Struggling

Here I am again. It is the third week on sick leave now, and the sick leave is supposed to go on two weeks still, till the end of January.

I have been to my ordinary doctor twice, and to the asthma specialist once (it was last week Wednesday). The ordinary one had some lab tests made and I called her to hear what she thought of them. At least thyroid is functioning normally, it is not the cause of sleepiness and drowsiness and exhaustedness. Also the Central hospital is tracing the cause of my tiredness and I have had sleep registration done, and after that they wanted to have the thyroid tests made too, so I have been in those testsa twice. Still I have no results from the registration, and I have not been asked to see the doctor there either.

X-rays show no new damages done to lungs, they are ok in spite of the swine flu which I had in the end of last November, which was this time the beginning of this evil which I am now going through. It is just the asthma which is now hyperreactive. The specialist told to me about healthy young men who had got permanent damage done to their lungs due to the swine flu. I can consider myself blessed since I got nothing.

I got instructions from the specialist last week on how to gradually drop the size of the cortizone dose, and I thought of course that would be it. Cortizone is not a very good medicine to take for a long time. I have now taken it for about 8 weeks, without being able to stop - when I have stopped, it has made the situation worse, and I have been forced to start again. Now I was dropping it to half, from 40 mg to 20 mg, yesterday.

As a result I stayed awake most of the night, making everyone in Twitter insane I am sure by tweeting continuously - for what else is there to do when everybody sleeps... except those who are online? I had several fierce attacks of asthma which made sleeping impossible. I took my medication in the morning, again just 20 mg, not thinking about it because I have a dosette for medicine and I take what I have put in there. The attacks went on all mnorning.

When I was having lunch and talking to my dear husband, I suddenly realized the connection between the decreased cortizon dose and the increased attacks. I was thinking about it and realized that I have no choice - I have to add on that 20 mg again. And I did.

I feel so frustrated. There are contraindications: I have glaucoma, diabetes, overweight - not good to combine with cortizone, any of them.

I have been to opthalmologist too, last week. There was no damage in the eyes to be seen, I got prescription for a new pair of glasses and found a nice pair for both ordinary progressive glasses and screen glasses (which my employer will pay for). Neither was the eye pressure too high. It was within the normal range, although in the upper end of it, and I was told to come again in a year.

Actually I was so happy that "doctor day" when I had both opthalmologist and asthma specialist and saw a lot of people and went shopping and talked to optician and tried on new glasses and joked and.... I have been so isolated here at home, and I have isolated myself even more, not being available online, just using Twitter, not having enough energy to write emails or letters or anything... okey... I was so happy after all these PEOPLE things that it felt really good. Even husband noticed the change.

Actually, he will be taking me out to lunch on Thursday when he has not the entire day scheduled at work. Feels good.

SO, X-rays were good. Eyes were ok, it was just good news from the opthalmologist. And I like the new glasses though they are not ready yet.

Then there was blood in the urine. You start to think of all kinds of things when you see that. ANd when I called my doctor she wanted to see me personally. I have truly never been as scared as I was the day before I went to see her, and that special day.

It was no infection, there was no bacteria. It was neither anyhing else that could be seen or found in her surgery. Everything was perfectly clean and healthy, which was such a relief. She also said I was not menopausal (I think I know that - ).. I asked if it could be that kidneys are failing, and she said absolutely no. But she also ordered new lab tests to make sure it was just something occasional. So what I feared so much seemed to be nothing at all - at least nothing yet. Except new tests.

Now I am just feeling frustrated. It seems a never-ending battle with that cortizone. Why cannot I do without it, or even with a smaller amount of ii? I will have to try again, after a few days.... maybe next week? I also need a new appointment with my specialist in that case but I was just online and had a look but the only time there was was today. So maybe he will give new times today when he comes to the surgery. I must go and have a look after 3 p.m. forf he usually starts then.

I feel so trapped with this cortizone.

SO really trapped. Without it, I can't breathe. But it is not good to have forever either.... though I know people are on cortizone for long times, some forever. But I haven't been one of them.... I don't want to be.

Agenda for today...

1) measure the the blood sugar of my daughter and give the first insulin shots of the day

2) make breakfast

3) comb the girls for school

4) drive husband home from garage (he had his car on service today), he leaves for work with a 3rd car

5) make the declaration of my late brother's sold house - mine, and my mother's (took all morning!)

