The season rubs me wrong/ The summer swells anon...
So, week and a half or so without posting, whups! On the other hand, the headaches have taken a pretty bad turn this late-June-early-July time of year. So I've also had to bail on socializing plans for the last couple of weeks, contrary to my long-term goals, so kinda sad. On the other hand, I learned the hard way many years ago that going out when you don't feel well can lead to high levels of more ick.
It helps to keep things in perspective. In general, this time last year I was a complete wreck. Severely chronic-fatigued, no real plan of action to deal with it, and no medical support structure to help me. Physically and emotionally depleted, probably the lowest point of the last two years of this body-fail. Specifically, I think it was early July when I had the migraine that was so severe I needed an MRI to make sure I wasn't having a stroke. (It wasn't, and now I have fun free pics of my brain, yay.)
By comparison, things aren't so bad this summer. Even with the headaches (no crazy migraine auras yet), even with having to bail on friends parties and events, even with renewed sleep deprivation & my energy levels plummeting again yesterday and today. My road to less-fail started this time last year, so didn't really become obvious until late August, so I didn't really learn how to deal with the Dog Days of Summer in NYC. Guess I'll learn now, *shrugs*.
This time I have doctors who actually help me, an acupuncturist who is nice and insightful (tho we're taking a break for this month due to financial reasons, and she's even OK with that), and have identified and eliminated dietary and lifestyle habits that were making me worse. Tho the only properly diagnosed problem I have is a barely researched hard-to-treat sleep disorder, it helps to know I have it, and my non-drug guesswork to try fixing it has been helpful.
So I'm hoping this is just a temporary thing, brought on by the heat, and also hoping that I can acclimate to the heat rather than just hide in my home all summer.
I also hope that I'm actually 'leveling' into a more interesting stage of life, b/c the alternative looks very not fun.
As for the last couple weeks of goings on...
The weekend after my last posting held the Pride Parade, the Del Close (improv, 48hour) Marathon, Recess, and a Pagan street fair directly outside of Recess. And I wasn't feeling well enough to attend any of it. So that sucked. But again, leaving the house while sick invites further horribleness.
Instead I worked on the Delenn costume. Altered the pattern pieces after completing the muslin (too big, needed to bring it in from size 22 to 18, *and* nip in the waistline), made sure I had enough fabric, cut and ironed the fabric, and suddenly it was four hours later. So the 1hour sewing limits really don't work so well with the pattern/fabric cutting stage. Whups.
That was mostly Saturday night, so Sunday night I spent a couple hour-sessions putting on the interfacing (which I did actually need, thanx muslin), and some actual sewing. Added some extra bits in clever ways, felt brilliant, yay.
Watched a lot of Pride related Youtube vids. Found a new channel of a show called "Crafting With Cocktails" which does a lot of sewing/costuming, and had a "My Drunk Kitchen" crossover, so yay :-)
Yay, short work week. Found out the Friday before that the head librarian wanted to close the library for 7/5, since the construction crews could work faster without patrons here, and there would be no classed that day tho the school was technically open. So we could choose either to come in and do non-circ stuff (oddly tempting, I like cataloging and not paying for a/c), or take a last minute vacation day. Based on how sickly I'd been feeling, I figured I'd go for a four day weekend (excellent idea, as it turned out).
Ordered a carefully-planned bunch of gluten free makeup from three different online stores, including a big pack of lipstick samples. Got some by Wednesday, the rest today. That was still 1/3 of my 'extras' budget for the month, so no rush to buy more for a few weeks. Plenty of time to go over those samples.
I got a 'save the date' card for a friend's wedding in November, which is going to be fantasy/rennie costume themed. On one hand, yay! On the other ... didn't I just say I wasn't going to buy more fabric until 2014? Uh oh.
