Skin's just about back to normal, Tupp.
Haven't heard the monitor results yet (they'll go right here when I do)!
I'm hesitating on swimming today as I just don't want it to start up again.
And might be needing a day off all these intense convos with M about the
future.
I discover (and re-discover) that I can get overstimulated when I don't
control what I'm absorbing, no pun intended.
After some intense convos about houses, moving, timing, money, all
that...then I spend hours reading about end of life care (horrifying state
of it in the US) and sexism and politics and I've just trashed my capacity
to self-soothe enough to get back on a nice sleeping schedule.
It's gonna be okay, it's just difficult at times. M can accelerate and so
can I and to maintain serenity I just need to do some escapist mental
soothing.
That's sure part of health.
hugs
Hops
Thanks, Tupp.
I do want (need, actually) to know what the cardiac data is. Because if I have afib, then I'll be put on strong blood thinners for the rest of my life. If I don't have it, I won't have to take them. I'll be automatically informed when the results are in.
It is taking a verrrrrrrry long time to get them but the neurologist said that info from the outside company (device manufacturer) can take a while and it's variable. So I'll just wait.
I'm feeling okay so not too anxious about it. Que sera, sera....
Hugs
Hops
Thanks, guys.
I'm just a wuss.
And alas, Tupp, though I AM eating better I've been reverting to my sedentary ways and not walking regularly. I am truly, actually, reconditioned and unfit. Wake-up call Part One.
I think you're right, it's not the beginning of elder-falling-cascade, and was to do with two things: 1) new boxes in odd places, and 2) ADD and spacing out. I think #2 is more of a danger than it used to be.
CB, "I'll move that later" is like a precise summary of my hugest psychological/ADD issue. I've said that to myself every day in multiple ways about a million procrastinated things. Or I'll start something that needs getting done and wander off like a bee to a new blossom. It's cumulative and it's torture.
I am grateful for the sympathy, it really helps!
Moanily,
Hops
I wish we could take things out of each others hands and keep each other moving through house edits and organization.
I accepted long ago.... I need someone to help do that.
Doing it for others is easy. Doing it for myself, with all the emotionally charged stuff.... is almost impossible to move through efficiently. I have to be on a crazy tear to do it quickly....just emotionally screaming while filling the truck, over and over.
Lighter
Lighter,
I think an attack from a pug puppy would be incredibly therapeutic! Snort, dash, attack-retreat... :) !!
Pooch has apologized, by which I mean has not.
She is so funny.
When I need comfort I'll haul her up to spoon and just talk into her ear a mile a minute. As long as I make my voice goofy and the tone go up and down in an interesting fashion, she'll listen as though Buddha decided to tell her something really important. That makes me laugh more, that she's listening to me free-associate about something ridiculous, or something serious in a ridiculous voice. So she winds up being therapeutic after all.
Knee's slowly calming down, Tupp. I think it was a good wakeup call (I guess...as if a stroke didn't do it). And you're insightful to mention the ADD could be worse under pandemic background stress. That makes a lot of sense.
The organizing stuff does intensify when fear does. My ADD alone is just scattered and deeply annoying. My ADD plus "must update will and DNR/DNI and advanced directive" and "I really should be cooking more" and "now's my chance to work on the novel but I haven't been!" on various similar loops in the brain....is just ADD-er with an edge.
Give the distancing measures, I don't feel comfortable hiring the organizer lady for another bout of help, much less the housecleaner who could do floors, tub and sheets-changing (the back-hurting parts) for me.
Then again, it's a beautiful spring day and another way I could be thinking about all this is that facing myself, by myself, and chipping away at some very bad very old habits, might change me for the good. IOW, if I manage to make headway, and there's no rational reason not to, I could come out of the self-quarantine (I'm guessing fall, earliest) feeling much stronger and more positive about myself.
That's a hope I feel good saying out loud. Not a promise (setup for guilt), but really a hope.
Thanks for listing, y'all.
Hugs
Hops
your home might be messy but your heart and your feelings aren't
I'm going to be a heck of a lot more careful about falls.
Two days ago I woke up after a GOOD sleep, full of energy and resolve, and for the first time in ages, felt like getting a lot done. I was still aware of knee pain but it wasn't disabling, so though I limped some (kind of swung one straight leg instead of a normal walk), I: did laundry, went on four non-contact errands and to a doc appointment, dog to vet, in and out of the car, etc.
