#WeekendCoffeeShare (March 11, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare today. I’m very early by my standards, having just had my afternoon coffee. I probably won’t finish this post till early evening though, since it’s nearly 3PM and I’m allowed another activity hour at 3:30. The coffee maker broke down last week. Then we got a new one yesterday – a really fancy one that can work with beans -, but it broke down today. Thankfully, the Senseo coffee maker still works. Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, I’d first ask about your weather. We got snow this week. Like actual snow that remained on the ground. Yesterday was cold and snowy and icy. The rest of the week was mostly cloudy with some rain. Today is okay. We even got a little sunshine and the temperature climbed to 7°C.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I finally decided to contact an independent client supporter re my care situation on Tuesday. These are not affiliated with the care agency, but can help clients with their care plan or finding the right care. The person I spoke to on the phone, asked me a few questions and then would forward my info to a client supporter for my area. This person called me on Friday and we’ll have a phone appt on Wednesday. Unfortunately, somehow, her E-mail confirming the appt and giving me her details didn’t reach me, so I’m going to call her on Monday to let her know.

If we were having coffee, I’d let you all know I’ve decided a whole lot needs to happen if I want to actually stay at my current care home. After all, like I didn’t yet say in my previous coffee share post as I didn’t know back then but have written about since on the blog, the meeting between the behavior specialist, my assigned staff, mother-in-law and possibly me got canceled again on March 2 and has now been set for this coming Tuesday. Apparently, my support coordinator won’t be attending. However, since my last mentioning that I saw some potential for it to work out here and now, I’ve had a few really hard conversations with my assigned staff. These conversations made me feel as though there’s little or no room for improvement. In one of our last ones on my care situation, in which I’d pointed this out, she suggested I go back to living with my husband. This would have been an understandable question from someone who has no clue about my care needs. I’m in fact half expecting this question from the client supporter too. However, my assigned staff should know better. The fact that she – one of the staff who’s most accommodating to my needs – asked this question, to me underlines the fact that this care home’s staff are either clueless or careless about my needs, possibly both. I mean, she meant well and didn’t mean to push me. She said that, while living with my husband would no doubt be hard, so is living here for me. Her reasoning also was that, if she were to marry someone, she’d do so with the intention of living with them. Well, our intention for marriage was to prove to each other that we want to remain a couple for life, nothing more, nothing less.

If we were having coffee, I’d share that once again my exercising has declined over the past week. I in part blame the weather. However, yesterday I took up the courage and went up to another client’s room to ask her and her staff whether I could go on her stationary bike. Turns out it’s not her stationary bike at all, but the home’s. I went on the bike for only eight minutes (and four seconds, to be exact 😉). Today, I did go for two longer walks, totaling 73 exercise minutes on my Apple Watch.

If we were having coffee, lastly I’d tell you I’ve picked up soap making again. My soaps aren’t great so far. I made a simple butterfly soap on Thursday fragranced with lemon and pink grapefruit essential oils. Yesterday, I made another butterfly with lavender and ylang ylang essential oils, but decided to add some mica powder too as a colorant. However, I had no idea yet how to add micas to melt and pour soap, so messed it up quite a bit by adding way too much mica and also adding it to a white rather than clear soap base, among other things. I guess one never stops learning.

How have you been?

#WeekendCoffeeShare (February 4, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare today, even though I’ve long had my last cup of coffee for the day. No soft drinks or vitamin water for me today either. In fact, I actually now realize I forgot to ask my one-on-one staff for chips this evening, which we usually get on Saturdays. Oh well, the scale will thank me (I hope). Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, first I’d confess that I still write “2022” rather than “2023” as the title of my coffee share posts and other dated posts regularly. I don’t think I did this for so long during previous years, but “2022” comes out so easily. Oh well.

If we were having coffee, I’d ask about your weather. Ours has been mixed. Early in the week, we had some rain, but later, we’ve had nice winter weather. Daytime temperatures have usually been at about 8°C.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that, yesterday, I got in almost two hours of exercise according to my Apple Watch, most walking and a little dancing. “Dancing”, in my book, is usually just walking with some arm swaying to the tune of some upbeat music. I got in over 13K steps. Today, I got in nearly 11K steps too.

If we were having coffee, I would share that, like I said in my post on Wednesday, the home’s kitchen renovations are over with. On Thursday, the living room furniture got moved back to its proper place. I notice I was almost used to the temporary arrangement.

