Big, general update
Not really sure what to write here. I used to find this journal so therapeutic, but these days, I really only enjoy reading and sometimes commenting on peoples' entries. But an update is overdue, and a lot has happened in the last few months, and bigger things are just on the horizon.
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When I finished writing in practically stream of consciousness, I found I had such a mountain of text, I think maybe I was wrong about this being therapeutic. Regardless, I split what I wrote up into separate entries, mostly to "convenience" you, and because even though several of them are close together in terms of events, the feel of each is a little different. Not sure how I worked all that out in my mind, but I figure that if you're really still one of my friends here after I've been so infrequent with my updates, you probably aren't the sort to come after me for polluting your friends page with like five consecutive entries either.
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My body has mostly continued to deteriorate, but not in any spectacularly interesting or unexpected fashion. What used to be pain in one hip abruptly started on just the same in the other as well, sometime in June. The pain in both has continued to increase over time, and now I can't walk even half a block, or stand in place. I use a cane when I walk. More on that later.
My eyes have fared similarly. I haven't done any work on my left eye's cataract, so everything it sees still looks like it's through a think haze (picture looking at yourself in a fairly steamy mirror, and you've got the general idea). My right eye, the one that had the lens installed, got better, but not lots better; I still can't read with it, I still see halos (but with less frequency and intensity), and my focus at middling range (about six-eight feet) is only mediocre at best. Once in a while it still sees double. The ophthalmologist wants to perform a "yag laser capsulotomy," which he promises will make everything better. The downside is that it also makes my lens permanently, whereas right now, if I so choose, I can have it removed- now or later in life- and have something different installed. It would be throwing away about $1500 out of pocket... but with a different lens, I might see better. But the doctor insists everything would be better if I had the procedure... But the internet has mixed stories about how much improvement, if any, people truly get... I don't know what to do. I go around in circles nonstop, thinking I should replace it, then that I should have the procedure, then that I should get a different lens installed in the other eye and see how that goes. I just don't know what to do. It seems like I always choose wrong.
That got long for a minor thought in a more general post.
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My body has mostly continued to deteriorate, but not in any spectacularly interesting or unexpected fashion. What used to be pain in one hip abruptly started on just the same in the other as well, sometime in June. The pain in both has continued to increase over time, and now I can't walk even half a block, or stand in place. I use a cane when I walk. More on that later.
My eyes have fared similarly. I haven't done any work on my left eye's cataract, so everything it sees still looks like it's through a think haze (picture looking at yourself in a fairly steamy mirror, and you've got the general idea). My right eye, the one that had the lens installed, got better, but not lots better; I still can't read with it, I still see halos (but with less frequency and intensity), and my focus at middling range (about six-eight feet) is only mediocre at best. Once in a while it still sees double. The ophthalmologist wants to perform a "yag laser capsulotomy," which he promises will make everything better. The downside is that it also makes my lens permanently, whereas right now, if I so choose, I can have it removed- now or later in life- and have something different installed. It would be throwing away about $1500 out of pocket... but with a different lens, I might see better. But the doctor insists everything would be better if I had the procedure... But the internet has mixed stories about how much improvement, if any, people truly get... I don't know what to do. I go around in circles nonstop, thinking I should replace it, then that I should have the procedure, then that I should get a different lens installed in the other eye and see how that goes. I just don't know what to do. It seems like I always choose wrong.
That got long for a minor thought in a more general post.