That night, and yesterday, I had muscle spasms from my bad back down the leg through the knee, down calf and into foot. Very painful! Like a half-body charleyhorse, and sometimes the tiniest change in legs position would kick it off. Took a lot of magnesium citrate and stayed in bed yesterday. Was rough but bearable. Better this morning but I'm going to do today "still" as well. Frustrating but a good warning.
Fortunately it's rained enough to keep the veggie beds happy, I think. I so hope I'll still be able to get down and thin and weed.
Hugs
Hops
(((((((Tupp))))))
Thank you. I find it almost humiliating or embarrassing
to talk in such detail about my body-fears, etc., but it
really has been a relief.
Since y'all have received it so kindly.
Much gratitude,
Hops
Smart idea, Tupp!
I've thought that if I do veggie beds again next summer I will NOT do them unless I get some sort of a watering system in place first. At the moment though, I've just abandoned my garden and I'm okay about it. Whatever rain it gets, it gets, and I'm done hobbling around back there for now.
Once I let go that it has to be done right, I felt better!
hugs
Hops
Once we drop the judgment.... once we're as kind to ourselves as we'd be to a small child.... shift is possible. It's easier....
Weirdly health related, at a stretch:
I have been a huge "voice hog" on the Board today.
Wrote and wrote and wrote. Looked back and asked myself what the volume was about.
I THINK I got it:
Ran the light overlong because I forgot (ADDuuh), and it's very stimulating.
Got excited about a zillion ideas at once.
My brain actually works in the way it works, and sometimes that's almost manic.
Ta da.
Not really a "health" thing in the physical sense. But it relates to racing, and that's why I fell.
I need to listen to my aching tailbone. It's trying to tell me something.
hugs
Hops
At 70, it's harder to convince yourself that chest pains and shortness of breath are heartburn and asthma, but even if that's so....they build into free-floating anxiety and even panic mode. Ugh.
I thought I'd never get to sleep because the shooting pains are so random and often happen as I try to sleep. Played a hypnosis YouTube all night and it helped.
In the past when I had SO much anxiety this kind of symptom pileup would go on for days/weeks/months. Hope I can continue to self-calm and not panic at each jab.
Don't need advice or instructions on how to meditate/breathe etc -- just the comfort of my friends!
hugs
Hops
Thanks, Tupp. That's a great observation about over-stimulation and it's making a lot of sense to me.
I was in a brief email round with one of the neuros I saw in the ED and he pointed out that there was some concern about TIA (or mini-stroke) although no damage showed up on the MRI. I know my mother's brother had multiple TIAs, and she herself wound up with a big stroke at the end of life (after my brother had dragged her all over town one afternoon which was way too much for her at 97).
So I'm thinking your observation is seriously spot on. It may be (I hope) that if I can concentrate on ways to calm my CNS and sort of build a lifestyle around that, I might reduce my chances of a Big One.
But I'm still feeling pretty unhappy about all this kicking in when I'm barely 70. Seventy just is not old in my book because of my parents and some of their friends, but I'm starting to wonder if the sustained stress I lived under for so long, combined with genetic vulnerability, may mean I don't really have as long an old age ahead as I'd hoped.
That's what is troubling me. I am supposed to make a followup appointment at the Stroke Clinic, and have asked if it's possible to do over Zoom. If not, I can go in.
So maybe life alone in my quiet little house is actually going to be healthier for me than ever trying to adapt to another personality, particularly an intense one like M's.
A girlfriend wants me to get one of these Life Alert pendants. Ugh. I will if I have to but hate the things. A couple of the 90's-ish people I worked for had them prescribed and it was like pulling teeth to get them to wear them. And they were in Assisted Living where somebody popped in a couple times a day anyway.
Uncertainty is part of life and I really need to make my peace in advance with whatever comes. It does make me feel that updating my Power of Atty and Living Will and paperwork and filing and all that is becoming even more important though.
I'd like to feel that I can approach it all in a positive way and inch my way ahead. Even if it's for scary reasons, leaving things in good order would feel like an accomplishment. Considering the struggle of that, I'd feel like I'd climbed Everest.
hugs
Hops
once had to spend an entire afternoon renaming files on my computer because I'd saved so many things as the way I felt about that particular person at that particular time: "B**tard w*nk face doctor" and "t*t w*nk scum drops social worker"
And...
my chest hurts and
I feel scared.
So, I'm thinking my GP's latest Rx is a good idea. It's isosorbide (related to but not the same as nitroglycerin), which relaxes blood vessels. Took the first one today. I was worried about whether there'd be an issue between cardiologist and GP but GP just looked at me and said, "I'm asking you to take this...." and I said yes. I know him for decades and I know he cares to get it right and knows his stuff. He also asked me to cut the statin dose in half because my liver tests were a bit out of whack. That can be temporary so we'll just test again in 4-6 months.
