Cat's Exercise Diary

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It's okay to have lazy days. Anyway, as a regular exerciser, it's good to have rest days - that allows your muscles to heal and recover, so that you don't get injured. So don't think of them as lazy days, think of them as recovery days. ;)

I should have added to my earlier post that I got a bit scared about tapering. I was planning to taper from 8 mg to 7, but I panicked. So I tapered to 7.5 mg instead to be safer. I'll stay at 7.5 mg for a couple of days and then will try going to 7 if all seems to be going okay at 7.5 mg.

On the subject of pred, it's really doing a number on my skin lately. I've had a bunch of acne and my face feels so dry (although the dryness could just be because it's winter). I've just recently gone down the rabbit hole of Korean skincare products - I have found a few products that I love and seem to help, so of course that's led me to buy even more products. Help! :p

I took a zofran this morning - I don't want to take imodium anymore, since it is opioid based and not really safe to take since I'm on LDN (which is an opioid blocker, so anything opioid-based could make me very ill). Zofran tends to slow down my transit time and is safe to take on LDN. And I haven't had a bathroom trip since taking the zofran, things seem to have calmed down. I still don't feel great - I'm really chilled and feeling very fatigued, but at least the d seems to have stopped. I'm having ginger tea and will see how I'm doing as the day goes on, if I'm able to eat a little something and if I'm able to take a walk. At this point I don't know, but it's only 8:30 AM so it's still early.
 
Cat I wouldn't think about tapering until you feel good for at least 3-4 days.
I haven't used the toilet since Wedesday.It happens sometimes and I hate it.I haven't taken any loperamide (Imodiam) for weeks so It's not that,and it's not my diet to blame.Probably why I'm feeling lazy.I might try some prunes later.I'm going to look into Zofran as an alternative to loperamide,what do you think.What do you take it for ?



PS.I've just searched Zofran and I see it's for nausea, which I only have when in severe pain,so not for me really.I thought it might help with frequent toilet visits.
 
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Yes, zofran is for nausea. It has the added "benefit" of slowing down my transit time, so it's a good thing for me to take when I'm both nauseous and having bathroom trips. I get nausea pretty regularly so I keep zofran on hand everywhere I go - it's in my purse, in my hiking day pack, in my living room, in my bedroom, in my bathroom...

I know it was a bit risky to try tapering today, but that's me being stubborn again. :p I think it's going okay, too. I've had a little food today and I'm feeling a bit better. Haven't been to the bathroom since this morning and I think my energy level has picked up a bit.

I'm not going for a walk, though. I just don't have it in me today. I'll see how I'm feeling tomorrow and go from there. Of course it's supposed to be a beautiful weekend weather-wise, so I'm going to try to at least walk the dog both weekend days, but we'll see how I'm feeling.

I hope you're feeling better soon, too. For me, if I have had a bunch of diarrhea, then as my system "normalizes", I tend to not go for several days. It's like my system emptied out and now that things are moving more slowly through it, it takes awhile for the poo to reach the other end, so I never worry too much if I am going a lot and then not going. That just seems to be normal for me. But I understand you worry about getting a blockage, so I know you'll do what you feel you need to do. Go easy on the prunes, though, that just sounds painful!
 
Yeah, I'm good. I spent most of the weekend away from the computer which is why I didn't update. Had a really nice weekend, actually, which is weird. My guts were suspiciously calm even though I tapered my pred on Thursday. I don't trust it, I think they're plotting something. Probably saving up some horribleness for the next time I taper.

I didn't lift weights but I did walk Lily both days. Saturday it was windy and muddy but we walked anyway. It was so muddy that once again my hiking shoes got a bit of muddy water inside and soaked my socks, yuck. Yesterday hubby was off of work so he and I walked Lily together - we stayed on the pavement and didn't go into the muddy dog park, so I didn't get wet feet that time.

Today it's warm, almost 60 degrees F, but windy and rainy, so I'm planning on going to the little gym and trying some weight lifting on my lunch break. Hopefully I can take a walk tomorrow, it's supposed to be almost as warm as today and sunny too so that sounds great for walking. I think I'm going to try tapering my pred from 7.5 mg to 7 mg on Wednesday, so we'll see what happens then.
 
We had a good 2 hour cycle today.We did get caught in a heavy rain/hail shower but it wasn't windy at least.Also I was wearing the wrong pants and I kept getting caught on the peddle.But I enjoyed it none the less.Glad you're ok though.Fingers x'd.
 
Eek, hail, that sounds really awful to be stuck on a bicycle in weather like that! Hopefully you were able to take temporary shelter somewhere during the hail. Rain is one thing, but hail can really hurt!

I had a really good workout today. Accomplished everything I wanted to. My strength is pretty close to where it was before this flare started (back in July!) and my stamina is improving (that took a big hit during the flare). My only complaint is that I broke my resistance band! :( I was given a couple of resistance bands by my physical therapist back in 2011 when I went through PT for my hip arthritis. I keep one at home and one in my gym bag at work. Well, that one broke as I was doing leg lifts with it. I think I need to buy a new one, I don't suspect that the physical therapy place will give me another one 6 years after I was discharged as their patient. So that's a bit annoying. But other than that, my workout was great. I felt good the whole time - a slight bit of reflux, but no other belly troubles at all. And reflux is very typical for me during a workout anyway so that was expected and standard for me.
 
I'm really happy to hear you're feeling good.Please don't spoil things for yourself though.
It's a cold 3c but sunny,so when the laundry's done we're going cycling before a weekly shop.Thought we'd do it that way in case the weather changes later.Have a good day.
 
It was fairly cool here as well - sunny and upper 40s F, but still very windy. I decided to take a walk anyway. The paved forest path is sort of down in a valley, it follows a creek which is in a sort of natural valley with hills on either side. So I figured I might be at least partially blocked from the wind if I took the forest path, and that worked out pretty well. The wind wasn't too bad at most parts.

My one big issue was my bladder, and really it's my guts to blame. I had taken a zofran last week Friday, and zofran often makes me constipated. It sure did this time! I'm still backed up, I've barely pooped at all since Friday. But I've been eating pretty normally, so of course my digestive tract is filling up more and more with stool. And that's now pushing on my bladder uncomfortably, and because of that I now don't have my normal bladder capacity. So, even though I urinated just before heading out to the forest path, I had to pee pretty quickly. That made for a slightly uncomfortable walk. I was glad to finish my walk and rush to a bathroom!

Other than that issue, I'm still feeling pretty well. My appetite is fairly normal and I'm not having any gut issues besides the constipation - no cramping, no nausea, no pain, just mild discomfort from my guts feeling so full - I feel uncomfortably bloated/full but that's about it. So I can't really complain too much. Zofran can constipate me for up to a week, but usually when I take just one, it's more like a few days tops. So I should become un-constipated very soon, the zofran's constipating effect shouldn't last much longer. (No, I won't eat any prunes! Ha ha.)

Tomorrow's plan is to lift weights again, presuming that I'm still feeling reasonably well tomorrow. Thursday will be my rest day and it's also bargain hunting day - my local thrift store that sometimes has the $2 pants sales, they're having an end of season sale on Thursday with $3 sweaters and $5 winter coats, so I'm going to go check that out. I already have plenty of coats, but I could use a few more sweaters. Since I've gone up a size thanks to pred, some of my sweaters have become a bit too small, so more sweaters in my new size would be good to get me through the last of winter.
 
I hope you get your innards back to normal really soon.I don't envy you one bit.But I do envy you your thrift shop.Although I must say ours We can get lots of designer stuff,not that I care about that much,and stuff that people have bought overseas on holiday etc.so it's quite unique.Not like going to the local fashion stores and seeing the same stuff in different sizes.We've had a good couple of days on the peddles,but my r ear end and tail bone feels a bit bruised,due to some rough terrain.Having today off and going into town to look round the auction house to see if there'll be anything worth bidding for tomorrow.
 
