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Showing posts from March 8, 2015

My Vision This Week... and Far Too Often

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I regularly struggle with vision issues as a result of my Systemic Mastocytosis illness. Actually, not a week goes by which does not include some sort of vision issues which demand a change in plans. This past week I struggled with quite a few symptoms at the whim of angry mast cells some of which made me sick as a dying, mangy dog but I also struggled with vision issues such as blurriness, some double vision and a slight loss of color saturation. For the most part, my vision was rather poor all the time this past week but as my overwhelming fatigue would worsen, my eyesight worsened exponentially. There is no doubt that fatigue plays a role in the severity of my symptoms and these problems with my vision are impacted in the same way. The loss of color isn't too annoying and typically affects reds the most but the blurriness really gets on my nerves. The only time the loss of color saturation is annoying is when one eye is different than the other. Of course, the blurriness is

HD Movies To Go

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Whenever we travel, we like to bring some entertainment with us in the form of music, movies, magazines and books. Our Kindles are capable of holding almost all of this media plus they save so much space and weight! Typically, what we can't fit physically on the Kindle's drive, we can access in our Amazon Cloud... if we always have internet/wifi access.  Our next trip, which is a cross-country Amtrak excursion in a sleeper car, promises to have spotty service throughout most of the trip so we needed to prepare. I never know when my miserable health will appear so I like to ensure I always have something to do to keep my mind off of my health. Plus, if my health is so poor that I am stuck behind while everyone is out and about sightseeing and celebrating, I really need something to entertain myself. This is where the HD movies, music, magazines and books come into play. I downloaded music to my Kindle Fire... no problem with that because I have more than enough space for tha

A 'Down Day' Needs Comfort Food

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Whenever I have a rough night because of my health, the following day is always a quiet down day. On these down days and perhaps needless to say, I crave some comfort food... Today, my comfort food was some country fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy for lunch. It was delicious but I ate more than my not-so-healthy stomach can handle right now. Nevertheless, it was quite satisfying and delicious!  

A "Down Day"

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I haven't written much about my illness lately and since today is a day of recovery for me, I thought I should write a few words today.  Seeing some of these symptoms in writing might give some important insight to some other patients as well as provide some insight to those in my life who may be wondering how and why I need a "down day" when I use this term. Yesterday morning, I felt fairly good considering my overall health. I classified it as a good day when I awoke and had a long list of things I had hoped to accomplish throughout the morning. I took care of a little bit of laundry and I did my daily physical therapy (mostly for my extensive spinal injuries but this also helps with my Systemic Mastocytosis). I made lunch. Then I was out of energy and needed to lay down to nap for a few hours. This is a typical, run-of-the-mill good day with a debilitating chronic illness. I get quickly and easily worn out just from a few mundane light activities.  When I awoke fro