Sunbeams

I’ve had my issues with depression creeping in, making me feel like all I want to do is sleep. Sitting here waiting, attached to my house via a 50-foot plastic leash blowing oxygen up my nose at two liters per minute, is not something I envisioned for myself at 41. I get frustrated easily, to the point of wanting to throw something or scream profanity, and have found my mental clarity diminished. It’s not at the point where I need or even want to take medication, because I still find enjoyment in my days.  

Today I had lunch with another nurse friend who I hadn’t seen in over two months since I went on leave. She brought her little dog with her and we went to a local Vietnamese restaurant which has become our usual spot. Usually we go there to relax after crazy days at work, and this time we laughed about the fact that we were just there to enjoy, not to destress. We had fried calamari and shrimp paste spring rolls (they were as funky as they sound), and boba teas which were refreshing on a beautiful sunny and breezy day.  

I had a million blood tests run last week, and it was found that my Vitamin D levels were about 15, when normal levels are 30-100. I rationalized that I have been inside for the majority of the past several months, with two straight weeks spent in a hospital room. Today was the first day that I’ve sat in the sun and wow, was it glorious. I almost immediately turned pink, thanks to that wonderful Irish-Great Britain genepool, but it was wonderful. I came home afterwards and went straight out onto the balcony to sit in the sun some more. Interestingly, I felt better within a few minutes of being in the sun today.  

I’ve started taking Vitamin D supplements upon the advice of my physician, but just being outside is definitely more healing in more ways than one. I believe that this funk may be partially attributed to the inside lifestyle I’ve been leading. Staying inside is just going to make it worse. My plastic leash reaches out to the balcony with miles to spare, so I plan on making a date with myself to sit out in the afternoon sun and breeze and enjoy. I have one of those recliners that I bought on sale (and with a coupon!) at Bed, Bath, & Beyond, and I have a little table out on the balcony. My cat, Bandit, joined me for a while and sat contently in my lap watching the birds in the tree right outside. There was the normal noise of people coming home from work, but no loud noises at all. The hum from the street across the canyon was actually relaxing, like white noise. I brought my glass of water and some cantaloupe out with me, and simply was.  

 

My dad and every cat I know enjoy a good sunbeam. I need to listen to them more.

Even though I’m by myself a lot, I have decided to make dates with myself on a more frequent basis. I’m blogging or writing or doing a bit of cleaning here and there, but I don’t just spend quality time with me. Watching bad daytime television doesn’t count. Today, while I was with my cat on the balcony, I was able to let my thoughts wander where they wanted to, and feel my skin warmed with sunlight. I haven’t reconnected with nature in a very long time, I realized. I don’t know how many oxygen tanks I would need for that, but I do know that, as soon as I possibly can, I’m going to get back into the trees away from electronics and life’s daily drivel. 

With that, I appreciate all of you who have kept me chipper and listened to me rant and dragged me outside of my abode for meals and camaraderie. Thank you.

 

 

Mutant Plantain

I don't know if I've never noticed these things before or else I've come to notice them now as partners in my #SuperMutantNurse life. I saw this guy hanging out in  Sprouts yesterday and wanted to document him for posterity. He's pretty buff, huh?

Healthcare Weirdness - A Rant

I know I’ve waxed poetic about the status of healthcare here in the United States, however I was reminded of how lucky we are here in this country. As many problems as we have, what I heard today was indicative of the differences in other countries.

I was having breakfast with a friend, and she was telling me about some experiences that family and friends had in Canada. Imagine having a TIA, known as a mini-stroke, and being sent home from the hospital with orders to follow up with your general physician. No aspirin or blood thinning medication or consult to neurologists, just “follow up with your doctor in a few weeks.” My hospital would scan your head and run extensive testing, if not sending you immediately to have a procedure to clear up the blockage. Then you’d be an inpatient on a stroke floor. Hell, I’m on prophylactic medication twice a day to help prevent a problem.

My friend’s mom also went into the emergency room (in Canada) for rapid atrial fibrillation. This means that the upper chambers of her heart were not beating properly, which can cause clots to form in the heart. The heart also works harder and doesn’t push the blood around as it should. Her mother was discharged on one medication without any further admission or cardiology consults. Instead, there were orders to follow up with a cardiologist in a few months. My hospital would admit someone with rapid a-fib to at least a telemetry unit to have their heart monitored, if not right into the intensive care unit on cardiac drips (IV medications). Instead, my friend’s mom was shown the door.

Surgeries in Canada evidently take months to schedule, and simply seeing a physician often means lengthy waits which lead to poorer outcomes. I know that we have patients in the U.S. who refuse to come in until things are literally falling off of them, because they don’t want to halt their lives or admit that they haven’t watched their health. It’s sad, isn’t it? While I’m sitting here waiting for my insurance to clear all of the tests and procedures that I need, I know it will happen in a few weeks if not days. I was shocked to hear what I was hearing.

Waiting is hard, especially when you don’t feel well or want to return to your lifestyle. We need to have a look to see what is really going on in our healthcare systems. Our people in this world are becoming more and more unhealthy, even if they try to change their eating habits or ramp up the exercise. There are limited physicians and even less nurse practitioners able to practice independently. Our world is consumed with charting and such a fear of legal ramifications that we can’t treat people, and we sure don’t have much time to give them preventative education!

I’d like to hear from anyone in countries outside of the United States, and even those of you in the U.S. What have you seen that you believe hampers the people’s wellness? What have you seen that has impressed you about your healthcare system?

Insomnia is such a pretty word

Here we are again, at 2:08 in the morning. I'm grateful for the Bluetooth keyboard I have on this iPad because I wasn't in the mood to fire up the ol' dinosaur of a laptop. The only issue with this thing is that the backspace key is about four millimeters wide and my fingernails are too long. So I'm typing a lot of "====" and then have to squint at the keyboard. But it's a neat little thing so I shouldn't complain.