What kind of seat do you have on your bike? I put a gel seat on my cruiser bike, and a gel seat cover on my road bike. It makes a big difference! You can get padded bike shorts, too, but they don't exactly look cute, which is why I opted for a gel seat/seat cover instead.

Yeah, there's been some designer stuff at my thrift store, too. At the last $2 pants day, I bought a skirt (they're included in the sale, really it's all bottoms that are $2 during those sales). And when I got it home, I realized the tag said "Gucci". Score, I got a Gucci for $2! But, then I washed it and it shrunk. Turns out it was wool. Oops! It no longer fit me after that. So I donated it back to the thrift store. Somebody else smaller than I am can now get a Gucci skirt. I don't care much about labels, I care more about whether something fits and looks nice and is good quality, regardless of the brand. And I honestly don't even wear skirts very often so it's fine. I mostly liked the skirt because it had pockets, ha ha. I'm very big on pockets.

I tapered my pred as of this morning, went from 7.5 to 7 mg. Hopefully my body will accept that. Oh, and I finally was able to have a bowel movement. :) Last night before bed I finally felt the urge to go, and I went a LOT. I feel like I emptied my entire colon, ha ha. I went again this morning, not as much as last night. I feel much more comfortable now, I don't feel so bloated and full.

Today's plan is still to hit the little gym on my lunch hour for weights. I'm feeling pretty good so far, so unless I start to feel like a taper fail is coming on, I don't see why I wouldn't be able to hit the gym. And tomorrow is bargain hunting - maybe I'll find a Gucci sweater. ;) Ha ha.
 
I think I'll have to get a gel seat.Mine is quite comfy but there's no harm in having "extra"comfy.Glad you had a good "clear out" The relief is great eh? One of our thrift shops is having a sale of donated clothes on Saturday.All new with shop/price labels still attached.You have to buy a £2 ticket to get in the shop before you can buy anything.I didn't bother though as I hate crowds.I got hubby a nice navy blue striped shirt for £1.
Good luck with the pred.taper.Are you going to stay on 7 for a few days before you try to go lower ? It might be best to take it slowly.
 
Yeah, I'm going to wait probably just over a week before I try tapering again. I'm going to take it slowly and taper by 0.5 mg. I prefer to taper on or around Fridays, so that I have the weekend to recover if it goes badly. But next week Mon & Tues I absolutely cannot be ill, as everybody else at work is going to be at meetings and I have to be in the office while they're all away. There's nobody else to cover but me. So I figured, I'd taper now, and if things go badly I can be sick from today thru Sun if need be, and then hopefully better by Monday. But hopefully the taper will go fine and I won't need to worry about that anyway.

So yeah, I'm thinking next week Thurs or Fri I'll try going down to 6.5 mg, presuming that I'm feeling well enough then to do so.

It's been a weird time for me lately. In addition to not feeling horrible, I'm also doing okay money-wise which is weird. :p We just got a hefty tax bill from the IRS - but then I just got a bonus at work today, which is almost the same amount as we owe the IRS. It's weird to get a large bill and then suddenly get to pay it all off and not have to worry about it! Worrying is what I do best, ha ha. What will I do with myself if I can't worry about my health nor my finances? ;)

I definitely recommend getting a gel seat or seat cover. They're not too pricey, either. I think my gel seat was about $25 and the seat cover was in the $10ish range, very reasonable. I also got hubby a gel seat cover for his bike, and he agrees that it makes a big difference in terms of comfort. I'm of the opinion that my poor backside has been through enough already, so I'm going to make it as comfortable as possible when I have that option.

I hate crowds too so I totally understand that. I'm a huge introvert anyway so I love being alone, and I feel sort of suffocated and overwhelmed in crowds. Plus in crowds I can hear people coughing and sniffling and then I get paranoid that I'm going to get sick. It was awful in Japan in particular - there's an unspoken rule there that you don't talk when on the train, so it's pretty silent on the trains even when they're packed full of people. And there's another unspoken rules that you do not blow your nose, that's disgusting in their culture. You sniffle instead, you sniff that mucus back up into your nose. So, imagine being on a train that's jam packed with people and all you can hear is sniffling! Eek, it was awful! I loved most parts of my trip to Japan, but not that part.
 
We were at the local craft market at the weekend.You would love it,whereas I just went for the walk and something to do.It was absolutely jam packed.It's in a Victorian train station and quite big with lots of space.It has a wrought iron and glass roof and the sun was streaming through.I'm not very tall and I was quite overwhelmed,so we just walked through and out.I'll be giving it a wide berth come the summer and holiday weekends.
 
That sounds like a lovely place and I do love buying craft supplies (I've been cooking up my next crafts in my head already, I have an idea for a chain maille necklace). But yeah, the crowds would probably overwhelm me too. I'm never sure if I'm tall or not, it seems to differ based on who I'm standing next to. :p I'm 5'8" so tall-ish for a woman I guess. But I'm the shortest in my family - all my cousins on both sides are taller than I am, my parents are taller than I am, my brother is much taller - he's 6'6" so he's nearly a full foot taller than I am! I'm the shortest and the only one with IBD, I often wonder if there's a connection there.

In hubby's family, though, I'm pretty tall. Hubby's mother is very short and his sister is also shorter than I am (hubby is 5'11"). So I feel rather tall when I'm spending time with them. My mother-in-law even forbade me to wear anything with heels around her, ha! (I normally don't wear heels anyway so that's not a problem.)

I had a brief period during the late morning of feeling a bit "off" - not quite nausea, not quite dizziness, but something approaching that. I think though that it was just my body getting adjusted to the new, slightly lower dose of pred. And I'm feeling better now. So I'm heading to the little gym shortly for my workout.
 
I had a good workout. Was able to do everything I wanted to and it was no sweat - literally, everything felt pretty easy today and I barely even broke a sweat, which tells me that I can increase the intensity next time. I brought my one surviving resistance band from home, so I was able to use that. I'm going to buy some more soon. I'm thinking my next workout will be Friday.

I've been doing well diet-wise for the most part except for when free food is in front of me. Then I lose all willpower. There were snacks brought in to work today - a veggie tray, a fruit tray, and some cookies. So I had a strawberry and two cookies. They were delicious! I hopefully won't pay for that, cookies are fairly safe for me as long as they don't have coconut in them or oats (I can eat oatmeal as long as it's cooked well and mushy, but hard oats like in cookies or granola bars is too much for my body to handle and that puts me in pain). These were chocolate chunk cookies and they didn't seem to have anything in them that would trigger me. And I know I've had issues with strawberries in the recent past, so I only had one. Hopefully one isn't enough to put me in pain.
 
I had a good rest day yesterday. Guts are still quiet. And I got some bargains - got 3 sweaters (a dark blue cardigan, a light tan long sweater coat, and a medium brown sweater) and I got one jacket that needs new buttons, and then I got something interesting. It's like a long black jacket in sort of a Chinese style - it's velvety and has frog closures. But it reminds me of a pirate coat. It was only $3 so I'm going to play around with altering it to make it more interesting. Hah, that's me bargain hunting - I can't just get bargains, I also have to get sewing projects. :p Like I needed any more sewing projects! I have a whole room full of them already. But if I see something interesting with potential and it's cheap, I can't help but snap it up and give myself another project.

Anyway. Today's plan is to hit the little gym on my lunch break for a weights session. My guts still feel good. The weather turned bitterly cold - it's only going to be about 20 F today, and it's also windy, so it feels even colder. So no walking for a bit until it warms up. Poor Lily might not get a walk this weekend, depending on how cold out it is. I'll make sure she gets some treats and I might take her to the pet store so that she can get out and have some socialization with other dogs. And I might take a walk on my treadmill tomorrow.
 
