Warning: Geezer Talk About Medical Issues

I've had diabetes over the last 21 years.  I've had an irregular heartbeat for the last 19 years.  Over the last five years I've had what are called "carries" from cancer damage.  The damage is from the disease itself,   as well as the treatments.  I'm not going to talk about my former suffering other than to say I am very lucky and the last five years have been bonus years and I treasure them as much or more as earlier years.  The "carries" are a burned out jaw and mouth and saliva glands and taste ability,  and swallow ability,  voice deterioration and on and on.  Used to be able to yodel a bit and use falsettos.  Listen to me.  I'm whining.  I have no right to complain at all!  I'm mostly healed up.  I have a thing called "Barret's esophagus".  According to the cancer center's shrink I have PTSD.   Ok, but I don't belong on any shelf with men and women in the armed forces and law enforcement or those with serious disabilities. I see nothing compared to them .  I salute them.  And the children I saw during my treatment days  So braver than I.  And their parents whom I cried for.  And prayed for.    Why am I telling you this?  It's not the half of it.  But over the last five years I've been taking current events in the world too much to heart.  My solution to the sadness and anxiety was to shut myself down socially.  Last summer I had some heart trouble.  When I was recovering from that I realized that after the cancer I was weak and way underweight and the doctor said I could not have my feeding tube or my IV port removed until I was gaining weight for a certain time.   The short story is,  I never came all the way back from cancer.  I'm pretty sure nobody does.  Again,  I am lucky.  Huge thanks to Cancer Center in Easton.  So this heart thing last summer had me doing nothing all day.  Lying in bed,  sitting at desk, trying not to raise my heart rate.  I'm naturally lazy anyway.  When I saw my family doc for a check up,  he said "Lloyd. you are six ft. one.  You weigh 136 pounds"  And I had dizzy spells.  And I already had a syndrome called Proximal Positional Vertigo.   So I mowed through the summer and layed low through the fall.  Something happened to me about a week ago.  I got sick and tired of being sick and tired.   The Endocrinologist had hooked me up with a thing called a Continuous Glucose Moniter.  The dietitian had told me to eat more.  "Your too light.  Eat more."  So about a week ago I started to learn that if one has diabetes and needs to GAIN weight there is a vacuum of advice on that.   The search engine takes you to weight loss.  Most diabetics need to lose weight.  A week ago I walked a mile.  And every day another mile.  Now I'm at day six.  I feel better.  Next I wanted something like the protein power powder the body builders use.  I learned that GNC had closed up most of their stores and I got little help from Walgrens and wasn't sure if that powder was OK for my heart.  Wife reminded me of this little store in Easton called Muscle, Inc.  I went there on a rainy Saturday and the nice trainer lady there told me about weight gain without mentioning weight loss!  It was like I was on another planet.      I got the whey powder huge bucket.  I got pills that make you hungry.  I got vitamins that "support" weight GAIN.  The lady showed me some geezer exercises like vertical push ups and stretches.  I drove the forty miles home in the light rain thinking I don't need no stinkin' Walgren's. I feel a bit Wokened  up about all of this.  Oh yes and wife bought me some walking shoes over the internet of course.  I can barely get them on.  They are my size 10.  I figure they are too small but my toes have room.  So I go out on the concrete and walk.  I can feel my feet in contact points all over the shoes.  The arch is crazy thick.  I'm sure they're going to be too uncomfortable. I force myself to walk.  One lap is 500 ft.  After the first lap I am not thinking about these sneekers.  I'm thinking about my stride and the arm exercises.  I complete the mile, ten laps.  Now six days later my feet haven't a single rash, blister, or mark.  So it's another tool found.  Oh, and wife got them on sale.  Retail $220  on sale $140.  Ever heard of Hoka?      I know I'm a geezer.  The way I look in these shoes proves it.  Thanks for reading.  Love  :::::+::::: LLITTU.

