Deep Language

Spaghetti Squash and Chard Gratin

2012-03-03T18:58:00.001-05:00

1 large cooked spaghetti squash
1 bunch swiss chard
grated rind of 1 lemon
salt, pepper, seasonings to taste
1 cup sour cream
sliced or grated cheese (I used swiss)

Cut the chard into small pieces and shred the spaghetti squash. Mix squash, chard, lemon rind, seasonings, and sour cream. Top with cheese and bake at 400 for 25 minutes.

Many variations are obviously possible, but I'm recording the recipe because it had never occurred to me to make a gratin with spaghetti squash, much less to add chard.

No Added Sugar Banana Cheesecake

2012-02-24T21:33:00.000-05:00

2 packages (8 oz) regular cream cheese at room temperature
3/4 cup sour cream
3 large or extra large eggs
3 ripe bananas
juice of 1 small lemon
1 teasp vanilla
1 tblsp rum

Butter springform pan (and sprinkle with some almond flour if you have it) and preheat oven to 315 F. Beat cream cheese at low speed until smooth then add sour cream and beat until smooth. Add eggs one at a time and beat until smooth. Mash bananas with lemon juice and add to cheese mixture. Add vanilla and rum and beat until smooth (beat more for a lighter cheesecake, less for a denser one). Pour into pan. I put my pan inside a larger springform pan to moderate the heat a little without bothering with a boiling water bath. Bake for 1 hour or until no longer jiggly in the middle. If you cool it and then refrigerate it a few hours it will cut more neatly than if you can't resist cutting a piece while it is still warm.

I like this the way it is, but if you like desserts sweeter you can add the sweetener of your choice.

Resentment

2012-02-11T15:57:00.000-05:00

John has slipped significantly, and I realize I have been repressing my reactions. For me, a lot of frustration and resentment comes up before I ever get to grief. And I worry that if I complain now I will look back when things get worse and wish I had appreciated how things are now.

For the last six months or so he has been having occasional bowel incontinence, maybe once a week at totally unpredictable times. He wears disposable underwear when he is particularly worried about it, but he doesn't like to wear them when he is fully dressed with jeans and belt because then he has to undo his belt to urinate instead of just opening his fly. He did agree to wear boxer briefs (once I cut one layer of the fly for easier access) so the mess would be more contained. Occasionally the problem is very minor and he doesn't need my help, but often he needs help with his clothes and with cleaning himself.

He finally got the help he needed for his swelled legs, and before he got any really problematic infections. And the therapist understood that he wouldn't be able to put on compression socks and recommended velcro-closed wraps. But that means he depends on me to be home to rewrap his legs after he showers. For the first time I am grateful he only showers twice a week. Today he said he would be ready for me to wrap his legs at 1 pm. Instead it was 3:15.

He can still talk to someone and appear just fine. But I asked him if he wanted to cancel an appointment Monday afternoon--he has an appointment in Charleston Tuesday morning so I will drive us down sometime Monday afternoon/evening. He said yes and commented that he can't look ahead that way and see the relationship of things. He is barely hanging in there with a Google calendar to be able to keep track of his schedule at all. He went to the doctor alone for a urinary tract infection and wanted to get a new prescription for another medication he takes occasionally. I reminded him to take the bottle so that he could get the same thing but he forgot. When I picked up the prescription at the pharmacy it wasn't what he wanted (too few days). He said he would call and straighten it out but when I asked him about it several days later he said he hadn't had time.

He doesn't like to ask me for help, so I get indirect questions when he is hoping I will do something, which just makes me feel that he is expecting me to do whatever extra it is. Yesterday he asked about recipes to use a lot of frozen blueberries that were accidentally left out.

He drools and his nose drips a good bit. He tries to carry a napkin, but then he leaves those around the kitchen. Sigh.

Borscht Stew

2012-02-05T19:41:00.000-05:00

Borscht Stew

2 lbs beef chuck
oil of your choice for browning
1 large onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 teasp smoked paprika
1 cup water or beef stock or enough to mostly cover the meat
2 bay leaves
1 can tomatoes (optional)
1/4 cup sherry vinegar
3 medium-large beets, cooked, peeled, and chopped
10 baby carrots, cut in half
1/4 green or red cabbage, chopped finely
4 leaves swiss chard, cut up
1 teasp ground cumin
1/2 teasp mace
Greek yogurt as garnish

Brown meat in oil and set aside. I browned my meat whole then cut it into small pieces when it had cooled, which meant more juice to supplement the stock. Cook onions in oil until softened and browned. Add garlic, smoked paprika, stock, bay leaves, the reserved meat, and tomatoes with their juice if you are using them. Press down the meat in the pan and make sure you have enough liquid to nearly cover it. Cook, covered, barely simmering for 1 1/2 to 2 hours--until meat is tender. Add cut up cooked beets, carrots, cabbage, cumin, and mace, and cook, covered, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender. Add chard, and cook briefly until the chard is wilted. Serve with a dollop of greek yogurt.

John thought this was missing something, but he doesn't like things with any strong flavor so I was very cautious with the spices.

Nut cookies

2012-02-03T21:39:00.002-05:00

This is a primal recipe--no grains, relatively low carb. I started from this recipe for chocolate chip cookies--http://www.marksdailyapple.com/primal-holiday-desserts/#ixzz1lNNNbckJ--but I didn't bother with the chocolate chips and didn't miss them.

8 pitted prunes
1 1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup pecans
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons coconut oil
1 egg
1/4 cup sunflower seeds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Grind prunes, walnuts and pecans in a food processor until very finely chopped. Add baking soda and salt and pulse a few more times.

Melt the coconut oil. With the food processor running, drizzle it into the batter with the egg and vanilla. Add sunflower seeds and process until somewhat chopped. Stir in chocolate chips or raisins if desired.

The dough will form a wet ball. Make small balls and flatten on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake 15 minutes, or until nicely browned.

year end garden reflections

2012-01-30T19:48:00.003-05:00

I turned my garden last week and got sugar snap peas planted yesterday. I left kale plants I put in during the fall. I was daunted about eating the kale for a long time, as my husband doesn't like greens, but I've been putting a leaf into my morning smoothie for natural vitamins. The whispy little plants are fennel plants from the farmers exchange.

I also have swiss chard that I planted last spring, which has come back nicely this winter after nearly disappearing in the heat of summer.

I pulled out the last few parsnips that I planted last spring. We ate some in late summer and some were woody, but the ones I roasted tonight were tasty. I planted them early spring and they developed very slowly. I won't plant them as a spring crop again, but I might try them as a fall crop

So what were the successes of the garden? I had good lettuce last early spring but I didn't succeed in getting it started this fall. The sugar snap peas last spring were wonderful and more than we could eat. I bought a few brocolli plants which did well, but one plant doesn't yield very much broccoli.

For the second year in a row, Japanese eggplant (bought as plants at Lowes) yielded reliably all summer. I got some cucumbers from the couple of plants I bought, though not as many as last year. I planted fewer tomato plants and they did better, but I still am caught on the dilemma of wanting to let them get really ripe on the vine but instead they start to go bad.

So this year I want to plant beans again, and I will stick with eggplant, cucumber, and tomatoes as summer crops. I planted broccoli rape, pak choy, and lettuce as early spring crops. I did plant some broccoli rape last year, but it kept flowering before I could harvest it. I should probably try it as a fall crop.

Reduced Carb Lemon Mousse Cake

2012-01-27T17:07:00.001-05:00

Cake: (based loosely on Foolproof Sponge Cake in The New Best Recipe)

3/4 cup whole wheat flour (I used King Arthur's white whole wheat)
1 teasp baking powder
1/4 teasp salt
3 tblsp butter
7 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup almond meal or almond flour
grated peel of one lemon

Preheat oven to 350 and thoroughly butter or spray a bundt pan. Sift together flour, wheat gluten, baking powder and salt. Melt the butter and set aside to cool. Separate 3 eggs. Beat the 3 egg whites, adding 1/4 cup sugar when they are frothy, until they form soft peaks. Beat the egg yolks and remaining eggs in a separate bowl until light-colored and thick. Beat in the almond meal and grated lemon peel. Fold in the beaten egg whites. Sift the dry ingredients over the egg mixture and fold in gently. Pour the melted butter along the side of the bowl and fold in gently. Immediately pour the batter into the prepared bundt pan. Cook for 45 minutes or until the top springs back when touched. Cooking time would be more like 25 minutes if you bake it in two layer pans. Cool in the pan at least 10 minutes, then invert onto a rack and cool completely.

Lemon curd: from The New Best Recipe
2 eggs and 1 egg yolk
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup lemon juice
2 tblsp butter, cold or room temperature
2 tblsp heavy cream
a pinch of salt

Whisk the eggs until uniform in a non-reactive pan, then whisk in the sugar. Heat the lemon juice until hot but not boiling (I do this in the microwave in the glass measuring cup) and pour slowly into the eggs, whisking all the time. Put the pan on medium low heat and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until it thickens. Stir in the butter quickly to stop the cooking, then stir in the cream and salt. Cool to room temperature.

Lemon Mousse:
1/2 teasp unflavored gelatin
1 recipe (above) of lemon curd
1 cup heavy cream, cold

Put the gelatin in a small bowl with 1 tblsp cold water. Wait a few minutes until it no longer looks white. Put the bowl into a pan of hot water and warm until the gelatin dissolves completely. Set aside to cool. Whip the cream. Stir the gelatin into the room temperature lemon curd. Fold the lemon curd into the whipped cream. Chill for at least a couple of hours before assembling the cake, overnight would probably be better.

Assembly:
If you made the cake in a bundt pan, slice the cake horizontally into the number of layers you want. If you want a surprise filling, cut it into two layers and partially hollow out the cut sides of the two layers with a grapefruit knife to make a channel for the filling. Fill with the lemon mousse. I use a bundt pan because I think it is attractive enough with no icing, but you could dust the finished cake with powdered sugar or add a lemon glaze. I spread filling over the top because I had so much left over. If you make the cake in layer pans, you can slice each layer in half horizontally, spread lemon curd between each layer to make a four layer cake, and then frost with the frosting of your choice.

Adjustments:
If you aren't interested in reducing carbohydrates you can double the amounts of sugar, leave out the almond meal, and use 1 1/4 cups of white flour instead of the whole wheat flour, wheat gluten, and almond meal.

Frustrations over John's health--Lymphedema

2012-01-22T19:36:00.002-05:00

John has had swelling of his legs for at least a year. I think it is related to the stiffness that comes from the Parkinson's, but I can't find any literature on that. His family practitioner said his heart was fine and prescribed diuretics to be taken when needed, but after 6 months or so those stopped working. If his legs stay swelled he gets sores on his legs because the skin is so tight it cannot heal. Finally he ended up at a physical therapist who seemed to know what to do, though she said it wasn't any of the usual forms of lymphedema. She wrapped his legs in pressure bandages and told him to order velcro-closed leggings which he hopefully can put on himself (at considerable expense--medicare pays for the therapist and her wrappings but not for the leggings).
She saw him twice, then told him he should take off the wrappings when he showered over the weekend and then put them back on. Or rather that I should. No instructions. I guess I should have gone with him. It actually didn't take as long to do as I expected, but I can't figure out how to do the feet smoothly. For the first time I am thankful he refuses to shower more than twice a week. His legs are much better.

That was Saturday afternoon, since it takes him about two hours to shower and soak his feet between unwrapping and wrapping. This morning he needed my help to catheterize himself, as he had gone out to dinner with a friend and become unable to urinate. He left a message for the urologist about that last week, and the urologist said it sounded like a bowel problem triggering it and he should get a gastroenterologist to help him with the bowel problem. Only there isn't any fixing John's tendency to swing between constipation and diarrhea, so that isn't realistic.
Then this morning he needed a lot of help getting dressed, as it is harder to put on his pants and shoes over the bandages. It takes care, and our son who usually helps him isn't good at that. We did get out to lunch with his 100 year old aunt.

Sigh.

Update on the Lymphedema. The wrapping works! The wraps are easier, but he can't do them himself. The therapist knew he wouldn't be able to do pressure stockings himself.

Sweet potato and leek soup

2012-01-15T22:26:00.002-05:00

Elizabeth made this Friday and it was delicious.
She made some small modifications to a recipe from the book Home Made by Yvette Van Boven via Culinate:

Soup

	1	onion, diced
	2	leeks, washed and cut into rounds
	3	sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed
	2	garlic cloves, chopped
	~	Dab of butter
	1	glass white wine
	4	cups chicken broth
	1	bay leaf
	~	Pinch of cayenne pepper, to taste
	1	can (14 oz.) chickpeas
	~	A few sprigs of fresh oregano

Garnishes

	4	Tbsp. cashews
	5	tsp. butter
	~	Sea salt
	1	Tbsp. crème fraîche per bowl

Steps

Brown the onion and leeks in the butter, then add the sweet potatoes and garlic and saute a few minues. Add the white wine. Blend in the broth as well as the bay and cayenne pepper. Simmer on low heat for 25 minutes.
Puree the soup in batches in a blender until smooth.
Serve the soup in individual large bowls, each with 1 tablespoon cashew nuts (briefly fried in the butter and sprinkled with a little sea salt) and a generous dollop of crème fraîche

Brisket Cooked with Sauerkraut

2012-01-14T20:12:00.000-05:00

My daughter loves German food, so we came up with this:

4 lbs beef brisket
1 onion thinly sliced
2 tblsp olive oil
1 1/2 cup sauerkraut
1 1/2 cup applesauce
1 1/2 cup German white wine
1 can chopped tomatoes, with juice
1/4 cup cider vinegar
3 leaves fresh sage
1 bay leaf
1 teasp ground cumin
1 tblsp grainy mustard
1/2 teasp ground pepper
2 tblsp cornstarch or potato starch

Brown brisket in dutch oven then set brisket aside. Saute onions in olive oil until brown in the dutch oven, then add sauerkraut, applesauce, white wine, tomatoes, vinegar, and seasonings. Put brisket on top and press down to submerge. Cook barely at a simmer for 4 hours or until tender, turning a few times. Strain out solids and boil liquid until reduced by half. Add 2 tblsp cornstarch or potato starch mixed with a little cold water to thicken the sauce if desired. Slice meat and return meat and the sauerkraut and onions to the sauce. Add a little fresh vinegar if needed.

Eye surgery followup

2012-01-06T12:57:00.000-05:00

I had my follow-up one week after surgery on my second eye today. I could read the 20-20 line of the eye chart with difficulty and a few errors with my right eye, easily with my left eye. I could read the 20-15 line with difficulty using both eyes. So an excellent result! My experience matches the test--my distance vision is better than it was with glasses. The doctor actually said "don't tell everyone that"--the point being they don't want people to be disappointed if they don't get quite as good a result.

They dilated my eyes to check the alignment of my lenses, which matters very much with the lenses that correct astigmatism. As you would guess from the 20-20 vision, they said it was good. Today is a very sunny day and my appointment was late morning, so there goes most of the afternoon

We discussed reading glasses and I learned a lot. The ophthalmologist said my moderately near vision may continue to improve (actually my brain adapting) for six months. But at my age (56), my eyes will now stay the same--I won't keep needing stronger and stronger reading glasses. Apparently my starting with stronger reading glasses after surgery and then switching to weaker ones is common. Part of it is the brain adapting, but part of it is settling on a reading distance. When I held a book at the distance I was used to, I needed stronger reading glasses. And the book also looked bigger--so much so that I wondered whether Newsweek had put out a special year end issue in tabloid size. That is because my glasses to correct for nearsightedness made everything smaller. So I'm trying weaker reading glasses and holding my book further away--if nothing else it will be good for my posture. The doctor said that another advantage to that approach is hopefully not needing separate computer glasses. He wrote me a prescription if I want to get custom reading glasses: pl pl (plain glass) and then progressive to +225 for reading.