Oops, I had a super lazy weekend. :p I started out fine - I got up early on Saturday and went to an indoor rummage sale and got a few things, then I hit the grocery store right away. Did my weekly grocery shopping and got myself a few chocolate treats too, and that was the start of my laziness. I got home, put my groceries away, did some laundry and straightened up a bit. Then I thought about all the other chores I should do - I should vacuum, I should wash some dishes, I should give the dog a bath... then I saw my chocolate treats sitting out and I was like, or maybe I could just play video games and eat chocolate! So that's what I ended up doing all weekend long. Oops.

Today I'm getting back on track. Going to the little gym on my lunch break for weights. It's very yucky weather here today, it's snowing and windy so the snow is blowing almost horizontally. I'm definitely not going out in that mess! So gym it is. Tomorrow should be sunny but cold, so I'm thinking I might either do a treadmill walk or do a cardio session on the stationary bike in the little gym. The tentative plan is weights Weds & Fri, and on Thurs it's looking like it might warm up slightly so I might take a walk that day. I'm thinking I'm going to try to taper my pred on Thurs so we'll see how I'm feeling - I'm only going to taper by 0.5 mg again (I am currently at 7, so I'll go down to 6.5 mg). Hopefully my body will be fine with that and will allow me to walk without throwing any symptoms at me.
 
My weekend consisted of clearing the attic.And you know what that's like hahaha.We had 4 refuse sacks of books which went to a charity (thrift)shop this morning,We have a good car load for the local tip (dump) and a van load for a cancer care charity,which is being collected later in the week.I also tidied drawers and cupboards in the house and found four packets of sweets which I bought for xmas and had put away.Result !!!
Hubby is quite poorly with a heavy cold so we didn't go out.But I did walk into town for a docs apt.and some shopping,today,so that's better than nothing.
 
Sounds like you had a very productive spring cleaning weekend! I hope your hubby feels better soon. There must be a bad cold going around. My grandma also has a terrible cold right now, I was told not to go visit her this weekend because she's so unwell right now. She's 84 and obviously not a healthy person to begin with so that's worrying, but she recovered from the flu just fine a few weeks ago, so hopefully she'll recover just fine from this as well.

I really should do some spring cleaning as well. I just recently went through my pants and got rid of what no longer fits me. I figure, if I lose a bit of weight, my current stash of pants will still fit, and if I lose more than a bit of weight, I have plenty of belts. Gaining weight is always more problematic for me than losing. If my clothes are a bit too big, it's not a huge issue, but if my clothes are a bit too small then everything becomes uncomfortable. So I got rid of all my too small pants. I need to do the same with sweaters and tops now. I have at least a couple sweaters that I absolutely love, but they just don't fit me anymore - they're too tight in the arms and too tight around the belly. But I'm going to have a hard time letting them go. I think that I might take those sweaters and re-purpose them. I have a sewing pattern for making mittens out of an old sweater, and I've also in the past made a throw pillow out of a sweater. So that way I could still get some use out of those sweaters.

It's snowing so heavily here that I'm wondering if we're going to be sent home soon. And the roads haven't been plowed yet either which is worrying (my city doesn't like to plow until after the snow has stopped falling, which can make for some very bad road conditions during and right after the snowstorm). If I get sent home, I can still do a weights workout using my barbell and dumbbells, etc. So we'll see what happens.
 
Didn't get sent home (but it's still snowing). So I went to the little gym and had a pretty good workout. I had a bit of reflux, but nothing out of the ordinary for me during a workout. I was slightly concerned because I had just a few odd abdominal pains earlier today, but my guts were fine and quiet during my workout and I haven't had any of those pains since either. I might just be slightly constipated again - I haven't taken any Zofran lately, but I always seem to forget to have enough fiber on the weekends. During the week, I have oatmeal and I have psyllium husks, and that's enough to keep me regular. But on the weekends, my usual routine is nonexistent and I often forget to have my psyllium and usually don't have oatmeal either. It's weird because when I flare, I have lots of diarrhea (I was having 20+ watery bowel movements per day at the worst of my flare in July/August, and I was taking like 6 zofrans per day then). But when I'm not in an active flare, then I tend towards constipation instead and need soluble fiber just to go at least once per day. My body is so weird.

This evening's plans are definitely to relax. Hubby is making belly-friendly burritos for dinner (with goat cheese and ground turkey instead of regular cheese and beef). And I just finished up a crochet project, I finished making a blanket as of last night, so I can start a new sewing or crochet project. I have a few ideas in mind - I have a jacket that I'm going to sew new buttons on, and I also want to crochet myself some wrist warmers. So we'll see what wins out, sewing or crocheting (and it's possible that I'll sew the buttons on and then start crocheting, I think I have time for both). Both sound like something cozy to do on a snowy day.
 
Hubby still poorly and as he likes to share,he passed it to me.Woke with sore throat,rattley chest,runnny nose and headache.Boy,am I glad the loft got done.So unlike you,who's always so industrious,or planning to be,I'm doing nothing for a day or two.The weather is good here,12c and sunny,which always makes me feel like I should be outside,but I'm not going.Good that you got some workout done,take care'
 
Oh no, I hope it's not too bad of a cold for you and that you recover quickly! Ha, you're right, even if I catch a cold I still would be working on a crochet project. :p I can't stand to just do nothing. I get very bored and feel worthless and antsy just lying around watching TV, so I usually crochet when I'm sick because it's not labor-intensive and it gives me something to do and makes me feel worthwhile.

I think there's a nasty cold going around here as well. My grandma has a bad cold, and there seems to be one going around at work too (so I'll probably catch it myself as pred seems to wreck my immune system even more so than it already was). A co-worker has been coughing terribly all morning and she just left to go to the doctor and I think at least one other co-worker also has a cold.

You mentioned a rattley chest, which can sometimes be indicative of pneumonia - so please do go to the doctor if that doesn't improve quickly or especially if it gets worse. In the meantime, rest up! No bicycling for you until you're completely better. From what I've read, with a cold, it's generally okay to exercise as long as the symptoms are above the neck only. But if you have symptoms below the neck, which you clearly do with the chest rattle, then you need to hold off on exercise until you're completely recovered. So rest, rest, rest!

As for me, my legs feel tired today so I'm thinking I might skip the cardio session after all. I'll make today be a rest day with plans to lift weights tomorrow, walk Thurs, and weights Friday. Hopefully by giving my legs a day to rest today, I'll be able to do my workout plans for the rest of the week.
 
Hmm, there are now multiple people at work who are coughing a lot, and I'm sure I've been exposed to the germs (I'm covering for the receptionist today as she's off, and the lady who is covering my breaks has been coughing - so she's been getting germs all over the reception desk, great). Pretty sure I'm going to come down with a cold shortly myself as that's usually how it goes. I think I'm going to run to the craft store on my lunch break and buy some more yarn! I see more crocheting in my future. :p
 
The last time I was unwell with a cold (?) was during the week of the Millenium 17yrs ago.So it's come as a shock to me.I have noted your advice re: chest,although I have had the pneumonia jab,which is for life.Also up to date with my flu jab.

Happy sewing !!!
 
Wow! That's pretty amazing to not have a cold for 17 years! I'm definitely jealous of that. Me, I tend to get at least 4 or 5 colds per year if not more. I also get the flu shot every year, but it's not 100% effective. I've gotten the flu at least twice in the past decade in spite of having the flu shot. So whenever people around me are ill and contagious, I automatically assume I'm going to catch it too. Usually I'm right, and it's a pleasant surprise when I'm wrong.

(I know when I've caught a cold rather than "just allergies" if my guts also act up - when my immune system turns on to fight the cold, it also fights my guts a little bit while it's active. And I know I have the flu instead of a cold when I get chills and aches. I last had the flu 2 or 3 years ago, and that year's version of the flu came with a cough that lasted for over 2 months. Yuck!)

