Smoke and Mirrors © 2013 Jane Waterman
Treatments

Seronegative and Out of Luck

On August 21st, I finally got to see my new rheumatologist – some four or so months after the referral was made. I haven’t had a rheumatologist since my first one retired in 2009 – I don’t count the appointment with the doctor who rejected my diagnosis immediately when he heard

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Pain Study © 2013 Jane Waterman
Mental health challenges

Grasping for Answers

I have mentally begun this post for weeks, but a chronically ill life has a way of shaking loose any idea of control over one’s destiny. Anyone who has been ill for a while will understand what I mean when I say I’m suffering a bad case of doctor fatigue.

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Where I Stand © 2013 Jane Waterman
Interior life

Where I Stand

I’m taking part in WEGO Health’s Health Activist Writer’s Month Challenge Day 16 #HAWMC – Tell us 3 things that are true about you, your condition, or your Health Activism. Tell us 1 lie. Will we be able to tell the difference? I’m improvising with this prompt. I’m in a weird

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Tribal © 2003 Jane Waterman
Mental health challenges

Alternative Depression Treatments and Tin Foil Hats

Day 20 – Write about alternative treatments/regimens/medicine. What do you support? What is crazy? Today’s prompt amuses me. Alternative treatments – what is crazy? What, indeed? I could wax lyrical about people in tin foil hats dancing naked under the light of the full moon, or sitting on the bottom

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Study #1 © 2012 Jane Waterman
Treatments

What Patients Want Practitioners to Know

Day 18 – Advice for new doctors or nurses I apologize if this post begins by tippy-toeing around, but as I make this pitch to you – a new doctor or nurse – I don’t want to imply that I’m giving you advice so much as suggestions. I know you

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Tattered © 2003 Jane Waterman
Living with invisible illness

Cry Me a River

Day 6 – Write about a time you had to take the high road I sometimes wonder at the irony of Sjogren’s syndrome, which often makes it hard to shed a tear, much less cry me a river. Whenever I cry now, I rub the tears into my eyes and

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This is What Is © 2012 Jane Waterman
Treatments

Chronic Pain and Catastrophic Medicine

This is a post I’ve been meaning to write for a long time. Having been through a somewhat hectic week, and feeling rather strung out by recent pain levels, I thought I’d try to jot down some of my thoughts in a more experiential post, and at a later time,

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Shame © 2012 Jane Waterman
Living with invisible illness

Shame

I come to writing today wrung out, hollowed, disappointed, ashamed. I can forgive myself the days that lapsed since my last entry. I sank into the recesses of a cave, and there I went through the motions of life in the grip of a depression so strange I can not

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