WhooHoo! A day with good readings

07:23:52   6.1  / 109  Fasting     
11:07:06   6.9  / 124  Post-Bfast  
14:07:05   4.6  /  83  Pre-Lunch   
16:56:13   6.7  / 120  Post-Lunch  
18:50:46   4.7  /  84  Pre-Tea     
21:17:53   5.7  / 103  Post-Tea    Roast beef, veggies, potatoes, gravy

Wow, I haven't had a full day of glucose readings that were in range since I had a cortisone shot a few weeks ago.

I started the day early as I had to go with Rod today - every other week on Tuesdays I have to put a form in at Centrelink. In the the last several times I've done this, I've had a late fast food breakfast, but as I was up early today, I had breakfast before we left, which apparently set the tone for the rest of the day. Neat!

I also made tea tonight even though Rod is usually the one who does any cooking of roasts. It turned out great.

I had an appt with my GP last week, and I'm still mulling over it, but while I'm adding a blog entry I may as well cover the bases with what was discussed. My memory really sucks lately so I had typed up a list, which I'm including below. My comments from the appt start with "...".

-------------
How long do the wonky glucose levels last after having had cortisone?

... Quite awhile as it's a long acting cortisone.

Have finished course of Iron tablets.

... No new prescription. Will check iron levels at next diabetes checkup (Nov) to see if there's been any change. Currently (as of 3 August) my iron levels are back up to normal.

Finished antibiotics yesterday.
Still have sinus infection, ear pain and cough
Ears - have woken up several times with them 'wet'

... Checked ears - blocked, but not infected. Checked chest, still infected. Sinus' still infected. Gave me a new prescription for another month of antibiotics. Vibramycin this time.

Rib pain - could this be weather related?

... no comment, not covered or discussed.

Having skin reactions I normally only have in summer.
Over sensitive in forehead, nose and left eye area. Very itchy.
Blisters on fingers - normally only get when it's hot and I've been sweaty.
Usually I get these two annoyances together.

... This is probably due to being ill with a long term infection.
... (I have since discovered our water bed heater setting was higher than normal, which led to night time sweats, which probably/maybe was the cause. Has settled down now.

My eyes have been quite puffy lately and have been a bit on the sticky side.
Recently noticed that my eyelashes have sorta disappeared.
Started recovery from chemo 5yrs ago... could this be why eyelashes
have disappeared?

... No idea. Will keep an eye on it.

Hands quite swollen and sore even with voltaren gel and tablets. Sometimes
fingers don't work. Like for remote control. Can only seem to use
my right hand for the remote.

... No comment, or was back to the due to being ill with long term infection.

Background sounds - pulsating (stop/start) and weak knees at the same time.
Have noticed this for awhile, but it used to be only once in awhile,
such as when getting out of the car and walking, but it's happening
more often lately and even at home. Even the tea kettle now sounds
like it's a big wheel turning. I get weak in the knees at the same
time, but not light headed or dizzy.

... Probably from being ill lately.

Extremely Forgetful. Almost forgot to mention this, but it's the main reason
for having a list in the first place. Stupid things I've done in
last few weeks - (... list removed because they're rather embarrassing).

... Also probably due to being ill. Suggested I take extra care as some of the things on the list could have been pretty deadly. Others were just stupid.

... He looked at my diabetes log book and remarked that even though I had a few highs, I also had lows on the same day and reckoned that it evened out overall and that they weren't bad stats. I don't really agree with that assessment as anything over 7.8 (140) does damage, and I had plenty of readings over this mark. But I do agree that considering I've had a cortisone shot, my readings really aren't as bad as what they could be.
-------------

So I'm on Vibramycin now for the next 4 weeks, and if the infections and odd symptoms like the weird sounds don't go away/improve, the next step is to do a cat scan of my head - mostly for the sinus areas.

