Recuperating (Or Being A Bad Patient)

I am recuperating from my surgery. It has been 8 days now. I am starting to get to the annoyed stage. The seriously annoyed stage.

First of all, I am stuck wearing this dumba$$ knee brace which does not fit. It is too big for me. I can't tighten the lowest strap to be useful. If I am wearing anything underneath it (including the TED compression stocking I am supposed to wear every day for the next three weeks - which is not happening), it just slides down my leg. So I am stuck wearing shorts. Today is a little chilly for shorts but that's why I have sweaters. I am supposed to wear it 24/7 except when showering.

Second, I believe I am supposed to be doing exercises. I do some sometimes. They are written on a piece of paper that is in a very safe space. When I find the safe space I'll make sure I am doing them as much as I should.

Third, I am supposed to take it easy. I am, mostly, sort of. Friday, the day after surgery, I did nothing productive. Saturday, we went to two estate sales and three yard sales. I got two beautiful antique canes - one with a brass eagle for a handle and the other with a brass duck head. Sunday, I made bread. Monday, I can't remember. Tuesday, I went to my father's doctor appointments and was out from 830am to 330 pm. I was tired when I got home. Wednesday I made home made bagels and set up both my looms. Thursday, I went to knitting and then came home and slept from 4pm to 5am. I think I tired myself out.

Fourth, I am allowed to fully weight bear on my leg provided a use a cane. I keep misplacing my cane. Its somewhere around here. I use it when I leave the house but the instant I come in the door, I put it down someplace.... I find it again before I leave the house again.

I may not have spent as much time resting my knee but I don't want to be bored. Bored people eat things like ice cream and cookies between meals. I can't wait for my appointment Monday. I am going to demand a new knee brace that fits and is less awkward. And I want to be able to drive.

Its been torture not being able to drive. But my friends have been nice and have been taking me places. I already have some lined up for next week if I can't drive.... If I can't drive, I might go crazy.

I don't think I am being a very good patient. But I am trying.

I Was Too Busy To Blog

Its the truth. I was too busy to blog. Tomorrow we are hosting Thanksgiving dinner for the first time. My mother, after 45 years of hosting Thanksgiving, has decided that she wants to go to someone else's house for dinner. Now I do admit to doing a fair amount of the cooking for the past 30 years or so, but its the first time at our house. In our new house with its big living room and open to the kitchen dining room which is why we now can host. In our new house with all my health ailments.

That's okay, my husband helped a lot and I can always take a nap if I get tired. Since I have cooked, I do not do dishes.

So anyway, today I have:

• brined the turkey
• chopped celery and onions for two kinds of stuffing
• chopped vegetables for veggies and dip
• made a pecan pie
• chopped the Brussels sprouts
• Set up beds for four guests after finding the sheets, pillows and blankets
• Went to Michaels (for a frame for the picture that should have gone on the wall weeks ago), the grocery store (for butter - you can't make Thanksgiving dinner with two sticks of butter, bagels and cream cheese), and the drugstore for my two prescriptions that I needed. 

I still have to:

• Make the dip for veggies and dip
• Wash and trim the green beans
• Set up our pill boxes for the next week
• Order take out for dinner
• Make a second dinner for our house guests that will show up around 9pm.

So all that being said, I am exhausted (but don't tell my brother or husband or they will start telling me what to do all the time). I need to take care of our pill boxes and go to bed early. And sleep late.

With my health ailments (and even before then), I do not do well with not enough sleep. I need sleep, I need sleep, I need sleep. Last night I was so tired I fell asleep before taking my giant pile of nighttime pills. I did wake up in the middle of the night and took the important ones which won't mess up with my morning pills (some need to be spaced out). 

But I digress. I do not want my health ailments to interfere with my enjoyment of Thanksgiving. I want to be able to enjoy spending time with everyone. After I sleep and take all my pills. And delegate more cooking stuff.

Meet my oncologist and her cookbook

When I was first diagnosed with breast cancer I had an oncologist who I really liked. He was nice and would explain numbers and statistics to me and give me detailed explanations on treatment options and why he chose one over the other.

At the end of my active treatment phase, he left. He was not given permission for this and I was upset. One big trauma point for cancer patients is when the active treatment portion ends and the come back and see us in six months starts. They go from caring about every sniffle to 'see-ya!'.

I was pretty stressed about the change and did not know what to expect from my new oncologist. But I was pleasantly surprised to find out how nice, compassionate and caring my new oncologist was. Over the past five years I have gotten to know her more. I have seen her speak at events as well as met with her individually.

Now I learned something more about her. She, along with other doctors, has written a cookbook for cancer patients. Now I have to get a copy of it. It is a book for people in active treatment. Its not that I am planning to go back into active treatment but I am a cookbook junkie and I am sure it will be full of good, healthy recipes.

If you are looking for a new oncologist in the Boston area, I do recommend her.

