Sunday Stroke Survival: The Pity Pot

Are you on the self-pity pot again?! I'm on again and off again these days. It seems that nothing is going my way again. I kick myself from time to time about my first stroke. Especially when I read statistics like 80% of all ischemic strokes are preventable.

Did I really do this to myself? Why did I play Russian Roulette with my way of life? Didn't I know that my combined family history was slap full with other relatives with this catastrophic condition? Didn't I know the risk factors like obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, and smoking? Yes, I sure did. So why am I kicking myself six years later? I asked for it, didn't I? I sure wasn't living the 20%.

Hindsight is 20/20. I can really do a number on myself when I get in this kind of mood. So why am I sitting on the pity pot. I got what I deserved, didn't I? But even people who don't have these risk factors have strokes. There is only so much medicine can do after the fact and every day that passes the odds of recovery slips a little farther away.

Normally, I can get outside and do something, but it's really rainy and wet right now. Too wet to do anything even in the breaks between hard showers. We are going on the third day of rain here which makes matters worse. I've already completed 99% of the busy work that needs done so my brain slips into the doldrums. I used to write away on rainy days. That ability is gone. That's my problem, a too active brain. Without activities to keep me occupied, my thoughts turn inward. My favorite/most hated boredom pastime is kicking myself when I'm down. Nobody does it better than I can. Isn't that true for most of us? Living post stroke is so much fun, isn't it? Everyone needs extra challenges in their lives. Let's have some real fun and have a stroke, or two, or if you are a real overachiever like me...three.

Depressed yet? Me too.

Snap out of it, Jo! Your readers want solutions, up beat blogs, and inspiration.

Okay, what can I say here. Hm, zero, zip, zilch is coming to me. I'm thinking harder. The rain is good for the garden. It has rained in a week, and you did say it needed to rain instead of having to water it all. No? Hmm, thinking harder. You could talk about how much your back ached picking 10 lbs of bush green beans this week and how you should have planted them in an elevated raised bed to make it easier. No, readers are tired of reading about the garden. Hmmm, thinking of another subject. How delicious your Cherokee tomatoes were that you sliced for dinner the other night. No, that's more gardening stuff. Something about surviving and living post stroke.

Nope. Nothing comes to mind. Well, I tried. Sorry y'all. The weather report shows these showers moving off tomorrow. Thank God! Nothing like getting out into sunshine to get off the pity pot for me. In the mean time, I'm going to get up and do the 1% I haven''t done yet... put clean sheets on my bed, and put on some music and dance with the vacuum cleaner a bit. If nothing else, I'll start tomorrow with a clean slate.

Nothing is impossible.

 

Sunday Stroke Survival: Canning Post Stroke, My Take

I've always been an avid food preserver. I was proud of the way I was providing for my family and saving money at the same time. My pantry, under the beds, and even closets were full of food stuff I needed. This was especially true when I had little ones around. Every penny saved counted.

After the children were grown, my thinking partially shifted to the importance of not eating genetically modified foods, over fertilized and pesticized foods  and additives. My allergies wouldn't allow it. Not that this wasn't important for my growing children, but it was more about quantity versus quality. GMOs didn't exist when my children were growing up. Oh heck, that still didn't come out right, but you know what I mean, right?

Canning is easier these days without kids at home. First, there are no distractions. No seeing where the children are before lifting the lid or moving hot jars. No "Whatcha doing? Can I help." No squabbling about "John's piece of peach is bigger than mine!" !"or "Eww! there's skin on mine" I had some strange kids, but I loved it. They would forego the dessert bar and head for the fruit bar in restaurants with no prompting from me. Except for maybe ice cream, they preferred fresh fruit. Now, the vegetables or fruits that I can may have little pieces of skin left on them. I'm not so careful peeling anything so every smidgen of edible product goes into the jar. If the size of the cuts are different who really cares. We are all adults here.

Organic foods were very pricey and hard to come by so I gardened. I knew where my food came from and how they were grown. It would be heirloom or organically grown without scarcity or high price, and it was healthy for all of us. But, I had to eat without having severe allergic reactions. Canning, dehydrating, and freezing only made sense and cents. I still got hormones and stuff from meat products, but it didn't overload my histamines with the organic vegetables. At least, it was marginally successful. It's hard when you are not allergic to only strawberries, corn, and pine but show allergic tendencies to everything else.

Fast forward to today, I still organic garden. I still preserve my own food. When you garden it's a  feast or famine type of existence unless you preserve your harvest. But living post stroke has its challenges in this area, but not over not impossible.