It's taken me a few days (nearly a week) to sort of 'get over' the discussion, as it left me feeling like I should go home and go to bed until I'm well again. Well considering I've had this hole in my side, along with the other infections for the last several months, I'd probably be a long time in coming good, so really there's no point in just going to bed and hope to feel better in a few days. I'm much better off doing what I can, but also realising that I do need to take it a bit easier and let my body do the work it needs to in order for me to get well. Yesterday I thought I'd have a nap, but ended up catching up on over a weeks worth of Neighbours episodes that I'd recorded but hadn't watched yet, but today I did manage to have a little nap in the early afternoon. I had one of those nasty sinus headaches that wouldn't go away. A 45 minute nap helped it a lot though.

For those of you in the USA, 'Neighbours' is an Aussie soap of sorts. It's been on the air for about 20yrs and I've learned a lot from it, culture-wise. It's not at all like American soaps. I got addicted to it while recovering from chemo a few years ago, and I think it's cool that the BCNA (Breast Cancer Network Australia) pink lady fridge magnets seem to move from household to household within the show.

Tomorrow I'm adding purple streaks to my hair... it's a mousse that washes out after 10 washes. It was marked down and I bought it on a whim. I don't even think Rod noticed it in the shopping last week. He has a long day at school so I figure it's a good day to do it. At least it's something a little adventurous, and since I've had a day with my glucose levels completely within range, I reckon it's time to treat myself. :-)

Cheers!

Being a Granny in a modern world

I had the most delightful surprise on my computer this morning, my son sent me an instant message to tell me the results of the ultrasound his other half had yesterday. I've recently changed the software I use for instant messages, so was surprised to see a bubble comment in the lower portion of my screen...



Oh how exciting! I got a kick out of the fact that it asked me if I wanted to view or ignore it. Right... like I could ignore this kind of news!! So I clicked on the view box and it showed me... (you may have to click on it to go see the larger image)....



Oh wow. I had called Rod into the room to read the screen with me and get the news at the same time.


And while I'm showing off photos, I took this picture the other morning in my back garden...



The bird is a lorikeet, and so pretty. There are a few other new piccies on my flickr account, so have a mosey over there and take a look. The link is: http://www.flickr.com/photos/flitterg/.

Meanwhile, it's a bit late, so I'm headed for bed. G'night all!

Well that didn't work....

The weekend experiment of using foam and opsite for my dressing didn't work. The nurse thinks it got a bit 'cooked' because there was a green tinge to the exudate on the foam and on the material they use to pack my wound. Green means infection, and in this case, green is definitely NOT good for me. Sigh. And since there was a lot of exudate this time, I'll be seen by a nurse again tomorrow (normally it's every other day) just to check it and make sure it's not still green. If it is, I'll have to go see my GP. The thing is, I'm already on antibiotics (been on them for a month now), and finish them up this week. I'll probably be seeing the GP anyway this week for other issues. On the brighter side, it'll be a full month since I last had to see him. Better than once a week like it had been. And, my heat experiment also didn't go well, because the opsite doesn't allow the area to breath, by adding heat to it over the weekend, I just made it so the environment was warm and dark, which is all that's needed to give it a dark, warm, un-breathing environment to cook an infection in. Great. I'm currently back to having alion as my dressing, temporarily, at least.

My eyelashes have disappeared. I've noticed that one eye has really puffy eyelids, but was really surprised to see that my eyelashes have just vanished. When I see the GP I'll mention it as it's pretty odd.

I have a new favourite green tea blend. I still drink green tea to help keep by blood glucose levels lower, and really I'd hate to see what the levels would be without it lately as that cortisone shot I had a few weeks ago is really showing up in my test results lately. A few weeks ago I bought myself a one litre tea pot, and have worked out I can have 6 or 7 green tea bags (or various flavours) and one regular tea tossed in for the caffeine. Last week a couple of green tea samples arrived from Lipton - they have two new flavours - apple and peach. Both are quite nice, but I'm more partial to the apple. It really have a nice taste. I've never been keen on peach, and that still holds, but if it's mixed with vanilla and chai green teas, it's pretty good. A bit like a liquid guilt free peach cobbler. My favourite blend of late is:

1 Regular black tea bag
2 plain green tea bags
1 New Deli brand Chai green tea (it's very strongly cinnamony tasting)
3 vanilla flavoured green tea
1 apple flavoured green tea

I let the mix brew and then to make a cup of tea, I pour half a cup of just boiled water in my cup with two equals, and then fill the cup the rest of the way with the brewed tea. It is VERY YUMMY. It's like an apple pie.