This article's the best general explanation I've read yet.
https://health.usnews.com/health-care/for-better/articles/2016-12-30/microvascular-angina-a-puzzling-form-of-chest-pain-and-unrecognized-danger (https://health.usnews.com/health-care/for-better/articles/2016-12-30/microvascular-angina-a-puzzling-form-of-chest-pain-and-unrecognized-danger)
I asked my GP to re-refer me to that indoor cardio program I once tried out, but not for long enough. He did so I should hear from them soon to schedule that. I'll just have to learn to breathe while walking in a mask and stop being so scared of being indoors with others. Ugh. Also have one friend willing to take short-short neighborhood walks now and then, which is actually hugely helpful.
The metropolol hasn't bothered me further; I think my body just needed a week to accept something new in the system. Too soon to tell for sure but I think the isosorbide may help me breathe better.
Overall I'm starting to feel a bit better and am mostly working on the mental adjustment to the diagnosis and situation.
It may seem weird to write out all this medical stuff here but in fact, it's like I would be explaining it to a partner or family member if I had one. Thanks for listening.
hugs
Hops
Well, here's what happened. Went to the fancy ENT cancer expert and he pondered all the scans, palpated, pondered more. (He was awesome; took time and enjoyed explaining it all.) Upshot: we agreed on a diagnosis and he let me name it: Sagging Salivary. LOL.
I'm so glad you persevered to an answer, ((Hops!)) There was an answer. You wanted it. You got it.
Evidently my two salivary glands are different in size, and over time one of them has gotten perceptibly bigger (and harder) than the other. And that's it. I felt like an idiot but he was laughing over the name and seemed to enjoy our convo, so I espcaped with most of my humiliated ego. He enjoyed my inspiration story though: The docs should be the ones with bruised egos, not you, IMO.
I saw a clip of [edit: Emma Thompson] on a British talk show (Brit humor really tickles me). She lives on an isolated farm and has a field between her house and a stream she likes to dip in most days. One evening the cops came knocking, which was unusual. "Mrs. Thompson," they explained, "we're very sorry to disturb you but there's been a report of an intruder on your land and we want to be certain all is well. A woman on a bridge down the way saw a naked man crossing your field this afternoon." I saw that too, SO FUNNY!!
On the show she said, "I told them sometimes I like to walk naked across the field to my stream, and my breasts have sagged so much I'm sure from a distance they might be confused with testicles. All is well."
ENT doc wants me back for a followup ultrasound in 6 mnths just to be sure, but so far no biopsy and no alarm. And I've stopped poking at my neck.You stopped poking bc you have answers, not bc you were told to by docs. Good'on'ya.
Actually I AM an idiot. But I can live with it. You're Hopsy and it's human to feel better when we have answers and truths. Don't feel bad about getting what you need.
Meanwhile, cardiologist has decided that I may have two types of chest pain. One will kick in when I'm stressed or even asleep (the scariest) and often mornings. He believes that is not microvascular angina. The other kind, that scared me so badly alone on a walk, is during exertion, and it would be (in that instance I should head for the ER). That hasn't happened again in the same way, so I'm going to start with snail-walks with a friend and gin up courage to rebuild the progress I lost when my back went out after rehab. I have to go see an esophageal specialist to see if there's erosion or anything else going on in those tubes that could explain chest pain at rest. That all makes sense to me. You need to know the facts so you can make informed choices with your health.
I'm determined to get some answer that is more clear. I've also requested a shrink referral to see if there is ANY ADD med that's safe for cardiac-vulnerable older people (from reading, I doubt it) and likewise, if there's anything for anxiety that doesn't depress the CNS (from reading, doubt that too--but no stone unturned).
I'm trying not to obsess but really would like to understand all this better. I know that being your own advocate is key, as long as you stay rational. And keep trying to do healthy stuff and just hope it brings results. I know I should meditate, too. Seeking out joy, as you've been doing, is a type of meditation, ime.
Thanks for listening to my tedious medical mysteries and worries. It helps! I have a Zoom with a distant friend and a real, in-person visit from a local friend this afternoon. Those help too. I ain't giving up. (Though my darkest thoughts when I am having breathing trouble or chest pain -- do I want to live with this? -- trouble me too. Trying with the T to get to the bottom of it all. Fear is fear and I hate it.)
Today is beautiful and I feel better than I have for days. So despite alla this, I'm good. (((Hops)))
hugs and gratitude,
Hops