Not Feeling too good

today has been weird, health wise. Woke up groggy, when I finally woke up. Blood pressure pretty low on first two readings -- needs to be watched. Lowering bp was why they first adjusted the first diuretics dosages, and this may be (or may not) a repeat of that. It did come up and stay up once I was up and moving around a bit.
My sugar is higher than I'm used to, too, My metabolism is seriously out of sync. I can feel that every day. Watch the numbers, watch the numbers. (Now, my numbers aren't all that bad -- one of my sisters would like to have my numbers, and her doctor would congratulate her if she did -- but they are running high for me, for the most part since just before I went to dr last week.)
I already have two more dr appointments set up regarding these changes, and everyone should be on the same page. one never knows for sure about communication on the other side.
Anyway, I'm off to write on one of my four stories, at least, and maybe all four of them until I fall both asleep and out of my chair. Actually, there's only three Works in Progress -- number four is an idea that is just beginning to germinate. I do wish it wouldn't, at least until the others have blossomed a little more (and maybe the one 'out there' begins to bear fruit) But, hey, it's spring. And Spring is all about germinating and growth that leads to blooming and bearing, so I guess I can't complain too much. Not justifiably, anyway.
So that's me for today.
Hope everyone else is doing even better

                                                                                               

                                                            

interesting day.

 I've certainly had that, an interesting day, today.

Got up and took a shower because I had an appointment to get an echo done on my heart. Mostly a routine thing; it's been two years and time to take an additional look and see if there's been any improvement or degradation. Inspired by the fact that if I sit down from standing it becomes harder to breathe for a few minutes. (Usually sitting down in is the best help for that problem.

I had my dr visit in early April. (It was due in February. Instead, thats when I called to make the appointment.) It was originally scheduled for Monday the 25th. 

I caught a cold (or something) and had to postpone for a week.

Which brings me to today. I went to the hospital for outpatient testing. My first fun event of the day. I knew where I needed to go and all that, but the lady on the telephone had given me instructions to go to the marked outpatient parking lot and enter from there. She also told me to park only in the marked outpatient parking spaces.

I knew from my dr visit a couple weeks ago (drs office is in same facility; different division.) that they were working in the parking lots, so okay. Never heard of that before, never saw any signs like that, but with all the construction going on, I'd better have a look around.

Drove as entirely around the structure as I could (construction blockages),twice. Never found nonexistent outpatient parking lot or spots. Lady must have mixed up her hospitals.

I did the test. In and out. Worst problem was walking the ninety miles of hallways from there to there to there.

For a nice change of pace, slow and steady got me through it without too much huffing, puffing, or holding onto the wall. Slow and steady does work, at least until I try to go a little faster. 

Come home, take off my shoes, set about the business of the day. Returning all the phone calls I had ignored the last two weeks while I was sick. Did some home stuff, read a little, took a nap.

More phone ringing. At first I thought it was on the tv, but it still rang after going to commercial, so I looked at the phone and it was an unknown Sardinia phone number. 

I thought it was one of the kids's schools calling, or something, although they don't have my new phone number if they ever even had my old one. 

It was my DOCTOR! NOT the office, but the actual doctor. 

He asked if I was using my C-Pap. How often I was using it. How long I was using it. (That one stumped me.) Was I sure I was using it? (I would say I had been overusing it, with that nasty cold and all. But I didn't say that out loud.)

Then he said that the echo today showed that my lungs are putting a lot of pressure on my heart. So hes going to order a lung scan to see if there are blood clots or anything else.

I am fine with that. 

After all, I've only been trying to find out why my heart and lungs are fighting each other whenever I exert for a dozen or so years now. 

So, maybe I'm going to get some answers. Maybe its a relic from the cold, but if so, I would guess that that was a fortunately timed illness.

And the doctor's office later called to give me the number to call to schedule the scan. 

Definitely an interesting day, with weird little twists and turns to keep me alert, even when I was asleep.

Yay Me

 Winter is a bad time for fresh air, exercise, fresh food, and many other things. Chronic ailments seem to intensify, fears are exaggerated, and nothing and no one feels quite in sync with the rest of Life. 

So, it has been winter.

The Fall (Autumn) was long and dreary. The run-up to the holidays is too often for too many a reminder of loss and loneliness. After the holidays, the darkness seems to set in, just when the outer darkness has begun to reverse itself. Maybe the powers of dark, having failed at holding the outer places is fighting for a foothold within? 

For a while now, I have had bad days and goods, with an average of one day a week being not worth getting out of bed for. (Except, y'know, going to the bathroom and such so the bed stays a comfortable place.)

But it's a new year, a new time, a new life, ha-ha, now. Time to do better. The new spring is coming. Sunlight is returning to the earth. 

It is time for change.

Change is hard to do at any time.

It's really hard to do from under the covers, in the bed, in the house with curtains closed and artificial or forced heat. 

I decided a while back -- can't recall when-- that if I could do nothing else, I would try to get at least a little bit of natural light every day. (Translation: open the curtains.)

