Events

The Juvenile Arthritis Conference in Costa Mesa, CA was a great success! Met a lot of interesting people and saw some good sessions. Thirty-seven states and two countries (Canada & New Zealand) were represented! Some of highlights: meeting Amye Leong (author of Get a Grip: A Take-Charge Approach to Living with Arthritis), the discovery of Warm Whiskers, the Parenting & Arthritis session for Young Adults, the Art & Arthritis keynote… my list could go on and on! Lots of highlights! I’m waiting to receive a CD of all the presentations so that I can make sure I give you as much info as possible. Stay tuned for the juicy details.

The accompanying photo is a piece of artwork that one of the kids created over the weekend, and then was displayed along with many others in an “art gallery” last Saturday night. These kids all had a lot of artistic talent!

Btw, I am seriously considering going to Houston to attend the conference next year. Who’s with me?

I’ll be attending the national JA (Juvenile Arthritis) conference from July 10th through July 13th in Costa Mesa, CA. In addition to the JA sessions for parents, they also have a Young Adult track, which I will be participating in. Energy-permitting, I hope to make a few blog posts over the course of those four days. I’ll definitely be sharing the information I gathered, in addition to my own thoughts upon my return. The two sessions that I am most looking forward to? Art & Rheumatic Disease, plus Pregnancy & Arthritis. Stay tuned, my friends!

If you are attending JA, please feel free to share your conference impressions in the comments.

JA Conference

A recent podcast of NPR’s Speaking of Faith struck a chord with me. It features an interview with physician and author, Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen, who has lived with Crohn’s disease since she was 15 years old. I found the discussion in the podcast to be immensely inspiring, plus it gave me hope. How refreshing it was to learn how Dr. Remen’s experience with battling Crohn’s has actually shaped her as a doctor.

She developed a course called “The Healer’s Art,” which is now taught at universities around the U.S. Students learn that healing and curing are two different types of relationships, while being reminded “of their power to make a difference through their human response and connection to their patients.” Read the rest of this entry »