So very grateful

So we were watching TV together when I noticed Chris was shutting one eye and then the other. Then he told me he had a really bad headache.

I gave him some paracetamol and he fell asleep on the couch after taking it.

A day or two afterward, he was looking at me and I noticed his left eye was turning in. That's when the double vision came into play...

After putting up with it for a week, Chris decided it wasn't getting better, so we went to the ED.

They noticed his right eye stares straight ahead, making the left eye turn like it should, but causing double vision which made him feel nauseous.

They noticed his blood pressure was quite high and started him on more medication for it. They ordered a Cat Scan on his head and admitted him.

The CT scan showed no abnormalities, so they followed up with a MRI which did. Chris had had a stroke in his cerebellum.

It was not a bleed but rather a blockage, and they believe this caused his double vision known as Cranial sixth nerve palsy. They don't know if it will be permanent or not.

They are treating his blood pressure,  upping his insulin for the diabetes and putting him on aspirin as a blood thinner, as well as giving him statins for his high cholesterol.

He will be treated by patching one eye to avoid double vision and taking the aforementioned medications. This will be punctuated with GP visits, physiotherapy visits for eye exercises, endocrinologist and neurologist.

My fibromyalgia has flared as I am exhausted. I stayed everyday of his week long hospital stay from 10-7pm. The weather was changing all the time as we are in our spring and I have had angina because the stress was mind numbing..

We are so very grateful that the stroke wasn't worse and we are praying believing that the eye nerve damage will sort itself out. Also we are praying that he doesn't have another stroke.

Mostly we thank the LORD for another chance at life together..

 

Some more to add to the mix

 

I have another couple of issues to add to the mix. Lymphoedema with skin changes similar to this picture above.

I also have sugars over 17 fasting and it's making me feel dreadful.

I have just changed doctors since the move and she has gone on vacation for two weeks. I need to go on insulin.. 

I have been putting castor oil on my legs and it seems to be stopping the scaling which hopefully will stop the legs getting infected. My right arm is also affected...

To add the final nail in my health, I have been suffering from costochondritis which is very sore.

With a fibromyalgia flare happening as well, I am truly feeling dreadful. Prayers would be very much appreciated.

We walk that path together.

 

It's a sad fact that lately Chris and I wake up each morning feeling exhausted. We can sleep for 8 hours or sometimes 9 and still feel tired.

We ache all over and carry the "just woken up" brain fog all day. Our morning routine consists of bloods to check the blood sugar levels and then an insulin injection for Chris followed by a hearty breakfast of pills swallowed down with a nice cup of tea.

Our love language is spoons and our song of lamentation is that we don't have any or that it won't be sufficient for the day's activities. We live just to take another nana or grandpa nap.

Of course I have a double whammy of woes, with my diabetes and fibromyalgia. The pain never departs except for the brief few minutes Chris rubs my feet. I have the combined effects of peripheral neuropathy, in my toes especially and the foot pain that comes with fibro.

With ongoing chronic fatigue, I am certain to fall sleep just 5 minutes into my foot rub. I joke and tell Chris that these days it's better than sex!... only between us- I think it's true! I mean when everything hurts and it's hard to breathe with angina and pulmonary hypertension, foot rubs now are the only pleasure in life that steadies my breathing and still relaxes me..

And talking of breathing, that RSV flu type virus is still hanging around. Not as bad, but bad enough to have me keep my asthma puffers strategically placed at my dining table, computer desk and bedside. It too drains my energy and adds to the joy of a fibromyalgia flare.

Statistics show that more women have fibromyalgia than men, but I often wonder if Chris' chronic fatigue and constant body pains are indeed fibro... there's no particular test to find out, but it wouldn't surprise me at all...

Meanwhile, he lives the horrible life of a fibromite, but at least he doesn't have to validate himself with me. We walk that path together...

She is not afraid of the snow

 

Recently Chris and I have been stocking up our fridge, freezer and pantry. The world is a very sad place and nothing is sure...

We aren't living in fear- we just think with the price of diesel, strikes, problems in distribution and so on, that it would be prudent to have some back up food in the house.

So far we have enough groceries to last us about six weeks on a planned menu that doesn't use all our reserves at once, yet nourishes us. I have a few extra packs and tins of cat food for Xena.

In line with this, I have been getting prescriptions filled promptly and buying extra diabetic supplies. Again, enough to last us about six weeks. And that includes pain killers for my fibromyalgia.

Already we have had distribution problems with shipping containers banked up on wharves and no workers willing to unload them. With all our various health issues that require many tablets a day to control plus insulin injections, we are aware that having a few weeks in advance if possible is also prudent.

My antidepressants weren't available for months and if I hadn't been wise, I would have had a meltdown. Fortunately I had a couple of boxes of them in obeyance. 

Whilst I don't advocate stocking up because of fear, it is not wrong to anticipate difficulties in obtaining basic supplies and acting accordingly.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks   

 

She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet-Proverbs 31:21

You better go check yours out!

 

So as you know I have been having problems staying awake. Even after 8 hours of sleep, I battle keeping my eyes open during the day.

This has had me perplexed and I have blamed my fibromyalgia, which still may be a part of what I have been struggling with, but certainly not all.

Going through my refrigerator last week, I sorted through the side top shelf on the door where I keep Chris's insulin injections and my thyroxin. Checking the dates, I was shocked to see that my thyroxin was out of date by two months!

I quickly discarded them and put a new week of indate tablets in my pill container for the week. No wonder I have had peeling skin off my face, hair loss and fatigue...

It's been 6 days so far with little change, but I would expect the synthetic thyroid hormone to build up in my system soon... I am hoping I don't have to wait long.

I am so switched on with medications and foods and so on that have a limited shelf life, but this time, it fell through the cracks...