It takes extra steps to can vegetables and meats. Pressure canners are heavy and lifting it one-handed while empty is a cumbersome process, but once it's on the stove, it gets easier. I'll set up my canner and assorted pots the night before a canning day. This way I'm not having to expend energy on canning days. During the summer and fall harvest times, my canner lives on my stove empty or full.

Canning day  step by step...

1. The day before-Gather canning supplies- pots on the stove, prep as many vegetables as I can. Fill the required amounts of liquid in the canner and pots. My 23-qt pressure canner takes 2 gallons of water to get the required 2"-3" water level. Now my water bath canner takes 5 gallons. That's a lot of back and forth to the faucet. But there is no way I can lift the canners with water in them one- handed. Not without spilling water everywhere.
2. Put jars, rings, and lids in my dishwasher. Mine is an older model and it takes 2 hours to run a full cycle with drying time.
3. Continue prepping vegetables to can. This can take an hour to half a day depending on the recipe and amounts to be canned.
4. Gather all the other canning supplies ladles, measuring cups and spoons, canning funnel, air debubblers stick (a wooden chopstick), and magnetic lid lifter. Pour vinegar (3 ozs) into my Mom's Japanese tea cup to clean rims with. The balance of this vinegar will be poured into the canner to soften any minerals in the water. About two or more paper towel folded to clean the rims with. Gather any spices or herbs that I need for the recipe. Double check my math when I'm halving or quadrupling the recipe.
5. Make my brine or fluid mixture and cook it as necessary. I make two recipes worth at a time for large batch canning.
6. If I'm small batching water bath canning, I'll use my largest pot for up to six jars instead of my enamel water bath canner. For my water bath canner I've replaced the rack with a standard rack. It's easier to lift each jar out one at a time instead of how I'd have to lift on handle of the canning rack and then do the other side.The jars don't tilt and they seal better. The canner will hold 12 jars instead of 7. I have used the standard canning rack and lifted and lowered the rack with a long 1" dowel rod, but this way is easier.
7. Process and removing jars from canner.
8. Cleaning up is the reverse of the set up. All small ware:measuring cups and spoons, canning equipment, bowls or buckets for ingredients, etc wash first. There isn't a dishwasher made except commercial ones that can handle canners so this will be washed by hand after emptying the canner water out one jug at a time. Dry and put away until next time.

The prep work and canning take twice as long working one-handed. I was lamenting to my roommate

that it took me all day Friday to do 18 pint jars of sliced peaches, when I could have done 18 qt jars before my stroke. All the peeling and slicing of the peaches (1/2 a bushel worth) took me 12 hours! She told me, "At least you could do it." Yes I did it. Talk about your words coming back to bite you on the hinny.

The next day, Saturday, I did 7 jars of zucchini pickle relish and 8 jars of bread and butter pickles. I put the cucumbers, zucchini, and bell peppers into the ice chest with salt, water and ice to hang out overnight. I prepped all the vegetables while I was canning the peaches. I chopped the Vidala onions, zucchini, and green pepper chunks to go into the relish while the pickles were in the water bath. The Vidala onions chopper to the rescue once again. I love my slap chopper. It made small dicing the 10 baby zucchini (4"-6" long), 2 Vidala onions and the pepper a breeze!

Then it was on to prep the bushel of green beans. I grow Provider bush green beans because they don't have strings. Just the idea of having to string green beans one-handed is stuff for nightmares for me. Prepping them is simply snapping off the ends and snapping them into pieces. Easy to do one-handed. The beans are thick and meaty versus the kind you find usually canned or find fresh in the grocery store. But after snapping the bushel ( 2-3 gallon buckets full of snaps) one-handed my fingers and thumb were sore. I ended up with 48 jars of green beans in my weekend canning session. With what I had in my pantry from last year, we can now eat green beans once a week for a year...next harvest season. That's without me canning any more. It's only the beginning of the green bean harvest for the year. I'm hoping for eating green beans twice a week, but I doubt I'll reach my dreamed of goal.

Although it only takes 20 minutes to can green beans, they have to be pressure canned which means raising the temperature (15 minutes), vent steam for ten minutes, then, the pressure based on altitude (15 lbs of pressure for us -about 20 minutes), processing, and finally bringing the pressure back down again.After this last wait, two hours, the liquid in the jars is still boiling away. Remove the jars and start again for the next batch of 21 jars. I did 3 canner loads of green beans over the weekend. I never run a half filled canner. I'll fill the space with soaked dried beans or other vegetable.

