News Taffy

They call it a mulligan in golf. It is when you get a do-over. That is what I would like to have for this last week. Actually, I would like to have a do-over for part of November, December and this first week of January. Why, you ask? Well, because I have been sick with various illnesses since before Thanksgiving.

It started one Saturday before I left for a trip to Philadelphia. I woke up and couldn’t feel my thumb, pointer finger and middle finger on both hands. Later on my knees, ankles, wrists and feet started to swell, along with my hands. I was moving around like an 80-year-old with arthritis. I came back from Philly early so I could see the doctor before we flew home for Thanksgiving. I arrived home only to find that Corbin was sick too with what looked like Fifth’s Disease, a virus that leaves kids looking like they’ve been slapped on the face. I had some blood work done, took Corbin to see his doctor who told us he had strep, too, we packed, filled his prescriptions and flew to Jonesboro.

When you can’t pin point exactly what is wrong with you and you have to wait for blood results, your mind can move to the dark side really quickly! I had convinced myself that I had all sorts of dread diseases. Once I was back in New York City, I was having coffee with a friend and telling her about my situation when she said, “I bet you have Fifth’s Disease, too!” I hadn’t considered it at all because I didn’t have the same symptoms as Corbin. So, standing on the street corner, we Google-d Fifth’s disease. The symptoms matched mine exactly. After yet another round of blood work, turns out that was the culprit.

In the process of getting the Fifth’s disease diagnosis, I also discovered through an MRI that I have two herniated discs in my neck. No more head stands in yoga for me! There is some physical therapy in my future to help with this.

Before Christmas, I started to get a head cold. It turned into a sinus infection which I started to treat with antibiotics two days before Christmas. I knew I had to get this under control because we were flying out Christmas night for a ski trip in Snowmass. It only got worse. I spent most of the Christmas vacation in the condo taking medication and monitoring my fever. We travel a lot and I have never been sick on any of our trips. After two different antibiotics, I was still sick and on vacation! We flew home, I saw my doctor again who informed me I also had an ear infection, too and started another antibiotic.

I’m feeling a little better today…THANK GOD! But, I still can’t hear out of my left ear or taste most of my food. I have decided that smell deprivation would make an excellent weight loss tool for anyone wanting to kick start the New Year by shedding some pounds. If you can’t taste the food, you don’t want to eat.

In between these two crazy illnesses, I ate at some amazing restaurants and also saw Elizabeth Taylor’s jewelry collection before it was auctioned off at Christie’s. I’ll tell you more about all of those experiences once I’m through with all of this medication and can think clearly. Once I can hear and taste again, I’m going to start 2012 over my way. I’ll use my mulligan. I’m going to do some yoga which I’ve not done since before Thanksgiving. And I’m going to eat some delicious food that I can actually taste!

You can read more about D.J’s adventures in the Big Apple at www.djduckworthyoga.com/blog follow her on twitter @mrsdjduckworth and also on Facebook.