Daily Check-in May 27 2023

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chocolite
Posts: 1444
Joined: Sun Aug 30, 2015 8:11 pm

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by chocolite »

Good morning, frugal friends. It’s been a busy week around here, what with trying to keep stuff up around the house and ferrying DH to and from PT appointments. He is doing better, using the cane more and the walker less. He’s still on the pain medication prescribed by the surgeon (he got a refill) and supposedly, as long as he’s taking that, he shouldn’t drive. I, of course, flouted this advice, since I took an opioid for years, while working and driving, etc. But he likes having me drive him around, so God only knows when I’ll get a break from it.

Then, there’s the issue of his car. Something is very wrong with it. It’s going to have to be towed to the dealership for repair. We've held off doing it b/c he won't be needing it for the foreseeable future. I can’t even express how much I dread finding out the cost. It feels like we’ve been hemorrhaging money lately. I’m frustrated that DH won’t even consider the idea that we can get by with only one car. I tried to sell him on that before he ever boought this one. We are literally never gone at the same time, unless we go together in my car, so it makes perfect sense to only have one. But he freaks out at the mere mention, says the very fact that his is inoperable and we’ve had mine to use this whole time proves his point that we need two. Ugh…

HappyDaze, I saw where you had your interview. Fingers crossed that you get the offer. You deserve less stress. We all do.

Jackie, I hope your back/ribs continue to improve. I know you’re being careful with it, which is my biggest word of advice.

FL Cat, I’m glad you got the outside of your mom’s house painted as you wanted. I’d love to get our wood trim and the front door painted. And I’d love to get the inside painted as well. It’s a lot, though, so who knows when we’ll get it done.

Kitty, I saw where your Grands are on vacation in Gasparilla Island. I wasn’t familiar with it, so I googled it. Sure looks like a lovely spot to vacation.

Clem, hope you have a great trip.

Mackie, I had to laugh at your dream. My DH tells me all the time about his dream that a tiger is walking on our heads. Which makes perfect sense because our little tiger Hobbes does that regularly. :-D

I know I’ve missed a lot of what's going on with everybody. I've been pretty much overwhelmed. I missed my local Carnegie Writers Group Zoom meeting Wednesday night, and I told my writing friend T I just feel like my time is not my own right now. Anyway, I hope you all are doing well.

Over the past week I’ve been at the lowest point, emotionally and psychologically-speaking, I've been in a long, long time. I pretty much hit a wall, felt like I just couldn’t go on. I told DH I cannot live the rest of my life like this. I don’t want a life of this. I had to miss my regular Zoom therapy session on Friday because of medical appointments, but truth be told I didn’t want to go anyway. I did make my chronic pain support group session on Zoom last Sunday, but I basically just cried the whole time. Couldn’t interact much; it was just too overwhelming. The chronic pain group is new, something my therapist began last month. We meet every other Sunday. Finally, and in desperation, I put a call into Nevro (makers of my stim unit).

For those who follow my crazy back stuff, I met with the Nevro Tech, Karen, yesterday. I love her. She’s spent multiple hours working with me to find a stim setting that helps. She loaded two new programs, alongside my old (original) program that works to control back pain (my remote holds three programs). One of the new programs is a low-frequency one that causes paresthesia. They call it their “tonic” setting. The reasoning behind it is is to create a new sensation that gives my brain something else to focus on, and hopefully, it will block the horrific pins/needles sensation in my left foot. The paresthesia part is so weird. The way she eventually was able to set it is for me to feel it working from my knee downward. I control the intensity with my remote. She said I need to keep the remote on me at all times, because I may need to turn it up or down while I drive, while I sleep, etc. Last night I made the mistake of cranking it up to some pretty strong sensations, just to see how that would affect my nerve pain. Within an hour or so, I think it overstimulated my leg/foot and created a lot of pain. I felt like I wanted to jump outside of my body, then I realized OMG…this is my fault. I caused it. Ugh. So I turned it way down and went to bed.

