Making My Dreams Come True

Life is often compared to being like a roller coaster. The twists and turns, the ups and downs, fast times and laughter, that always eventually, comes to a screeching halt. I like anyone else, have had my share. I've laughed and I've cried. I've been uber happy, and I've cried thinking that there was no way out. Everyone though, has dreams. It's when you put one foot in front of the other, to make those dreams come true that sets you apart. Let me give you just a little glimpse into my life, and my dreams.

All of my life, I never truly felt "good". Even though I was a typical teenage girl that giggled with her friends and cheered on the football field every Friday night under the lights, I was just a little too tired. My muscles ached a little too much, and I seemed to wake up as tired as I went to bed, no matter how much sleep I received. My mom used to tell me "Oh you're fine", and I'd walk away feeling sad and quite honestly a little depressed because I wasn't "fine". I was tired.

Fast forward in my life. I was a wife, and the mom of four kids that I loved more than my anything. Still though, I never truly felt "good". I would have times that I felt better than others, and then I'd have times that I'd literally ask myself "Wtfreak is wrong with you?! You shouldn't be feeling like this". My mom had it embedded in my brain, that it was "all in my head". Finally, in my late 30's, I reached out to a new family doctor I had started going to. I told her how I felt. She looked at me a moment, then told me that she was going to run a few blood tests. I thought to myself, "Really? There might really be something wrong with me after all?!" as I nodded my head and took the paperwork from her hands.

I had those blood tests done and didn't really think too much about it. A few days later, I received a phone call that literally rocked my world. The doctor called and said that a few things were abnormal with my blood work. My SED rate and ESR were both sky high, and ANA came back positive, with a speckled pattern. She told me that she thought I had a disease called Lupus and was referring me to a Rheumatologist in Toledo, OH. I was fascinated that there might truly have been something wrong with me my entire life, yet I was scared to death at the same time. I made the appointment with the rheumatologist, then waited patiently for the month until my appointment to see him.

When I saw the rheumatologist, he was a short little man, with a very displeasing short little attitude too. In all honestly, he scared me to death lol! He put me through yet another barrage of testing and then called me to come in for another appointment. At that next appointment he evaluated me again. He pushed on me here and pressed on me there. He had me stand, he had me sit, and he even had me walk! He then said to get dressed and he would see me in his office.

I walked into his office and sat down and he sat there and just looked at me in silence for a few minutes. Then he opened a desk drawer up, pulled out a pamphlet and handed it to me. He said "You don't have Lupus, you have Fibromyalgia. Here's some literature on it that you can read, but there isn't any cure. I'll see you back in 6 months" and then ushered me out the door.

What in the world had just happened? All that kept going through my head were the words "there is no cure". I literally choked back tears for the 40 minute drive back home. My husband had gone with me to the appointment. I kept trying to speak to him about this and he didn't want to talk to me. He just kept saying that the guy was rude and he didn't trust him. He wouldn't really let me talk out loud, or contemplate anything about it with him. I got home and started reading online about Fibromyalgia and although the symptoms fit, I refused to believe that I would have something that there wasn't a cure for. A few short weeks ago, I was excited that finally a doctor was listening to me and finally acknowledged that there might be something wrong with me. For once in my life, someone was agreeing I might have something wrong and I for the first time had HOPE that I might now be treated and finally feel like a real human. This doctor ripped that right away, by telling me I have something that they can't cure. They can't make it go away. Nope, I wasn't going to believe him. He was the rudest doctor with the worst bedside manor I'd ever encountered, so he had to be wrong. He just didn't want to be bothered with me and was brushing me off as having Fibromyalgia.

In the upcoming days I did a lot of research and reading. I live in NW Ohio, and I ended up calling The Cleveland Clinic, Department of Rheumatology. I went over everything with them, and asked if I could be seen for a second opinion. They assigned me to a world-renowned rheumatologist by the name of Dr. Carmen Gota. I had another month wait to get in to see her. I spent a full day on campus, going through one test after another, along with the most intense physical exam by her that I had ever had in my life! She was amazing. She listened. She asked me questions dating back to infancy and the fact I had been born 6 weeks early, back in 1970. She too, pushed and poked and prodded me and had me walk and a whole range of other things that I can't even remember all of these years later. I was scheduled to come back to go over everything, in 2 weeks.

When I walked back into Dr Gota's office that day 2 weeks later, she sat down and she reached out and took my hands in hers. She said, "Amy, I hate to say this, but you really DO have Fibromyalgia and unfortunately at this time, there is no cure". I was in disbelief. To say the car ride home with my husband that day was somber, is the biggest understatement of my life. I really hated Fibromyalgia, and there really wasn't a cure.

Having always liked to write, I decided to start a blog. I needed an outlet for my flood of emotions and it was clear that talking about them with my husband wasn't going to happen. I had heard about "blogs" before, mainly by being in an online parenting group for several years prior. I was the most UN-techie person in the universe though lol. I was still bound and determined that I was going to figure out how to make a blog. So I did, and so started The Fibro Frog.

