"Whispers of Fall Dancing in the Wind" - An Abstract Painting by Melissa Adams

"Whispers of Fall Dancing in the Wind"   4" x 4"     Acrylic on Gessoboard

 NOT FOR SALE

Well hello there, my long lost friends - those of you who I hope still remember who I am! I'm so sorry for having gone missing for so long on here, but things have gotten rather intense over here medically speaking and I just now am regaining the strength I need to even just sit up on my own in the morning (still not there yet) let alone sit up for long periods of time to paint. I've missed it so much more than I ever thought I would and I am just dying to truly get back to the easel!

Here's my painting all set up on it's easel in our home. It's my feeble attempt at cheering up our house AND showcasing my painting at the same time, all while creating a little "Fall Moment" filled with joy in the Living Room. I'm a sucker for Burlap and Pine-cones - there's even more scattered throughout the house, including places like the fireplace and Levi's shelf - I mean the pine-cones of course... I mean, they're just so incredibly cute and festive - you gotta love them!

So I guess it's been a whole month now since I suffered a massive, and I mean MASSIVE "throw-me-on-my-back - no longer able to take care of myself or the kids - walkin' like the Tin Man - using the wheelchair around the house - being taken care of like an invalid" type of flare. It's left me and my whole family reeling from the weight of it all, and we're finally, by the grace of God, finding our way back into the land of the living rather than the "just surviving." It feels like everything I've learned, all my pain management techniques and bio-feedback, all the breathing, relaxing, stretching and everything I've learned over this last year was just wiped away in one fell swoop of God's hand and made useless due to one tiny rainy weather system and a few other elements that all stacked up at once and took us down HARD. We hit rock bottom again, just like last winter, and I sobbed like a little child who lost their favorite toy at the reality that everything I feared, everything I tried to tell myself wouldn't happen again DID INDEED HAPPEN, and it happened so quickly we barely had time to react.

So there I was, struggling to breathe, to move, to live, to exist and to just try and get in a measly 5 minutes of play with my dear sweet little boys, just as if we never left last winter behind us last year. I was in a bad way, so much so that my mom, my sweet ever self-sacrificial mom, gave up every moment she could to be with us and try to help us through it, watching the boys, making dinner, cleaning the house, helping Ty get in some precious moments of work actually AT the office. And Ty's mom and dad just started watching the boys again for us as well, with Karla giving up two whole days to devote to them entirely so Ty can get in even more time at work - which I must admit as a mother is both incredibly wonderful and terribly painful for me. It's just so hard to watch my sweet little boys being taken from my home into anothers, even sweet loving "Gaga", to be raised by someone other than myself. It hurts and that's all there is to it. I feel for all you working mom's out there - you guys are amazing, facing the pain and the dilemma each and every work day in order to make ends meet and have a home for your family - you amaze me!

And it's not just me who's been struggling with all this - it's been hard for everyone I love, trust me! My sister and her awesome teenage daughter, Willow, have been essential in my new trial at a Gluten Free lifestyle. Going Gluten Free saved Willow's adolescense in so many ways - she was constantly suffering from excruciating pain in her hips and her wrists and one day my sister decided to see if there was any way it was possibly linked to Gluten, and by golly, getting Willow off it solved EVERYTHING! It's definitely an avenue to explore, that's for sure, though it doesn't work for everyone. 

Right now I miss my boys so much, the two little ones and the 6'1" one as well. I've been having the strangest symptoms lately as well of such overwhelming fatigue that it feels like I'm a narcoleptic or something at times. I've spilled far too many coffees, breakfasts, and even bowls of ice-cream into my lap because of it, as like a toddler, I fall asleep quite uncontrollably while I'm eating. I sleep insane hours - no joke, sleeping consistently 18-20 hours so many days out of the week that it unnerves me and seems so unnatural. It's actually quite scary at times, and it can be hard for Ty to rouse me awake - yet another chore for that poor over-worked man to have on his plate. For better or worse, though, and I don't even know if we've seen the worst of it yet, but he sure has borne far more than most men have had to in this department. Yet we ALL have our own forms of BAD. This auto-immune disorder just happens to be ours, and it's a toughy. And we don't even have it as bad as others do, if you want to start comparing, but I have to say this still isn't easy by any means. It will be by God's grace alone that we will get through this winter, and all the winters after that. But still, I find myself facing the wind and the rain and all the storms in my life, be they emotional, physical or literal, that are sure to come our way with a sick feeling in my gut, terror and fear gripping me, and a broken, wavering heart. How do we do this? Is this our life - forever?

