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Wendy The Wanderer

~ Stories Of My Life

Wendy The Wanderer

Category Archives: Chest pain

Mad at myself

07 Tuesday Feb 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, Amazing!, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Chills, confused, Crazy people, death, Edema, Fever, Gross, life, Pain, Pneumonia, Sick, Weak, Weather

≈ 2 Comments

darn

To me it feels like darned if I do, darned if I don’t. First off, I have to admit I think other people are crazy when they get too prissy about germs. Makes me nuts when people say they avoid family gatherings, shopping, public transportation, doc’s offices, etc. so they won’t catch some cooties. Yes, I feel a bit squeamish in a waiting room full of coughing or a TRAX train full of sneezers. I am most worried about mailboxes here, the front door box to get in with our magic fobs or the dumpster gate latch that virtually everyone and their nurses, friends, family and random workers touch. Just think of all the germy things a postal delivery person touches! Or how about the dumpster dumpers who go from facility to facility, filling up their garbage trucks? Each of us touches a zillion things that other people touch….or breathe the same air as countless folks from every sort of life situation. If you think about it all too much….we would all become paralyzed in fear. I try not to go down that road by washing my hands and trying to ignore reality ๐Ÿ˜›

Humans have lived this long amongst germs. I have the darned primary selective IgM deficiiency. “These patients have low IgM with recurrent infections that are often severe. There are variable antibody responses. Some patients are asymptomatic. This disease may be clinically similar to CVID though it should not be referred to by that name. It is important to note that IgM deficiency is also seen commonly in DOCK8 deficiency.” I have had way more than my fair share of strange things wrong with me!

sigmd

Wikipedia says…Isolated primary immunoglobulin M deficiency (or selective IgM immunodeficiency (SIgMD)) is a poorly defined dysgammaglobulinemia characterized by decreased levels of IgM while levels of other immunoglobulins are normal. The immunodeficiency has been associated with some clinical disorders including recurrent infections, atopy, Bloom’s syndrome, celiac disease, systemic lupus erythematosus and malignancy, but, surprisingly, SIgMD seems to also occur in asymptomatic individuals. High incidences of recurrent upper respiratory tract infections (77%), asthma (47%) and allergic rhinitis (36%) have also been reported. SIgMD seems to be a particularly rare antibody deficiency with a reported prevalence between 0.03% (general population) and 0.1% (hospitalized patients).

Sooo…..should I live in a bubble…..or just bull my way through life and hope for the best? I do the latter. And then I sometimes second guess myself. Like for going shopping yesterday. I got sicker and sicker as the evening went on. By the time I went to bed, I was feeling horrible. When I woke up this morning, I was back to intense misery. I went through 4 hours of nasty chills, creepy skin and wicked sore muscles. My lungs felt congested with crud. Then I got back in bed and slept for almost 2 hours. (And the RA came to check up on me while asleep) When I woke up, my body was on fire! I was glad that the chills were gone, but now my hair was dripping wet and my clothes were soaked. I opened the window all the way and pointed the fan at me going full blast.

For many hours now, I have been all hot and sweaty. I have used a whole box of tissues, and then some, this afternoon. I have coughed junk out of my lungs for hours. At least it no longer hurts so much to breathe! I keep mentally beating myself up. Was it stupid to go out yesterday? How else would I know how much I can endure unless I try? I cannot roll myself up in bubble wrap….can I? How can I make the best decisions? If I play it safe all the time, am I better off dead? How the heck am I supposed to figure out these answers?

cloudy

It has been rather nice with the window open ๐Ÿ™‚ Officially 59 degrees….but it was probably over 60 downtown. With the rain and warm weather, all the tree buds have gotten much larger today ๐Ÿ™‚ Sure is a gray day, though. What’s weird is that we are warm in the valley, but the mountains are getting lots of wind and snow and avalanches. So glad to have good air!!!!!! ๐Ÿ™‚

improved-air

Hyper Helen came to my window. She has been avoiding me ever since she said I was going to die soon…..maybe in August? Tonight she said she was going to pray that I die tonight ๐Ÿ˜ฎ Well, when she left, I closed my blinds and visited the bathroom. For days now, it has been very difficult to wipe after peeing. I thought maybe it was from me flopping on the toilet in weakness and I just needed to position better. Tonight I could not get my hand past the toilet seat. That’s when I realized….my right groin area is hugely swollen. It did not hurt until I felt around to see if it was lymphs. Now it hurts quite a bit ๐Ÿ˜ฆ Simultaneously the area of my left chest where my port is and the lymphs in my left neck, swelled up and hurt. Maybe Hyper Helen is more right than she knows? I have been soaked in sweat for about 7 hours now. I prefer that to chills!