Mind you, I started TFF, just to have a place to vent. To let my feelings fly. Every dang blog that I had found on fibro right after my diagnosis, was all this rah-rah cheerleader "We're warriors" ..."We've got this" ..."We're unbeatable" type of ....garbage. I'm sorry, but it truly WAS garbage in my opinion. I was angry! In fact, I was downright pissed off! In today's day & age, there was still soooo little known about fibromyalgia. So much conflicting information on the internet, and NO CURE?! NO WAY!

My thoughts were "if people happen upon one of these other blogs they're not going to really know how horrible it truly is to be trapped inside a sick body. A body that has something that has been wrecking havoc on me since I was a child, and something that has just gotten progressively worse over the years. NO. People need to know the truth and understand what it's really like, so that maybe ...just maybe, there will be more donations and funding marked for fibro research, to possibly find a cure in my lifetime". So with my little (and I mean little, I had like 3 subscribers at that early time ..God bless my daughters and best friend haha) spot in the internet I set out to shed light on the truth about Fibromyalgia.

One day when I woke up, I went to my blog and I had 50 followers! FIFTY! I was just in absolute disbelief. Fifty people wanted to read what I had to say? I was amazed. Then I hit 100. Then 500. I about died! The entire time that the blog was gaining new followers, my husband was acting weirder and weirder. Finally one day, he sat me down and said "Amy I'm sorry, but I can't do this any more. I'm sorry, but I really thought that you would have something they could fix. I just can't stay with you anymore. I just can't stay with someone who's always going to be sick. Knowing that there isn't a cure stresses me out. My blood pressure has been running high because of it and I just can't do it." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I bawled and begged and pleaded. I loved him more than life. He did stay. But for just awhile longer. I can't tell you how that turned my life upside down. I poured every bit of myself into reading, researching, advocating for a cure, and writing.

Luck was on my side, and even with basically a few years hiatus from the blog, to this day it's fb page still has almost 17,000 followers. Pouring everything I had into the blog, I was so extremely blessed with the way it took off. Healthline ranked it as a top fibro blog internationally several years in a row, and each year would have it certified for medical accuracy. CNN and Everyday Health's Dr Sanjay Gupta interviewed me and a few articles were published as a result of that interview. The issue of Teen Vogue that broke the story of Lady Gaga having fibro contains a quote from me within the story. Companies started hitting me up, asking me to do reviews for them. Many online magazines and websites reached out for me to guest author. Local publications made me part of their blog teams. I also have interviewed many doctors and researchers out there, along with writing blog posts for companies such as Synergy Health. All of this was for no, to very little pay though. I just didn't have a clue what I was really worth!

Shortly after my husband left me, because he was too big of a coward to stay with someone that was "sick", I put together a seminar on living with chronic pain. It's geared towards those that suffer, along with their friends and family. I didn't know how to really get it out there though. It was a fail. I didn't have any formal marketing experience. I honestly had no idea how to make money with the blog. I knew my dream was to be a public speaker. My dream was to help others that have the same illness that there isn't a cure for. I wanted to travel nationwide and present this seminar. Book conference rooms at hotels, advertise on local television, radio and newspapers. But all of that takes money.

Fast forward now, and I've been single for 11.5 years. I haven't even had a boyfriend in those 11.5 years. I didn't care. At first, I never ever wanted to open my heart up to love again. I just seriously didn't know if I could ever take the chance to love someone again, to have the chance of that kind of hurt. I didn't know if I could mentally survive it again. Then, I wanted to really concentrate on myself. -That is when my blogging days took a huge hit. Looking back, my marriage hadn't been "real" in the first place. With the pain and fatigue I had been feeling I had stopped exercising and gained some weight. Then, one new med after another trying to find something to help my fibro symptoms added on many more pounds. My husband had always, even before I was heavy used to put me down. Call me "fat @ss" and other horrible names. Once he left, the depression I was in, added on even more weight yet! I started developing diabetes along with a host of other conditions. My family doctor whom I love so much ...the first person who ever believed me that something wasn't right ....brought up weight loss surgery to me. I put it off and put it off. Finally upon her urging, I went to a surgeon and started the process.

I had an intense 3 months pre-surgery schedule I was on, that interfered with blogging. I lost the weight though! I lost a grand total of 133 pounds! Then, my life took a wild turn! I received a phone call from a production company out of NYC. The wanted to interview me, to see if I'd be a good fit for a new make over show that was going to air on TLC. Unbeknown to me, my youngest daughter had read about them casting for it and had sent in an email. I was driving down the road when I missed a phone call and saw they had left a voicemail. I played that voicemail and had to literally pull over along the side of the road and listen to it again!! HOW could a production company from NYC be interested in me. ME. A nobody who lived in the middle of corn fields in little ole NW Ohio?! I had a few months of zoom interviews with them, then received the news one evening on a zoom call that I was told was just another interview, that I had been cast! Months of prep for the filming began.