If we were having coffee, I would proudly announce that the theme for this month’s challenge in the Dutch polymer clay Facebook group is unicorns. It was chosen in part by me. I am looking forward to showing the blue unicorn that’s been waiting to be cured in the oven since Tuesday.

After all, like I said last week, someone from that group sent me some Hotfix rhinestones to try to decorate my clay sculptures with. When they arrived on Tuesday, I immediately tried them on the blue unicorn. I can’t wait to show her, the group and the world. Let’s hope the rhinestones won’t fall off.

If we were having coffee, lastly I would tell you that I had another nice visit from my mother-in-law on Tuesday. We went to Burger King to have lunch. Our food was lukewarm by the time it arrived, but that’s almost to be expected with burger chains these days. We also went to an arts and crafts store, but I decided not to buy anything, as I was rather overloaded already.

See, I did it: I created a coffee share post without complaining about my care home situation. It isn’t because it’s better. Well, today is a pretty good day for once. Let’s celebrate that and be thankful. But still all please pray I can get out of here.

My Hopes for 2023

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and a happy 2023 to you all! Regular readers of my blog know that I don’t do resolutions or new year’s goals. Instead, I call them hopes. Whether that isn’t just the exact same but worded slightly euphemistically, is up for debate. However, I found that, many years ago, when I did lists of resolutions, they didn’t work out. Now that I call them “hopes”, I usually probably subconsciously stick to them more. I say this every year as an introduction to my hopes.

This year, I haven’t actually thought of many hopes I have. That is, I do hope to achieve many things, but secretly I do think my “hopes” do need to be somewhat realistic in order to make it onto my new year’s list. Doesn’t that make them just like goals? Oh well, I guess so. With no further ado, I’m just going to write down the things I hope to achieve in 2023.

1. Get to a healthy weight. I never dreamt of writing this when I started my healthier eating journey at the beginning of 2022, but I lost over 10kg in 2022 and I’m only 3kg above a healthy BMI now.

2. Keep up my movement routine. I have my movement goal on my Apple Watch set pretty low at 300 active calories a day. I’d really like to surpass it regularly.

I would also like to improve on the parameters of my physical fitness level, such as my heart rate variability. These are all really low right now.

I am hoping to start actually exercising in other ways besides walking. I’d love to start swimming here on institution grounds.

3. Get to a more stable place mentally. In 2022, I hoped to remain stable mental health-wise, which got ruined by my choice to move and its consequences. Now, I’m hoping to get back to a place of relative calm again.

4. Further lower my antipsychotic dosage. I really hope the move to my current care home doesn’t mean I’m on 25mg of aripiprazole forever.

5. Get to a meaningful day structure and day activities. Okay, I have the new day schedule, which is better than the one my support coordinator gave me, but it’s not what I’d hoped for when I came here. I am really hoping to explore day activities beyond my room, beyond 60 minutes at a time and beyond one-on-one.

6. Write regularly. This is another thing I was pretty awesome at in 2021, hoped to maintain in 2022 and lost track of due to the move. I even only wrote five blog posts during the month of November. I am really hoping to get back into the writing groove this year.

7. Further explore my creative side. I’d really like to find ways to do part of my polymer clay work independently, so that I can actually do more complicated things with my 60-minute time slots of supported activity.

8. Socialize more. This was one of the main reasons for the move, at least according to the behavior specialists involved. Indeed, it is a positive aspect of my current home that wasn’t there at my old home. I honestly don’t know whether I can socialize much with the people at my home, but I can at least try and, if that doesn’t work out, there are almost 400 other residents here at the main institution. I’d really love to talk to some of them more.

I’d also love to connect to my peers in the cerebral palsy community more. I’ll hopefully attend the countrywide cerebral palsy day again in April and also hopefully join the online meetings more often. I’m also hoping to get in touch with the Eye Association more. I know this was something I hoped to achieve in 2022 but didn’t.

9. Get serious about the basics of my faith. I had a discussion about faith with my husband yesterday and the bottom line was that I tried to run without having learned to crawl, so to speak, because I was watching John MacArthur videos, which are deeply theological, even though I’m really still a new believer. I mean, okay, I’ve been a Jesus follower for two years, but I’m still struggling with the basic concepts of the Christian faith. That’s probably why I call myself a “progressive Jesus follower” rather than unapologetically claiming my identity as a Christian. I really hope to move closer on my journey towards God in 2023.

