I'll start at the present time. It's hard to recap the past.
We had quite a bit of rain this past week. Our house is weird. We have 2 levels of basement. My room is on the upper basement level. NEVER has my room flooded. We've had "hurricanes" hit PA and no flooding in the upper level. But oh yeah I wake up, put my feet on the floor to get out of bed and the floor is sopping wet. WTF. The entire floor was soaked. Puddles. Little puddles all over the place. Of course my laptop bag was on the floor, big expensive Disney books, board games (ok so I have a 75th anniversary edition Disney Monopoly never opened) Camera bag, you name it. Why is it that all of my nice stuff was on the floor?! THANK GOD my laptop was double bagged...it only went through the first bag, and not the sleeve. The camera safe. The books....:'( Ok well I don't know if you know how I am with books....I don't like my books ruined, I don't like my book pages bent, folded, wrinkled etc. Do you know what water does to books? UGH. So now I have curly paged books. They're expensive. I can't buy new ones. That's stupid. The monopoly collectors edition had to be opened...it was soaked through. I spent the next day with Joe (to the rescue) moving furniture, packing my life away, soaking up the carpets, [Floods + Chiari + Allergies = Do not mix well] We were up until about 4 AM the next day just sucking up water. Joe was the best. He did the most of it. He didn't have to. He kept making me go upstairs and sit/lay down. <3 I owe Joe big time for his help though. I think I'm going to owe him Chipotle for life.
So now I'm in the drying process. Rotating furniture, drying, rotating, drying. It's tedious. And it smells.
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A Chiarian named Teresa Taft messaged me on my Chiari-Life page to let me know about this Facebook group called: Chiarians Swap Socks.
" I have started a group called Chiarians Swap Socks; a way to show an act of kindness and spread awareness at the same time. I just started in about a month ago and I can not believe the response. It's amazing the kindness and the effort we are making to spread it through out the world! What we do is post on the group wall that we are looking to swap socks or a sock buddy then people will comment if they want and exchange info through personal message. This month socks are to try and have purple in them, because that's our ribbon color, and also those that want can help bring awareness to childhood awareness this month also which is yellow. Next month will be pink for breast cancer awareness. The most important part of this group is decorating our envelopes with Chiari Awareness; sharing what we know and hoping for better education for doctors. We are in the US, Australia, UK, Canada, and more. You don't have to have Chiari to join. All I ask is that you put the name of the group on the envelope, so everyone will know where it came from with Chiari Awareness under it please. Thank you so much for letting me tell you my story. Some of my words may be messed up or my sentences don't make sense I'm sorry it's part of it two there are over two hundred symptoms for Chiari
This is my way of trying to help mainly living on the couch or bed because of pain and the medication We need help , we need a cure cause there is none. "
The basic idea...You post in the group that you're looking for Swap buddies...wait for others to reply. Or reply to others who posted looking for Swap buddies. Then you PM (private message) each other addresses. The fun part...Sock shopping. Head out to Wal-Mart, Target, $5 Below, $1 Store etc. and get some fun socks! Each month Teresa will post a few different Awareness ideas for that month. Its up to you if you'd like to send socks of that awareness color/idea or if you want to stick with Purples or Holiday Socks etc. You can throw in trinkets, teas, charms, etc. Anything else is entirely up to you. The packages....Design the outside of your packages until you fill them up with Chiari Awareness facts, statistics, symptoms, pictures, and anything you can think of. (Be sure to leave room for the addresses lol)
It is a closed group so member information stays private. The idea is to spread as much awareness as possible by the changing of hands through the postal system, while having fun doing it. If you're interested in taking part click below:
Chiarians Swap Socks
You do have to have a Facebook account in order to join.
Teresa Taft has spent a lot of time, energy, and money on this project. She has put her heart and soul into this. If you could take a minute of your time and stop by Anne Marie Tiernon WTHR and post something on their page about Chiari Malformation. Let them know what this disorder is, how it affects you and your life. Let them know about the group and the awesome job that Teresa is doing!
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I've also found this awesome site for vinyl window decals: Dip Graphix & Dip Graphix & Decals
They have a huge sale going on with their Chiari Awareness decals until the beginning of November! You can get a pack of 30 for $25 or 50 for $50. Otherwise they're $2.00 each. So be sure to stop by and check them out!! Tell them Alicia at Chiari-life sent you:)
Don't forget to LIKE Chiari-Life on Facebook!
#chiarilife