I just bought a whole bunch of yarn and also some more chain maille links, so I'm set for projects for a while. :p Hopefully I don't catch this nasty cold that's been going around, but in all likelihood I will catch it. Better to be prepared with some sick day projects just in case. And if I don't get sick, bonus! Not getting sick will mean I can still work out but I'll also have a lot of yarn to have fun with. :)
 
Hmm. Not sure if I've caught a cold or not. I definitely have more sinus congestion than usual today, and my guts might be slightly iffy, but I'm not coughing - everybody at work has been coughing. My lungs and throat feel fine, it's just my sinuses and maybe guts that are slightly wonky. So I'm not sure if I'm going to make it to the gym today or not. I'll just play it by ear and see how I'm feeling over the next few hours. I can always skip a workout today and try it tomorrow instead if I'm questionable today.

Carol, I hope you're feeling a bit better today! Keep resting and stay hydrated.
 
I should add that if my guts are indeed iffy and if I do indeed have a cold, then I'm going to put off tapering. I had been planning to taper tomorrow but I won't do it until I'm feeling better.
 
Hmmm. I'm still quite sniffly. The mucus is starting to go down my throat which is making that a bit irritated and I'm clearing my throat more than usual now too. And my guts are just slightly iffy still. I'm thinking that I am going to skip my workout today after all and will see how I'm feeling tomorrow. Will probably also postpone tapering as I mentioned earlier. I'm taking extra vitamin C today and will rest as much as I can and re-assess tomorrow. Yuck!

Wait... oh no... I think the coughing has just started. Maybe it's just the mucus in my throat, but just now I've started coughing a little bit. Ugh! Oh well. I figured this would happen so it's not like it's surprising. Good thing I bought more yarn yesterday!
 
Cat,please don't do to much today.Better safe than sorry.
I feel better than yesterday,but I've been sleeping a lot.Only had porridge for two days,just 'cos I thought I should have something. Drinking lots.and peeing lots.Haven't "been" since Monday morning so I've got THAT to look forward to.I haven't taken any cold meds for that reason,just lemon juice and honey in warm water.
 
I won't do too much today. The fatigue is hitting me now and I just feel like sleeping too. I'm definitely skipping the gym for a few days at least, I know what I need now is lots of rest. I haven't taken cold meds yet myself either, I'll only do that if I need them to be functional for work. Cold meds tend to make me have to use the bathroom - of course with presumed IBD I don't take any NSAIDs, so acetaminophen-based meds is basically all I can take, and acetaminophen seems to make me have more frequent and looser bowel movements, especially if I take it on an empty stomach. But having a cold also makes me go more often, as my immune system likes to attack my guts a bit while it's turned on. So no worries about being backed up for me right now.

I just had some ginger tea with cinnamon, which is my go-to warm drink when I have a cold (honey isn't allowed on low-FODMAP so I tend to avoid honey these days). Is porridge the UK term for oatmeal? If so, that should help you go - oatmeal always helps me go. Hopefully you don't have to resort to prunes again. Feel better soon, both guts-wise and cold-wise! Get some more rest, I will be resting too.
 
Ha ha, oops, I didn't rest. :p I didn't go to the gym, I promise. But I had time to kill on my lunch hour since I wasn't going to the gym and I also didn't have much appetite. So, I did my favorite non-gym activity: I went clothes shopping. :D Got some really good deals, too! I found a super cute sky-blue moto style leather jacket, for $20. I've been thinking about getting a moped, and hubby says I would need to wear a leather jacket while riding a moped for safety. So I've been looking around for awhile now for a cute, affordable leather jacket. I think this one fits the bill perfectly, now I just need to find a blue moped to match. ;) I also got a really pretty black and white maxi dress for summer, that was only $5! And I got a sweater and skirt set for $4 which was maybe the best score of the day. It is really cute, it's sort of a retro style (it reminds me a bit of the fashions of the 1930s) - it has sparkly buttons and a peplum. I've gotten a bit more, ahem, curvy, since being on pred, and this is the first time that my curves have looked good with a peplum. Usually peplums do me no favors but this one actually works for me. The skirt is a bit too long, so I think I'm going to hem it, but other than that no alterations are needed. So yeah, I scored big at the thrift store today! That makes me feel better mentally if not physically. Shopping and finding super cute bargains always brightens my mood. And that's a good thing when I can't get to the gym.
 
Clothes shopping lifts the spirits eh? Yes, porridge is oatmeal,and yes I have "been".It's 9-10am and I've been back and forwards since 6am.I think it's settling down now.I didn't have prunes this time.I do like to try natural remedies, but to be honest I'll take meds anytime as long as they work.I haven't done my hair or make-up since Monday,so I must be quite poorly.It's the first thing I do every morning as a rule.I just hope we don't get visitors.Hahaha. Have a good day.
 
The fatigue knocked me down hard today. I woke up this morning and just felt exhausted. So I called in sick to work and went back to bed and slept for another 4 or 5 hours. I still don't feel great, and honestly I still feel fatigued, but a bit better than I was feeling. I haven't been coughing today and barely been blowing my nose, so it feels like fatigue is really my only big symptom right now. Hopefully it goes away soon.

I'm glad to hear that you were able to go without having to take prunes again. Hopefully you and I both recover from these colds soon. As for you not wearing makeup, I find that certain things go by the wayside for me as well when I'm not feeling well, with the first thing usually being flossing. I floss my teeth religiously when I'm well, but it's the first thing I stop doing when I'm unwell. I did not floss last night and I doubt I will tonight either.
 
Oh dear Cat,I'm glad you took notice of your body and took the day off.If you slept extra time,you must have needed it.I'm feeling marginally better today,I've even put a wash on,and a casserole for hubby,but I'm wacked out now,so that's it for the rest of the day
 
I went to work today which might have been a mistake. The fatigue is much better, but I've had nausea all morning. I've taken 2 zofrans and they've done little to help. I don't want to take anymore but I have to be functional to work so I don't know what to do, ugh. I hate when my body does stuff like this. It's endlessly frustrating.

I'm planning a restful weekend. My parents want to come down but I'm just not feeling up for a visit. I just want to rest some more. Probably not going to do much of anything over the weekend. If I'm feeling up to it, I'll take Lily on a short walk, but that's a big if. It's rainy today which matches my mood. I'm just feeling so bleh both mentally and physically.

I was productive yesterday, though. I crocheted myself a new scarf while resting and watching movies. (I watched Wild - I thought the book was better.) I had gotten some super pretty, thick, soft yarn for cheap - you know me, I love a bargain. Apparently sometimes the factory messes up skeins of yarn, so they sell it for much cheaper - the yarn itself is fine, it's just that the skein looks lumpy or whatever. So I got a bunch of gorgeous yarn for $5 - it should have cost at least $20 if the skeins hasn't been messed up. The yarn is soft light grey, almost white, with silver sparkles running through it. So pretty! I made myself a very thick, warm scarf with that yarn yesterday. I'm quite happy with the result. Next crochet project will probably be to start on a new blanket. I got yarn in shades of dark red, so I'm going to make a red striped blanket. (My last blanket was blue stripes.) So I am sure I'll be working on that quite a bit over the weekend.
 
Even when you're resting,you're busy, hahaha
I had to laugh earlier.I told you I'd put a wash on.Well when the cycle finished I went to empty the machine and realised I hadn't added the detergent or softener.It was there on the worktop and I knew instantly I hadn't put it in.First time in over 50 yrs and countless loads of laundry.If it had been a"dirty"wash,I would have done it again,but I thought,"oh,too hell with it".Was that an "age" thing or just being a bit poorly ? I said to Les earlier,we do take feeling well for granted until sickness strikes.Of course,we've just has a cold and I'm really not complaining.I'm so looking forward to getting on little blackie again,but it will be a few days yet,if not more.
 
I've done something very similar to that! I put the laundry in the washing machine, put in the detergent and fabric softener, and walked away. A couple hours later I was wondering why I hadn't heard the washer beep yet, so I went back downstairs to check it... and realized that I had never turned it on. :p I'm 37 so I don't think I can blame it on old age quite yet, either.