I asked about the instructions they gave me to continue the Bromday eye drops once a day for five weeks. When I looked them up online, the FDA information said there were greater risks if continued longer than two weeks. The doctor said that was because of a problem years ago with one generic for a different but closely-related medication. He said using them for 5 weeks reduces the risk of retinal inflamation. Since retinal detachment is the key (though very unlikely) risk of this surgery for me, I was convinced.

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

Lucky Stuffed Kale

2012-01-01T19:53:00.000-05:00

This recipe incorporates lucky foods from several cultures for New Year's

Lucky Stuffed Kale

1 pound of ground lamb
1 medium onion
1 Tbs olive oil
1 cup cooked black eyed peas
1/2 cup cooked rice
1/4 cup pine nuts toasted
1/2 cup golden raisins plumped in boiling water
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
juice of 1 lemon
Several sprigs fresh mint
1/4 cup parmesan cheese
20 leaves of kale (cabbage would be good too)
1 cup of tomato sauce diluted with 1/2 cup water

Saute onion in olive oil until soft and slightly browned and set aside. Saute ground lamb until cooked, breaking up into small pieces. Mix lamb, onion, peas, rice, pine nuts and raisins in a food processor and process until coarsely chopped. Return to pan and stir in spices, lemon juice, chopped mint leaves, and parmesan cheese.

Cook kale or other suitable leaves in boiling water until they soften, then place in icewater. Take one leaf at a time, place filling down the center of the leaf, and roll like a burrito. Place filled leaves in a greased 9x13 pan. Cover with tomato sauce and sprinkle with more parmesan cheese. Heat in a low oven until warm (we cooked for an hour and a half at 250 because we were warming a cooked ham).

Brain adjustment

2011-12-31T22:28:00.003-05:00

I knew that my brain had adjusted to my glasses, which were progressive bifocals I wore all the time, so there would be a period of adjustment to my new vision. The surprise is that my close vision keeps getting better as my eyes adjust. I keep going back to Dollar General and buying weaker reading glasses. I started out with +2.50 but now I'm finding +2.00 stronger than I want for reading or writing with my book or pad on my lap. For my laptop I am now happy with +1.50 instead of +1.75. I'll keep a pair of +2.50 for close work such as sewing.

I took a walk today with my kids and found that I had a bit of movement of the road as my head moved with my stride. I don't know if that is a brain adjustment to glasses with progressive lenses that I am unlearning or possibly a little distortion in my lenses (which are not aspheric). I'm confident my brain will adjust and filter it out.

I was warned when I got progressive lenses that they were hard to get used to. What no one warned me is that it is just as hard to adjust back to not having them. My brain had compensated for the progressive lenses to give me an accurate sense of the position of steps and the like. So without them, my brain at first gave me the wrong information about where to put my feet (making a correction that was no longer needed).

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

second vision correction surgery

2011-12-29T10:58:00.002-05:00

I just came back from the ophthalmologist, where I had my day-after-surgery appointment. 20-20 in both eyes! Happy Dance!! The 20-20 line of the eye chart was a little clearer with the eye that had surgery last week (clearer than it was the day after surgery), so I'm hoping with further healing for the right eye I will be better than 20-20. The world is more three dimensional than it was with glasses.

I noticed different things in the second surgery than than first (and I had some trouble getting them to listen to me about what had been done differently the first time). But I did get my half dose of Versed, and the experience was no worse. The day of surgery was pretty miserable with the scratchy discomfort of the eye, but I had hope it would feel fine the next morning and it does. Between surgeries my vision was so confusing that I wanted to stay home most of the time. Now I want to go out and give my brain lots of opportunity to adapt to my new vision.

I'm still getting used to how I look without glasses. My first reaction is that I don't like my eyes.

Getting used to reading glasses for actually reading isn't a problem. I'm wearing them on a chain around my neck so they are with me. I have a less powerful pair for my laptop (because it is further away), and they sit next to the laptop (I bought a four pairs of $6 reading glasses in some different strengths). What is hard to get used to is things that mix reading and computer distances, such as cooking, or laptop and middle distances, such as looking at my food and the others at the table when eating. I need to see how much improvement I get in those things now I have both eyes working together.

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

The week between surgeries

2011-12-25T12:27:00.001-05:00

If you are too nearsighted to be able to read comfortably without glasses, plan very carefully the timing of the week between surgeries. I am finding it quite difficult to function. It might be a little easier if I were wearing my glasses and using the eye that has not yet had surgery. But my glasses broke so I am using the eye that had surgery and cheap reading glasses. In either case, there is no avoiding the vision of one eye being totally blurry. This is a particular problem for driving at night because every bright light has a big blur around it. If you need to do significant driving at night, get an eye patch beforehand.

The adjustment to using glasses for closeup is such a reversal of all my habits, and it is harder to make that adjustment when the vision from one eye is completely blurry at the same time. Yet it seems like a good thing to use the eye with the new lens, to have brain and vision settling in together right away.

Cooking turns out to particularly be something that requires working at a variety of distances. But I'm glad not to be working. I don't have much feeling that my body is recovering from trauma, but it does feel right to take it a little easy. And doing a lot of reading either on a screen or from papers would be hard. Christmas is nice because I can enjoy sitting around with my family, and I have my daughter to help with the cooking.

One of the improvements in the corrected eye is a greater sense of depth, the world is less flat. But I am using only one eye and therefore lacking binocular depth perception. Add to that that reading glasses make things appear a lot closer--it seems as if my arms have gotten shorter. Pouring things was hit and miss at first. Because I used progressive bifocals, I also had gotten used to odd information about the lower part of my field of vision. No longer wearing glasses, I have missed stairs several times because of that and one time actually fell (luckily going up my front steps).

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

day after surgery

2011-12-23T15:41:00.000-05:00

I woke up with my eye feeling much better. I went to the doctor for a scheduled check, and I could read the 20-20 line on the eye chart. I was very happy.

But living with one eye fixed and the other not is a mess. I got fed up with wearing my glasses and having my brain trying to put together a clear image and a totally fuzzy image, so I asked the optical shop at the doctor's office to pop the lens out of my glasses on the side that is fixed. I also bought $6 reading glasses and sunglasses at Dollar General.

The doctor was right that it wouldn't work to take one lens out of my glasses because the size and angle of the two sides would be too different. I had a lot of double vision trying to wear them that way walking around. It might work better than anything else if I were sitting still doing close work, but I didn't get much chance to try that because I put the glasses in my purse just in a soft case and they broke (they were 4 or 5 years old). Outdoors I find the sunglasses a big help--wearing just non-prescription sunglasses and using the good eye is working well for me. For reading and the computer I am struggling to get used to using reading glasses that only work for one eye. It is doable, but not fun.

Getting used to reading glasses is hard. I am someone who adjusted smoothly to progressive lenses, so I am used to having the whole range from distance to closeup just by tilting my head. I needed to buy different reading glasses for my laptop than for actually reading. And what am I supposed to do about eating? It is nice to be able to see my food clearly, but then I can't see my family members as clearly.

I may in the end decide that I want a pair of glasses with progressive lenses, particularly for things like cooking and eating. But I want to wait a few months and let my vision fully settle in, and get used to using reading glasses. For now, I'm tired and discouraged (just for the moment--I know it will be better in the morning). I did too much today--was out of the house almost all day.

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

First eye surgery

2011-12-22T13:56:00.001-05:00

After three days of eye drops I had my first vision correction surgery today. I was scheduled to arrive at 7:45 and my son went with me to drive me home. It was a dark and foggy drive to get there and I was feeling nervous this morning.

It seemed like a long wait in pre-op. I didn't have to undress at all; they just put a cap over my hair and various drops in my eyes. The anesthesia was Versed by mouth. I said I was medication sensitive and the usual dose might put me to sleep, so they gave me a half dose. I then worried I would regret not getting more but they wanted me conscious. I was a bit fuzzy headed but definitely could focus my rational mind if I tried. They checked many times which eye they were doing and the doctor marked my eyeball somehow while I was sitting up to make sure to line up the astigmatism correction accurately.

When the took me back to surgery they attached a plastic drape over my eye and then various devices I won't go into. The doctor told me to keep focused on the light above me, which was painfully bright. I focused on that task and also on calming my breathing. The doctor didn't speak as he was working so I didn't have a sense of what was happening, just that the light kept changing. And then he said he was done and they wheeled me into recovery.

My eye was still numb so I really wasn't uncomfortable at all. They put a protector over my eye I was supposed to wear until I got home. I was given instructions for eyedrops and they sent my son to drive the car up to the door and we headed home at about 9:30 am.

Not having had significant anesthesia, I really don't feel badly at all. My eye is miserably scratchy, but I don't feel badly enough to stay in bed. I've been sitting in the living room with Christmas carols playing and knitting (which doesn't take much close vision--I can do it in large part by feel).

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

Refractive lens exchange

2011-12-13T15:52:00.000-05:00

I've decidedto go forward with surgery to correct my vision, and since an number of peopleare interested I want to post both the results of my research and myexperience. So this is the pre-surgery post.

I'm a 56year old woman with a prescription of: R -725 sphere -275 cylinder, L -600sphere -300 cylinder. That is, I am quite seriously nearsighted, though not inthe extreme catagory, and have very significant astigmatism. My vision is toobad to be fully corrected by Lasik. I have never worn contacts because Icouldn't bear the thought of touching my eye.

If I wereunder 40 I would be waiting for the Visian Toric implantable contact lens to beapproved in the U.S. Implantable contact lenses are lower risk than the surgeryI am scheduled for, and should give the same quality of correction. But theyaren't used over age 45 because of the risk of needing cataract surgery inrelatively few years.

Theprocedure I am having is called Clear Lens Exchange or Refractive LensExchange. It is exactly the same as cataract surgery with the implantation of acorrective lens, but in my case I am having it done even though I don't yethave any signs of cataracts. I will have a monofocal toric lens implanted,which will correct my distance vision but leave me needing reading glasses.Most people who have such a procedure get a lens that does both distance and close up, but they don't yet make a lens for people with significant astigmatism that corrects both. And I am not interested in waiting until onecomes on the market because the multifocal lenses come at some compromise ofsharpness of vision and clarity of night vision. I prize the sharpest possiblevision more than not having to wear reading glasses. I am paying for this out ofpocket--if I did have cataracts the insurance would pay for the surgery andsimpler lenses. My total cost is around $3k per eye.

I had mypre-op appointment yesterday. The most serious risk in my situation is ofretinal detachment--perhaps a 1% risk. That risk is greater for people who arenearsighted, particularly with a correction over 9, and for men and youngerpatients. The risk is less if the vitreous has already detached from theretina, but that is not the case for me. The doctor is at least confident thatmy retinas show no problems.

He said that85% of their patients end up with half a diopter of normal, that is, they wouldhave a prescription between 050 and -050. They did a lot of measuring of myeyes, which is very important to me because I really want that accuratecorrection. My eyes were different lengths so they did an ultrasound to confirmthose measurements. It was hard to tolerate the ultrasound sensor on my eyeballeven well numbed--I didn't realize that I tolerate the usual pressuremeasurement well only because it is so familiar. I am going to need thatsedation for the procedure.

The twosurgeries will be done 6 days apart, Dec. 22 and 28. In between I will have to use only one eye, as my glasses make things smaller in a way that the lenses will not, so even if I popped one lense out of my glasses it would be too hard for my eyes to work together.

Posts in this series (reverse chronological order):
Eye Surgery Follow-up
Brain Adjustment
Second Vision Correction Surgery
The Week Between Surgeries
Day after Surgery
First Surgery
Refractive Lens Exchange

Orange Marmalade Cranberry Sauce

2011-11-23T14:49:00.001-05:00

I only have one oven and I'm doing Thanksgiving (just for four) single-handed, so I'm cooking up a storm the day before Thanksgiving. I got inspired and made a cranberry orange marmalade, starting from this recipe but with more cranberry. I wanted something relatively low sugar--this is not a recipe intended for canning--but with fairly long cooking it did set.

Orange Marmalade Cranberry Sauce

2 good sized navel oranges
enough cider or apple juice to cover
2 cups sugar
1 bag cranberries

I removed the central pith and seeds from the oranges and cut peel and flesh together into thin slices. I packed them down and poured cider over them to barely cover. I put the bowl in the refrigerator overnight, as is recommended for marmalades. The next day I measured the fruit and juice (I had 4 cups) and added half as much sugar. I brought it to a simmer, added the cranberries, and simmered for perhaps an hour and a half.

I thought it was going to have the bitterness that some marmalade has (which I like ok), but even the orange pieces that include the white part of the peel are not bitter. It made about 3 cups.

child sexual abuse at Penn State

2011-11-10T17:47:00.001-05:00

I'm very caught up in the Penn State story, though not to the point of having the stomach to read the indictment. It seems to me very clear that children could have been saved from harm, and instead the program was protected.

To me, the legal issues are important because I think those of us at colleges and universities should know a lot more about our legal responsibilities. I have seen contradictory information, but it looks to me like this article is based on actual research into the details. Pennsylvania law mandates that school personnel report evidence of child abuse, but that reporting can be up the chain of command. School administrators are mandated to report to the police, and they are the ones who have been indicted for failing to report. That is not the case in most states, where school personnel are mandated to report directly to the police or child welfare workers.

So Paterno technically did fulfill his legal responsibility to report up the chain of command. What is left is the ethical responsibility--harm was still being done, and he didn't act to stop it. There is a really good article here that focuses on the comparison with the Catholic Church. And an interesting story about the reporter who has been reporting the story for 6 months.

But the best thing I have read addresses the victims: Rick Reilly on the Penn State Scandal.

update 11/12. A good story about our ability to act.

caregiving and having a life

2011-10-30T16:40:00.001-04:00

What I find hard is becoming a little clearer to me as I recover from the stress of Friday's trip to the emergency room. I don't have the energy or attention to do much this weekend and I feel low. Part of it is that I'm now worried about my plans to go to a professional conference next weekend. But looking at my feelings more closely, I realize that nothing seems important to me. And yet this isn't a short-term emergency where I can put other things aside, this may be the next 10 years of my life.

Emergency room visit

2011-10-29T20:58:00.000-04:00

Friday morning a few minutes before I headed into class I got a phone call from John. He was crying so that I couldn't understand what he said, beyond that he had fallen. I grabbed a film for my teaching assistants to show and headed home. Luckily I had gone in very early so my car was right in front of the building.

I found John sitting on the bench in the bathroom, with a mess on the floor and in his clothes. Trying to take his clothes off he fell and hit the side of his face against magazine table. He had a lump and a small scrape, but he wasn't in pain any more. I helped him get the rest of his clothes off and get in the shower and I cleaned up the floor. I left the clothes to deal with later and went back and taught the second half of my class.

When I got home again I ate my own lunch and then cleaned up the floor and helped him get dressed. I made him some lunch and then he discovered he couldn't eat it because it hurt so much to chew even something soft. We decided that had better be looked at, particularly since it was Friday afternoon, so we went to the local urgent care center. The wait there is usually very long--this wasn't too bad in comparison. The nurse-practitioner said he needed an xray.

I explained that he couldn't lay flat on the table because his neck is bent forward too much. It turned out they planned to do the xray sitting up and the problem was he couldn't turn his head to the side very far. Eventually the technician had him sit on a stool and put his head forward on the table. He wasn't very stable that way. I suggested I could robe and hold his shoulders and to my surprise the technician went for that. The technician said the xrays didn't show anything obvious.

We waited a while for the xrays to be read at the hospital. The nurse-practitioner came in and said John would need to go to the hospital for a cat scan but it looked like his jawbone was shattered and he would need surgery. We were surprised given what the technician had said and John's lack of pain, but we headed for the hospital, with a brief stop to get me some food and John a milkshake.

They took John back right away, though then we waited a while for the doctor. The nurse said the radiologist hadn't seen much, and we began to realize that the nurse-practitioner might have misunderstood the report. But they did want to do the cat scan. After another wait they took us back and again they included me in the process of positioning John. This time he was stable by himself and the technicians just asked me to go to the booth with them each time they took an exposure.