After the jars sit on the breakfast room table for twenty-four hours, I'll remove the retaining rings, wash each jar, label it, and put them back into their original boxes for Mel to carry out to the pantry. While I could do this, I make Mel work for her food. LOL I now use Avery freeware to print my labels on the jars instead of hand writing with a Sharpie because I want to read it months from now. I'll add the jars to Mel's inventory program so I can keep track of what I've processed. Then I'm done until next time.

The next huge canning day will be tomatoes. I see at least a bushel worth hanging on the plants now,Tomato sauce and canned tomatoes here I come, Then it's BBQ sauce, sloppy Joe's sauce, pizza sauce, salsa, and Ketchup. Oh boy!

Nothing is impossible.

Sunday Stroke Survival: You're Just Old Fashioned

I received an email last week that called my thinking  "old fashioned." Well, I do say..."agree, disagree, indifferent...no matter" above the comments so I asked for it. My first thought when I read this wasn't anger, but I thought, Oh, thank you! Yes, as a Christian, I'm wired differently.  I also do tend to hold my opinions until I get the whole story. It could have been worse. They simply could have called me  an old fart. Wait a minute. I call myself that all the time here. I tend to keep Louisa May Alcott's words close~ as if it was engraved on my soul.  

 "Good, old-fashioned ways keep hearts sweet, heads sane, hands busy."

Living post stroke,  I tend to simplify my life and don't sweat the small stuff with a this-to-shall-pass attitude for the most part. Stressing only makes the frustration and situation worse. I am what I am. I'm old enough not to have to prove anything to anyone. The fact that I've always thought this way is besides the point.

Credit

I tend to be hard working and soft hearted. That's just me. Even post stroke, not a day goes by when I'm not in the garden or orchard pushing my limited body to the collapsing point. Why? I feel the need to do so. I'm not the type of person who looks at a challenge and says I can't do that any more. After all, who knows what they are really capable of if they don't try?

Millions of people out there want to write a book and never do. Be it nonfiction or  a novel. I've done both.  I haven't written anything new in over six years besides these blog posts. I still get monthly royalty checks for my self published works even after all this time has passed. The point is, I did it. It was hard learning a new skill set, but I wasn't afraid to try.

Living post stroke every day is challenging under normal circumstances. Even getting out of bed in the morning isn't without its problems. Taking on the daily tasks of homesteading is borderline insanity, but they haven't come to take me away to the funny farm yet. Wait, is that an ambulance I hear? Nah, it's just Lil Red, the rooster, crooning to his ladies.  Darn, it sure sounded like an ambulance though. Whew, I was worried for a minute. 

This was my dream and strokes fall into the fiery pit, I'm going to get my dream. I'll admit my choice is not everyone's, but it's mine. Be it an old fashioned ideal or just insanity, I'll own it.

Maybe I am old fashioned in my thinking. I find new uses for items rather than fill the landfills with it. I expect quality workmanship for my bucks. I used to say in writers circles that I had 'made in Japan' stamped on my butt with pride. My mother sewed on a Toyota sewing machine for 40 years before I got it.  I relearned how to spin, after my strokes, on my great grandmother's spinning wheel.  I believe in giving 110% to anything I've committed to. I give more than I'll ever get back. Not that I do it for that reason. I believe all life has a purpose. I dislike this disposable mentality of people these days. If it's broke buy a new one instead of trying to fix it. I believe, as the Bible says, to treat everyone as you would want to be treated and love one another. I believe in quality of life not quantity. If you really want to do something or be something in your life, you don't need a bucket list, you fulfill that desire. Even after my strokes, when my all rights I should have given up my dream of a more self sufficient lifestyle, I didn't and found a way to have it.

Old fashioned? Why, thank you and you betcha! I'll take that compliment even though you didn't mean it as such.

Nothing is impossible.

Sunday Stroke Survival: Is Fear Holding You Back?

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned about fear holding me back from having surgery sooner. I also posted this picture with it. The words are actually words to a song. If you listen to a Christian radio station, you might have heard it. Zach Williams, the artist who recorded this song, has a couple of songs which hit home for me. I'll post both the songs that spurned me into action and this one later in this blog.

This song strengthens my resolve to continue waiting for the surgeries that may fix the spasticity and the pain that accompanies it. These three lines of this song reminds me that God is in control.  Theodore Roosevelt said it best when he said, "Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty" even waiting.

