Early in the morning again.

Here I am sitting early in the morning again after a lovely sleep in my warm bed, after I had a lovely evening sleeping on my comfortable sofa. Sleep is the healer of all things gone array and puts everything back into its proper position. I took a long nap yesterday morning too and I always feel so good when I wake up. I feel that I can tackle any job or any mind boggling problem and I am full of good cheer and goodwill to mankind.

Of course, I had no problems to tackle and no mind boggling problems to solve yesterday, because it was Sunday and on Sunday I don't do such things. The only things I had to do basically was take care of the animals and have something to eat now and then. That's what Sundays are made for. On Sundays I can look around me and see all the things that I need to get done and not feel guilty one bit about not doing them, because it is my day off and since I live by myself, I don't have to explain myself to anyone.

I am also happy to inform you, that as of yesterday my new anti psychotic medication is working and I no longer have compulsive thoughts haunting my mind and I feel very relaxed and at ease. There is no mayhem happening in my head; all is quiet there. It's as peaceful as a sun drenched meadow in August when the gentle wind moves the colorful wild flowers to and fro. I am existing in a state of wellbeing that can not be shattered and pulled away from me. It is a solid thing and tightly in place. I am most grateful for that and I do count my blessings.

The Überhund and I had our lazy day together during which he tried to trick me into giving him treats without having done anything to deserve them and he had the greatest pity parties when I ignored him, something which I am very good at. Since I have to apply the ointment to his eyes 6 times a day, he gets enough treats as it is, and sometimes he is just plain hungry and needs to eat his bowl of food, which is less appealing to him than the treats. I think eating dog food is below his dignity. Maybe he has forgotten that he is a dog and he thinks he is a fellow human being.

The cats, on the other hand, are very much cats and wind there way around my legs and climb on my lap when it is most inconvenient and walk on the keyboard and sit in front of the computer screen when they try to get my attention. They are silently always present and have a way of letting me know that they too have rights in the family unit.

When I go into the kitchen they jump on the counter and interfere with whatever I do there and make the job twice as hard, because I'm kind and don't push them out of the way, because we are spending quality time together. They're very friendly while I make my coffee and push their heads into my hands to be petted and purr. We do our most important bonding in the kitchen.

I am very happy that today is Monday and I get to go to creative therapy again. The group of people that is there is such a nice bunch of people that that alone makes it worth while to go. There really is a good atmosphere there and it is all very convivial. We can talk and joke around and admire each other's work and give each other tips on how to do something. It has really made me crawl out of my shell and made me become more sociable. I move around inside that space with ease now as if I belong there and everything is familiar and within my reach. The socializing aspect of it should never be underestimated and it is a very good thing, because psychiatric patients tend to isolate themselves. The fact that in the process you also create something worthwhile is extra special, of course.

I'm a person of words. Not so much in my daily life, but very much so on my blog. I always feel that I am filled to the rim with words that I have to write down and I feel them literally spilling over the edge all trying to get out at once. Now, a lot of these words are not important, they are just idle thoughts, so I do have to edit myself and not write down just any old thing. But I have so many words inside of me that it feels like I will explode if I don't let them out. They are all crowding around at the exit of my mind.

Before I ever took any medication, I was an easily depressed, emotional and unstable person who always had to put a lot of effort into staying as normal as she possibly could. There were periods in my life when I could pull that off, at least it seemed that way to the outside world, that could not look inside of me and see that there I really suffered, because I had learned to hide things so well. But given any stressful situation, my facade crumbled and I became the least of stable people and fell apart and was unable to pick up the pieces without outside help.

I always thought that I was doomed to be an unhappy person and that some curse rested on me that would prevent me from being happy and feeling joy for any length of time. I had my crazy periods, during which I became reckless and irresponsible, but I saw those as an attempt of a prisoner trying to escape from her cell. During these periods I did outrageous things, only to collapse again in the end and become that same unhappy person who had that curse resting on her.

It took the mother of all breakdowns to get me to the point of getting properly diagnosed and on medication and even then it took a long enough time to find the right kind in the right combination. When you have a psychiatric disability, you have to walk a long road before you are on the path of healing. You have to become very knowledgeable about what your problems are and become your own expert. You can't be a helpless victim who stands there immobilized asking for help and not doing any of the work yourself.

It took me a long time to understand all of this, because I was confused and rattled for a long time. I felt victimized for a long time. I wanted other people to solve my problems. I thought I was helpless.

