Moving cities with cardiac sarcoidosis

Day 1,427.

It’s April and that means it Sarcoidosis Awareness Month. The biggest thing happening in my life this year is that I am moving cities soon.

Planning the move

Our family has chosen to move north to Auckland. It is due to a combination of factors. The husband found a new job, we are a bit cold in Wellington and our holiday home that we have been trying to build in Auckland has stalled.

So we are moving.

I looked into hospitals and how emergency services work up in Auckland. Even before I looked into schools for my son. The suburb we ultimately chose is on a small island 40 minutes by ferry from the CBD.

That does create some risks if there is an emergency, but there is an ambulance service. I contacted them through Facebook to find out how they handle emergencies. If there is a patient needing to go to hospital on the mainland, they either go via ferry, police speedboat or with the Westpac rescue helicopter (weather dependent).

Our new house has a very steep driveway with many stairs in a split level house. This should be fine if I remain as well as I am now. I shudder imagining getting me out to an ambulance from upstairs though.

Managing stress

As you can imagine it has been very stressful finding and buying a new house. Getting finance approval was a nightmare due to a really incompetent mortgage broker we got referred to. We finally had our offer accepted to a lovely home.

Right now we are trying to sell our house in Wellington, cleaning for open homes every Sunday. The market is bad right now with only 50% of houses getting offers. The uncertainty with the war in Iran is impacting even little New Zealand down in the Pacific.

I am not sure I am managing the stress well or not. Sometimes I just don’t think about what is coming next. Just focus on what I need to do that day. Sometimes I overthink everything - imagine all the possible things that may go wrong.

I just try my best so that the stress get to me. I don’t want any arrhythmia or a relapse in my sarcoidosis.

Logistics moving with a chronic condition

I am also just finding out what I need to do to move to a new medical team.

I can’t transfer my Infliximab infusions, and can’t be referred by my medical team here to the DHB in Auckland. I will need to finish up my treatment here, register with a new GP in Auckland after my move, and ask them to refer me to the hospital there.

I am very worried that there will end up being a gap in my infusions or a long delay before my next outpatient appointment.

Just something else I am definitely not stressing about.