6) pack clothes to be sent to the children's 2nd cousin (too small clothes for our girls)

7) brush the car from snow, drive to the post office to post the declarations and the parcel with clothes

8) walk (!!!) to pharmacy to buy some medicine and a support bindage for my daughter's anckle

9) make lunch

10) have lunch with husband

11) call the doctor for lab results

12) make another appointment with the doctor for Monday because she wants to examine something closer.. and this has nothing to do with asthma... new things are coming up all the time... Swallow tears and try to live on with disappointment for a while, it feels difficult to think about yet another thing that's wrong...

13) a short while online, organizing the payments for the next holiday trip to the Mediterranean, and I don't even know if I will be fit to go...

14) drive girls from school(s) to the parish hall where they have "Sunday" school on Fridays

15) go shopping, shop three bags with vegetables

15) discuss for a while with son

16) short while online, reading Twitter messages

17) drive girls home from the parish hall

18) watch tv with the girls, have a good talk about real beauty, i am proud of my girls and their opinions!

19) shortly online, chat with a good friend, avoid telling him much about my health, pass it with jokes

20) drive husband to the garage

21) husband cooks dinner and I get a huge portion of vegetables and I am happy

22) tell son I cannot get a video out of a cd and that he should try since he knows more about it than I do - but perhaps we never see it, I am afraid

23) send an offline message to explain the odd way our laptops work here

24) demand that son behaves and it raises a calamity but in the end the solution is satisfactory

25) comb the girls who have been to sauna

26) watch son lift his bicycle to the basement and the sauna shower room to melt from the snow and ice. He cycles 10 km each day, to work to the local tv station, back to home for lunch, and back to work again - in the snow and cold, and does not complain with a word. I am proud of him. On the other hand cycling makes thirsty and he has almost emptied "my" 1,5 liter bottle with mineral water - another calamity till I asked if husband could buy some more of it next time because he must be thirsty and just plain tap water is not always quite satisfactory if you sweat salts and other minerals too.

27) Now I am here - noticing that it is late, I am dead-tired - exhausted - been a short while on Twitter and met friends, cool - and still I have not done what I have promised already for several days: I have not written to my health (rather: illness) blog in Blogger and told what everything is going on now, and what is not.

Whooooofffff!!!! Call this sick leave?????????????????? Anyone????????????????????

MY AGENDA FOR TODAY

MY AGENDA FOR TODAY:


*OPTHALMOLOGIST Nörtti
*OPTICIAN, TO PLACE AN ORDER FOR TWO TYPES OF EYE GLASSES (NORMAL PROGRESSIVE Aurinkolasit PLUS SCREEN GLASSES NörttiTietokone)
*ASTHMA SPECIALIST Sairas
*PHONE CALL TO A THIRD DOCTOR ABOUT LAB RESULTS THAT SEEMED WORRYING Matkapuhelin

Yllättynyt HEY FOLKS I AM ILL, I CANNOT POSSIBLY MANAGE ALL THIS, PLUS BEING MY OWN DRIVER WHEN FALLING ASLEEP BEHIND THE STEERING WHEEL Auto Juhlii ! GIVE ME AN ASSISTANT PLEASE Vihainen ! I NEED AN ASSISTANT AND A SECRETARY AND A CAR DRIVER AND AND AND.... THIS IS GETTING A FULL TIME JOB, BEING ILL... Näyttää kieltä

Doctors, doctors, doctors...

I am so sleep-deprived that I sometimes feel all my life is focused on possibilities to sleep, or take a nap - it's all I can think about..

Trying to get the papers ready for both opthalmologist and asthma specialist. Wish me luck - I am tired and nervous and slow and and and ---


In addition, I should call a third doctor about lab results...


Oh and did I mention I am fed up with being ill - ? :D

Asthma causing you difficulties in cold weather?

Do you suffer from asthma? DO you have difficulties with cold weather? I had them for years and I did not know about this producer, and nobody gave me the information. Now that I have it, and have used their thermal mask, and have bought one for my son and one for my mother and we can all move freely out in the cold in spite of our asthma - my son cycles to work in -18*C without problem - now I want to share this information with everybody because it is so essential:

Get a thermal mask. There is a producer. Here is the website:

In Finnish: http://www.jonas.fi/fi/

In Swedish: http://www.jonas.fi/se/

In English: http://www.jonas.fi/en/

Aspartam in diet beverages

The aspartam in diet beverages opens up the pain receptors in the nervous system and adds on pain. Anyone who has fibromyalgia and who uses diet beverages with aspartam and who has pains that could be linked to the use of aspartam might want to consider excluding all aspartam in his or her diet. I have stopped using aspartam and I now drink mineral water and have much less pain than before.

The Children of Cyberspace: Old Fogies by Their 20s - NYTimes.com

The Children of Cyberspace: Old Fogies by Their 20s - NYTimes.com