Be you!

Dear Readers,

      I know it has been a while since I have posted a blog. I have been pretty busy lately. From doctors appointments to choir practice and so much more I have really not had much time to breath! Haha! I try to stay busy. Thats how I keep from getting upset about having JDM I guess. I just try to keep life as normal as possible.
      For the couple months after I was diagnosed with JDM I was mad and upset, but once  I got over that and realized that I had JM so that I could be the voice for all the little children who couldn't tell their story I felt much better. One thing that had really been weighing on my mind though is how my friends seemed to be coming to see my less often as the months went on. I always had my family and my boyfriend there but my "friends" seemed to just disappear. I did have a few that came to see me as often as they could but it always seemed different.
      The summer of 2012 just sucked. Like really. You see the disease is made more active by the sun so I couldn't do most of the things I used to enjoy doing such as riding my boat and fishing. I soon found a way to distract myself from the boredom though. I started cooking more. And not just anything I started cooking healthy. The doctors told me over and over again that weight gain was expected with the type of medicine I was on but I, being the competitive person I am,  said that I was not going to gain weight. I was going to lose it. So that is what I did and I have lost 30 pounds since.
      So summer passed and it was time for school. I was so afraid of going back. I had not been at the school since January of 2012. I actually cried because I was just so over whelmed. I am a normal person, Im not some super human who is just happy all the time and I will be the first one to say that. I just choose to rejoice in what I was given instead of dwell in the fact that I have a chronic illness.When I got into school thought I realized that I was freaking out for nothing.
      On the first day of school I could feel everyone starring at me. Some people walked up to me and ask me where I had been. Some told me they thought I had moved but the majority of the people just ignored me. Then there were the people who came up to me and put on this big show, im not sure who for, telling me how much they missed me and how bad they felt for me and the the next day they would not even give me the time of day! It was a lonely feeling though. And I realized that I had become very quiet. Before I had gotten sick I was very vocal and I always tried to talk to people but now I kept to myself. I was afraid I guess of what people thought of me.
      After a few months I kind of got back into the grove of things with the help of my closest and bestest friend Taylor Helmstetter. She and I sang together in a group call the Toula Girls before I got sick but like I was saying It did take a while for me to get used to school again. It didnt help that I can only attend school on the days that I'm feeling good. But anyways I started talking with people and letting them know that I was the same Callie that I used to be. That I wasn't contagious or anything like that. I was still Callie. I still loved music, and talking, and all the things I used to love. I just do some things a little different. JDM won't stop me though from doing what I love to do. Nothing should ever stop anyone from doing what they love. Never change who you are because you have a disability or sickness. Be who you want to be and do what you want to do.
Love ALWAYS,
Callie

To learn more about JM please visit www.curejm.org