Posts Tagged ‘Cough’

Not One of My Better Weeks

April 9, 2017

It has been a challenging time lately.  I have been coughing like crazy – sometimes so hard it feels as if I have rows and rows of burning needles in my chest.  I also lost my voice – not that it kept me from talking.  I had to ask Benny to rebroadcast a show for me – no voice and 28 minutes of coughing is not my idea of entertaining radio.   Because I have been having such a bad time, I saw Doc Pierce Tuesday morning.  He gave me antibiotic for 7 days, plus I had forgotten he had given me something for the cough a while ago.  Last night was the first night’s sleep I have had in a long time.  I didn’t cough much, but it took me a bit to go to sleep.

Eddie has a cough, not like mine, but he has stuffy, runny nose with sneezing – he thinks it’s allergy.  I’m wondering if my is sinus because I get what feels like a sinus headache at times.  Both of us would love to be finished with all of it.  I wonder if we are getting more sensitive to things inside and outside.

After I went to the doc Tuesday morning, I went to see the eye doc in the afternoon.  Not my favorite to have all this in one day.  However, I am doing well and the macular degeneration is not any worse.  I seem to have spent the day taking cat naps because I was having trouble keeping my eyes open.  I went to Breakfast club the next morning, came straight home to bed and slept and cough until about noon.  This stuff is for the birds.  I did feel better in the afternoon; I’d rather sleep at night.

Brad has been here for a week or so doing the bathroom remodel downstairs.  He did demolition to prepare it for the repiping on Thursday.  They turned the water off so Greg the plumber could replace as much pipe as possible.  That meant Eddie and I needed to find things to do somewhere else.  We went to Panera for breakfast, picked up the laundry and wandered around the new Ikea.  I was amazed at how much I walked before needing a sit-down.  It’s huge, with floors, but the food available to buy is very sparse from what it was.  Their restaurant is much bigger – we didn’t check the menu.  We took stuff home and then went down the hill.  We spent quite a while wandering around in Barnes & Noble, then grocery shopped and finally decided to come home around 3:30 or 4.

The water was still off and it was close to 6 when Greg was done.  There is a lot of sediment and grit from the peeling pipes, plus the pipes coming in from the street need to be replaced.  I was glad to have the water back.  Greg said to call him the next day of there were any problems – he was working Burien that day.  In the night, I heard water running – the toilet was completely closing.  So there was drip, drip, drip along with a spraying sound.  I looked in the tank and found a new kind of set up.  No ball, though the handle still has a change to flush and the left has the regulating to open and close the valve.  However, where the ball used to be is a canister type device – love to know how it works.   I called Greg the next day to let him know – he came out and found there was sediment in the works.  So he flushed it out and thought he fixed it, but then on his next test, it started running.  More sediment; I am glad to say, so far it is working perfectly.

Friday was quite a day rain with really high winds. some places lost power, trees fell on houses and cars.  I’m so glad Mom and Dad opted to do underground wiring a long time ago.  So far we have not lost power.  I suspect when all that weather goes over the mountains and east, it will intensify.  Everyone has been having wild weather.  It was up to 60 on Thursday, now it is in the 40’s.  I keep thinking Spring weather will finally emerge.  Meanwhile, the flowers,  trees and bushes are blooming like crazy.  We may not have the weather, but we have lovely blooms and beautiful colors.  I miss the mountains, they have all been shrouded in clouds most of the time.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the 737 at the Museum of Flight.  It is not Eddie’s week to go, but he wanted to check it out.  I don’t think it is raining, which I’m sure the organizers are pleased.

As soon as I download pictures of the bathroom remodel, I will give you a link.

Early Happy New Year!

December 30, 2013

I had a wonderful trip to Toronto over Christmas and planned to write a post or two about it.  We came home 1:30 Friday morning and the next thing I know, I am hit with the flu.  The past weekend was horrendous, now I am beginning to feel a little more human, but still tired.  I haven’t gotten much sleep this weekend and I need to have a nap or two to catch up.  I haven’t forgotten about posting blogs, just have not been with it – the cough syrup makes me rather spacey, though it does help the cough.  So bear with me for a couple or 3 days and I will tell you how much fun we had in Toronto with our niece and her family.

We arrived just after the ice storm hit and it snowed on Christmas.  It was really cold, -12 to -28 celsius.

di have some neat pictures from my sister Ellen I will share with you.  She writes great captions.

P1020188

Maybe it’s warmer in a footprint?

