Life Without Cheese
And Other Events Since July 18 (For Real This Time)
Happy Solar Eclipse Day! This is perfect for today - I'm talking about cheese and my path - perhaps my path of totality.
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Once again, it has been more than a month since I have posted. Ugh.
I have written pages and pages in my head but haven't been able to make myself sit down at the computer and type. I'll say this: pneumonia recovery is intense; pneumonia recovery with the stress of borrowing money to pay bills, meeting with attorneys to discuss lost job and severance docs and attempting to file for unemployment benefits (mostly an exercise in frustration) is painful and overwhelming.
I'm going to try to not make this a whine fest. I'm struggling with that lately. I'm letting everything get to me and feeling like a failure most days when most of my life I have been an upbeat, positive, glass half full, PollyAnna Glad kind of girl.
Since my last post, lots and lots of ups - improvement in my health. I still sleep 9-10 hours a night (this for a lifelong 5-6 hour a night sleeper sounds crazy) but I haven't been napping during the say along with that sleep. I want to most days but it's not required as it was for two months. I turned a corner about a week ago - more energy, more color in my face and the lung exerciser (you know the weird plastic contraption where you have to keep the ball between the lines while getting the plunger to rise) is much easier now and stairs no longer cause a panic.
I have run - well walk/run - 3 times this week. Two to three miles. I'm as sore as if I had run a marathon - not kidding. For my running friends, I walk downstairs sideways. At night, I am coughing more, but from what I have read, I will likely have mucus created by the pneumonia for several months. Mucus is the enemy of asthma so I'm watchful of my peak flow numbers and how my lungs are feeling. B is incredibly watchful - he is very observant of my breathing and my purple lip when it shows up and takes better care of me than I do of myself. 💓
Eating - here's the cheese part. I miss cheese. I'm pretty sure I will always miss cheese. Dr. Trudy says I will likely not be able to have it again - at least not without consequences. I don't think I will get over not having cheese. I likely will get over having wheat and gluten - though I Do miss sandwiches and beer. As of Aug. 13, I made it two months on the elimination diet and ultra supplements including my daily shake (sometimes twice a day). I was supposed to only have one month left before the great adding back experiment began but Dr. Trudy thinks because of the pneumonia-steroids-antibiotic gut set back, I should add another month before I start the experiment. The experiment involves eating three servings of a banned food in one day and waiting 72 hours for any effects. You might remember I have 34 banned foods. If each food only takes the three days (in that it doesn't make me so sick I need more time to get over it), that's 102 days.
There are worse things and I feel better. My gut feels better. My brain feels better. My body is on the mend. I imagine I would be feeling pretty tremendous by now had I not gotten pneumonia.
Other happenings
My other sailboat is dead. My wooden sailboat - named Sloopy but I had another name chosen. I won't share it because I never put her in the water and conducted the name changing ceremony. I had to destroy her and throw her away. I went to move the boat from one storage spot to another and she had rotted out. My friend Karl and I figured out how to keep her local by chopping her up and dropping her at the local recycling center. That was July 19.
Since then, I have seen some beautiful sunsets; taken a couple of boat rides; had a couple of meltdowns - over feeling like a failure, questioning my existence, upset I still have barrel belly; made some fun food, watched a lot of HGTV and FOOD; discovered a decently yummy but weird vegan gluten free mac and cheese; had some very nice chats, texts, prezzies, coffee visits, boat visits and words of encouragement from lovely friends; packed and unpacked from my missed trips; celebrated B's birthday; and found more restaurants and kind chefs to put up with all my eating restrictions.
I have figured out a new path or a new path to begin the path of totality - more on that later. I'm excited and nervous. It's not traditional. I can keep getting well and do it. I might need a part-time job for a bit to go along with it. That's enough information for now.
I made quinoa and roasted tofu stuffed poblano peppers
Those are sun dried tomatoes
From Jeri
