Thank you Alexander Fleming, Howard Florey and Ernst Chain!

I have only taken antibiotics a few times in my life, possibly only two before now. One was for infected impacted wisdom teeth.

My mother did not really let us have antibiotics when we were kids. To her credit I believe it was because she disagreed with doctors just prescribing them without confirming beforehand that the problem was bacterial. Beyond that, I am not aware of any of her reasoning.

As such, if I had them it was rare. I do not remember having any but that does not mean I wasn’t on any.

Last week I did too much and I knew I would get sick. By that I mean that I knew I had at least 75% chance of getting sick. I know my body. I was running on fumes and felt it shutting down. I THOUGHT I would catch a cold…not STREP throat!?!

I do not remember ever having Strep Throat. In my adult mind it was this thing I have always HEARD about that was VERY painful.

Anyway, it is &#?*{$! painful.

I have only ever ONCE gone to the doctor for the flu, or a cold, or a sore throat. It was a very long time ago after a flu that did not seem to go away and my lungs and breathing continued to be affected. My doctor gave me a powerful steroid inhaler.

I have never actually understood why people regularly go to the doctor for colds, flues and sore throats. The last place I want to be when I am feeling ill is sitting in a doctor’s waiting room, waiting to be told that I do in fact have a cold, flu or sore throat. But then again, I also think that people should stay at home when they are sick and not spread their infections around and people do not seem to go for that either.

This time around, in the middle of the night of my third night in a row of no sleep with excruciating pain while forcing myself to swallow water, I realized once again…you know your body and this is not going to resolve on its own and got myself to medical care.

The treating doctor looked in my mouth and said, “Oh yeah, that is strep throat”.

Anyway, I am grateful today to the inventors of antibiotics Alexander Fleming, Howard Florey and Ernst Chain. I have always had a profound respect for the power of bacteria. Today, more so than ever. I have taken the third dose of antibiotics today and the pain is going away.

Swallowing water without pain is a good thing.

Elina Grace Edwin

I am a bad person now!

Are you the sum of everything you have done, or are you bad once you had done something bad?

A friend who I met in kindergarten made a speech about me at her wedding that made me sound like Mother Theresa. It was very uncomfortable being in that room when she spoke those kind words.

Until now I have been a good person throughout my life. Integrity has always been the most important thing to me.

But something has happened to me as a result of the events of June 15, 2009 that has led to a crisis of conscience. I think I was in some sort of shock state for a long time after that and when the shock lessened, I don’t think I believed in good anymore. Doing the right thing got me abused for far too many years and when the people who I thought were the good guys, the white knights, the heroes the cowboys, the cavalry showed up… they were the bad guys too.

Bad seems to keep winning win and good gets abused so I don’t know anymore what all those years of integrity were worth??? I guess I have lost faith in good.

I can tell you what was in my head when I decided to do something bad but I cannot tell you that it will make any sense. It does not make sense to me so why should it make sense to you.

I have felt suicidal too often since moving here and somehow the combination of feeling suicidal and having lost faith in good made me want to know what it felt like to do the wrong thing before I died.

It was then spurred on by someone lying about me and trying to make me out to be a bad person…after I had tried to help them when they were sick!!! Again!!!! another person lied about me. I did the right thing and the wrong thing won…again?!?

Something in me snapped after that. My faith in good seemed to be gone. I don’t know if I will ever get it back. Things keep happening to reconfirm that bad wins. The latest was that the Super who I have treated with kindness and respect since moving here came into my apartment and behaved in a manner that made me physically afraid of him. When he left he looked pleased with himself, like Cheshire cat pleased, like a bully looks like when they have found themselves another victim.

Where have all the good people gone?

I think I am writing this because today on Easter I am feeling guilt about my choice to do bad. It is the first recognizable feeling I have had since choosing to see what doing the wrong thing felt like. I have not felt anything before today since choosing to do the wrong thing. Just numbness, which is very strange coming from someone who has always felt guilty for every single avocado I have wasted by mistiming them before they go off. How can I be someone who historically has always felt guilty for the slightest thing, including every wasted avocado but only have only felt numbness until a moment today at Easter mass from consciously choosing to do the wrong thing???

