Friday
Just a quickie. Did too much at the hospital gym on Monday. Paying for it still. Bugger!
Didn't fall asleep this afternoon, so I must have slept alright last night. No word from Sleep Unit yet.
Friday
Oh well.........something manageable at least...........this morning's visit to my Dermatology Consultant brought me three new sites of basal cell C, and an extra site of infection on a leg. All to be treated with various creams and unctions.
So another six weeks of blisters and stings. Best advice from her was, "to wear a wide-brimmed hat and use total sunblock for the rest of your life." Not in bed obviously. But I do have a rather fetching, slant-brimmed, trilby already.
This I can cope with. I know how it works and I know what to expect.
Have you seen the price of Factor 60???? I shall speak to my GP and investigate options.
Still nothing from the Sleep Unit.
Wednesday
An aside......I spent quite some time yesterday teaching myself how to load music CDs into my hard drive, and then getting Album and track titles. After that I eventually managed to Rip the album and download it onto a storage card in my PDA. I had to get my youngest son to sort out an efficient program to get the Album details. Windows does not please me, or him. I am now listening to J Cash through my PDA. The sound reproduction is excellent. Having got the gist of how to Rip and transfer, I added several B Dylan CDs as well. I have a very good mini disk player (a present brought back for me from New York) which I use for all of my favourite music selections. Loads of disks and hours of playing.
I used to enjoy gardening, growing my own veg., and pottering for hours around the garden. It was hard work and I loved it. Physical exercise is so rewarding and a great antidote to daily problems. Alas, no more. Pushing a vaccum cleaner causes increased pain. I bought a Dyson for two reasons. It cleans the bed of dust mites etc., to help prevent my breathing from getting worse while asleep. The Dyson I bought is a long hose and small cyllinder model. There is only the weight of the hose to push around. Yes, this is another example of how I've had to alter the way I approach any physical activities.
I've spoken to fellow patients with similar conditions to mine, and we all agree, that we are always thinking several steps ahead before tackling any jobs to be done. Even washing the dishes. I bought a dishwasher to do the job for me, but the simple act of bending and twisting to load and then later, unload the dishwasher, put me on the sofa for some time afterwards. The pain was bad.
Friday
I've been discussing the Apnoea on our own Forum and the best description I've seen for the CPAP and APAP machines, is that they provide an 'air-splint.' You can't see the splint or smell it, but it is there, keeping the airways open.
Thursday
The muscle cramps were far worse last night. More intense and attacking my whole body. It may be lactic acid that has not been dispersed after my exercise routine at the hospital gym. I shall do a proper warm-down followed by stretching exercises from now on. It does get rid of the acid. I do a warm-down, but not the stretching. That's life. For every action there is a reaction. The elephant was close by this morning, but not too close.
I've increased the anti-depressants.
Wednesday
I have been in the company of my elephant today. Decreasing the medication in readiness to change to new medication always brings problems. It's horrible. The old wounds are revealed as the salve of the medication is slowly removed. If this continues I'll have to 'up' the dose again. Strangely, I had a real positive episode an hour or two ago. If ever there was an example of Bipolar in my day, this is it.
Last night was a terrible night for not sleeping. Muscle cramps in right arm and right leg kept me hopping most of the night. It's a while since these cramps last visited me. Eventually slept for about 4 hours.
It is impossible for me to fire on all 4 cyllinders these days. Nuff said.
Wednesday: A Seedy Hotel Poem
Welcome. #2
Welcome lies the doormat
To guests who are fallen
On hard times and thin walls.
Labelled, boxed and shelved
They pass the old concierge
Who files them away in his mind
And grim rooms.
What name(s) to record
In the unread log
As Life locks them in
To a tower of dust.
The only way up
Is denied by the stairs
That carried hope in their youth
To higher dreams
Now each step up
Takes them down to despair
Pay cash on the nail
For the shared toilet door
With rolls of loo-paper
Thicker than shared party walls
Light bulbs fight
With grime-smeared windows
To make lives dimmer
Welcome lies the doormat
To purgatorial souls............
Wednesday; A poem that took ages.
Winter FeedingJanuary.
Sitting at peace, content
peering through french doors
ignoring my reflection.
Birds ignore me
Three bird feeders
catching the rhythm
swing on pollarded remains
of autumn’s last chop
A trinity of reserve,
hope for this winter
One, a basket of suet
to clothe fragile bones
Two, a station of black sunflower seeds;
oil for joints and aerial locomotion
Three, a tower of seeds with ports of call
for almost one and all, almost
Visitors aplenty passing through
jostle for life on invisible stairs
Alpha male sparrow sporting cravat
barging into tiniest gaps, scattering seeds
unaware of his bounty
to those below
Elegant greenfinch, tubby blue tit, corporal chaffinch
deploying beaks in short sharp attacks
on suet, seed, nut
House sparrows
helicopter in
with flying school precision
A duck, a dart, a weave
of near misses
as a great tit fails
to master the art
of bilocation
while pushy Robin flicks his tail with affectation
Aloft, a magpie’s crackling announcement
introduces her handsome cousin:
Jay (kingfisher blue tuxedo)
floats to the catwalk
struts his stuff
and is gone
Courting collared doves meander
in pairs through priapic shoots
delicately picking
at the entree between
Food to stand in stead
against chills that take no prisoner
A wren peeps from the blackness below
waiting her turn, weighing the odds, wavering
vanishes.
Wednesday: A poem which nearly wrote itself.
The theme was Old Love Letters.
The characters provided me with a wealth of emotional angst. I had to leave out far more than the characters gave me.
Take a LetterTake a letter, Miss Jones.
Any letter, take it.
Follow the threads of the ties of my life,
As they slacken.
What’s that you say?
Don’t worry, Miss Jones.
No need to write as I loosen these ties,
I’m unravelling.
The view from up here, Miss Jones.
Do you enjoy it?
Following the life of the city,
Beneath us,
Now Passing.
Where was I, Miss Jones?
Ah yes, letting go, for a moment.
Letters I lived for,
Giving me wings and my life back,
To follow her,
Smiling.
Did you meet her, Miss Jones?
Her smile and her grace and her touch, were beguiling.
Our years full of seasons,
Enchanting.
These letters, Miss Jones.
Are all that I have of her love
And a life,
I am leaving.
Don’t worry Miss Jones.
Keep them safe and explain,
That I leapt,
With a heart
That was breaking…..
Tuesday
It is two weeks since my Full Sleep Tests. I was connected up to many electrodes. EEG, ECG and breathing monitors, as well as other bits of electronic monitoring equipment, were applied to me for the full night's sleep. It took 45 minutes to fit all of the electrical equipment to me. I am waiting for the results.
I continue to modify my methods of attempting to get as much quality sleep as possible. A bank of pillows seems to be the best way to keep my airways clear by preventing gravity from closing my airways. By staying in the same position as anyone who reads while in bed, I am giving my airways the best possible chance of staying inflated.
