One step at a time...

What I like about my GP is that she completely understands why I do not find it comforting that I cannot remember my nightmares and night terrors at the moment.  I am sleeping so much, so deeply ... ever since the cold.  I am sleeping 12-14-16 hours a day.  Easily.  I get up late afternoon, feed Amos and myself, piddle for a while, and fall back asleep.  I am so bloody exhausted all the time.  All.  The.  Time.

She, too, is concerned that how I am is not normal for me.  I sat there, like a slug, in her office, since I had to force myself to get up by 2:00 in order to get there.

My GP said that, sometimes, when someone is having great fatigue, forcing activity will help it get better.  HAH!  I had already started taking Amos for a walk.

Yes, a walk.
Much work.
Much fear.

We have now walked 11 days, counting today, not all that far, but a genuine walk.  No, walking has not helped me feel any less fatigued.  Worse, maybe, but not better.  Still, I am trying to battle the fatigue a bit.  I mean, if I am going to spend most of my time supine, I wish for some small segment to be actually living a bit.

Amos loves to be with me, but he still does not like walking.  It might sound strange, but we walk after dark. That way, we are less inclined to encounter anyone, and I do have my pepper spray gun with a light guide that shoots up to 25 feet.  I listen to music and count the seconds until this whole walking thing is over.  Amos tries to keep his eyes on everything around him until this whole walking thing is over.  I try to take it one step at a time ... because I really find the small spate of exercise gargantuanly difficult.

Amos also does not like his harness/leash, but he likes less for me to leave without him.  Once back home, he practically tears himself out of it once I start to unclip it.  So, I am teaching him to sit first and then stay until I have it completely removed.  This training is a work in progress.  At least he now jumps up on the deacons' bench and sits once we are back inside.  The staying part is just so hard for him.

I am trying, though, to be a better puppy mom.
Good parenting means boundaries.

Anyway, I received an early Christmas present, once I talked a little bit about trying to start walking: a Fitbit Flex.  That seems kind of odd gift for a slug, but I do like being able to track my steps and my sleep.  This is only the third day of wearing it, but yesterday I finally figured out how to set it so that it could automatically track the walk.  So, I was able to actually show my GP that I walked and where I walked.  She squinted at the map Fitbit created, counted the blocks, and was impressed.

Tonight, struggling to stay awake, I have been meticulously looking up ingredients and calculating the calorie count for each of the freezer meals I make.  For example, since I use an alternative on the Lemon Chicken Gyros with Tzatziki and Feta so that I can eat them from the freezer (mixing cream into the marinade left once the chicken in cooked and using that as my sauce), the calorie count of that version is 740, including the homemade gyro bread.  That means, having entered everything I've eaten and had to drink today, I know that I have consumed 1,270 calories.  Thus far, I have burned 2,103 calories.

Since I went to my appointment, went to have blood drawn (my GP wants to see if something else might be going on since the cold), and fetched the mineral sea salt that I use and was almost out of, my step count, thus far, is the highest yet:  6,417.  That also includes the walk that I got done despite the weather.  Amos and I both were not so keep on going out in the light rain.  My goal, 5,000 steps, is half of what is suggested.  I figured that 1/3 of that will be walking and the rest will be fetching tending to the needs of the house, my puppy, and my person. For comparison, without the errands, yesterday I only had 4,167 steps.  At least my trips for fresh ice packs during the middle of the night will count for something now!

Data.  It's all about data.  Now, I will be able to show just how much I am eating, that I do move about during the day, and that despite the fact that my caloric intake is less than my expenditure, I am still gaining weight.  That bothers me.  It cannot all be the swelling in my lower legs and feet.  I just know that something is off.  I can also show my GP just how much I am sleeping.  [I think the sleep monitoring is very, very, very cool.]

Part of me wants all the blood work to reveal some issue ... an infection or anemia.  I want a reason for the exhaustion.  Part of me, of course, does not want to deal with anything else medically.  I am worried that the cold triggered a new normal for me with the dysautonomia, just as the food poisoning did four years ago, wreaking permanent havoc on my digestive system.  I am very much worried that I am going to be this exhausted all the time.

I find it ... odd ... that the very thing that I started doing because I am so worried about the exhaustion is the first suggestion my doctor had:  try to move about anyway.  The thing about trying to walk is that Amos very much needs more exercise than my sitting at the top of the stairs and playing fetch with him by tossing his baby down the stairs.  Plus, walking is something I can do without causing great pain to my body that lasts days and days and weeks and weeks.

After the porches (and the front steps ... okay ... and the raking), I really am determined not to do things that are too much for me anymore.  I am especially determined not to add more great pain in my life.  Somehow.  Somehow that back porch is getting painted without great pain.

I will confess that my girly soul has long wanted a cane that is not so ugly.  Back when I first started using a cane, but not really using them, I got two "fashionable" canes.  They are useless.  Now that I have to have one to walk, I have this really sturdy, folding cane with a soft grip handle.  I've been looking ... all the pretty canes have hard handles.  My only other choices in the soft grip cane that I've been able to find after eons of searching are blue, pink, and lavender.  The blue is masculine and I am NOT a pink or lavender kind of gal.  I did see this fantastic earth tones striped cane, but it had a wooden handle.  If you actually have to lean on a cane for support, skinny canes, tiny rubber feet, and hard handles will make your life more miserable, not less.

So, here I am, sleeping my life away, but walking some each day.
Imagine that.

When I mentioned that it is actually easier to walk than to stand, my GP's ears perked up.  I explained that when I am standing still, my blood pressure drops and my legs start to tremble.  Too much strain on just parts of my body.  Suspicious, she asked me how much I was fainting.  I dropped my eyes and kept my mouth shut.  She upped my dose of theophylline.

Yes, well, that's probably been needed.