But after much over-researching of patterns and fabrics online, I went with a pattern I already own with a fabric I was planning to use for a muslin, but this should be more fun. A long, purple taffeta Regency style coat, with a simple dress underneath (yet to be determined). And if the first run turns out to muslin-y, I am allowing myself to buy more fabric in a later month (esp since I'm already pushing budget limits this month, whups). I also confirmed that there will be noms I can eat there, yay! So now I just have to work out how I'm getting to PA.
On a related note, that means PhilCon and the Long Island DW con won't be happening for me, I think those are the same weekend. Always next year :-)
Wednesday I had a 9:30 am follow-up scheduled with my pcp doctor, and I'd set it that early in the day back in January b/c I forgot what my summer hours would be. So... weird. Sat in Madison Square Park for a bit with my breakfast b/c I'd gotten there an hour early. Read in their waiting-room library, and my appointment was about a half hour late anyway :-P
Dr. L didn't immediately remember who I was until she checked her notes, but at least she *has* notes. And mostly just gave me a lot of thumbs-up for all the life-hacking I've been doing. Dietary, stress, anxiety, sleep (told her the sleep-doc story again, her flatly serious response "Wow, he needs therapy,"), headaches, etc. I'd spent my waiting-room time reading a book about migraines, and she was able to confirm for me that while sinus headaches and migraines are two different things, sinus stuff *can* trigger migraines. So that makes a lot of sense for my experiences.
She also gave me a new referral for a GI b/c I lost the last one, and my stomach is still weird. She also recommended (and somewhat chided me about) exercise, especially if I seem to be 'carb sensitive'. But no weight-chiding, just "You should exercise so you'll feel better :-D" Actually, she didn't even check my weight, which I'd meant to get checked and forgot. Whups. So ... not bad.
After the appointment, I went to M&J to pick up some trims and notions for various sewing projects (including my new wedding costume). While I stuck to my shopping list, I had forgotten how expensive that store is, so... whups. How do I manage to spend that much on trims for the Regency coat when I effectively had the fabric for free?
Between that and treating myself to Bareburger for lunch before work that day, I was about 2/3 thru my 'extras' budget for the month and it was only July 3rd. In that case, maybe its for the best that I'm too sickly to go out and spend more money, I can always stay in and work on makeup and sewing until I'm well enough to go back out, right?
And then I got to work, where it turns out I qualified to leave work an hour earlier (its a pre-holiday thing we always get) despite having only a half day to begin with. In retrospect, if I'd realized that in January I wouldn't have had to take a half day off work to go to the doctor that day, but whatevs.
I do remember that Wednesday had the random rain-sun-rain-sun-STORM-sun weather pattern going on. And my headaches seemed to go away when it was raining, only to come back with the sun. So... wtf body?
Picked up groceries on my early trip home from work, then puttered around the house, took some sudafed, and went to bed. Woke up with a headache around the crown of my head that intensified whenever it changed elevation, or I leaned over, and ... ugh. Did not go to my friends party that night, but I think she was sympathetic b/c she wasn't feeling well either. Between heat index and pollen, a whole bunch of my friends just aren't feeling well so far this summer.
So most of the day was spent puttering around the house, watching random stuff on YouTube and listening to the Decemberists. Also wishing I'd been sick *before* going to the doctor, and wondering if the sudafed did this to me.
I still had a decent amount of energy despite pain + dizziness, so I figured out the design flaw in my ice cream maker. The built-in spatula isn't scraping the frozen bits off the side of the bowl properly, so I'd sometimes end up with a rim of frozen around a soupy middle, which would then just freeze unscoopably solid in the freezer. The fix is to hold a spoon to either help hold back the spatula, or just scrape it myself. Standing next to a cold thing for 20 minutes wasn't so bad, and it didn't seem to hurt the freezing process. It was a bit dense compared to other batches, but it took me a little while to figure out what was wrong. At least the mint ice cream mix came together really quickly. Coconut milk, mint extract, salt, stir, and then into the ice cream maker. No heat required.
Eventually the sun set, and I sat out on my balcony watching fireworks displays from all over Queens. I think I identified 12 different displays that I could see, tho some were far away and I could only see their highest fireworks over the horizon. But it was really nice seeing all of those celebrations going on at the same time. I watched for a half hour before going back inside, but the fireworks continued on for hours.
