It’s that time for all of my follow up appointments so here are a couple of updates!

First with the great news!!! Yesterday I had a follow up on my eyes and once again everything looked pretty stable so no injection and I go back in six months!!! I really cannot express in words how happy this makes me because that means a guaranteed six months of no eye injection! I am beyond grateful how God used my previous doctor leaving to lead me to this doctor! And not just because he hasn’t given any injections (although that does help haha) but because I truly do trust him and feel he is doing what is beneficial to me, and not to him!

Then today I was back in Iowa City to see my pulmonologist which was by far the worst I have failed at my breathing tests. On my last attempt to push out all of my air, there was a sudden loud bang that made my tech turn around and shoot straight up from her chair while I shoved the stupid tube away from my mouth and kind of crouched down in the booth. We discovered that part of the plastic thing in the tubing had popped like a balloon while I was blowing out!! She said that was the first and we were both laughing so hard after we thought about how ridiculous our reactions must have looked!! I told her I do these things every six months so guess it was time to make it a little more exciting! Unfortunately my breathing was the worst it has been so as a result of today’s appointment, I will be starting an inhaler again in hopes of helping with some of my symptoms…mainly the horrible chest pressure and my cough which I have been dealing with for about a month. I have had to leave church in the middle of service and sneak out of other activities or avoid them altogether because of extreme coughing spasms. They are horrible and very intense!

November 4th I will do more scans and see my cardiologist to get a better idea of the progression and discuss other options we might want to look in to.

Like I mentioned earlier…having a doctor you can truly trust is a must!! And while I have an amazing medical team, my pulmonologist is probably my favorite doctor! He is very knowledgeable about fm and all of the other health issues I have going on and he really listens to me. He does not sugarcoat anything and tries to rule out all options, not just assume what might typically be a given.

I have some personal fitness goals I am working on so while discussing them with him today he explained the whole muscles use oxygen and the stronger our muscles get the easier it is on our respiratory and body…all that stuff. I told him I’m pushing myself as hard as I can in hopes of getting stronger and building stamina to meet my goal. He then pointed out that is my human nature to push myself but that fibrosing mediastinitis is a very bad disease and does indeed cause extreme damage which will continue to put a limit on my abilities. For the first time I felt like my doctor was indicating that while I push myself as hard as I can, I may only be able to maintain what I can do now and not necessarily improve. I just smiled and thought to myself…challenge accepted!😉

I can’t wait to see him in six months and tell him all about meeting my goal…and I’m pretty sure he’s hoping I’ll have a story to tell as well!!

Thank you for all of the prayers and support today and every day!! Enjoy your weekend!!