Hi, fedex! Good to hear from you. It's now about 8:00 p.m. here in Oregon. No, the West Coast is not getting the worst of the winter weather. Our daytime temperatures have been in the 30's and 40's F -- cold but not bone-chilling. However, I managed to turn a cold into a case of pneumonia anyway. Just saw the doctor this morning and had my suspicions confirmed. Now I'll be resting and trying to avoid exertion for several days while the antibiotic does its work (I hope). The continuous cough is the most annoying symptom; I sound like a Doberman pinscher!
All right, I'll stop whining and pick up a good book instead. Have a good day!
I am glad you have escaped the POLAR VORTEX, or winter to you and I its the last thing you need if you are ill, my gran had a cure for everything ,( it was the same cure), but for every thing colds flu bronchitis stomach problems cuts bruises ingrown toe nails you name it, the CURE consisted of boiling three lemons and a whole onion in a large cauldron like what the Mc Beth witches used, " a little poor grammar " there but it ads drama, into the foul liquid went a bottle of Cod liver oil, and I for one can vouch for its effectiveness one spoonfull and you were out of bed dressed and on the first bus to anywhere before the prescribed three spoonfulls and they were tablespoons, I look back on those days with absolutely no affection at all , I remember my cousin, he had two broken legs so could not escape, he had to imbibe the horrible elixure it used to make him violently sick,you will have heard of projectile vomiting, as a way of vengence on his part he could hit Grans cat at three mtrs, I kid you not, the cat hated him, not suprising really as the same fluid caused severe damage to car paintwork I have no doubt if she was still alive, " she would have been145" she would have claimed it cured PD, when she passed away ( it couldnt cure that) we made a hasty exit from the crem as the cause of death was severe alchohol poisoning and being a typical disrespectful teen lout we thought she might explode which caused great hilarity.
I hope this little tale has cheered you J its all true, if you want my , Mother 95 and counting, still has the recipe for this potential chemical weapon, I can send you it, maybe not.
Thanks, fedex! You can always make me laugh, even when I'm coughing. My mother's recipe for coughs and colds was more benign than your grandmother's. She just combined lemon juice, honey, and brandy. (My father said it was better to omit the first two ingredients.) We probably slept through most of our colds!
I think I hit the low point of illness last night. I was thinking I'd have to check into the hospital. But I managed to get enough sleep in half-hour increments that I feel a bit better this morning.
Thank you again for taking the time to post. Having read what your nights can be, I am shamed to complain about my illness. J
One of my worst nightmares almost came true today, my dear wife had a bad fall, nothing broken but very sore and bruised , it has always been a worry to me should anything happen to her as I do rely on her totally ,that might come across as selfish and I suppose it is but there are so many things my wife does for me things that I used to do pre- PD but simply do not have the strength in my muscles to do any more, the Ddopa is a great help in keeping me mobile but its not a cure all and tasks that need a bit of welly are beyond my capability now,also fine detail work is almost impossible so my model making days are stalled for now, and of course as L is my main carer she is my first line of defence so when she came home early from a shopping trip I could see she was shocked and realised things were going to be very different from now on, also she has health problems of her own ,she insists she is ok and wont go to the docs but I will try and persuade her to go tommorow, if anything potentially fatal ,well I dont even want to think about that, my world would be at destroyed, its not until a incident like this occurs that you appreciate how much someone means to you.
Thank goodness disaster was averted! But I know how you feel. One split second can alter the rest of your life. I am keenly aware that one serious accident for me could take away my independence, my ability to continue living here in my home. When my planned caregiver, my husband of 40 years, died in 2012, my view of my old age shifted into a different picture altogether. Of course, that was not my main concern during his last months of life, but now I am obliged to keep safety and health in mind always. If my case of PD should advance suddenly, I'd have to choose between moving to an assisted living facility and hiring a live-in caregiver. Either choice would remove my independence. But perhaps when I reach that choice, I'll be more ready for it than I am now at age 67. I'm hoping to have another decade here in the last house which my husband and I bought, remodeled, and decorated together.
I hope your wife recovers quickly from her scrapes and bruises. Falls always seem to deliver an emotional shock as well as a physical one.
As for me, my lungs are not yet quite clear, but I have lost that sick-all-over feeling. I am resisting the temptation to get too active too soon and will stay at home the remainder of the week.
Thankfully i have not had any vivid dreams lately i had a few when i first started the medication but i do not sleep long enough to have time to dream ,going to sleep at 5am is becoming the norm for me unfortunately
Glad to hear your finally free of the night terrors Fed
I much the same way as you train a dog or cat or any creature that is intelligent, I think I have trained my brain to filter out these horrors and see them for what they are, using that well accepted process of CBT which I now do while sleeping,I find it always amazes me how my brain when faced with the unsurmountable finds a way to solve or beat whatever difficulties it is faced with. As I mentioned yesterday, my dear wife had a bad fall, well she is ok apart from a few bruises, and has been walking this morning so that was one unpleasant event over only to be followed by my Mothers car failing, and having to arange rescue, a kind lady who is a Head mistress at a nearby school took her into the building as the car was in a dangerous position, so that was sorted,
J I was saddened by your loss, it must have been very hard to bear you will miss him terribly,and at one fell swoop you were forced to face up to your future without your partner, there are no words to ease your pain other than your husband was your companion and carer , a good man and he will be at peace now and will be with you for eternity, in your memories please accept my condolences. You said in your mail that you have lost a degree of independance and that is something that we all must face , the recent Ddopa op has returned a large amount of mobility and freedom to my life but it is only temporary and one day battle will restart , PD has shattered hopes and dreams J but do not let it dictate your fate your posts indicate you are strong ,hold on to that J we are all in for a rough trip.