Now I am knowledgeable and I am proactive. I know which medicine does what and when I need a higher dose of something. I understand my disabilities and I know my pitfalls. Especially since I live on my own, I have to be my own analyzer and my own adviser and understand the whys and wherefores myself. That is probably for the best, because it is better to be an independent thinker when it comes to your own foibles of your mind.

In many ways now, I am a better person than I ever was, although I know there are areas that need improvement. That's because I am a little bit shell shocked. I need to get over the trauma. I will in time, I am sure of that.

Well, those were some of the words that were waiting to spill out of my mind. I hope they are of interest to you. Sometimes you just need to write things like that down.

Ciao...

Lazy Sunday...

I am planning on having a lazy Sunday. That includes taking many naps and hanging out behind the computer and watching interesting, I hope, programs on the television. I want to have a day of sheer self indulgence and the least amount of responsibility. Well, I'll take care of the cats and walk the Überhund, but other than that I will contemplate my navel and stand in front of my closet and look for pretty clothes to wear. Maybe something good will jump out at me.

Then I'll look in the bathroom mirror and see if I have any stray hairs on my chin while wearing my extra strong set of spare reading glasses that I can't wear behind the computer, but that are perfect for rounding up stray facial hairs. Yes, I am at that age of confused hormones that can't decide if I am still enough of a woman not to grow a beard. It's the curse of womanhood and hardly ever talked about. Luckily, they are all blond and not easily seen by other people.

I will contemplate my navel while drinking mugs of decaf and smoking handmade cigarettes and think about such issues as will I part my hair to the left or the right, will I make it curly with the curling iron or just leave it straight and what will I do about the two kilos that I gained and will I be able to loose them by next week? See here the uncomplicatedness of my thoughts. I keep them that way on purpose and selectively think that way, leaving the larger issues for other moments when I am more willing to tackle them head on at braver moments.

I will pet the Überhund and have several cats sit on top of me and not be bothered by the addition of hair to my black cardigan, if that is what I end up wearing. I will wear my Pippy Longstocking leggings of which I have 3 pairs in different colors and feel amused and silly by them.

I will also, probably, contemplate the walls, which need a coat of paint, but the thought of that is too daunting for me, so I will not dwell on that too much. Better think of collages and colors and images and texts and that tomorrow is Monday and I can go to creative therapy again.

So you see, I will have a busy contemplation time and hopefully sometimes my mind will wander into an area of nothingness and be as blank as an unwritten piece of paper.

I was such a daydreamer as a kid, that very often I was oblivious of what happened around me and had to be called back to reality with some effort. This gave my parents the impression that I was somehow not quite functional, as in dysfunctional, and they worried about my state of mind. They expected little of me and were surprised when I did well. I daydreamed my way through grade school and didn't wake up until high school where I had to keep my wits about me.

Sometimes, I have a hard time understanding what people say to me and I either fake it and pretend that I heard them, or I ask them to repeat themselves. It all depends on how comfortable I feel with that person. Sometimes this creates misunderstandings, because I don't react in a way that is expected of me in response to what has been said to me. I think people must think I'm a bit of an airhead, when really I just didn't understand the words they spoke to me. It was the tower of Babel to me. I like people who articulate well and speak loudly. I've had this problem my whole life.

I learned to speak up and clearly when I lived in the States. I acquired one of those loud American voices. Hearty and cheerful. I could small talk with the best of them and no subject was out of my realm. It was a problem when I came back to the Netherlands, because I had forgotten so much of the language and I became timid and self conscious about speaking out my thoughts for which I had no words. I was verbally handicapped and could no longer small talk, let alone talk about the big issues. I always reverted back to English.

It split me in half and I was only half a person and I didn't recognize the Dutch one and had a hard time coming to grips with her. I reverted back to being a child in my dependencies and felt very helpless. I had to carve out a whole new woman. A Dutch woman with an American tint. It took me quite a while to give shape to this person and the mastery of the language was a very important part of this. The problem was that my thoughts and my dreams were in English, so I constantly had to translate myself.

I have been here 15 years now and I think I have made the transformation, but I still love the use of the English language and in a way, it will always be my first language in which I can say a whole bunch of things that I can't say in Dutch. Depending on the subject and the characters, I either dream in English or in Dutch. I can say endearments in Dutch now and swear in Dutch now also, so I have come a long way.