But waiting isn't without its own trials. Fear creeps back in. Is this interminable wait because it's the wrong decision? This is the biggest one for me because I'm always questioning my decisions. Yes, you are not the only one thinking this in whatever choice you make. Conquering the effects of pain from the spasticity on my body and on the emotional front is another huge trial. The spasticity in my arm causes my trapezius muscles in both shoulders to strain causing unbelievable headaches, and my spine to contort as I try to find comfort. Which, in turn, causes more muscle aches from poor posture. But the worst, is Mel asking me all the time, "What's wrong? Are you mad at me?" Because my happy, smiling demeanor has changed to a frown or scowl most days because I'm dealing with this pain. I actually look haggard and tired as I go about my daily routine. I find myself doing the bare minimum to get by which is totally out of character for me.

Combating these fears and concerns is exhausting! A small voice keeps reminding me that God is in control and He has not forsaken me. Thus fear is abated for a time, but it returns. Yes, even for me a minister, it does so don't beat yourself up about it. Hey, I'm only human! God understands this through Christ.

In the previous blog, I mentioned my fear of dying as a reason for not coming to a decision sooner. You have to admit that there's not much worse than death. Although, some people say death would be easier than living post stroke. I don't feel that way. Now after years, first with the Fibromyalgia  and in combination with the spasticity, I can honestly see their point. Don't worry. I still don't have a death wish. At what point does your desire to be pain free overrides your chance of death? I reached that point, and then some.

 So what is fear holding you back from doing?

Now as promised above the two songs that spurned me to action and give me the strength. Enjoy. May they touch your soul as they did mine.

Nothing is impossible.

Sunday Stroke Survival: Why Can't Jo Read?

You may have seen this is grade school. After a stroke, the ability to read and comprehend what you are reading might be impaired. It is for me. It can get very frustrating at times.

Reading used to be fun. I did it to relax. I did it to educate myself. I did it to be transported to another time or place. Although I dudn't do well in school grade wise in this subject. I loved to read anything I could get my hands on. This was encouraged by my parents and my librarian grandmother. I guess that, in part, is why I became an author. To not only read but create reading material.


Amazingly enough, I can read scholarly text with no impairment. I can enjoy researching and Dean's Stroke Musing because of this ability. It's funny how some abilities are affected by a stroke while others are left intact. In a way, it adds to my frustration. I can decode words to where they make sense to my stroke addled brain, but certain comprehension is lost. I have a memory and dyslexia type impairment when I read now. Reading is no longer fun, but HARD WORK. I often have to read through a passage three or four times to understand what is written. This is why I strictly read nonfiction now. When compounded with any sense of a time crunch, I can't read with any comprehension other than a gist of what was read or skimming where I understand a few key words.

For example, McDonald's recently changed there menu board. The Quarter Pounder with cheese is now a double Quarter Pounder with cheese. I was at the drive-thru,  ordered what I thought was a Quarter Pounder with cheese and another one for my roommate. What I got was a double Quarter Pounder and a regular one. I usually order one meal and two sandwiches. The drink is for me for the ride home. We split the fries between us and Dervish, the cat. Neither of us could finish eating the double Quarter Pounder. My brain skipped over the word "double." What a waste of money and food.

There's no joy or relaxing when reading now. I have to be alert to understand what I'm reading. There is no relaxing because I'm having to concentrate so hard to comprehend. It's hard to be transported to another place and time, when your feet are firmly planted in the here and now. So I read task oriented nonfiction rather than memoirs. Subjects like straw bale gardening and natural sourced dyes for example. I can read them over and over until the comprehension circumnavigates around the black, dead areas of my brain. But, even this is not without its frustration points. It takes time to read books an average of three times for this to happen. I have to really want to know this information to put forth this amount of effort. I have to admit that my library card is not used as much as it once was.

I fair a little bit better with audio books. My phonographic memory is showing signs of returning. At least the comprehension is better than reading words. I lost my kindle reader in my move up to north Georgia. It wasn't a Fire but it would read to me. I'll have to replace it. But even with the kindle, fiction was still a no go. Too many characters occurring too far apart. I just can't hold them in my memory even after six years of working on my recall abilities. Try as I might, I can only recall two out of three items. Characters even in audio are lost in the quagmire in my brain unless brought forward by rewinding to where I last heard or seen them.

Jo can read, but it's selective. My last stroke did a number on my reading comprehension, but I can read. I just choose not to read much and that's very, very sad. Still, I keep at it and try. That's all I can do until the brain learns to reroute my ability or I recover it.

Nothing is impossible.