A beginning...

Today's the day (technically last night) that I begin treating this disease with methotrexate, rather than treating just the symptoms with prednisone.

I told my friend Joyce earlier this week that I'm truly not worried about any of this. God has given me a steady measure of peace - an assurance of His unending grace and provisions for my needs. As silly as it may seem, the only thing that has produced any anxiety in me has been the possibility of nausea. I don't do nausea well.

From all my research (and the doctor's recommendation), the methotrexate seems to cause less nausea if taken just before bedtime, and that is exactly what I did.

So far, so good. Nothing I can't manage. I have a headache and  feel like I'm in a bit of a fog, but I can feel that way without taking methotrexate.

I don't have much of an appetite, but even that is not a bad thing. The prednisone has kept me in a perpetual state of starving. A day or two without an appetite might be a welcomed balance.

I have nothing to complain about. Truly. I'm writing this from my back porch as painted buntings, red-headed woodpeckers and white-winged dove feast at the feeders under the barren limbs of the sweet-gum trees. Thunder rumbles in the distance and drops of rain fall here and there, bouncing off the roof and the dry mulch around the already blooming azaleas.

Work calls to me from the laundry room and kitchen. Yogurt needs to be spooned into jars and I must focus soon on completing the organizer for our taxes. But for now, this leisure time is a grace gift.