I don't daydream much anymore. I've become much too alert for that. I am constantly monitoring myself, as I always keep track of my inner self and its state of mind. Aberrations are dealt with immediately. I will keep an even keel. There will be no tilting to the right or left. My state of mind is like a child that needs a guiding hand all the time and needs to be led on the right path constantly, lest it strays away too far from its destiny. That's the kind of discipline I've taught myself over the past years.

I am Dutch enough now to care a great deal about what happens inside this country and I bend myself over the big issues and form opinions on them. It's a good country to live in and most people are of good will. The politics aren't obviously corrupt and when you vote, you get the feeling that you make a difference. Things could be better and there are a lot of conditions I would change, but I can only achieve that by voting. At least I can vote, which I was never able to do in the States, not being a citizen of that country.

The best part about being dutch is, that I have found my pragmatism again and my sensibility, but maybe those are European traits. I am not a flag waving, take it or leave it Yankee. I know that is a broad statement, but you get my drift. Things rub off on you.

I think if there is anything Dutch people abhor, it is nationalism, having come in contact with that in an extreme form during world war II, We suspect anyone who starts spouting that kind of nonsense. It goes against our grain, even though secretly we are proud to be Dutch, we don't like to be organized in a group of fatherland lovers. We don't salute our flag and hardly know the words to the national anthem, but don't attack us as Dutch people, because we do have our pride. We pour scorn on ourselves, but don't allow an outsider to do it.

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I've been out walking the Überhund. It isn't very cold out, 3 degrees Celsius. That does make difference between freezing and not freezing. It was almost balmy. You get used to anything when it is cold and appreciate any rise in temperatures. It was overcast, but it is supposed to be sunny today. A meek little sun that hardly warms the earth, but does its best anyway. Its going to be a bit warmer in the next few days. All is well as long as you wear layers of clothes.

Here in the South, people are very chauvinistic about their language and lifestyle. The language is spoken by high and low and the life style is Burgundian, with the emphasis on good food and drink. There are many good restaurants and many fun cafés. Downtown is a perfect area to get lost in and do nothing but move from one café terrace to the other to get different views of the old buildings. You can have cappuccinos with cookies all afternoon, though you can alternate those with glasses of white wine or good beer from the local breweries.

There is nothing wrong about being a woman on your own and going into a café. Nobody will bother you and you very leisurely can have your drink and enjoy the noise and activity around you. I have never seen cases of drunkenness during the day and everybody is in a good mood.

Th best thing about living here is that it is a city, but it feels like small town, because it is compact and you can get around by foot or by bike. Once you learn to understand the language, you don't feel like an outsider so much. A Hollander.

Well, that's about all I have to share with you today. Don't forget to read my post below about the medicines.

Have a great day.

Ciao...

The medicines.

I want to first of all thank you people for leaving me such great comments of support and encouragement while I go through the trials and tribulations of taking the wrong medication and now am adjusting to a new one. You know I very rarely comment on the comments, but I think it is worth mentioning here. You're all a great bunch of people.

The reason that I didn't notice that my medication was different to what I normally take was, that the Exfactor had gone by the pharmacy for me and had picked up a 3 months supply of 4 different kinds of medication and brought them home in one bag. I didn't check then to see what was in the bag and just deposited it in the cabinet where I keep all my medicines. It is possible that the pharmacist said something about the medication being different to the Exfactor, but if he did, he neglected to tell me. I think the pharmacist didn't say anything, because the Exfactor would not have forgotten something as crucial as that.

I didn't realize the medication was different until the very morning after I had used up the batch of the previous medicines. I read the enclosed information sheet and figured it was okay and took my usual two tablets, expecting them to work as they normally do. Imagine my surprise when they didn't.

When I talked to my psychiatrist that day and he told me that those medicines had not been prescribed to me and that I should go back to the pharmacy. He did say that the new medicines should work the same as the old ones, but I knew that they did not. At that time, we both believed that it was a mistake that the pharmacist had made and that I would come home with the right medicines.

When I did not, it was too late to call my psychiatrist and to be sure, I took an extra dose of the new medication at night, hoping that would help, but the next day I realized that it had not. When I talked to my psychiatrist that day he suggested doubling the dose, but I told him that I had already tried that. I think he realized that I had lost faith in the new medication altogether and that this was the reason that he allowed me the option to choose for a whole new anti psychotic, feeling that I would have more faith in that.

