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Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt

Today, the African violet leaves that I planted back in June of 2012 are bearing beautiful blooms! Not just ones and twos, but many of the plantlets have grown and are putting forth colorful flowers. The splashes of magenta, purple, blue, white, and even green are, indeed, glorious. But one of the things that truly…

I’m embarking on a new leg of my journey with lupus, after learning that one of the medications I’ve been taking for a long while is causing damage to my retinas. The next year will be, to say the least, very telling. The effects may or may not be reversible. The disease may or may…

The process of getting a diagnosis for some illnesses can be fairly straightforward. But for some it can take years of testing and perseverance. Some lupus patients I know went 5+ years before their doctors determined the reason for their symptoms. Some people have problems that have defied explanation, even after batteries of tests. A…

Yesterday was a tough doctor day for me. I had to have retests of my retinas for a problem that may or may not be related to one of the medications I take to treat lupus and keep it (moderately) at bay. Unfortunately, the tests were, once again, abnormal, and I’ll be seeing another doc…

When I heard the news story today about the Mississippi child who was born with HIV and now, 2 1/2 years later, seems to be cured, I was very happy for researchers and others who have been working in the trenches to understand, treat and eventually erradicate HIV-AIDS.  Of course, this one story is not…

Whenever someone visits or lives in a place where snow has recently fallen, I ask them to “throw a snowball for me.” It was one of my favorite things to do, when I lived in blizzard-prone places, and I still like the vicarious glee of thinking of one of those cold orbs arcing across the…

I am constantly amazed by the great strides researchers in all aspects of medicine are making to identify, diagnose and treat heart problems. From ethical research focused on using an adult’s own cardiac stem cells to regenerate heart tissue that has died due to heart attack, to the medications that have been and are being…

We do live in a competitive, success-driven society!  I once heard someone say that she had prayed for a cure for her kidney-involved lupus and her prayer was successful; she believed she was cured completely, lupus-free, although her kidneys were still failing and she eventually needed a transplant. The topic of the use of the…

So far, this has been a more painful Lent than usual. Lung inflammation, joint pain – ah, lupus! The twinges, aches, and stabs sure make pain immediately present. And one of the things I’m trying to do when they occur is bring Lent into the present, too. So often, pain takes us out of where…

Calling all multi-tasking, over-stressed, well-intentioned people with chronic illness! (and I mean myself, too): You do not have to do it all. Not even if the nicest person from church calls you to ask you a “favor” because he/she knows that you’re home all day and you “must have a few minutes” to help out…
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