Yes, even when I'm resting I have to be doing something - either playing a video game or on the forum or doing crafts, something to keep my mind occupied. I'm sort of an antsy, fidgety person and crafting in particular helps keep the antsiness at bay. When I was off of work back in Aug/Sept due to my terrible flare, I was of course hospitalized at first and then resting at home for a few weeks before I went back to work. And I did SO MUCH crocheting during those few weeks, ha ha. I made several blankets and I made one very interesting scarf (it was orange and had a hood on it and the hood had fox ears, and the scarf part looked like a fox tail, it was super cute). I can crochet even when I'm too ill to do much of anything else. The only time I wasn't able to crochet was when I had that accident with a hedge trimmer and sliced my right index finger badly and needed 7 stitches. I couldn't crochet with that finger out of commission, but after it healed, I got right back to it. (That finger never regained full sensitivity and has a huge scar, but I can crochet just fine and I'm pretty used to how that finger feels now.)

I took another 2 zofran because I couldn't deal with the nausea. I also ate a few potato chips as sometimes I drop too low in sodium and chips always seem to help. So I am less nauseous now, I can at least deal with how I'm feeling now. But my total for today is 4 zofran, eek. I'm not going to poop for like a week! :p But I just hate nausea so much, and I find it extremely hard to get through a work day with nausea. I needed to take zofran to be functional. So now I'm functional, and I will just have to deal with the constipation.
 
Re: the laundry,glad it's not just me then.....:thumleft:
Re; the nausea.It only affects me when in severe pain,so occasionally.But I don't know what I'd choose between it and constipation.It's not the constipation that bothers me, per se,it's the result after the meds.for same.Between a rock and a hard place,excuse the pun.:frown:
 
Ha ha, I'm going to be in a hard place while pooping a rock. :p I think I've said this before, but vertigo is my #1 most hated symptom, followed closely by nausea & vomiting. So I'd rather be constipated than nauseous. It's not always worth it - like, the nausea may have gone away on its own, but since I didn't wait and see, I'm now going to be constipated for days. Worth it? I honestly don't know. It's really difficult to say if saving myself a few hours of nausea is worth up to a week of constipation. But usually, if I'm nauseous, I choose to take zofran because I just hate nausea so much. I at least can function when I'm constipated. It's not a fun time, but I can deal with it. Nausea, I have a much harder time dealing with. And I'm prone to pretty frequent nausea. Like, most mornings I'll have some nausea (usually not enough to need a zofran for). Mornings can be rough and some mornings are worse than others (like, today). If I eat something that doesn't agree with me, or if I have a taper fail, or if my guts are just feeling feisty, or for seemingly no reason at all, I can be hit with nausea. It's a frequent but unwelcome visitor in my life and it doesn't necessarily accompany any other symptom (like you said you only get nausea with pain - I get nausea on its own, no pain required).

I'm feeling a little better as the morning has gone on so I'm going to attempt to eat a small amount of food (mac & cheese, which is usually very safe for me). Wish me luck!
 
Good Luck, but take it easy this weekend.You'll have plenty good days to catch up with your fitness regime and your tapering.
 
Yes, I haven't even thought of tapering, I'm staying put at 7 mg at the moment until I recover from this. And walking is the only fitness I've thought of doing, but even that is iffy.

Eating went fine! The small bit of mac & cheese sat fine in my belly. It seems like the nausea is gone, thank goodness. I might have oatmeal for dinner just to get some fiber though. (No, I won't resort to having prunes, ha ha.)
 
My guts are feeling a bit rough today (and I didn't even have oatmeal for dinner). I was wrong about not being able to go for awhile, I've had several bowel movements already this morning. I'm feeling some crampy pain, too. Not a fun time. Good thing I had already planned to rest this weekend. I recently got a new heating pad and I've been using it today. I've also made some progress on crocheting, I started on a blanket yesterday and got a chunk of it done already. And I started making a chain maille necklace too. And I'll do some sewing probably later today or tomorrow. :p These distractions are a good thing, though, they help me forget for a bit how icky my guts are being.

I'm not walking the dog today. I don't feel well enough and it's cool and windy out, so I'm just going to stay in and keep on resting (and crocheting). Tomorrow the weather is supposed to be nicer, so I'll see how I'm feeling. I know that walking does help my guts, but I also have to listen to my body and give it rest when it needs it. So we'll see. No plans to taper yet, I'm not going to risk making myself feel worse when I already feel not great.
 
Well,because I felt a little bit better I thought I'd change and wash the bed-linen.And when I had,I could have crawled right back in.But I'm glad I made the effort AND that I remembered the detergent.I do love a fresh bed.It's been wet today but the sun tried to come out so we had a little walk over to the park.That was hard work too,but like you I'm not one to sit and do nothing,we just do different things.This crohns thing does get in the way of planning things to do,but I'm not complaining.I can muddle through, whereas there are so many holding down a job and/or raising kids.I can please myself,and for that I'm thankful.Enjoy the rest of you weekend me darlin'.
 
Yeah, I'm really glad I never had kids. I can barely take care of myself some days, and working full-time often has me exhausted. I do not think I could handle a kid on top of everything else. Did you have Crohn's when you had your son? Or did that come into your life later? For me, I got sick just before I turned 30. I was already on the fence about having kids, and getting a chronic illness just sealed the deal for me, no kids for me. If I do want to hang around with kids (which I rarely do), I have 5 nieces and nephews between the ages of 3 and 13. But mostly, hanging around with those kids reinforces for me that not having kids was the right choice for me! :p I'm very happy with just hubby and the pets, I don't need any other people in my household.

That reminds me, I really should wash the bed sheets as well. And then, like you said, crawl right back into bed! I'm already ready for bed, I've been in my pajamas all day.
 
I had a decent day yesterday. It was pretty nice weather and I was able to walk Lily with hubby. We even ran into our neighbor, who we haven't seen in awhile. She owns 2 corgis, and Lily loves playing with her corgi friends. So we walked with her and her corgis for a little bit. We stuck mostly to the paved path, as the park was very muddy. But even so, Lily did not stick to the path, she walked through a lot of mud, and at one point she slipped and fell face-first in some mud. She had a muddy snout after that! And very muddy paws. So right after our walk, Lily had a bath.

Today's weather looks even nicer. Close to 60 F, it really looks and feels like springtime! Usually the first day of spring still feels more like winter weather than spring, so it's a real treat for the first day of spring to feel like spring. I'm going to take advantage of it and have a lunchtime walk on the paved forest path (it's still quite muddy out, all the snow melted so everything is soggy and muddy). Tomorrow, if I'm feeling up to it, I'm tentatively planning a weights workout. Later this week, also presuming that I'm still feeling reasonably well, I'm going to try to taper. I'm still at 7 mg pred and plan to taper to 6.5 mg. Not sure what day I'll try that, maybe Thurs or Fri.

The weather is supposed to get icky - starting Thurs, it's supposed to just rain and rain and rain. At least a week of rain, yuck. It's in the forecast every day. So I won't be able to take walks during that. Not quite sure what I'll do during all that rain. Probably some treadmill walking.
 
Dogs love to run around with friends,so I expect it was worth having a bath for.We are expecting bad weather too, so just as well I'm still not feeling up to cycling.At least I'll be able to blame the weather.
 
Yes, Lily sometimes will get a little aggressive with dogs she doesn't know (especially dogs that are much larger than she is), but she loves her friends and never gets aggressive, and sometimes will even play with them (she's not usually very playful when it comes to other dogs - she didn't have a lot of socialization with other dogs when she lived with her previous owners up through age 2, so she's still sometimes sort of clueless as to how to interact with other dogs).