tec

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Failings, embarrassments and screw-ups

26 Thursday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Amazing!, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Diabetes, Edema, Faith, Food, God, Heavenly Father, myasthenia gravis, Olive, Scary, Weak

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pride-humility

I figure we all need to become more humble. I’m tired of hearing how much better some folks are than others. Everybody is a mix of good/bad, smart/stupid, kind/nasty, etc, etc….on and on an on…..

humble

It has always been obvious that some of us are blessed with varying amounts of each trait…and that sometimes one way of being is treasured more than others.

flash

One of the things I both love and hate is suddenly remembering things I have said or done throughout my life. Those little movies pop into my head more regularly now that my mortality might be coming to an end. It’s the slow motion version of life passing before my eyes. There’s plenty to be embarrassed about! There are also lots of good things ๐Ÿ™‚

let-go-and-let-live

You know what I like? The way I came to think about Vermont and Vermonters. It’s a small state. The capital was only around 8,000 people and I lived 10 or 12 miles away. Our town was fairly close-knit. Generally everybody knew everything about each other….and were still friends ๐Ÿ˜› People were who they were…it felt like live and let live. Sure, people had a sense of who to trust and who not to….but all were still part of the fabric of the community.

foot-checker

Olive supervises

Ugh. I took a morning diuretic and then decided FORGET IT for the afternoon pill. One eye was drooped closed and I was getting too weak to keep going back and forth to the bathroom. Besides, I had a shrink appointment.

crazy

I just love the stock questions he has to ask me. If he thinks I’m crazy….he hasn’t said so ๐Ÿ˜› I am grateful for the every other week visits. I can compare and contrast the 2 week blocks with other chunks of time. His visits are my measuring stick. Just like everyone else, he seems to be surprised that I endure as well as I do. Only God knows why I am still alive. I guess I am good at being a wreck. I have a lot of practice. Every time I wake up, I am surprised I am still here.

Watch this video of a Utah skier going over a cliff ๐Ÿ˜ฎ His thank you is the same awe I feel at still being alive every morning.

swollen-wrinkles

Yes, I am still grossly swollen, but see the tiny wrinkles? That’s an improvement. The best part is that it is easier to breathe ๐Ÿ™‚ I coughed and choked all morning, but haven’t been as bad this afternoon. The worst part of all this is that each time I get a bit better, eventually I relive it over and over like in the movie Groundhog Day.

groundhog-day

My food has been biting back ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I made breakfast and seriously wondered whether I would live through the experience. It was onion, mushrooms, a baby zucchini, eggs, avocado and cheese, served with salsa. I had to spend most of my time leaned over the counter to be able to breathe and hold myself up. My core strength is going, going, almost gone. I had to sit quite awhile before eating so I could suck in enough air.

bite-back

Oh, my gosh! The food hit my guts like a lead cannonball….and just sat there ๐Ÿ˜ฆ My blood sugar had been good. The more my breakfast just sat there, the more my blood sugar soared. I went from 90 to 132, 278 and then 310 ๐Ÿ˜ฎ And that’s despite shooting up a whole lot more insulin each time I tested. I never did eat lunch…or supper. Ohhhhhh…..my guts…..

good-grief

No such luck

24 Tuesday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Bitch And Moan, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Cranky, Diabetes, Edema, exhausted, Food, Hot flashes, Insulin pump, myasthenia gravis, Olive, Pain, Scary, Sick, Weak

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missing-neck-red-cheeks

I turn red most nights. I really miss having a neck!

I woke up right at midnight. I was struggling to breathe. So I sat up for a while…but it has been 5 hours of coughing and choking so far. I am on my third box of tissues in 24 hours. My lungs are rattling and there seems to be no end of the crud I cough up ๐Ÿ˜ฆ Pretty soon I am going to down some codeine cough syrup and try to go back to bed. This sucks!

skin-tags-galore

I managed to accidentally rip off the most obnoxious skin tag ๐Ÿ˜ฎ

Well, I slept less than 4 hours and woke up coughing and choking. So much for hoping the pneumonia was letting up. Both Kent, who lives in this building, and many people I have heard from online, seem to have this never-ending pneumonia. I am certainly not alone.