I do gratefully accept your condolences. The saddest year of my life was undoubtedly 2012, when my 40 years of truly happy marriage ended. But I also believe in the eternal nature of love and take solace in many delightful memories, photographs, letters as well. Remembering the laughs we shared in the past often cheers me in the present.
I do seem to find a certain strength in life's adversities. I don't take any credit for it; I don't even know where it comes from. Probably, it's an animal instinct for survival. But it helps me continue my defiance of PD and maintain my overall optimism, so I am most thankful for it. And, as you say, "we are all in for a rough trip." Indeed, mine has barely begun, I realise; my PD is still so mild that I haven't come far along the road yet.
Glad to hear your wife fared well for someone who had a bad fall. Your mother's experience was really dangerous, too! What's that line from Poe's "The Raven"? Something about one disaster after another "follows fast and follows faster"? Sometimes that seems like the essence of life!
I am giving great thought to my reply, partly because your story is so sad and when I am sad my Brain wont work properly, I find Sadness overpowers me, in much the same way as anger anguish fear these emotions tend to bring my normally logical brains processing ability to a standstill The loss of your Husband will have activated all those emotions yet somewhere from deep inside you find the strength to continue living I admire you , you have gathered resources and you go on, in all honesty J if i lost my dear wife as a result of her fall my heart would break into many shards, I would not want to be in this world without her ,she is the one and only shining star I would lose any willpower already depleted by PD, she has suffered no ill effects from her fall and she is very lucky as she has Osteoporosis and could have ended up in Hospital for a long stay, or worse, however she is fine so we must be thankfull for that. But and its a big But, changes are taking place inside my head, I could not remember my address the other day I thought I was still living with my mother, convinced of this also Ddopa does not seem to rectify this ever increasing problem its very worrying also I am back and forward to the bathroom all night so I dont i have to worry about the nightmares as I am not getting any sleep, this constant tiredness is crushing the life out of me and no doubt will be adding to my confusion, I have informed my good friends at my local PD clinic and will probably have a visit tommow, they are all fantastic people to have onside and I am sure they will put me back on track, I hope.
I will find inspiration , you are inspiring, having gone through all that you have and survived , I read many posts on this Forum that give many powerfull reasons for rebuilding and continuing the fight,but I feel the cold fingers of parky dragging at my heels, I am only one step ahead instead of six one week ago ,so thats the state of play at the moment , in the words of a old work mate Necessity is the Mother of Invention, so I better start inventing J , my Gran mentioned in a post elsewhere also used to say Yll n,er be reet till yu stand on ya feet, in other words get off your backside and go to school, or work, she used to scream that even on point of death, she would have loved it in years gone by when you could be hung drawn and quartered for riding your bike without lights.
All my very best wishes, hope to be more cheerful nextime
I'm truly glad that you can take a bit of inspiration from my life. I take at least as much from yours. You have faced, accepted, and dealt with so much more than I have in regard to PD! Your trials are great, but you surmount each difficulty as it comes, whether it is hideous dreams or fear for your wife's safety.
And when you speak of your all-encompassing love for your wife, you sound exactly like my husband. He used to say, "If you die first, I'll end up in a double-wide in Kansas." (I don't know if you use the term "double-wide." Just in case, it refers to a mobile home or caravan. Of course, the largely rural and flat state of Kansas was my husband's idea of a godforsaken place.) One of his favourite songs was Irving Berlin's "What'll I Do?" He also predicted that if he died first, I'd move to Baden Baden. That little joke came from our stay in that city at a hotel that seemed to have an inordinate number of wealthy elderly women as residents and also a good number of handsome young men on the staff pampering them. Naturally, that is not happening -- not even a visit to any part of Germany!
I now have a selection of meds and have found that a concoction that suppresses the tremor and relaxes the tension does help me get around 4 hours continuous sleep.
Depending on when I need my meds to be 'on' the following day I delay the concoction so that I wake up sort of refreshed at the appropriate time.
Discuss your plans with your med support team. My concoction is a fast acting levadopa (Madopar) a medium and long acting levadopa (Sinemet Plus and Sinemet Prolonged Release) and a beta blocker (Propanalol). All tablets at the same time.
I also found that getting out of bed when I couldn't sleep and only going back when tired helps. I also take my daytime naps in bed not the armchair. I read somewhere that your mind needs to associate bed with sleep and laying awake in bed can upset this link.