It's been a stressful day at work! I feel like I'm being pulled in about 100 different directions. We're transitioning over to our new regional president and there's a lot of data she wants from us and I'm the person who runs a lot of the data and puts together spreadsheets and so on, so it's been a challenging time. But it's good, the new president already knows she can come to me and get data and info, so that's a good thing. Just a bit stressful at the moment as we're transitioning. I'm heading out soon for my walk, it's much-needed on a day like this! I just want to get out and breathe in the spring air and enjoy the calmness of the forest. That sounds so nice right now!
 
My walk yesterday was fantastic! I was just warm enough that I didn't need a jacket. It was a bit breezy but it was also sunny, so the breeze felt nice with the warmth of the sun. I got my 10,000 steps in yesterday and my fitbit was very happy with me, ha ha.

The Zofran constipation is now catching up to me. I had several substantial bowel movements on Saturday, but nothing on Sunday, and only a few tiny "rabbit poos" yesterday, so I'm feeling a bit backed up and slightly crampy this morning. I'm still planning to go to the gym this afternoon, but I'm going to try to void my bowels first if I can.

Work continues to be stressful. Our official transition date to our new president isn't until April 1st, so I'm sure it's going to be stressful until then and likely after then for awhile as well until we all adjust to whatever changes happen. Today is particularly stressful though because our new president is going to be here in the office tomorrow (her home office is in another state) so today and tomorrow are going to be extra challenging. I'm definitely looking forward to my workout today as a way to relieve some stress.

Tomorrow I have a plan in mind, too. It's supposed to be colder, so I'm going to take a rest day. I am going clothes shopping and then I'm going to treat myself to sushi for lunch, yum! I know that will brighten my mood as well. Thursday I'm hoping to hit the gym again - I'm also thinking that I'm going to try tapering that day. So I don't have plans yet for Friday, as I want to see how tapering goes first.
 
I had a good workout yesterday. Everything went fine, except that I think my one remaining resistance band is getting too stretched out. I ordered myself a set of new resistance bands online, so when they arrive in a couple of days then I'll be able to do my hip exercises properly.

My guts aren't super happy today, I'm sure it's due to work stress. There's some pain and I can also feel a small fissure. I'm still going to have sushi for lunch, it always sits very well in my stomach and is one of my safest foods (my guts were at their best when I was in Japan!). Hopefully after today is over, I'll be a bit less stressed. The real test will be to see what happens in April. I've been told unofficially that my job should probably be safe, but there's still that little bit of uncertainty, so I'll be stressed until I know for sure what's happening with my work situation.

Still hoping to do a weights workout again tomorrow. Friday, not sure yet - it's supposed to rain all day, so maybe a treadmill walk. Saturday, I'm probably going to go visit my grandma with my dad. He also wants to put some flowers on my grandpa's grave (his dad). It's supposed to rain that day as well so we probably won't stay long at my grandpa's grave. But hopefully we can have a nice visit with my grandma.

It's supposed to rain all weekend, it's apparently going to rain for days and days according to the forecast. So no walking Lily for a little while. I'm hoping to maybe do a weights workout at home either before or after visiting my grandma, and I'll probably hop on my treadmill at home as well at some point.
 
Today has been very stressful indeed! I'm glad it's almost over. Work has been crazy.

I did have my shopping and sushi lunch, and I'm having sushi for dinner too (shh, don't tell hubby). At a local grocery store, they do decent sushi rolls and they have "sushi Wednesdays" - on Wednesdays it's only $5 for a meal-sized amount. I usually get the spicy cooked shrimp rolls, yum! So I had that for lunch and it was delicious. Then, hubby texted me and asked what I wanted for dinner. I very slyly asked if we could go out for sushi for dinner, and he said that's a great idea. ;) Yum! We go to a restaurant that has specials on sushi rolls from Monday thru Wednesday, so again it's not too pricey and it's really yummy. So I'm headed there shortly to meet hubby for some more delicousness. :)

I'm not even really being naughty, either. My guts love Japanese food, especially sushi. So really, I'm being nice to my guts AND I'm giving myself a little treat in the process - win-win!

My guts were feeling a bit rough this morning, but are feeling better as the day has gone on. The abdominal pain seems mostly gone now. So the plan is still to do a weights workout tomorrow on my lunch hour, and also planning to taper my pred tomorrow morning. I'm still not sure about Friday, haven't planned anything for that day just yet. Saturday, I'm meeting my dad at my grandma's facility for a visit with her. We're meeting in the early/mid afternoon, so I'm thinking I can squeeze in a home gym weights workout around 11 AM and still make it to my grandma's place in time. My new resistance bands should arrive tomorrow so I can try them out on Saturday. I'm usually not a morning exerciser, but hopefully late morning should be okay.
 
Thanks Carol! I don't think I'm overdoing things, I feel okay. Yesterday's sushi sat fine with me, my guts are quiet this morning. I'm still planning to hit the gym today for a workout. The work stress has alleviated a bit now that yesterday is behind me, thank goodness.

My weight is up which I have mixed feelings about. I'm 5'8" and currently 153 lbs, which is tied for the highest my weight has ever been. I was 150 lbs when the week started, so somehow I gained 3 lbs just this week. I've been eating healthy and not over-eating, and I've been exercising, so I really don't understand how I gained 3 lbs. But my body seems to do this - when I eat junky food and skip workouts, I tend to maintain or even lose weight, and when I eat healthily and work out, I gain. It's dumb, I don't understand it. And I have not been working out so much that I put on 3 lbs of muscle this week. :p Maybe a bit of it is muscle but probably most/all of it is flab. Just a pred thing I guess? I don't know. It's a little frustrating, I already went up a pants size but now those pants are starting to get a bit tight too. I don't want to go up another size if I can help it!

Speaking of pred, I tapered this morning. Went from 7 mg to 6.5 mg. So far so good but it's probably still too early to tell for sure whether my body is going to accept the lower dose. Wish me luck, I just want to be off of this darn stuff already!
 
Fingers x'd for the taper.I know you want it over and done with.I would too.A neighbour of ours used to get down to half a tablet,but if she stopped all together,she was ill.It wasn't for gut problems,can't recall what it was for,but she is/has been on pred. for years.Stop putting yourself down,regarding your weight.No one tries harder than you,re; diet and exercise,so it's got to be the pred.I know muscle weighs more than fat,so it would be nice if it was that,but you know best.Glad the stress is abating some at work,You know it's not good for us but it's unavoidable sometimes.Enjoy your day.
 
Work got a bit more stressful as the day has gone on, but still not as bad as yesterday. I keep getting assigned more projects to work on, hopefully this means they like my work! I'm trying to view it as a positive, and in a lot of ways it is. It's just all a bit stressful at the moment though. But it is good job security (I hope!).

I know, I shouldn't be hard on myself about my weight especially while I'm still on pred. I just feel chubby lately, today in particular is bad because of somehow gaining 3 lbs and being at my highest weight ever, and I just happened to put on trousers today that were already tight on me before and are almost ridiculously tight on me now (I dare not bend over or I might bust a seam!), so I feel quite chubby with all of that happening at once.

I'm just about to head to the gym and a workout is much-needed today. I seem to be saying that a lot lately! I'll be happy to put this stress behind me.

So far so good on the taper, I haven't had any symptoms so far yet. Yes, with certain illnesses (Addison's disease comes to mind), you just basically have to be on pred indefinitely. My aunt, who has Crohn's, has put herself on pred indefinitely - she's just taking 10 mg per day every day and has no plans to ever taper. That seems risky and reckless to me and she's not that old (she's in her late 50s I think). I know pred can cause bone loss and all sorts of other undesirable things, plus of course it's making me fat and crazy. :p So I'd just like to be off of the stuff.
 
I had a really good workout. I felt strong and good in the gym. Really no reflux to speak of, either, I don't think I even belched once during my workout! That was fantastic, I wish all workouts could be like that.