Eventually the doctor came and reported they didn't see any break at all, it must be just a bruise that made it hurt so much. He gave John a prescription for pain medicine and we got home about 8 pm.

I have had the principle "avoid the emergency room at all costs," but this was actually a good experience. We weren't there much over two hours, and that on a Friday evening. They were much more willing to let me accompany John for everything than I had expected. I don't know if it was just because they saw he was on Aricept.

When we got home I made him some carrot soup, but told him he would have to ask Paul to help him get in his pyjamas. Today he has not dared try eating anything that requries chewing. I'm discouraged by the strain. Can I really go away next weekend?

2011-09-23T10:35:00.000-04:00

I had a useful meeting with an Elder Law attorney yesterday, so let me sum up what I know.

If you don't want to spend all your savings on your spouse's care, it is worth seeing an elder law attorney who specializes in Medicaid at least 5 years before your spouse needs nursing home care, particularly if your spouse does not have long term care insurance (or might run out). The rules are very complex and vary a lot from state to state.

Medicare does not pay for nursing homes beyond a few months of rehab. Medicaid will help with the cost of a nursing home, but only after most of the savings of both spouses have been spent, which is easy to do when a nursing home costs $5,000 to $10,000 a month and some people with dementia live in a nursing home for many years. My husband's 100 year old aunt has been in a nursing home for two years and is doing well--in a wheelchair but still mostly competent and enjoying going out to a restaurant for lunch. Her long term care insurance lasts 4 years, of which she has used close to two. When that gets close to running out she will have to move to a nursing home that takes Medicaid, but spending down her savings and applying for Medicaid should be fairly straightforward.

It isn't so straightforward if you are married. Medicare treats the two spouses as a unit--it doesn't matter if assets are in one name only (even a prenuptial agreement won't allow one spouse to keep separate funds). The well spouse is allowed to keep the house and its contents, one car, and half of the couples savings up to around $100,000. All the rest of the couples's savings must be spent on nursing home costs, including in many states the well spouse's retirement savings. I have a lot more than $100,000 in my IRA and 403b retirement savings accounts. If I didn't live in South Carolina, I would have to pay the early withdrawal penalty (I'm only 56 so I could easily be under retirement age when I needed the money) and spend down those funds on my husband's care before we could get Medicaid help with the cost of a nursing home.

What about my retirement years after he is gone or money I had hoped to pass on to my children? About the only way to keep more than the allowed amount for myself is divorce. I do have some options for my children if I do it now. Medicaid looks back and counts any money given away up to 5 years before the person applies for Medicaid. I can give money to my children or set up an irrevocable trust for them, because I am at least 5 years away from needing help, but if I did that within 5 years, Medicaid would not pay for a number of months equivalent to what was given away.

Be careful also if you expect to inherit any money. If my mother dies before my husband, the inheritance I get from her must be spent on his care before he would be eligible for Medicaid. There may be a way to fill out legal forms to refuse the inheritance now, so it goes to my kids instead. But I have to do that before the five year look-back or Medicaid would count it as a gift.

Reflections for my 35th Reunion

2011-09-15T20:42:00.000-04:00

Here's what I wrote for my 35th college reunion (which I don't plan to go to):

My kids are in college—it isn’t yet clear what their life choices will be. I’m still in the same job (over 25 years now). I built a program, Science and Technology in Society, that is holding fairly steady, but at a state university in this economy, holding steady is the best I can hope for. I spent 7 happy years doing triathlons, my longest one a half-ironman, but I’m not finding room in my life for the training any more.

The big change in my life is that my husband (now 66 years old) was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and the beginnings of dementia in 2008. His disease is progressing slowly and he can still mostly take care of himself, but I take care of almost everything else. It is far from the equal partnership marriage I signed on for. I managed renovating a house for his future needs and we moved--that was my major focus for a year and a half. The past year and a half has focused on my daughter’s college search process. I still enjoy my job, but I haven’t figured out how to focus on my own research the way I had hoped to when I reached empty nest.

I haven’t made peace with the lack of control yet. I understand that there is nothing we can do to stop my husband’s slow decline, but it is hard to wrap my mind around that and stop researching the disease. On a day-to-day basis the difficulty is how often I have to drop what I might have planned to do and instead help my husband with something or take him to a doctor’s appointment or do something for his 100 year old aunt, who lives in our town. And this could easily go on another 10 years. It is the task I have been given and I’m good at some of it. But I mourn my hopes for in this stage of life.

Looking back on home renovations for dementia

2011-08-21T19:43:00.005-04:00

Two years ago we were deep in home renovations, and now I am perhaps ready to write about it. It was an intense process, but it has been worth it. I had a hard time finding advice on home renovations for dementia, so I will try to pull together what I learned here.

We already owned the house we renovated, but we did not live in it. When we had our second child and moved to a larger house, we kept our smaller house--living in a college town it rented for more than the mortgage payment (and that was a 15 year mortgage). It was rented for about 15 years, mostly to college students, so it was in bad shape. But I wanted to downsize and simplify our lives, and the small house had a lower level that was walk-in from a car port with no step at all. My husband didn't like the idea at all. He remembered the lower level of the house as damp and dark, and he didn't want to face moving. But he said when I got an idea in my head there was no stopping me. The picture below is the house before the work began.

The house we renovated was built in the 1950s and had hardwood floors on the main and attic levels, plaster walls, and three bathrooms, one on each level. The picture below is a view from the dining room into the living room on the main level, after renovation but before we moved in.

What I want to focus on here is the renovation of the lower level, which became my husband's space. I had been frustrated in our previous house by his tendency to pile his stuff in any area I cleaned up, and because of his REM sleep behavior disorder and odd sleep patterns I was ready for separate bedrooms. So he was to have his own space on the lower level, and his chaos would stay there, sharing the space only with our son who was leaving for college. This is my husband's sitting room, which also has a desk.

The middle room has a sink and refrigerator, an eating table, and a corner nook with bed and large closet for our son. All three rooms got drywall over the cinderblock walls and laminate flooring (no rugs). We added two closets, one in the sitting room as well as the one for our son. We put in kitchen cabinets and counter and a new sink (the lower level had once been an apartment so there was already plumbing for a sink in the middle room). With a microwave on the counter my husband can make his own breakfast and lunch. The view through the door in the background is into his bedroom.

The biggest job downstairs was moving the bathroom, which was in an awkward place at the bottom of the stairs which made it impossible to enlarge in its original location. To move it, the floor was torn up to put in drain pipes to a new bathroom location in the corner of the middle room, using the cement block foundation for a small porch as the basis for a roll-in shower (that is, one with no lip between the shower and the rest of the bathroom.

The shower has both a permanent showerhead and a hand shower. The controls are just outside the shower (necessary because of the cement block)--one control adjusts the water temperature and then two separate controls adjust the volume of the shower head and hand shower so that either one or both can be on. I made sure to get a hand shower with an on-off switch on the hand unit as well.

Opposite the shower is a bench to sit on while dressing. The towel racks are actually grab bars so that they won't give way if leaned on. The door to the bathroom opens out to avoid the problem where someone falls in the bathroom and needs help but is blocking the door.

We ended up designing the bathroom with a toilet area on the other side of a load-bearing wall, so the doorway to the left in the picture above goes through that wall but does not have a door. A fold-down grab bar makes it possible to have bars on both sides of the toilet and a wall-hung sink would allow a wheelchair underneath. The lower half of the bathroom walls are painted blue to make it easier to see the white toilet. The toilet has a Toto Washlet water squirting seat. My husband was very dubious about the idea, but once he tried it he loved it. It is quite easy to install on any toilet if you have an electrical outlet next to the toilet. In selecting a toilet, I was careful to choose one with maximum flush capacity.

The overall renovations were also a big job. It turned out the house needed to be completely rewired and replumbed and we bought all new light and plumbing fixtures and completely redid the kitchen.

We also went ahead and put on a new roof and all new windows. The floors were refinished and all rooms were painted. The one major change we made in the structure of the house besides moving the lower level bathroom was to add a dormer to the attic bedroom, as the stairs came up to the wall in a way that the building inspector was never going to accept. We figured out the dimensions of the dormer as they cut the hole in the roof.

Below is a view of the finished dormer from the inside:

I don't know how we could have done the renovation if we had not owned two homes free and clear. I arranged a home equity line of credit on the larger house, and then we were lucky enough to sell it right about the time we moved. The renovations cost over $200,000, which I had not expected when we started the process. In other terms, the renovations cost nearly the appraised value of the resulting house. It makes sense if it keeps my husband out of a nursing home even for a year or two, but it didn't make sense in terms of what it added to the value of the house. The job took seven very stressful months, working with a contractor who usually built new houses. I am happy we did it not only because my husband can take care of himself more with everything arranged for his convenience but also because moving motivated me to declutter and make myself peaceful space in which to live.

vacation

2011-08-08T05:49:00.000-04:00

We spend last week at Kanuga, in Hendersonville, North Carolina, as we do the first week of August every year. We were able to arrange a 3 bedroom cottage this year instead of two, so I didn't have to have my sleep disturbed by John's disturbed sleep. But it was still closer quarters than we are used to, and returning after a year made John's decline more visible. He wasn't able to do the whole walk around the lake this year--the easiest hike. And it takes him so long to get dressed, though he can still do it himself (except his socks and shoes).

Mirena IUD for endometrial hyperplasia (TMI warning)

2011-07-25T21:10:00.003-04:00

Ok,most of my facebook friends don't want to hear more about this, so I will write here, where I am more writing to myself. I want to pull the whole story together, for reference 5 years down the road.

I used a diaphram for birth control my whole fertile life, so I experienced a natural menopause (quite different from the menopause experience of people taking birth control pills). It is a long process. During my last couple of years of perimenopause, I had very heavy periods. Even the highest absorbancy protection lasted less than 2 hours at times. My doctor suggested ablation, but I didn't want to do anything that dramatic--I figured it would end eventually. With what I now know, I think I should have been on some kind of progesterone treatment then.

I had what I hoped might be a last period in the summer of 2008, then none for almost a year, then several a little under a year later in the summer of 2009. Then I had nothing until the spring of 2011, when I had what seemed like a normal period. I knew that since it was more than a year I needed to have it evaluated, so I went right in for an ultrasound. That showed that the lining of my uterus was too thick, endometrial hyperplasia, so the next step was an endometrial biopsy.

The good news was that the biopsy did not show abnormal cells, but the thickening still needed to be treated before it did turn into abnormal cells. Having avoided birth control pills all my life, I didn't want to start taking progesterone pills, so I like the idea of the Mirena IUD, which releases progesterone where it is needed. My doctor agreed, so we started the process of ordering one.

The distributor for the Mirena is CVS Caremark, which tried to bill my insurance and was told that the Mirena isn't covered. It turns out that it is covered, but under medical rather than under pharmacy. My doctor wasn't willing to order it at their expense and then bill insurance, so I ordered it on a payment plan and then will file for insurance and pay when the insurance pays. It finally showed up at my doctor's office last week, nearly two months after the biopsy.

I was told to take two Aleve before my appointment, and I arranged for my son to drive me. The doctor had told me that some people find the biopsy easy and some people find it very painful. I found it trivial so I was optimistic about the IUD insertation. I think I talked the whole time about concerns about my kids--it did hurt some but I was trying to distract myself. It was more like bad menstrual cramps than like labor, though with some sense of being painfully poked inside, particularly in the step that measures the depth of the uterus. Once it was done I was just glad it was over, though I had cramps still.

My doctor said to me "You're a tough woman." That was really the first time she had admitted that the procedure is pretty painful. I said "I had a 10 lb 1 oz baby vaginally with an epidural that didn't work." Yes, I'm tough, and proud of it. I went home and rested a while then took my husband to his doctor's appointment. I made dinner, but I was significantly uncomfortable with cramps. About 6 hours after the procedure they suddenly got much better, so I'm hopeful they're over.

If all goes well I will have another ultrasound in 5 months to see if my uterine lining is back to normal. But what my doctor doesn't know and I can't find discussion of is how it will get that way. Will it bleed off, in one giant period or gradually over a long time? Or will it reabsorb without significant bleeding? My doctor was hopeful that might be the case.

Update in early October: I had light spotting for about two months, but now it seems to have stopped. I had a lot of difficulty getting my insurance company to agreee to pay, but that has been because it falls between medical and pharmacy and each said the other would handle it. Supposedly it is now worked out, but the check hasn't come.

Baseball bat sized Zucchini

2011-07-23T11:45:00.005-04:00

On impulse at the Pendleton farmers market, I bought a baseball bat sized zucchini. The seller said the ones they had cut did not have mature seeds, but I picked one of the biggest ones (over 4 lbs) and it did have mature seeds. So I peeled it and scooped out the seeds and grated it--I've got at least 6 cups of grated zucchini.

I wanted to make a richer chocolate zucchini cake than the recipe that uses cocoa powder, so I started from a recipe at Scandi foods and modified it into:

Reduced Carb Chocolate Zucchini Cake

2 cups grated zucchini
1 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped
1 cup almond flour
1 cup white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup vital wheat gluten
2 tblsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp ground cardamom
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
6 oz 70% dark chocolate
1 cup brown sugar
4 large eggs
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tblsp strong coffee
3/4 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350 and spray a large bundt pan.

Squeeze excess water out of the zucchini. Sift the dry ingredients, except the sugar and almond flour, into a bowl. Melt the chocolate and butter together. Using electric beaters, beat the eggs and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the chocolate-butter mixture and the vanilla and/or coffee, then the almond flour. Fold in the flour mixture and the buttermilk. Lastly fold in the zucchini and walnuts.

Pour the batter into the bundt pan and bake for 60-70 minutes or until a a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool on wire rack before removing from pan.

I'm planning on zucchini pancakes for dinner (eggs, flour, cornmeal, parmesan) but that still leaves me with enough grated zucchini for another recipe.

Family caregivers: the different issues of spouses and children

2011-07-23T09:00:00.001-04:00

The Lewy Body Dementia Association sent out a newsletter that included a short article on "Five Questions Caregivers Should Ask Themselves." One of the questions was:

Do you have a supportive spouse or partner, a negative partner, or no partner? How does this relationship affect your caregiving and how does your caregiving affect your relationship?

Wait a second. What about those of us who are caregiving for our spouse/partner? Can you imagine the lack of support then? I get so frustrated when I go to read an article about caregiving and it speaks only to the issues facing children caregiving for a parent. Maybe the answer is separate groups: on Yahoo there are separate support groups for Lewy Body Dementia for spouses and for other family caregivers. Half-seriously, I suspect that is because the children couldn't stand to read the spouses writing about what to do about sex. Another group I find helpful because it addresses the issues of spouses is The Alzheimer Spouse, which includes lots of spouses dealing with other kinds of dementia as well.

I want to say some things to children caring for parents. First, if you are sharing caregiving with your parent's spouse (whether that person is also your parent or not), think about that person's right to make their own choices even if they are not the ones you would make (go read this article about knowing what is best for another person). Watching the decline of a parent and of a spouse are both great griefs, but they are different griefs. Try not to be so caught up in your own grief that you don't see how it is for the spouse.

If you write about caregiving in a forum not specifically oriented towards children caregiving for parents, please acknowledge that many caregivers are spouses. And we may be your age. I'm 56, caregiving for a 65 year old husband in the early stages of Lewy Body Dementia. I know women in their 40s with children still at home caring for husbands with early onset Alzheimers. We may be working full time; we may have dreams of what we were going to do in this stage of our lives that have been crushed. Don't leave us out of your discussions and resources.

Birth control blog carnival

2011-07-21T11:47:00.001-04:00

I want to celebrate the decision to recommend that insurance cover birth control--see the blog carnival here--and throw in my own experience.