I am linking this post up with today’s #JusJoJan post, for which the optional prompt word is “resolution”. I am thinking of writing another post about resolutions in a different sense, namely the Model European Parliament debating contest I participated in during high school. However, it’s past 9PM so I don’t think I’ll have the time or energy for another blog post.

TGIF: Walking and Crafting

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone on this third Friday of November. I’m joining Paula Light for TGIF. How is your day going? Mine’s almost over, as it is 9PM as I type this.

I had a pretty good day. Have had an okay week in general anyway. Finally got down to creating my first actual polymer clay piece here at the new care home, a flower. Creating this simple piece took me about 45 minutes yesterday, including gathering my supplies, watching the tutorial, conditioning the clay, etc. The piece nearly got ruined when the staff took it off the tile to transfer it to an oven-safe mat, but thankfully she was able to put it back together. I initially didn’t want to cure the clay because, once cured, if a piece is ugly beyond sanding/buffing, all you can do is throw it in the trash. However, after some thought, I decided I wanted something tangible to remember my first actual claying session in the new care home by.

As those who’ve seen my creations from back at the old care home, will know, this one can’t compare to those. However, I feel judging from the fact that I haven’t been actually working with clay in a long while, I did an okay job.

I also went on several walks this past week. Haven’t met my step goal, insofar as I have one – those who know the Apple Watch, know its movement goal is calorie-based, not step-based -, but I have been doing an okay job overall. My movement goal, by the way, is easy to reach. My exercise goal, not so much. My monthly goal for November on the Apple Watch is to reach my daily exercise goal 23 out of 30 days. I reached my monthly goals for September and October – different goals – with ease, but am struggling with this one, because walking and dancing are my only ways of exercising here now that I don’t have my elliptical anymore. I could cheat by starting some ball game workout when throwing a ball with my staff, but that’s not fair.

Overall, this week is going okay with respect to my care. A slightly modified version of the day schedule I mentioned last Saturday got shoved down my throat once again on Tuesday, but thankfully, most staff are willing to take it with a grain of salt (or a whole bucket of salt).

Unfortunately, the situation had to get worse over the weekend before it got slightly better and the slightly better (ie. an okay week this week) might just be chance. I won’t disclose details of the, in my opinion, unacceptable care I received over the weekend.

I talked to an independent mediator about my care situation today (this is not a secret, all staff know I did). I won’t disclose what exactly we discussed, but we’re hoping to resolve the difficult care situation as peacefully as possible.

Here’s hoping you’ll all have a good weekend.

Gratitude List (September 30, 2022) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Good morning everyone! I was up at 7AM today and am ready to blog. Today, I am writing a gratitude list. As usual, I’m joining in with Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT). Here goes.

1. I am grateful I was able to break the cycle of compulsive exercising before it got too bad. Last Saturday, I didn’t meet my exercise goal on my Apple Watch and, now that I didn’t have a perfect month anyway, I was able to let go of the need to meet all my goals everyday and just do what feels good.

2. I am grateful for my health. I’ve been having a sore throat for a week or so. It isn’t bad, just slightly annoying. In this regard, I am grateful I don’t have COVID. And yes, even though I don’t have any other symptoms, I took a test on Sunday just in case.

3. I am grateful for a comforting talk with the manager for my current care home. She was able to answer some of my more important questions about the new care home.

4. I am grateful my husband was content with the new care home and quite happy to see me move in there. In his own words, it is a “significant improvement” over my current care home.

5. I am grateful for muesli rolls. On Tuesday, we couldn’t find anything to eat for lunch that I like, so my staff offered to drive to the supermarket. I chose muesli rolls, which aren’t what I usually have. I am grateful my staff felt that these were within reason so the care facility would pay for them.

6. I am grateful for blueberries. On the same trip to the supermarket, we bought blueberries too. They were still reasonably priced even though I think blueberry season is over here.

7. I am grateful for the support of my staff as I navigate the stress of transferring to the new care home. I still had some worries on Wednesday and even on Thursday after I’d made my decision, but my staff are able to support me through them. So is the behavior specialist.

8. I am grateful my sister reacted positively to me moving to the main institution. She, in fact, said she will now be able to visit more often, as the main institution is close to Apeldoorn, where her in-laws live. She enthusiastically planned a first visit for October 8, the Saturday after I move in.