When I got up this morning, I increased it just enough to feel a slight sensation on the inside of my leg and on the inside of my left big toe (that’s the only place I can feel it on my foot unless I crank it up—which I am not going to do). The sensation is best described as a tingling. Not like the painful pins & needles, but definitely there. Karen said the settings she used are crazy, way different from what she’s ever done before on any of her other patients with neuropathy. She said my minimum setting is far above what her other patients' max would be. Anyway, I *think* (fingers crossed) that it reduces my foot pain *some*. I guess time--and my continuing to adjust the remote--will tell. I have another program that is set to their “burst” setting. It’s high-frequency and not meant to be felt by me. It would sort of run in the background in a wave, up and down. Again, meant to be perceived by the brain with the goal of reducing the foot pain. But she said if I feel like the low frequency one is helping at all, I should keep working with it before trying anything else. So that’s what I’m doing.

It's been raining this morning. I’m glad and hope it washes away the pollen. My sinuses are wacked out over something, that’s for sure. We (or I) have to get out at some point to pick up DH's Rx. Our Walgreens is in the neighborhood, so it's a ten minute round trip. The rest of the weekend is supposed to be nice. I made pork chops, mashed potatoes, and biscuits last night and added the leftover stir-fry veggies, so we had a good supper, and have plenty for tonight as well. We’ve been alternating watching episodes of The Bob Newhart Show and Alfred Hitchcock Presents while we eat supper. We’re enjoying both.

Hope everyone has a good weekend. xxx
Last edited by chocolite on Sat May 27, 2023 1:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Patty
User avatar
MackerelCat
Posts: 7257
Joined: Thu Aug 27, 2015 9:44 pm

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by MackerelCat »

Patty, honey, (((Hugs))). I am praying that things get better for you and your DH gets to where he can drive himself to his PT appointments. The information about your pain control unit is fascinating. It's great that you have someone dedicated to helping you with that.

Men are quite weird about cars. We could get by with one, but my DH won't hear of it. We have a hard time finding one vehicle that suits both of us because I am so short. He's a foot taller than I am and is uncomfortable driving my little car, while I can't see out of his.
Mackie
floridacatlover
Posts: 8056
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 7:21 am

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by floridacatlover »

chocolite wrote: Sat May 27, 2023 12:45 pm Good morning, frugal friends. It’s been a busy week around here, what with trying to keep stuff up around the house and ferrying DH to and from PT appointments. He is doing better, using the cane more and the walker less. He’s still on the pain medication prescribed by the surgeon (he got a refill) and supposedly, as long as he’s taking that, he shouldn’t drive. I, of course, flouted this advice, since I took an opioid for years, while working and driving, etc. But he likes having me drive him around, so God only knows when I’ll get a break from it.

Then, there’s the issue of his car. Something is very wrong with it. It’s going to have to be towed to the dealership for repair. We've held off doing it b/c he won't be needing it for the foreseeable future. I can’t even express how much I dread finding out the cost. It feels like we’ve been hemorrhaging money lately. I’m frustrated that DH won’t even consider the idea that we can get by with only one car. I tried to sell him on that before he ever boought this one. We are literally never gone at the same time, unless we go together in my car, so it makes perfect sense to only have one. But he freaks out at the mere mention, says the very fact that his is inoperable and we’ve had mine to use this whole time proves his point that we need two. Ugh…

HappyDaze, I saw where you had your interview. Fingers crossed that you get the offer. You deserve less stress. We all do.

Jackie, I hope your back/ribs continue to improve. I know you’re being careful with it, which is my biggest word of advice.

FL Cat, I’m glad you got the outside of your mom’s house painted as you wanted. I’d love to get our wood trim and the front door painted. And I’d love to get the inside painted as well. It’s a lot, though, so who knows when we’ll get it done.

Kitty, I saw where your Grands are on vacation in Gasparilla Island. I wasn’t familiar with it, so I googled it. Sure looks like a lovely spot to vacation.

Clem, hope you have a great trip.

Mackie, I had to laugh at your dream. My DH tells me all the time about his dream that a tiger is walking on our heads. Which makes perfect sense because our little tiger Hobbes does that regularly. :-D

I know I’ve missed a lot of what's going on with everybody. I've been pretty much overwhelmed. I missed my local Carnegie Writers Group Zoom meeting Wednesday night, and I told my writing friend T I just feel like my time is not my own right now. Anyway, I hope you all are doing well.