I'm now thinking I'd like to have a cardio session tomorrow. 30 mins or so of riding the stationary bike. I don't do a lot of cardio and honestly I'm not a huge fan of stationary cardio - pedaling to nowhere gets old fast. I love riding my bike outdoors, but being stuck inside doing a repetitive thing really gets tedious for me, so as a result I don't do a lot of cardio in the colder months. I know I need to work on that. So I'm going to plan for a cardio session tomorrow. It's going to rain anyway so I may as well stay in and get in some fitness. Maybe I can lose a little of this extra flab that I've packed on this week! But at the very least I can work on my cardio fitness as I'm usually working on my strength instead.
 
It's a lovely mild sunny day,so we're going on the bikes.To be honest I'm doing it more for hubby than myself.It's been 2wks since we went cycling and although we've been to the shops and for short walks,we have just been biding time 'til our colds are better.My chest is still weezy and I still have lots of mucos in my head,but I'm going to give it a go.It was my idea,not his.Trying to plan a route where there are no inclines, but it's not easy.If I can't do it,I'm not ashamed to push though.
 
I hope your bike ride went okay. With a wheezy chest, that sounds pretty iffy to me. I hope you got through it with minimal symptoms/discomfort.

I'm having yet another supremely stressful day. Had a bit of a bad guts morning, too, but I think I know the culprit. I woke up with a headache - there are rain storms moving through the area, so I think the changes in pressure from the storms gave me the headache. So I took some acetaminophen right away to get rid of the headache - but I stupidly took it on an empty stomach, which usually upsets me. I'm doing better as the morning has gone on. Still a bit of lingering gut unhappiness and sort of a lingering headache too, but I think I'm okay for my cardio workout as planned. And that should help me relieve some stress, which is very much needed. This week sucked!
 
The ride went ok thanks.I was glad I made the effort,and boy,was it an effort.

I'm sorry your day got off to a bad start,but you might find a bit of exercise beneficial.
But don't push yourself to hard.
 
I did 30 mins on the stationary bike. It was interesting. My stamina was fine - I was expecting to get tired out, but I didn't. The issue was my hip. I have arthritis in both hips (GP thinks osteo, a rheumy I saw thought inflammatory) and my right hip has always been worse than the left. About 15 minutes into my cardio session, my right hip started aching. Ugh. I made sure to stretch it out very well afterwards, and it's feeling a little better now, but there's still some achiness. Usually high impact exercise, like jogging, will make my hip hurt like this, but low impact is usually fine on my hips. So that's frustrating. Maybe it's just because it's my first cardio session in quite some time. Usually I do ride the stationary bike to warm up, but that's only for 5 to 10 minutes and then I go lift weights. I'm going to try to have another cardio session next week to see if my hip does the same thing or not. I hope not!
 
I'm dialing it back a bit on my exercise plans. I had originally planned to work out at home before going to visit my grandma. But when I woke up a couple hours ago, my headache was back and it sort of feels like my cold is, too. I'm very congested and coughing a bit and feel run-down. Definitely don't feel like lifting weights right now. So I'm taking today off, and will re-assess tomorrow. Still going to visit my grandma (if it's the same cold, surely I'm not contagious any longer). But other than that, I'm resting. I've been playing the Sims all morning, ha ha. That's about as ambitious as I am right now.

My hip feels okay today, that's the good news. It's still rainy so I'm guessing that's why I've still got a headache. Don't want to take acetaminophen for it though since that didn't go well yesterday, so I'm just trying to do normal things like drink a lot of water and rest, etc. I have some chocolate, too, which sometimes helps with my headaches.
 
It's nice just to snuggle down if you're a bit below par,especially with chocolate.
It's a lovely day here,got up to 16c.We went for a walk down the bank to the river,then along the river and up the bank to the weekend market,then back through the park and home.I think it's about 3-4 miles.It is a cycle path ,but there are far to many people,and dogs and kids running around,so not worth the stress of cycling,unless you've got a big stick with a sharp point to poke them with.I was almost on my knees with back pain when we got home.I'm so glad cycling doesn't have the same effect.I hope you find your Granma well and in good spirits.
 
I had a rough Saturday all around. My visit did not go well, my grandma was extremely agitated when we arrived and she kept yelling that she was leaving her facility and coming home with us. When we told her no, she said then she's either going to run away or kill herself. Fortunately she said all of this in front of staff members at her facility, so they're keeping an eye on her. She started packing her stuff to run away but then she did eventually calm down and we were able to have something of a conversation, but it was really stressful especially for the first hour or so. Her dementia is progressing fairly rapidly, she made faces at people several times which is very bad. Making faces means she's losing her words, and that means her dementia is progressing from moderate to severe. (I wrote a much longer version of this in the Grandparents thread.)

Yesterday I woke up feeling better - my cold seemed to be on the way out again, guts were quite good. So, I overdid things. :p Of course I did. I hadn't done any of my usual weekend chores on Saturday because the visit took up a good chunk of the day and because I wasn't feeling well, so I had a lot to do on Sunday. I vacuumed, did laundry, tidied up the house, walked Lily and went grocery shopping with hubby (he did dishes and cleaned the kitchen while I was doing my chores). We also went to this huge antique store just to browse, we found a few good things. I got a vintage sewing kit, it was only $9.50 and it has a ton of sewing supplies in it! That was a nice score. But we sure did a lot that day. While we were running around doing shopping, we went out to eat, which I think was a mistake. It was even my idea, I said let's go to the Mexican restaurant - it sure sounded delicious at the time, and it was delicious. I had a quesadilla, and I know that cheese isn't my friend. (Mexican food in general isn't my friend.)

So, between overdoing things yesterday and eating something that I shouldn't have, I'm not feeling so great today. My guts are a little bit unhappy and I feel kind of exhausted, too. The work stress isn't helping, either. As of next week, our transition period will be over and then we can start learning what's actually happening. So for now I'm just sort of in survival mode. I just need to grit my teeth and get through this week. That sounds like a really hard task when it's only Monday morning, ugh.

I don't think going to the gym is a good idea today. I might try a walk if I'm feeling up to it this afternoon, but that's the most I'll do. Will see how I'm feeling tomorrow and will go from there.
 
Nothing's going your way lately ,you poor soul.I'm so sorry your Granma was acting up.Not easy,but at least she still has some spark in her,and wasn't staring vacantly into space.It's hard to know how you would like her to be.Thank goodness she's in a safe environment looked after people who can cope.Not much happening in the fitness department here.We went up the coast,about an hours drive,and had a walk around an outdoor market, on the harbour.Today we brought all the rubbish down from the attic and took it to the council tip (dump)So that was a workout of sorts,going up and down the attic steps.Good job done.The charity van can't come until next Monday,so I've got time so sort .through some more stuff.
 
That's great that you have time to go through more stuff. I've been purging some things lately too, but on a smaller scale than you have been doing. I got rid of a couple of sweaters that no longer fit me, even though I loved them. And I went through my gym bag and got rid of some workout clothes that are old or don't fit right or that I no longer wear. That felt pretty good to get rid of some stuff. I also tried on all my dresses to make sure that they still fit - there's one that's going to be tight if I gain any more weight, but it still fits okay for now, so I'm trying hard to watch my weight.

I should add what I'm trying diet-wise this week. Since my arthritis got a bit angry with my cardio session last week, I figured I should try something new for my arthritis. I've read that tart cherry juice can really help with arthritis pain, and I happened to glance in the juice section at the grocery store yesterday and I saw tart cherry juice concentrate. It was pricey, but it's enough to make a bunch of drinks (it's 7 parts water to one part juice concentrate). So once my stomach calms down a bit more (it's calmed down somewhat already), I've made myself a tart cherry juice and I'm going to try it. I'm hoping it helps and that my stomach agrees with it too.

