Week Ending 3/16

Another very interesting week.

Juno drove to Vermont, to deal with some things around mom's passing that had to be done in person. So, D and I had the house to ourselves. Of course, we also had to take care of ourselves. We did pretty well, thanks to some good advanced planning. Juno kind left us with enough food and supplies to last the week. All in all, we did pretty well. Also, D did some experimenting with cooking and discovered that he knows how to make some pretty darn good fried chicken! 

Yeah, we did OK, D and I.

Juno's back now. She brought back some things of mom's that my uncle put in storage for us. Some books, some of her artwork and a fair chunk of her DVDs. What can I say, mom was a movie buff.

It's kind of bittersweet, going through these collections. Lots of memories and lot of smiles and a little sadness.

Oddly, the hardest thing right is getting used to have Juno back. D and I really did OK but we got into our own different rhythm. Now we're suddenly getting used to have all of us together again. Funny that. Still, nice to have her home.

Onward

Week Ending 3/9

 So, the good news is that, apart from my chronic condition, I'm actually in pretty good health. My blood sugar is solidly down into the pre-diabetic range and almost everything else is normal (apart from my hemoglobin which is mysteriously slightly high). The bad news is it took me three days to recover from my doctor's appointment. 

Yeah, Post-COVID chronic fatigue remains chronic. 

So, pretty much spent the week in bed watching TV... which, really, is not as much fun as it sounds. 

I did run into something interesting. Pretty much decided to call one day late this week a write-off... wasn't even going to get dressed. However, after spending the morning laying around, I was actually able to get up in the afternoon and got a fair bit of miniature painting done. I find myself wondering... am I still unconsciously trying to follow a "work" schedule of Get Up Early, Do Work (or whatever) Until I Fall Over, Rest. Maybe doing things in shorter bursts with rest periods between is a better plan. Going to experiment with that.

Of course, it's harder to make those kind of changes than you think. Still, I'm working on it.

Onward

Week Ending 3/2

Gods, it's nice to be able to think again!

My head is so much clearer. I feel more like myself than I have in a while.

I'm still struggling with my energy levels. I think I've been overdoing it without really realizing it. I've decided that I need to cut back on my ambitions and give myself a little more grace. I've been feeling a lot of time pressure, probably because of all the paperwork concerning mom's death... just a steady drum beat of "got to get this done, and this done and..." 

Yeah, need to give myself some grace. Mom would be the first person to tell me not to overdo it. 

I miss her. We would totally have spent the last couple of days on the phone with each other, complaining about the insanity that has gripped Washington DC. She'd have some things to say. Oh yes, she would.

Well, in the spirit of giving myself some grace, I'm going to chill. 

Doctor's appointment tomorrow (regular quarterly checkup), so maybe a short update on my health before next week's regular update.

Onward

Week Ending 2/23

Well, this has been an interesting week.

As far as I can tell, I haven't talked about this yet... back in December, before I flew out to see my mom, my doctor prescribed me a very low dose of the antidepressant fluoxetine (commonly known as Prozac), as an off-label treatment for my post-COVID chronic fatigue. The latest in a long line of experiments with various prescriptions to try and help. I decided that starting a new medication while traveling was a Bad Idea and held off until I got back. By a curious coincidence, I took the first pill on 1/7, just hours before I got the call that my mom had died.

Since then, I've been struggling, obviously. I've been depressed, exhausted, unable to focus and generally miserable. Well, of course... my mom just died. The thing is, I knew that at least some of those feels might be side effects of the fluoxetine... or my natural grief... or my post-COVID... or maybe my incipient type-2 diabetes.

Finally, after more than a month, I did the smart thing - called my doctor's office and put the matter in front of the professionals. My doctor's response wasn't what I expected. She increased the dose of my fluoxetine. It didn't feel right to me, but then nothing felt right to me. I decided to trust my doctor. 

As it turns out that was the right choice...

As soon as I started the higher dose, my symptoms got dramatically worse. I was confused, unable to focus with getting a major headache from effort, even more exhausted... Yeah, all effects of very bad reaction to fluoxetine. 

I called the doctor's office again and we started weaning me off the medication (because you can't just cold-turkey that stuff without even worse side effects). 

My head is a lot clearer now.

I also had a great meeting with grief counselor this week but that's another story. 

So, yeah, interesting week.

Onward

Week Ending 2/16

This week I was struck by a revelation.

My mom died. My mom is dead. 

It's really weird to say that and it find it to be a revelation. I mean, it's not like I didn't know it. I've known it for more than a month now. I've hardly talked about anything else on here. Yet somehow, I finally really felt it. It's as if someone else has been thinking and feeling these things for the past month. Now, suddenly, it's me. I knew it. I felt it. I said it.

At the same time my subconscious, always subtle as a brick, continues to rail against the idea. I had a dream earlier this week of my mom, very annoyed, insisting that I call her right away. I had another about her having a lifesaving medical procedure. 

So, on the one hand, I'm finally touching this new reality. On the other, some part of me still refuses to accept it.

Obviously, I've still got some work to do.

You know what this reminds me of... those weeks and months early in my illness where I kept saying - "yeah, I know I'm sick but I'm really feeling better today and I'll be OK soon." Well, I'm not OK. With my illness, I've adjusted to a new reality, a new way of living. I guess I need to do the same thing here... and the first step is really, truly, accepting that I'm not OK... but I'll adjust.

Onward

Week Ending 2/9

Good days and bad days. 

The last couple of days have been rough. I'm tired. I'm just so bloody tired.

It's hard to focus. Hard to concentrate. That's frustrating because I have things I want to do, and I can't because I'm just so bloody tired. 

Meanwhile, I continue binge-watching NCIS because I pretty much don't have to get out to bed to do it.

That said, I watched Section 31 last night with Juno. It was... OK, I was pretty bad, really... but it was also fun. I enjoyed watching it. It's nice to enjoy a bad movie every once in a while. 

So, good days and bad days. Maybe more bad than good right now, but still some good in there. I'll take the wins as they come.

Onward

Week Ending 2/2/25

So, at some point in the last week or two the car broke down and Juno commented that January has been a really bad month. 

It has. It really has. It's almost impossible for me to really get my head around the whole thousand-year-long month that was January. I'm not even going to say something foolish like "well that's over" because, while the month may be, all the rest of "that" isn't. 

I mean, I keep catching myself thinking "I can't wait for this to be over so I can call mom again and talk to her about all this" ... and then realizing that I can't. It's funny, she said the same thing after Grandma Cathy died. Looking back, I see how I didn't really understand. Now I do. Of course, like I said to mom, I can still talk to her, in a way. It's just different now. 

Well, as for the rest... there actually is a "rest." I haven't been doing much - mostly watching old shows, playing Skyrim and reading - but I've been doing that. 

I'm still finding my way forward, a little at a time. 

Onward