Thursday, May 5, 2011

A Rose By Any Other Name....

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may by Waterhouse found on Wikimedia commons. 

When I first started writing Reasonably Well, I thought that I was dealing with one autoimmune disease - Sjogren's syndrome.

Ignorance is bliss.

Fast forward to today, when I'm sitting here thinking about  not only Sjs, but asthma, psoriatic arthritis, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, and who KNOWS what else is hanging around in this old body of mine.

Instead of thinking about acceptance, motivation, coping mechanisms, or other very useful personal growth issues when dealing with a lengthening list of disease challenges.......I'm wondering if I should tweak the name of this blog.

Denial is bliss, too.

When I named this blog, I gave the title a great deal of consideration. It went something like this:

Adult Child of Mine: You should write a blog.
Me: OK!
Adult Child of Mine: Whatcha going to write about?
Me: Hm. Sjogren's syndrome, I suppose.
Adult Child of Mine: Whatcha going to name it?
Me: Something un-sappy. Probably Reasonably Well. Something about being OK with Sjogren's syndrome.

Yes. After that agonizingly difficult decision process, I'm hesitant to make changes to the name of this blog without entering back into that very trying exercise.

Ah. I think I'll change the "Living Well With Sjogren's Syndrome" to "Living Well With Autoimmune Disease".

I'm exhausted. Introspection is so draining......

4 comments:

BD said...

I'm so sorry that your Sjogren's brought it's 'friends' to the party. Like you I started with Sjogren's and it didn't end there, I ended up with Lupus and the skin form of Scleroderma on top of it. I'm always afraid to go to the doctor now in case I get another something lol.

I do like that you dedicate your blog a lot to Sjogren's though, not a lot of them out there. It helps to educate because of the misconceptions out there of Sjogren's. Thank you for that!

Anonymous said...

Recently diagnosed with lupus and secondary SjS, I looked for some type of online support and found your blog. Just love it's upbeat tone! I've adopted "reasonably well" as my response when folks ask me how I'm doing :-)

kate said...

Julia - Just gotta say that "Reasonably Well" still works - because that's your attitude, not just your status. You're going through some tough adjustments right now, but based on what I've learned about you from your blog, you'll find a new equilibrium here somewhere, with, no doubt, some appearances by Inner Bratty Julia.

I've used your attitude as a bit of a role model in my own adjustment to Sjogren's- how can I live reasonably well with the more limited physical and mental resources that I now have?

We all come up with the answers that work for us, but it is all based on that basic question.

Hope you're feeling better soon

Bubbie said...

I Like "Reasonably Well", and although I love the painting you posted, I think more the thorns than the blooms appropriate. I was dx'd with a demylinating disease of unknown idiology...yup...a WTH dx. After awhile they said well....it looks like MS, even though it presented differently. After years of learning everything MS and taking DMD's to no advantage there came Lupus and Sjogrens and now what they believe is that it was Sjogrens all along.
I think I should coin a blog name "autoimmune soup" and hope not to add more ingredients.

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