Cancer killer article

I love these articles which tell us the things to do/eat/drink/avoid to cure cancer. They usually appear on some what dubious websites, full of ads for other 'cures' which make me think of snake oil salesmen. But here's one that tell us the 'Top Ten Natural Cancer Killers'.

Its on prostate.net which is a website for 'healthy living for men'. It requests '© All Prostate.net Content is Copyrighted | Please Link to Us but Don't Copy From Us'.  This little statement is a big red flag in website credibility.

But I digress, here are the top ten natural cancer killers from their website:

1. Beans
2. Broccoli and other vegetables
3. Carrots
4. Red peppers and Capsaicin
5. Garlic
6. Mushrooms
7. Raspberries
8. Resveratrol (found in red wine and grapes)
9. Tomatoes
10. Turmeric

You can read their article on what the benefits of all these are but here is a dinner menu which you could make at home and eat once a week and get all the benefits:

Appetizer

Broccoli and carrot salad - shred or finely chop - add some finely chopped red onion, and fresh parsley, and toss with oil and vinegar or lemon juice.

Entree

Vegetarian stew with beans, carrots, mushrooms, tomatoes, garlic, finely chopped hot red pepper, and onions. Saute onions and garlic. Add beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, some water or vegetable broth. Season with turmeric, Garam Masala, and Vindaloo seasoning (substitute curry powder if none available). Bring to boil and let simmer for 20 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve over brown rice or with Naan bread.

Dessert

Raspberries and grapes by themselves or over vanilla ice cream. Or puree raspberries and serve over ice cream with grapes on the side.

Beverage

Nice red wine to counteract the heat of the stew.

This is how I cook. I look at what I have and wait for an inspiration. We will not have this for dinner as we are having cheese burgers. We will have it later in the week. I may think the website is dubious and am not sure these will kill off cancer - I would want a little verification before I did believe it. But it would make a relatively easy and healthy meal. A home cooked meal always beats restaurant food.

Think before you eat

Someone pointed this article out to me. It makes me pack my own snacks for a professional sports game. If you read it, you will note that in Chicago, where the scores were good, they inspected when the stadiums were closed. Also, in FL where all the stadiums did poorly, apparently the state has stringent inspections. But regardless, I am not sure I want to eat at any of them. It makes me reconsider a lot of restaurants in general.

When we go out to eat, we assume that food is prepared correctly. We assume the basics - the ice machine is clean, they are not using the same knife and cutting board to chop raw chicken and a prepared sandwich. And that the food is cooked and stored correctly. The whole idea of it is EEEWWW!

I do like my own cooking and know that I may not always be up to restaurant food critic standards and am happy eating sushi, I do the basics in sanitation. I use separate cutting boards and knives for meat and vegetables. I cook things until they are done. I don't let food sit out. I do my best but I am also not trying to feed a few thousand people during a 3 hour game. You can see why short cuts are taken.

But then there are concerns about the whole food supply. Just because something is organic doesn't mean it doesn't need to be checked for quality. Think of it this way, if a vegetable is grown organic with cow manure as the fertilizer, wouldn't you want to make sure its really clean before you eat it? Also, what if a pesticide free vegetable has residents - like worms in broccoli or snails in lettuce. Finally, if you buy fruit and vegetables anywhere, how many people have handled them between the farm and your fork? How clean were there hands? Yicky!

Anyway, enough of that for now. Today I will call my doctor and whine a bit more. I woke up in the middle of the night because my hip hurt. I can't stand for more than 10 minutes with out significant hip pain. I did attempt to go to Costco yesterday with my husband and I'll just say its nice that they sell chairs because I tried out some of them. Today's plan is to only take one pain pill at a time so I can get some work done from home and swing by the post office and my office. My plan is to go to my other job tomorrow but that is a 20 mile drive. I am not sure I am up for that yet. I can switch my days if necessary so I'll have to see. I cant even go for a walk yet so I'm not sure I am ready to commit to an 8 hour work day.

Uncomplicating things

My life is just so complicated. I mean I try to balance working part time, working from home, going for walks, volunteering, support groups, getting together with friends, hanging out with my husband, cooking, errands, taking care of the cat (most important according to him), keeping up with my blog, facebook, and a million other online communities, reading, gardening, physical therapy, going to the gym, doctors and dentists, and the many other details of my life. So last week I got a brain storm. (I am not sure what I was thinking but it sure seemed like a good idea at the time.) I make my husband's lunch for work every day. It usually is a sandwich, celery and carrots sticks, and an apple. Last week, I said 'what if I make a different entree salad every day'. How smart was that? DUMB!