Figures. I took a nap for a couple of hours this afternoon. Mr wheelchair says he knocked. Something about hooks for the back of my chair…..so I can carry groceries. I guess I will find out more some other day.

ginger-carrot-soup-with-meatballs-and-cheese

Ugh….I have been coughing crud out of my lungs most of today. Eating makes it worse. Breakfast was yogurt and a banana. Lunch…carrot ginger soup with quartered chicken meatballs and some Swiss-Gruyere cheese. Supper…a sandwich with pepper jelly, bacon jam, roasted garlic and onion jam, lime mayo, a sliced tomato, 2 pieces of roast beef and some guacamole on the side.

condiment-sandwich

Food and Olive are the bright spots in my life. I am very, very weary of the darned pneumonia. There’s not much more to my life than coughing, petting Olive and eating. Thank goodness for Olive ๐Ÿ™‚ Ohhhh…..she told me my blood sugar was low this morning. I was shocked it was down to 54! I did not even feel low ๐Ÿ˜ฎ My blood sugar rarely makes sense any more. Later it was almost 300. Sigh….

olive-nap

Unexpected surprise!

23 Monday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, Amazing!, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Food, Pneumonia, Power wheelchair, Weak, Weather

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rain

Most of the night and morning, we had rain. Several other counties cancelled school because of all the snow and ice, but here in the valley, just rain and temps in the high 30’s. Around noon I realized it was neither raining or snowing. I got the garbage ready to take out. There by the office was the guy who is sometimes nice, sometimes a liar…..the one who has emailed me 3 times to say they JUST ordered the needed parts for my worthless new wheelchair! He was talking to Pauline, who truly hates him ๐Ÿ˜›

I decided it was an excellent time to get my mail that had not been collected in days. Pauline had to say hi to me ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I could not escape. Mr wheelchair man came over and watched me open mail. He claimed he had come to see me. I was trying to ignore him. That made him want to talk to me even more. He said they REALLY were going to fix my useless new chair. Then he gets a message and says they already have the parts. I did not believe him now any more than the last 6 months or so.

mochi-rice-nuggets

He went back to talking to Pauline. She told him he needed to take out my garbage! Snicker…..I lucked out. Third time someone has helped me with garbage. I told Pauline I was going to Trader Joe’s and left. I wanted some ice cream and some mochi rice nuggets. I was sooooooooo bummed! I trekked 1.2 miles through the streets, around unplowed sidewalks and there was NO ice cream in the freezer case. Instead, there were 2 workmen standing around looking at the defrosting empty space. I told the guy I was sad ๐Ÿ˜ฆ He said no problem….there was ice cream in the back ๐Ÿ™‚ Whew! Emergency avoided!

At the same moment I was having an employee put ice cream in my insulated bag, Mr wheelchair man popped around the corner and said he was looking for me. Pauline had told him where to find me! He said the wheelchair fix-it people would be at my apartment at 2 PM. It was then 1:10. Sigh….so much for time to leisurely peruse all the yumminess atย Trader Joe’s. I quick grabbed some tomatoes, avocados and bananas and was out the door.

Just in the time I had been insideย Trader Joe’s, the weather had deteriorated. About halfway home I tried using my umbrella to protect me from the slush falling from the sky. After less than a block, I had to fold up the umbrella because the wind got serious and tried to wreck it.

No sooner did I make it to my building than a blizzard started. There was a white-out. Geeze! Within a few minutes the 2 wheelchair fix-it guys showed up. They took my chair out in the hallway and spent at least a couple of hours taking off useless parts and putting on better ones. I went halfway down my hall and back to try it out. Seems better. I am so very not with-it.

Maybe my coughing is an every other day thing? I have not coughed much today. Yesterday was the pits. Today I am hugely swollen for the problem of the day. My voice is both squeaky and husky.

Pauline and Kissing Helen came to visit. Pauline hauled off the toys for her grandkids. Yup…..getting more empty in here.

mg

One of these days, myasthenia gravis is going to kill me…if the hernia or swelling or infections don’t get me first. Today was the worst SOB ever….along with almost paralyzing weakness of my arms, legs, neck and diaphragm. Really….my body has had about all it can take…..hasn’t it?

