Author Archives: Ms. Boice

Top 10 things I’ve learned since getting married

15 Saturday Oct 2011

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I married later than most people do.  Particularly for those who live in Utah. I thought I knew myself pretty well, but marriage is a lot like looking in the mirror.  When people used to share that little nugget of wisdom I thought they were suggesting that my spouse would be similar to me.

Ahem, not exactly.

It’s myself that I see reflected back to me.  So here’s the top 10 things I learned since getting married 3 1/2 years ago.

1. It can be okay that we don’t like to hang bath towels the same way.

2. I tend to speak for other people (Steve) when they (Steve) can do it for his/her self (Steve). This, apparently, is not good. This is news to me.

Yes, I’ll speak for him.

3. I make my husband laugh.  A lot.

4. Sometimes I think the exact thing my husband is thinking.

5. Sometimes I’m not at all close to thinking the same thing Steve is thinking.

6. I can do a lot of things I didn’t think I could do (zip lining, scuba diving, cutting back on the shoe purchases, answering nature’s call in the woods–Don’t ask.)

7. I get weird about the laundry.

8. I have issues with other people being in my kitchen. (I’m working on that one.)

9. I know the difference between a junco and a house finch.

10.  Sometimes I tend to take the complicated route when the simpler route will do just fine.

Steve Jobs. He changed the world–and me–simply, thoughtfully and creatively

06 Thursday Oct 2011

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Steve Jobs - Photo from the front page of Apple website

I remember the ad that aired during the Super Bowl in the year 1984. That was my senior year in high school. All seniors in Oregon were reading the George Orwell novel, 1984, and so the Apple commercial totally resonated with me. But it wasn’t just the Orwellian nature of the commercial–it was the first time technology caught my eye.

Then I went to college where there was really only a handful of Macintosh computers on campus and I made sure I knew what computer labs had them. I always used a Mac, even if it meant standing in a queue for it. I thought people were insane to use computers that had DOS because I had no patience for DOS. I loved fonts and Apple had them.

I told a friend one time in the late 80’s that if I were reincarnated as a font I would be the font, Avant Garde. Apple had that font on its computers.

After college I went to work in Silicon Valley for a (wait for it…) Macintosh software reseller called Computerware. I loved working in Palo Alto and getting the skinny on all things Apple Computer. On my desk was a Macintosh II. And then I advanced to a Macintosh SE30. Several years later I bought a Mac SE from a friend and then when I had enough money saved I bought my first brand-spankin’ new shiney Macintosh–the Cube. Oh, how I loved that computer!

I remember when Apple stock was selling around $10 a share I wished I had enough money to buy shares. Looking back, I should have taken out a loan to do that. I had faith in the company and once Jobs came back to the company I knew it would take off. I bought one of the first iPods, and then the one in color (still have it!) and got the iPhone. Two laptops later, plus the conversion of two family members, I have Apple in my DNA. In fact, a lot of my wedding was the result of Apple. (Customized thank-you cards using iPhoto cards, our wedding website using iWeb, our music using iTunes, and iDisk, which enabled me to manage all the wedding plans from what would later be known as the Cloud. I also made a beautiful Apple photo book with iPhoto using my photographer’s digital photos.)

I’m a proud Mobile Me user, iPad owner and plan to buy Apple TV for Christmas.

I know this all sounds so materialistic, but what I’m trying to say that I’ve completely loved being part of the ride of innovation sparked by Steve Jobs. The message in that first Apple commercial in 1984 was what resonated with me–the idea that the stodgy way of doing things doesn’t have to be. The tools we use can definitely impact how we think and how we act. It opens up so many possibilities. That’s what I have loved about Apple and what I’ve loved about Steve Jobs.

He has shaped who I am and how I look at things: Simply, thoughtfully and creatively.

Thank you Steve Jobs.

Ugh. I’m chronic.

04 Tuesday Oct 2011

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After giving it much thought, I’m going to come out of the proverbial closet on this one.

I have a chronic illness.

There are a few reasons why I originally didn’t want to “come out” on this one. First of all, there’s the whole privacy issue with one’s own health care. Do I want people to know that something is wrong? What if my employer used this against me? What if people looked at me differently? What if it kept me from achieving something I really wanted because I was held back by someone else?

The other reason for maybe not going public was that I didn’t want to become depressing. Not just for readers but for myself too. I’m not judging those who find therapy in the Internet, but it’s not my approach on how I want to manage my own situation. I often have to give myself a break from the Internet–mostly when I’m hunting for solutions–because often times the people who are suffering the most tend to also be looking for answers and frequently post some of the saddest conditions. There’s a lot of hopeless folks out there who seem to be facing many challenges. It can be very depressing for those going through it and for those looking for answers.

