Category: health

A Little Lost

My head doesn’t feel like it’s on straight today. Why is today any different than yesterday?

Dad was moved to a new hospital on Tuesday and spent the day yesterday getting all sorts of tests. We have an idea of what’s coming but we don’t know when and we don’t have any details. It feels like we’re back into a holding pattern and it’s messing with me.

Something I ate last night (too many peanuts, methinks) isn’t playing nicely today and it’s irritating the hell out of me. Stupid digestive system. I also got a pretty shitty night’s sleep last night. That’s not helping the situation.

I have meetings booked for the entire morning and part of the afternoon. What if a call or a text comes in while I’m busy and I can’t get to it? What if I miss something?

I feel useless and pointless and lost right now. Well… I probably always feel a little useless and pointless and lost, but now those feelings are kind of taking over and I don’t like it.

Procedure – Part 2

My father’s cardiac procedure is done and he’s back in his room. Everything went well in that they have enough information to move on to the next steps. The next steps, however, sound seriously terrifying. That’s okay though, we knew that was coming. The only question left is when does it happen and who handles it. I am trying not to freak out over the possibilities.

Procedure

At some point this morning my father is going to have a cardiac procedure. It’s not a big one. Under normal circumstances it’s probably a tiny, routine thing. With his current situation though… well… it’s cardiac, enough said.

Should anyone reading this care to send any happy thoughts or good vibes or positive energy his way, I’d be grateful.

I am totally optimistic that all will go well and it will clearly tell us what the next steps are. That doesn’t mean I’m not scared though.

Break a leg, Papa.

That Was Unexpected

I got onto the weight loss wagon back in September. I started the intermittent fasting silliness and I started making sure I closed the 30 minute exercise ring in my AppleWatch Activities app. I never stopped with the fasting thing, that’s still going on every day. The weight tracking thing fell away just before Christmas, as it does. My last weigh in was December 15th. The exercise thing temporarily ended on the day my father went to the hospital.

Yesterday was the day I officially went back on the wagon. I closed all three rings for the first time in over a week. My weigh in day was on Tuesday before, so I weighed in today…..

….and I was down six pounds.

So I stopped being careful with food and I stopped exercising and… I lost weight. Six pounds in almost two months isn’t all that much, but it’s still good.

I did not see that coming.

Unmotivated

I’ve been pretty much crushed for the last week. It’s getting worse. I just want to curl up in a ball and go away. I can’t though. I have too much to do. Is it necessary stuff or is it distracting stuff. Yes. Tonight I hope to finish up the bed room. New mattress pad, new mattress, new end tables. Tomorrow we start on the kitchen which includes the closet in the mudroom. It’s going to take a few weeks to get through everything on the agenda. There are so many boxes waiting to be opened that I don’t know what to do with them all.

So. Many. Boxes.

At least a new mattress could potentially mean that Jen and I aren’t overwhelmed with back pain when we wake up tomorrow. That’s a plus, right? My foot issue which may or may not be Plantar Fasciitis started sneaking up on me eight or nine days ago, and it was a nightmare through last weekend, but now I think it’s gone. I probably just jinxed it though. At least I’ve got that going for me.

The work day is ~88% complete. 60 minutes to go. At least I’ve got that going for me, right?

Mad at My State

I am mad at Massachusetts right now. Jen sent me this article which lists out the percentage of Covid-19 vaccine doses that have been distributed by each state.

Massachusetts is the heart of health care in the United States and somehow we rank 44th having only administered 54.09% of the vaccine doses we have available.

Massachusetts
Doses distributed to state: 1,156,375
Doses administered: 625,477
Percentage of distributed vaccines that have been administered: 54.09

How can we be that far behind? We have the best hospitals, the best health care staff, the best everything. How can we be so far behind on this? I don’t understand.

More Stuff

Not to be left out of the birthday fun, my nephew is 10 today. Double digits. He’s a mini-me. He’s lucky in two ways. If you’re going to have the misfortune of looking like me, it’s good that you didn’t lose your curly hair the way I did, and also it’s extra lucky that you’re skinny while I was already well on my way to being a fat ass by the time I was 10. He is keeping all the good stuff that I had when I was little. He’s also hysterically funny and he’s not afraid of his own shadow. Two things I didn’t have at 10. So basically, if you eliminate all the stuff that I was bad at when I was 10 you have my nephew. He’s awesome and I love him and I hate that I haven’t been able to visit in forever. I am so sick of the pandemic. It’s killing me.

My father showed some improvement on Tuesday. On Wednesday he seemed to take a bit of a step back but was still better than he had been. Today the word is he seems to have improved a little bit again. We have tentative plans for next steps starting next week. It’s all scary.

We should have the bedroom done tomorrow night… assuming we don’t come up with any new ideas. The mattress is going to be the killer. We have plans in place though. The kitchen stuff starts coming next week. Next weekend is going to be another crazy furniture assemble-fest.

I made a works in progress playlist for RPM. Still not 100% invested yet. Maybe if I can get some guitar parts down it will trigger me. Maybe.

https://hearthis.at/roberjames1971/set/rpm2021-works-in-progress/

I haven’t played with blog themes yet. I browsed a little before bed last night. We’ll have to book some time soon. I have so many reminders in my phone right now. I have to schedule everything with myself or I forget everything.

I’m tired and sad and I want everything to go back to normal and I want it now.

Improvement

I think there may have been some improvement over at the hospital. Not sure. There aren’t any answers, but there was a little more clarity. A little. A tiny bit. It’s something and I’ll take it.

Cautious optimism (I use that phrase too much, I think, but it’s appropriate here). Raise a glass to continual improvement. I mean, I don’t drink but if ever there were a time to start….*

*Ellipses are supposed to be three dots. Why then do I almost always use four or five? The compulsion….. annoys me. Something else I am not very good at, in the long line of things I am not very good at.

Scary

My father is moving out of the intensive care unit into the intermediate care unit. His physical issues are stabilizing. That’s excellent news. Unfortunately, none of the physical problems that were uncovered when he got to the ER on Friday are the reason he went to the ER on Friday. The reason he went to the ER was his confused and disorientated mental state. Even more unfortunately, that situation is getting worse.

He keeps trying to get out of the bed because he keeps forgetting why he’s in the bed. He called home today and talked about everyone who has visited him, including a couple of cats. There is a global pandemic. The hospital does not allow visitors, period. They especially don’t allow cats.

I just want a diagnosis. I want root cause. At this point I’ll settle for a decent theory. I’m completely freaking out. I am trying to be the good Male Irish Immigrant Stereotype* and bottle it all up but I’m failing miserably. I am completely freaking out and constantly on the verge of falling apart. What the hell is going on?????

*I’m a great grandson of Irish immigrants via my paternal grandmother’s line, but the stereotype still applies. I have the red hair to prove it. I probably have the alcoholic gene too. See what I did there? That was a joke based on a stereotype. See how it all ties together? I told you I was coming unglued.