These days I have the sense that people assume birth control means the pill, but there ares other alternatives. I tend to be sensitive to the side effects of medication, and I didn't like the idea of taking a pill every day when I didn't have sex every day. So I used a diaphragm, from when I became sexually active in the mid 1970s until menopause a few years ago. It is a plenty reliable method if used well--I never had an accidental pregnancy, even though when I decided to get pregnant I conceived the first month of trying.

Now I'm post menopausal but I'm going to get a progesterone-releasing IUD soon to treat endometrial hyperplasia. My insurance company, interestingly, covers birth control for the subscriber and spouse but not for dependents. I suspect that is a moralistic position, as dependents are pretty much by definition unmarried. But at least the IUD is on their list of things they cover for me, though in an awkward way that took many phone calls to figure out.

It is a pity that people don't consider other options than the pill. Given the tendency of the pill to cause weight gain and my experience of pregnancy, I'm glad I didn't complicate my long term trends with the pill.

Changing up my way of being healthy

2011-07-17T09:17:00.005-04:00

I was diagnosed with diabetes in the fall of 2003. I quickly found the low carb tight control approach, and gradually began to exercise more seriously, as I realized that I could eat more carbs if I exercised afterwards. In May 2005 I did my first triathlon. In September 2007 I did my longest race, a half-ironman. I signed up to do the Beach to Battleship iron distance race the following year, but life got in the way of training and I gave up the idea several months beforehand. The combination of a low carb way of eating and exercise kept my A1c in the range of 5.6 -5.8 for most of those years without any medication, and I loved being an athlete, enjoyed the training immensely.

I did one sprint triathlon last fall and another this spring, but I haven't been keeping up my training very much. I still feel healthy, but my clothing size has crept back up almost to what it was when I was diagnosed. I try not to care, but I miss other people seeing me as healthy. A year ago my A1c was up to 6.1, which I thought problematic, though to my surprise this year it was down to 5.8--my way of eating works! I'm lucky in my genes--my HDL chloresterol is naturally high (around 80) and my triglicerides naturally low (in the 30s), but my LDL is mildly high and has been creeping higher. In the past year I tried to bring my LDL down by adding oat bran to my morning smoothie and taking a garlic supplement, but it didn't work. I am not willing to take statins--I'm not willing to take the risk of muscle damange or memory loss.

So I began to consider the idea that what had worked for me so well for five years wasn't working as well any more. I loved being a triathlete so much and I had felt such pride in finding a way of being healthy that worked for me (without medication!) that it was very sad to admit that it wasn't working any more and consider a change. I love being outdoors so much, but with less time flexibility now because of John's illness, too often the weather or other commitments get in the way. And I find it hard to be really dedicated if I am going to be interrupted regularly--if I take a dedicated approach then the interruptions are too frustrating.

I had two ideas for a new way of being healthy. One is an exercise machine at home, so exercise is more flexible and less of a time commitment. The other is to go on diabetes medication, because there is a fair bit of evidence that metformin has a wide range of benefits and few downsides (unlike most diabetes medications). I began to see things differently. My old way of being healthy worked wonderfully for me in that stage of my life, but change is good, both for freshness and because the once the body gets used to a pattern there is less benefit. Instead of thinking that I had found what worked for me once and for all, I might try a perspective that every five years I will change my way of being healthy.

So last week I started my new approach. My exercise machine came Tuesday in a large box on a pallet, and thanks to a young man who works for me sometimes, it is set up. I'm trying not to overdo it but I am enjoying using it to walk while I read blogs on my iPad. I would be happy to get on it several times a day, but at this point I clearly need to be careful not to irritate my achilles tendon. I like the motion of the hybrid elliptical/stair stepper a lot.

The first couple of days I took metformin I noticed a little stomach discomfort, but that has faded quickly and the main difference I notice is that I feel more energetic--so much so that I have just switched to taking it in the morning instead of at night. Some people have terrible digestive problems from it, but I didn't expect those because I am lucky enough to have a cast iron stomach.

I'm keeping a few pieces of my old way of being healthy. I'm still going to swim regularly and run/walk when I feel like it. I'm dropping the garlic and an acai/berry supplement, but I will keep on with:

oat bran (on the theory that the fiber is good for me even if it doesn't help my cholesterol)
a supplement called serenity formula which I found reduced the impact of stress on my blood glucose
a calcium/magnesium combination with trace minerals (I only take one instead of the recommend dose of 4)
2000 IU of vitamin D3
fish oil (which seems to reduce my mild hot flashes)

I will also add Vitamin B12, which Metformin interferes with. I'm convinced by the argument that the methyl form is the best.

I have one more piece to put in place--the treatment I have chosen for my benign thickened uterine lining is an IUD that releases progesterone. Figuring out how the insurance would work was a major enterprise, but it is on its way and my doctor's office will call to set up the appointment to put it in when it arrives. I actually have had symptoms of estrogen/progesterone imbalance for years so I am hoping that if I feel any differences they will be to the good.

I'm excited to be making a new start!

internet issues

2011-07-09T06:52:00.000-04:00

I've been having trouble with the internet of our ATT Uverse system. Oddly, some of our laptops worked fine with it, but my daughter's Levono and my iPad lost connection with the internet a lot. It got to the point where my iPad would download my mail, but anything else I tried to do got a "not connected to the internet message." I chatted with a representative, who "refreshed the lines" and now it works, though they wouldn't admit there was any problem with the line. They now tell me to put the cordless phone further from the router, though they put the phone jack right next to the router.

John's surgery

2011-06-24T20:04:00.004-04:00

The short form is that John had his surgery today and it went well. The surgery was scheduled for 2 pm (we had to be there at noon) and we got home around 6. The cathether can come out tomorrow.

The rest is whining. They took us back, I undressed John, and the nurse started an IV quite promptly, but there was a backup in the operating room so we waited more than two hours before they took him for his surgery. Between the problem this surgery was for and nerves, he had to pee at least 4 times during that waiting time. I helped him turn on his side a little and held a handheld urinal for him. After a while the nurse offered him sedation and he dozed listening to a book on tape and waking up now and then to request the urinal or help shifting positions. The anesthesiologist came by and we confirmed again that John would have a spinal. The anesthesiologist made a comment about spinals and epidurals that led me to say that I had had an epidural that didn't work but I understood spinals were more reliable. He said they had a very good record for spinals and epidurals.

My frustration when they took him back is that they told me to be in the waiting room, that it should take less than an hour. I had brought food for myself, but there were signs saying no eating in the waiting room or the lobby. So I made a hurried trip to the cafeteria in the basement.

It was more than an hour before the doctor came back out and I learned that the spinal had not worked so they had had to give John general anesthesia. I did say that I wished someone had discussed with us what they would use if that was necessary. But we talked mostly about the surgery results. The doctor gave me before and after pictures of the bladder mouth (more than I really want to know) and told me he had been able to do just what he wanted anatomically. He cautioned that the symptoms would be worse until the tissue healed and that there might be continuing problems because of the Parkinson's disease, though he thought he could help them with medication. I asked him for information on what anesthesia was used, and he said he would have the nurse write it down.

The nurse-anesthesist then came out to talk with me because of my concern about the general anesthesia. She said she had given him the absolute minimum to just keep him under, a combination of sevoflurane and propofol. I said I wished we could have had the discussion beforehand because I had some information on what was safest for people with dementia. She said that they always used what was known to be safe. I said that the information I was looking at wasn't yet standard medical knowledge. And instead of dismissing me she wanted to see my list. According to the research I have done (which is clearer for Alzheimers but there is some evidence is relevant to Parkinson's too), sevoflurane is safer than isoflurane and halothane but desflurane is even better. She said that John had woken up quickly and seemed to be with-it in the recovery room. Length of time under anesthesia and how deep the anesthesia are clearly factors in the impact, but there is also some evidence that anesthesia can accelerate the brain changes characteristic of Alzheimers and Parkinson's.

When I went back John was not especially confused, but he was mentally very slow. I don't think it is nearly as bad as the surgery three years ago, but we will see. Some of it is stress rather than anesthesia--even before they sedated him before the surgery he seemed really out of it and not himself.

John couldn't really walk in the recovery room, but I assured them than I could handle him at home even if he was wheelchair bound tonight. He was hungry and wanted a Starbucks smoothie. My GPS led us first to one inside a business, and John insisted that he needed one right away, not the one I knew 45 minutes away near home. I found one but there was a long wait. I did get an extra smoothie out of it because the barista misread the cup and made the wrong kind first and offered it to me. I thought the kids would like it, but John drank both. He then wanted to stop at a pharmacy nearby and get his pain medication more quickly, rather than waiting until we got home. I resisted that; I said he could insist on a smoothie right away or insist he needed his pain medicine right away but not both. I didn't want to wait 15 or 20 minutes for the medication before heading home. He decided he could wait.

I wanted to get the transfer wheelchair from his aunt, but he didn't want her to know that he had had surgery and so refused. So we used the same system we have used before, wheeling him from the carport into the house in an office chair. I told him that the wheelchair was easier for me so if he wanted to use the office chair he needed to make more effort to get himself around, not want to be pushed around the house. He agreed to that and that is good for his recovery.

I quickly ate some dinner and hurried back out to pick up the pain medication. But I was able to leave the kids to get John settled and fetch and carry for him. Elizabeth just made him some oatmeal. I have trouble being patient with all the details he thinks up of exactly what he wants.

getting ready to travel

2011-05-21T08:33:00.000-04:00

My endometrial biopsy Monday was easy, and they were hoping to have the results this week, but I haven't heard anything. Hopefully I will hear Monday. My doctor and I were talking about the bleeding I had and she said "maybe you just threw an egg." Scary to think that maybe I could have gotten pregnant two years after my last period.

Yesterday I focused on errands that needed to be done before I go away, so today I am focusing on packing. It seems more difficult because I am driving--I have room to take more. And it is always tricky because it can be so cold in Chatham in June.

I just checked Google maps and it tells me that in the next two days I have 17 hours of driving (in the absence of traffic)--986 miles. That is actually a bit shorter than I thought it was. It is 10 hours to Harrisburg PA, which is roughly my goal for tomorrow. But I'm flexible.

Race Report: Clemson Triathlon

2011-05-14T15:19:00.004-04:00

750 meter swim 27:53
T1: 4:31
11 mile bike 53:07
T2: 2:08
5K run: time not posted

I hestitated whether to do this race because I have been doing so little training. But I hated to miss it--I have done Clemson five times, just skipping last year because that was the weekend that worked for my sister to help my mother move. So I signed up, figuring I could pull out if my knees or back started giving me trouble. I was pretty faithful about taking a 10 to 15 mile bike ride every weekend the last month, but I didn't push my run/walk past the 2 miles I have been doing. I did the open water swim practice two weeks ago and I was excited to be doing it, which convinced me that I would enjoy the race.

I got up around 6 and had a leisurely breakfast and rode my bike to the race. Very relaxed. It was after 7:15 when I got there, so I didn't have a long time to wait around, though I think the start was later than 8 am. I had decided not to bother with a wetsuit and was happy that the water felt quite warm. It felt 78 to me, but they didn't announce that so it must have been just under. I swam in my sports bra and tri-shorts and then added a short sleeved shirt.

Usually I have been so excited I get out of breath at the start of the swim, but I got a steadier start this time. The water was still but the sky was cloudy so the buoys were easy to see. I was pleased with how straight I swam. This race starts people in waves of 50 or so, and while there was at least one wave that passed me, I didn't get pushed around at all. It is a long run barefoot to the transition area.

The bike went smoothly and I think I kept my level of effort up fairly well. I passed a couple of people the last mile. I ate a half a peanut butter and marmalade sandwich, which tasted wonderful.

The first mile of the run my legs were pretty unhappy and I wondered if I could go three miles. I took frequent short walk breaks and walked the uphills, and that felt right. By the time I got to the turn around my legs felt much better. It had gotten fairly hot, but I was grateful for a breeze and for a cloud that shaded me most of the time I was on the dike. A Great Blue Heron flew low over the dike not far ahead of me. I was enjoying the world around me.

I was happy to see the photographer still there when I finished. Usually it seems the photographer doesn't wait around for the last few finishers. The web site doesn't list a finish time for me, which surprised me, as the finish was still set up and I would have said the timing system beeped when I finished. They have been nice in the past about not cutting off people who exceed the time limit. I didn't happen to look at the clock, so I realized I had no idea of my time and that was probably a good thing. But I would like to have it for future comparisons. And I had been feeling so comfortable because it is a Set Up Events race, and I trust them. I did listen to the awards because sometimes I am 3rd out of 3 in my age group, but this is a big race for around here (over 400) and there were more than 3 women in the 55 to 59 year old age group.

I felt sore but I kept walking to gather up my things and after a while my legs felt ok but tired. No chafing, which makes me feel I've found the right approach to what to wear. I wasn't looking forward to riding my bike the three miles home but it felt like it was good for my legs to go back to riding after running. I did walk my bike up the hill to my house.

It also meant that I was still warm enough that I stretched when I got home, which should help how I feel tomorrow. I also lay on the floor for a while with ice under my back and my legs elevated. It is nice to feel virtuously tired. And now it is raining, much needed, so the weather has been very cooperative.

Elizabeth's school formal

2011-05-07T21:17:00.005-04:00

Elizabeth's school has an annual formal dance for students in grades 9-12, but seniors make a bigger deal of it so it comes close to being a prom. Elizabeth has attended all four years; she and her boyfriend got together after going to the formal together freshman year. She has been looking forward to this year for months, and finally tonight is the night. I think she went shopping with friends for her dress. She wasn't happy with her choices of evening bags so she crocheted her own. Her advisor gave her a ride to a store to buy a black satin ribbon for the strap.

After watching my friends post pictures of their daughters heading out to the prom, I wished for some way to honor the occasion even though she is in Massachusetts and I am in South Carolina. So I suggested that I get her flowers. I checked with her boyfriend's parents and they though he should do it, but he and Elizabeth said they would be glad for me to do it. I thought I could come up with something different and modern.

I looked at a lot of pictures on the internet, and came up with links to send to the Concord Flower Shop. The person I spoke to there a week ago said she definitely could do something like the example I found of an upper arm corsage. I hadn't seen Elizabeth's dress but I knew it was black and white flowers, one shoulder, so we settled on a gardenia and small orchids. I have only seen a cell phone photo so far, but I think it worked well.

more medical stuff

2011-04-20T09:55:00.002-04:00

After John had to go to urgent care because he couldn't urinate, I have been increasingly thinking that he needs to go ahead and have surgery to fix the scarring from his previous surgery for benign prostate enlargement. He has been resisting the idea, then focused on wanting to go to a different urologist who might try to avoid surgery. He got a recommendation of a urologist from a friend, and we saw that doctor yesterday for a second opinion. The doctor said John needs surgery, and this time he accepted that. He said he had lost trust in his other doctor and wants this doctor to do it, which is ok with me (a 45 minute drive instead of 20 minutes but not too much of a problem). The next step is a cystoscopy to look more carefully at what is going on and decide exactly what kind of surgery, but the doctor did say they could do the surgery with spinal anesthesia, not a general. The doctor was kind enough to squeeze John into his schedule for the cystoscopy in early May.

I had to write a letter to my doctor to get my test (endometrial biopsy) moved up to before we go out of town, but I did get that scheduled for May 16. My letter took the approach that it isn't that I am panicked about cancer but rather I am worried about having a precancerous condition and having them recommend a hysterectomy, which I would need to have scheduled as early as possibly in July. I'm glad my letter worked, but I also have a "gulp" reaction that my worries are realistic.

So it isn't going to be a fun summer. After his surgery, John is likely to have a foley catheter for at least a week, so he will be not able to do much for himself for at least that long. I fear that if I need a hysterectomy, I will not be able to have the easier surgery because I have a largish calcified fibriod, so that could be 6 weeks of recovery before I am supposed to lift more than 5 pounds.

life is complicated

2011-04-08T13:34:00.000-04:00

This is my place to vent--if you get tired of my complaining stick to what I post on Facebook, which is more balanced.

