Fully Embracing the “NICE” Days

Today… Today was a nice day.

My pain was eased up a good bit, and I felt a little stronger. My kidney infection seems better, too.

I had a physical therapy appointment this morning super early, so my friend took me to that, and it was pretty full-on. Lately, I have been up on my feet for most of the hour-long session. This is a good thing. It’s helping me to get stronger! I still have a lot of weakness from the muscle atrophy and the chronic fatigue that goes along with my condition… but working hard in PT is very good for me. Today, my therapist told me that I am okay to walk a little bit in my house with the walker! I just have to be SUPER careful because most of my downstairs floors are hard surfaces. I am also to ensure that I always wear shoes. The more I practice, the closer I will get to being able to walk “for real” on a more permanent basis. Right now I can only do a tiny bit before I am too tired and my right leg sort of “gives out”. It starts shaking super bad and I have to pretty much stop at that point – or else I become a fall risk. The good thing is – I can feel it coming on. I will be better able to check myself in time before that happens – so that’s a good thing! I am excited to start trying to do a little bit more on my feet – it’s a positive development, but at the same time, it’s also really scary. I’ve been in this wheelchair full-time for almost 5 years! I’m SO ready to be out of it, mind you… but… it’s also sort of a “safe space” for me as well – because I know if I am sitting down, I can’t fall. (Before I got the chair, I used to fall a lot – it was frightening). I’m really quite stoked to embrace this new chapter though and see where it takes me! I might fall some, but hopefully, it won’t be too bad. If I fall on my bum, I have plenty of natural padding to protect me… lol… so I just have to try and land on that! 😂

After physical therapy, my friend basically “kidnapped” me for the day and we spent most of the day running errands. It was so nice just to be out of the house! We browsed a charity shop and took care of some errands he needed to do (so I got to go to Walmart and Marshall’s, too!) Just being able to go inside the shops is still such a foreign concept to me. He had me use one of the self-checkout tills at Walmart and I was sort of panicked – I really didn’t know what I was doing. To be fair, I RARELY used those BEFORE I got sick and trapped inside the house. I hated them. I always had the opinion that if I was going to ring up my own stuff and basically work as a cashier, they should either put me on the payroll or give me a discount. LOL! So I hadn’t LOADS of experience with it. I’d used one once to buy some bananas a long time ago and it rang up my bananas at $49.00. I was buying 4 bananas. Obviously, that was a fluke, but it freaked me out. And NOT being a cashier, I had no CLUE how to fix that! Hahaha! But… I’m happy to say that it went well today. All I did was scan the items. He did all the other stuff. 😜

We then ran some more errands and stopped off at the eyeglass place afterward, where he had taken me to place an order for new glasses a couple of weeks ago. (I had a new prescription from my Ophthalmologist from back in July that I’d been carrying in my wallet). Another very dear and wonderful friend had very generously paid for me to get them, and I will be forever in this person’s debt. I’d received an email telling me they were ready, so I was excited to go and get them today!

You see, I’ve been using old eyeglasses that… well… were pretty much past their sell-by date. My vision had worsened so much (thank you, Sjogren’s) that I was unable to see much of anything at a distance, and I had to squint very hard to see things close up. (I wear progressives… or varifocals, for my UK friends). This meant that all the work I did on the computer had to be done in only short sessions. I got LOTS of vision headaches. By the time I would go to bed at night, I pretty much could not see anything. This made it hard to watch television because I rely a lot on the closed captioning and I couldn’t see the words! My world has been very, very blurry for quite a long time. Several years, to be exact. The new prescription was super strong. I was told that my vision had worsened to the point where I would not be allowed to have a driver’s license at all without corrective lenses, as I was rather blind otherwise. Yikes!

The moment I put the new glasses on, it was like my whole world had changed! It was surreal to be able to see everything look so SHARP and VIVID! This eyeglass place (Eyeglass World) offers a 2-for-1 deal, so I got some sunglasses as my second pair. I wore that pair home, and they were AMAZING! Polarised and everything! Both of the new frames are very similar to what I’d had before (I’m a creature of habit – I like rectangular frames because round ones make me look like a Jack-o-Lantern with my round face! LOL!) I’m hanging onto my old frames, though, and later down the road if I can afford to do so, I want to have them put some new lenses in them – that way I will have a backup pair in the event anything happens to these new ones! The old frames are still perfectly fine and I really do like them, so it would be nice to be able to do that at some point.

