Last week, I said I would tell you this week what your doctor should be doing and how often, but it will have to wait another week. Instead of writing, I ended up spending a lot of time trying to get past a software glitch to finish up something that should have been in yesterday. I won’t get into the details, but it took hours.
Hey! I reached a goal! I was getting onto my scooter just fine from every place except the desk chair, but I finally cleared that hurdle one day last week. Normally, I get onto the scooter by putting one hand on the seat, the other on the tiller, and lifting myself up to the seat.
After spending a week in the hospital, however, my strength was gone. My Sweet Baboo found and dusted off my transfer board, which I used to get to and from the scooter and the bed, and from the recliner to the scooter. In the bathroom and from the desk chair, I devised a way to get onto the scooter that didn’t entail using my leg (which was the biggest problem; there’s not much wrong with my upper-body strength). For a while, I could only take showers when Baboo was home because he had to help me get back onto the scooter. I tried the transfer board once, but it was too slippery in the shower.
To help with that darned leg that wouldn’t lift me up high enough to get onto the scooter’s seat, I also got hylan G-F 20 (brand name Synvisc) injections in my knees. I have osteoarthritis and it’s bone-on-bone in my knees. The hylan provides lubrication so I can straighten out my leg better.
Why don’t I get knee replacement surgery? Well, I once had a pin put in a toe, got a bone infection, and lost part of the toe. Then I had a screw in my heel, got a bone infection, and lost part of my leg. I’m not even going to think about having anything put in my knee. Nope. No “third time’s a charm” for me!
I was having coffee with a former mayor a few years ago and asked him how it felt getting old. “I thought it’d be more fun,” he said.
Anyway, I’m happy to be back in the groove as far as hopping onto the scooter goes. Now if only the scooter would work. It started messing up a few days ago. It goes a little way, then stops. Goes a little further, then stops. Sometimes it doesn’t want to start up again. Nobody seems to have time to take it into the shop, so I’ll probably have to pay for a house call.
As I recall, we were looking for a new scooter before I managed to land myself in the hospital. Hoo boy, was that expensive!
I would like to go out to the garden, but I’m afraid the scooter wouldn’t make it back up the ramp. It rained so often at the beginning of the planting season, I couldn’t get to the garden, so my husband planted stuff. Since I was left out of that, my enthusiasm for gardening never got off the ground this year.
Nor has the garden, for that matter. Gotten OUT of the ground, that is. There is said to be beans and cucumbers. Planted, anyway. Eggplants were planted, and I got my recipes all together in anticipation. No eggplants. All I’ve seen in my kitchen so far are tomatoes and bell peppers. And they are good.
I’m working on getting my basal rates set properly. Again. My glucose just won’t stay up. I’ve already reduced my basal by 1 unit per hour – and it needs to be lowered some more! It would be nice if you could just set everything once and it would work forever. Unfortunately, diabetes doesn’t work that way. One thing’s for sure: It’s never dull.
My nest is half empty: Granddaughter went off to college a couple of weeks ago. She’s already called her brother to come and visit because she’s homesick. She wanted to go away so she’d be with her boyfriend. I told her she had to make decent grades or she’d be coming back home.
Now I’m waiting for Grandson to move out. Except that he spent his rent money going to see his sister and having fun Sunday and Monday. He has to learn you don’t play with the rent money.
Next week for sure it’s the doc stuff I said I’d do this week. Promise.