I've had a frustrating time with my doctor's office about my test results. When I hadn't heard back in a week about a test done in their office, I called. I didn't get a call back until 6 pm, and then I got a message saying that my uterine lining was too thick and they want to do an endometrial biopsy, and I should call in the morning to schedule. When I called, they said someone would call me right back. When I hadn't heard in an hour I called again. Turned out the nurse wanted to talk to me to make sure I understood the procedure. She did answer my question, said there would be some cramping. Then she transferred my call to the person making appointments. The first appointment available was the day I need to leave to drive up to Concord. So I couldn't get an appointment until late June, though I did ask to be called if there was a cancellation.

I'm frustrated to have to wait that long--I don't like living with uncertainty either about whether something is wrong or about whether having to do something more could affect my summer plans. I'm not much worried about cancer--there isn't a lot in my family and I got tested at the first sign of problems. There is a good chance that it is nothing. But what I'm worried about is some kind of mild precancerous state that would mean a difficult decision if they recommend a hysterectomy.

I did tell John. I realize that thinking he would worry is wishful thinking--he is off in his own world and my issues don't much register.

more TMI--John's urologist visit

2011-04-05T21:01:00.000-04:00

On Saturday John was unable to empty his bladder and had to go to the urgent care center and get a catheter put in. He hardly wanted to get out of his chair while it was in. Today he went to the urologist and got it removed, but when we went back in the afternoon he wasn't emptying well. We talked a lot about what to do and he really wanted to try and see if he would be ok without it, though the nurse practioner thought it would be better to put it back in for a while. The compromise finally was that they taught himself to cath himself instead of using that kind that stays in (Foley catheter). He didn't like the experience, but what a relief to think that he won't have to go to the emergency room if he can't void at all.

Menopause (don't read if it is TMI)

2011-03-27T10:43:00.003-04:00

I had a tough perimenopause and a fairly easy menopause, I thought. I never took hormonal birth control (I used a diaphram my whole reproductive life) so I didn't have a planned menopause. The first changes of perimenopause for me were mild hot flashes at night and my periods became regular, after being very irregular (28-60 days) my whole reproductive life. That was fine, except it lasted around 5 years and my periods kept getting heavier and longer. My doctor recommended ablation to reduce the flow, but I said I would try to wait it out. And indeed my periods stopped before the heavy flow became unmanageable.

I skipped a few periods, then had a few, several times, then went 9 months or so, then had a couple, and finally it has been 20 months or so since I last had a period. The hot flashes never got bad (I do think taking fish oil reduces them for me) and while this has been a difficult period of my life for outside reasons, I never felt menopause had caused mood swings. I find grapeseed oil is all I need to manage personal dryness. At one point about a year after my periods stopped I experienced rapid weight gain no matter how carefully I ate, but that has stablized.

But now after 20 months I have my period again. Discouraging. I assume my doctor is going to want to do an ultrasound. The last time I had one, maybe 5 years ago, I found it triggering, and said to myself the next time I would bring my husband to support me. But he's impaired enough by his own illness that he wouldn't be a help now. I guess I'll try music. I'm not worried that I might have cancer--this has been so much a normal period that it doesn't feel like something is out of whack.

It is annoying to have to go back out and buy supplies. I gave most everything away, but luckily I had kept a box of my favorite o.b. ultra, which are no longer available. I did just do some research because I remembered reading when it was too late to help me that progesterone is the best treatment for heavy flow. And I learned that taking ibuprofen may reduce flow by 25%. I already took a Naproxen today to help the crampiness so I will wait to tonight to switch to ibuprofen, but I'm happy to know that there is something easy I can do.

Cross reference added later to more of the story

my spring break

2011-03-23T20:06:00.001-04:00

Monday I took our daughter and her boyfriend to the airport then John to a doctor's appointment, which turned out to be fairly quick, but I felt tired and didn't get out in the garden.

Tuesday I had an appointment of my own in the morning, then listened to some of an interesting webinar, then took the lead at John's aunt's care plan meeting, then a dentist appointment for me. I talked to a reporter on the phone while I did some errands and did get to church for centering prayer.

Today I went to the flea market and bought some vegetables and plants and did a little in the garden, then spent most of the afternoon helping our son get registered a the local community college (there were several issues that took them time to work out). I did get to have coffee with a friend in the late afternoon. I just took care of getting my son's AP score reported to the community college. I probably should have given him the necessarily number (which I keep after he lost it) and said he could do it himself, but sometimes it just feels so much easier to do it myself.

Tomorrow I have a couple of appointments for me, then my peer group and after that a spiritual direction appointment.

Rally for the American Dream

2011-02-26T19:32:00.000-05:00

My son and I went to the rally at our state capital in Columbia in support of Wisconsin workers. It was a small turnout but cheerful and interesting to hear the stories of union members. I wanted my son to have an experience of participatory democracy, and it was a good experience.

avoidance

2011-02-19T18:34:00.000-05:00

Several weeks ago I had the thought that I should start organizing the material for our taxes, but I never got to it. Now I have received two of the forms that sometimes hold us up. There are a couple of other forms I have not received yet, but at least one of them I know I can get online. But I'm going to have to get telephone help to do it. That might be possible for the other too, but for that I will need to contact the broker.

I should discuss with him Paul's refunded tuition. The broker is going to ask me how soon Paul will need that money, and I have no idea. So long as Paul is taking a course or two at the community college we can pay. So how soon might he go to college full time again? I think my guess is two and a half years, but I could so easily be wrong.

It all seems too complicated, so I avoid it. But I need to get the taxes filed as soon as possible for Elizabeth's financial aid applications.

making friends with painful feelings

2011-02-11T19:58:00.000-05:00

Maybe I should see being a caregiver as a chance to develop a side of me that has been relatively weak. But I have a very strong reaction that I refuse to go gentle into that good night. So I'm stuck in a situation where I resent the role I have to play and what I have had to give up of my own plans for these years. I've struggled with my resentment for several years now, and I don't find a way to work through it and make it go away.

So I'm trying a different approach. Often our painful feelings are there for a good reason. It is the force of growth inside us that makes being stuck so painful. So I'm trying to look at it from the perspective that I'm glad I feel resentment and other painful feelings. If I didn't, I wouldn't have so clear an impulse in me to lead me to growth and healing. I want to learn to let the feelings live, even make friends with them.

giving and getting

2011-02-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

I went to a local retreat on Saturday that asked us to examine how we feel called to change. I said I want to grow, develop other sides of myself. I resist completely the idea that caregiving might be the side of myself I am called to develop, or at least the only one for this period of my life. Yet it is in some ways not my strength.

At Peace Church Sunday evening Susie preached a very moving sermon about God's love. John was in tears, and I put my arm around him. Paul was sitting on the other side of me and had earlier said he was low, so I also put my arm around him. It felt ok for a few minutes, but by the time we got up to receive communion I was crying hard, feeling that I am always giving, there is no one to hold me. (If I asked John to hold me he still would, though I don't know how long he would last before he thought of something he wanted or needed. But it wouldn't work for me because I am too aware of how much he needs from me.)

When I returned from communion I sat down in an empty seat next to Paul--I couldn't bear taking my place between John and Paul. And Paul patted my arm while I cried. We talked about it a little in the car driving home and he seemed pleased that he had known what I needed.

explaining my son coming home

2011-02-02T14:14:00.000-05:00

Here's what I wrote to Paul's former advisor:

Paul did so well last spring when he transferred to Presbyterian College, but it took him a lot of effort. Several things have gotten in the way since, including losing a week to flu last fall, but I think fundamentally he couldn't keep up the effort. He got off track after the snow days and stopped going to class. He and I talked at length and agreed that he would try to get his act together, but if he didn't go to all his classes and appointments that week then he would come home. I heard last Tuesday that he didn't show up for his appointment with the academic coach and I started the process of withdrawing him.

At the beginning of this term I hoped the issues might have a quick fix with an antidepressant that had more anti-anxiety effects, but now I think that Paul needs to find what he cares about before he will be ready to continue college. He and I have talked about how he may just not be ready for college yet, or at least for how college requires increasing responsibility each year. Hopefully it is a matter of brain development and he can go back in a year or two. In the meantime the plan is for him to do volunteer work and take one or two courses at a time at the local community college.

It is an interesting path we are on because of John's illness. I had been trying to protect both kids from having to deal with their father's slow downward slide, but now Paul has ended up on a different path. I'm going to be treating Paul more like a partner in the household than like a child because I need the help. So far he has cheerfully done everything I have asked him to do. Maybe being home will be the maturing experience he needs. He seems relieved more than depressed to be home.

People at Presbyterian college were very kind through this whole process. I'm glad Paul had that experience of the semester where he did well because now he knows he can do it. If in a year or two he wants to return to a liberal arts college, I will encourage him to go back to Presbyterian.

volunteer work

2011-02-02T09:37:00.000-05:00

Paul doesn't have much experience with working. He never showed any interest in projects at home, and I didn't push him because his problems with coordination and fine motor skills were likely to make it frustrating. School seemed to be the place he could succeed. But now he needs something else to do, particularly until he can start taking courses at the local community college in May. I'm thinking the place to start is volunteer work. We met yesterday with our pastor, because someone told me he would be a good source of ideas, but he didn't have many suggestions. I guess the next step is to see if I can get any ideas from friends on Facebook.

changes in our household

2011-01-28T08:10:00.000-05:00

Paul is home--he said he could pack himself up and come home but in the end I went to Clinton and helped him. A few minutes after he left in his car, he called to say he had gone off the road. He was in a ditch, uninjured and with very minor damage to the car. So I went to help him and we waited an hour for AAA. Then we waited another 45 minutes for someone to bring John to drive one car home, as I figured Paul was too shaken for it to be wise for him to drive home.

It gave us good talking time. I said that when he has been home from college, I have treated that as a vacation and asked him to do very little. But now that he is home to live, I hope to treat him less like my child to take care of and more like a roommate sharing in the work of running the household. I said eventually I would even like him to start taking a turn cooking for us all. His response to that was that it probably wouldn't be very good, but he seemed comfortable with the idea. I also said I was glad to have him home to help with John. Paul asked what that might involve and I said the first step is that I want him to learn to put on John's socks (it requires learning because John is sensitive about his feet and Paul puts his own socks on any which way).

I told Paul last night that I would buy him orange juice this afternoon when I went to the store, but if he wanted it sooner he could go to the store for himself. He said "That would work, I went to BiLo a lot at school."

Step 1: Integrate Paul into the household as a partner. That is going well so far.
Step 2: Help him find volunteer work to do.
Step 3: Figure out possible changes in the house so he has better space.
Step 4: When does he want to start taking courses at the community college?

moving home

2011-01-27T03:14:00.001-05:00

When I planned the renovation and move to this smaller house, I assumed that Paul would be in college. There is a large attic bedroom with its own bath, which I gave to Elizabeth, who has filled it with her stuff. It has a motel style heating and air conditioning unit, which can be left off when she is not home.

John has three rooms downstairs. I originally wanted him to have two of the rooms and leave the third for Paul, but he didn't like that idea. John has a sitting room with his TV and a bedroom, both crammed with his stuff. And then there is a room that is partly Paul's room, but it also has John's partial kitchen. John makes his breakfast and lunch there, and his endless cups of icewater. Paul has a bed tucked in a corner and a bookcase and a good-sized closet with shelves. That has worked fine while Paul has been in college--I like having Paul a little more integrated into the family rather than shut away in his room all the time, and he doesn't have a lot of stuff.

But it doesn't seem fair if Paul is going to be living at home for him not to have his own room. The trouble is, this is an oddly laid out house, and there just isn't another room. If he switched with Elizabeth there just wouldn't be room for Elizabeth's stuff. The main floor is open; my bedroom is the only room with doors, and even it is also the passageway to the screened porch. John isn't going to be willing to give up any of his space. I've been laying awake at night trying to figure out how to make Paul a room by finishing half of the unfinished basement area, but it has huge insulation-wrapped HVAC ducts and a washer and dryer that can't really go anywhere else. If it didn't include the washer and dryer his room would be 8 feet by 9 feet, and would need to have two 3 foot doors (because of access needed to the other part of the basement). It would have ductwork, some of it with only 74 inches clearance from the floor, and rusty pipes. It would have a basement window, in a window well. John wouldn't be happy having to move the stuff he has stored there, but that I am willing to fight.

I need to let go of this and go back to sleep. Paul didn't come home yesterday--he said packing up took longer than expected and he will come home today. I need to wait for him to come home and talk about the issue together, not try to solve it myself. I don't know how he trades off privancy versus the walls not closing in on him. I wish we could at least move the washer and dryer, but the problem is dryer venting.

leaving college

2011-01-26T08:39:00.002-05:00

My son is withdrawing from college today. We had a good conversation Saturday and made the plan together. He would see if he could get his act together this week, and if not he would come home. I was a little worried that he would get his act together and then not be able to keep it up, so I was thinking the best thing was probably for him to come home. But I am surprised by how much it hurts.

As a senior in high school he had no doubt that he wanted to go to college. With two parents who are/were professors, part of the problem is that he can't imagine doing anything else. He went off in fall 2009 to St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, which had been his first choice. It turned out not to be the supportive place I had imagined because it is so small, and after the first semester they told him he couldn't come back. I didn't want him to come home and have to deal with his father's illness, so I arranged for him to go to Presbyterian College, which had been his second choice. Spring semester a year ago he worked with an academic coach and his grades were As and Bs. Over the summer he took courses at our local community college and completed his language requirement, with an A in Spanish 201.

This past fall went less well. He was having trouble with at least one course, and then he got sick and missed more than a week of school (he tested positive for both influenza and strep throat). After than, he had trouble catching up. We arranged for a medical withdrawal from one course and he got through the semester with a B and two C+s in his other courses because I went three days and sat with him in the library all afternoon and made sure he worked.

We hoped this semester would be better, but after the snow days he stopped going to class and to his appointments with his academic coach. He doesn't report the anxiety of last fall, he says he just doesn't feel like going to class and can't make himself. So he is coming home, hopefully on a medical withdrawal. He thinks he wants to take one course at a time at the local community college, and I want him to find some volunteer work.

When we talked Saturday we talked about how maybe he just isn't ready for college yet, needs more time for his brain to develop. I said if he was home I would expect him to do some work for me, and he said he could understand that. I will expect him to help with his father and aunt. While I had been trying to protect him from that, I see his coming home as a different path. We will see where that leads us.

blogs

2011-01-26T08:12:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago I used sharedbook.com to print this blog into two printed volumes to save that stage of my life for the future. I thought it was a good time because I have stopped writing--it was a record of my life from 2002 to 2008. But it made me value the blog more as a permanent record of my thoughts and evolution. So I just imported all the posts I wrote on a different blog, about my husband's illness, so that would be combined with the record here. I've also posted here some items I first posted in Facebook.

I had used a separate blog because I saw that as a different audience and because I knew my daughter read this blog and I didn't want to burden her too much with my feelings. But we are all more adjusted now (and she has probably stopped reading this blog because I have not written in so long). And I have something I want to write about, and realized I wanted to write in my own place, not on some discussion board. That post will follow. Then I realized I have written several things in scattered places, and I have gathered them here to be that continuing record.

a personal reflection on elder care issues

2011-01-21T16:53:00.000-05:00

I wrote a piece on this topic for my professional society's newsletter, which you can read here. I am getting nice feedback on Facebook.

venting

2011-01-21T16:42:00.001-05:00

My husband is in the very early stages of dementia--he still makes his own plans, though he moves too slowly to do much and he gets confused sometimes. Eight months or so ago he started to go with me to some monthly church suppers where people talk about their lives, and I wasn't too happy because he told me I couldn't talk about my frustrations with him. But he tends to isolate himself, so I decided he needed that group more than I did and I would do it his way. The group is meeting tonight, and he said several weeks ago he did want to go.

