For better or worse...

Through the course of the day yesterday, the bug I had moved from my throat and my chest to my stomach and my belly. In other words, it made its rounds. I felt the worst in the afternoon when I laid down in bed and had a fitful sleep and stomach spasms. I was aware of feeling very sick and making it a point to try and not wake up and consciously experience it. 

That did get me through the bad part, although I had the chills for the rest of the day into the evening. Now that I'm up in the middle of the night, I feel better and I think the worst of it is over. I don't nearly have the aches and pains in my body that I had and my head feels more normal too. It doesn't feel in a sick state anymore. 

It must have been a 24 hour bug and I should be fine in the morning. I told you that I never do get properly sick like other people do for days on end. I get being sick over and done within the shortest amount of time. 

Except for the bother of the aches and pains, it was very boring to be sick and I hope I don't have to repeat it any time soon. You can't do any of the things that you regularly do and on top of everything, I missed my appointment with my therapist. Food and drink don't taste very good either and are no diversion. At the end of the day I ate some crackers, but that was it. 

I crave a milkshake, but I'm having some ice cold milk instead. I wasn't able to drink that yesterday. It's a good sign that I can drink it now without my stomach protesting.

I've got to go back to bed and finish sleeping. I look forward to being a healthy person again the morning. 

Ciao,

Nora

Almost cured at last...

My cup of coffee tastes especially nice now in the middle of the night and it's the second one I'm drinking. And no, my stomach is not in an uproar because of it. It is behaving quite normally, almost as if it is completely back to normal, although there are still some odd noises emanating from it. I just pretend it's practicing behaving like a regular stomach again. 

So, I'm very cheered that I get to have my cup of coffee and right now I think that all is well with the world. I can claim happiness and contentment for at least a little while. I'll actually try to make it last for as long as the night and day are long. That shouldn't be too hard to do. I don't expect anything to stand in my way. I do feel that I must choose the side of optimism. The glass is half full. 

It's an amazing thing that you have to be miserable to really appreciate what you've got, but that's how I feel right now. I'm so relieved that I have been able to drink and eat a few things again, that my whole disposition has been affected by it. I'm grateful that my stomach is healing and that it's not permanently going to cause me problems. 

I was very concerned about that and it's an enormous relief to find it getting better now. I suppose there's nothing like good health and even the threat of bad health is enough to put a scare into you. Imagine if something had been seriously wrong and how that would have affected me. I mustn't think about it. It would have been a huge burden to live with and my heart goes out to the people who have to.

Yesterday was a seriously nice day. The weather was wonderful and the sun was out all day in a bright blue sky. Luckily, I really got to appreciate it because my sister and I sat outside the front of her house in the sunshine in the afternoon and even got some color. We stayed there until it was time for me to go home. Her house sits on a sheltered street and we weren't bothered by the wind. It didn't interfere until I got on my bike and rode it home.

I did chores on and off while watching sports on TV and I've been watching the rugby championship that's being played in New Zealand. I'm becoming more knowledgeable about rugby and what a good and tough sport it is. I still don't understand all of the rules, but I'm learning. 

The Netherlands won the world championship baseball competition. We beat Cuba to do it. We do feel a certain amount of pride at that. It was a big deal over here and it is hoped that even more kids will start playing baseball now. A lot of our players come from the Dutch Antilles where baseball is a big sport. We have an American coach who speaks Dutch very well. 

Of course, there was the football competition and I do give a running commentary on that with the dog as my single audience member. He does look at me funny as he tries to decipher what I'm talking about. I do very clearly state my opinions. It's a good thing that there's no one else here to get into an argument with. Yesterday, during one game, I would have handed out many more red cards than the referee did. 

Still, I managed to change the bed and do the laundry. At least one load of it. The second one is for today. It was pleasant to get into a clean bed last night. I think the dog appreciated it too because he very cozily cuddled up to me. For a change the cat wasn't around to hog all the attention and he was happy about that. He didn't have to bother chasing her off the bed anyway. 

I must get ready to go back to bed now because today is Monday and duty will be calling this morning. 

I hope you'll all have a good day.

Ciao,

Nora 

The day I quit smoking.