Should I be acerbic? I might be, but I don’t think that’s going to be my approach. Should I be funny about it? Hmmm, I might laugh at something now and then, but not everything is funny. Sometimes it’s just plain annoying, inconvenient, and downright frustrating. Should I be a grassroots advocate for change or research or try to get people to pay attention to a rare condition? Oh, I wish I could. But with a very hectic corporate job with oodles of responsibilities, for now all I can do is keep up with that and make sure I’m staying on top of my own health, which requires consistent exercising at the gym. For now, I’ll have to find other ways to champion the cause.

What I do know is that this blog isn’t going to be all about my illness. I don’t think readers can bear that and I know I can’t. Part of living with a chronic illness is the living part. I’d rather focus on the other parts of my life that bring me joy. For now, this chronic illness that I have is forcing me to make decisions–about how I do things and when I do them as well as how much I do them. But I can still do them for now. And I’d rather try to find work-arounds rather than spin my head out of control by focusing everything in my life around the illness.

So, in case you’re wondering, I don’t have lupus. (Remember, in an earlier post, I mentioned that I was misdiagnosed four 1/2 years ago.) Most people’s reaction when I tell them that is “Wow! That’s great news!” While that’s great news, I just traded one disease for another. The official diagnosis I have is scleroderma. It’s part of the auto immune family and fortunately, it hasn’t impacted my organs at this point. And it just may not. We suspect that I’ve had it for about five years now and usually if the organs are involved that gets manifested in those first five years. But the doctor did inform me, “never say never.” Yes, there’s always a disclaimer.

Where do I go from here? Well, there’s no cure — just managing the symptoms. I can’t really play piano like I used to–it’s been that way for the last four years. Most of this has been manifested in my hands, which are puffy and swollen most of the time. (When my rheumatologist delivered the diagnosis news he said, “Well, you’ve been dealt a bad hand,” to which I replied. “So to speak.” See? There are appropriate times to be humorous, no?)

We’ve finally got me on some medication to manage the Reynaud’s Syndrome, and that’s been a blessing. And I am now pleased with my new rheumatologist and next month I’m seeing a gastroenterologist for consultation on other issues related to the disease. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that he’ll have some more solutions for me as well. (Oh duh. I can’t cross my fingers–too swollen. Ha! More scleroderma humor!)

So why write about it? Why am I not being private about it? Because keeping it a secret just adds to my stress. I’m not ashamed about it and besides, maybe there’s someone out there who might identify with what I’m going through.

I mean, for Pete’s sake, I’m over 40. I was bound to have something happen to me.

World, meet Willow.

29 Thursday Sep 2011

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“We’re never getting a cat. Just forget it,” I told husband Steve.

I think I said that a gazillion times. But one day we saw a petite little cat named Willow who was up for adoption at Petco and Steve melted. “Nope. We’re not getting a cat,” I reminded him. And we left the store.

The next night in bed, Steve pines, “I keep thinking about Willow.”

“Well, you can keep thinking ’cause we’re not getting a cat.” And then I rolled over in bed and thought about how I might be a mean wife, but I’m still right. You see, for months Steve had been talking about wanting to get gerbils and a big ass Habitrail that goes on for miles and miles that he would connect all through the house.

“Sure, that’s a great idea,” I told him. “…if you’re seven!”

A couple of days later I left for work and I don’t know what it was but all day I couldn’t help but think of Steve –my husband of only nine months– who really wanted that cat. Maybe it was Newlywed Bliss that fogged my thinking, but I all of a sudden became certain that Willow would bring so much joy to my new husband. So after work I went over to Petco and adopted Willow for only $40.

Because I was not educated in the art of pet ownership I didn’t have the wisdom to actually buy a cat carrier. I had bought the food, a cat bed, and even some toys, but I didn’t buy the carrier. Instead, I put Willow in a box on the back seat, laid a bag of kibble on top to secure the lid (there were holes for her to breathe–I’m not that dumb), but she cleverly escaped and was wandering around my car as I drove home. For some reason I thought turning on the local classical radio station would calm her down. (Who wouldn’t calm down with a little Chopin?)

When I got home I called Steve from my cell phone to have him meet me in the garage to help me carry some stuff in. I had Willow in my arms and was terrified she would jump out and run away and I would be out $40 and my husband would think I was the stupidest wife on the planet.

He saw me sitting in the car holding the cat and then he opened the door slowly and asked, “Is that Willow?” and then he got in the car and took her from my arms into his where she just purred and purred.

Willow the cat.

And it didn’t go completely unnoticed to me that when Steve turned to me his eyes were a little glassy.

And little Willow has become a great joy in my life. (Plus, I’m afraid I’ve turned into one of those people I swore I would never become: The type who thinks her pet is like a child.)

So, the moral of this story is two fold: First, never say, “never,” and it’s always a great idea to do something wonderful for your husband because it can also turn out to be wonderful for yourself.

