Lessons from Sporadic Artie

Life with Sporadic Artie (Psoriatic Arthritis / PsA) has taught me lots of useful stuff. Most of the recent lessons have been taught in the week or so before each infusion, when one part of my body or another decides to do something interesting and unexpected. The malady of the week this week is unusually swollen and incredibly painful fingertips. And not ALL fingertips, just SOME fingertips. This weeks' lessons include, but are not limited to:

- How to Experience Intense Pain and Not Swear Quite Vociferously No Matter How Much Better You Might Feel if You Did (see the next lesson learned) 

- How to Turn the Beginning of the Exclamation of a Profane Word Into the Overly Loud Usage of a Mundane Word (ex. Fu...dgesicles, Sh...eboygen, Holy F...ather please help me make it through the week until my infusion without lobbing off my fingers in an attempt to end this agony!) 

- How to Accomplish Nearly Everything with the Use of Two Fingers or Fewer ... including typing, brushing teeth, making dinner, and various cleaning activities.

- How to Convince Your Children to do Anything Requiring Hand Usage ... including dishes, laundry, opening things, making coffee using a french press and requiring grinding the coffee beans, assisting with craft activities, taking Legos apart, and packing their own stuff for camp. 

- To Live in Gratitude for helpful children, a helpful spouse, books and internet on Kindle due it's finger-friendly design,  and blocks of chili in the freezer which make making dinner that much easier. 

Although living with Sproadic Artie isn't always easy, he certainly has a lot to teach us, even if they're not lessons we' particularly wanted to learn.