I have a cookbook with some great salads. I chose (after consulting my husband) chicken Caesar, nicoise, antipasto, taco, and pork noodle salad. Each day a different one. Well, this means the day before I needed to prep a container of lettuce with vegetable toppings, a container of toppings that might make the veggies slimy, some home made dressing, and then anything else needed to round out the salad. For example for the chicken Caesar, there was a lettuce container,a chicken container, a cheese container, and a dressing container. Every day I had to set aside time to make all these different containers. And on the days I had to work or had late meetings, I had to make them the morning of the day before... While we did like the salads - I had the same salads every day - in the future, they will be interspersed individually, once a week or so. Not five days in a row! Very time consuming. This week is sandwich week. Much less complicated.

Yesterday, my back was not reasonable and cooperative at all. I ended up spending some quality time with an ice pack on it. Then I end up being freezing cold and have to put on a sweater and drink some tea to warm up. This morning I got up at 5 and put some ice on it and went back to bed. Its supposed to be getting better damn it! (Great,now I can start lecturing my back on how it is supposed to be getting better - that's an exercise in futility - kind of like training the cat...) I did notice yesterday that my crocuses are really appearing as are tulips and daffodils and iris. No flowers yet but some greens are showing.

Today we are going to celebrate a friend's birthday and going into Boston to walk on the harborwalk and out to breakfast/lunch/brunch/coffee type thing. It should be fun. The weather is going to cooperate mostly. The sun will be shining and there will be a breeze off the tropical North Atlantic ocean... I will wear a warm coat. But it will be good to see my friends. This is all part of that social life I am trying to return to...

Clarification

I feel I should clarify a few things. First of all, the cat has not been catching any mice. Walter and his traps are catching mice. We last caught one on Sunday. The cat sleeps through all mice catching activities.

Also, my back only hurts some of the time. Defining some as 'anytime it would like to cause pain' is about as clear as I can get. I am sitting here right now and it is just beginning to hurt. There doesn't seem to be any clear rationale for it to start hurting. I can bend over and touch my toes, twist, and stretch and nothing seems to cause an increase in pain. I can also go for a walk or a snow shoe or use the machines at the gym and not have it hurt always but sometimes it does. It is inconsistent.

Yesterday, it was mostly okay. Sunday afternoon it was awful. Where does it hurt? Well, my lower back on the right side and in the middle and sometimes all the way up my spine. (If you happen to have a miracle back pain cure, feel free to let me know.) I have already tried advil, ice, heat, massage, Icy Hot stuff, and ignoring it (the most proactive thing). I am suffering in silence until my doctor appointment one week from today. I am sure you will hear a few more whines about it between now and then.

Another clarification is that sometimes I cook things that are inedible. Currently I have some pumpkin sage biscuits in the oven that may never be edible. They were supposed to cook for 8-10 minutes and currently are close to 20 but are still all gooey. (My husband said 'you seem to be cooking up a storm these days - you do this when you are stressed'. Possibly back pain causes stress but that's another story.) And I really hate recipes that say use an ungreased pan and then you have to chisel the results out of the pan...

Otherwise, yesterday was a busy day. I went to the gym, worked from home and went to work. Today I am working from home, going for a walk, and then going to work and my support group and running a few zillion errands. Not much. Just enough to keep me out of trouble. Perhaps I will look for a job in there some where as well.

Thoughts on air travel

After spending two fun filled days as part of the flying public, I do have a few thoughts on air travel and other travelers (of course I have to have an opinion.

- If you don't bring something to read or do while flying, please do not expect the 'lucky' people who are sitting next to you to chat for the entire flight.

- If you do manage to take a nap while flying, please don't snore.

- If you are traveling with a small child, why did you let them cry for the duration of TWO flights?

- You need to get some food in the airport before getting on the plane if you plan on eating more than a tiny bag of peanuts.

- If they tell you the policy is credit or debit cards only for your drink purchase on the plane, don't expect them to take cash from you. They won't. You won't get your drink.

- Please brush your teeth and use deodorant before flying. The other passengers will like you better.

- Yes all suitcases really do look a like. Label yours, look at the name on the baggage claim. If its not your name, put it back on the belt.

- Passengers do not really feel safe when the pilots tell them they deice planes and take off in raging snow storms all the time. It doesn't really make us feel better.

Yes, air travel is wonderful. I can't wait to do it again. In the meantime, before my next flight (in the unscheduled future), we have now done all the laundry, but not yet put it away. (Hey, we are most of the way there.)

All of a sudden I realized I was going to make treats baskets for Christmas and we are having a delayed celebration on Thursday here so perhaps it is time to start cooking. Unfortunately, Walter is still on California time and stayed up late. I went to bed early so I woke up early and decided it was time to get started on my cooking. However, cooking by the smoke alarm is not conducive to sleeping late. (And when you stick the smoke detector back up on the ceiling, if you don't do it right, it will fall on the floor.)

Anyway, today we return to our normally scheduled programming. I am going for a walk when I am done cooking by smoke detector. Then I will attempt to clean the house (maybe, maybe not). We will also retrieve the cat from his vacation home (my parents house) and endure four fun filled miles of meowing and shedding.