An ear for Amos...

Tuesday was a difficult day, but most of Wednesday found me curled in a ball.  It was a worse day.  At one point, I was weeping, my body wrapped around Amos, practically suffocating him.  It is very good that Amos prefers pressure.

There was this moment, this place where I found myself really, really, really weary of being ill.  A moment where the myriad battles I face daily with my body was just too much.  I wanted so desperately for someone to come and read psalms and pray.  I wanted so very deeply to be quit of the battle, if only for a while.  It was the first time that I couldn't fathom really living this life.  I don't know how to explain it.  Such darkness....

Tuesday to Wednesday was marked by having-a-chill and two migraines.  Try as I might, I could not get warm nor stop the pain in my head for any length of time.  Huddled in wretched misery, I could scarcely think or move or even exist.  However, Wednesday evening was the final chamber performance.  Surely, I would miss it.

My one thought about going was that I realized, in the wee hours of the morning, that I had just taken the last thyroid pill.  I had forgotten, once again, with the new prescription to ask for it to be put on auto refill.  A few hours later came a text about an auto-refill at Target.  A little bit later, another text came about the prescription at Meijer.  No matter how wretched I was feeling, I had to fetch the thyroid meds and it would only make sense to fetch all three prescriptions.  I thought I could go fetch them and then go on to the chamber performance.  I thought I had to go there.  I thought I must prove that I could go, despite my life.

Sitting through a chamber performance with a migraine is a strange experience.

In my beleaguered state, I will admit that I did feel that I was being punished, for the first half of the evening were two piano pieces.  The first with a trio of cellos and the second with a single violinist.  When I walked in and spotted the piano, I almost walked back out.  But I was, I suppose rather foolishly, trying to prove myself in myriad ways.

Pooper's Requiem for 3 Celli really didn't need the piano.  It felt like the piano playing was sporadic and a bit plunking.  I found myself trying to shut out the piano music and focus on just the cello music.  You know, how you can sit outside on a cold winter day and concentrate on the sun to take in its warmth despite the cold wrapped around you....

Brahms' Violin Sonata No. 3 was more to my liking, for something with a piano piece that is.  I did not recognize the violinist and, surprisingly, she was given flowers at the end.  So, I wonder if she was brought in for the performance.  I loved the violin portions of the composition and did not actually find the piano altogether too intrusive.  I realized that what I did not care for last Saturday night was when the pianist would run his fingers up and down the keys.  That seems ... cheap ... for orchestral music.

After intermission, the third and final piece was Beethoven's String Quartet, op. 131.  SIGH.  Myrtle music of the bestest sort.   I am too nauseous to go and fetch the program, so I cannot tell you if it was a cello, a violin, and two violas or a cello, two violins, and a viola.  In any case, I very much savored this composition, despite the migraine, and was sorry when it was over.  One of the bits I liked best was when the players seemed to be handing off a bit of melody from one to another.  Simply marvelous!

I think ... I'm not sure ... but I think that the increased dose of thyroid meds is messing with the theophylline.  I cut the theophylline in half and felt better after two days, but was fainting more.  Plus, without it, when I lay down my heart rate drops into the 40s.  I do not like that.  I started back with the full dose and am having wonky heart rhythms all the time.  What I cannot figure out is if I simply need to adjust to the change or if the theophylline needs to be decreased.  I emailed my doctor's office and asked for a theophylline check blood work form to be sent to me so that I can do it at the same time as the thyroid check the week before my appointment with the new GP.

In the mean while, I decided to move the two halves of my daily theophylline dose closer together.  One of the reasons I will really, really, really miss my doctor is that, after moving here, on my first visit with her, she switched my theophylline from a single 800 mg pill to two 400 mg pills and had me take them 12 hours apart so that, with the extended release medication, I would not have daily dips.  However, theophylline and thyroid medication do not get along.  Neither do hormones and theophylline.  Juggling taking all three medications is hard ... one more thing I have to daily think about.  Anyway, instead of taking them 12 hours apart, I am now taking them just six, to try and mitigate the interaction with the thyroid medication, which I am now taking at 3:00 in the morning.

SIGH.

What I am also wondering is if all this wretchedness is merely my wonky blood pressure.  Mostly I wonder this because I have been getting incredibly ill when my time to conduct "major business" nears and have been fainting whilst going daily.  Waves of nausea and sweating and weakness before, during, and aft.  I crawl back to my bed or the couch or the GREEN chair and wait for life to get better.

It never really does.

And my heart rate is lower, despite the wonky rhythms.  One way to test my theory would be to go eat that salad at Panera ... the one with so much sodium and protein it's like giving me a blood transfusion and a year's worth of vitamins all at once.  Maybe.  Just maybe I'll try that.

For me, this has been an eternally long week.

I was a bit discouraged to have the person who was going to take the books call me with a third reason for delay on picking them up.  Yesterday, I got the strong feeling that she didn't want them, which doesn't make sense.  Even for culled books from my collection, they are good books in excellent condition.

Discouraged and weary and wishing for something different in my life, I started Googling and remained so until I found another place.  I am hesitant to engage with the organization, for the work it does means too much for me.  I would give anything to volunteer, but I do not believe that I am strong enough, mentally and emotionally, to do so.  However, the books are now going to be picked up by SCAN, which advocates for and helps abused children.  There is a Read to Me program that takes in books and gives them out to children in many programs, up to two a month per child.  An interagency program.  Something I truly admire.

When talking to the head of HR, who oversees the book donations, we wandered into trigger-filled waters, but we also talked about office supplies.  Their marketing "department" is teeny-tiny and does a lot of in-house work.  All those Avery supplies and such that I have been desirous of being used instead of tossed will have a new home.  I also went through my desk office supplies in my antique secretary and reduced the four drawers worth down to two.  I mean, I didn't want to be rash and just get rid of all of them.  I might possibly one day be in need of binder clips again, right?

Being so exhausted, I have not yet gathered up all the supplies from the basement, such as the colored printer paper and the high-end color printer paper.  Or the post cards and note cards.  Or the still over-abundance of top loading sheet protectors.  And maybe a plethora of hanging files, too.  And binders....  You get the point.

I won't end up with empty shelves, mind you, because I like the look of the bankers' boxes on the shelves.  I guess they will be empty bankers' boxes.  Or maybe I will find a way to take the items on top of the shelves and put them in the boxes, so that the top is empty.  That would me less reaching above my head (and fainting/near-fainting) whenever I need to get into my mailing supplies box.

That would be good.

Amos did cheer me up by pointing out a funny video he spotted whilst looking over my shoulder.  As a thank you, I typed up his blog post about it.  My sweet little fluff-ball!

What do you think?  Should he get one, too?