Took a long time. Goes against the bad days. Hard to do. Every day it's not done, the next day is even more difficult. 

But I have done it, for a couple of weeks now. 

Not only the open curtains, which necessitate getting out of bed. 

I have got up, got dressed, and opened the corner and sat by the window every single day.

I didn't always stay up for very long, sometimes less than an hour, but I did get those things done for at least a while. For an impressive (to me) number of days in a row. 

There's nothing wrong with small goals. Victories are often an accumulation of them. 

And they are doable.

If you're in a bad place, start small. 

If you're in a dark place, maybe just open your eyes, whether it will make any difference to your seeing or not. It MAY make a difference to YOU. (It may not, but you won't know if you don't try.)

No matter what, it is an incredible sense of achievement, when you do it, first for five minutes, then ten; and eventually maybe two days in a row. 

Look at you!

You decided to do something, and then YOU DID IT! You are not a nobody nothing who can't ever do anything. 

ENJOY YOUR VICTORY.

starting over again.

 knee, back, knee, weather, car, coasts, depression, life, and everything else.

I'm still here and still trying.

It has become impossible for me to walk on a paved path in the woods.

This is NOR ACCEPTABLE.

But, between breaking and being fixed, I am now having to start all over again. The horrible gasping for air, even though I'm not really out of breath (figure that out; I can't.) has returned and I have to build up my endurance again.

I've spent my whole entire life starting over.

Could I please finish one  thing before starting the next one?

Could it please b a new goal, not a repeat of the last half dozen goals?

Ah well, it's better to have small attainable goals. That's what they say, anyway. Notso sure if I agree, but I have nothing else.

And, for all that I look like a lump of wobbly fat that does nothing, that's a difficult and boring way to live. If you even want to call that living. 

I don't. 

nope, not fit for anything

 It's been difficult, and it keeps getting worse. First my back and then when i finally got into walking again, and was gradually increasing my endurance, my knee went all wonky.

Sounds like more lazy-daisy excuses, but it's subjectively (or is it objectively?) true. I have MRIs to prove it. It may need surgery, and probably will, sooner or later. For now we are trying interim stuff, which, so far, is working well. I'm at least able to walk around my house without holding onto the walls and the furniture.

It's hurricane/headache season and it is miserably hot outside. Maybe it will rain. Maybe it won't. Probably it wont.

My hanging baskets that get full sun have been baked. 

My birdbath is scummy. Yuck.

Some of my newer plantings have not survived. 

I'm so tired. I sleep too much. I hurt too much.

On top of that.it seems that people are dying all around me. Old, young, contemporary. It's getting really sad, especially when it is the unborn and the newly born that are dying. Friends and their families are suffering.

Not from the stupid virus; not from the heat, not from any one thing. But everywhere there is death.

Of course, it always is, but usually more remotely. And , yes, these little spates of tragedies have happened before. 

Wake me when it's over.

If you must.

6/1/2021

 wow, has it been that long. I apologize to my loyal readers. The end of May was rough, It was completing the first year cycle of my daughter's death. Believe me, it was a difficult time. I tried to keep busy. I did keep busy. But every day it seemed more raw.

When it happened, it felt, for the longest time, as if I were inside one of my reality-straddling dream. And I wanted it to be. The days I didn't spend just breathing, going to the bathroom, and waiting to go back to sleep, I don't even remember. 

The world was closing down around me, but I hardly realized. It had already ended, in some ways, for me. So, I guess I was closing down, too.

As this anniversary approached I had to deal with the reality. I had to admit to it, look it in the face, and somehow get through it.

As I said, I have been keeping busy. My knee got all arthritic, which was really fun when the April Showers finally came -- late, like everything else in this craziness. Made it difficult to stand, to walk, to do anything. My car had a nervous breakdown, or maybe a psychotic break with delusions. (Or perhaps I was the one having delusions, etc.)

But I tried, I forced myself every day to move around, to get at least one chore done. 

I usually did it.

But May is here, even though Tammy still isn't. May will come again and she won't.

And I am here.

I must do better.

That is all.

And I am indeed trying, and have been trying through these last few weeks.

5/18/21

 Had my grandkids over the weekend. Attended a birthday party for one of my brothers's grandchild. Walked to the store with kids. David R, the kids's dad, changed my tire, so now when I drive it's with a baby tire on my left front, and the muffler clop-clopping down the street, and everything moaning and groaning. They'll hear me coming, that's for sure!

My diet is pretty steady for now, staying consistent. Weight is steady and going down, but in small increments. So small that it would take a digital scale to tell the difference. That's probably as it should be.

I have been doing some work in my flower beds as well, too. There's one I can't get in because of my knee, but the other two are doing okay. 

I'[m beginning to get restless and have an unfinished feeling if I don't get in a certain level of activity every day. That's probably a good thing, too.

Summer is rolling in like a steam roller, with the requisite humidity. I may have to move walking time to later in the day. Or perhaps earlier.