It has been a little while since I have posted on the cholinergic urticaria blog, so I thought I would write a quick update post on a few things. First and foremost, I hope everyone had a great holiday season, and I hope 2010 brings some awesome things to us all.
I like to constantly examine my life and analyze it so that I can learn as much from it as I can. My wife and I had a year of big ups and big downs in 2009. Here is a quick recap of those:
Positive things that happened to me in 2009:
- My wife Graduated from Nursing School with her RN-BSN degree (a big dream come true)
- My wife got a job immediately after graduation (which is great considering the state of the economy)
- We bought our first house which was a dream come true (something I have wanted for years) and we love it
- We grew many more members on the forum of this site, and some of my other websites have grown in terms of income and traffic
- I feel like I have matured and grown as an individual
- I have decided to change my career path/business strategy slightly after agonizing and stressing for the last year, which I hope works out well
Negative things that happened to me in 2009:
- My wife’s younger sister passed away, which basically devastated the entire family, and we (my wife especially) still struggle with it.
- My Cholinergic Urticaria didn’t go away, which is something I had hoped for.
So there are the big highlights. Some big dreams came true, and some big tragedies also happened. That’s life I guess. But overall it was a good year considering.
My Plans and Hopes for 2010:
I am optimistic about 2010, and I feel like I have a fresh start in life or something. I now have my house, my wife is done with school, and I am going to be experimenting with different career/business ideas. I hope and pray it turns out to be a good year. My resolutions are as follows:
- Work extremely hard on “finding my purpose” in terms of my career, and pray it works out well and is successful
- Get in better shape and exercise more
- Try to eat healthy, but I will allow for the occasional treats
- Work really hard on trying to be happy with what I’ve got, and who I am. This is something I struggle with as I am a perfectionist and when I feel I am not doing well in an area in my life, I worry a lot about it. Hopefully I can just be more positive in this regard and accept life for what it is, while working hard and striving for happiness in all areas.
- Re-read the bible, and continue my studies in religion and life
How My Hives Have Been Doing, and How My Thinking Has Changed
My hives have still been here of course, and they are about the same in terms of intensity/frequency. I do find relief most of the time in my house because we don’t turn the thermostat on at all, and only use space heaters when we need them (and try to only run them as short of length as possible).
This saves us so much money on electricity (our previous one was $42, and our most recent was $70–not bad for a 3 bedroom house with a basement too). It also means that in rooms where we don’t have the heaters, it has gotten as cool as 40 degrees. But I enjoy it and just put a sweater on or something, and use my space heater to ensure I don’t get too cold.
It has also been a huge help that my wife basically has taken over many tasks that used to cause me a hives reaction. Like returning an item to walmart, my wife does that for me. She has also took postal packages for me when needed, even done shopping for me, going in to Subway and ordering our subs, and so forth. I am very appreciative of that fact, because it has helped me avoid many potential hives attacks and frustrations. In fact, it has been a while now since having hives in public due to this fact.
I have also pondered my hives a lot, and my thinking has changed a lot on cholinergic urticaria as of recent. It is funny because I really went through a process, and I will continue to progress through this situation. Like people say you have a process when you know you are going to die (like denial, anger, fear, acceptance, etc.) My hives have played out in a similar way:
- First I was confused and frustrated as to why my body was getting this tingling/itching sensation. I was really confused, had no idea what was happening to me, which was scary. I thought for a time I might be dying or have cancer or something. It didn’t help that the doctors didn’t know what it was either, which really freaked me out.
- Then, over the years, that confusion settled down once I realized I wasn’t alone, and my condition had a name, and didn’t appear to be fatal. That helped a lot. The confusion over what I had, however, soon was replaced with anger and a deeper confusion. I began asking, “why me?,” and more importantly, “what the heck is causing this cholinergic urticaria, and what can I do to treat it?”
- This then led to a period where I logically thought, “I know what condition this is, and I know something must be causing this, so what?” At that point I tortured my mind day and night trying to find a practical solution to curing the cholinergic urticaria symptoms. I did everything from putting myself through difficult diet regimens and even fasting, experimenting with antihistamines, to working out, to exposing myself to the sun, to vitamin supplementation, anti-yeast medication, and more. None of this seemed to do the trick, which led to even more frustration and feelings of failure and hopelessness.
- At this point, I think that I am finally in the “acceptance” phase. Given all of the research, experiments, and more, I have finally realized this fact about cholinergic urticaria: I have it, and w hile I don’t know everything about it, I must live with it the best I can because there is basically nothing I can reasonably do about it. At this point, I have no other option than to simply, “live with it, and get over it.” I know that I may have this off and on during the majority of my life (although I try to remain positive that it will go away soon for good). I also know that there is basically nothing I can do in terms of medication, unless I do heavy duty drugs (such as steroids), of which I don’t want the side effects that come along with it. But I am no longer going to put myself through this mental thing that I can somehow cure it. I have given it my best shot, and done everything I reasonably can.
Even if they can find out the exact mechanisms and cause of cholinergic urticaria, I honestly don’t think they would be able to do anything about it without giving some heavy medications that could potentially mess up other things in the body. So that is how my thinking has changed over the years since living with this condition. I hate the hives, but I deal with it. It has messed up my life in many ways and has limited what I am able to do even on a daily basis, but whining about it doesn’t solve anything either. And in the end, I need to be thankful for what I have, and learn to deal with those things I don’t have (like perfect health).
In any event, that is a quick update on some of my thoughts, and a quick recap of the year. I hope you all have a slammin’ 2010, and many of your dreams come true. I also hope and pray this is the year that our hives may mysteriously disappear for good. Stay positive, keep fighting, and learn to manage your hives as best as possible (both mentally and physically). Till next post,
Ben (HivesGuy)
Sponsored Links
Posted under general information
This post was written by Ben on January 8, 2010