Friday I felt a bit better, tho I had some baaaad dizzy spells, and just started playing with food. Pasturized a couple of eggs, and separated them for meringues and mayo. Oddly enough, the mayo worked and the meringues didn't this time. The egg whites just wouldn't whip, and then I looked more closely at the mint extract and realized it was oil based. Durnit.
This time I decided to make the mayo by hand, bowl + whisk + oil dripping, and with EVOO b/c its what I had. It worked, but oooooow my arms. Yikes. I can understand now why you're not supposed to use EVOO alone, but I still liked the taste, and finished it by the end of the weekend. In future I'd like to try the processors again, but I guess the only way it will really work is if I make a LOT of it at once, otherwise the egg yolks form a later under the blades, and the oil just sits on top while its supposed to be mixing.
Then I took out some cold egg whites and tried making meringues again, ith maple syrup instead of honey. This time they whipped up super fast but then flattened out completely in the oven. I think b/c the syrup was more watery than my usual honey, or b/c I added some almond butter after they whipped up. The flat not-meringues were still tasty little crispy maple syrup thingies, so I ate them all anyway.
Got most of my regular grocery, cooking, and other chores done on Saturday, but Sunday I was too tired do do the laundry. Saturday night I went to bed exhausted and headachey, and it was warmer in the Chantry from using the oven all evening. Once in bed I realized my pulse and mind were racing, in that "Hey we're your adrenals and we just woke up!" way. Not sure why. I hadn't been feeling well for days, but usually this doesn't happen unless I'm coming out of a gluten reaction, and I hadn't been feeling sick in that way. I fell asleep eventually but had stressy dreams and was extremely sleep-deprived all day Sunday. My parents came in for a pleasant visit to Bareburger, so I went outside in the ridunkulous heat, so I was a listless lump for the rest of the day.
I also got more sewing done on Friday and Saturday, and probably would have finished the jacket if I hadn't been too brain fogged to use sharp things on Sunday. I just the sleeves and back pleat to finish. I realized on Friday that if I pushed myself, I probably could have finished the whole costume by Sunday night. But I didn't *want* to push myself, and with DCon weeks away I don't have to. Yaaaay self control and mindfulness. When I finish this project, I'll probably work on the Regency coat, since that also has a deadline, albeit one that's comfortably far off.
Conked out early Sunday nite and got 9 hours of sleep for today. But this morning I had another bout of being a listless lump, almost unable to get my butt out of the house to start the day. That seemed to pass by the time I got to work, but the brain fog is still really bad. Behind the brain fog, my energy levels seem to be fluctuating, but not too low.
I think today's ick is from continued sleep dep, and thus indirectly caused by the heat wave. No matter how many aspects of my life that I hack, or how many precautions I take, you just can't control the weather. Oh well. But up until yesterday and today, my energy levels had been pretty good, so maybe I'll start feeling better now that this week's heat index is around 90F instead of 100F. And I hope I'm acclimated by DCon.
There's a Harry Potter meet up group gathering on Thursday, so I'd like to attend that, but hopefully body fail won't get in the way. I won't force myself to go if it does, tho its nicely close to one of my train lines. Its at a bar with food, but not me-friendly food, so will pack an extra lunch box for that day if I think I'm up for it. Saturday is Browncoats, but I like having my Saturdays free to sleep and/or space out. But its an option.
This morning I remembered to pack one new project into my bead kit and take it to work with me, so that's good. I think with my recent heat issues, and recent weird weather, I'm just going to stay inside on my lunch breaks with craft stuff. I didn't get around to putting some other projects together, but hopefully I can when the brain fog lifts. I haven't had much yen for jewelry work lately, despite the energy increase, but I hope it hits soon. I need shiny things for my DCon & wedding costumes, and my Etsy shop. I think I have enough seed beads & crystals to do more of those types of pieces until August, when I may have to order some more, in that nice specific "I have a list!" way that works quite well for me.