He has had some swelling in his legs that got worse, so the doctor wrote him a prescription for a diuretic. He got the prescription today. He told me yesterday that he had decided not to go to the dinner today because of the effects of starting the diuretic. That seemed reasonable. But when I called him this afternoon, he said he was going to postpone the first dose of diuretic and go out to dinner with some friends of his. I'm so angry, but there is no point in expressing it at him when he is no longer capable of learning to be more thoughtful.

Our son meanwhile flunked out of one college and then did really well at a second college last spring. He had some problems in the fall because he missed a week with the flu, but we hoped the spring would be better. But he didn't show up for a meeting with his academic coach yesterday and isn't answering his phone or email last night or today.

My therapist's office messed up and gave someone else an appointment next week that I had sent them two emails saying I wanted. They can give me another one not as good, but it does feel like my safety net is unreliable.

Atlas

2011-01-15T09:10:00.000-05:00

Christmas letter

2011-01-01T08:18:00.000-05:00

Here's what we sent this year:

Dear Friends,

We have had a much easier year this year, happily moved into our renovated house. We enjoyed tomatoes, snow peas, and even eggplant from our two raised bed gardens.

John’s illness is progressing slowly. He is still able to travel, including a trip to Bremen, Germany, and Stockholm with Andreas and Nino, German friends from graduate school days. He enjoys organizing wine dinners and a local group called Drinking Liberals. We celebrated John’s 65th birthday in August with a small dinner party. We drank a bottle of 1842 Madeira we had bought on our honeymoon in Madeira in 1987.

Pam spent a lot of time this year helping Elizabeth with the college process. Pam did do one short triathlon in the fall but is doing less training than in recent years. The Science and Technology in Society program she runs is hanging in there, though it has been a stressful year because her closest colleague in the program had a successful heart transplant. Her new excuse for some peaceful time is fountain pens with many colors of ink.

Elizabeth is loving her senior year at Concord Academy. She and Pam took a long road trip to visit colleges last summer after Elizabeth finished a summer course for high school students at University of Chicago in Egyptology. She is interested in studying ancient Near Eastern archeology and also preparing for a graduate program in art conservation, with the idea of eventually working in a museum with archeological artifacts. She has decided to apply to Emory, George Washington University, University of Delaware, Bryn Mawr, Boston University, Brown University, and Harvard.

St. John’s College did not work out for Paul, but he moved in spring 2010 to Presbyterian College in Clinton, SC, where he had a very successful spring semester. He finished up his language requirement over the summer at our local community college. This fall has been tougher—we arrived for parents’ weekend to find him so sick Pam took him to the doctor, where he tested positive for both strep throat and influenza. Catching up after missing more than a week was a bit overwhelming.

We’ve simplified our lives a lot, which reduces the stress of the unexpected things that come up. We don’t have the control over our own lives we expected, but life is rich in its details.

Pam, John, Paul and Elizabeth

Green Tomato Relish

2010-10-24T14:36:00.004-04:00

Amounts are approximations. I suspect the tomatoes are acid enough that this can be safely canned in a boiling water bath, but don't count on that until I have done some research. I will test later and report back. (I am waiting for some pH test strips--if the pH is under 4.5 it is safe.)

5 lbs green tomatoes
2 lbs sweet onions
2 tblsp picking spice plus an additional 1/2 teasp cardomon seed in a mesh ball
1 bay leaf
1 cinnamon stick
1/2 cup cider vinegar plus perhaps another 1/4 cup to taste at the end
3/4 cup sugar

Coarsely chop the onions and tomatoes, add the other ingredients, and cook over low heat until they release liquid. Then cook at a simmer until very soft, a total of about 2 hours. I pureed about 4 cups of the mixture briefly in the blender to make the sauce thicker. Adjust seasonings--I added a little more vinegar and some salt. Pack in jars and process in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes or refrigerate. Makes 6 pints.

Tri the Ridge

2010-09-25T21:14:00.002-04:00

I signed up Thursday for today's Tri the Ridge triathlon put on by the Pickens YMCA. I didn't make time to go drive the bike course, so the whole thing was a bit of an unknown. I suspected it would be less professionally run than the Set-Up events I've mostly done in the past, but I was wrong about that. The race shirts were even navy blue technical shirts with mens and women's sizes available.

I was ill-trained but determined to have fun. I got there early, but didn't try to warm up. The swim was 300 yards in a 25 yard pool, so up one side of each lane and down the other side. Too crowded, and people seemed to expect that the person in front would stop if they wanted to pass. The swim ended with a long run down a hill to the transition area, so I don't know how accurate my 7.5 minute swim time prediction was.

The bike was rolling hills and some lovely rural roads. I didn't think the hills were terrible, but they did slow me down. My bike time wasn't the slowest, by 10 minutes or more, but I didn't pass anyone. Bike time for 12.4 miles about 55 minutes

By run time it was hot, but at least most of the run course was shaded. I started out walking, as I knew my legs wouldn't want to run off the bike. By the second mile I was running relatively freely, though I walked the hills and occasional rests. I felt slow, but given how little I have run it went fairly well. Run time for 5 k about 52 minutes.

Overall time 2:05:32. I waited around for the awards, because out of about 150 participants how many were there in the women 55-59 age group? But there were at least three, because they gave two awards to people ahead of me.

A Poem

2010-03-18T11:19:00.000-04:00

By my cousin Patti Carey, struggling with cancer in her 30s:

Let It Go

Let go of the ways you thought life would unfold;
The holding of plans or dreams or expectations –Let it all go.
Save your strength to swim with the tide.
The choice to fight what is here before you now.
Will only result in struggle, fear and desperate attempts to flee
From the very energy you long for. Let it go.

Let it all go and flow with the GRACE
that washed through your days
whether you receive it gently
or with all your quills raised to defend against invaders.
Take this on faith: The mind may never find the explanations that it seeks,
but you will move forward nonetheless.

Let go, and the wave’s crest
will carry you to unknown shores,beyond your wildest dreams or destinations.
Let it all go and find the place of rest
and peace, and certain
transformation.

Two years

2010-02-24T08:18:00.000-05:00

It is about two years now since we realized John had Parkinson's disease. He was diagnosed as soon as we saw his family practitioner and sent to a neurologist and then to the Movement Disorder Specialist who said Lewy Body Dementia.

John is doing better than I had expected. Our son, who isn't very observant, said he thought John hadn't changed significantly in those two years. The changes I see are that John is slower and gets confused more easily. But he is still taking care of himself except for wanting help putting on his socks and he still doesn't have hallucinations. He did a driving evaluation with the occupational therapist at the rehab hospital and passed. I think our new renovated house has improved our lives--he can deal with his sleep issues by watching tv or listening to books on tape in bed or sleep on his back and snore. We have a caregiver/cleaning person twice a week who does her best to keep his chaos under control. I'm happier anyway now that I have my own peaceful space.

He is in somewhat more denial about the cognitive issues, but he admitted recently he can't handle financial matters and the like when he asked for my help with a situation where he has been dropping the ball for years--serving as executor of the estate for some people who were important to him when he was young. I thought he had withdrawn a year or so ago but it turns out he didn't. I will play the illness card on that one--tell them he has early dementia and doesn't like to admit it. We also have arranged for an accountant to help aunt Florence with her finances so she doesn't keep asking John for help.

John and I talked a little about how he is doing better than I expected after two years. He wondered how much of it is due to his taking coconut oil and MCT oil? No way of knowing. He does have impaired glucose tolerance, so if some dementia is a kind of diabetes in the brain he is likely to be in that group. And that is what the oils are supposed to address by providing ketones as an alternative fuel for the brain.

We saw John's neurologist yesterday and the doctor was pleased with John's muscle tone. John is working with a better physical therapist and she has even motivated him to do some exercising on his own. He has even gone out for a walk a couple of times in the last few weeks. I just wish he didn't have such a tendency to decide to go for a walk or to go see his aunt Florence at dinner time.

fairly stable

2010-01-27T20:02:00.000-05:00

We are now pretty well settled in the renovated house. We have a woman who comes twice a week and cleans, does John's laundry, and straightens up his area. He doesn't like it when she tries to organize his things but he doesn't get around to doing it himself. I tried to suggest that when he can't do things himself he needs to accept someone else doing it not exactly his way, but he doesn't buy that.

He will let her help him with some things like putting on his socks. I tried to push him that he needs to shower more than once a week but his answer was that putting on his socks was too difficult. Sigh.

Today he went out for a walk for the first time in months and called me to come get him because he had been too ambitious (he went nearly two miles). It would be good new if he would get back to exercising. He has a physical therapist he likes and now goes there twice a week. Maybe she has finally found the trick to get him to make the effort to exercise.

He did a driving evaluation with an occupational therapist at the rehab hospital and he passed. It worries me that he came home exhausted by the effort because he had to change his usual habits for the evaluation (for example staying under the speed limit). But so long as he has no hallucinations and does this three hour driving evaluation once a year I won't fight it. Despite how slow he has become his reaction time tested as good.

Technology in Haiti

2010-01-24T13:30:00.011-05:00

I'm going to use this post to accumulate links relating to the role of technology in doing things differently in Haiti:

Twitter in Haiti (thehaitian) on NBC
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/vp/35031832#35031832

Help Haiti Heal: Instructions for volunteers:
http://helphaitiheal.wordpress.com/find-hop/about/
home page: http://helphaitiheal.wordpress.com/

Haiti volunteer network: http://haitivolunteer.org/

Ushahandi:
http://blog.ushahidi.com/index.php/2010/01/22/the-nuts-and-bolts-behind-4636-in-haiti/
volunteer: http://haiti.ushahidi.com/diaspora

article on the role of texting
http://ow.ly/ZSx3

Crisis Camp:
http://crisiscommons.org/node/39

a blog example of small scale aid:
http://livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/

problems with large-scale aid:
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2010//hallward240110.html

rebuilding differently (appropriate technology)
http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/journal/docs-temp/350-anderson.pdf
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/haiti/v-fullstory/story/1441239.html

appropriate architecture:
http://www.dwell.com/articles/an-architecture-prof-on-haiti.html

what's wrong with news coverage:
http://www.tomdispatch.com/archive/175194/

I'm supporting Partners in Health because people in my church had a role in the origins of the organization and because they are putting the Haitians in the lead as much as possible, not coming in as cowboys to tell them what to do. My church is supporting in particular the rebuilding of the dam and water project in Cange that was their first project in 1984. The water supply is needed to support the hospital and expected long-term refugees. http://www.regonline.com/Checkin.asp?EventId=663543

Also make sure to sign the petition to drop Haiti's international debt: http://www.one.org/us/actnow/drophaitiandebt/

Mary Daly

2010-01-16T13:11:00.002-05:00

I just learned that Mary Daly died ten days ago. It was reading her book Beyond God the Father that started me on the path to becoming a believer and a churchgoer. It was about 1976 and I was studying feminist analysis of science with Ruth Hubbard. I read Mary Daly because I thought Christianity was a similar kind of patriarchial system to science and so her analysis might be helpful in thinking about science. It was the first time I understood that the Christian church could be more than just a social institution. When I joined a church for the first time, about five years later, it was a Congregational Church, First Church Amherst, then pastored by Donna Schaper.

hoping for a better 2010

2010-01-08T14:05:00.003-05:00

I haven't given up on blogging entirely, but the fall was overwhelming, with supervising home renovations, moving, moving my husband's 98 year old aunt first from an apartment into assisted living then into a nursing home, and my son flunking out of college.

We had a housewarming party Jan. 2 and I think we are finally pretty well settled. The house I would say is a success, though I haven't had much chance to enjoy it. Downsizing from about 4000 to about 3000 square feet was hard. A wonderful cousin I had hardly known before is helping us sell things we didn't want.

John's aunt is doing better now that she isn't trying to manage her own apartment.

Our son started Monday at Presbyterian College, much closer to home. He is optimistic that will work out better.

Am I really going to get to catch my breath?

When I don't have time to blog I have been posting on Twitter (set up to transfer to Facebook). You can find me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/pammack

I miss having someone to share the work

2009-12-22T20:53:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I went with John to the urologist, who again recommended more surgery for his benign prostate enlargement (or the scar tissue from the first surgery). They did say they could do it without general anaesthesia. John wants to try a dilation procedure first, but if that doesn't last very long he wants to find a high-ranked doctor farther away. Sigh.

I'm wishing for help with Christmas. Our daughter and I went and got a tree today and I got it up, but no one has offered to help with decorating it so it isn't decorated. John hasn't been feeling well this afternoon/evening, so I shouldn't complain about today specifically. But more generally, Christmas is too much work to be trying to do mostly on my own. I'm ok with cooking a traditional meal even if I have to do most of the cleaning up too. But even if my daughter will help me some with decorating, having to do the cleaning up makes the decorating seem too hard. I need to think about what I would want in a simpler Christmas.

tired

2009-12-15T18:51:00.000-05:00

This week our focus is on moving John's aunt's things out of her assisted living apartment, as she has moved permanently to the nursing home at her retirement community. We have one helper who is very good at sorting through things and making decisions. John is not so good at that but he did arrange several people to pick up things.

I've been trying to set up an alternative for our son, who is in his first semester of college and flunking out. I wanted to make sure he had another choice and doesn't have to stay home and deal with his father's illness unless he chooses to. And today I heard the good news that he is accepted to what was originally his second choice college for the spring. I'm hoping he has had enough time to learn his lesson, but I think a fresh start will be a relief for him.

John was complaining yesterday that I don't tell him things. Actually, I make a pretty good effort to keep him informed. Sometimes he forgets, sometimes I don't tell him because I don't want to spend the time and answer his questions and have him second-guess me, and sometimes I don't tell him because of my resentment that he doesn't share the burdens more. He said he thinks I am angry at him for getting sick. I said I am angry at what has happened to my life but he is just going to have to live with my strengths and weaknesses. I'm good at working things out practically, but I'm sometimes going to be impatient or irritated.

interesting study

2009-12-11T11:36:00.000-05:00

This isn't information I need yet, but it is so clear I thought it worth linking:

Clozapine is the only antipsychotic shown to be efficacious for the treatment of PD psychosis, although quetiapine is more frequently used because of convenience. Concerns about antipsychotic sensitivity in DLB patients may prevent antipsychotics from being tested further in this population. There is also preliminary evidence that cholinesterase inhibitors may have antipsychotic properties in both PD with dementia and DLB.

source: "Presentation and Management of Psychosis in Parkinson’s Disease and Dementia With Lewy Bodies," Daniel Weintraub, M.D., and Howard I. Hurtig, M.D. Am J Psychiatry 164:1491-1498, October 2007 http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/reprint/164/10/1491

end of my rope

2009-12-02T06:36:00.000-05:00

Moving was hell. We had two particularly intense two day periods, when the professional movers came and when some people with pickup trucks helped us finish clearing out the old house. Then I pushed to get as much unpacked as possible before Thanksgiving. I thought things were settling down now, or at least I could focus on my job, but now John's aunt who lives in our town has to move from assisted living to the associated nursing home. Clearing out her crammed apartment is going to be a nightmare.

Right now I need to go check on her. They didn't have a room ready for her in the nursing home until today so I had to arrange round the clock care for her. John was coping with helping her until the bad news came, but then last night he said he couldn't bear to go back.

Not sure of anything

2009-11-02T19:18:00.000-05:00

My packing went well Sunday but it was hard today to have to deal with last minute renovation questions and my job as well as getting ready to move. I can't tell whether John is going to be ready to move or not. I suggested he might want to stay in a hotel the night before moving day but he didn't think that would be necessary. I may suggest it more forcefully.

Today he asked me if he needs to cancel physical therapy and massage appointments on moving day. I told him yes. I think moving day is going to be overwhelming for me trying to make sure everything ends up in the right place. I also told John that in the two or three days after we move, the woman who is helping us pack and unpack would put away his clothes and set up his partial kitchen without him if he made other plans in the afternoons.