Considering I have been battling a long term fibromyalgia flare for about 10 months... yes nearly 11 months since moving here, I guess I have to cut myself some slack. Nevertheless, when I discovered the out of date meds, I did tell myself  that I am an old sausage! And I am!  You better go check yours out! 

And a good sleep

So recently we have been told that we are low on magnesium and have been taking magnesium tablets. It is about 10 days now that we have taken them and although my muscles still pain me, both Chris and I have had less calf cramps.

I have noticed a deeper sleep for myself, though Chris still has trouble but also reports a more refreshing sleep when he manages to drop off. He has noticed that he has less restless leg at night. Any help is a blessing.

As a sufferer of fibromyalgia, I welcome anything that helps me hurt less and sleep better. As it's early days of taking the supplement, I live in hope that it will get even better in its' relaxing effects.

I know it is improving my sleep already because I usually cannot get back to sleep if I wake up early and it's getting light. But today, I woke up to the grey dawn and decided to try going back to bed after going to the bathroom. I managed to sleep until 9.50am. 

I was amazed by this, but had to have an inward chuckle as today was the day my cleaning lady comes at 10.30 and I hadn't done anything. I still needed to get dressed, take our bloods, give Chris his insulin injection, feed Xena and then feed us.

Usually I pick up any dirty clothes up off chairs in our rooms, stack the dishwasher, and empty rubbish from the mini rubbish bins around the house, plus check Xena's tray is clean before she comes. I don't want her wasting her time on stuff I can do- I want her to focus on what I can't do like washing the floors and cleaning the bathroom.

But today, I managed to tidy up so that the cleaner could just clean- but we still were eating breakfast when she arrived. So because we were late through sleeping in, she was surprised to see us still at the island bench, eating. 

It all worked out well and I am hoping that the magnesium's effect continues. Even if it's ten pills a morning now for us both to take. As long as they make our bodies think we are healthier than we are, it's all for a good cause. And a good sleep.

But then again, maybe not!

 

With the start of our summer tomorrow, we have been having some very lovely days this last week and today. I have enjoyed the respite from constant rain and so has my body.

Fibromyalgia has taken a back seat and I am enjoying having some spoons. It's been so long that it is a surreal feeling. 

I have been washing our bedding after the winter months and will be packing away our doonas. We both don't sleep very well and so we prefer minkie blankets. They are light and easy to throw off if we get too warm, yet warm enough to preclude the need for the heavier doonas for a drop in temperature.

It's such a joy to open the windows throughout the house too. We are fresh air freaks. There's nothing like the smell of the early morning. 

I am going to make up my favourite cookie recipe today. And I think I will bake some sultana muffins for Chris. He loves them. 

In stark contrast to flare days, I have already had my shower and gotten dressed. I need to take our bloods and give Chris his insulin injection. I think I will serve him some soldiers for breakfast this morning.

I have pork chops thawing for dinner tonight. I may do an egg salad to go with them. It's salad weather here at the moment.

As I must pace myself so as not to bring on another flare, I think in between tasks I will go out in the back garden and sit on the garden swing. My friends the birds are so tame that they actually come down to eat almost from my hand. It's so relaxing!

I have a lot of things I want to do today, but nothing compares to sitting in the swing in the sun watching the birds. So maybe I will get all those things done, but then again, maybe not! 

Sometimes you have to be your own doctor!

It's Saturday evening here. Not much accomplished today except I washed some dishes and will cook dinner soon. 

Chris's face is improving already with his Bell's Palsy and he can open his eye almost fully and his mouth is not as drooped. He is regaining his speech again and is not slurring his words as much. 

His sugars are way up because of the Prednisolone he's been taking. Consequently, he has been sleeping on the couch most of the day. The doctor wants him to discontinue the steroids so this morning was his last day. 

I was awakened by asthma early hours of this morning. The inhaler didn't help much but I still went back to bed because I was needing to sleep. Especially with my night medications. If I don't sleep for 9 hours, I can't focus properly. Plus I am having the Mother of all Flares with my fibromyalgia and can't stay awake.

We have watched all 14 seasons of Heartland and are now waiting for Season 15 next month. We miss it. There's not much on TV or Netflix that we really want to watch. But I like watching something with Chris.

We put our clocks forward an hour tonight as daylight savings ends. I hope to get a better sleep tonight and I have decided to take some of Chris's Prednisolone if the asthma comes back.-it is an average of a week to get into a doctor up here.  

Ya gotta do what ya gotta do! Sometimes you have to be your own doctor! 

Just when we came up for air!

 

So today I had just finished ordering my groceries online when I received the news that all of our home state, Victoria, is going into a five day lockdown starting tonight at midnight. It was a snap decision.

I have been preparing for this, so it didn't catch us unawares. Well, the timing caught us unaware, but the possibility that we could be forced to stay home again didn't.

Since the lifting of restrictions that saw us locked down for nine months, I have been gradually adding extra tinned foods, non perishables and drinks to our pantry. 

I have been gradually getting extra prescriptions and insulin injections made up in case of another snap decision by the Victorian government to enforce a lockdown. I am glad I did.

Although it is supposed to be for five days, with this virus mutating and so on, one never knows. It is  best to be prepared.

With no visitors allowed to our home and nowhere to go,  it will be easy to recover from my most recent fibromyalgia flare that has seen me unable to think clearly, let alone write a blog post. 

I won't be feeling guilty for going to bed during the day, but even so, I would prefer the freedom to come or go as I feel led. 

We Victorians are getting old hands at being cooped up at home and it can be depressing. Especially as we were just starting to relax and relish going for drives and visiting family. 

It was certainly a lovely time and we should have known it wouldn't last long. Typical of events with this horrid virus... it took us back to nine months lockdown just past and coming just when we came up for air!