Grocery Shopping with Rainman

23 Friday Sep 2011

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This evening after our workout at the gym, my husb, Steve, and I popped over to the grocery store to pick up some groceries. We were out of tea and as we were looking at all the brands and varieties of tea we got a little dizzy.  THERE ARE GOBS OF TEA!

Alas, amidst all that tea, they didn’t have our usual Bengal tea from Celestial Seasonings, which is essentially a decaf Chai tea, so we tried a new brand of decaf Chai tea. We also realized that we were out of peppermint tea, which is a shared favorite.  (In fact, I took it as a sign from God that I was to marry Steve when after just meeting him for the first time he offered me peppermint tea.  sigh )

After we got our Chai and our Peppermint I noticed this:

Prince of Wales Tea

“Prince of Wales Tea?” I asked Steve, who is Canadian and who has a Queen. “So does Prince Charles get his own tea?” (Yes, I said it a little mockingly about the Royals as if I didn’t wake up at 3 a.m. to watch the big Royal Wedding last Spring.)

Steve picks up the box and starts reading the back, which says something about the Prince of Wales granting Twinings permission to sell his personal blend using his royal title, in 1921. And then Steve leans on the grocery cart and rolls his eyes up as though he’s remembering something.

Thinking…

Thinking…

Thinking. And then he says, “Oh, that would be Prince Edward, son of King George V.”

Either everyone born in a country under the British Crown knows these things or it’s just another one of Steve’s Rainman moments.

I’m with my people now.

18 Sunday Sep 2011

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Turning 40 was just like walking through a door from one room to the next.

In the pre-40 room, I was getting up every morning at 4:30 and was at the gym by 5:00 a.m. where I took a spinning class.  (That’s the uber-tough cycling class that always resulted in a puddle–no, a large body of water–on the floor surrounding my spin bike.) On the days that I didn’t spin, I would pound out 30 mins. on the ellyptical machine and 30 minutes lifting weights.  I had a trainer. I had weight gloves. I even had a heart rate monitor.  And the first year I started doing this (I was 33) I dropped 40 pounds and was super thrilled at my new bod.

Then at 40 I walked through the door.

Here’s what that other room looked like:

Okay, let me first start off by saying that I was traveling a whole lot that year.  I made Platinum frequent flyer status in just  8 months, plus I was rendezvousing long distance with my boyfriend, then to be fiancee and later husband.   When I did find time to work out I was so fatigued I couldn’t get up at 4:30 in the morning for a workout.  If I did, by 10 a.m. I had used up any energy stores I had and I wanted to crawl under my desk at work and take a nap.  (I actually did do that one time at work.  I have an office and I just locked the door and curled up under my desk for 20 minutes.  I was crazy tired that day, I remember.  But now that I think of it, why didn’t I just go home?)

After going through that door I was working out at a gym where I had a killer monthly rate. There were lots and lots of 20 and 30 somethings who looked way cuter than I felt.  I soon realized that I had gone through that door and everyone else at the gym was “in the other room.”  I had heard for years that once you turn 40 that everything starts to fall apart.  But man, does it have to do it all at once?  I remember clearly being on a treadmill at the gym and this girl in her 20s was to my left just pounding hard as she ran.  She never stopped.  I thought, surely she’s going to tire. Nope.  She kept going.  In fact, she’s probably still going now.  And then to my right there was this buff guy who was just pounding it out too.  WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE??!!

That was really my first brick into my head moment.  I knew that this was crazy and something was not quite right.  That’s when I started to bring this up with my doctor and we started investigating.  It turned into four months of tests and wondering, which really sucks, because during that four-month period I turned into the biggest cybercondriac on the planet.  I would Google  everything under the sun.  Every day I had a different disease or ailment and I was going out of my mind.

Anyway, long story short, I got a diagnosis.  (Turns out it was wrong, but I’ll address that in a later post.)  So turning forty and walking through that door meant I was walking into two rooms.  Maybe it’s a great room–you know, in the sense that it’s a kitchen and living room. That sort of thing. That is, I walked into the normal getting older ailments room along with I’ve-got-something-really-bad-going-on room.  The problem is, I don’t think either room gets along with the other.  Or maybe it just needs redecorating.

Soon after my first diagnosis (the wrong one, remember?) I just changed gyms.  I now go to the community rec center that is the same distance as the young groovin’ gym I used to go to. It’s pretty much the same, but the clientele is older and they seem to have a lot of classes for people with ailments.  There’s gentle yoga and water aerobics classes for people with arthritis. I even have become quite addicted to Zumba, which is surprisingly offered at my gym.

I no longer do the wake-up-at-the-crack-of-dawn workout anymore.  I have to find time after work to do it. But that’s okay.  At least I can still workout. It’s important to me and critical to my recovery–both for rehabilitating my broken leg/ankle injury from last November and so I can stay ahead of this mystery ailment I have going on. 