I got some packing done today I had been avoiding, but now I'm feeling discouraged. The big chunks are getting done but that makes the small scattered things more visible. And the most unreliable person I hire, who was a big help Friday, didn't show up today.

I have people who offer to help, but I don't know what to ask for. I'm thinking I want to organize a picture moving and hanging party for Friday (after the movers move the boxes and furniture next Tuesday). What can I get a 12 year old boy who really wants work to do? Do I want friends to help on moving day or do I need to be able to focus on telling the movers what to do?

more delays

2009-10-31T06:32:00.000-04:00

Moving is now delayed until Nov. 10. The third coat of polyurethane goes on the floors today. But I think that date will hold, and maybe even the extra painting of shelves will be done by then. John tells me every now and then that he knows I have put a lot of work into the new house and I have done a wonderful job. My first reaction is that he sounds insincere (our therapist actually agrees) but I am trying to be grateful he is that positive instead of totally dragging his heels. My hope is that 4 or 5 months down the road, when we are settled, he will tell me that I was right, our lives are better in the new house.

house progress

2009-10-23T19:58:00.000-04:00

We accepted an offer for our old house today, so that is a huge relief of tension. No major contingencies and closing Nov. 16.

The plan is to move Nov. 2, which is a tight deadline but looks possible.

Here are some pictures:

John's sitting room has a laminate floor and is walk-out to a carport with no step at all.

John's bathroom--the folding grab bar to the right of the toilet is not mounted yet. The toilet seat is a Toto. The wall is blue below the chair rail to make the toilet easier to see.

John's shower:

The controls are outside the shower because the shower head had to be mounted on a cement block wall.

getting close

2009-10-20T19:43:00.000-04:00

I had hoped to move this week but the house isn't going to be ready. I'm not sure whether it is going to be ready in time to move next week or not. It is getting close, but the hardwood floors still need to be sanded and refinished, paint touched up, and the grab bars installed in John's bathroom.

John is a little more focused on packing than he was at first but there is still a lot to do. And I spent the afternoon today working in the yard of the new house, not packing. I realized today that we have 5 different people we hire to help us with yard work and packing, all of whom are pretty unreliable. I got upset Sunday when someone who had repeatedly said he was coming didn't show up, but I found someone else to help me get the bushes planted before it got too cold. I'm trying to be more laid back and figure if one person can't help someone else will be able to.

I will post some pictures once the grab bars are up. John's space is going to be really nice.

hope

2009-10-07T19:12:00.000-04:00

I had a very sore back Monday and Tuesday from preparing a garden and planting a tree Sunday, but I am much relieved it is much better today.

The roofer came today and did a minor fix that he thinks will stop the leak in our current house.

The plumber pushed down the tree that wouldn't fall and the two dead trees next to it with his backhoe and didn't charge me anything. Another subcontractor said the plumber just wanted to play with his toy.

The refrigerator that seemed not to be working did eventually get cold (it took more than 24 hours). I was too efficient and ended up paying for a service call for a repair person to tell me I should wait longer, but it is still good news.

The renovations on the house we will move to are beginning to get to the last stages. The painting isn't all the way finished yet but most of the plumbing fixtures were put in today and the appliances come tomorrow. The big thing still to be done is laminate floors on the lower level and sanding and polyurethaning hardwood floors on the main level and in the attic (where more oak flooring needs to be added in the new dormer area). The light fixtures should start to go in Friday or Monday.

The realtor says he is hoping to have an offer for us on our current house tomorrow. He doesn't know if it will be a good one, but if that did work out it would be a huge relief of stress. We had an offer earlier in the summer and agreed on a price but it was contingent on those people selling another house that has not sold.

Our kids are coming home for the long weekend and I have Monday off.

John told the therapist that he thinks the antidepressant (Wellbutrin) is helping him. I don't see much difference in his ability to get things done, but he seems to be a little more engaged--now and then he does notice that I have feelings. He started going to a specialized hand therapist and his hand is finally getting better. It will be interesting to see whether he wants me to continue to put on his socks and shampoo his hair as his hand recovers. He doesn't seem to mind being dependent, while I wish he tried harder to do things for himself.

overloaded

2009-10-05T09:19:00.000-04:00

I had hoped to move this week but the renovations are not done, so we are currently scheduled to move Oct. 22. So it could be worse, but I need to vent.

I had some landscaping taking care of last week, regrading on both sides of the house so the water flows away from the house and not straight at the driveway. I got beds along the foundation prepared for me at the same time. Saturday the university botanical garden had a plant sale, so I bought a good sized arborvitae (emerald variety), to go near the house between two windows where it looks a bit blank. Then I took John to a funeral of someone he cared about and then went to Atlanta to pick up a chair my daughter and I had ordered.

Yesterday (Sunday) started out with two men coming to move several appliances. I didn't see any need to buy a new washer and dryer and refrigerator, but since there were decent working ones at the new house (from when it was rented to students) I decided to swap now so the refrigerator could be installed along with the new appliances later this week (it needs an icemaker line). The person who was coming to help me clean couldn't come because of an injured foot so I unloaded and cleaned the refrigerator and cleaned behind it and behind the washer and dryer when they moved them. John tried to help a little with the cleaning but he is so slow that his help didn't amount to much. He didn't try to help reload the refrigerator. This morning I had to call the appliance service people--the refrigerator that we moved to our current house isn't cooling properly.

I was left with the job of capping off the icemaker line at the old house, as the refrigerator we moved there doesn't have an icemaker. My first trip to Lowes I came home with a cap that was too big, but John went back and bought a smaller one and that worked.

Meanwhile, I had someone coming to cut down some dead trees. They are cedar trees and the one he started with proved to be hard to cut--he borrowed a splitting maul from me to add to one he was already using to wedge the tree in the right direction. He eventually got it cut but it didn't fall--it is held by vines to two other dead cedars. He was going to come back today with a winch but it is raining.

While he was working on the tree I worked on digging a hole to plant the tree I had bought (ironically also a kind of cedar, but one that grows 12 feet tall and 3 feet wide). The clay soil was the right wetness to dig relatively easily so I dug a really big hole and mixed in composted wood chips and lime and fertilizer. I should have asked for help moving the tree and the 40 pound bag of wood chips, but I had enjoyed doing the digging and doing the whole job right. Not surprisingly my back is sore this morning.

These days I usually move to another bed when John comes to bed and wakes me up with his snoring or crying out or just shifting trying to get himself positioned in bed. So I moved around 4 am last night to my son's room (since he is away at college) and realized the bed was wet because the roof was leaking. I went up and put a bucket in the attic but I didn't get back to sleep. We have been struggling with this roof problem for a couple of years--it was supposedly fixed. I called the realtor who is selling the house and asked him for a recommendation of a really skilled roofer. He said they are either cheap or good and I said I want good.

The good news is that the roof leak in the dormer of the new house does seem to be fixed, though there is still a problem with a downspout backing up. I took my laptop back to the repair place this morning--they supposedly fixed it last week but it isn't fixed.

It is all more than I can bear.

hand problem

2009-09-14T19:54:00.000-04:00

We went to the neurologist last week and talked mostly about John's partial loss of use of his good hand, which was supposed to get better (it supposedly resulted from falling asleep in a desk chair and compressing the nerve). It has gotten only a tiny bit better, though I notice the last few days John is doing some things he had said he couldn't do, such as taking out the trash. The neurologist said recovery definitely is slower than it should be, and he was concerned by how the muscles in John's arm have wasted. He wanted John to get electrical stimulation at the physical therapists office first, and if that doesn't work in a couple of weeks he will try a cortisone shot in the elbow.

John's massage therapist is concerned it might have been a mini-stroke. I'm not following that up because I don't think the therapy would be any different and I am not up for a new round of doctors right now.

I'm tired of cutting John's food up for him, and this is only the beginning of the journey of helping him with activities of daily living. Caregiving does not come easily or naturally to me.

getting help

2009-09-08T19:42:00.000-04:00

We actually are making progress getting packed to move in a month. Today I found a consignment store that looks like a good place to sell some furniture we don't want. We have two helpers, one a strong student and one a woman who can work more independently, who each come one afternoon a week to help with packing. I'm hoping the woman will help John unpack and then slide into helping him manage his things.

I said something to John yesterday that seemed to get through. I asked him to try to find ways for paid help to do the things he can't do any more, instead of expecting me to do them all. Today he asked the student to clean the inside of the microwave and take out the trash.

I'm here

2009-09-05T20:11:00.000-04:00

We had at least one of our kids home all summer but now they are both back at school. My daughter helped me a lot with decisions and shopping for the house renovation (a big help because John shows no interest). I taught both kids to drive (talk about stressful). The house renovations have been intense and are still not done--hopefully by the end of the month. Our current house hasn't sold, though there has been some interest. I've been posting renovation pictures on Facebook and instead of blogging Twitter has been about my speed (what I post there shows up on Facebook too).

John fell asleep at his computer and compressed the nerve in his elbow. The result was that he lost a good part of the use of his better hand. It is supposed to get better, but more than a month later it has improved only a tiny bit. He needs me to change his socks for him and cut up his meat. I wasn't expecting to be here already.

My tentative plan is to move the second week of October. Somehow. I am teaching a full load this fall.

I am grateful that John has been able to continue to take responsibility for helping his 98 year old aunt. She took a bad fall a couple of weeks ago and I met the ambulance at the emergency room, as I knew it would take him too long to get there. But he managed after that. Amazingly, nothing was broken and after a little more than a week at the nursing home she is back in her assisted living apartment.

feeling burdened

2009-08-05T06:45:00.000-04:00

I've made plans to give away our cat tomorrow--John doesn't like her around because she demands attention. I'm not strongly attached to her but it is still a sad thing to do. I think I have found a good home, at least, someone who really cares about cats.

We are supposedly on vacation in North Carolina and John still seems to enjoy being here, though his hiking is really slowing down. I went back home yesterday and will go again tomorrow to deal with work and house matters. I'm worried I should be there today to look for anything in the rewiring that isn't the way I want it. I forgot to check yesterday whether they moved a switch I wanted moved--I know they didn't move another one. The good news is that they are hoping to be done today with the rewiring.

Our son missed his plane home from Spain Saturday and I had a hairraising time getting him scheduled for a flight the next day. But he is now home and with us on vacation. Next step is to get the details worked out to take him to start college at the end of the month.

I went to a Lewy Body support group yesterday, though I didn't stay the whole time because I wanted to get back to North Carolina for dinner. Still, I liked the other people and I talked about how confusing it has been for me.

Chocolate mousse-torte pie

2009-07-18T19:48:00.003-04:00

12 oz semisweet chocolate
1 1/2 teasp instant coffee
1/3 cup boiling water
12 eggs, separated
1 cup sugar
2 teasp vanilla
1/8 teasp salt
1/2 or 1 cup heavy cream (optional)

Prehead oven to 350. Dissolve coffee in boiling water and place with chocolate in a double boiler over hot but not boiling water, stirring occasionally until the chocolate is melted. Beat egg yolks and sugar until thick and lemon colored. Gradually beat in chocolate and vanilla. Beat egg whites and salt until stiff. Stir 1/4 of egg whites into chocolate mixture then fold in the rest. Grease a deep dish pie pan, fill with half or less of the mousse mixture, and bake for 25 minutes or until puffed. Turn off heat and leave in oven for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and cool completely. Meanwhile chill the remaining mousse (first stir in 1/2 cup of cream whipped until firm if you prefer a slightly lighter mousse). When shell is cool cover it with the chilled mousse and chill 2 to 3 hours. The pie can be covered with 1 cup of cream, whipped, before serving.

John is home

2009-07-18T19:26:00.000-04:00

John went to Spain with our son, who is studying abroad there for a month. They traveled together for a few days and then John went to Madrid alone for several days. Going to the Prado was on his life list. He had an international cell phone, and called me for help with several problems. The biggest one was that he missed his plane back from Madrid to Malaga and could only reschedule for four days later. By then he was ready to come home but Delta said the flights were very full so I persuaded him to go see our son in Ronda instead of spending his days trying to stand by for an earlier flight. He's glad he went but was very glad to be home.

He has terrible sleep patterns and has not been willing to try to change them. In recently months he usually falls asleep and sleeps most of the night in an office chair in front of his computer. Then he goes to bed for a few hours around 7 am. He has a chair that reclines and has a footstool and two different laptops but he likes to use the laptop in the privacy of his downstairs office. Last night he pinched a nerve in his arm and today has only partial use of his left dominant hand. I had to help him get dressed. So I expected that he would be at his worst when he got home from holding it together for a trip but he has ended up even worse.

When he is around me leaving anything hard or complicated for me to deal with, it is hard for me to imagine that he can travel alone. But he can still pull it together when he needs to. And he has lived all his life with making a lot of mistakes because of ADHD and is used to it. I discovered he hadn't put the registration paper in his car when it came in April (though he put the sticker on his license plate). He commented that he had made that mistake before.

Today's last straw was when he reported "we have a big problem," the sewer pipe had backed up into our downstairs bathroom. Guess who cleaned that up.

changes

2009-06-20T20:23:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I took John to try out a lift recliner, and he liked it. Now I need to find a medical equipment place that is a preferred provider for our health insurance and see if buying one there (with the insurance paying $300 for the mechanism) actually comes out cheaper than buying one from a furniture store. John isn't on Medicare yet, but I did get a message from someone at our insurance that with a letter from the doctor they will cover it.

I assembled a couple of shelf units for Aunt Florence. She is buying specialized things so as to get every possible bit of storage space in her smaller apartment. She wanted John to assemble them for her and he tried the first one and couldn't manage it and asked for my help. I just wanted to get it done today so that I will have as much flexibility as possible tomorrow.

Tomorrow is my birthday and I am trying to think of something special to do for myself. I cooked an early father's day dinner tonight so I can put myself first tomorrow. It is a big change of mindset for me to do something for myself on my birthday instead of expecting my family to do it for me. It feels like going in the right direction, if only I can figure out what I want to do.

antidepressants

2009-06-16T20:48:00.000-04:00

I went on Zoloft (actually the generic) a couple of months ago, feeling that I needed help to get through the stress of house renovations and moving. I'm very medication sensitive and I found that 1/2 a 25 mg. tablet daily was plenty, in fact when I went to my gynecologist, who prescribed it, for my annual checkup I complained that I can't cry any more.

She was concerned about my cholesterol numbers. My HDL is always very high--over 80--and my triglycerides were excellent (34), so it isn't clear that I have to worry. But my LDL was up a lot. I had been on vacation and eating less carefully, but my A1c was down slightly at 6.0, which suggests that my diet hasn't gotten worse. I couldn't figure out what had changed, particularly as my LDL had been trending downwards before that. The doctor asked if I was doing less exercise and I am doing less than two years ago, but not less than at the time of the last test. John's experience is that exercise improves triglycerides and HDL, not LDL. I'm pretty careful to avoid transfats.

I'm already taking fish oil, so what to do to bring my LDL down? As I started to look for information on approaches that would fit my way of eating, I discovered scientific papers that say Zoloft raises LDL. I'm going to taper off the Zoloft and see what happens. See if my LDL improves (the doctor wanted another test in 2-3 months) and see how I feel. One source suggests that Celexa might not have the same effect, if I find I need an antidepressant (and it comes in pills than look like they can be split to get the lower doses that work for me). But I'm hoping I can hold on to this stabler place now that I've found it.

Race Report: Death Valley Open Water Swim Meet

2009-06-13T20:49:00.003-04:00

It had been a difficult week. Worries about the renovations of the house we will move to, a lowball offer on our current house, and then the budget of the program I run at work was drastically cut (that is only part of my job so my job isn't threatened). I was feeling so low last night I just went to bed early.

I got to the swim meet around 10, not knowing the exact schedule. I had signed up for the 2k, which turned out to be scheduled for 11 and didn't actually start until 11:30. I had done this meet two years ago and I thought I had done the 2k then, but now that I look back at my blog I see I did the 3k that time. I was feeling fairly relaxed about it, as I swim more than 2k in practice.