I watched a fire truck and ambulance come in, then a minute later, the mail lady. I decided I should try out my new chair and went out to talk to folks. Keep in mind that lots of people look the same to me, but I think the “sick” guy is the guy who flooded this building. The ambulance and fire department people were very angry with the guy. They told him if he called again, they would write him a citation. They ended up giving him a ride. He jumped up onto the gurney and they were off. Apparently he calls 911 at least twice a week. Well….now I know why the ambulance is here so often.

I am feeling both better and worse. Depends on which part of me I am thinking of. Kent says he’s the same way. We both have burning lungs and constant back and forth sweats then chills. I think it’s time somebody cultured our lungs….or something!

good-air

So, tonight much of Utah is under either a Winter Storm Watch or Warning. Not much snow is expected here in SLC, though. What a relief it is to have good air!!!! ๐Ÿ™‚ That must be helping me breathe easier. Yes! I wish I could still breathe when standing. At least it’s easier to breathe when sitting still and not talking ๐Ÿ™‚ That part of me is leaps and bounds better than yesterday. Here’s hoping tomorrow will break the spell and I will get 2 days in a row of better breathing!

wishful-thinking

Swirling flocks of birds

22 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Bitch And Moan, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Cranky, Dizzy, Edema, exhausted, Fatigued, Fever, Frustrated, Grumpy, Hot flashes, myasthenia gravis, Pain, Scary, Sick, Tired, Weak, Weather

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birds

Saturday we had a hefty snow storm. People are still digging out from it. That’s why it’s even more surprising that birds have chosen now to come back. I missed seeing them. Usually all we have had this winter is small flocks of seagulls. Hmmmmm….

stormy

The storms just kept rolling in

I have been noticing the creep of creepiness. Our local CBS station is owned by the Sinclair Group. I’m not sure if I have been grossly unobservant or if they have been slowly but surely changing things. There were these opinion segments tacked on at the end of programs. I kept checking what station I was watching because they sounded more like FOX news than CBS. Then I started noticing that theย Sinclair Broadcast Group was mentioned more and more often. Then people who had been on local TV for a long time started disappearing. Sunday morning, a program came on that shocked me by the tone of it. Whenever lots of adjectives are used in place of factual info, my radar for creepiness goes of.

terrorism

Rise of Terrorism: Holy War is the program. It gave me the creeps on two fronts. I don’t understand why humans have to keep having the same wars over and over….and whoever wrote and produced this program did it to enforce their particular view. It was anything but fair and balanced.

myasthenic-crisis

I have been sooooo close to myasthenic crisis….over and over….thanks to this bout of pneumonia ๐Ÿ˜ฆ

And…about that no coughing yesterday? Last night and today is more than making up for it. So much crud in my sinuses and lungs! ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I want to go crawl in bed, but people are supposedly going to be here in an hour or two.

mg-crisis

Wrote that, realized I was crazy to suffer not breathing well and slept 2 hours. Was awake 10 minutes and the missionary, Sister M, brought me my laundry. I realized I just plain cannot talk until most of the crud has been coughed out of my lungs. Talking makes it way worse ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I was not much fun to be around.

pain

I’m at a real unpleasant part of my life right now. Very sick. Very miserable. And….I don’t have a clue what to do about it. All the coughing and MG weakness has made it very difficult to read or even watch TV. The world is a pair of blurs. I cannot seem to shake the double vision for even a few minutes. Call me cranky!

blurry

The above is how my reading vision is more often than not.

offset

Usually my double vision is side by side and one objet is higher up than the other

next-to

Sometimes there are 2 objects of the same size, just overlapping

stacked-double

Stacked double vision happens to me the least often, but has been like that this week. The first time my eyes saw this way, I ended up being hospitalized.

myself

I’m trying….

