Scattered Thoughts . . .

T he past two nights have been quite lousy.  My health has been so lousy that I needed to use epinephrine during the night last night.   During my previous bouts of COVID, my doctors have assumed that COVID is causing an undesired response in my primary illness.  It causes inflammation which causes a response by my mast cells.  I already have a life threatening issue with inflammation and mast cells so anything that exasperates this is not a good thing.  So, in response, I need to throw medications at both problems.   I awoke in the middle of the night after only an hour or two of sleep both last night and the night before last.  I was having difficulty breathing both nights.  This was clearly a case of needing to clear out my lungs because, as I would do some coughing and huffing, I could get a little bit of phlegm to come up and that always seemed to help my breathing enough to be able to get back to sleep. Last night, however, regardless of some phlegm coming up from my lungs, I was

I had an appointment with my doctor again this morning. I had planned to go to this appointment alone (Sheila and I usually attend appointments together but this appointment seemed like it would be uneventful... ie, no life threatening decisions to be made or discussed... so I was going it alone today) but my car is frozen in the mud so Sheila had to leave work to drive me there. Other than giving up some blood, the appointment was rather painless. Sheila and I saw the same doctor last week for Sheila's lingering cold. While we were there for Sheila, my doctor said she wanted to see me for a full exam and to adjust my medications. That appointment was this morning. This appointment was not a moment too soon since my health has been rather miserable lately. I've been having significantly worsened breathing issues since June of 2015... which is a long time and something which should have sent me to the doctor long ago. That was a priority today because it seems to be worseni

Near the end of our stay at the lake house this summer, my health took a major nosedive after a physically demanding incident on the water ( can be read here ). Pushing my body since developing Systemic Mastocytosis  always results in failed and deteriorating health and this incident was no exception   (even for a short spurt of only two minutes, like this time) .  For about four months, my health has been deteriorating more and more each day. Breathing capacity was limited and breathing has been difficult, at best, due to inflammation in my lungs. Along with this inflammation was some fluid buildup. I felt as though I was drowning and suffocating.  My energy level plummeted. I don't have much energy to begin with so any loss of energy is significant. For example, even on the best of days since developing Systemic Mastocytosis, I am only about 40-50% of my physical self as I once was when I was healthy. Plus, for a more accurate assessment, we should add the intense chronic pai