Summer

Growing up I absolutely loved spring time! The grass was turning green, you could play outside without your coats on and the days started getting longer and longer. As a kid what is there not to love about that time! Most of all I loved counting the days until school let out for the summer! Spring time initiated the global countdown for long nights chasing lightning bugs,eating your ice cream so fast so it would not melt all over you and just laying in the sun with no shoes on! Summer could not last long enough for any of us. Summer was the first love I have ever had.......ok, ice cream and cake, those were my first loves!

As you get older the outlook on summer changes. It seems more of a pain than a magical moment in time. Work calls on you everyday and those kids you love so much.....well, you have to pay someone to take them and care for them as much as you would. Summer is just not the same and never will be. Those care free moments have slipped away and the burden of being a grown up hits you like a ton of bricks!During summer I just pray that the air conditioning in the car will at least keep me from sweating through my clothes! 

For those of us with autoimmune diseases summer brings on another heartache......the sun and heat! You see we suffer from a diseases that makes being in the sun literally painful and I don't mean from a sunburn! Our bodies tend to freak out when it comes to, well, anything! We have to take such potent medications that they change the makeup of our system that was going haywire to begin with! So, with the diseases itself and the medicine treating the disease summer is not a match made in heaven for us anymore!

This Fourth of July I really wanted to feel normal! For those of you who know me that can be a far stretch, hehehehe! I wanted to try to enjoy myself and do everything that everyone else is doing. I wanted to lounge by the pool and stay out until it was dark for fireworks! I wanted to eat a blue snow cone and watch kids play everywhere! I wanted to feel that love for summer again! Well, I did it! Before you get to excited let me tell you what happened afterwards. 

The first thing I did was stay up so late on fireworks night and watched the most amazing fireworks! The kids were oooooing and ahhhhhhing! There was so much joy in that moment and it truly reminded me of being a kid. Well, the next morning I was exhausted. I took my medicine late and the effects lasted all day from taking it so late. I slept off and on and I knew shot day was going to be bad. Instead of dwelling on it I decided I would perform my next summer task........enjoy the pool all day! I lathered myself up with SPF 80 and floated on a floaty all day! I reapplied every hour and just relaxed in the water. One thing I forgot to mention before the pool idea was that I have medication that reads right on the label.....STAY OUT OF THE SUN THIS MEDICATION COULD INCREASE THE ABSORPTION RATE OF THE SUN! As the night settled in I took a shower to wash the chlorine off and you know what is coming next........the sting when the water hits a fresh sunburn! How could this happen when I applied sunscreen every hour and it was SPF 80???? I guess those warning labels in the medication are really there for a reason:-) Not only did I have a sunburn but my body itched and little spots popped out and the exhaustion rate tripled at this point and yes, shot day was a pain in the rear!

My love of summer over the last ten years has truly changed. I now get the summer blues. I know I can not go outside and play with my friends. I know that I need to wear a long sleeve shirt when it is 115 out and this can make me so sad. I see everyone's vacation pictures and I am jealous of the fun in the sun. I want to go to the beach and I want to have enough energy to play the next day and the one following it but I can't. I am not admitting defeat, I am just accepting what my abilities are at this point. Summer lasts only a short period and I am thankful to live in a state that offers year round beautiful weather. In the winter it gets cool enough to actually feel comfy in those long sleeve shirts in the sun and THAT is what I look forward to! Tim always fills up our winters with tons of camping and outdoor activities because he knows the heat and the sun and me do not have a good relationship!

Now the question remains, what do I do with myself for the next three months? I have a challenge for all of you. Yes, I mean all of you......even you without an autoimmune disease! Get out! It is very easy to fall into the hum drum of staying indoors and avoiding the day all together but that is not healthy for any of us, physically or emotionally. My goal for myself is that I will do a new activity every week! This week I went to The Albuquerque Museum! I was indoors surrounded by gentle quietness at the same time as being surrounded by people. It was wonderful and I felt so much better afterwards! This next week I am going to go to the zoo! Yes, it is outdoors but I will go very early and make my rounds outside when the sun is just staring to warm up and then when the sun comes up explore the exhibits inside! I encourage all of you to do the same thing. Lets fall back in love with summer and stop counting down the days until winter. Lets go back to being kids and looking forward to the long days! Oh and one more thing you must do every week is pick up an ice cream cone and see if you can finish it outside before it is all over you!