Warning: too many rides can be a bad thing!

Since I'm sticking with this amusement park theme lately, I wanted to tie it in with one of my favorite written tools called the "Spoon Theory."  I did not come up with this theory and want to give all the credit due to Christine Miserandino, a woman with Lupus, who does an excellent job in her writing of helping others visualize and feel what it is like to have a chronic illness.  Please read her story at www.butyoudontlooksick.com.  I will do my best to paraphrase here.  She talks about having a certain amount of "spoons" available to you each day and they are nearly ever consistent when you are dealing with illness. Your spoons could be extremely low due to poor sleep or increased pain or possibly a rough conversation with a spouse.  You could wake up with more spoons due to the opposite.  The important thing to remember, however, is that your spoons must last you through the day.  there is no going back to "replenish" when you are out of spoons.  Some days it is 6:00 pm and I can feel I have 2 spoons left--literally--before I will break.  One to brush teeth and the other for taking medications.  That's when I get on my knees and thank God more than ever for family support.  To tie this all together, amusement parks--like holiday weekends--are spoon thieves.  While they may be full of fun, busy, family activities, they still use up quite a few spoons.  Remember to keep some in reserve if you can and be good to yourself.