Elina Grace Edwin

I finally cleaned my bathtub. Cleaning with a muscle disorder is hard!

I grew up in a very clean home. Truthfully, it was the cleanest home I have ever been in. People would joke that they could eat off our floors…that clean.

The cleanest our house ever was were the years it was cleaned by the lovely Benedetta. I miss her. She was always kind to me. When she retired to take care of her aging husband my mother hired Lisa to clean her house. The first day Lisa started she said to me in broken English with a Portuguese accent, “mama say no clean your room” accompanied by a quizzical look on her face that read, ‘I don’t know why I am cleaning the entire house including your brother’s room (who was also living there) but not your room’?

That was how I was informed that my room would be no longer cleaned. Strange as it may seem, I was actually grateful to be informed by my mother’s cleaning lady. Her telling me meant I was not abused while being told.


By that standard, I now live in filth. Not because I do not care but because that is what my muscles can manage. It is embarrassing.

Certainly, some things are more regularly cleaned around here than others. I focus on keeping things clean for health reasons. I decided that it is best way to use my limited muscle energy. So…the kitchen counter is cleaned with every use. The sinks and cloths are sanitized after every set of dishes are washed (washing dishes is very hard and seems to be getting harder recently). Things like the bathroom sink area and places were hands regularly go are sanitized. That means that things like my floor are not regularly cleaned. Furniture is not regularly dusted. Depending on how I am doing, parts of the apartment at times can look like my own personal haunted house. Seriously. I do two things which help keep things cleaner in here and therefore help me. I do not wear outdoor shoes in the apartment (though the Superintendents do) and I always put the toilet seat down before I flush (though my Auntie Beth refuses to, for some reason).


As already said, some things are more regularly cleaned around here than others. The bathtub is not one of them.

If I could, my bathtub would be cleaned once a week.

The first time I tried to clean my bathtub I fell. The next day I cried all day like a baby. I believed that I would never have a clean bathtub again because I would never be able to clean it. The next day it was also clear that I had hurt my back when I fell. I spent the next week sitting in a chair accomplishing nothing.

I do not remember when I next tried to clean the bathtub but I know that it was many months later. I eventually realized that the ONLY way I was ever going to be able to clean the tub was to actually sit in it to do so.

So, I did that, sat in the tub and worked my way round it with vinegar and baking soda. It took me three to four days. When I was done my arm muscles were more tired than I can possibly describe. I couldn’t brush my teeth for a few days afterwards so I used mouthwash.

The first time I cleaned it I was just so grateful it was cleaned that I did not even think to have a bath in it before it became dirty again.

The second time I cleaned it, I had a bath the day after I finished cleaning it.

That brings me to the second reason I cried the day after the first time I tried to clean the bath. Until I moved here, Lisa,while not cleaning my room was cleaning the bathroom once a week so I was able to have regular Epsom salt baths for my muscles. When I feared I would never be able to clean my tub again, I also realized I had lost that coping mechanism for my muscles.

I have now cleaned the tub for a third time. I am so proud of it that I took photos. Seems silly to be proud of cleaning a tub but if you ever become serious ill and experience an enormous change in what you can do…I use to run up to two hours day before I became ill…then you will sadly feel pride at what seem like small accomplishments to normal people.

Here is my clean tub:




Here is my tub with magnesium salts in it for only the second time since moving here: (look closely, white salts are just in front of tub stopper)




Here is my magnesium salt water bath filling: :)




And even the not so hot water in this building turned out to be a good thing, as I know you really should only stay in a magnesium salt bath for 20 minutes or so I believe. If the bath water had been hot-tub-hot I would have stayed for an hour. I wouldn’t have been able to resist, it being only my second bath since moving here. It wasn’t hot-tub-hot so when my 20 minute alarm went off I got out. My muscles had one of the best sleeps they have had since moving here, so noticeable that I am determined to get that tub cleaned again sooner next time.