<3 Chrysilla
Crossposted from Dreamwidth, http://chrysilla.dreamwidth.org/
It helps to keep things in perspective. In general, this time last year I was a complete wreck. Severely chronic-fatigued, no real plan of action to deal with it, and no medical support structure to help me. Physically and emotionally depleted, probably the lowest point of the last two years of this body-fail. Specifically, I think it was early July when I had the migraine that was so severe I needed an MRI to make sure I wasn't having a stroke. (It wasn't, and now I have fun free pics of my brain, yay.)
By comparison, things aren't so bad this summer. Even with the headaches (no crazy migraine auras yet), even with having to bail on friends parties and events, even with renewed sleep deprivation & my energy levels plummeting again yesterday and today. My road to less-fail started this time last year, so didn't really become obvious until late August, so I didn't really learn how to deal with the Dog Days of Summer in NYC. Guess I'll learn now, *shrugs*.
This time I have doctors who actually help me, an acupuncturist who is nice and insightful (tho we're taking a break for this month due to financial reasons, and she's even OK with that), and have identified and eliminated dietary and lifestyle habits that were making me worse. Tho the only properly diagnosed problem I have is a barely researched hard-to-treat sleep disorder, it helps to know I have it, and my non-drug guesswork to try fixing it has been helpful.
So I'm hoping this is just a temporary thing, brought on by the heat, and also hoping that I can acclimate to the heat rather than just hide in my home all summer.
I also hope that I'm actually 'leveling' into a more interesting stage of life, b/c the alternative looks very not fun.
As for the last couple weeks of goings on...
The weekend after my last posting held the Pride Parade, the Del Close (improv, 48hour) Marathon, Recess, and a Pagan street fair directly outside of Recess. And I wasn't feeling well enough to attend any of it. So that sucked. But again, leaving the house while sick invites further horribleness.
Instead I worked on the Delenn costume. Altered the pattern pieces after completing the muslin (too big, needed to bring it in from size 22 to 18, *and* nip in the waistline), made sure I had enough fabric, cut and ironed the fabric, and suddenly it was four hours later. So the 1hour sewing limits really don't work so well with the pattern/fabric cutting stage. Whups.
That was mostly Saturday night, so Sunday night I spent a couple hour-sessions putting on the interfacing (which I did actually need, thanx muslin), and some actual sewing. Added some extra bits in clever ways, felt brilliant, yay.
Watched a lot of Pride related Youtube vids. Found a new channel of a show called "Crafting With Cocktails" which does a lot of sewing/costuming, and had a "My Drunk Kitchen" crossover, so yay :-)
Yay, short work week. Found out the Friday before that the head librarian wanted to close the library for 7/5, since the construction crews could work faster without patrons here, and there would be no classed that day tho the school was technically open. So we could choose either to come in and do non-circ stuff (oddly tempting, I like cataloging and not paying for a/c), or take a last minute vacation day. Based on how sickly I'd been feeling, I figured I'd go for a four day weekend (excellent idea, as it turned out).
Ordered a carefully-planned bunch of gluten free makeup from three different online stores, including a big pack of lipstick samples. Got some by Wednesday, the rest today. That was still 1/3 of my 'extras' budget for the month, so no rush to buy more for a few weeks. Plenty of time to go over those samples.
I got a 'save the date' card for a friend's wedding in November, which is going to be fantasy/rennie costume themed. On one hand, yay! On the other ... didn't I just say I wasn't going to buy more fabric until 2014? Uh oh.
But after much over-researching of patterns and fabrics online, I went with a pattern I already own with a fabric I was planning to use for a muslin, but this should be more fun. A long, purple taffeta Regency style coat, with a simple dress underneath (yet to be determined). And if the first run turns out to muslin-y, I am allowing myself to buy more fabric in a later month (esp since I'm already pushing budget limits this month, whups). I also confirmed that there will be noms I can eat there, yay! So now I just have to work out how I'm getting to PA.