My life is getting smaller and smaller

19 Thursday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Edema, exhausted, Fatigued, Hot flashes, Incisional hernia, IVIg, myasthenia gravis, Pain, Pneumonia, Scary, Sick, Snow, Tired, Weak, Weather

≈ 3 Comments

keepbreathing

I woke up to heavy snow. Spent the morning coughing and struggling to breathe. Some time after noon, I just could not take it any longer and got in bed with the blessed CPAP and oxygen.

better

Slept a few hours and now I am struggling even harder to breathe. It feels like without IVIg, there’s going to be a limit to how long I can cling to breathing. Thank goodness the precipitation has cleaned out the air! Look! Down to the green! ๐Ÿ™‚ ย Now it’s raining.

cling

My hold on breathing is tenuous. Soooo swollen! Very wheezy. Not enough room to expand my lungs fully ๐Ÿ˜ฆ Another day wondering where the hours went. I mostly remember pain and desperately wanting to breathe.

just-breathe

I often share things with presidents

18 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, Bitch And Moan, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, exhausted, Food, Recipe, Scary, Sick, Weak, Weather

≈ 2 Comments

I can’t remember which presidents….but one of them and I had phlebitis together. There were a couple other things a president and I had at the same time. This time Bush and I have pneumonia. I would love to fling this pneumonia far, far away! I am miserable morning, noon and night. It has weakened me.

storms

Snow, snow and more snow is on the way

I spent the entire morning coughing and choking. It started to let up around noon. I looked at the weather forecast and decided I needed to go get tomatoes and avocados before I could no longer go out in my chair. Same old same old. Getting dressed is at the very edge of things I am capable of. By the time I get to the wheelchair, I can barely lift my arms or legs and am sucking in air as if my life depends on it……which it does. There was no one in the lobby to help me put on my coat. Bummer ๐Ÿ˜ฆ


NO and PM2.5

Allllllllllllll the way to the store, I coughed, choked and spit. The junk in my lungs is so thick that it often feels like I cannot breathe. The air quality was awful today ๐Ÿ˜ฆ It was so depressing and I was so sick that it never occurred to me to take any pictures. I was in zombie mode. I don’t remember much about the trip home. That’s scary!

One of the recipes often talked about in Trader Joe’s circles is Organic Tomato & Roasted Red Pepper Soup with Chimichurri Rice.ย I am way too cheap to buy pre-made rice! A few months ago I bought 2 jars of Argentinian chimichurri sauce for 50 cents each at Smith’s. I put a jar in the rice cooker with half a diced red onion, half a bunch of diced cilantro and a chopped up fresh tomato. I used 2 measuring cups of Basmati rice, some water and pushed the white rice button. The cooker did the rest ๐Ÿ™‚

I then heated up some TJ’s Tomato & Roasted Red Pepper Soup in the microwave and added some of the chimichurri rice. I have no idea how close it is to the bagged rice, but it was good ๐Ÿ™‚ I wasn’t hungry for chicken, so left it out. Of course I forgot to take pics of that, too. It was a humongous struggle to do anything in the kitchen.

It’s another one of those days that was mostly coughing. I used 2 boxes of Kleenex. Neighbor Pauline rolled in while I was coughing my brains out. She made me take some of the codeine cough syrup. I don’t understand where today went. I know I barely felt conscious much of the time.

chase-cat

 

Feeling sick, sick, sick…..

17 Tuesday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, Amazing!, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Diabetes, Edema, Gross, Insulin pump, Queasy, Sick, Snow, Weak

≈ 4 Comments

bleh

I woke up with a very swollen face, neck and trunk of my body. Yes, the arms and legs are still swollen, but this feels extra creepy. It’s hard to swallow water again. But you know what’s worst? My brain. Has the swelling everywhere done something to my mind? For lack of a better term….I’m feeling crazy ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I also feel quite nauseous.

As I read news and putter around the internet, something is wrong with my thinking. I’m not really smart enough to know what’s wrong….I just know something creepy is happening. My tongue feels fizzy. Tastes like some nasty chemical ๐Ÿ˜ฆ Sooooo queasy!

Pretty soon it was time to shower, get dressed and go wait out front. I took out garbage and recycling…and lucked out. Kent offered to open the dumpster enclosure and toss it in ๐Ÿ™‚ I don’t think I would have had enough strength. It didn’t take long before the paratransit bus was there to get me. I got another driver with a long white beard. He said he played Santa for Christmas ๐Ÿ™‚

Trent Nelson  |  The Salt Lake Tribune Smog trapped in an inversion layer over Salt Lake City, Tuesday, January 22, 2013.

Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune
Smog trapped in an inversion layer over Salt Lake City

OMG! I knew the air was bad….but I had no idea just how bad until we started going south, down the valley, on the interstate. Mountains were more of a suggestion than a thing. I was constantly squinting, trying to figure out if I was, in fact, seeing the Wasatch Mountains or clouds or what. Creepy. Then at some point, we turned toward theย Oquirrh Mountains. A few peaks poked out of the smog, but the mountains were barely visible. Incredibly disgusting air ๐Ÿ˜ฆ It’s not often I ride in a vehicle and even less often am I in a high vehicle on a high interstate bridge. It gave me a whole new perspective.

The roads were totally dry. The further we got from SLC, the less snow there was. It didn’t even look much like winter in West Jordan! We passed a couple of golf courses that were green, without a speck of snow. I got to my endocrinologist’s office 55 minutes early. Much to my surprise, I was taken right in. The endo thinks I am doing well at controlling my diabetes….especially because my steroid dose was raised since the last time she saw me. I’m not sure exactly what she did to my insulin pump, but she changed the background insulin dose to make up for the every afternoon spike when the steroids hit my system. Now I need to relearn my optimum doses. Never a dull moment with all my variables.

My BP was 150/77. Curiously, they weren’t worried….saying the bottom number was good, but the top was high thanks to pneumonia, swelling and pain. And as I knew would happen, my a1c went from 6.6 in October to 6.9 now, thanks to the increased dose of steroids. The endo also wrote me a new script for another meter. Mine has never worked correctly. I have to stick the strip in a bunch of times until it turns on. A new one will be great ๐Ÿ™‚ While the doc was pushing my leg to see how much it would pit, leg juice got all over her. Wish I had a pic of her face ๐Ÿ˜› She has no new ideas how to get the fluid off me ๐Ÿ˜ฆ

So I was done at the doc’s office before my originally scheduled appointment was even supposed to start. That meant a long wait for my paratransit ride home. I went outside and sat in the sun! Did you hear that??? Sun!!!!!!!! What a nice treat ๐Ÿ™‚ It wasn’t until I got on the bus that I realized a lot more of the mountains were visible. The driver this time was an ex-trucker. He scared the crap out of me! I did my darnedest to pay attention to anything but his driving. That’s when I started realizing that all the buds on all the trees were greening up. I sat mesmerized by all the greenness flying by ๐Ÿ™‚

bad-air

SLC bad air today

Then my next realization was the closer we got to SLC, the nastier the air and the more snow there was. Yuck! The mountains soon disappeared into the smog. Usually my whole world is what I can see from my chair…the lower hills northeast of downtown and a few buildings. I forget that a few miles or a different vantage point opens up a whole new world. Readย Living in inversion could mean a shorter life.

inversion

I live in the trapped pollution under the temperature inversion ๐Ÿ˜ฆ

ย Good news ๐Ÿ™‚ I have peed more today than the last several days put together. I hope that trend keeps up. I feel humongous. I am so swollen that my arms and legs can hardly bend. I feel like a big, bloated Barney.

bloated-barney

Trespassers kept me awake

16 Monday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Air quality, allergies, Bitch And Moan, Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Chills, Cranky, Crazy people, Disgusted, Dizzy, Edema, exhausted, Fatigued, Fever, Food, Frustrated, Gross, grouchy, Grumpy, Hot flashes, Incisional hernia, mixed connective tissue disease, myasthenia gravis, Olive, Pain, Scary, Sick, Tired, Weak, Weather

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trespassing

A little white Chevy pick up truck was parked outside my windows last night with a man, woman and dog in it. Sometimes they ran the engine for heat….which made their headlights come on. I was NOT amused. They peed in the parking lot and they also had a dog that looked like a pit/rotty mix. They were not very successful at controlling it and they did not pick up after it. They went to 7-11 for hot drinks a few times….so they were not destitute.

This morning they ran the truck a long time….with the exhaust coming in my apartment. The whole time they were staring in at me ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I called the office, but got voicemail, so I got dressed and went out to tell the office myself. Duh. It’s a holiday. No one is there. So I knocked on the RA’s door. My voice was barely understandable, so I had written down all the info and handed it to her.

Turns out it was family of a guy that lives here. Makes me wonder why they were not allowed to come in! Soon the RA knocked on my door. She told me next time to call the cops. Hmmmmm…..isn’t that her job? The man lives in my hall and went out to his relatives. The scary looking younger guy made ugly faces and said things while looking at me. I’m glad I could not hear him! They all drove off together.