Over the past week I’ve been at the lowest point, emotionally and psychologically-speaking, I've been in a long, long time. I pretty much hit a wall, felt like I just couldn’t go on. I told DH I cannot live the rest of my life like this. I don’t want a life of this. I had to miss my regular Zoom therapy session on Friday because of medical appointments, but truth be told I didn’t want to go anyway. I did make my chronic pain support group session on Zoom last Sunday, but I basically just cried the whole time. Couldn’t interact much; it was just too overwhelming. The chronic pain group is new, something my therapist began last month. We meet every other Sunday. Finally, and in desperation, I put a call into Nevro (makers of my stim unit).

For those who follow my crazy back stuff, I met with the Nevro Tech, Karen, yesterday. I love her. She’s spent multiple hours working with me to find a stim setting that helps. She loaded two new programs, alongside my old (original) program that works to control back pain (my remote holds three programs). One of the new programs is a low-frequency one that causes paresthesia. They call it their “tonic” setting. The reasoning behind it is is to create a new sensation that gives my brain something else to focus on, and hopefully, it will block the horrific pins/needles sensation in my left foot. The paresthesia part is so weird. The way she eventually was able to set it is for me to feel it working from my knee downward. I control the intensity with my remote. She said I need to keep the remote on me at all times, because I may need to turn it up or down while I drive, while I sleep, etc. Last night I made the mistake of cranking it up to some pretty strong sensations, just to see how that would affect my nerve pain. Within an hour or so, I think it overstimulated my leg/foot and created a lot of pain. I felt like I wanted to jump outside of my body, then I realized OMG…this is my fault. I caused it. Ugh. So I turned it way down and went to bed.

When I got up this morning, I increased it just enough to feel a slight sensation on the inside of my leg and on the inside of my left big toe (that’s are the only place I can feel it on my foot unless I crank it up—which I am not going to do). The sensation is best described as a tingling. Not like the painful pins & needles, but definitely there. Karen said the settings she used are crazy, way different from what she’s ever done before on any of her other patients with neuropathy. She said my minimum setting is far above what her other patients' max would be. Anyway, I *think* (fingers crossed) that it reduces my foot pain *some*. I guess time--and my continuing to adjust the remote--will tell. I have another program that is set to their “burst” setting. It’s high-frequency and not meant to be felt by me. It would sort of run in the background in a wave, up and down. Again, meant to be perceived by the brain with the goal of reducing the foot pain. But she said if I feel like the low frequency one is helping at all, I should keep working with it before trying anything else. So that’s what I’m doing.

It's been raining this morning. I’m glad and hope it washes away the pollen. My sinuses are wacked out over something, that’s for sure. We (or I) have to get out at some point to pick up DH's Rx. Our Walgreens is in the neighborhood, so it's a ten minute round trip. The rest of the weekend is supposed to be nice. I made pork chops, mashed potatoes, and biscuits last night and added the leftover stir-fry veggies, so we had a good supper, and have plenty for tonight as well. We’ve been alternating watching episodes of The Bob Newhart Show and Alfred Hitchcock Presents while we eat supper. We’re enjoying both.

Hope everyone has a good weekend. xxx
Patty, (((Big Hugs))) I’m glad that you share what you are going through here. It is good to let it out. I hope that your stress gets better as your DH can do more and more and hopefully soon drive himself. I’m glad that you have the stim so that you can get a bit of relief and adjust the settings. You are a strong lady and I admire you.
User avatar
Jackielou
Posts: 13423
Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2015 7:51 pm

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by Jackielou »

Quilter51 wrote: Sat May 27, 2023 10:58 am Good morning all. Having my lazy morning time over here.

Before I went to bed last night I did my grocery order and today I will need to go and pick it up. I kept it at around 75, we see now that holds me. I probably for got something I always do,lol.

I had a lovely time yesterday at my brother in law's retirement. They are now going to move up to Lubbock where daughter and two grand sons ilve. Other daughter lives in Madison and has no kids. This will be agood more for them. They are building a house (moving to a less expensive housing area so the sale of the other house will take care of expenses) that is smaller and will have all the wide doors and lever handles and such to age in place with.

My daughter got two huge bags of fabric from someone on her buy nothing group. Turns out these ae mainly what I guess one calls dressmaker fabrics. Most of them are what I would call challis if that's still the phrase used. I guess I will be getting a couple easy patterns from joanne (the kind that have skirt and top and pants and stuff in one) and reminding my self how to sew clothes. I do note that none ofthe patterns have facings any more, they all seem to use seam tape or something else. I acutally like facings but we will see

So my big chore is to sort all these fabrics and measure all the pieces I have been given that are large, and then start cutting the sheets into useful pieces to make quilts or sew with.