P1020155

Winter Scape

Sunday Round Up

January 13, 2013

Obviously I didn’t write more than one post last week – I thought I would because of Brenda Ueland’s book and how much it made me want to write.  I am still dragging from the flu but feel a lot better, too bad my energy hasn’t caught up yet.  But I have decided it is long past time to change my thought patterns – instead of thinking in terms of my fatigue,  I am going to think in terms of “My energy is returning”.  So there!  I realize I am waiting for it to come but I have to do more than whinge and sleep.  I also think the cough stuff put me to sleep – helped the cough and now I am not using it.  Maybe it takes more than a day or so to be completely out of my system.  Some days I feel as if I have more questions about so much and very few answers. However, I also tend to want to see it on a flashing neon billboard so I won’t miss it.  That is one of the things I am concerned about – missing the messages.  Maybe I need to change my name to Thomas on those occasions.

I did notice something interesting on Thursday.  I didn’t put my neck collar on to work on the computer, but I wasn’t stiff or uncomfortable when I finished.  I was looking at other RA blogs and commenting on them as well as checking out dementia blogs.  I was having fun and I must have been doing it for 2 or 3 hours non stop.  Hmmmm, something to think about.   However, I had planned a post that day – it was a day to myself and I took full advantage of it.  I was caught up in the blogs – there are some really great bloggers out there! – and forgot what I wanted to do.  Maybe when I do things I enjoy, there aren’t the repercussions I get when I am doing something that isn’t always fun.

I have been checking WordPress to see what I need to do on my blog to be on Freshly Pressed on Fridays.  One thing is not have long paragraphs, one thing I have on my posts.  So I have been working on making my paragraphs shorter – when I write, I just go full steam without noticing things like that.  Then I check spelling and publish.  I need to do a little more with it now. They also suggest pictures, that  means  I may be surfing a lot to find  a photo that  fits the subject.  I need to go back and see what else I need to do – now that I think about it, a page with long paragraphs isn’t very interesting to look at.  However, the most important is content and how it is written.  I did learn how to put in a gravatar, so I am learning something new every day.

I just saved my draft and decided to view the post to see how it looks – about twice as many lines as they recommend – on the part where I write, I have short paragraphs, but on the blog the space is narrower, so instead of no more than 8 lines, I counted 15.  Hmmm, this is going to take some thought to decide how to do this. – I don’t have anything else to do, do I?  I checked the blog preview again, 3 lines equals 6 lines on the blog.  That does help me figure out how much to put in each paragraph when I am writing the blog.  Ain’t technology wonderful?

I am very pleased to see the sun out again, though it has been in the very low 30’s and upper 20’s the last few days.  It is a delight to see the sun this week, it feels as if it has been away on holiday for quite a while.  We checked the rain amount, as of Saturday afternoon, we have 2.71 inches, and the middle of the month isn’t even here yet.

Speaking of which, Tuesday is my birthday, the big 66.  I don’t necessarily feel that age, except Friday night and Saturday morning when I was so stiff and uncomfortable – no idea why.  Not my favorite way to feel.  I don’t feel any age, but looking at 66, I realize I don’t necessarily have a lot of time left to accomplish whatever is my Life Purpose.  By the way, I have the list of Life Lessons and I will do a post on that soon.  In looking at it, it feels as if all of them are mine.

We have been applying for a mortgage but had to hold off for a bit until we have Mom qualified for Medicaid.  Since it all looks really good, they started the process up again, but it may not be until the end of this month.  I was hoping we would be starting on the kitchen this month but not so far.  Looks more like February.  Ah well, all things come to he/she who waits.  Another part of being a late bloomer.

Lee Proposes, God Disposes

January 3, 2013

I had planned to write a blog post 2 1/2 weeks ago called “The Bears Have It Right”.  I had decided to take the last two weeks in December off just relaxing – hibernating, so to speak –  doing what I wanted, writing blog posts as well as in my journal.  I needed some quiet time to rest and recuperate from this last quarter of the year.  Unfortunately I came down with the flu and have been coughing, blowing my nose, losing my voice and dealing with a sore throat.  If I had been in any mood to write, it would have been to whinge about how badly I felt and chronicle in detail the day my throat felt as if there were thorns in it – made swallowing, sneezing and coughing very uncomfortable.  Then I would have complained the day I had a horrendous headache – all of which would have been against my rule of No Whingeing.  So that is why you have not seen a blog for  2 1/2 weeks.  To make the whole thing more interesting, Eddie came down with it as well about a week after I did.  What a pair we have been.  There are times when I think God has a very peculiar sense of humor – last time I needed a break, it was a broken hip rather than two weeks at a spa as I had imagined it.

