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Tuesday evening, my Aunt Christine died. She and my mother were the oldest and youngest, and last two surviving, of 12 siblings. Aunt Chris was born in 1922. Think about that. She was born before the Great Stock Market Crash and the Depression. I know the basics of her life. She was born and grew up in southwest Mississippi. She moved to New Orleans where she met and married George Cowan. The two of them had four sons, three of whom lived to adulthood. She had ten grandchildr

You've seen the memes that say something like, "When someone leaves your life, don't run after them. God has something better for you." There are a lot of them. I got to thinking today that the meme, while giving very general advice, isn't always giving very good advice. Yes, we can all agree that memes are not situation-specific. They are generalized truisms or messages. But this one rubbed me the wrong way. See, I know a very old woman who has been estranged from her son fo

"What can you eat for breakfast in the morning?" It's a perfectly reasonable question. But it kind of hit me tonight that it's the wrong question to ask. I CAN eat anything. The better question is what do I choose to eat in the morning. A few years ago, I started a ketogenic diet for my chronic migraine. I had a month of decreased head pain. In fact, I didn't need to use my triptan medications for an entire month! But, over the next couple of months, my pain came back to it'

(I have to give my friend Karen Alea Ford credit for the inspiration for this post. She tweeted this idea about a year ago.) I sometimes hear people wonder if it is worth it to get involved in politics. I want to shout, "YES! Absolutely!!" Politics is the mechanism whereby we, the people, make our voice heard in government. In fact, one way to take care of our neighbors and to love our neighbors, is to engage politically. I believe that everyone in our country should have acc

We missed church again yesterday. Another migraine. Honestly, we only make it once or twice a month these days. Sometimes, it hardly seems worth the trouble to get up and dressed on a Sunday morning. But it is. I miss the people. We've only been at this church for a little more than a year, so we don't know the people well, but I feel loved. When we "pass the peace", the entire church (I know, it's only about 40 of us) gets out of their pews and goes up and down the aisles to

So, it's a new year, if anyone noticed. We're out of checkbooks, so I haven't had to write the date yet. My migraines don't seem to have noticed the new year, although I did have my first Botox of the new year this week. I actually had a massive migraine on New Year's Eve. It broke at about 12:15am on New Year's morning. Crazy, huh? I don't do resolutions anymore. I used to do a word for the year, but I forgot about it after a couple of months, so that doesn't seem really use

I'm a planner. I always have been. The New Year is one of my favorite holidays. Time for a new planner to fill in and start using. I like to look at my week on Sunday night and know what I'm going to be doing on Monday morning. Why did a person who loves planning go into medicine? That's one of the most unpredictable professions there is! Especially when you deliver babies. One birth could throw off my entire week! That being said, I was part of a 10-12 person group of physic