A Little Life Update: Health, Photography, Sewing, Ect.
Hi everyone! After going through old blog posts, I realized it’s been a while since I sat down and wrote a life update about my health. Because of this, I decided to do one and talk why I haven’t sewn so much lately (Except for throw pillows and knitting. My blog thinks I’m very proficient in creating those) as well as talking about how hard it’s been to travel, take photographs, and do anything I enjoy.I made not secret on this blog that I had health problems for many years, but what I never talked about was my illness and how I’m feeling right now.
As a teenager, I began to show signs of an illness most doctors associated with a poor diet and lack of exercise while some assumed I suffered from a mental illness and the symptoms I suffered from are associated with it. After seeing a new doctor in my late teens, I was diagnosed with an antibiotic resistant infection as well as very serious allergies, delayed growth spurts, and nerve damage (Later identified as nerve damage to my spinal cord).
For years I had trouble talking openly about my illnesses, partly because of the misunderstanding associated from it (People thought I was out of my mind when I told them I had growth delays… until I grew taller than them in my 20’s) and partly because of my own sadness and depression from having three different health problems. Also, there was no cure for an antibiotic resistant infection. Today, even though there is no catch all cure for it, some people they can manage the infection if not be cured from it, but it really does depend on the infection and what kind of an infection it is.
My version of the infection created non cancerous tumors all over my body, making me look like I was either pregnant or severely overweight. According to my doctors, my body created these tumors to isolate the infection and prevent it from attacking my internal organs. Because of this, and other symptoms I suffered from, my infection was deemed not as bad as others (Such as MRSA super bug) and can be cured by my body’s immune system.
In late 2017, when I planned to start making costumes again, I didn’t make anything because of my ongoing treatments for my infection. I took some medicine to boost my immune system and it worked so well, my tumors dissolved and all the infection problems I suffered from went away. Since I was doing so well, my doctors declared me cured (I’m still stunned by that!) in the summer of 2018.
So, what does that have to do with sewing, photography, and travel? Well, as you could imagine, I didn’t feel like traveling much. In fact, I traveled very little in the past year sans for my work. The reason is because, even though my energy levels improved by leaps and bounds, I also found that my body ached more and need to rest. Because of the tumors and the infection in general, parts of my body was damaged, including some muscles and ligaments, which made moving around hard. I need to build myself up and give my body time to rest. Although I did do some traveling for fun, I found it hard to go on day trips and instead try to go places that are closer to home on days when I feel good and can spend time at home to heal and recover.
Since I was worried about a recovery time after traveling, I didn’t go places and take photographs that I wanted to. I enjoy taking the desert photographs, but I’m becoming very bored with it. The place where I take my photographs is where I love to hike (It’s not open to the public for hiking, just FYI) and, even though it’s a piece of Arizona desert paradise, I’ve walked around the area, took photographs, and spend so much time there I’m getting very bored. Because of this, I want to do some day trip travels in hopes of seeing places I haven’t seen since I was a teenager and healthy.
Although my recovery from being sick affects my ability to travel and take photographs like I want to, it also affects my sewing. Over the past few years, I’ve sewn many costumes, clothes, and more but never talked about them here on this blog or on my YouTube channel because I didn’t have the energy to work on the videos and write the posts. Throughout my whole entire illness, I worked. Recently, my job became more stressful and a family member became sick and needed me to take care of them. Since I needed as much energy as I can muster to work at my job and take care of my family member, I let my editing and posting of anything sewing-wise fall to the waist side. I plan on picking it back up, as well as post some art and sketches I did and photographs I took, very soon, but I’m more focused on healing and resting instead of being a blogger with the best photographs, sketches, finished art, and sewing on the internet.
Looking forward to the end of 2019 and into the beginning of 2020, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to post everything I worked on the past few years very quickly, but I hope to start posting something before the end of 2019! The reason why I’m so cautious optimistic about posting anything before the end of the year is because there are a lot of life changes I’m waiting on, including moving to a new city. (The most worrisome allergies I suffer from are caused by the vegetation and other things in the area where I live. So, under doctor’s orders, I must move) But if I can’t post anything before the end of the year, I’m still optimistic about life in general. Also, I feel motivated to sketch, digitally paint, take photographs, and sew anything I can. Being sick held me back creatively more than I tried to let it, but now that I’m cured and on my way to a full recovery (Which is presumed to take a few more months, depending on a variety of factors) I feel motivated to start trying to create things I enjoy as well as talk about them here on my blog!
Well, that’s all for now! Thank you for reading!
