Raise your Left hand

   When dealing with the changing world of arthritis you have learn to read the situation. I had to go to my hand specialist, today. I had a Gout attack in my left hand around Christmas. It made for a painful Christmas. I spent most of my time between the hospital and my room with my hand in a bucket of freezing water. It was not fun but I tried to stay positive. 

    After the holidays my left hand pain started to get better. It wasn't in constant pain but movement of the fingers got more difficult. So, I scheduled an appointment with my hand doctor. I never thought I would need a hand doctor in my entire life. However, back to the story. By, the time I went to my hand doctor my hand was only in pain when I tried to make a fist or grab something with my left hand. 

     I explained to him that I was concerned for two reasons. One, I was afraid I had loss the use of my left hand and two, that every time I get an Gout attack in my hands it will cause damage. My doctor assured me that my hand would be fine and gave me a cortisone shot for my hand. And, when I asked if every time I get a Gout attack in my hand will I have to get another shot. He just answered me with a statement "You and I,  Charmaine are going to have a long relationship with each other." Which to me, if I am reading the situation correctly, means I will be getting cortisone shots for my hands throughout the year. Another reality of chronic Gout arthritis, that I hate. 

Working through the Pain

    I hate being stuck in bed in pain. So what I just wrote is so much more than just the pain. I have been depressed before because of long periods of being stuck in the bed with sciatica. So being back in bed again with another flareup is like having a flashback to that mindset. So I want to limit the amount of time I have to spend in bed.

    So I was thrilled when this flareup only put me in bed three days. However, when it was over the stiffness was still in my body. So when it was time to cook, I had to move slowly and plan out my steps. I had to use my backup, frozen, and prepackaged food. I hate using it because it has too much salt and sugar. However, those TV dinners are worse. This is why I like to cook extra food and keep it in the freezer. However, since my son is not a cook and my microwave died last year....it is either prepackaged frozen food or fast food. 

   Anyway, at least the pain was manageable, today. And, the most important part is I got to cook (warm up) food in my own kitchen. 

No cook day

Today is a bad day for cooking. My sciatica is acting up today. I couldn't even walk 2 feet today. I had cooked some Orange Chicken and rice yesterday for dinner.I had left some over for lunch and dinner today. However, with me stuck in my room I couldn't eat it.

I had to order fast food and deal with the pain. Heating pads and pain meds help. This is why I suggest making extra food when you feel good. Now, if it was any other part of my body, I would have been able to eat my leftovers. 

My advice is to always plan backup meals ahead of time. 

Posting Issues

I had a huge Gout attack and couldn't post. I do apologize. Arthritis is a beast and can have you screaming in pain. And, trying to cook is crazy. I had made extra food on Sunday for me and my son to have leftovers. I planned on giving the leftovers to my son but then had to take it back. I hated doing that but my son is a grown man and can cook whenever he wants. 

So the tricks I told you on my Podcast: The Arthritic Cook, worked perfectly. 

Anti Fatigue Mat

    My son brought me an anti fatigue mat from Amazon for Xmas. I love it, to pieces. As you all know that I love to cook but it was getting impossible to cook a real meal. Because, if I had to stand in the kitchen for more than 10 minutes my foot would hurt. I would even wear my Diabetic cushion shoes and it would still have my foot swollen the next day. I hated it and knew something had to change. It was either an anti fatigue mat or an stool to sit on while cooking. 

   Honestly, I was not really trying to do the stool, unless I had to. In my mind, it was like being in a wheelchair in the kitchen. I know that is silly but all I could see in my mind's eye was me sitting in a chair trying to cook and not being allowed to stand up. Well, at least not in the kitchen. Both of my legs work, I can walk and stand. So telling me not to stand in the kitchen...well it felt like, yet another thing was being taken away from me. And, I couldn't do anything to stop it. So I am so glad this mat worked. I will talk about, again on my podcast.... "The Arthritic Cook".

My Arthritic Therapy

   Dealing with arthritis can be a rollercoaster of emotions. One day you feel great and no pain. You can do everything you need to do, without pain. The next day you can barely get out of bed. It can mess with your emotions as well as your body. It can make you feel sad, angry or hopeless. 

     In my case, I have a chronic condition which means it is never going away. I can manage it with medication, physical therapy and diet. However, finding the balance that stops or minimizes the pain and damage to my body, is an ongoing process. It is a long, drawn out, and infuriating process. Everytime my health issues limit my mobility or causes me so much pain I end up going to the hospital. It can make me feel depressed and hopeless. 

     This is why I have a therapist that I talk to multiple times a month. So when I tried talking to friends who have similar issues, it becomes a contest. So I either get an comparison, the person down plays my complaint with their horror story of their pain. Or, I get no sympathy because the have a worse case of Arthritic pain and they push through, so I am being a big baby about the pain. 

     So my therapist doesn't judge me. He just listens and reminds me that I have the right to my own feelings about my pain. He then redirects me to focus on what I can do while I deal with the reality of the situation. He tells me dwelling on my sadness over something I can't change, now will only make me stressed. I am telling all this because having a chronic illness can make you emotional and having a therapist can help. 

Osteoarthritis Reality

     I keep forgetting some of the limitations that I have with having 3rd stage Osteoarthritis. So first of all I am far from not being able to walk or having a full time nurse to help me. I still am not as mobile as I used to be. I was a nurse for 13 years and I loved to walk. There were times I would walk 10 miles a day, usually 5 miles to work and another 5 miles back home. I would play my music on an mp3 player and walk to the beat. It kept my weight off, my muscle tight and was great exercise. 

