I'm catching up on Lost, since it's leaving Netflix streaming this Friday. I'm currently on S3, and watching the Nikki and Paulo episode. HI-larious.

And I simply don't think that's true. I think "unlimited energy to do whatever they desire" applies to a very small minority, if anyone.

"unlimited energy to do whatever they desire" may just be the writer's perspective, at that time. I gathered from the article that the writer was in college when she wrote this essay. If she's been living with lupus for a long time already, she probably spent at least part of her high school years with lupus, while her friends and classmates bounced around with the enormous energy of the healthy young. I don't think she's comparing herself to, say, 40-somethings who don't have the energy they used to have, but to late-teen-and-early-20-somethings who even to me seem to have unlimited energy.

I gathered from the article that the writer was in college when she wrote this essay

That is a good point that I hadn't considered.

Seska, it's even worse. My mom has fibromyalgia, Sjögren's and a couple other conditions so she feels like "if I can do x, you can do x". No, Mom, I can't. I don't know how your disability works for you but I know what I can and can't do without huge consequences. And honestly? She can't, either. She regularly drives herself into month long bedrest and hospital visits because she does not know when to back off and take care of herself.

I think the spoons metaphor is very helpful. It's imperfect for the reasons mentioned but I think it's largely true that healthy able-bodied young people don't think about what mundane tasks they can do before their body collapses. Before I became disabled, I didn't. In fact, for a number of years after I became disabled I didn't because I hadn't really come to grips with my condition and what it would mean for me.

The good: The gluten-free brownies I made for my co-workers (one has celiac) were so good that they were all eaten up.

The bad: Now there are no brownies left for ME even though I had to stay late.

The lesson: Next time, make extra brownies and hide them.

The lesson: Next time, make extra brownies and hide them.

Then make more extra brownies and put them in a glass case and label it, "In case of emergency, break glass."

Sigh. The motivation fairy visited me for like, an hour. And then she left. And I'm NOT DONE. But I had to stop to eat something because it was 1:30, and now it's...3:15 and I haven't started again. Doh.

But then won't the brownies have shards of glass in them? I'm seeing a downside to your plan...

Congratulations, Aims!

But then won't the brownies have shards of glass in them? I'm seeing a downside to your plan...

Good point. Maybe something like this to protect the Emergency Brownies:

[link]