January – March 2017 Happenings, and ID on Me

Happy 2017!!! I hope this year has been a interesting adventure of life. I want to say mine has been wonderful, but I would not exactly be truthful if I did. Parts of it have been good, and some have been challenging, and events happened that have had me pray lots more than usual, and to let go of outcomes, and also to live One Day at a Time and to stay in today and not look far down the road.

I have been taking action to reach some goals for myself, and taking care of things I have wanted to do for quite some time. One of the major things I have been wanting is a medic alert bracelet so I can have information regarding my health condition and contact information. Often when I go walking I don’t carry identification on me. If something were to happen I would be a Jane Doe. I didn’t want an engraved ID bracelet. Besides not liking the way they look, they don’t hold my information and I don’t want anything visible. I kept searching and then a few weeks ago, I came across an ID bracelet I liked and it comes in several colors, and I can write my information and it’s enclosed in a case on the bracelet. I was able to put my name, what state my drivers license is issued from, my doctors name and phone number, my medicines, and also that there is an emergency contact card in my wallet. Check out www.idonme.com to see the selection of identification options ID ON ME offers. They also have ID bracelets, key chain charms, etc. that are not medical alert bracelets, and also various options for children, pets, and other areas of notification that may be of interest to you.

In the middle of January my mom called me early one morning saying she is having chest pains and wants to go to the emergency room. I suggested that she call 911 but she didn’t want to because they would take her to the county hospital and she wants to go to one in Fort Lauderdale where her doctor is. So, I hurried and dressed and drove to get her and take her to the ER. My mom has given me permission to write about her and what has been happening. We got to the ER and they hooked her up to monitors and her heart rate was 147 which is really high and her blood pressure was high too. So they gave her medicine to bring both of these down and after an hour or two they started to get high again.

More tests were done and the doctors decided to admit her and do a procedure called an Ablation where they go into a vein in her groin and isolate a nerve or part of the heart that is looping to cause the fast heartbeat. A day or so after she was admitted and it was safe to operate and do the procedure they did it and it was successful. So on Saturday afternoon I brought her home, Sunday night her groin hurt, and early Monday morning she called me to take her back to the ER. She had a Hematoma and she was admitted overnight. The next day, Tuesday, mom was dressed and discharged and we were waiting for a wheelchair to take her out to the car. We were waiting over an hour and my pain was increasing and we couldn’t get the staff to get the wheelchair. I told her that I was okay, but she decided to walk to the nurses station and she fell in the hallway and broke the top of her femur bone in her hip area. So, she was readmitted and when her bloodcount was okay they operated and put a pin in her bone.

So, mom has been in the hospital for about a month, doing rehab in the hospital, and on Valentine’s Day she was transferred to a rehab facility. Mom is doing pretty good, and getting along using a walker. It’s going to be a while before she is back to normal and able to manage without a walker. My sister and I have been cleaning mom’s apartment and getting rid of stacks of magazines, and putting things away, and taking care of her finances, etc. Cleaning her apartment has been a major project. There was no way she could come home and move around her apartment with a walker if we didn’t do major cleaning there. I spent many hours and days there, and on her days off my sister has been doing a lot there too. Mom needed chairs she could sit in that don’t have wheels, all her chairs have wheels, so I went looking for sturdy chairs and found some at an office supply store.

In mid February I decided that I need to get motivated to start working out. I have had many days of intense pain and in general not feeling well. So, I decided to take actions in hopes of feeling better. I called my health insurance carrier and signed up for Silver Sneakers which allows me membership to a gym. There are two within 3/4 mile of where I live. I also signed up for a health coach to help me set goals and to follow up to see what my progress is. I felt that if I had someone to report to that it would motivate me more than without one.

There have been quite a few days when I didn’t want to get off the sofa or out of bed in the morning. I have been meaning to write a story on my website for almost two months and you see that this is the first time I have actually made the time to write a story. I have been walking up and down the stairs where I live, and going to the gym 5 days a week. Some days I take one class and other days two or three classes. All classes are about an hour long. I have been doing yoga, chair yoga, and the Silver Sneakers classes which work on balance, strength, movement, etc. I even bought a yoga mat and have 2 pound hand weights. I have been doing this for two weeks and yesterday I thought I would try 3 pound weights, after a few minutes I decided to stick with 2 pound weights for a while longer.

