My hearing continues to fade. But with help from my ear trumpet I could juuuusssttt make out the cicadas last night. They like the warm nights.
The Mkt is down and took me with it this time. I'll have to wait it out.
I bought at 91.57. I'm currently down $72.96. Fortunately, I limit my betting involvement to $1,500.00. I was making $1,000.00 a week there for the last few months. Despite Trump.
I bought the lounge chair and will try it out today. I can sit for a brief spell as respite from standing -- the left hip won't tolerate weight for more than a few minutes at a time. But it's only when lying down that I'm really free of pain. The lounge chair showed up on Craigslist as if on cue.
Wearing my diaper I can ignore the urinary urgency and just pee in my pants. They'll soak up about 4 or 5 pees then gotta change 'em out. It's alot easier than carrying around a pee bottle or trying to make it to the bathroom. If I happen to be standing I pee in the yard.
Yesterday was the day after the trip to the store and those days are always a write-off. I was able to get up to goto the bathroom but went no further. It's as much a lack of energy as the hip having had to go beyond the normal call of duty.
Debbie the hospice nurse came by. She encouraged me to take more lorazapam instead of isosorbide. By doubling the loraz I was able to go 12 hours between doses of isosorbide instead of the usual 4 or 5. Her point was the angina is due more to anxiety than lack of oxygen. Next I'll try increasing the lorazapam and "meditating." That gets the heart going and often needs the isosorbide...or so I've thought.
Today my ears are clogged.. again. I use hydrogen peroxide to clean them out. I now have an alcohol soaking bowl for the ear twigs.
Basking in alcohol
I unscrew them off the hearing aid & toss 'em in. It seems to reduce the frequency of infections somewhat.
In situ
Ah, and let us not forget the left hip. Good for maybe 20 feet, it then requires 20 minutes of full length flat outness to recover. I've not worked up the chutzpah to assume the position in Trader Joe's or at the glasses buying place, but I'm confident I'll get there. I'm caring less & less about what people think. It's the cat calls that annoy though. A few poundings with the Ekrin Kestrel actually help.
I asked Debbie about when folks decide to take the MAID. She said when they get tired of dealing with it all: Remembering to change the fentanyl patch, remembering to take the murilax to counteract the constipation caused by the fentanyl; remembering to take all the other meds that keep the blood pressure down, the warts off my nose and enable me to pee.
I still think back to Justin Gorton, John & Julia's son. That guy set the bar for wanting to live. And he enjoyed eating so you know he was in his right mind. No dieting B.S. for him! I have a long way to go to match Justin's determination, but he left a pretty clear trail.
In betweeN I think about restoring Phoebe's interior. We have all the parts. I found a supplier in L.A. who's even affordable. I just need the energy to hobble out to the carport.
One step at a time man! 20' isn't so bad!
ReplyDeleteYeah, the woman who led the charge for getting rid of leg-hold traps & snares in NM is married to a guy who underwent prostate cancer treatment. It knocked out all his testosterone and he now has no -- NONE -- ZERO -- muscle mass. At 92 he's still in pretty good health but he's spent the last 20 years in a recliner cuz he doesn't have the wherewithal to get up, let alone move. I know, as Michelle tells me, it could be woise.
DeleteIt's just, I don't know, you must've gone through it at least somewhat....where you're starin' down the tunnel and damn if it ain't just a light, it's a friggin' lamp and you can make out the pleats and the knob and everything. And no amount of denial makes it any dimmer.
You just had a close call. You mustuh gotten some inkling of the mortality thang. It adds some perspective. Or, rather, it did for me.
Yep. Once I got through that first shock I decided that I have to live every day by carrying on with my plans and not looking around every corner for "the light". When it ends, it ends. There's an old Irish toast that goes "may you die before you run out of dreams". In my case I change out "dreams" for "projects" and keep on plugging away.
ReplyDeleteI'll repeat what Greg said. Twenty feet isn't so bad. Justin would have smiled a mile wide if he could have walked twenty feet. Focus on the things that make you happy, not the things that you've lost. During Justin's last days, he ordered UberEats delivered to his hospital room and was still buying video games for his hand-held Nintendo. You only live once, and none of us is getting out alive.
ReplyDeleteThank you both, Greg and John. I usually do pretty well at looking ahead, but the psilocybin had a bad effect & I'm still trying to pull out of it. I've been wanting to try counteracting it with some LSD, but the "set & setting" haven't come together yet. In the meantime, all the parts for re-doing Phoebe's interior have arrived. I just need to find a little more get up & go.
ReplyDelete