So here I am in January 3rd, feeling a whole lot better, though still with the stuffy runny nose and cough.  I am beginning to feel more human again – boy does that feel good.  I am still lying low this week to see if I can get over it all as much as possible before starting the new year.  I am happy to say I have been sleeping well for a while, though I still don’t feel rested.  But I think I am working through the fatigue of this year and last by going down layer by layer.  It has been a very different Christmas this year, the first time we have been on our own.  We always came to Seattle for Christmas with Mom and Dad and my two sisters – didn’t seem like Christmas otherwise.  The only decoration we put up were the cards that arrived – thank goodness Eddie was on the ball sending ours.  Christmas Day we went over to see Mom and bring her a box of goodies.  We also brought Candy’s gifts with us since she sent them to the house.  She was pleased to see us, even though we were both feeling terrible.  They had all been given gifts – John gave Mom a large teddy bear – she really likes it and cuddles it a lot.

I wanted to give the others in the house a gift, so I bought handkerchiefs for John and Wendell, a plush bear for Jennifer because she keeps admiring Mom’s and has said she wished she had one.  I gave Monique and Jan each a bone china mug and scarves to Didi, Judy and Susan.  I appreciate their caring for Mom and  being there for her.  Mom is often confused and has been having trouble sleeping at night.  To counteract that, she sleeps a lot in the day.  They have a new med to help her sleep at night but it hasn’t kicked in yet – it may take a couple of weeks.  One day I went to see her and she was sound asleep – she had not slept well the night before.  Another day she had just gotten up – it was about 1:30 in the afternoon.  She seems to be more forgetful when she is timed and they are beginning to see her feisty, irritable side now.  When I saw her yesterday, she was very upset and wanted to go home, I think more likely her mother’s house, though she did say she wanted to live with me again.  Part of it is not sleeping well and part is the dementia, it was upsetting to be there.  This is definitely the hardest part of the disease.  I talked to Judy about it and she helped me to understand about it a little more.  I have to remind myself her perception is not always a true one.

2012 has been a challenging year for a lot of people, not just me.  What I would rather do when I look back over the year is to see the gifts in it.  Although it has been difficult taking care of Mom and then finding a place for her to live, plus all the balderdash applying for Medicaid, I am realizing I can ask for help as well as step up to plate and deal with what comes.  I have realized that a lot of my childhood programs have been hitting me in the face so I finally have begun to recognize them.  One was “Don’t ask for help, don’t bother or burden others”,  I am listening to my older sister’s advice of “Ditch it, girl”.  With the broken hip, I had a break from Mom and home, though not quite as I pictured it.  But it gave me a chance to have time on my own where the focus was on me and what I needed.  It also gave Eddie a chance to see what I had been dealing with all those months.  Yes, I still had to deal with stuff for Mom on the phone, but I could forget about it for a while as I was doing therapy and sleeping – not a lot of energy or interest for anything else.

I suspect I will be able to see the gifts better as time goes on, it isn’t always apparent at the time.  I see 2013 as a new beginning, though I am not sure what it will be or how it will show up – I look for what is for my highest good, what works no matter what form it appears.


Angelswhisper2011

Me and my Granny

TWO Spoiled Cats

Angel Sammy and Teddy Make TWO

Northwest Outdoors

This WordPress.com site is the cat’s pajamas

countingducks

reflections on a passing life

Universal Cosmic Consciousness

All experiences are the journey.

Tofino Photography

Professional Wildlife, Landscape and Seascape Photography

Rocking This Illness: My Story of Life with Behcet's Disease

Navigating Life with an Illness that Doesn't Define Me

I used to be indecisive...

...but now I'm not so sure

livelovebegreen

making my world greener, one day at a time

LEANNE COLE

Trying to live a creative life

Wiley's Wisdom

Joy: From the Ground Up

StickertyClick.com

" Creativity is a drug that i can't live without' - Cecil B. Demille StickertyClick, Destination for all of your edgy creative needs.

brent's iPhone & japan

what am i up to...

TwoCatsViews

Life as Seen by Hemingway and Steinbeck

Kalliope Amorphous

Art blog of Kalliope Amorphous

Top 10 of Anything and Everything

Animals, Travel, Casinos, Sports, Gift Ideas, Mental Health and So Much More!

The Jiggly Bits

...because life is funny.

All Flared Up: An Arthritis Blog

Living Rather Than Wallowing

∞ itis

Rheumatoid Arthritis, autoimmunity, and life