When you have regular struggles with your muscles you have to develop coping mechanisms where you can. For a long time now I have used a power toothbrush because this former star at cleaning my teeth became aware that I was no longer cleaning them well enough to let it go long term.

Recently, I have also been struggling to clean a spring form pan that I bought after I moved here, my first spring form pan. It has been in the sink for a couple of weeks. It has been cleaned many times during that period but I still could not get all the food out from the folded over ridge part. I had tried everything and finally managed to clean it today with a brand new grout brush, which is now my spring form pan brush. Here is what I used:



So, if you have muscle issues and have been attempting to clean a springform pan with little success, you might want to buy one of these.

I will never buy a SECOND springform pan.

God Bless!


Elina Grace Edwin

I pay $14.97 to not spend Sundays alone.

Sundays.  Emotional Sundays!

Growing up meant Sunday Dinner each week.  It was required, not optional.  When the person for whom it was required no longer wanted it occur each week, then it was no longer weekly required.

  I participated in the ritual of Sunday dinner until I was thrown out of my life like a sack of garbage.  Since then, 19 months ago, there has been no more Sunday Dinner.

Even though I have no desire to ever go into that house again, it has still been a difficult adjustment as the rest of my family is still at Sunday Dinner.  I know that they are all eating together and I am eating alone.

Over the last 19 months, I have experienced many emotional Sunday’s.  Early on I realized that it would help if I made a new Sunday tradition and that I had to replace the ritual with something else.

I decided at first that I would try to eat a proper meal on Sundays.  I would cook my own Sunday Dinner.  What do mean by proper meal?  Well, I do not cook very often.  I eat things like humus and carrots most of the time.  I guess a proper meal for me means a protein source, vegetables (three of more) and a starch or grain.  So I cooked a few Sunday Dinners.  I have also eaten out a few times at a local restaurant. 

  That has changed and for a few months maybe, I have been doing something else.  One afternoon following working in the apartment together, my brother and I went to a local bakery cafe to get something to eat.  It was a storefront that I had walked by many times as I went for walks but for whatever reason I had not really noticed.  For whatever reason it did not invite me in.  I really do not know in hindsight what the reason was except I recall thinking it looked like a bakery not a restaurant.

it is now the second time that my brother has initiated me to a place that has subsequently become  a haunt.  The first was a Thai restaurant on Yonge Street that closed when the owners moved back to China.  It was my escape place whenever I needed some place safe to just be, outside my home.  After my brother and his girlfriend (now wife) took me there for dinner one time, I just kept going back.  I ate the same thing every time, Vegetarian Thai Basil (basically Tofu, Broccoli and Thai Bail Sauce).  After it closed I ventured into another Thai place.  I did not want to go somewhere new.  Being in a restaurant was very stressful for me but it was less stressful than being at home during those times.  The second Thai place became my new escape place until I moved here. 

When my brother took me to the local bakery cafe months back, we had croissant sandwiches and salad.  It was the first salad I had had since moving here other than at my sister’s house.  I had decided that I could not justify buying prewashed greens and I did not have a salad spinner nor a place to store one so I just did not buy salad greens after moving here.  That salad at the cafe that day, spinach, tomatoes and cranberries with the nicest vinaigrette I had had in many many years made me want to eat salad again.  I started buying salad greens after that and even bought dried cranberries for the first time. 

It wasn’t immediately after my brother and my visit that I returned but eventually I did.  It has recently become my Sunday ritual. 

I like the food or I would not go.  The staff is kind to me.  I eat the same thing every time.  But going there has nothing to do with food.  I could make the same lunch at home, for cheaper.  Sitting there in that cafe, I am not alone.  For a short time, I am not alone.  Because of my health, being around healthy people leading normal lives is actually very hard.  At the cafe I am not with people but I am near people, something that I now seem to need. 

It is not easy being ill and living alone.  Being near people at the cafe helps each time.  It is a large amount of money to me now but I spend $14.97 not to spend Sundays alone.

Elina Grace Edwin