It was a beautiful day with little wind and the 2k was a small group. There were people around me for a little while at the start and then I settled in to the long lonely haul. I tried to focus on keeping up my effort. The last part out to the turnaround there was more wind and a lot of wake from passing boats, so it felt easier once I had turned around.

Someone swam with me towards the end and asked me if I was ok. Do I look that incompetent? Actually I was feeling a bit discouraged, as the number of buoys ahead of me seemed to stay the same. I passed a buoy and realized people were yelling at me to turn. Only then did I realize that what looked like a row of buoys stretching ahead of me was actually buoys piled on a dock beyond the finish. So I had a very short last push to the finish. I came out feeling pretty tired, though not shakey.

I didn't ask my time; I thought I would see it on the clock which was a little ways up the beach. But just after I finished they started the 1k, so the clock had been reset by the time I got to it. The results aren't posted on the web site yet. But however I did, I am feeling less depressed.

Update: My time was 1:09:31

doctor's visit

2009-06-13T06:23:00.000-04:00

John had a neurologist's visit Thursday. John reported that his balance is worse and we both reported that he is moving slower. He asked about increasing the Sinemet but the doctor said no because the doctor found his muscles not stiff. The doctor seems most worried about falls.

We asked about when the doctor thinks Namenda should be started. He said when the Aricept stops working. What I wonder is whether the Namenda would be any better than the Aricept, which John takes only a half dose of because it causes him balance problems.

John reported that he doesn't get enough air through his nose and needs to breathe through his mouth. The doctor asked about allergy symptoms, but John said it is true even when his nose is not running. The doctor suggested more exercise to strengthen his chest and diaphram muscles. John said he would go back to using our exercise bike. He does take a 1/2 hour walk several times a week, but I don't know how aerobic that is.

After we got back from Massachusetts it was several days before I got John to go visit the other house, and then he didn't say much. The renovations are in the stage where everything is torn out and some of the changes are framed in. I did get him to make a decision about whether he wanted a larger closet or more built in bookshelves. But it feels like he isn't interested, which is hard on me. It is mostly just one more thing than he can deal with--he has trouble getting the necessary things done in a day.

I'm having a tough time because the main part of the budget for the program I run at work just got eliminated. My job is safe but it is discouraging and hard to know what to do. We also got a lowball offer on our current house and they haven't responded to our counteroffer.

progression

2009-06-04T10:39:00.000-04:00

Here in a different setting, where we come once a year, I can better evaluate how John's illness has progressed. The most noticeable difference is that he is even slower. It really is beginning to take him until noon most days to get dressed and be ready to do anything. That is in part because he spends time reading his email and the New York Times on the computer, but he isn't willing to do it differently in order to participate in a family activity.

He also turned down a family activity one day because he was focused on wanting to go to a favorite food store to get the nuts he likes to snack on.

His slowness and focus on his own interests also means that he doesn't do much of the cooking and cleaning up. Our daughter complained that he wasn't doing his share. When I ask him to do something he asks one of the kids to do it, until I finally complained that I wanted to ask them to do other things. He's done a bit more since I complained (and passed on the complaint that he wasn't doing his share).

Our daughter says she definitely sees a change. She says when she starts talking fast he can't understand her at all. She isn't easy to understand when she talks fast.

I'm feeling a bit resentful because I haven't done some of the things I like to do here, such as ride my bicycle. That is in large part because my daughter's boyfriend is with her, so I'm focused more than usual on family things. But John isn't, so I have less flexibility.

vacation on Cape Cod

2009-06-01T20:32:00.000-04:00

John and our son on Coast Guard Beach in Eastham MA. I do notice John doing less than a year ago when we were here.

John is home

2009-05-24T20:34:00.000-04:00

John left Monday to go to New York city for a wine tasting, returned Friday. He was very happy with the wine tasting (and went to another) and he had one unsuccessful day of museums and one successful day. He came back saying he had had a wonderful trip.

I don't drink so I didn't wish I had gone. But it is hard that he does so well when he travels on his own, then comes home and is negative and confused. On Friday our son had had a driving lesson and done testing to evaluate his ADHD. John got mixed up three times in half an hour about which one our son had gone off to do that evening. And yesterday he was having particular trouble finding the word he wanted and sometimes used the wrong word without realizing it.

I think he is in a stage where he can hold it together when he is doing something he wants to do, but it is tiring so he doesn't do so well when he gets home. It makes sense that he would be awfully tired after a trip but I do get frustrated sometimes that he can't put together that kind of effort when it isn't all about him. On the other hand, I'm glad he is taking responsibility for his own happiness.

I've been deep in house renovations. After they cut a hole in the roof the carpenter and I batted ideas back and forth and ended up more than doubling the size of the dormer. He says I should take the attic room as my bedroom, it is going to be so nice. He also came up with a better idea for how to fix the staircases, which weren't to code. John initially didn't like the tile I had picked for his bathroom, but we went to Lowes to look at other alternatives and he decided he liked it after all when he saw it on a wall from a distance. So many decisions to make.

John and I walked around the badly overgrown lot with a friend who is a professor of horticulture and he told us what to save and what to cut down. I'm not good about asking for help, but I did and he was wonderfully helpful. John is eager to go after the poison ivy--something he has always gotten obsessed about. I think he also took in that our friend liked the house.

Belated race report: Clemson Triathlon, May 16, 2009

2009-05-22T17:54:00.002-04:00

Swim 750 meters 25:15
T1 03:15
Bike 11 miles 46:01
T2 02:29
Run 5k 43:37
Overall time: 02:00:36

photos

I picked up my friend Pam and we biked from my house to the race, as I wanted to leave my car for my daughter and my mother to come (though in the end they didn't). We had one fairly heavy shower before the race, then on and off light showers. The race was a week later than usual and the water quite warm--I'm not sure it was worth wearing my wetsuit, though most people did. It did help for the in the water start, as I could float upright waiting for the start without expending any energy.

The water was warm but I didn't settle in very comforably to the swim. Not for any good reason; it was even easy to see the buoys with the sun not out. My swim time was 2 minutes slower than last year.

I had left my transition things in a plastic bag instead of laying them out and I was happy to put on dry shoes. Clemson attracts a lot of people doing their first triathlon, and on the bike I passed a number of people on mountain bikes. It hadn't rained that hard and so there weren't many puddles.

I did the walk-run thing for the run and was happy that my time was slightly faster than last year. The funniest moment in the race was on the run when someone going the other way (ahead of me on an out and back course) said in a tone of great surprise: "Professor Mack!" I was passed by a 67 year old in pink tri shorts on the run and I said I want to be her when I grow up.

I didn't stay long after the race because we needed to get to North Carolina for my son's awards ceremony that evening and then graduation Sunday morning. But I had fun.

different directions

2009-05-20T19:49:00.000-04:00

John is in New York city for a wine tasting and to go to museums. I've settled down so much about how he is doing, and I don't think he has lost much in the last year.

I'm very busy with the house we are renovating:

The first task is a new dormer for the attic.

house renovations

2009-05-20T19:33:00.005-04:00

The house renovations have started and today they cut a large hole in the roof for a new dormer.

We decided to make the dormer bigger to better fit the existing roof and to improve the space inside.

Pray that it doesn't rain.

Graduation

2009-05-17T07:17:00.000-04:00

Our son's graduation from high school is today. John came up Friday to attend the celebration of seniors. I told him one of us needed to attend and he reluctantly agreed, but it sounds like he enjoyed it. I stayed home because my mother and daughter were flying in Friday evening and to do my favorite local triathlon Saturday morning. We all met for the award ceremony Sat night, where our son got the drama award. It is rainy this morning so graduation in the gym.

-- Post From My iPod

busy

2009-05-11T21:08:00.000-04:00

Trying to get John's aunt moved this week. She holds onto stuff worse than John. And I spent much of today dealing with the house we are renovating. I'm glad I was there when the rental manager went through--I don't think the students will be getting their security deposit back. Tired.

2009-05-08T16:41:00.002-04:00

This character was in our road. It turns out she had only 3 legs--missing her right hind leg. But she seemed to be getting around fine. We put her onto a lawn where she wouldn't hit a fence.

houses

2009-05-07T07:59:00.000-04:00

The meeting to sign the contract for renovations on the other house just got postponed until tomorrow, when we are also meeting with the realtor to sign the papers and list this house. And John's aunt Florence got a place in assisted living, so she will be moving out of her apartment in the next few weeks. The assisted living place smaller, but it is still a one bedroom apartment, so I don't know how much stuff she will be giving us. The timing is actually fairly good in terms of needed to focu on her--at least we've pretty much finished getting this house ready to show. But more things to deal with...

My first swim meet

2009-05-03T20:25:00.005-04:00

I asked our coach whether to sign up for the meet or whether I would be too slow and hold things up. He said I should ask the person running the meet, he didn't know what the times were like. She encouraged me to sign up, so I did. I didn't want to lose my whole weekend, so I said I would volunteer early Saturday morning and swim Sunday only. I signed up for the 500 yard free, because that is most like a triathlon, the 100 IM (25 butterfly, 25 backstroke, 25 breaststroke, and 25 freestyle), and the 100 free.

When I got there Sunday I was a little nervous, but a teammate was much more nervous so I took charge of figuring out what we needed to know. I asked our coach what to do for a warmup (what he suggested was more than we could have done, but it gave us a starting point). People were really friendly.

The 500 free was swum with the fastest heats first so we were in the last heat, but I didn't fully focus on the starting procedure, I just knew I was going to start in the water. I forgot I was jumping into the deep end and and came up sputtering, and then it was the start. I started out awfully fast (1:05 first 50) because I was excited, so my main goal became not to fade too much. Mostly I tried to stay just below getting too out of breath. My time for a 1500 meter triathlon swim last week was 46 minutes so I had said I just wanted to beat 15 minues. When I looked at the scoreboard after finishing I saw a 15, because my last lap time was 1:15. Only after I got out did I realize that my time was actually 12:46, which I was very happy with, even if the 74 year old woman doing her third swim meet ever beat me. I got second in my age group (out of two).

There was a fairly long break and I ate a nut bar but didn't do any more warmup. The shorter events were organized slowest heats first, so I was up quickly for the IM once the next part of the meet started. That for me was the most exciting event because I did feel competent in the butterfly (which I don't always) and was in a tight race with the person swimming next to me all the way through the event. She was always a little ahead and I couldn't gain on her in the freestyle, but I tried. I was very happy with my time of 2:29 (first 50 in 1:13). I was sixth in my age group.

The most interesting event to watch was the 200 butterfly--the youngest person in the race was 49 and the oldest was 65 (the 82 year old didn't enter that one). The 65 year old won it.

My last event was the 100 free. I worked really hard and I had the start a bit better figured out, but I was disappointed by my time. I didn't stay until the results were posted, and now I don't remember if it was 2:20. Maybe I was tired, or I just pushed too hard and lost efficiency. My first 50 was 1:04, second was 1:16.

I stayed to cheer teammates in the mixed relay and still got home around noon, very hungry and with that good feeling of having pushed myself.

avoidance

2009-05-02T19:04:00.000-04:00

Thursday John avoided actually working with the woman who was supposedly helping him declutter for three hours, before he finally started with her in his office (she worked on other things, but his things are most pressing). The good news is that he acknowledges that he wouldn't be getting it done without her. And she is beginning to get him to accept the idea that someone else might do the things he does his way, such as his laundry.

We had someone take a load to the dump and it has become more visible that we have made a lot of progress. And we are taking over 10 boxes of books to a booksale tomorrow.

swim meet

2009-05-02T16:31:00.002-04:00

I'm swimming in our local swim meet tomorrow only. This morning I went and helped for a couple of hours. I talked with one lady who is 74 and swimming in her third swim meet. She will probably beat me tomorrow (she said she was a swim instructor for many years, just didn't compete). I'm pleasantly scared about tomorrow: I've said to several people that I am doing it because it is something I never thought I would do in my life.

old pictures

2009-04-28T20:49:00.000-04:00

John said that as he sorts through things it makes him sad to see old pictures of us. I asked why and he said we were so much closer then. I thought for a while and said but I feel like I was only half alive then (because I have since done a lot of work to heal from childhood trauma). He acknowledged that. I wish he had more ability to join me in that new life.

race

2009-04-26T20:21:00.000-04:00

I went away for one night to do a triathlon Saturday morning (4 hours 6 minutes to swim 1500 meters, bike 24 miles and run 10K). I was happy with my results (I'm slow but I enjoy racing) and John seems to have picked up my energy a little and worked with me more today. I got my home office straightened out and we improved the layout of the downstairs family room.

Race Report: Langley Pond International

2009-04-25T16:54:00.006-04:00

Short form:
swim 1500 meters: 46:26
T1 (including a long run from the water to transition) 00:06:18
bike 24 miles: 01:39:22 (14.5 mph)
T2 02:28
run 10K 01:32:12 (pace of 14:50)
total 04:06:43

I'm actually very happy with that result, because I really wasn't trained for the distance. I did about half and half power walking and running, so I was happy to end up with a run pace of under 15 minutes per mile. My last international distance, almost two years ago, was 3:59. And it was hot today: 79 degrees by 11 am.

I didn't pack for the race until right before I left, but the only thing I forgot was my Garmin. I had found a cheap hotel ($55 with tax) about 10 minutes away, so I got to sleep until after 6. I had my usual microwaved frozen quiche for breakfast and a banana about 15 minutes before the start. It was 63 degrees at 8 am--I didn't need my wetsuit to keep me warm. But I wore it--the water temperature was 70 degrees. I had swum in the lake up here on Wed. and the water was cold enough to make it hard to settle down and breathe, but the water felt a lot warmer in Langley Pond and I was comfortable from the start. I felt rather alone the second half of the swim, but I wasn't the last one out of the water. Having forgotten my Garmin, I didn't even wear a watch, so I had no idea of my times.

I had driven the bike course so I knew that there was a long hill in the first quarter and then some small rollers, but the big hill wasn't too steep. It was a two loop course and during my first loop I was passed by a lot of people doing their second loop. I took two salt (Succeed) capsules and ate a gel and a half a peanut butter sandwich. I was glad I had the gel--I started to flag fairly early on and the gel fixed that. I usually prefer one loop bike courses but this time I liked knowing what to expect the second time around.

My legs were pretty sore after the bike and it was beastly hot. But I ate a gel with caffeine and started out power walking and once the road turned downhill I was ready to run. I would run until I felt my legs were tiring and then walk fast until I felt like running again and that worked amazingly well. I was immensely grateful to a man who sprayed me with his hose in the part of the course with the least shade. I knew I was last but the water stations stayed out for me. At the prerace meeting they had told us the trains wouldn't run until noon, so I was happy when I heard a clock strike noon shortly after I crossed the railroad tracks. I was also happy when I saw the finish clock--I had expected to be slower.

I was the last finisher by about 25 minutes, and they had finished the awards ceremony when I finished. But I asked, and I was third in my age group. They didn't have an award printed up but they said they would send me one. The food wasn't quite gone--I got chili, chips, and salad. There was no line by the time I went to take a shower, so I got the pleasure of driving home clean (about 3 hours). I'm a bit sunburned and chafed and my legs are very sore. But I'm happy that doing this race despite not being well prepared worked out so well.

Pictures are here (link goes to 3 of 5--it should be possible to page through all 5).

still decluttering

2009-04-23T19:48:00.000-04:00

I was hoping to have the house ready today to put on the market, but John's decluttering helper cancelled on him yesterday and is away for a week. John told the realtor he needs another two weeks. He is definitely making some progress. I just want it to be done, though I've still got work to do in my office.

I'm signed up for a race early Saturday several hours away and haven't made a hotel reservation or anything. Unless something comes up that makes it seem wrong I think I will put everything together tomorrow and go do it. It would get me away from all the stress for a day.