Some of the side effects are worse on Day 6. I was also surprised by the fatigue and finding myself dizzy. Next, I was hoping the extreme cold sensitivity would fade, but instead–like last time–it has pulsed and is worse in some ways. My legs, arms, and face burn with the extreme cold of 68F that the house slips into at night. My right hand is still very painful as it seems to have been badly bruised by the cane use and still needs painkillers.
On Tuesday I managed to sleep into the morning and get going about 9ish. I am challenged to sit down quickly as I get dizzy with exhaustion. Not something that I had experienced before. I am moving from chair, to chair, and then to bed. Shower and use of the kitchen would be unwise. So it is a PJ day and I call to let Susie know at the Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center, Room 44A, located at 3900 Pacific Highway, that I will be staying home. The nurse Sarah gets my call and lets me know Susie is having a good day and will let her know I can’t make it over there today.
Despite thinking I would do no kitchen work, I do manage to poach two eggs with toast, a fav of mine.
The cold issue continues to worsen and breathing issues are next. Scary and caused by inhaling the air under 70F, but not unexpected. More sitting and resting. It is the worse of all the side effects and so scary I have not included it before in the blog. It can begin to make me believe that I cannot breathe as my body overreacts to the cold and suddenly makes it feel like I am short of air. I drink warm water and coffee to stop this. Thusly, I have lots of stops at night. To drown in the air is a hard feeling and one of my worst nightmares, so it is even hard to write about.
I note this as I was having this issue this Wednesday morning making writing hard.
Aside: In the manual for this experience–yes, there is a manual–the side effect is described to be so convincing that nurses put an O2 monitor on you when this happens so that they can show you and themselves that it will pass and that you are actually breathing OK.
I am just exhausted and just start to go with it. I order the same lunch from GrubHub (thank you all who have sent me GrubHub cards as this is really helping) and watch TV while eating. I have an electric blanket on max and the house 70F and my face still burns with cold.
I am returning to my fav of Bloomberg for my news. I used to have three screens up when working from home, my Apple on Bloomberg, sound off, and my Nike laptop on current work, and Nike email on yet another screen. I like money news as it has a unique spin, not political. Tuesday, most of the news was the changes that events in Ukraine were having on the Fed decisions and gas prices. So today, I just rest and watch.
Rev. Anne Weld-Martin calls me, and she gets to see the full Mad Scientist look; I was asleep when she called in my bed, as she brings us all together on FaceTime. Susie is there with Anne, and we get to chat for a few minutes. It was wonderful that Rev. Weld-Martin got to see Susie today.
More rest and Bloomberg. I know how to handle this. I sleep a bit. I watch a bit. I do something on my laptop. I continue this rotation as I know it works for me.
Corwin makes a wonderful dinner from scratch, with me growling at him (and I apologize for that). He continues to follow the new guidelines and is trying to be less messy and bring some order to the chaos that he has been living in.
I speak to Susie’s hospice nurse (Susie has a lot of nurses now), and Paul is happy with her recovery and is also hopeful that Susie may graduate from hospice. Susie’s nurse visited her on Tuesday. So a good day for visitors for Susie. Even with me stuck in the house, Susie is getting care.
I switch books as I need more entertainment and start to reread The Interdependency series by John Scalzi as a distraction. It is a brain-cookie SciFi book, but I love Space Opera and would recommend it for SciFi lovers. I will return to the book Americana soon, just needed some entertainment at night. I love Scalzi’s characters in the story.
I managed to sleep most of the night, but froze this Wednesday in the 67F coolness and was up at 5:30. I watched the opening of USA markets on Bloomberg under a hot electric blanket sitting up drinking warm coffee. I am a bit better today.
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