When a friend asked me why I changed gyms I said (a little tongue in cheek), “I’m with my people now.”

And it’s not a bad place to be. I don’t feel like I suck at working out right now.

One step closer to Mary Tyler Moore. Well, almost.

17 Saturday Sep 2011

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A funny thought about Minnesota as I’m leaving.

When I was a senior in college I was thinking about my next move. I didn’t want to just go back to the Portland, Oregon area where I was raised. I was determined to find a new adventure and go out on my own. One day I read an article about the 10 best cities in the U. S. for singles and ranked right up there was Minneapolis, Minnesota. I became enamored with the photos of the lakes and beautiful sidewalks with beautiful people jogging or cycling on the paths. I learned that Minneapolis / St. Paul area was one of the most cultured cities and I could imagine myself with season tickets to the opera or symphony.

And I imagined myself one step closer to being Mary Tyler Moore.

So I was pretty convinced Minneapolis was where I was going to land. One February morning I decided to make a phone call to the Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce. I was looking for some information on the city. I imagined that they would be thrilled that I chose their city to settle in. While I was on hold, waiting for someone to help me, I listened to their on-hold music–which seemed to be a local radio station–and day dreamed about my life in Minneapolis with their lush parks, blue skies and lakes.

But then the on-air announcer came on and said, “…and today it’s going to be 15 below, so make sure you bundle up.”

And then I hung up the phone.

Minneapolis was crossed off my list.

Who can turn the world on with her smile?

12 Monday Sep 2011

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Me and Mary Tyler Moore in Minneapolis

I had to travel to St. Paul,  Minnesota for a week of meetings and ever since I was a young girl I had been fascinated with the Mary Tyler Moore show, so it only made sense that I had to go see the Mary Tyler Moore statue. (Or rather, it was Mary Richards, but for the sake of this post, I’m still going to refer to her as MTM.)

Add Epsom salts to the list

06 Tuesday Sep 2011

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Not sure exactly what Epsom salts are except that last night after soaking a very sore ankle (from my near-death, catastrophic accident and post-accident surgery last Winter), I felt so much better. As I was soaking I decided to do some Google searching on my iPhone about Epsom salts (is it a proper noun? I don’t know. I’ll have to Google that too) and learned that it does amazing things. For instance, my iPhone told me that it reduced inflammation.

Praise the Lord.

I’m going to try soaking in a bathtub of Epsom salts tonight to see if that can help get rid of the inflammation that has plagued my entire body for the last couple of years. Really, it’s not middle-aged weight gain. I swear.  My body has been retaining water for two years now and I feel like I’m about to pop. Hoping there’s a doctor out there that’s going to solve this problem for me.  But in the meantime, I’m going to give the Epsom salts a try.

Baby aspirin.  Epsom salts. Next thing you know, I’ll be asking the husb to rub Ben Gay all over my back.  I’ve become my grandma.

I think I’ll also take my latest issue of Conde Nast Traveler and read that while I’m soaking in the salts tonight. I’ll reduce inflammation and dream of traveling with the geriatric crowd on a Celebrity cruise ship.

“Start taking 1 baby aspirin each day,” the doctor told me.

28 Sunday Aug 2011

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When I was in high school for some reason I didn’t want to live past 40. I know. That sounds awfully morbid, but it’s true.  I don’t know if I had overheard my mother talking to someone about her aches and pains or if I overheard one of her friends doing the complaining, but I figured that life after 40 must all be downhill from there and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it.

Strangely, my life actually started to get interesting at 40.  It was that year when I met my husband and after all those years of being single and pretty much thinking the marriage ship had passed me by (and I had come to terms with that), I found a wonderful man and we had a fun-filled, adventurous  courtship for two years, after which we finally decided to get married.

But along came the aches and pains.  And some of them were just plain mysterious.

While I was having the time of my life, traveling the world, rendezvousing with my then boyfriend (and later husband) during our long-distance courtship, I began to experience  the slow metabolism.

The inflammation in my body.

The swelled hands.

The aches and pains.

Test after test and consultation after consultation with physicians, I was finally diagnosed with Lupus.

Crap.  Not the disease I wanted to hear about.  Just one year prior to my diagnosis, my best friend, Jessica Mears, died from complications of Lupus.

So, for about four years, I’d been treated for Lupus, only to find out recently from a second opinion that I don’t have Lupus.  (Really?  Are you kidding me?)

I’ve since fired the original rheumatologist who diagnosed me with Lupus and have begun seeing a new rheumatologist who seems very determined to find out the answers.  We don’t have the answers yet, but he did tell me to start taking 1 baby aspirin each day.

Baby aspirin. Isn’t that what old people take?

Now I really feel old and can’t help but think about that time in high school when I was certain things were just going to get really, really bad after age 40. (sigh)