COPING WITH HUSBAND IN PAIN

We ended up going to the doctor on Friday and husband’s pain is muscle related.  Doctor felt a “knot” in husband’s back. Since the hospital had taken X-rays of husband’s back, the doctor would have access to them - he was not sure why he had not received the info about the visit as we had specified him as the doctor.  He did send husband for X-rays of his neck.  He called in prescriptions for husband to our pharmacy.  (By law in our state there are no longer written prescriptions allowed for people.)  He had the Xrays taken.  We had lunch on the way home at Wendys that we passed, so it would be the most like a normal lunch for him - although it was a terrible Wendys, not like our regular wonderful one, I settled him in at home and picked up the prescriptions.

One is an anti-inflammatory and one is a muscle relaxer.  He was also to take extra strength Tylenol with them.  The former drove his blood glucose up high (doctor said it would).  And between the other medication and his pain, he could not drive - which meant he would be staying in the house.

Until Saturday night he sat in the kitchen at the table watching TV.  At my suggestion, I brought him his laptop so he could go online.  His chair (well, the chair I brought him to use instead of his) blocks the way to the bathroom, the pantry, and the door to the basement - especially if he sits back from the table which he was doing.  So, little got done.  I still have one load of laundry from last week which has not been brought up and folded yet - and I just started this week’s laundry - but at least as of Saturday night he felt well enough to go upstairs to his computer.

Through Sunday night I was picking up lunch for us and bringing it back (Wendys, of course) and picked up dinner Saturday night.  Sunday I made him hot dogs for lunch and then we had Wendys - picked up by me - for dinner.  Thank goodness the big "Dr. Who" season start was Sunday afternoon and gave his something to watch.

Monday he decided that he was going out for lunch and drove us to, of course, Wendys.  I ordered and picked up the food as he normally would and he got the table as I normally would.  We did the same yesterday and today (Wednesday) also.  I have been cooking dinners that are “soft”as he does not want to use a knife to cut - it hurts too much. I had been going out and running errands without him.  The weekend and Monday (a holiday here) the post office was closed, but yesterday he decided that we would go, as normal, on our way to lunch to mail what I had to mail out and see what was in our box.  That went fine and then I left him at home and went to the supermarket as while running errands I found that some items we normally buy were on sale (who had time to look at the circulars received?) and I wanted to buy them.  Today we went out for lunch, stopping at the post office on the way.  Afterwards I had to go to the bank and he wanted to buy a new remote reading thermometer as the one he has in our holly tree to let him know what the temperature is outside, broke since all of this started.  Walmart has discontinued the thermometer, so he has to find an alternative.  Walmart and the supermarket next to were both too cold for him and it made his shoulder hurt more.  I knew I should have left him home.

Strangely I did manage to get a lot of things that needed to be done finished.  My cell phone won’t work with this (or my other) laptop and I wanted to transfer and organize photos that I took so I don’t buy (any more) duplicate bears.  While at my desk I always feel that I should be doing work, work or household books and such so I don’t get to it - so I used this opportunity to sort the photos and copy them. While he was upstairs I got the downstairs bathroom cleaned - I hate to admit to being “at least”a month behind on this - now I have to do the upstairs bathroom.  I made some phone calls that needed to be done.  I did an IRS form for my embroidery club (I am treasurer of same). 

I always said that I needed more time home and more time driving - unfortunately it took his injury for me to have more of both.

He feels better than he did - although when today started he felt worse.  I can see from how he moves and how interested he is in things that he is doing even better than he thinks he is.  One problem is that he is afraid that cold air will make his arm hurt worse.  One theory on where the injury came from is that I had turned on the a/c for him when I left for the meeting as it was hot in the room and his shoulder got cold - so he is trying to avoid cold air.  Unfortunately we are having temperatures which are more summer than fall and we are both sweating and hot and I think the discomfort from same is keeping him from feeling better.  It is also making our bedroom smell like a gym locker room - I have changed the bedding and keep spraying with Lysol.

I was to go to a client this week - I called and told her what happened and I would call next week for an appointment.  I need to do the work and I also get paid quarterly and need the check.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

“Stuff” happens. 

One has to figure out what to do to keep life going as normally as possible.  One has to take the time to take care of one’s loved ones - and one’s self.  Time and money have to be reappropriated when needed.  I am glad he did not have a heart attack and can put him with the 4 year old child that he is when not feeling well.  If driving out and picking up his regular lunch keeps him happier, that is fine with me even if it would be easier to make him lunch at home.

If organizing falls a bit further behind, well, that it is how it is. 

RV WATER AND FRIDGE PROBLEMS

This will be a shorter post than normal.  I am writing it on my old Palm Centro phone, which I carry as a PDA on trips.  We are driving home from a trip.  We planned on staying 2 more days so I planned to write today’s post on my laptop tonight & then post it, both in our RV, which technically I am doing, but I am writing while riding at 65 mph on the Pennsylvania Turnpike!  (Obviously husband is driving,)  From this we learn in terms of organizing, not to put things off to the last minute.

Everything on our trips takes organizing, even more than at home.  Going home 2 days early (on a 4 night trip) changes lots of plans.  We carry at the start of a trip 25 gallons of water with us in 2 tanks,  We know from experience that we can easily get by on same if we conserve water for 4 nights.  We learned on a recent trip that if we are very careful, we can make it through 5 nights.   Now on the other hand, we need to fill the outgoing tanks at least 75% or they will not dump properly.  See the organization needed to manage the water.  Uh oh!!!

Back again,  drive needed my attention.  Road construction & the cones were in our lane making it rather narrow.  About 10% of them were knocked down by vehicles ahead of us.  Glad we are not in an 18 wheeler.  Needed to help husband avoid them.

So since we used so little water as we expected to need it to be used over 4 nights, we had to add enough water - gallons and gallons - to the outgoing tanks so each had enough to dump them before we did so.

This was our last trip of the year with running water.  We will be winterizing the RV soon so that there will be as close to no water in its systems as possible so there will be no damage from water freezing in pipes, valves, tanks, etc.  If we travel again this year we will get a space near the bath house.  But that is a story for another time.                   
                   
We had a problem this trip with our refrigerator.  It is a small one about the size of a dorm fridge.  It is different than same, however, as it can run on regular household current or 12 volt car battery current - it switches on its own.  It is harder to keep it at the correct temperature than the refrigerator in the house.  It is affected more by the temperature outside, as well as also by the temperature in the RV.  I can usually get it to the range I want - about 38 or 39 degrees Fahrenheit and then I work at keeping it at same.  Sometimes it behaves and stays in range, other times it can take days of playing with it until it is correct - and even then it can need an adjustment.  I have been known to jump into the back to play with it when stop for gas if it is going too far off.

This time it was going too low.  I raised the temperature and it was too high and would not get lower no matter how low I turned the thermostat in the fridge.  We have an electronic thermometer which reads the temperature in the fridge and sends it to a device outside the fridge so we don’t have to open it to read it.  I also have a mechanical thermometer in it.  When I looked at same it was about the correct temperature.  The problem was the electronic thermometer, not the fridge - good thing as it is much cheaper and easier to buy a new thermometer.   We took out the batteries and played with it and eventually it was working, seemingly, correct again.  We will have to keep an eye on it.  Thank goodness I had kept the original mechanical thermometer in the fridge just in case. 

Please remember if you are in the US where there is daylight savings time to "fall back" an  hour this Sunday (Nov. 6)  and VOTE    TUES - whether you vote for the same candidate as me or not - Vote!