9. I am grateful for a somewhat relaxed text convo with my mother. I informed her that I’m moving, to which surprisingly she reacted pretty supportively. She did put in a few comments about the possibility that I could learn to walk around grounds on my own (which I might at some point, but it isn’t a given) and that I could help prepare food, but oh well. Both of these comments wouldn’t have bothered me had they not come from her, actually.

10. I am grateful for some weight loss when I stepped onto the scales today. I lost 0.3kg compared to last week, which is pretty much what I’d expected.

What are you grateful for?

Being Active Is Making Me Happy

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Today I want to share all about my active week. I have truly been enjoying my Apple Watch and seeing my stats go up as I move. And of course being physically active is helping me feel better too.

First, last week, my Apple Watch told me that based on my activity level of the week before, I could up my movement goal from 300 to 330 active calories a day. This week, despite my having surpassed that new goal every single day, the stupid watch told me to keep my goal the same. However, there was a reason I was going to get it back to 300, which I will get to in a bit.

However, I first need to tell you about my major accomplishment yesterday: a nature walk! My husband came by for a visit to have lunch at Subway. After that though, he drove to a nearby nature reserve, where we went for a 2.5km walk. Although I did have my Apple Watch as well as my iPhone with me, the stupid watch’s GPS probably didn’t work (or it’s broken altogether), so it didn’t register my walk as a workout. This means I cannot check details such as average speed, hills climbed, etc. My husband did check his Garmin app though and we’d walked pretty fast and climbed a few hills.

I did go for several more walks yesterday. In total, I got in 163 exercise minutes yesterday, all by walking. I got in 122 today so far, which honestly is quite fabulous if you ask me. This does include 18 minutes on the elliptlcal.

Now on to why I’ve lowered my movement goal to 300 active calories a day. I am participating in a weekday challenge on an app called Challenges, hosted by the admins of an Apple Watch-related fitness group on Facebook. In the app, you earn points based on completion of your fitness goals. To allow for fair competition, daily movement goals are allocated individually based on weight and mine was 300, because I weigh 150lbs. Honestly, I’m pretty content with my place in the competition so far. Obviously, since the weekday challenge lasts until Friday, a lot can still change.

I am loving being this active again. It gives me a true mood boost. Of course, my cardio fitness level is still low, but I don’t worry about it as much as I used to. My husband did also point out that smartwatches are mostly purchased by physically active people, so “low” according to Apple may not say much. I did notice that I was huffing from that nature walk, while my husband, despite recently recovering from COVID, had no problem with the walk. Then again, before contracting the virus, he’d go for 6km runs without much training.

Tomorrow, a staff with whom I used to go on hour-long walks two summers ago, will be working my day activities shift. I did go for a 45-minute walk yesterday, so am tempted to try for such a long walk tomorrow. Even if I can’t though, I do have yesterday’s walk to prove that my physical fitness is returning to a better level.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (September 3, 2022)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi all on this beautiful first Saturday of September. I for whatever reason keep typing “July” rather than “September”. Maybe that’s me wishful thinking. Anyway, here’s my post for this week’s #WeekendCoffeeShare. I just had my afternoon coffee, but the other clients are currently having theirs, so I bet there’s still some left for you. Let’s have a cup of coffee (or another drink, if you so prefer) and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, I’d start out by asking about your weather. Ours is beautiful. Today, we’re supposed to get daytime temps of up to 27°C. On Monday, the temperature’s even forecast to rise to 30°C. I guess my husband was wrong a few weeks ago when he predicted that it’d get only colder from that point on.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you about all the physical activity I got in this past week. I got in a total of 330 exercise minutes according to my Apple Watch this week so far, exercise being anything at least the intensity of a brisk walk. I guess this means I can up my goal from 20 minutes to at least 30 a day. Then again, I badly want to reach it everyday.

If we were having coffee, I would use the rest of this post to share the details I promised you all in yesterday’s post about the potential new care home. You see, on Thursday at 2PM, the behavior specialist came by my room. The appt had already been planned or so I believe, because of the situation I shared a few weeks ago about an application having been put in for me to live at a senior citizens’ home for the visually impaired, a place I don’t consider suitable. I knew from my care facility’s manager that she understood this place doesn’t sound suitable indeed and also that she had heard that the people at the main institution for my current care agency, with whom I’d met at the end of July, were pretty enthusiastic about me. However, the manager didn’t expect to hear anything from them until next week.