I take the new anti psychotic 3 times a day, 5 mg at a time, so that it is slowly building up in my system. The old medication I took all at once. I like the fact that I take this one 3 times a day, because it makes me feel that I am actively doing something to keep the level of medication steady in my body and I look forward to taking the next dose as if it is a little miracle pill that will take my troubles away, which is not far from the truth. It makes me feel very proactive. I am silently cheering it on. I think the anti psychotic and the mood stabilizer are my two most important medicines. I could live without all the other ones maybe, but not without those two.

I needed some more milk today, but I was not up to going to the supermarket, so I went to the little neighborhood market instead and when I walked in, I was met by an overwhelming odor of alcohol and a crowd of people shouting above loud Christmas music. Apparently they were having a Christmas party. Much shouting and laughing was done. I pushed my way through the crowd to the milk and managed to grab a hold of three cartons and also two packs of cookies. There was a woman ahead of me buying loads of sweets and cookies and cakes and she was obviously feeling no pain. She must have been partaking for some time. That's what you get when you live next to a working class neighborhood. Lots of cheer like that and lots of singing and shouting and partaking. It's the stuff that clichés are made of the world over.

I took many naps today and did not accomplish anything but the dishes. When not in balance, sleep, it's the best cure for what ails you. I always feel so much better when I wake up. Sleep really is like a heavy blanket that lies on top of you and covers you from head to toe and separates you from the world. Even the Überhund did not bother me this time.

I am in my pajamas now. The Überhund is sound asleep under the desk, he is snoring. It is a cozy sound. A while ago, he was hungry and I told him to go eat his food, so instead of that, he walked to the cats' dishes and ate all of their food. Stubborn fool. I think he was trying to make a point. It wasn't lost on me.

Have yourself a great night, full of cheer and pre Christmas excitement.

Ciao...

I've slept well...

I've slept well and, although it is a little bit early, I've slept enough, because I spent the better part of yesterday evening asleep on the sofa curled up in my pajamas and my red cozy bathrobe. It was so pleasant and only occasionally was I aware of the TV and the Überhund who pushed his wet nose against my hand to be petted, which I did half asleep.

He always figures out a way to be petted by me by pushing against the hand that is hanging over the edge of the sofa and nudging it until I react in some way. He knows that if he is persistent, I will start petting him automatically. One cat was laying on my stomach, purring very merrily, as unmovable as a rock in a meadow. You see how even in my sleep I perform a function for the animals.

I'm very glad that the Überhund doesn't need to be taken out for his late night walk anymore, because it means that after his 6 o'clock walk, I can put on my pajamas and get comfortable. Sometimes he needs a piddle out back before I go to bed, but more often he doesn't and in the morning he is in no hurry as long as I let him out back first. Then he can wait forever for me to get done and he just lies beside me while I sit behind the computer.

When I feel good, sitting behind the computer is one of my favorite things to do. The last two days it was a hard thing to do, but as a rule, I enjoy it very much. I know I am not addicted, however, because in one of my groups there is a woman who really is and it is a very sad thing indeed when you are at the cost of everything and everybody else. When that computer becomes more important than all the other activities and people around you.

The awareness that she is addicted only recently dawned on her, but she is very resistant to change, and very stubborn about it too, and I don't know if she can be cured of it. She is a lot like an alcoholic who needs to be weaned off the bottle. In the meantime, she neglects her family and her dogs and her household and her friends and is in the process of alienating herself from human participation. It's a miracle that she shows up for the therapy groups, because all she wants to do is be at home and sit behind the computer. You learn a lot from listening to a person like that and you think, "There but for the grace of God go I."

Oh yes, today is Saturday again. Well, I'll be darned, another week has flown by. I want to say, another jam packed week, because I think a lot of things happened. New glasses coming up, I am starting in a new therapy group and I've started a new anti psychotic medication. You see that even in a life as dull as mine, things happen.

It's impossible to not have things happen when you are alive and out there in the world in whatever capacity, unless you are holed up in you apartment and never go out. If my reading glasses hadn't broken, I wouldn't have put on my regular glasses and I wouldn't have realized how bad my eyes really were. So, a bus trip down town solved that problem. If I were a recluse, I wouldn't have gotten onto that bus. And if I didn't go to my ergo and creative classes, I wouldn't have known how much I needed that other therapy class. And if I weren't such a stubborn woman, who knew better because of her interaction with other people, I would have taken the other medication and there would not have been a peep out of me. I would have blamed it all on myself and my circumstances. Instead, I was insistent and opened my big mouth.

