Sunday Stroke Survival: Making Mud Pies

As much as I've complained about my difficulties moving around because of the mud, this week I was having fun making mud pies intentionally. With all the rain we've had, the garden area is staying high and almost dry with all of it. Not a single mud puddle in the whole area. The soil is that great for growing in. I actually made a layer of mud pies to plant in.   The garden is now halfway planted and additional summer crops (started indoors) will fill it up with yummy goodies for us. A year before I moved here, Mel made a video of her flooded garden. Boy, what a difference of time and labor wrought.

The same can be said living post stroke. Sometimes you have little choice to make mud pies where the heavy torrential rains (adversity) come. None of us like it very much, but our ideal choice is swept away in the flood. Still, the flooding can't last forever. It will gradually abate and the waters will drain away. That's just life in general, isn't it? It ebbs and flows between bad times and good ones.

Sometimes, you have to make mud pies and make a horrible situation better. At least you're having fun in the midst f it or you'd cry out in despair. I'm in that position now with my spasticity. I need to go to therapy for dry needling to reduce the escalating pain I'm feeling with a good stretch. The problem is our county is in lockdown mode with the COVID-19 virus (now in week 3). All nonessential appointments are canceled for the duration. I've tried the hot showers, I'm taking my medication, but I'm back in pain mode until at least the end of April...possibly longer. ARGH!

So, I'm trying distraction. Is it a distraction if it has to be done anyhow? I'm planting the garden and tending it closer
than I should be at this point in time. I'm plucking weeds for the bunny rabbits we have left. It's only a few ounces per day until they get through transitioning off the commercial, winter feed. But we only have two rabbits left, Buddy Baby and Cara, instead of the eleven this time last year. So I can go slow because of my pain levels. This time last year, I was schedule for a Baclofen pump placement to combat my spastcity. SIGH! You readers know how that turned out.

Everyone is facing hardships now. But they are short lived because the end is in sight. Everyone else will go back to their jobs even if they hate them with gusto. I will have to stand in line with others needing outpatient therapy waiting to be put back in the queue. It only took two months the last two times for this to happen. But, it's not like it will be never ending pain without the hope of a reprieve. Of course, there will be the lucky few that will have aged out of the need for therapy. I will get my appointment before those unlucky new atients behind me needing therapy. So I won't be stuck in the mud as long as they will be.

Still, I'm looking at several weeks like this with the painful spasms increasing until then. So until then, I'm making mud pies in the garden trying to keep my mind and body focused n other things. I'm still picking up kindling (twigs and branches) for the wood stove. There are still a few chilly days and nights ahead before the temperatures stabilizes warm constantly. Even so, kindling can be stored in the barn.workshop until its needed later. The cockeyed critters still need to be cared for and life goes on

Nothing is impossible.

Sunday Stroke Survival: Winter Doldrums

As winter sets in here in our little hallow, I start reevaluating everything. Freezing temperatures, and snow and ice makes driving up the foothill precarious enough for us to not even try in Mel's 4-wheel drive truck. I mean in an emergency we'd chance it, but just to go to town...no way, no how. You'd think I'd be stir crazy, but I'm not. There is plenty to keep my hands and mind occupied.

In case you don't know how much a cord of wood is

It isn't always so bad. Some days we've hit almost 50 before the sun goes down and with it the temperatures. We've burned through a cord of wood already and we haven't hit the really cold months of latter January and February yet. We'll probably go through at least four cords this winter. It's supposed to be a cold one. But even that being said. I prefer temperatures around the mid 60s or low 70s. My heart usually behaves better. Mel on the other hand, in her born and raised Orlando Fl body, prefers high 70s to low 80s. Growing up and living up north taught me to dress in layers to keep
warm and keep myself from being overheated at the same time.Yesterday, she finally pronounced it warm enough and I had stripped down to a tank top,

Today, I shed two layers (jacket and sweater) and was still working up a sweat loading a 1/4 cord of wood into the back of my van from the big wood shed to move onto the front porch. Mel would have just loaded it into unto several wheel barrow loads to make the trip, but being one handed, I have an issue with the wheel barrow. Chock it up to another tool that takes two functioning hands. At least I know that I can handle these splits of wood with little or no difficulty. These aren't the evenly split pieces of wood that you see bundled in the stores. They can weigh upwards of five to ten lbs two feet long a piece with plenty of splinters upon splinters in my arm, hand and fingers. Yes, I should be wearing work gloves, but they are a royal pain to get off and on.

Yes, I know I could use a wagon to pull the small load, but heck, I'd already taken care of the chickens, rabbits, household animals, made the bread/rolls, and set up dinner to cook on top of the wood stove BEFORE I went to get the wood. I had also gathered a 5-gallon bucket of kindling. Burning that little bit of gasoline was a lifesaver. That was until I got bogged down almost to the axle in the slick, clay mud. I grabbed the crepe myrtle branches Mel had cut down over the summer which lined out new makeshift driveway. It gave me enough traction to make it around front again. Another day on the homestead or Murphy's Law strikes again. I guess I could have played the disabled woman in distress card, but honestly, it never crossed my mind.