I've already read through more than half of my friend Dustin's new book, "And the Devil Shivered." It's nestled on my Kindle between another friend Kelly's book of poems "My Own Kind of Beautiful" and "See You in the CCU," a tale by Steve Ludwig about his experience with open heart surgery. I also have 50 Shades of Grey on there, as well as three or four books on the Mediterranean diet, so my reading tastes are pretty eclectic. 

I've set aside Dustin's book for now as I've found myself squawking with laughter in between tearing up with heartfelt emotion - I'm so glad he opened himself up to us by writing every day. He's a treasure and I encourage anyone and everyone to get his book. And Kelly's, too. Her poems will grab you... For me, I immediately felt as if she was a kindred spirit speaking to me directly in her poems about infertility. Both of these fine people I've met through Twitter; I had the fortune to meet Dustin a few years ago during a trip to the beautiful Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado. You may recognize it from "The Shining" which is a terrifying novel by Stephen King made into a movie. In the novel/movie, it was referred to as The Overlook, however Mr. King was inspired by the Stanley during a stay there. I really have gone off on a tangent, there. Twitter has brought a lot of really good people into my life, and I'm very grateful for all of them. We're spread all over the country and the world, and sometimes it feels as if they're right there in the room with me, especially when I really need a friend. What blessings.

I don't know about you all, but I really enjoy watching infomercials at night. There's something soothing about watching women drag a heated brush through their hair, or watching a miracle vacuum lift a bowling ball into a tube of feathers. I was stuck on this one commercial for IT Cosmetics Bye-Bye Foundation so ended up buying a set to try. I'm pretty happy with it. I have thin dark skin under my eyes and this stuff works well to hide the appearance of chronic insomnia. The mascara in the set makes my scraggly eyelashes appear to be even scragglier, however I also invested in Younique fiber lashes and they're fantastic for making me look like I have lashes at all.

Here's this lady on the television who must be wearing about seventy pounds of diamond jewelry. How is that comfortable at all? I don't like wearing much jewelry, maybe some small earrings or a necklace that belonged to my sister. I will be writing about her soon... I've been missing her a lot lately and it's comforting to me to wear her jewelry or something else that belonged to her. Right now it's a pair of Halloween pajama pants with sock monkeys on them. 

The other day when I was at my folks' house, my Dad and I noticed that a pair of doves had relocated to one of the planters on my parents' back patio. Usually this upsets the parents due to the amount of "splatter" residue left on the sliding door, but this planter was more off to the side. I peeked into the plant and saw that Mama and Papa Dove had already made quite an establishment within the planter, so set big brown puppy dog eyes on my Dad and asked him if we could leave the nest in. Yes, even though I'm 41 years old, the ol' eyes still have it. Dad relented and now the folks have Mama and Papa Dove happily nested in a geranium outside the window. Today I heard Papa Dove cooing loudly, and looked outside to see him standing proudly on the edge of the patio cover while Mama Dove was comfy in her nest. It was really a beautiful sight and one I was grateful to witness. Remember when I talked about the little things a few days ago? That's one of the little things.

I've been thinking a lot about writing a book. I really don't know what the subject matter would be; maybe there wouldn't be subject matter. I love writing short stories based off of prompts, and writing my dreams and whatever the hell may be going through my mind, as obviously evidenced by this ridiculous blog post. I imagine the insomnia will be a "thing" every once in awhile and I might as well make use of that time. I'm not a parent and I don't know about how great my self-help jive is, so if you all had any ideas, toss them my way. I usually get great ideas from readers and friends, and am happy to oblige opinions. 

Until next time, readers... For now, I'm going to readjust the oxygen tubing so I don't strangle myself, and try to get some sleep in before my doc appointment tomorrow. I hope you all have a great Tuesday. Stay out of trouble, and stay away from pre-verts. :-)

#LoveAndLight

(One of those coloring book apps... Also good for wasting time.)

Eggless Mocha Almond Cookies

I love baking, especially biscotti. My dad is a huge fan of my biscotti, so I wanted to make him some today. It was going great until I figured out that I had no eggs in the house, and none of the usual substitutions.

Well, crap.

I decided to wing it, and threw a bunch of stuff into my KitchenAid stand mixer (I love this thing, so so much.) The cookies turned out great, and I wanted to get the recipe down, as much as I can remember anyways.

Mocha Almond Cookies (Eggless)

2 cups white all-purpose flour

¾ cup white sugar

1 stick softened butter (I used salted, as I always do)

6 tablespoons brewed coffee (thank you, Keurig)

¼ teaspoon baking soda

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla

¾ cup slivered almonds

½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

1 tablespoon instant coffee granules

• Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.      
•  In a bowl, or stand mixer, mix together butter and sugar until it’s fluffy.
• Add in instant coffee and stir until evenly mixed
• Add vanilla, baking soda, and baking powder – mix for several seconds until combined
• Add flour and mix
• Add in brewed coffee one tablespoon at a time until the dough starts to stick together. This was about 6 tablespoons for me.
• Add chocolate chips and almonds and combine until you don’t have a pile of either on the bottom of the bowl (you know what I mean.)
• Use a small ice cream or melon ball scoop (or two spoons, or your hands) to make even cookies. 
• Bake at 350 for about 12 minutes. The cookies will be ridiculously squishy at first, but let them sit for about 20 minutes and they will firm up. They’ll still be nice and soft in the center. Dad described it as “fluffy.” So good!
• This recipe yielded about 20 medium-sized cookies.
  

Om nom nom....

Here is the biscotti recipe from Giada that I've modified to my heart's content, just in case you were interested. :-)