Filming that episode of the show, made the biggest impact on me of my life. I wasn't compensated any cash for it. They paid for my lunch each day, and coffee when I wanted it. They got me some new clothes and they paid for my "Butterfly Party" that I had already intended to have, to show off the new-me to friends and family that hadn't seen me since my weight loss journey began. But what they gave me, money can't buy. The head show runner and all of the producers, even the camera crew not to mention the "stars" of the show that I worked with all day each day, gave me my self esteem back. They taught me that I AM worth loving myself, and that I AM worthy of allowing someone else to love me. I'm still especially close to one of those ladies to this day, and I can never, ever repay them for what they've done for me. Now I'm just getting sappy though so let's move this along lol.

My GP who I'd become especially close to as well through this long journey of mine had for years tried to talk me into getting a breast reduction. When the weight loss didn't work to help my back pain I finally gave in. Too many ups and downs along the way of getting to surgery (over a year and the original surgeon dying 10 days before my surgery date) to go into when this is already too long lol. But I finally had the surgery. That was a year ago this past August. I fought a life threatening infection for 3.5 months after. I lost my 3 day and 4 month old grandson to SIDS this past December 1st. This past May I rushed my youngest daughter to the ER in crying pain, which started the journey of a diagnosis of her having cancer. About 2 months ago now, she had surgery to remove a good chunk of her cervix and her entire left ovary.

In between all of this, I had finally started a business and I was succeeding at it too! Although it wasn't my passion of writing or reading or reseaching, I still liked it and it was paving a way for me. A way that my end goal, was to be able to have the money to travel around the world and present my seminars. I scraped together the money to buy an old pop up camper, and converted it to a food trailer. I took it fairs and big festivals. I started out selling hot dogs and french fries, with homemade sweet tea. I did well enough with it that after 2 seasons, I had the money to buy a REAL food trailer! I expanded my menu. I started doing various types of ribbon fries. I used that trailer only ONE year, and made enough to buy an amazingly nice, one owner trailer. After one year with that trailer, I bought a second trailer. The second trailer, I made into a "sweet" trailer, offering gourmet funnel cakes, elephant ears, and deep fried oreos. I financed all new equipment for that trailer and upgraded a few things in my "main" trailer as I called it. All of that, took me away from blogging as well. But it had to be, if I had ANY hope of following my dreams and traveling the world presenting my seminars. Or just traveling the world and then writing a book about "chronic pain friendly" vacations and vacation spots. I had to try to make a living. Well guess what? I got ONE season in with the second food trailer, and covid hit. It SHUT. ME. DOWN. With all of the new bills of the new trailer and equipment, I had to sell that trailer the first summer that we had covid in the U.S. I tried hard to hold on to the "main" trailer, but last summer we still just didn't have hardly ANY of the big fests going on here in NW Ohio, and I had to sell that trailer too. I was devastated to say the least.

So it's been a long hard road, my friends. But The Fibro Frog is finally BACK! Not only am I back, but I come back now also having the dreams of not only presenting seminars on living with chronic pain, but also with a corporate seminar geared to give you tips and tricks to up productivity and lower missed work days, by employees that suffer from chronic pain. I also want to offer life coaching sessions. I'm not a doctor, I'm just a Nationally Certified Clinical Medical Assistant that has a crap ton of life experience under my belt, and a plethora of research. Also, I didn't fully grasp how beneficial my services of writing, editing, and blogging could be to other companies. I had no idea that I could actually be paid for doing the things I love! Now, I do lol. So I have just this week officially started a new business. It's called Freelance Fix and my services include: blogging, editing, content copywriting, and conversion copywriting. What's conversion copywriting you might ask? I'll tell you! Conversion copywriting, is spinning words together in such a way, that you take a passive reader, and turn them into a real, buying, paying customer! This can be in the form of a blog, company information, or product ad descriptions. As a blogger at heart, I know how to take the facts and tell a story with them. Depending on the company, a blog can sometimes be even more important for you than a Facebook page is. Taking facts and important information and turning them into a realistic story is sometimes just what you need to improve your SEO and gain new customers! Sounds fun, right? I love it!

What I really would love to do, is to travel. I want to take a cruise. -My biggest dream in life, would be to present my seminar ON a cruise lol. I would give anything to go to Belize. Belize is number one on my bucket list! I've never been to Hawaii or Myrtle Beach. Heck, I've never been to Las Vegas even! My birthday is November 18th, and every year I say that "next year, I'll finally go to Vegas for my birthday". Sadly with the twists and turns and the ups and downs that life has thrown at me, that has never been able to happen. I almost had my dreams, until covid ripped it from me. I REFUSE to give up though. The motto of The Fibro Frog has always been "Never give up HOPE. Without HOPE, you don't have anything". I'm living true to that. I have to have HOPE that this new adventure I'm trying in my life, is meant to be, because I refuse to give up HOPE that I can travel, and that I can present my seminars. I also refuse to give up HOPE, that the right man is out there just waiting for me.

Would you all be willing to help me make my dreams come true? I would love if I could crowd fund to either help me travel and present seminars, or to travel and write my book based off those adventures! I can't even tell you what it would mean to me, if I could at least hit Vegas or take a cruise, for my birthday this year. I'm going to be 52 years old, but I'm sure not dead yet! I'm still young enough to fill the remainder of my life with HAPPY stories. I'm still young enough to find love, after not even a boyfriend in 11.5 years, and I most certainly am still young enough to "Never give up HOPE"!