I think being insistent is very important when you are dependent on any kind of a system. When you threaten to become a number instead of a human being. It's so important to always stick up for yourself and to be like a terrier and take a bite and not let go. Always make noise and persist and try to win, even if you loose in the end. At least you will have done your darn best and fought the system. The system has an attitude and a haughtiness that always need to be challenged. I had to argue with my psychiatrist about the medication. It was a friendly argument, but I argued nevertheless.

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Bbbrrr...it's cold out there. I just took the Überhund for a walk and it's freezing outside. It is -4 degrees Celsius and all the cars have a layer of ice on them, but today the sun is supposed to be shining all day. At least that will be cheerful.

I think the Exfactor has taken my bike keys with him again, because I don't see them anywhere. He must have left them in his pocket after he did the groceries, just like he did the last time. That means he will have to come by today to drop them off, because he has to be in town anyway. That, by the way, is no big thrill to me. I like it when he comes by, but sometimes we have no conversation material and we are left without anything to talk about.

My fantasy still takes a run with me when I'm outside and I imagine the most horrible scenarios. I imagine them from the beginning until the end and they are never good. That means the medication is not yet working properly, but my psychiatrist said it would take a few days. I am fine inside. I catch myself now having these long drawn out imaginary thoughts that I get lost in and tell myself to stop it and get back into reality, that none of these things is really happening and that I should not react as if they are. Once I'm inside again, they are all gone, so that is an improvement.

Well, that's all I have to share with you right now. Have a great day, whatever your kind of weather.

Ciao..

As the day...

As the day progresses, I get progressively worse. If you want to understand that statement, you have to read the preceding post. I have attacks of anxiety that fall over me like big waves of the ocean and I have compulsive thoughts that I can't get out of my head. I find it difficult to get started on my housework, as I can't keep my mind on it and it all seems rather futile now. I don't care if the floors and the furniture have been vacuumed, I just want to get out of this state of mind.

I tried to call my SPN, but she is at a congress in Antwerp and will not be in today. I left a message for my psychiatrist too call me urgently, but knowing him, he will not call me for some time. For some reason, he likes to call when he is good and ready, not when you need it. It's a cat and mouse game. The secretaries can't urge him to make the phone call. This leaves me feeling defeated and ties me to the phone all day.

When I go outside, a general sort of fear attacks me, but I can't tell you what I'm afraid of. I feel a suffocating feeling and I just want to get inside again, but I must walk the Überhund. The groceries need to get done, but I have called the Exfactor and he will be over in a while to do them for me. It's been 5 hours since I left a message for my psychiatrist and he has not called me back yet.

The Exfactor has been here and done the groceries for me. Luckily, I did not need much. He is a sweetheart for doing them for me. At least he is always available when I need help. He doesn't let me down. So, it's good to have him as a friend. How many friends would do that for you?

I think I would like to try another anti psychotic altogether. It feels like this one is doing nothing or very little. I find it so hard to function and get anything done, except for write my thoughts down. It always helps to write those down, no matter what sort of mood I'm in.

My psychiatrist just called me and cursed when he found out that the insurance company would no longer pay for the original anti psychotic medication. We had quite a discussion on deciding what to do. He suggested increasing the dose of what I take now and I thought that I did not have much faith in that, because the medication does not work, so we decided to try a different anti psychotic that I have used in the past and that also worked, but gave me the munchies and caused me to gain weight. I told him that at this point, I am so desperate that I am willing to give that one a try and not worry about any weight gain now that I have my gastric band.

I think he called back on time, because I called the secretary and got angry about the whole situation and told her that I was not going to wait by the phone until 5 PM. I was not amused, as Queen Victoria said. Now I have to call the pharmacy in a little while to see if they received the prescription by fax. I'll do that as soon as I've finished this cigarette and my cup of decaf. I do see a glimmer of hope, and I assume that all will be well now and that these terrible feelings will pass and that soon I will feel normal again.

It's strange that I have to take pills to feel normal, but that is the case and I am happy that it is possible after half a lifetime of not feeling normal. Yesterday and today are just reminders of that.

Well, I've been to the pharmacy and picked up the new medication, which is called Zyprexa. I have taken the first pill and am supposed to take one 3 times a day. Now I wait and see what happens. I'll take another one at 6 PM. I am hopeful, so maybe that will help. A positive attitude is good, but then again, I had that with the other pills also. No, there must be no doubt in my heart.