Anyway – I was SO grateful to be able to see clearly again, and when we got back to my house (and after my friend left) I rolled out to the driveway and I just sat there looking off in the distance at… pretty much EVERYTHING. It was as if I had brand-new eyes! The difference was so astounding that I was overcome with emotion… I broke down and cried a river. Happy tears, mind you… but I just couldn’t help it. Part of it, you see, is the fact that I was trapped inside my house for 4.5 years – confined to an upstairs bedroom, mostly IN the bed… not even able to open any windows… so being able to even BE outdoors in the first place is still a relatively new thing for me. I remember at one of my lowest points, I vowed to myself if I were ever able to go outside again, I would NEVER take things like – the feeling of gentle breezes, the sun on my face, fluctuating temperatures, raindrops, petrichor, the smell of fresh cut grass, the louder sounds that I can hear (certain loud birds, cars going up the road, etc…), watching leaves flapping around on the trees – and then falling off in autumn (and feeling the crunch of them underfoot), seeing the wildlife we have here (deer, squirrels, rabbits, turkeys) scampering around, marveling at the clouds as they drift past overhead, and even seeing planes flying over me – high in the sky… for granted. It’s like I am seeing the world anew, and let me tell you – I am totally here for it! Even more so since I have new and improved eyeballs!

My friend also surprised me today with one of my favourite autumnal treats (which I don’t get to experience much – it’s been about a year since my last one) – a decaf pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks. Yeah, I know, I know… go ahead… call me “Basic” – I earned it on that one. LOL! BUT… I do love a good PSL! Plus they’re only around for a very short while – LET ME HAVE THIS ONE, DING DANGGIT! I will say that my year-round fave from Starbucks is a decaf chai latte – but I’ve yet to have a decent one since moving back to the States. I’ve also not had much access to any Starbucks at all – so there’s that. I got a bit spoiled in London because the university library where I worked had a Starbucks inside – so I was able to get them pretty much daily. It’s probably good that I do NOT have that sort of access to them now (I mean, I couldn’t afford that sort of habit now anyway, but I digress… )

Also, while we were out running errands today, the UPS delivery person dropped off a small box for me. When I got home and opened it, I found the cutest little Tenth Doctor (from Doctor Who) Hallmark Christmas Tree ornament! It was a gift (it came from Amazon) and there was no gift tag inside – so as of the time of this writing, I haven’t the foggiest who gave it to me… but I simply ADORE it! Bring on the holidays so I can hang it up on the tree! So cute!

Of course, being gone for most of the day has ROYALLY confused my little birdies. I did feed them, and I cleaned their cages this afternoon. Then after I’d had Kiwi out to play with him for a bit, when I went to put him back in his cage, he clamped onto the tip of my left ring finger HARD. That beak might be tiny, but it is MIGHTY! Then when I finally got him to let go, he gave me a good blessing out in birdspeak. 😬 I guess that’s what I get for being away from the house all day. And NOT leaving their telly on with Sesame Street for them. The very idea! I will have to be extra careful to spend more time with my flock tomorrow to make up for things. Little scamps. It’s a good thing they’re so blasted cute. 😂

I did realise later that my friend had driven off with my folding wheelchair in the back of his car (we used my power one when we got back and kind of forgot about it). He was in the area, so he popped back around to bring it back. Basically, it was a bonus for me because I got to see him again. He’s pretty blasted awesome. I’m very lucky to have a friend like that in my life. (I do have other friends who are wonderful as well, but they all live very far away.)

Since the birdies ate later in the day, I stayed downstairs with them a bit longer to give them plenty of time to “graze” from their fresh food bowl as long as possible. I’ll take them up in about a half an hour and get them all ready for beddy-bye, and then go upstairs myself. It has been a very long day. (I was up at 5). I’m quite tired, but it’s a good tired.

Yes, it was a nice day. I like the nice ones.

The bad ones, however, can very well bugger off, thank you. 😂