On the computer side of things, since Rod told me all about it and showed me how cool it is, I installed a VMware server and added a Windows virtual machine so now I can have access to all the programs I've had to use my laptop for, such as my glucose meter, the Turbo Lister software for eBay sales, and of course Publisher for clients that send me files in this format. The neat thing is my linux box has far more memory and a faster cpu than my laptop so all these things run much smoother/faster, and I don't have to change position or keyboards to access my Windows computer.

If my eldest son is reading this.... vmware would certainly be the way to go if you want Mrs Eldest Son to use your computer and she wants to use Windows. It's much nicer than wine in that everything just works.

Well, I've been falling asleep typing this, so I better get it uploaded so I can get to bed. Tomorrow's another early day.

New Experiments, updates

I'm trying a new experiment. When I had my reconstruction, after I'd been returned to my room, they brought in a heater and made my room incredibly, uncomfortably warm. This was to help the blood vessels do their job in returning (or starting) blood flow into the reconstruction area. Over the course of the last 5 months, a couple of times the RDNS nurses have mentioned that whenever my dressings are changed, it cools the wound down, and it apparently takes several hours for it to get back up to the required temperature for healing to take place. I think I may have mentioned that I have either cracked my ribs again or the formerly broken ribs are now extremely sensitive to weather changes. Anyway, they hurt, and one of the things that helps make it feel better is keeping a heat pack on the area. The area where it hurts is just above where the wound is, so I'm thinking maybe the heat is helping both the ribs and the wound. I think after 5 months with this thing, if someone told me that standing on my head and singing Waltzing Matilda would make it heal faster - I'd try it!

My DDIL (Dearest Daughter in Law) will be having an ultrasound on the 23rd of the month and needs to decide whether or not to find out the sex of my grandchild. Oh, what a tough quandary. I didn't know the sex of my first child or my third, but middle son was a show off on not one, but two or three ultrasounds... and no one asked if I wanted to know or not, they just blurted out the news. So I've had it both ways. I think there's something special about not knowing, but in some ways it helped me to know a bit about who was kicking me from the inside... at least he had a real name!

I'm a bit wishy washy over which type of baby I'd like for my first grandchild. Happy and healthy would be the best kind! I'd just love a little girl to spoil, but a boy to spoil would be good too. The one thing that amazes me is this means my maiden name will live on in the USA for another generation. I've never had much thought about these things, but it's such a cool thing to realise. Like wow, a part of me, and all my family for generations behind me will be part of this new human being.

Rod needed more memory for his computer for some of the things he's studying right now, so we ordered him a couple gig... turns out the bios on his motherboard won't let him use it. So he gave it to me - and I've spent the last several days trying to work out why my CPU runs so high all the time. I've managed to get it down using some Tweaking Ubuntu sites I've found, but it still isn't right. I also lost my webcam for a day because Rod, who never seems to screw any computer component in, added a screw to my video capture card. It caused the opposite side of the card to not make contact with the board, so for a day or so my web cams weren't working. We managed to get it sorted in the end though, and he even apologized. I said I'm sure I send him around in far more circles and for far more time than what I spent trying to get it going. It's true, too.

So in the meantime, he's been working on getting settled with a newer motherboard and dealing with a corrupt partition, losing half his data (maybe), and of course in the midst of all this trying to actually study and do his homework. Ultimately the set up that he'll have is using Linux as his base system, and use VMware for Windows and any other linux flavours that he needs to work with for his classes.

I recently bought a new clock for in the bedroom. It's small, but the numbers display on it are huge, which is good, because I can see it without my glasses on. It has 8 alarm settings, but unfortunately the instructions don't really say how to disable the alarms without having to reset them completely when you want them again. So I'm just letting it tell me it's 8am every day and if nothing else, the early mornings help to keep my diet a bit more on track. As in breakfast in the morning etc. Both yesterday and today I've managed to miss seeing the frost on the trees by probably only minutes as the branches all had droplets of water but no frost. The grass was frosty though. Very pretty.