Thankyou for your kind words,your husband was a very lucky man, when you have been together for so long it must be hard to let go. My wife and I were married in 1983 we actually lived opposite sides of the street and I had chatted to her a few times but she was way out of my league, or so I thought I drove Earthmovers and she was a PA for a company called AAF Mquay, a American based firm working with well paid highflyers many of them young and single and she had been out with a few but it never lasted, when we got together I asked why when she had so many opportunities she chose me,she just said "you are the right one" so we have been together 31 years J (and never a wrong word)???? Little did we know what lay ahead, and the pressure that this evil illness has placed upon our relationship , it did make our lives scarey for a while but we soon got back on track and we are stronger as a result, and I could not live without her, I know this might seem a bit mils and booney but its just simple facts we were both alone I bought the house across the road and it all started from there if I had not bought this place we would never have met, fate is a mysterious thing. Best wishes Fed
Yes, I am a firm believer in fate. My husband and I used to marvel at all the little details that had to fall into place for us to meet in (of all things) a philosophy class in college. For example, I had to work full-time one year to earn enough for my college fees. That set me back one year in credits. At the time I was distressed that my classmates were ahead of me, but had I not taken that year aside, it is highly unlikely we'd have had a class together. He was getting out of the Navy after six years in the Vietnam era. Choosing between two universities known for strength in his major, he picked the one at which I was entering my junior year. The first time he asked me out, I forgot plans I had made with a girlfriend and accepted his invitation. With a better memory, I might have lost the opportunity to get to know him. (Though he would probably not have been so easily discouraged, now that I think of it.) And we ended up in that class because the professor was extremely unpopular; our last names began with R and S, the groups last to register that semester; so it was the only philosophy class still available. (That was a general ed. requirement and was an excellent survey course when taught by a knowledgeable prof.)
Registration for classes in those pre-computer days of the 1960's was quite a headache. We met, then, in 1968 and dated a long time before he could convince me that marriage could be a good thing. So I had known him 44 years when he died in 2012. He was the one love of my life, and "I shall not see his like again." We were very fortunate to have a lifetime together!
Forgive my babbling, please. Once I start reminiscing, the words flow even faster than the tears. J
I'm still following this thread as my insomnia is getting worse. I have physically only been to bed once in the past 8 nights. I find sleeping in my reclining chair is not perfect but better than nowt"
I did speak to a nurse via this page but she wasn't`t too concerned where I sleep, rather that I was actually managing to get some shut eye. My GP did prescribe me a short course of mild sleeping tablets and yes I slept better last night, albeit in my chair!! Actually I wake in less pain after a night in the chair anyway, so I have stopped worrying about not getting too bed and making sure I can get as many hours as I can, wherever that may be!!
I think you may have stated the best way to approach insomnia: "I have stopped worrying...." Forget the usual circumstances of sleeping only in a bed, retiring at a certain time, etc. Just consider sleep a gift to be accepted whenever and wherever it is available. (At home, of course! I'm not suggesting sleeping on park benches.) If the mind and body are ready and able to sleep, it is time to sleep! It doesn't matter what time of day it may be or whether you get two hours of sleep three times a day or seven solid hours or only one-hour increments.
I have to admit, I too fall asleep in my reclining sofas. It is about finding a place where your body is comfortable and mind will soon associate that place with sleep, it just isn't the bedroom. Staying awake in bed and then falling asleep in your chair will reinforce the bed is not where you sleep. When you have family at home though, the reception rooms in the house aren't always the quietest places to stay asleep for long. Quality of sleep is more valuable than the length of time asleep but you need a certain length for the deep sleep to start?
Have to agree with you Kendo about quality of sleep , i do frequently find i have to have a sleep around tea time , pd certainly does play tricks with my sleep i can sleep for England during the day but at night when i want to sleep i am awake most nights till 4am in a morning when i do finally get to sleep it is restless sleep , i have tried not sleeping during the day but the sheer exhaustion gets the better of me now i just accept that i sleep when i need to sleep
I think the key thing is to find a place where you can sleep and do everything you can to keep that area of the house calm so you have a chance of quality sleep. I still advocate not staying in bed if you can't sleep or try out an adjustable bed. I have one and end up sleeping in a normal bed, adjustable bed and reclining sofa in equal proportions depending on what works on the night or day.
I have been having major problems through the night with very severe freezing and immobility so I contacted my friend Nurse Consultant , for advice, this was to take two 1.25mg madopar before retiring, well as I dont seem to have a time machine or a TARDIS handy, "sorry a bit silly there" I retired in 99, thats 1999 not 1899 though sometimes I feel that old , anyway as I was saying I upped the dose, and ,,retired to bed,,only to suffer the worst possible nightmares ever, the mobility was much improved I ran downstairs faster than a ,,?fast thing so I have the two choices night terrors or totally imobile, decisions decisions?
Always good to here from you, even with your totally understandable sad face. Maybe those aren't your only choices? Back to your nurse consultant perhaps and see if they have other suggestions?
Best wishes Fed
Fed