Can't Help but Wonder

       It's a long and dusty road,    It's a hot and a heavy load                                                                               

       And the folks that I meet ain't always kind                                                                                                  

       Some are bad; some are good                                                                                                                            

        Some have done the best they could                                                                                                          

        Some have tried to ease my troubled mind                                                                                                

        Nail my shoes to the kitchen floor                                                                                                              

        Lace 'em up and bar the door                                                                                                                                              

         The answers I know I'll never find                                                                                                                

                                                                                                      :::::+:::::LLITTY         peace friends

Times I've Had

Hi guys.....    I'm remembering a lot now about civil unrest during my young years.  I think about  violence  and I guess we as species,  just can't evolve past it.  Half of us just aren't able to handle disagreements very well.  Some folks are, in this day and age, dead against helping the poor and the homeless, and the ill and disabled and those seeking refuge .   How could anyone. Anyone-  be against such help? This is what drives me to my hermitage........among many other things.

But here's a blues lyric I found back in my College Park memories:

"There's a lotta people talkin' bout a comin' war

Some of 'em rich,  and some of 'em poor 

They talk about it like a Blackjack game  ...

But win or lose ...

You can't play again.                                     Be safe my friends.      Love you.      LLITTY  :::::+:::::

You and Your Pussycat Eyes

 Greetings friends!   Our Kitty Cat,  a barn cat whom we brought from our farm 4 years ago is named Jewel.   She's kind of in kitty hospice now.  I mentioned this in a previous post.  Wife after lots of diagnosis back 5 months ago knew Jewel was at the end of the trail.  A day came when Jewel seemed sicker and wife took her in for a planned putting down. I was sadder about it that I expected to be.  But something happened.  Wife and Jewel get to the vet's.  The regular vet was off on a call;  the other vet was to put Jewel down.  He handled the cat.  He talked to my wife and decided to run some vitals on Jewel. Yes she had lots of problems.  But he felt she could have some time left and we could watch her carefully.  This was about 4 months ago.  So we still have Jewell!   On that day that she came home alive wife had got Jewel fed and medicated and she carried Jewel to my bed where I was lazying under the blankies.        She layed Jewel on top of me.  Jewel was getting her bearings with almost no sight.  She put her nose right up to my face.  There were these two green, big, beautiful eyes  giving me a staring contest.  What a wonderful gift for an old mortal like me.  My mind had been filled with the hate in the world.  Wife and Jewel have fixed me at least for today.  Something had happened (again) and I was laughing and crying at the same time.                      LLITTY    :::::+:::::

everything is smaller and slower; no more driving at night

 Hello readers . Been maybe 4 months since I logged in to post.   I know I wasn't too busy to post.  In fact I have plenty of free time.  There was a time when "free time" was something I longed for.  Now I have the time,  and I have to remind myself that I'm lucky.  I find myself watching the world.  My country,  my region, my state, county , town.  Our town.   I see the folly in men over and over.  I'm very disappointed in my fellow man.   I guess I've lost or forgotten almost all of my psyco-social coping skills.  It's hard to just let things go.  And now after seven years or so my anxiety  has settled into  a defense reaction.  It's simple. I go nowhere.  I see no one.  I do nothing.  This used to be called "shut-in depression".  What I experience in isolation used to be called a "nervous breakdown."   I'm not entirely an island. I have a loving wife who understands.  I travel out where stores and people are all around.   I must do that to function and provide.    I wear a mask inside the stores.  When I see someone else with a mask I know they've had a nervous breakdown too.  When I wear the mask some people hate me for it...and some folks love me for it. Isn't that strange.

