In this case, h is a theoretical mathematical symbol for “the smallest possible number”.

It’s sort of a sideways infinity,

So yes, I am feeling slightly better today. Or at least somewhat alive.

Still having problems staying out of bed. Spent a lot of time sleeping and a lot of time playing games on my tablet in bed today.

It’s a good thing I can’t play my PC games in bed, or I might spend all day there. Only get up to pee and poo and get food.

That’s actuallly not that different from how I live now, come to think of it. On the physical level, that is. Assuming I sat up in bed to play the games.

But psychologically, they are worlds apart.

Besides, with the way my health is going, I am going to end up bedbound eventually anyhow, so I might as well enjoy my time being able to get up and move while I can.

Let’s do an inventory of just how sick I am, shall we?

Yes we shall.

Peripheral neuropath is killing my fingers and toes. I have so little feeling in my fingertips that it is like I am constantly wearing skin-tight gloves. I routinely get bizarre sensations in my feet. Stabbing pain (as in, I can feel the needle), erratic tingling, the sensation of hot water being poured over my toes, and of course, the feeling that a hot poker has been jammed between my toes.

You know. just the routine effect of nerve cells dying.

I have a sore on top of my head that just will not heal. And it likes to ooze. So I end up going out in public with this huge section of clotted hair that I can do little about except clean it up as best as I can in the shower.

And that just buys me a little time.

And it’s not alone. My skin just plain does not heal any more. I have scratches that have had multiple birthdays. Mosquito bite scars that remember Obama. Odd little bumps of no known origin.

Presumably, I will eventually be a dermatological nightmare of broken and bloody flesh in the vague shape of something that once was human.

Sleep apnea continues to murder me in my sleep. God knows the damage being done to my entire cardiovascular system, not to mention my poor beleagured brain, when I smother many times a night in my sleep.

Judging by how bad I feel when I wake up sometimes, where I feel like I am being crushed under a heavy atmosphere and it takes time for me to reinflate to normal pressure, it’s pretty fucking bad.

My blood sugar is, presumably, atrocious. It’s a wonder I haven’t starting bleeding maple syrup. All that sugar in my blood is damaging pretty much everything in my body over and over again. A dose of death with every heartbeat.

And now I have to face the fqact that my pneumonia permanently damaged my lungs. That heavy, scratchy feeling that I felt in my lungs when I came back from the hospital that I assumed would go away in time did not, in fact, go away, and in fact has only gotten worse. I have started coughing like a smoker now and then, big wracking wheezing coughs that scare the bejesus out of me.

But the crown jewel of all my ailments is, of course, the depression, because it’s the bastard that keeps me from being able to look after myself properly and thus enables the rest of it to go on unabated.

I honestly need help. I need someone to help me keep track of all my ailments, someone to supervise while I take my meds, test my blood, get exercise, and do all the other goddamned things I should do if I don’t want to die.

That’s a mighty big if. Let’s just say I don’t want to suffer.

I don’t think I would need full time care. Someone who visits for a couple of hours four or five times a week would probably be enough.

But it’s high time I faced the facts : I can’t take care of myself. I know I have been saying that for years now, but this time I am fully accepting my own lack of competence. I do not have the willpower, the instincts, or the perspicacity to look after myself.

If I was my own pet, I’d be arrested for neglect.

This is not an easy thing for any man to admit. Even one as, shall we say, nonstandard as I am. There is a presumptive duty to look after yourself for men in our culture and failure to do so means you failed as a man and should be deeply ashamed of yourself.

It’s why so many of us suffer in silence, to the point of dying premature deaths from entirely treatable conditions. To admit to anyone, even a highly trained medical professional who sees this kind of thing all the time and is professionally bound not to judge, that we cannot take care of ourselves without help, is to utterly surrender all self-respect and gender status and that is a price that is too high to pay for some even in the face of death itself.

And denial is always easier. It was just a headache. Oh, I had some indigestion, that’s all. A little heartburn, no big deal. I must have worked out too hard. Sure, I get tired sometimes, but I still do my job and take care of my family, so what the fuck else do you want from me?

And the ultimate, and the one I am most guilty of : Well that was weird. But I feel better now. So it must not be that big a deal.

Time to go back to my distractions so I can stop thinking about it.

I don’t want that to be my epitaph. But the depression makes it so hard for me to cope. Life overwhelms me so very easily. And I don’t know what to do about it.

But here’s the breakthrough : I am finally willing to admit to myself that it’s not just a matter of me figuring it out over time. I am not going to come up with a clever solution or write my way to some world-shattering realization that will make everything revert to normal and just walk away from all this shit.

It’s not going to get any easier. This is it. This is what I have to deal with.

This means that my Next Thing is clearly to get some kind of help. That might involve checking into some kind of facility.

I must admit, the time I spent in the hospital, I was the healthiest I had been in a long time in terms of my diabetes.

The key thing is that I admit that I cannot do this alone.

And I have been very alone for a very long time.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.