I decided to do the lower impact workout for a while before getting a trainer and using the machines. I felt it wise to get my muscles and body used to working out gradually and I’m glad I did. My neck and back have been sore and I am rubbing muscle rub on them at night, which seems to be helping. I have also been taking Vitamin D tablets and Zyflamend tablets. I took Zyflamend a few years ago and it got rid of tendonitis. It’s good for relieving inflammation in the body. I have been on this regiment for two weeks and now with working out and taking these supplements it seems to be helping to lessen my pain and also to make me more tired and I’m going to sleep earlier than normal. Normal was about midnight or one a.m. Now, I’m ready for bed about 8 to 10 p.m. I try to stay up to at least 10 or 11.

Since I got home from my trip in November I have been baking all of my own bread, cakes, cookies, desserts, etc. and cooking all of my meals from scratch. I’ve been finding recipes on the Internet and I try not to duplicate what make. I have found great recipes like sour cream banana pancakes, bread recipes some that need kneading and others that don’t. I even made chicken pot pie cooking chicken soup so I could use the chicken and broth in the pot pie, and I made a cream cheese pie crust for it. The recipe made a lot so I froze several portions to eat at a later date. I also freeze bread or make bread crumbs from some of it.

Since I gave all of my things away in 2012 when I sold my condo after the doctor told me I didn’t have much more time to be alive, I didn’t really have a good set of pots and pans. So, the end of January I ordered a good set of Curtis Stone dura pan cookware and I love using it. I had a large skillet with that finish and nothing sticks to it, so I decided that is the set of pots and pans I wanted to buy. I’ve been having lots of fun using the new cookware and experimenting with recipes.

So, with all of the events happening, I just didn’t make it a priority to update my website even though I really wanted to. I was just in a funk and couldn’t get off center to do it. I have about 80 stories from June 2011 through sometime in 2013 where I have to go to each story, and the album for that story and create a link for the album and update the story to include the link to the album related to that story. When I began this website I didn’t know how to add links to an album so I had a tab with a link to all photo albums, now that Google doesn’t use Picasa any longer, I need to create links. I hope to get myself motivated to spend the hours, gradually, to complete this task. I have gotten as far as writing a long list of all the names of the albums so I can check them off as I include the link in the story.

It looks like mom may not be able to stay by herself when she comes home this Monday. She told me she is apprehensive about living alone because she is not strong. She uses a walker and she can’t get her antembolism stockings on her legs by herself. I may have to stay with her for a little while which I am not looking forward to. My brother flew in for a day and a half when mom first went into the hospital, and now he is coming for another day and a half to bring her home. It’s nice that he feels he can spare a day and a half… if you don’t know it, I am being sarcastic. My sister has been spending her days off working on moms apartment and visiting her. I am glad my sister moved back to Florida in late October or all of this would fall to me. My family feels that since I am not working that I should be the one to stay and take care of mom. I let them know about my health condition, they weren’t aware of it since I don’t say anything to them. In addition, I just had some skin cancer cut out of my chest. The doctors office said it isn’t the bad kind of cancer thankfully. It still hurt and needs to be taken care of.

The other day I noticed that my parakeet Katie was acting strange. She was losing her balance and falling off of her perches, and having trouble climbing up the cage to her perches. She was a rescue bird that I got in December, I wrote a story about her when I brought her home. I didn’t really want to spend a lot on a vet visit, but I also don’t like to see animals suffer. I took her to the vet and $150 later took her home with some vitamins I have to give her once a day along with drops of water several times a day. I don’t see her drinking water and she was dehydrated and underweight. I went to the pet store and bought some more rope perches so she can grip them better than wood perches. She has two rope perches already and she likes them, but I needed to get a spiral one that is vertical from the top to bottom of the cage. The vet doesn’t know what is wrong with Katie and seeing that whoever brought her in to the wildlife center didn’t give any info it could be that Katie is old, or has arthritis or something more serious. Hopefully, the antibiotic she was given and these vitamins and trimming her beak will get her strong. She is about a third less weight than she should be. I weighed her today and she gained 2 grams in two days which is a good sign. She still seems to be unsteady and have trouble climbing and she seems to sleep alot.

I’m glad I was able to motivate myself to write a story, I know some of my friends check this website to see what I have been up to. If I am at my moms for a while, I won’t have Internet to update my website or create links in my stories, I will have access to my email using my phone. I was planning on leaving on a new trip in early April, now it looks like it will be sometime in May. I told my mom this morning that I plan on leaving in May and she said she can’t believe I am abandoning her. I am hoping she gets motivated to get better and stronger and is able to take care of herself like she used to  before May. Medicare is sending someone to do physical therapy with her a few times a week for a while which is good because when she hurts she doesn’t want to move, and doesn’t. When I don’t want to because of pain, I do it anyway. Well, that’s about it for now. I can’t promise, but I will try to write at least a short update more frequently than two months.