Scleroderma

Living with any serious disease or condition like Scleroderma, is without a doubt, difficult. It is not hard to understand either, that we often can lose sight of what is important, including our way. We may also fall into to a false sense of security about our condition, worsened by ignorance of the facts and the reality of our situation.

Today, we would like to encourage you ultimately have Faith and never lose hope. Faith and hope though, are meaningless without action. If you have not done so as yet, develop a long-term plan for dealing with your Scleroderma. With time and effort, a well formulated plan can help you understand and monitor your progress and quality of life.

Here’s a simple, yet effective framework for getting your plan together: Define, Discuss, and Determine!

Define:
As with most other plans, it is important to first develop a thorough understanding of your current condition. Start with what type of Scleroderma you have, along with its associated symptoms, complications, and more. Research and collate what you can. Our own website and many others can help tremendously in this regard.

Discuss:
Next, it would be important to determine what your options are. They should be based on what your current resources (financial, physical, human, or otherwise), capabilities, strengths, and weaknesses are. Talk to your doctor about available treatments and possible courses of actions. Feel free to talk to other Scleroderma patients, as many have tried different techniques and strategies for treating, coping with, and managing their Scleroderma.

Determine:
With an in-depth understanding of your condition and assembling what your available options are, decide upon and determine a plan of action for managing your Scleroderma that is uniquely suited and tailored to you.

Your plan should include a long-term goal and a number of contributing objectives. For instance, “I aim to live a full and healthy life, despite my Scleroderma”. Your objectives might then include;

• I will exercise for 30 minutes a day, twice a week
• I will have at least two servings of fruit and vegetables per day
  

Your objectives should be specific and measurable.

It should also include your desired course of action, and what you would do to ensure that you’ve successfully completed those actions, thereby measuring your success and ability to execute on your plan.

What’s Next?
Well, with your plan in hand. The only thing left to do is execute! Here are a couple tips for doing so.

• Track your personal progress, daily, weekly, or monthly through progress reports. They could include dates of medical visits, appointments, test results, symptoms, physical changes, dietary habits, medications, and side-effects.
• Adopt and maintain a pace that is suitable to you. Don’t overextend yourself, and do exercise your right to say “no”.
• As mentioned earlier, maintain a regular exercise schedule, develop better eating habits, most importantly, get adequate rest. Check out a guideline for eating well with Scleroderma. Being able to execute would require that you’re mentally and physically capable of doing so.
• Do take the medicines as prescribed by your doctor, being sure to follow the instructions provided. Be sure to visit to discuss progress and any ill-effects which may be experienced as a result.
• Seek the support of family and friends in tracking and implementing your plan, as they do provide excellent emotional and physical support.
• During execution, your experiences would bring about new learning. Use it to revise and improve upon your plan.
  

Without a cure today, Scleroderma is not going to disappear tomorrow, but with a plan and suitable coping strategies, you can indeed make a discernible and positive impact on your quality of life. Do start today!