It's now the afternoon of the day I quit smoking and things aren't nearly as bad as I thought they were going to be. I thought I was going to be a nervous wreck by now, tearing out my hair and pacing the floor, searching through the trash for cigarette buds, being emotional and desperate, going to the gas station for a pack of cigarettes and all sorts of other things.

Well, I had all these scenarios in mind, but not the actual one, and that is that I'm pretty calm and only go through cravings sometimes and have a peppermint if I do. That seems to do the job. Every once in a while a sense of panic hits me when I realize that I can't smoke, but I quickly subdue it and tell myself not to be a wuss. There are worse things in life.

I know that if I were to light a cigarette now, I would suffer from a terrible coughing fit and would not enjoy it at all. I would be bent over double from coughing, because I would not be used to smoking anymore. I do realize now that I had a chronic little cough with phlegm all day long and I really need to get rid of that and I'll be happy when I have. It's not healthy and it is my goal to be. I want my lungs to be clean and my bronchi to be in good shape.

I bought the bag of peppermints at the pharmacy. It's a good thing that they sell candy there, because I bought it as an afterthought and it has come in so handy. It really takes care of the mild frustration I feel when I have a craving for a cigarette. When my mouth wants to be occupied.

I find keeping my mind occupied works well too. Reading is a good activity. I've started a new novel. A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons and I'm reading it quickly, because it's that kind of a book. It reads very easily, but I think maybe I'm better able to read now that I'm not distracted by my smoking. I can pay better attention and not worry about the ashes falling on my book and having to light up another cigarette yet again.

Every once in a while I think, oh, I will light up a cigarette, but then I think, oh no, I will not, and am disappointed for just a split second, but I am immediately relieved again because I don't have to. It's not a compulsion. I can live without it.

The domestic help has been here and cleaned the apartment and I have also liberally sprayed all the rooms with air freshener and opened the windows wide. The ashtrays have been washed and put away. I will not be using them anymore, nor will anyone else, unless they go outside. It's nice to have clean, never to be used again ashtrays. They will be museum pieces soon.

I wonder what smoking does to your psyche while you inhale all those different chemicals that manufacturers put in the tobacco to get you hooked? It must have all sorts of psychological effects on you that happen as a result of the chemical reactions in your brain. It can't help but be a mood altering drug or drugs. I wonder very much how I am going to be feeling over the next weeks and months. I bet I'm going to see an improvement in my mood and my overall mental health. That's something that really motivates me. I want to see how my total health improves.

I remember when I started smoking more than 40 years ago and how tough it was to start and how I really had to fight my body's resistance against the nicotine. For some reason I was determined to smoke and within a very short time I was hooked. I never was hooked on anything else but nicotine, but it bit me good. I'm just as determined to quit now. I should say, to stay quit, because I already have quit.

I'm going to finish reading my book now. I have the feeling that I'll be doing a lot of reading in the near future. Luckily, I have enough books to read. And interesting ones too.

Have a good afternoon!

Ciao,

Nora.

It's working well!

I've decided not to watch any Olympics this evening, but instead to catch up on my blog reading, which I was very behind on. I'll get my pajamas on in a while and make myself comfortable on the sofa and watch some Olympics then. They are broadcast all night because of the time difference. I don't know what I'm going to do when the Olympics are over. Life will be so boring when everything gets back to normal. Well, maybe not. There was life before the Olympics, after all, and somehow I managed. I know I read a lot more books then.

I'm taking my medicines for my airway infection and I must say that the codeine works very well. I'm allowed to take it 4 times a day and it completely takes away the pain, making it a lot easier to breathe, allowing me to do things as if there is hardly anything the matter with me. So, needless to say, I did some chores today.

First I cleaned up that torn bag of cat litter. I was a ten kilo bag and when I tried to pick it up, the bottom fell out and all the cat litter dropped on the ground. I swept it all up and put it in a different bag and then swept the whole room which was covered in dog hair and debris from outside that the cats and the dogs had tracked in and other dust and soil. It hadn't been properly cleaned in a while and it is where the back door is, so you can imagine what it looked like. It looked like the great outdoors.

Since that was done so successfully, and since I was hardly out of breath, I vacuumed the apartment next. I didn't rush the job, but did it nice and easy, as if I had all the time in the world, which I did. I vacuumed up the last of Jesker's hair that was stuck beneath the furniture and now that is all gone. Tyke doesn't shed any hair. His fur is thick and curly, but I have yet to find any laying around.

