Lupus SLE Rears it's ugly head

Well, I haven't been able to Blog OR play bass for that matter for a few weeks. The painful symptoms of Lupus SLE hit me hard and shut down all the fun! Lupus is an autoimmune disease, and your immune system can turn on itself. Where one person will have the flu and take a couple days off of work, if you have Lupus and get that same flu, it will send you to the hospital and can be a fatal infection. In my case, it wasn't flu. I had this great idea to try snow skiing again,I hadn't done so since years prior to my Lupus diagnosis, and thought I was feeling strong and good enough to do so. However, all it took was riding the lift to the top of the mountain that I realized I was in trouble. My hands and specifically fingers were hurting so bad, as were my knees, and I hadn't even gotten off the lift yet! It was the cold weather. I was bundled up too. But, with my Lupus comes poor circulation to my fingers. Therefore, I got off the lift and automatically wanted to get down the mountain as fast as I could to thaw my hands outs. I was actually nauseated from the pain in my hands and fingers. As I skiied down, my knees felt like I'd been a pro skier for years and had two old knee injuries, which I don't, but they hurt too. When I finally got to the bottom, I ended up in the lodge next to the fire. I told my friends and family to keep skiing, I fine. This little outting cause a month of what is called in Lupus Circles as a "Lupus Flare"....when lupus rears its ugly head and symptoms return. Luckily, mine were confined to my joint pain, fingers, and horrible exhaustion and days on the couch. I am also very fortunate that it didn't attack my kidneys as in the past or my lungs.

BUT, when my friends said, hey! We are ready to put this new band thing together and here is the first track I've written, AND we have a wonderful singer, I did sit up off the couch! So bottom line, I won't be going skiing anymore, I really wasn't that into it, I was always jealous that I could snowboard instead. I am getting better every day and following doctor orders.

It is more important to me to live a long life, and enjoy my family and passions than it is to do activities I don't think through very well. I know my boundaries, I just try to do more than I should and be the person I used to be.

Our new music is pretty cool I have to say though, and I'm learning some new techniques which are helping my playing. I think we are actually going to have a full line up, a full set list, and shows set up by the end of the year! I just pray I stay healthy. I still study a lot at www.activebass.com and watch all the music channels to find songs with different bass lines to learn. For those of you that are healthy and can play bass or guitar, I mean are shredders deluxe!!! Count your blessings!! It takes great talent to do what you do! You inspire me. Also inspiring me are people on my YouTube channel who say nice things about my journey to grow old playing the bass....ha! Yes, and I DO mean old! Keep those comments coming, they keep me going.

As far as gear....I played my friend's Geddy Lee Fender Bass the other night. I had gotten mixed views on it and not knowing all that much about which bass is best for which music, I loved it. The only con was that the bass itself was too heavy for me, my shoulder was pretty sore after the jam. I am used to my little Peavey. The Fender shoulded awesome and the neck was small and easy to play like my Peavey. PLUS, I do love active pickups!!! So, I've played an Ibanez 5-string, Geddy Lee Fender, and my little Peavey Millenium and have to say they were all great sounding. The Ibanez had the deepest tones, the Fender second and my Peavey third. But that is probably because I am not setting it up correctly. Keep playin! Susie