6/7/04 - Under Pressure...in more ways than one

It's Monday, another weekend behind me. Anymore, the only difference between the 'week' and 'weekend' for me is whether I can possibly see a Doc right away if my pain and/or symptoms warrant it...
I've been taking the Lasix and potassium pills since Friday now, but feel no difference (pressure in head, never-ending headache, weakness) except that now my bladder has me in the bathroom every fifteen minutes 'til noon... The headache is no longer a thundering roar, but diminished to a pounding jackhammer. I guess that's improvement, though...
I do know that, from what I've read about 'intracranial pressure' (pseudotumor?), this increased pressure in the brain is a serious thing. And that makes me worried because everything else continues to work in 'slow motion': my Doc has me scheduled for more labwork on the 18th (3 weeks??) and a followup a week after THAT...
The blurred vision spells are getting more frequent (hourly or less) and my hearing is like I'm 'under water'. I'm also 'seeing things': like a movement that isn't there, or shapes that make no sense ('til I study it long and hard and see that it is a bookshelf and its shadow, for instance).
The 'heavy head' is the worst, though, as it feels like I'm balancing a watermelon on my stiff and achingly painful neck, with little crackles and 'ticks' constantly going on in the back of my head...

Perhaps the worst of all of this: I feel I'm becoming more 'crippled' by the day: it was bad that, before this all got worse, I had to make dishes wait a few days at a time, and that housecleaning had become a 'sort of once or twice a month' thing, but now... I managed yesterday to 'sort' the dishes to get them ready for washing, but tired quickly, and hope to actually get to washing some of them today. And the carpet needs vaccuuming badly (thanks to my shedding kitties). This room (computer room, we call it now) is so cluttered I barely have a 2 foot by 6 foot patch to navigate in (it's tight in here anyway, with two desks AND a large drafting table and 2 bookcases) without bumping into something (Cd's falling everywhere, papers that I thought were important enough to print that wind up on the floor under my chair, etc.).

It's enough that I feel GUILTY for the half hour or so a day I squeeze out of my reserves to water and look after my flowers outside...

The 2nd Clematis (Magenta) has begun to bloom, and all 3 have all but overtaken one side of the deck... Both container roses are building nice new buds, and the climbing Blaze rose has already produced NICE clusters (and continues)... One of the little potted Hydrangea starters, the white one of the three (Red, White, Blue) has had a crown of white blossoms for a few weeks now, and it's only a four inch tall starter plant!
I sprinkled some wildflower seeds in the back by the gas meters, and finally got around, this past weekend, to putting the Lupine and Columbine starts in the ground back by the shed...
And I finally recharged the batteries to my digital camera this weekend, tested it with a few pics of my flowers...it works fine! That's a positive thing.

I just wish I could concentrate more and get some WORK done (have a few things that have piled up, going on a MONTH now), so I don't completely lose credibility and strand myself completely. A friend of a guy I did work for in the past has wanted me to give him some ideas, do some work on a new wwebsite for him, and I can't think straight long enough to get anything done on it...

Caught myself looking at the clock again -- hard to remind myself that Nash doesn't need to wake up now (5:30am) to get ready for school...SUMMER vacation!

Need to reset a few minutes, try to get something REAL done this morning...