MSI Press Blog

  Recently released: audiobook edition of How to Be a Good Mommy When You're Sick by Dr. Emily Graves. Book description: Soon after receiving her Bachelor's Degree, Emily Graves was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis and given a prognosis that she would be confined to a wheelchair within ten years. Shortly thereafter, pregnant with her first and only child, Emily's kidneys shut down. Thus, began a new chapter in Emily's life: balancing chronic illness, motherhood, and the professional ambitions that had caused her to excel as an academic and meet her husband. Today she is still fighting chronic illness, but she has found some answers as to how to manage that fight while being a good mother and spouse and continuing to pursue her professional ambitions. In this book, Emily chronicles the challenges and successes and shares her experience-and tips-with other mothers suffering from chronic illness. A formula for surviving and thriving, this book is meant as a source of i...

  Today's daily excerpt comes from  How to Be a Good Mommy When You're Sick  by Emily Graves. Introduction: My Story   When women with Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) get pregnant, their RA goes into remission. At least, that’s what my doctor told my husband, Robert, and me when we went in to discuss the possibility of having a baby. At that time, we both were professors with busy careers. I was 28, and according to my doctors, my RA was on “cruise control”. Thus, we were given a big “thumbs up” from the medical community to get pregnant. I would not trade our son for the world, but, boy, were they wrong! There was no remission for me, not unless remission means running head first into kidney failure and an abrupt pause in my career. After many months of discussions with baffled doctors, biopsies, and blood tests, I was diagnosed with Essential Mixed Cryoglobulinemia Type II—a complication of my RA that was causing kidney failure. I was officially the complicated, rare cas...