I'm considering totally coming off some of my medications. I'm beginning to wonder if I really need them all. I am always my own self advocate. I have to admit the Cymbalta helped my depression after my beloved's death. I'm definitely more active here than I was before. Yeah, my body aches, but look at what I'm putting it through. You'd think my fibromyalgia would flare up big time, but it hasn't enough to incapacitate me in almost two years. Considering my pain was so great before that I had even considered taking additional meds. I'm handling the pain better with more natural methods like cups of Earl Grey tea. Bergamot oil has been used for centuries for depression and nerve pain. I work through the pain. I do use reason and stop when I need to. Although I am taking more breaks than I used to ten years ago. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm getting older too. It may take an hour or two to gain control with meditation and a couple cups of Earl Grey tea, but do I really need prescription too? Meditation is also  my control over my PBA. I'm not really asking you and I will talk to my physician.

My muscle relaxers are the bane to my existence. I'm on Botox, Zanaflex, Baclofen and Valium. Plus dry needling and therapy.  None of them are working worth a hoot to stop my post stroke spasticity. When the Botox wears off that's it. My foot inverts and will develop sores unless I use care to prevent it. My wrist is solidly locked and contractures prevent it from releasing to neutral without some serious, constant manipulation. Surgery is even more not an option with a third heart valve and a triple A in the mix. I haven't taken Valium in over a year. The Zanaflex plays havoc with my heart. I have gradually tapered my dose down to 2 mgs per night instead of 16 because of this. And yeah, there was discussions with my cardiologist and neurologist. There are definitely advantages to not sleeping at a 45 degree angle, ingesting quantities of salt before bed to keep my heart rates above 40 and not feeling like a fish out of water gasping for breath every night since my aortic valve started crapping out last year.

What I've opting for instead of drugs. I'm embracing my spasticity. It is what it is. It's going to be part of my post stroke existence until the powers that be find a way to fix it. It's not a part time thing but a full time issue. Sometimes is worse than it's other. When it's bad, it's horrible and nothing makes it better. I would live the horrible times in a continuous, warm bath of epsom salts, rosemary, and thyme if I could, but that's not living. I'll cry and move on until the next time. Even when I'm in a Valium induced sleep, I'm still in pain. So I'll treat the pain with Tramadol when necessary. I'll pick and choose what I take and when. Hopefully, the increased Botox will have a longer carry over effect so there will be less breakthrough of severe spasticity between series. It's a shame when you have to pick which poison you put in your body.

So do you reevaluate decisions during the winter doldrums? What have you concluded?

Nothing is impossible.

Saturday Saunter~ Botox Werked 4 Me!

Yes, the title is misspelled on purpose. Sometimes you just have to be bad when you feels so good. And, I also know it's Saturday and not a regular post day for me, but I have to share.

For months, I have been suffering with increased tone and spasticity in the wrist and fingers not to mention other joints affected by my stroke similar to the picture, but imagine the the hand clenched in a tight fist with the thumb set at a ninety degree angle. That would be my hand, but the wrist is about right. The wrist wouldn't move past neutral into extension, and the fingers after thirty minutes work, would half way straighten.

Wrist splint

It was frustrating at best and painful work to get that accomplished. Even wearing my resting hand splint or my wrist splint was impossible. The spasticity was so bad that even wearing these splint became extremely painful after a few minutes, let alone the hours I was supposed to wear them.

Resting hand splint

My fingers would curl and my wrist would arch while in the devices. My body was fighting the rigid plastic and the steel. My thumb would even work its way past the padded restraints because, you didn't want to place the straps so tight that it would cut off blood circulation.

I'm supposed to where the resting hand splint while sleeping and inactive. The wrist splint takes the place of the resting hand splint for several hours a day. But, you can't wear it and move around. It weighs about five pounds. Imagine being on Lasix, a diuretic, for your heart and having this thing on, and not having the sensation of having to urinate unless you shift positions? Yeah, it's an off/on things rather quickly!

It looks like instruments of torture to nonstroke survivors, but for stroke survivors with high tone and spasticity they are a must do. See the silver on the sides of the wrist splint above? That's steel rods.

Standard pill bottle & large

About the best I could do was wrap my fingers around a large pill bottle most days. My neurologist told me to keep a rolled up washcloth in my hand, but the pill bottle was bigger. In this case, bigger is better.

I had Botox injections last week in my bicep, pectoral muscle, and for my wrist and hand in the forearm. A short painful necessity when tone and spasticity does not respond to any other treatment. All together 20 injection sites in one arm and under it in the chest wall. Two whole bottles at $365 each went into this area. Thank God for insurance!

Once again, we will makes the maximum out of pocket expense allowable for the year per our insurance plan by the end of January. We still have eleven months to go. It's sad when you think about it. It is such a joy getting older. Heavy sarcasm intended.

I awoke this morning and did my morning ritual, but something was different. My wrist was extending and the fingers except for the thumb was relaxed. No, not full extension, but I managed twenty degrees past neutral. It's a start. Even though the shots worked on my bicep and pectoral muscle last time, there was a niggling doubt whether it would work on my wrist and hand. It's all about hitting the right spot.

I'm doing the Snoopy dance of happiness right now. I worked the wrist and fingers stretching them out to find the limits so I'll know when there's more improvement. I think I over did it because the muscles are exhausted and have resume their previous state before the shots, but I did it! It werked!

I'm waiting on Monday and the doctor's office to open for an OT therapy order. Meanwhile, I'll wiggle my dance in my chair and stretch my shoulder and elbow. Happy, excited, and once again filled with hope at the possibilities.