All the creeps park by my windows ๐Ÿ˜ฆ

breakfast

I did something I have not done in months….I made my favorite scrambled breakfast with sausage, onions, mushrooms, zucchini, tomato, avocado, shredded Swiss-Gruyere cheese, eggs and served with a puddle of Sriracha and roast garlic bbq sauce. I paid a price for that! I had to keep bending over the counter to catch my breath. My very lower back just above my butt gets so painful that I kept coming close to fainting. It’s really, really hard to cook in the shape I am in.

And….for days now, when I swallow water, it often comes right back up. It was challenging to swallow my breakfast. The edema in my body now seems more concentrated in my belly. I can still taste and smell that weird breath. Yup….worried about my kidneys. Kidney function keeps bouncing around between OK for my age, to stage 3 kidney failure. I wonder what it is now? WNV and MCTD are risk factors for kidney problems. I can’t talk to my doc because today is MLK Day. I wonder if my endo can help with that? She’s the next doc I see this week.

I took a long nap this afternoon because I just plain could not breathe any more. When I woke up, my throat and lungs were full of crud that it took about an hour to cough up. That’s exhausting ๐Ÿ˜ฆ There were moments when I wondered if I was going to choke to death. When is this stupid pneumonia going to let up?

I’m hungry for lunch/supper, but am afraid of eating. It might be an ice cream day. I don’t think I can swallow anything else. I have no idea why my whole neck/throat is so much more swollen than even my usual swollen. My darned ears are mostly swollen shut, too.

Mail holidays are boring. Usually mail is one thing I have to look forward to….even if it’s just grocery flyers. Even when I am too sick to go get mail….at least I know there’s something waiting for me when I feel better.

cache-valley-air

Cache Valley bad air

slc-air

SLC bad air

The news is full of bad air news. Geeze! Could be worse…I could live in Cache county! I hate temperature inversions ๐Ÿ˜ฆ Despite the mostly gray day, I quick took a pic when some blue sky and hint of sun shone through. It didn’t last long. Tuesday is forecast to be a really bad air day, with levels sometimes in the red.

blue-sky

From Channel 2 News…..Weather forecast for Monday, January 16, 2017
The valley inversion remains firmly locked in place across the valleys of northern Utah. Low clouds, patchy fog, and haze will stick around for the next two days as high pressure sits overhead. A few sun breaks are possible at times during the afternoon. A splitting jet stream will bring a weak storm to Utah Thursday, with a chance for light rain or snow, but with little wind, the valley haze and fog may linger.

Olive has been bugging me for half an hour….telling me it’s time for my evening meds. I have been doing my best to ignore her. It’s going to hurt like heck to swallow. I hope the darn pills will stay down. Sigh…..

pill

Yes…I paid for it….

15 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by WendyUsuallyWanders in Breathing difficulty, Chest pain, Edema, Frustrated, Olive, Sick

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cant-sleepcant-wake

I was seemingly OK overnight, but today has been the pits. All that choking to and from Trader Joe’s was not a good thing ๐Ÿ˜ฆ I woke up coughing up blood this morning. I have had some scary coughing and choking all day today. Sigh….

tubing

Each time the coughing intensifies, I can feel my breathing passages swelling shut. It got bad around noon, so I got in bed with CPAPย and oxygen. It was a horribly fitful sleep. Olive kept walking on me, too. When I woke up a couple of hours later, I was struggling to breathe. When I went to turn off the oxygen concentrator, I discovered why. Olive had chewed through the oxygen tubing while I was asleep ๐Ÿ˜ฆ What’s going on? Why the sudden war on tubing?

laugh

As I was waking up, I could smell and taste something weird. I hope I am wrong….but I think it’s related to my kidneys not working. Dang it! I have peed less than a cup in maybe 24 hours. I even ate HALF of a watermelon and drank many cups of water. When I do pee, it is brown or green. It must be extremely concentrated to color the water in the toilet, since I hardly pee at all. The taste of my tongue is getting stranger by the hour.ย You know why this is happening…..right??? It’s a night during a holiday weekend!

boring

There has not been much to my day besides coughing and sleeping. Kent dropped by for a few minutes. His pneumonia feels worse today, too! We must have a nasty strain of it. Olive sure likes him ๐Ÿ™‚ Perhaps Olive is trying to hasten my demise so she can go live with Kent? He is excited about adopting her. Is that why Olive chewed my oxygen hose?

fear

 

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