This weekend, I'm having a bit of a break from having the RDNS nurses. My skin has reacted again to the Alion dressing adhesive, so at the moment we're using a type of foam over the wound and using opsite tape to keep it in place. If you've ever had an IV, the clear plastic they use over top is what opsite is. It's a bit stretchable and for now at least my skin doesn't react to it. So by using the foam and opsite, it's giving my skin a rest from the adhesive in the Alion, and also allows 2 full days between changes. This in turn helps it stay warm and hopefully helps promote healing as well. It also means not having to worry about being up and dressed for the weekend nurse visit, but here I am up anyway.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Blood Test Results

Just a quick Whoo Hoo! Before I go to bed...

My iron is back to normal again.
My HBA1C was 6.2 ---- the same as it was in April!

I'm really thrilled with this news.

Cheers!!

Some Creative Therapy

Check out the new logo on the sidebar! I've joined a new diabetes community named Tu Diabetes. Someone described it as 'Like MySpace on insulin'... and there's a Flickr group for it with a challenge of "... write in your hand, a one-word feeling about being touched by diabetes and take a picture of yourself". I took 2 pics, which are shown below. When I did the second one, I thought what a neat idea for a logo for the Random Experiments blog, and so I created it. Took only a few minutes but I like it. The group on Flickr is "TuDiabetes.com" and really worth a look - there are some neat images and feelings there. It's a bit like PostSecret for diabetics. I found it very therapeutic and inspiring.

Here are my two entries:


Click on the images to view them on Flickr and read my descriptive text.

I saw the Gastro specialist last Friday, and am pleased to report that the polyp removed during the colonoscopy was benign. Yay! She had a few suggestions for adding fibre to my diet (since I take pain pills and these cause constipation), and then was curious why I haven't had a follow up blood test for my anemia. So she ordered one and tacked on the HBA1C test as well just to, in her words, get a bit of a snapshot. Good idea, I thought, mainly because it would be a good idea to find out if the anemia is any better or not. I suspect the 'or not' based on how I've been feeling, the constant infections and slow healing. I'll get the results of these tests hopefully tomorrow. I rang for them today but my GP had left for the day.

Last week I had a few days where the ribs just above where my wound is were hurting intensely. I thought maybe I'd cracked them again (these are in the same area as I kept breaking a few years ago - a result of having had radio thereapy). I kept heat on them for a couple of days, and after the weather cleared up, so did the pain. I think the ribs are sensitive to the weather, as if they were cracked again, I know it normally takes six weeks (for anyone not me) for them to heal.

One of the days I was using a heat pack (the type you boil for 10 minutes to liquefy it), I occidentally boiled the pan dry and wrecked the gel pack. Fortunately I didn't start a fire, and caught it in enough time that the pan was able to be saved. I've ordered two new gel packs and they should arrive tomorrow.

I've had a couple of good days in the last few weeks where I've probably over extended myself trying to catch up on things I haven't been able to do in awhile. So for the last two days I've started taking a nap around 3:30 for an hour or so. Hopefully this will help give my body some extra 'down time' so it can do the repairs for my side. It'd be nice. By the way, I've now had the hole in my side for 5 months now.

Next month I can get my prescription for my eye glasses updated -- last year the right eye was so vastly different they only gave me a half strength prescription, so this year I can get the proper prescription, and my eyes certainly have changed a bit. As this won't be covered at all by Medicare - they only pay for prescription glasses once every 2yrs - I have to pay for it myself. So today I was browsing online looking to get some pricing ideas and stumbled into Vision Direct Australia. Here's a link to the glasses I'll most likely be ordering. The frames are pink and quite similar to the pair I have now. Almost all of the things I planned on getting for the lenses (scratch and smudge proof coating, anti-reflective coating, and 100% UV Protection) are included in the price with the exception of transitions, which will only cost an additional $45 (instead of over $100). Total cost, including transitional and postage: AU$ 155.90 - considering the same would cost me well over $300-400, this is an excellent deal. They also accept PayPal, which is very very cool. And for those of you reading in the USA, they sell world wide and the shipping price is excellent.

Anyway, that's me. Rod is back at TAFE and we're back to keeping early morning hours again.