On a related note, that means PhilCon and the Long Island DW con won't be happening for me, I think those are the same weekend. Always next year :-)
Wednesday I had a 9:30 am follow-up scheduled with my pcp doctor, and I'd set it that early in the day back in January b/c I forgot what my summer hours would be. So... weird. Sat in Madison Square Park for a bit with my breakfast b/c I'd gotten there an hour early. Read in their waiting-room library, and my appointment was about a half hour late anyway :-P
Dr. L didn't immediately remember who I was until she checked her notes, but at least she *has* notes. And mostly just gave me a lot of thumbs-up for all the life-hacking I've been doing. Dietary, stress, anxiety, sleep (told her the sleep-doc story again, her flatly serious response "Wow, he needs therapy,"), headaches, etc. I'd spent my waiting-room time reading a book about migraines, and she was able to confirm for me that while sinus headaches and migraines are two different things, sinus stuff *can* trigger migraines. So that makes a lot of sense for my experiences.
She also gave me a new referral for a GI b/c I lost the last one, and my stomach is still weird. She also recommended (and somewhat chided me about) exercise, especially if I seem to be 'carb sensitive'. But no weight-chiding, just "You should exercise so you'll feel better :-D" Actually, she didn't even check my weight, which I'd meant to get checked and forgot. Whups. So ... not bad.
After the appointment, I went to M&J to pick up some trims and notions for various sewing projects (including my new wedding costume). While I stuck to my shopping list, I had forgotten how expensive that store is, so... whups. How do I manage to spend that much on trims for the Regency coat when I effectively had the fabric for free?
Between that and treating myself to Bareburger for lunch before work that day, I was about 2/3 thru my 'extras' budget for the month and it was only July 3rd. In that case, maybe its for the best that I'm too sickly to go out and spend more money, I can always stay in and work on makeup and sewing until I'm well enough to go back out, right?
And then I got to work, where it turns out I qualified to leave work an hour earlier (its a pre-holiday thing we always get) despite having only a half day to begin with. In retrospect, if I'd realized that in January I wouldn't have had to take a half day off work to go to the doctor that day, but whatevs.
I do remember that Wednesday had the random rain-sun-rain-sun-STORM-sun weather pattern going on. And my headaches seemed to go away when it was raining, only to come back with the sun. So... wtf body?
Picked up groceries on my early trip home from work, then puttered around the house, took some sudafed, and went to bed. Woke up with a headache around the crown of my head that intensified whenever it changed elevation, or I leaned over, and ... ugh. Did not go to my friends party that night, but I think she was sympathetic b/c she wasn't feeling well either. Between heat index and pollen, a whole bunch of my friends just aren't feeling well so far this summer.
So most of the day was spent puttering around the house, watching random stuff on YouTube and listening to the Decemberists. Also wishing I'd been sick *before* going to the doctor, and wondering if the sudafed did this to me.
I still had a decent amount of energy despite pain + dizziness, so I figured out the design flaw in my ice cream maker. The built-in spatula isn't scraping the frozen bits off the side of the bowl properly, so I'd sometimes end up with a rim of frozen around a soupy middle, which would then just freeze unscoopably solid in the freezer. The fix is to hold a spoon to either help hold back the spatula, or just scrape it myself. Standing next to a cold thing for 20 minutes wasn't so bad, and it didn't seem to hurt the freezing process. It was a bit dense compared to other batches, but it took me a little while to figure out what was wrong. At least the mint ice cream mix came together really quickly. Coconut milk, mint extract, salt, stir, and then into the ice cream maker. No heat required.
Eventually the sun set, and I sat out on my balcony watching fireworks displays from all over Queens. I think I identified 12 different displays that I could see, tho some were far away and I could only see their highest fireworks over the horizon. But it was really nice seeing all of those celebrations going on at the same time. I watched for a half hour before going back inside, but the fireworks continued on for hours.