Okay, it 5:30 PM now and I had a nap and I feel pretty good now, like I always do when I just wake up. I'll take another pill in half an hour. Usually, these anti psychotics work pretty quickly for me and it is not a matter of days before I know if they do their job. I can tell they're going to work after a day of using them by the calming effect they have on me. I should feel a lot better by tomorrow afternoon.

I'll stop writing here and pick up where I left off tomorrow. Now I am going to get comfortable and watch the news.

Ciao...

An Odd Day.

I had such an odd day yesterday. You'll remember that I had gotten up in the middle of the night. When I went to take my medicines in the morning, I realized that I had forgotten to take all of them the night before. That may have explained my nearly sleepless night. Then, when I went to take my anti psychotic medication, a new box, I realized it was different than what I had been taking before. It was from the same manufacturer, but it's name was different and it was different in appearance. I took it anyway, because I needed to, and assumed it was okay, because the dosage was the same. After that, I didn't give it another thought.

Sometime during the day, I started to get obsessive thoughts about random people in the street murdering each other with knives and me being witness to that. This changed into thoughts of people breaking into the apartment and wanting to murder me, causing me to hide and, when they could not find me, murdering the Überhund instead. My fantasy went so far that in my head, I was calling the police and describing the perpetrators to them.

You can imagine that these thoughts were very disturbing and I called my psychiatrist to ask him about the medication, which I thought was the cause of these obsessive thoughts. After trying for a few hours, I finally got a hold of him and he told me that I should have gotten the old medication, because that was prescribed to me and that apparently the pharmacy had made a mistake. But he also added, that although the medication that I had was more slowly absorbed in my body, in the end it should have the same effect as my old one.

So, I went to the pharmacy, where I found out that the reason they gave me the new medication was, because my health insurance would no longer pay for my old medication and that, if I still wanted it, it would cost me 250 Euros. Of course, I can't pay that, so I'll have to take the new medication and hope that if I take it at night before I go to bed, it will have enough time to get into my system properly. I think that and remembering to take all my medication and getting enough sleep should sort me out.

You see how everything is so carefully balanced and so dependent on each other. This morning I feel fine and I can think straight again and I don't have any obsessive thoughts.

Yesterday morning, I had my appointment about getting another activity added to my schedule and that went well. I had to talk to someone from a different program altogether, but she basically had the same sort of activities on offer, just for a different sort of clientèle. We quickly decided on a creative therapy class on Thursday mornings, as that was the best she could offer me and that was fine with me. I met the creative therapist who leads the class and he seems like a nice enough person and the group meets in the same space as my other class, so I can work on whatever project I have going. So, that worked out well.

I didn't get any housework done because of my state of mind and found it hard to concentrate on things, so I just sat around and drank mugs of decaf and smoked cigarettes until the Exfactor came by. Together, we tackled the cats and applied flea drops to them. Doing the job with two people meant it was done in no time, as the cats were unsuspecting and had no time to flee. Hardly any resistance was put up.

I didn't let the Exfactor know about my state of mind. I didn't want him to think that I was being creepy. Luckily, he didn't notice anything, because he thought he was coming down with the flu and was trying to find a replacement to work for him that night. As a result, he didn't stay long and soon enough I was on my own again.

I sent my SPN an email explaining my state of mind and the situation and I told her that I would call her today if there was no improvement. I didn't even feel like blogging and watched some inane TV program.

In the evening, I took the Überhund to the vet, who was not happy with his eyes yet and now has given me a different kind of ointment that I have to apply 6 times a day. The Überhund won't mind, because it will mean that 6 times a day he gets an extra snack. It's possible that his eyes won't get better and that this will be a chronic problem. The vet said that he had another dog with the same problem that he had sent to a specialist and the specialist had given up and sent the dog back to him. So, no specialist for us.

After we got home, I put my pajamas on and watched TV, except that I kept falling asleep and I only caught little glimpses of what I was trying to watch. It was all very noncoherent. I don't advise this sort of TV watching. I had been hoping for a good British thriller, but now I'm glad there was none on, because I would have missed most of it.

Looking back on this post, it seems a dry summing up of the facts without humor and emotion. I am sorry about that. I suppose I just want to convey how yesterday went and not get caught up in the feeling of it. As a result, I'm kind of dull. I will try to be more exciting in my next post.

Ciao...