Tomorrow is pentecost and in the episcopal church we traditionally read different parts of the gospel in various language. I am refrishing my german pronunciation this afternoon so that I can read two verses tomorrow.

Off to enjoy my lazy morning time.

Was trying to think waht to do to turn my tree into a red white and blue thing without runnign to the collar store. I have lots of one inch by whatever strips of various red white and blue fabrics and I will tie them together to make a long garland for starts. Then I will see what I have around here or what the dollar store has that can also be used. I'd like red white and blue l itghts but I am not emptional about it. I usually leave my patriotic stuff up tillt he week after the 4th. at a minimum.

Blue bell has a new ice cream flavor. Dr Pepper float. I am wishing I had added it to my order this am, cause i love Dr Pepper and I love Blue Bell.
I mostly use the single fold bias tape and just love it. I now even use it on patterns that have facings.
Jackie
http://inthelandofthelivingskiesii.blogspot.ca/
Mrscreative2
Posts: 241
Joined: Fri Nov 25, 2022 10:02 am

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by Mrscreative2 »

Good afternoon beautiful people,

Well today has absolutely flown by so far. Dh and I left very early this morning and bought four bags of sheep manure (on sale) and a new smaller watering can which was 60% off. I really have to take it easy on my back. I also find I must pace myself now. After Home Hardware it was off to the Waterfront we went. The Viking cruise ship is still in port and we walked right up to it to get a good view. The weather has been outstanding for their visit and the Waterfront area has been hopping with activity.

After this it was time to prepare our nutritional smoothie and reboot the laundry. Got a load folded and put away. Dug out all my summer hats too and put into front closet. Head bands, scarves and magic gloves stashed away. Lunch was from home. After lunch, off to the garden we headed. Dh added two bags of manure to my little vegetable plot and leveled it all out. I managed to plant my green and yellow beans, peas, radishes, parsley and planted the basil in a pot. Basil seems to be very cold sensitive and likes it warm. This way I can move it around so it’s in the sun. I then watered everything thoroughly. That will start to become my morning routine. Dh was on dandelion and weed control in the lawn and he washed the dust off my car. Now he’s watching track and field. I changed out of my garden grubbies and just relaxing for an hour. Enjoyed an apple cut up and vanilla latte match tea,

! Glad to hear from you Patty. Happy to report that I am now pain free and receiving PT to hopefully strengthen my back and right leg strength. However it’s thought that I may have permanent nerve damage. My case of sciatica was very severe, right down to my toes. I did my PT exercising before breakfast. Still have another session to complete. My 3 km walk already completed and then some.

Have a wonderful evening everyone!
Creative
HappyDaze
Posts: 4186
Joined: Tue Oct 15, 2019 11:11 am

Re: Daily Check-in May 27 2023

Post by HappyDaze »

Good afternoon! I am just taking a break. I've been cleaning the siding and windows on my front porch, cleaning the porch furniture, floor and rugs, railings, ceiling, etc. It gets so dirty from "street dirt".

I am hoping to have some energy left to plant the flowers I got this morning. Beautiful huge bright orange and bright pink - some type of impatients I think. The cost an arm and a leg - but I will enjoy them - they will be so nice to see planted in front of the porch every time I leave and come home.

I have some plants to move outside once all the furniture is put back in place. My porch really needs to be replaced but it is not in the budget (I will not go into debt for it - I don't plan to keep the house that many more years) so I try to keep everything nice and clean and spruced up, hoping to make the needed repairs less noticeable.

I can already tell that I'm going to be hurting tomorrow from this endeavor but it makes me so happy to be getting it done. I'll take a hot shower and some advil and suck it up.

I'm off to get a snack and get back to the task - can't leave it partially done.

Patty, I hope you and your DH are hanging in there and thank you for the good wishes for the interview. Floridacat, I hope you are doing alright today. I know the bad days can go all the way bad. You are a strong and lovely lady and a wonderful friend.
"All his life he tried to be a good person. Many times, however, he failed. After all, he was only human. He wasn't a dog."

Charles M. Schultz
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