Weeks Ending 4/23 and 4/30

 OK, so I missed last weeks update. Sorry about that. 

The week ending 4/23 was a little intense. I had my regular doctor's appointment on Monday and more medical testing assigned by the SSA on Friday. You may recall how my visit to the eye doctor turned out and imagine that two medical visits in one week would leave me pretty worn out. You'd be right and wrong at the same time. Neither visit broke me quite as badly as the eye doctor's did... my doctor is pretty easy to deal with, and less walking was involved and the medical testing... well, Juno insisted on getting me a wheelchair to get around the hospital. 

Still and all, I was worn on last Sunday and told myself I'd post an update on Monday. I didn't. I was stressed out and distracted all week. It wasn't until Thursday that someone pointed out that I hadn't posted an update and by that point, I figured I'd just wait until today.

So, yeah, still having a hard time of it... but for all that, I'm still having good days too. 

I think part of my problem is I've been getting frustrated with myself. I have things I want to do. I've let them become goals instead of ambitions. (You may recall, many moons ago, I decided it was better to have ambitions than goals... because if you miss a goal, you feel like you've failed, but ambitions don't need to have deadlines.) Recognizing where I've gone off my path helps me see how to get back on it. I'm working on it.

In other news, my mother pointed me to a very interesting video from Second Opinion with Joan Lundon about Post Acute COVID-19 Syndrome. The fellow they have on who has it uses some of the exact same language I do to describe it. If you have 25 minutes and are interested, I highly recommend it (link below).

I'm going to try out a couple of things suggested in the video (treatment stuff starts around 18:30 on the video if you want to skip ahead).... though the tepid showers ideas, I don't know. :)

https://youtu.be/fNkYt9tcfkk

Onwards

Week Ending 4/16

 So, the astute - which is to say awake - reader may have noticed that I haven't been doing very well the past couple of weeks. Honestly, I think I lost my balance somewhere (and I can pretty easily guess where) and was having a hard time finding it again.

I think I might finally be starting to find that balance again... thanks to, of all things, Chopped.

Digression - Juno and I are big fans of certain cooking shows, especially Cutthroat Kitchen. Alton Brown torturing chefs foolish enough to set into that kitchen game show is one of our go-to things to watch on otherwise quiet evenings over dinner. I'm not a big fan of Chopped. Overall, I find it negative and oddly cruel in a way that Cutthroat Kitchen - which ought to be - isn't. Maybe because Cutthroat Kitchen plays it fun and Chopped plays it serious. Still, having watched every available episode of CtK multiple times and needing something to fill the silence when it's just me, I've started watching/listening to Chopped.

The last episode of Chopped I had on featured a chef who, through all the trash talking and mayhem, kept his cool and stayed positive. He didn't let it get to him. He didn't get dragged down and, in the end, that won him the episode. His attitude struck a cord in me. 

Sure, I've had a lot of bad days lately, but I've had good days too. I've been letting the frustration about the things I can't do get to me, instead of embracing the things I can do. 

Yesterday, energy-wise, it wasn't a great day. I wouldn't have been able to write this yesterday, because I was too tired to string together this many sentences. That's been really bothering me. Instead, I set it aside. I embraced what I could do. I lay down and I read a book. I even went and sat outside in the sun and read my book (and it's been ages, maybe literally years, since I did that).

It was a good day... because I didn't let it get to me. Because I remembered to take to the win. 

I can do this.

Onward.

Week Ending 4/9

 As is probably obvious, the week before was pretty rough. I basically didn't sleep last Sunday, plagued by nightmare of being buried alive... literally woke up uncertain if this was real or if the dream was real and this was the illusion I was crafting in some desperate bid to keep my sanity. 

I'm pretty sure this is real (or as close to real as we get on a typical day).

I'd like to say this week was better. I can honestly say it at least wasn't that bad. 

After all that, I felt pretty good when I woke up on Monday. I had eye doctor's appointment and I expected to be wiped out for the rest of the day afterward. What I did not expect was that I would crash, and crash hard, not even halfway through the appointment. The nice technician looked really concerned. The doctor was visibly horrified. By the time I got home, I could barely make it up the stairs. I spent the rest of the day in my recliner with Juno's cat refusing to let me get up. 

It took most of the week to recover. 

I'm feeling OK now, but my wrist is killing me and I slept until 9:00 this morning... so maybe I'm not feeling OK. At least I'm not feeling bad.

My vision is pretty good, all things considered.

Onward.

Week Ending 4/2

 There are good days and bad days. 

You get through the bad days, celebrate the good days.

More later

Onward