Last month (Feb) at some point the weather media was talking about a big snowstorm in January.  They kept saying "next week"  A daily threat which seemed to me to just be "click-bait".  The media just has to have a big story.  And they simply create the whopper if needed.  Now I assume everything I hear or read is a lie.  So instead of being lied to....I just avoid the liars.  And I do self help to counteract so I can laugh rather than cry due to frightening future scenarios. So here is what I did on Groundhog Day:   I read an article on the scroll about geezers shoveling snow.  Yes yes.... we all know :  heart attacks and stokes.  But part of the free advice was helpful.   Elders should not work shoveling too long at one time.  It's not a race.  Work 20 minutes,  rest ten or 15.   Shovel during the snowstorm so the accumulation doesn't get ahead of you.  Use a plowing shovel so you are not lifting;  only pushing.         So I find myself going to Seaford.  Phil,the GH saw his shadow and the day was sunny.  I went to a store called Big Lots.  I found a plow shovel that suited me.  At the check out I talked with the nice lady.  I told her 4 geezer things:   1.  "Sorry about the mask but my Dr. says I am crazy high risk."   2. I am buying the shovel now and I'll take it out to the car and come back in for more shopping because   I don't want to risk forgetting the shovel!  3.  Everyone in Sussex county owes me thanks because by buying my brand new shovel I have insured that I won't need it all via Murphey's law.    The cashier got it and laughed,  but this couple behind me was like "wait, what"   4.  Happy Groundhog Day!

Awake

"Show me the country where the bombs had to fall.

show me the ruins of the buildings once so tall.

And I'll show you young man, with so many reasons why.

There but for fortune ...  Go you and I.

LLITTY   ::::::+::::::

I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now

 Hey Shipmates......long time. me gone... since June.    Today has been a good day.  Good day/bad day        has been a mental roller coaster last few years.  But I know today must be a good day-  because I find myself writing to you.  How can I feel cheerful enough to type?   A bunch of stars have to cross and numbers align. And remedies taken.  And rest.  And dreams that are soft  and memorable.   This morning I awoke thinking very sentimental, romantic,  and childlike.  That hasn't happened to me in years.   I got up and headed down the hall and there was my wife sitting as she often does on the couch with her cat named Jewel on her lap.  Jewel is old and near the end of the trail and liking the kind of attention she is getting.  Wife's dogs are Mia and Roxy and they are lying around quietly.  Wife and I greet each other with a           "morning"  After 34 years of marriage there is electricity between us.  My blood glucose level is OK,         but getting close to low.  I fix a coffee mug full of dry cereal.  The cereal is called "Magic Spoon".  Wife asks me to fetch her glasses and let the dogs out.  She can't get up because she is "Kittenapped"  on the couch.  I go back to bed.  I do not turn on TV or computer.   I check my blood sugar quick and easy with a sensor glued on to my upper arm.  I pull the comforter up to my ears and lie still, not fully expecting to get to sleep.  Sleep exactly 2 hours.  Get up feeling O.K.  I drink an Atkins shake. I take my daily meds and insulin. I ask wife to make some coffee.  I head to the shed and take out some paper bags with paper trash and some cardboard boxes and burn it all in my 55 gallon drum.  I go back to the house.  Check glucose level.  I nuke 1/3 of a cheesesteak,  take it to my bed and TV.  I eat the sub with a fork and bypass the bread.  I watch about a half an hour of a Halmark movie.  I get up and head back to the shed.  Where am I getting the energy?  I usually do one thing a day.  And my arthritis is not bothering me.  I drag a big box out of the shed.  It's heavy and work it up into my truck.  It's a xmas tree.  New in the box. 7.5 ft. pine.  Been sitting in storage for years.  I took it to Goodwill.  We just never got around to setting it up.  After Goodwill I went to McD's for a burrito and coffee, which I took to a place called TS Smith Orchard where I had my burrito and coffee and watched the sunset.   OMG.  There had been a misty fog all day and now  the entire sky had turned blue dappled with pink and orange.  It was getting darker and lighter at the same time.  Enjoyed the short ride home.  Wife was back with Jewel and reminded me the trash can was to go out.  Another thing to do!  This is the most productive I've been in years.  Will I ache tomorrow ?  I went to my bed and watched another Hallmark and made a shake out of Carbsmart Bryers Vanilla.  I did not doom scroll on the internet.  I did not watch TV news.   Yes this was a good day.       

Addendum:          To the Pro's from Dover:   I owe you both greetings and fellowship.  We have the finest aviation club in the world.   I can't keep up with you guys....but you are family and I know we all love each other and have for 50 years.  Tailwinds and sweet dreams and shout outs to your wives and all the fams.           LLITTY    :::::+:::::         You are not what happens to you. You are the space in which it happens.