Mamarati

So, I forgot to mention in my last post… so far, I’ve had luck drinking a gigantic glass of water right before I go to bed. Then I wake up naturally in this gentle way about 3 hours after I fall asleep because I need to go to the bathroom. I realize then that my eyelid is stuck to my eyeball and I keep a bunch of vials of the Bion Tears by my bed. I fumble around for those and it usually takes a full vial between both eyes. I gently spread it around my lids and put the slightest pressure on my eyes to open until they come open without tearing anything.

Then I go to the bathroom and drink another big glass of water and repeat the process again 3 hours later. It helps me stay hydrated, too, which is just one contributing factor with the dry eyes.

I’m waking up about every 3 hours, but since I’m just getting my eyes to open and then going to the bathroom it doesn’t seem that disruptive to my sleep and I’m still having plenty of dream time.

I’m also taking 1mg of melatonin before bed to help conquer the anxiety / insomnia cycle I’ve got going. It helps a lot. I find I’m not laying in bed in a panic, fighting sleep.

I read over my words in these eye-related posts and find it’s just so strange that something can come along and have such an impact… turn your every day and night into something it wasn’t before.

I was thinking about this and how much my arm injury changed my life for a while. I was trying to remember what my life was like right after it happened… I was trying to remember dinner, what did I eat? How did my boyfriend manage everything? We (mostly he) did some pretty major cleaning this weekend. It’s not like I’m the best housekeeper, because I’m not. I think I’m missing the gene that sees things like dust… But after the arm incident I couldn’t even open the toothpaste, much less operate a vacuum or a broom. Still, more than a year later, using the vacuum tires me quickly and makes my arm hurt for days.

So, I was trying to remember cleaning during that time. Cooking. Anything that I did. I couldn’t even dress myself. I couldn’t dry myself when I got out of the tub. Hell, I couldn’t even bathe for the longest time. More than a month, I guess it was. Jacob stayed with his dad most of that time. I was taking so much pain medication. I slept day and night. I guess I was really only awake a few hours a day. Mostly what I remember about that time is the cat. She never left me. Ever present, curled up on my chest or right on top of my injured arm… she was there with me almost every hour. Crazy cat.

I wanted to write more about everything going on then, but I couldn’t type for so long and any energy I had I used to do the handwriting recognition so I could do what I needed at work. Then I was zapped and would just crash again. I had so much to say about what was going on, though. The frustration and uncertainty of it all. I had so many fears about how much use I was going to get out of my hand and arm. At the time, the nerves in my hand were completely shot and I could hardly move or feel my fingers… It was really scary.

But now… even though there are still lots of problems and I can’t sleep the way I once did and there is pain and all those things… I have an arm and hand that both work. And all that fear and anxiety were for nothing. Even if I didn’t have working bits, what good would all the fear and anxiety have done?

I wish I could keep that in mind now. That yes, this thing is turning my life upside-down right now and I’m having to take lots of measures all day and all night long and it’s a pain in the ass and it’s painful and it’s affecting me greatly… And it could affect my vision and change things even more… Still, what good does it do me to have all this worry?

I go to the doctor tomorrow. I really just want to relax between now and then. I’m worried he’s going to tell me that it’s not healing well and who knows what the next course of action will be… I’m worried he’s going to be upset that two other doctors have stepped in and maybe have done things that he wouldn’t have done. I can’t really help that, however, since he wasn’t available and I wasn’t in a position to wait for treatment. I’m also concerned that while my cornea issues are being addressed, the underlying problem (in my opinion) has not been addressed at all beyond “drops.” The dry eye problem needs more aggressive treatment, I feel. There’s no end to that and I just have this feeling that no matter how many times they scrape or zap my cornea, it’s going to happen again because my eyes are so dry and they resist hydration so completely.

But, you know, who am I to say?

(Yeah, right. I’ll be saying plenty.)

In other news, I am not eating beef any more. I keep saying I’m going to swear it off… each and every recall just adds to that resolve. I just can’t take the thought of it any longer.

The cat is circling my chair… guess she needs a lap / nap.