Friday I felt a bit better, tho I had some baaaad dizzy spells, and just started playing with food. Pasturized a couple of eggs, and separated them for meringues and mayo. Oddly enough, the mayo worked and the meringues didn't this time. The egg whites just wouldn't whip, and then I looked more closely at the mint extract and realized it was oil based. Durnit.
This time I decided to make the mayo by hand, bowl + whisk + oil dripping, and with EVOO b/c its what I had. It worked, but oooooow my arms. Yikes. I can understand now why you're not supposed to use EVOO alone, but I still liked the taste, and finished it by the end of the weekend. In future I'd like to try the processors again, but I guess the only way it will really work is if I make a LOT of it at once, otherwise the egg yolks form a later under the blades, and the oil just sits on top while its supposed to be mixing.
Then I took out some cold egg whites and tried making meringues again, ith maple syrup instead of honey. This time they whipped up super fast but then flattened out completely in the oven. I think b/c the syrup was more watery than my usual honey, or b/c I added some almond butter after they whipped up. The flat not-meringues were still tasty little crispy maple syrup thingies, so I ate them all anyway.
Got most of my regular grocery, cooking, and other chores done on Saturday, but Sunday I was too tired do do the laundry. Saturday night I went to bed exhausted and headachey, and it was warmer in the Chantry from using the oven all evening. Once in bed I realized my pulse and mind were racing, in that "Hey we're your adrenals and we just woke up!" way. Not sure why. I hadn't been feeling well for days, but usually this doesn't happen unless I'm coming out of a gluten reaction, and I hadn't been feeling sick in that way. I fell asleep eventually but had stressy dreams and was extremely sleep-deprived all day Sunday. My parents came in for a pleasant visit to Bareburger, so I went outside in the ridunkulous heat, so I was a listless lump for the rest of the day.
I also got more sewing done on Friday and Saturday, and probably would have finished the jacket if I hadn't been too brain fogged to use sharp things on Sunday. I just the sleeves and back pleat to finish. I realized on Friday that if I pushed myself, I probably could have finished the whole costume by Sunday night. But I didn't *want* to push myself, and with DCon weeks away I don't have to. Yaaaay self control and mindfulness. When I finish this project, I'll probably work on the Regency coat, since that also has a deadline, albeit one that's comfortably far off.
Conked out early Sunday nite and got 9 hours of sleep for today. But this morning I had another bout of being a listless lump, almost unable to get my butt out of the house to start the day. That seemed to pass by the time I got to work, but the brain fog is still really bad. Behind the brain fog, my energy levels seem to be fluctuating, but not too low.
I think today's ick is from continued sleep dep, and thus indirectly caused by the heat wave. No matter how many aspects of my life that I hack, or how many precautions I take, you just can't control the weather. Oh well. But up until yesterday and today, my energy levels had been pretty good, so maybe I'll start feeling better now that this week's heat index is around 90F instead of 100F. And I hope I'm acclimated by DCon.
There's a Harry Potter meet up group gathering on Thursday, so I'd like to attend that, but hopefully body fail won't get in the way. I won't force myself to go if it does, tho its nicely close to one of my train lines. Its at a bar with food, but not me-friendly food, so will pack an extra lunch box for that day if I think I'm up for it. Saturday is Browncoats, but I like having my Saturdays free to sleep and/or space out. But its an option.
This morning I remembered to pack one new project into my bead kit and take it to work with me, so that's good. I think with my recent heat issues, and recent weird weather, I'm just going to stay inside on my lunch breaks with craft stuff. I didn't get around to putting some other projects together, but hopefully I can when the brain fog lifts. I haven't had much yen for jewelry work lately, despite the energy increase, but I hope it hits soon. I need shiny things for my DCon & wedding costumes, and my Etsy shop. I think I have enough seed beads & crystals to do more of those types of pieces until August, when I may have to order some more, in that nice specific "I have a list!" way that works quite well for me.
<3 Chrysilla
Crossposted from Dreamwidth, http://chrysilla.dreamwidth.org/