After all, we weren't sure that this winter would even be that bad. Well, everyone else wasn't, though I can't say the same for myself. For some reason, no matter how hard I tried to deny it, I just couldn't shake the certainty that even though we had come so far, that a huge flare of pain was coming, coming hard and fast and every bit as bad as it was before. And so, when it hit us I felt instantly crushed. It was a Wednesday, and I had a very dear and amazing friend over, one of those kinds of friends that you pray for all your life and praise the Lord for finally bringing them to you. Those steadfast, through the muck and real-life "this is me, with my guard down and what you see is what you get" types of girls that loves you despite all of that. Oh, she's a keeper alright. In fact, all my dearest friends are and I love them for that! I can't even begin to tell you how much it was worth every moment in those seven full years of praying to have those type of steadfast women of faith like that in my life, but I am so very grateful for them! If you don't have friends like this - don't lose hope my friends, just pray without ceasing and have faith that God will bring them to you in his timing, and He will. Like I said, it took 7 years, but it was worth every second of that wait!

Anyways, I had a dear friend over, and as it seems to happen whenever a little friend of the boys' comes over, my boys acted like I fed them spoonfuls of sugar topped with coffee that morning, and I started getting more exhausted than is usual for me. It was that scary kind of tired, the type that leads down avenues of pain I'd rather not visit. So I called Tyler soon after she left and he immediately came home to my aid, as I was huffing and puffing just by walking around the house. He took over the boys and I lay down and tried to regain my strength. That Friday we had a girls night at my home, (oh how it was amazing to see all the faces I have missed so much over this last year!!!) and Tyler, my knight in shining armor, literally did everything to make it happen so I didn't have to move a muscle. How I convinced that man to marry me I still haven't figured out, but it puzzles me every day! Anyways, after a mix up that night with my Doc we ended up heading to the ER to pick up a mixed up prescription and they could immediately see I wasn't doing so well. They gave me some Valium and Dilaudid and sent me home. From that point on, my exhaustion exploded - I quite literally slept 3 days straight, other than taking small moments to eat or use the washroom or give the boys a kiss and whisper that I love them... =) Unfortunately a few days later we ended up back in the ER merely because the pain became unbearable, and it required getting a shot this time, which helped a ton, and from that point on I started working hard with all my Drs. to figure out what was causing such a ridiculously hard flare.

We've taken leaps and bounds in my care since then, starting on working up some flare plans for everything from mild to severe flares like this one, but I'm still finding it hard to make a plan for something so completely debilitating. I mean, I can measure how bad I'm doing by whether or not I can handle even the simple task of painting or walking around the house without a walker, the first of which is known as a wonderful form of therapy in so many ways. But it's been weeks since I've been able to handle sitting up long enough to even paint a little bit, let alone hold the paintbrush and get out my supplies. Perhaps I should Google how to paint while laying down like Frida Kahlo did most of her life due to her horrible accident when she was young, but then again, that's most likely a recipe for disaster in a household with two little boys constantly running around getting their fingers around every single thing in it. Perhaps that's not such a great idea after all... But slowly, like last year, and with the help of many wonderful souls, we'll get through this winter to face a beautiful spring. I know in all my heart that God will get us through this - after all this is His good and perfect plan for our lives, and God simply doesn't make mistakes nor does He pick up the pieces like a confused parent, trying to make the most of what's left. God not only allowed this for my life, He filtered it and planned it specifically for me and my family because He knew we could use it to help us grow and mature in Him, and eventually He will use it for great things some day, even if I never do get to see them here on earth.

Wow, I'm sorry for going on and on like that for so long, I've just had so very much on my mind, on my heart and on my plate, and I feel like it's been ages since I last checked in with you on here. It's so therapeutic to write things out and share them with others, though I imagine that it might bore some of you (if not all of you) to death at times. But that's alright, not boring you to death, that is. I just meant there's always that handy-dandy little scroll bar to help cut to the chase of the matter and skip through all the type to see the pictures. For those who truly enjoy to listen, I thank you from the depths of my being - you have no idea how much it means to me to have such sweet and loyal followers of my art, and to those who don't, I want to thank you as well. I love all my readers, even if you don't really care so much about the words and just want to see the work! I feel blessed either way!!! So I'll leave with this - this last picture that was taken not too long before my major flare hit this Fall, and it's just happy little me, all covered in paints in the middle of the night after having poured myself into creating quite a pile of art and a wonderful mess of beautiful abstracts. I do believe abstracts are my joy-finders - they are so random and lovely and make me smile nearly every single time I do them, so perhaps I should try doing them more often! Trust me, if I can get up some more regular posts this month, I'll be sharing each one of them with you that I made that night. Oooh, and I have a new contest for this month as well, though I honestly haven't decided what it should be yet. I should hope to have it up by tomorrow, Lord willing, so stay tuned because this may just be your lucky month. =0)   Either way, it will be an easy one to participate in, so it's worth doing if you have even only a minute of your time to spare. Well, I hope to talk to you soon, my dear friends! May God bless you this day!  =)

Little Missy Messy Hands  =0)