Well, as it turned out, my behavior specialist had planned a meeting with the behavior specialist whom I’d met in July as soon as she could, which was last Thursday. It turns out I am number one on the waiting list for a home at the main institution. The home caters primarily to people with moderate to severe intellectual disability with a need for intensive support due to additional problems such as autism, attachment issues, etc. The level of intellectual disability is significantly less severe than in my current home, so I can actually make smalltalk with the other residents. The staff offer help with activities of daily living (personal care) where needed. Each resident has their own day program. This means that residents aren’t required to go to the day center by default. In fact, some of the residents go some of the time, others ride their bikes around institution grounds, while still others can’t leave the home unsupervised.

I told my husband about this home and he immediately replied that it sounds perfect. Well, I said, that isn’t possible, but it does sound pretty good indeed.

Of course, I am on the wait list, so there currently isn’t an available room, but the behavior specialist said they are working towards finding a new home for one of the current residents. She said it might go quickly but it might still take six months or so. Well, if you ask me, even if it’s going to take six months, that’s still super quickly. That’d honestly mean I’d have found a place within the year from saying I want to find a more suitable home.

I will get an extensive orientation, getting to look around at least twice before I decide whether I want to move to this home. I am both nervous and excited. Mostly quite excited though. I’d read up about this home before and wished I could live here and now my dream might come true.

How have you been?

Things I Can Do to Improve My Physical Fitness

Posted on by Astrid

I had an intensely frustrating physical therapy appointment this morning. I told the physical therapist that, despite the semi-orthopedic shoes and the ankle-foot orthosis, I still walk with a drop foot after roughly 20 minutes of walking. She is going to bring my shoes and the AFO to the orthopedic shoemaker and the guy in charge of the AFO yet again, but I’m skeptical there’ll be a solution. I feel very frustrated that, a year to eighteen months ago, I could easily walk for an hour several times a day and now I struggle to walk for fifteen minutes. That, my staff later countered, may be related to my lack of physical fitness too. In other words, I need to build up stamina again. Now that I have nothing better to share, I am going to list ways in which I can improve my level of physical fitness.

1. Go on the elliptical for ten to fifteen minutes at a time three times a week. I used to try to go on the elliptical for 25 minutes at a time and aim for five times a week, but that’s not realistic right now. Besides, I hate that thing with a passion, so making myself go on it five times a week right away is guaranteed to fail.

2. Go for daily walks again. I have been avoiding walks because of the pain the AFO causes me as well as the hassle involved in trying to judge the weather, whether I need to wear sunscreen, etc. I really need to make daily walking a habit again, even if it’s only a ten-minute walk around the day center.

3. Throw a ball. This doesn’t necessarily strengthen my legs and it isn’t quite cardio level either, but any movement counts.

4. Weight training. I really need to get into the habit of doing weight lifting again, if only three rounds of ten a few times a week. This is arm training, since I cannot really do core training at all, but again, it will help me get to a higher physical fitness level.

5. Doing the exercises I originally did with the physical therapist for my back. I am not sure why I list these, but they can’t hurt.

Ultimately, I would really like to go to a gym at some point. The day center has a stationary bike too, but I’m not sure I can use that.

Do you have any suggestions as to ways for me to practise physical exercise?

Gratitude List (October 22, 2021) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Hi all on this mixed-bag Friday weather-wise. It’s cloudy with some rain, but the sun tries to peek through here and there too. I seem to have given up on the blogging challenges entirely, but I’m still attempting to write as often as I comfortably can. Today, I’m doing a gratitude list. I’m joining Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT) as usual. Here goes.

1. I am grateful my staff, the one who is on sick leave, was happy with her presents. Like I mentioned before, I gifted her a handmade soap, hand cream and bracelet. Another staff delivered it to her house as to allow me to save money on postage. The staff who is on sick leave, later texted the other staff an audio recorded message for me. It was so sweet!

2. I am grateful for my nurse practitioner and community psychiatric nurse. On Sunday, I landed in a bit of a crisis and E-mailed them, along with my assigned day activities staff and my support coordinator. My nurse practitioner responded on Monday. Though I felt like he was downplaying my crisis a little, my CPN later said that she at least felt that I was doing well because I asked for help.

