Well, I am definitely not well.
I’ve been coughing now and then, a dry hacking cough, but I think that is more to do with whatever the hell is making me dehydrated so fast.
I dry out quite rapidly. Especially after I sleep – I have been waking up absolutely parched, like I have dust in my mouth, for at least a day now.
And there’s urinary complications, though those seem to be sorting themselves out. Earlier I was getting the urge to pee every 20 minutes or so, but when I peed, it was some teeny tiny amount that would barely fill a thimble.
So clearly something was triggering my urge to urinate besides urine. My best guess is that something in me is swollen and pushing against my bladder, thus invading its space and making it smaller.
Hence, a small amount of urine is a “full bladder”.
Luckily that seems to have ended. I have normal pees at a normal frequency now. I hope things just stay that way for a while.
Moving on from the bladder et al, I have also been feeling really hot. This is probably also tied to my dehydration. Maybe i am running a fever.
Probably not, though. I am not sure I am capable of it. I don’t know how many times now I have showed up at the ER totally sure I was running a fever of 100 degrees only to have the nurse scan my forehead and nope, normal.
So either I have a false sense of my own body temperature, or whatever genetic weirdness makes my veins both hard to find and hard to pierce also makes my body temperature not readable correctly by thermometers.
Because trust me, on the inside, I’m an inferno.
Most worrisome of all, though, is that my muscles are a lot weaker than usual. Even using the walker, my legs feel like spaghetti. I can still walk and move but it takes a lot of effort and I don’t feel stable at all when I am doing it.
Hopefully this is just a temporary symptom of what vague ague is passing through me this time. I keep feeling like I am going to sink to the floor and not be able to get up again, maybe ever.
Thank God I spend most of my time laying down or sitting.
Of course, that’s part of how I got these problems in the first place…
Anyhow, I of course live in fear of whatever is happening to my muscles getting worse and leaving me too weak to stand up or walk, or even worse, bedridden with paralysis.
So I am quite worried right now.
One odd thing : I feel feverish, but not in my usual “the furnace in my torso just turned on” way. It feels more like body-wide inflammation.
Time to take an Aleve and see if it helps. They contain naproxen, which is a very effective anti-inflammatory medication, so if it does help, I have my answer.
Damn, I am sick and tired of being sick and tired. And I have this nagging feeling that there are things I am supposed to be doing for Doctor Madhani, and I dunno what they are, and that means I am fucking up my own health yet again.
I suppose Doctor Madhani must have a lot of experience dealing with people in compromised mental states, I guess.
But I try so hard and I fuck up anyway.
And that is very, very depressing.
More after the break.
Further symptom alerts
Well, I am coughing more often now,
And I am definitely coughing against something. My body is trying to cough something up. Presumably something real nasty.
And my nose has been running all day (and boy, are its feet tired).. This, despite my having taken my antihistamine this morning, meaning it’s not just my vaguely defined “allergies” making it tun, it’s something else.
And the Aleve did help with the hot feeling in my body, so yup, it was inflammation. Right now I am experiencing a lovely coolness throughout most of my body.
Everything except my nostrils. Air breathed through them still feels oven hot. Also not a typical symptom for me and my “allergies”.
And the muscle weakness continues. Just making myself a peanut butter on toast. sandwich in the kitchen felt a bit like I was doing a high wire act.
Tomorrow I’m gonna have Wound Care. We’ll see how that goes. Could be that when I get up and get moving and get the ol’ blood flowing, everything falls into place and I am fine to make the journey.
Or it could be that I end up lying on the ground in our parking structure, helpless, and poor Julian has to call 911 then go downstairs to let the ambulance in.
Or anything in between, of course.
Only metaphorically related is the fact that there’s heavy winds in Richmond tonight. Nnot enough to make you feel the building bending in the wind, thank God. That only happens very rarely.
But you can feel the wind blow in the vibrations of the building, and it makes a spooky sound all around our crumpled abode. Gives me an all too familiar feeling of loneliness and exposure, and that’s why the moment I stop blogging I am going to be getting right back into bed and burrowing under the comforter.
Oh, One last thing. I seem to be making a lot more mental errors lately. Like forgetting whether I have taken pills, or what I am doing in the video game I am playing, or forgetting to bring things for my meal with me from the kitchen, et al.
I’m trying not to read too much into it but it’s frightening. What control I have in my life comes from this magnificent mind of mine, and I can’t rely on it, where am I?
Hell, who am I?
For that matter, WHAT am I?
I’ve never been able to answer that question. I am certainly radically different from everyone else in the world. I’ve never met or heard of someone who made me go, “That. I am one of those. That person is just like me. ”
Bits and pieces, sure. But nothing approaching the total me.
Well, time for me to make like Bugs Bunny and burrow out of here.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.