    One day, about 11 years ago I started having pain in my foot. It began to swell and became impossible to stand on. I went to the doctor and found out I had Gout. If you don't know what Gout is, you are very lucky. Gout is a common and complex form of arthritis that can affect anyone. It's characterized by sudden, severe attacks of pain, swelling, redness and tenderness in one or more joints, most often in the big toe. They gave me an steroid shot for the swelling and pain. Plus, a booklet on Gout about what I can and can't eat. It was hard at first cause most of the food on their list was all in my freezer at home. I had to give it away and go shopping. So I thought I was done with painful joint damage. Nope.

   About a year later, my heel started to hurt when I walked. I knew it wasn't Gout because Gout pain is continuous. It doesn't matter if I stand up, walk, run or etc. However, this pain was different, so back to the doctor I go. They did x-rays and found out that I have Osteoarthritis. So now I have two forms of arthritis battling each other to breakdown my joints. The Gout flare causes pain, swelling, and tenderness in my joints. I take medicine and drink a lot of fluids to flush it out. However, in the middle of my treatment the Gout is doing damage to my joints. So by the time the Gout flare is over I have to go to occupational or physical therapy to get my range of motion back, if I can. Sometimes, it never comes back. 

   So now, I have to deal with the reality of arthritis changing my daily activities. I can't cook like I want to because standing long times in the kitchen can make my feet hurt. So I had to get anti fatigue mats to stand on. I had to get a bedside commode in my room because when the Gout flare hits my feet, sometimes I can't walk to the bathroom. Today, I had to get my son to help me get of the toilet because the toilet is so low that when I tried to get up on my own....I couldn't. This is my new reality until I can get my health under control.

Time to Talk

    I realized that I need to get over one of my fears. See I am great at talking to others and being an activist. I can champion for the under dog, everyday and never get tired. I can make a passionate speech that would make an audience cry. I have created books, plays and screenplays that moves people. I can tell a story that will have you begging me to continue. However, when it comes to asking for help with my business I go silent. 

So today I had to call some local agencies about collaborating together to get the information out to the people who want it.  However, when it came time to call them I panicked and didn't know what to say. I put it off for several hours. I let myself get distracted by phone calls, weather forecast, scheduling a doctor's appointment, etc. 

My issue is when it comes to talking about myself to assistance, I feel like I am being a bit egotist. Plus, I feel bad asking for money, equipment, etc. I hate sales and to ask for donations, sponsorship, or funds you have to sale. You have to sale yourself, your idea, your product, etc. 

What does this have to do with "The Arthritic Cook"? This is the program I was trying to get the funds and equipment for it to grow. I know that their is a serious lack of information out there for us people with arthritis that wants to still cook in their own homes. 

One Snowing Day

     I live in Virginia and today was a 4-5 inches of snow day. I had plans on cooking one of my recipes, talking to people and attending Zoom meetings but the snow stopped all that, in many ways. First, I don't hate snow, in fact I love it. However, my joints don't love cold precipitation and I am sure I am not alone. I don't have rheumatoid arthritis but my joints still react to waking up to freezing temperatures. I felt stiff for most of the day, even though I was inside all day. I finally, just ate a bowl of cereal for breakfast, just to hold me over until I could get my joints more limber. 

As I had said before in one of my podcasts: "When you are in pain it is hard to focus on cooking." I had to use one of my back up meals for lunch. However, now my joints feel better so now I am cooking. I wish someone had told me not to push myself to much when I am in arthritic pain.

As I said before, I am a African American woman and my mom raised me to push through the pain. So like many people, I kept pushing through the pain until I couldn't. What does that mean? I worked through my pain, I took care of my son through the pain and took over the counter medicine for the pain. I didn't call the doctor until the pain was so bad I couldn't move, "Cause black woman are strong and don't need any help." This was the words I repeated to myself for years. LIES !!

I still have pain but I go to my primary doctor and specialist so I can live an arthritis pain free life. It hasn't happen yet but I an still striving for that goal. I am a foodie and my stress release is cooking. I need to manage my pain so I can keep cooking. 

So what am I cooking on this snowy day....Turkey Chilli (no beans) over a large cheddar baked potato. What is you favorite simple dish on a snowy day?

In the beginning, there was Pain

 So I decided to start this blog off with the why? Everyone always wants to know why people decide to do what they do.

I am 53, an African American female with multiple chronic health issues. I have osteoarthritis, diabetes, gout, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and obesity. However, it has been the Gout and the arthritis that has been the catalyst for this new fire in my belly. See, I have had these issues for at least 10 years but they have been getting much worse. In 2021 it was so bad I was confined to a bed at least once a month due to the severe pain and swelling. 

It affected my job, my eating, and even my hygiene. I would get pain so bad I would even end up in the ER trying to get relief. It was bad enough from the gout attacks swelling my joints, but afterwards it would cause damage to whatever joint it attacked. I would then have to go to specialists, get cortisone shots and physical therapy. Afterwards, I would have to relearn a different way to bathe myself, use the bathroom and even cook. 

This is why I started this blog and my podcasts with the same name: "The Arthritic Cook''. In trying to accommodate my decreasing range of mobility, I went looking for equipment, gadgets, and tools. I found out quickly, that even though we have over 27 million Americans with some form of Osteoarthritis, there was no one website that had what I needed. I am a foodie and have been one since I was 12 years old. I don't want anyone to cook my food and with my gumbo pot of health issues, my diet is custom made. I had to search multiple websites to find even the things I knew I needed but I know that there are at least another 7 million people that don't know what to search for to help themselves in the kitchen. 

They are just suffering in silence cooking their everyday meals, or worse yet, having someone else cook their meals for them in their own kitchen. This is why I started this blog and the podcast, to help out others like me suffering in silence.