Hello everyone, I know I’m bad at keeping up a regular posting schedule.

This past week I had the opportunity to volunteer at MDA Nevada’s annual Summer Camp. This was my 5th summer camp and 6th year of volunteering with MDA Nevada. To say I love these kids would be an understatement. There are just no words for how amazing they are and getting to spend this one week with them and creating a fun and enriching environment is wonderful! I love going to camp every year, it is one of the biggest highlights of my year!

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Unfortunately for me, camp does come with some set backs. Because this is a week long stay over camp and I am an Activities Lead, my body gets worn out a lot quicker than it does during the regular part of the year. I love this camp and I love these kids, it makes me so angry that my body tires out so easily that it makes it hard for me to keep up with everyone throughout the week.

We come to this camp as volunteers and are told to put away all of our problems and focus on our campers, and I do that. Having whatever this is frustrates me because I do not want my kids to see me looking worn down and sick. I want to feel good so that I can keep up with them and keep being my crazy self that they seem to enjoy.

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I fear that there might be a day that I cannot go to camp because of this Collagen-Vascular Disease, I pray that never happens. This camp means so much to me, these kids are just to wonderful for me to ever have to leave.

Every year when I get back from camp my recovery time varies. This year, I was already going into a flare at the beginning of camp that caused me to loose my voice…yup…me with no voice. Fortunately, Nurse Robin gave me NyQuil every night which helped to fight off the bronchitis while I was at camp. I slept straight through Saturday night into Sunday night (I was deeply in need of some rest). At work today I sounded like a groggy old woman with a smokers voice, but hey, too broke to skip work.

I know that there is no easy answer to how to fix whats wrong, I do want a complete diagnosis though, just being told “well it could be this, this or this, for right now we’ll give you this”. Explaining my chronic illness becomes such a jumbled mess when I say “Collagen Vascular Disease”, no one knows what that is so I have to say that it is an umbrella term for multiple diseases like Lupus, Rheumatoid arthritis and others. We all just want easy answers to how to feel better but that does not ever seem to be the case.

I am thinking about trying the AIP Diet or Anti-Inflammatory Protocol Diet, but it is a very strict elimination diet that eliminates the majority of my favorite foods for a few weeks to find out if any of them affect me…Sounds horrible. But, now that I am back from camp and need to go to the store, now seems like the best time!

Let’s hope I get over this cough and can get some energy back so I can try doing the AIP diet! Ill update you on how that goes -_-

Till Next Time