Now I have to mop the floors, which is going to be a lot of work, so I saved that job for another day. I have a sponge mop and I think it is more work than a rag mop, though I am still undecided which of the two I like better. I know I will feel a lot happier once the floors are clean, because they are mucky now. I do want to pick the right moment to clean them, when I have a lot of energy and I know I can get the job done. I will do them in stages and take little breaks in between.

My nose is still plugged up and I can't blow it now. Everything is stuck. It causes me to talk funny. My throat is slighty sore and hoarse, and my chest is rattly, but it doesn't hurt thanks to the codeine. I know that in a few days I will feel a lot better. I'm already glad that I'm able to do chores so much easier and that I'm not just lying on the sofa being sick. That's a great relief to me.

Lately I've been having regular crises over the value of the purpose of my existence. I very much miss having a reason to go on living for other than Tyke, and before that it was Jesker. I think of how tough it has been to survive this past winter and how very much I don't want to have another winter like it and that I'm not happy with the prospect that I'm going to have winters like that for the rest of my life. I wonder about the true purpose of my life and what it really is all about and I don't see much reason for it, other than to just get up in the morning and somehow make the best of it until I go to sleep. It doesn't seem like a very fruitful and useful life.

I wish there were an option to step out of your life when you think it has been enough. That you've lived the life you've wanted to live and that you don't see much purpose in going on living. When the negatives of life outweigh the positives and there's not enough happiness left in it. I find myself in that position now and I very gladly would have followed Jesker into his eternal sleep. I'm quite envious of him to have died such a peaceful death. Just one little injection of sleep medication is all it took.

Well, that's all I have to say about the subject for now. I'm sure I'll talk more about it later. It's open for discussion.

Ciao,
Nora

Getting Better...

I still have a head cold and I am somewhat congested in my chest, but I really think I'm getting better. At least I don't feel like a wrung out dishrag and my body doesn't ache all over the place anymore. I think the worst of the flu is over now and that I'm mending, and I tell you, that's not a day too soon, because yesterday I became pretty disgusted with it. I saw all the things I had to do and felt my inability to do them and was very frustrated.

I also felt bad about not being able to take Tyke for a walk and now I think that is one of the first things I will do this morning. I will not go for a real long walk, but long enough for both of us to get some exercise and fresh air, which we both need, because we've both got cabin fever. It will be wonderful to be outside in the cool morning air and to stretch my legs and get some exercise after being immobile for the last few days. I think yesterday afternoon was the turning point and I started getting better from that moment on.

Now I'm sitting here with a glass of cold milk after I've had my obligatory cup of coffee. I've been drinking a lot of cold milk lately, because the fruit juice made my stomach sour. The cold milk quenched my eternal thirst really well and I drank it greedily. I know it's not supposed to be the thing to drink when you have a cold because of the mucous build up, but it doesn't seem to hurt me and it sure has quenched my thirst these past days. I've never been so thirsty and the fruit juice upset my stomach.

I have drank very little coffee, just a cup now and then, and I haven't missed it very much. I certainly did not go through withdrawal symptoms. I thought about drinking tea, but for some reason tea doesn't seem to settle in my stomach well and I don't know if that is because I take sugar in it. I have to try it without the sugar sometime.

While I was asleep, Tyke completely tore apart the hyacinths that my sister had bought me and broke one of the pots. The soil was spread all over the place and I had to sweep it up in the middle of the night. I have to replant them later this morning and find a new pot for one of them and then place them on the windowsill in the kitchen where he can't get to them. He had no sense that he had done anything wrong when I scolded him, so that was an exercise in futility. He was very curious when I cleaned everything up.

The hyacinths themselves are okay. He didn't bite them to pieces. I suppose this is what life is like with a pubertal dog. There will be another year of this before he has completely outgrown this kind of behavior. I have to have an awful lot of wits and patience in the meantime. A dog like that dares you to love him in spite of everything. And you do.

In comparison, it's so much easier to have cats, although they have a tendency to shred your furniture, but they usually stick to one piece. They do it no matter how many scratching posts you have. They are very good at ignoring those, even if they are quite appealing. I'm afraid to get a new sofa, or I should say, the sofa of my choice, because of what Gandhi will do to it. I think I will not get a new sofa until I have no more cats. That should be in another 6 years or so. I hope my sofa lasts that long.