3. I am grateful my GP takes me seriously. This really could’ve been a grateful for last week, but I forgot to mention it then. As regular readers of this blog might know, I’ve suffered with what doctors think is irritable bowel syndrome with constipation for years, but it’s gotten worse and somewhat different over the past nine months or so. I saw my GP about it a few weeks ago and he initially sent me home with orders for the staff to fill out a rating scale on my bowel movements. Boy, was it embarrassing having to ask the staff to look at my poop! Thankfully, it did show that I hadn’t been misguided about my symptoms. Last week, we went back with the rating scale and the doc examined me again. After discussing me with the gastroenterologist, he decided to refer me for an abdominal X-ray. It’s been scheduled for this coming Tuesday.

4. I am grateful for my husband’s ability to put things into perspective. I have been worried sick (no pun intended) about the possible outcome of said abdominal X-ray. My husband though said that, since I’ve been having symptoms for as long as he knows me, it’s not likely to be anything serious.

5. I am still grateful for topiramate. The increased dosage does seem to do something in the end. Last night, I had dreams about leaving the care facility, but they do not seem to affect me as much as they used to. I call that a win!

6. I am so grateful for one-on-one support. I cannot say this often enough. I am so very grateful my staff aren’t leaving me when I’m in crisis.

7. I am grateful the chili con carne I had for dinner yesterday was better than I expected. I hadn’t had meal delivery company chili in a while since it’s part of their fall/winter menu. However, I’d remembered it as dry rice with dry beans and a tiny bit of mince thrown in. To my surprise, they’d actually added some sauce and there was more mince in it than I expected.

8. I am grateful that the people who were installing blinds on my side of the building, are finally done doing so. Originally, only the other side of the building had blinds on the outside, but some of my fellow clients suffered badly from the sun shining through their windows during the day especially in summer. It took the company several weeks of installing the blinds and they had to be in each room to program them too. Thankfully, they programmed mine to manual, not automatic. Otherwise, if it’s sunny, the blinds will go down, then if a bit of wind blows they will go up, then down again, up again, etc. I’d rather keep them up and just draw the curtains when it’s sunny.

9. I am grateful that, when they were working on my blinds this afternoon, my one-on-one took me to the snoezelen® room at the day center. After all, the noise was quite unbearable. I loved lying on the waterbed while there was no-one in the adjacent room. So nice!

10. I am grateful I had the energy to go on the elliptical for over 30 minutes this afternoon. When I first stepped onto it, it felt as though I’d hardly manage 15 minutes, but I did pretty well.

What are you grateful for?

July 2021 Health and Wellness Update

Posted on by Astrid

Today, I’m not feeling too inspired to write. However, I said last month that I wanted to make health and wellness updates a monthly occurrence. Here goes.

Last month, I was worried about my kidney function. My nurse practitioner was since able to reassure me it was within the acceptable range. I since have stopped using the Water Reminder app, as it was being a bit of a nuisance having to fill out my fluid intake each time. However, I still make sure to drink plenty of water.

The fact that my kidney function is acceptable means I have been able to start the topiramate too. Thankfully, like I’ve said, I don’t experience any side effects.

I also found out last month that I don’t have a UTI. The doctor still isn’t sure what is causing my bladder pain. I for a while took the max dose of paracetamol plus naproxen twice daily. Thankfully, I have since been able to get the naproxen back to an as-needed prescription.

As of last Tuesday, my magnesium, which I’ve been taking for constipation for a few months now, has been upped. I myself thought I suffered with diarrhea, but my GP was able to see that it was a result of constipation really. I am really hoping this will work.

To be honest, with respect to lifestyle, I’m not too satisfied with how I’ve been doing over the past month. I am still struggling to make healthier breakfast and lunch choices. This week, I started having crackers for lunch, which I like far better than slices of bread. However, we didn’t have those until Wednesday and yesterday, we already had a special grill lunch.

I did make sure to eat some fruit at lunchtime each day as well as some slices of cucumber. Overall, combined with my relatively healthy choices from the meal delivery service menu, I did meet my five servings of fruit and veg each day.

I got weighed in again yesterday and, sadly, had gained 400 grams compared to last month. I am still within the acceptable to me weight range, but I do need to make sure I really watch my diet more carefully over the next month.

Exercise-wise, I’m not doing as well as I’d like to. I would really like to make it to 10K steps more regularly again. I do know the weather hasn’t been great, but I still have the elliptical and can dance in my room. I would also really like to make weight training a part of my routine again. That might take some more time though, as, well, I want so many things.

Overall, I feel okay about the things I can’t control, like the fact that my kidney function is within the acceptable range after all. However, I could really do better on things I can control, such as eating a healthier diet and exercising more.