is good news to leave you with!

It is a GREAT site. but I went into the invite friends and clicked on some people from my contact list and click yes, please. Then it told me that instead of the 38 I clicked it sent 748.

Sorry about that. It send something to every email address that has ever been emailed by me and to me. oops. I have gotten some REALLY funny email responses from people I don’t hear from often, but seriously, it wasn’t my intention to send emails to everyone in the world (my friend Danielle’s fiance informed her that I must have mistaken him for someone who reads books, for instance – he is a funny funny guy.

I swear when I am not knitting sekrit wedding projects and test knitting things I will have some content. Pinky swear. Now, back to school work and work work so I can knit later!