Having been sick, and nearly being over it, sure makes me appreciate my health very much. I can't wait to start doing some ordinary things like hanging up the laundry to dry. That was still impossible yesterday, but I think I can manage it today. I won't be able to hang it outside, because we're expecting rain, even though the temperature is going to be nice at 9C. That would be warm enough to dry the laundry.

We're expecting rain for the next few days and it really doesn't bother me that much, as long as it's not cold and it doesn't turn into snow. There's no chance of that, however. I think we've left all of that behind us. I keep focusing on the idea that we're moving towards spring now and that nothing can stop that movement. It's the law of nature.

Tyke is very innocently sleeping by my feet. You'd think he'd never done a bad thing in his life, that he was the best puppy ever, that's how adorable he looks, all rolled up in a ball. Puppies look adorable so we forgive them their evil deeds. It works the same way with little kids. We love our children in spite of the fact that they drive us nuts, because they are so adorable. We don't understand that other people think our children are spoiled brats. Luckily, they get over this stage and turn into normal children.

Okay. I'm going to do some useful things now. I think I'll sweep the junk room and find a bag to put the cat litter bag in to. More and more cat litter is spilling out. I hope I'm not being overly optimistic as to my capacity to do things. I do so want to get the show on the road. And you know what they say: where there's a will, there's a way!

Ciao,
Nora

Choices...

I took Jesker to the vet this afternoon, because his diarrhea is back in full force. The vet was sad to see him again. Because Jesker was not so bloated this time and because he had lost a lot of weight, the vet was able to examine him well and found a tumor the size of a fist in his stomach cavity. It's bad news. He is giving hum an antibiotic cure for ten days to see if it will cure the diarrhea. If so, we wait and see what happens next, although it will probably return. If the antibiotics don't work, I have to make the final decision. The one where I say, it has been enough and I have the vet put him to sleep. This is the fourth time in 3 months time that he has bad diarrhea and it is getting worse every time. Sometimes it's only liquid that comes out. His intestines are starting to stick to the tumor.

I'm taking this very hard, but somehow am amazingly calm about it. I realize that whatever time I have with Jesker now, has to be quality time and I have to make sure that I bond with him as much as I can, while I can.

I, on the other hand, am as fit as a fiddle. Contrary to what the nurse of my GP had me believe, there is absolutely nothing wrong with me and there was really no reason at all for me to go in and see him this afternoon. One of the values of my thyroid hormones was high, but that is only a concern if another value had been high also and that is not the case, so it is functioning just fine. All the other results came back normal. I do not have an infection, or cancer, or a liver dysfunction, or anemia. Everything is perfectly fine. It is with a great deal of relief that I heard this, especially after hearing Jesker's bad news.

So, whatever is going on with me, is purely psychological and must be found in my emotional functioning or malfunctioning. Well, I am a rapid cycling manic depressive, so I go through these extremes of moods and it seems that the medicines I take don't prevent it from happening. Therefor I am seriously beginning to question the use of some of my medications and want to discuss with my psychiatrist the continuation of them. It seems I am no better of with them and may be even worse of in the long run. I don't see myself taking these huge doses of medicines for the rest of my life. Some changes need to be made.

It just snowed very hard for about an hour, so we have a new layer of snow, which will hopefully melt tomorrow when it is supposed to be 4C and raining. I have an appointment with my SPN at 10 am and I do intend to keep it. I'm bound and determined to go. I will walk there.

I rediscovered my long black cardigan that's very warm and that has a collar and two buttons at the front. I'm wearing it over a stretch T-shirt and my Turkish pants. I'm also wearing my red necklace with it. I look very decent.

Someone asked me when I'm going to get rid of my toad picture that's my blog template right now. I guess it is time for me to find another one. You know, I'll gladly do it, if I can find something else that's equally good. I'll have a good look around and see what I can come up with. For those of you who don't like change, you are allowed to raise your voice in protest. It may fall on deaf ears, though.

I act very tough now, but I'm not in the least. When the time comes, things will be very difficult. I don't know how I'm going to live through it yet.

Have a good evening.

Ciao!