Yeah, unfortunately the spark that my grandma has seems to be part of the dementia too. She was never mean, would never yell, certainly would never threaten suicide years ago before her mind started going. She was so sweet, kind, just a happy person, would never say a mean thing to or about anyone. Now she screams and makes faces at other people. It's not her, it's the illness. And we need to put her in a nursing home soon - she's currently in a memory care unit at an assisted living facility, but since her dementia is progressing, she's going to need more care than they can provide at her current facility. So in a way she was right after all, she does get to leave her current facility - but where she's going, I think she'll hate even more, and she'll hate us for it, and then we'll really see that spark come out. :(

Between my grandma and my workplace, stress is high for me! I seriously need so much chocolate in my life right now. I'm tempted to just go and buy a ton of it and stash it away where hubby can't find it. Of course, that won't help me with my goal of not gaining any more weight. There's always a catch! ;) I still want chocolate though.
 
I didn't walk but I did get my chocolate. Guts are still a little bit iffy but they seem to have called a tentative truce with the chocolate. :p It got a bit drizzly so I didn't walk. I'm aiming for a walk tomorrow, looks like the rain will finally end and it's supposed to be sunny and fairly warm tomorrow, looks ideal for a walk.

I'm still having a slight bit of arthritis pain after drinking my tart cherry juice. Maybe it takes awhile to start working? And I think all the rain we've had lately is contributing to my hips being achey lately. Hopefully things will improve tomorrow when the weather is nicer. (And if not, I've got more chocolate, ha ha.)
 
I think you need to give the cherry juice at least a week.But watch out for symptoms that it might cause.Have you googled the benefits ?I always try stuff I think might help,what can you loose except a few dollars.? Re; Granma.I think we all have the devil in us somewhere hahaha.I always said I was going to grow old DIS-gracefully.But I'm to tired now.hahaha.Should have been naughtier when I was young enough to appreciate it.My choccy stash is in the dish towel drawer.I don't think hubby knows we have one of those.
 
I'm not drinking the cherry juice today. My guts still aren't great and I probably shouldn't introduce something new like that when I'm not feeling well. I'll try it again when I'm feeling better.

My guts woke me up at 3 AM with cramping. That was not fun. Fortunately I was able to get back to sleep pretty quickly. They've been iffy all morning though. I'm thinking they're still a bit mad about the Mexican food I ate. Hopefully this isn't a taper fail! Usually I feel worse than this with a taper fail. I'm just keeping an eye on things for now. If I continue feeling like this then I might have to go back up to 7 mg pred, ugh. I don't want to have to do that.

So I'm on the fence about taking a walk today. I think it will help my guts, so I'm probably going to try it, but I'll see for sure how I'm feeling this afternoon. I don't want to be caught on the forest path and need a bathroom! There aren't many bathrooms to speak of in that area - really they are only on the far ends on either side (you can leave the path on one end and there's a gas station right there, and on the other far end of the path there's a fast food restaurant, but for the rest of the path there's nothing - I'd literally have to run into the woods and squat! Eek!).
 
Work continues to be very stressful and overwhelming. My guts feel okay-ish, but I passed a small bit of blood in my stool this morning. I'm thinking it's either a small fissure or maybe a new hemmie. Either way, I'm not happy about it. I haven't passed blood into the toilet in almost a year now! I really wanted to continue that streak, but I guess my body had other plans. That's really frustrating.

I feel sort of exhausted today. I don't want to lift weights because I'm afraid I'll make the bleeding worse, I feel like I should give it at least a day and re-assess. I'm thinking I should just rest today and see how I'm feeling tomorrow. That's also frustrating, but I don't know what else to do.

Geez. I knew this week was going to be tough, but this week is seriously awful! I wish I could just hibernate until better times come along, but I'm going to have to just keep on pushing through.
 
I would have a lazy week if I were you.You're having enough stress at work and now you're worrying about toilet issues.I think that's enough to be thinking about for now.Get on with some needlework and eat chocolate.Exercise can wait.When you're feeling a bit off,I honestly don't think you give yourself enough time to rest.take it easy and chill........lecture over.Hubby put new peddles on little blackie today.The bearings had gone.It could have bad if I'd been on a main road with traffic behind me.Luckily it was a quiet side street.And I didn't fall over.
 
I know, I hate to rest for longer than what seems necessary. You know me, I get antsy and over-eager to get back to it. Which isn't always wise of me. I just looked at the weather report and it's supposed to rain from today through Friday, with Saturday looking like nice weather again. So, I'm going to try to rest until Saturday. If I'm feeling okay on that day then I'll take a walk or maybe even a bike ride, but I'm going to make myself rest until then.

The good news is, I haven't passed any more blood. And I am going to speak with a person at work tomorrow about my workload and how overwhelmed I've been. One of the issues lately has been that my boss is out - she had major surgery recently and has been recovering for nearly 2 months now. Usually my boss helps me with my workload, but since she's been out, I've really had nobody to help me. But tomorrow another manager is going to try to help me as best as she can. So maybe there's some relief in sight.

I have my chocolate and I have my tart cherry juice. :) And my crocheting and sewing too. I'm glad you didn't fall over and that your bike has new pedals now! I almost certainly would have fallen if my pedal came off.
 
I'm feeling a little rough again this morning. I'm sure it's due to stress (the layoffs at work have officially started, one lady from another office got laid off yesterday). I've had 3 bowel movements so far - the first one was fairly formed, but the latter 2 were loose - no blood though. I'm a bit nauseous too so I took a zofran. And, I've been coughing and sniffling again this morning, ugh. So I'm sipping some orange juice to try to help those issues. Some days (weeks, months, years), I just cannot win!

It's pouring rain here which matches my mood today and is giving me a slight headache. I had thought that I lost my umbrella, which made me upset because it was my grandpa's umbrella, but then I found that I had left it at my desk at work. So at least I found it. I'm still in a mood, though.

In spite of feeling rough, I tapered my pred today. Went from 6.5 mg to 6 mg. So far 6 is the lowest I've been able to get without flaring up again, so we'll see what happens next week when I try tapering to 5.5 mg. I'm not looking forward to that!

I was good and rested yesterday. Ate bland foods too (rice and chicken) so I'm sure it's mainly work stress that's making me feel rough. I'm going to rest again today. I just need to survive today and tomorrow and then I can rest on the weekend and hopefully things will start to get better.
 
I'm glad you're taking notice of what your body is telling you Cat.Good luck with your taper.You'll feel soooo much better when you can get off pred. all together.But you know that,of course.
After a bit of dithering,we went out on the bikes today,It looked like rain,but it didn't.I really enjoyed it.It's great cycling along the coast,looking out to sea.The road is atop a cliff,not sheer,and it's easy to get down to the beach,and there's a great view out to the horizon.There were surfers out today but it wasn't a good surfing day.Having been born and bred here we tend to take it for granted,but we are very lucky.
 
That sounds gorgeous, I'm jealous of where you get to go cycling! I can ride my bike through some pretty areas, we have a few lakes here that I can ride alongside of, and there's an arboretum where I can ride through. But I'm nowhere near the sea, it's probably at least 1,000 miles away in either direction (so a bit too far to cycle to, ha ha).

Speaking of the sea, it's been a year since I went to Japan. I want to go back! I loved Japan so much and my guts loved it too. That was the most well I felt all year. So today I'm daydreaming about riding the shinkansen and eating onigiri while looking out the window at Fuji-san. Sigh!
 
I've had a really rough week. I woke up this morning and all I want to do is go to the gym. So I'm going. I know I said I'd rest today but you know me. :p I'm feeling okay, guts are reasonably calm and taper is going fine. I have a slight headache but it's been raining for like 3 days straight so I'm sure that's why. I feel a bit exhausted just because of the toll this week has taken on me stress-wise. I know working out helps me relieve so much stress, so I'm really looking forward to hitting the gym today.

I'm also so looking forward to the weekend! I need a couple of days to recover from this week, that's for sure. Tomorrow's weather looks like it's going to be gorgeous - the rain will finally stop and they're saying it's going to be sunny and almost 60 degrees F tomorrow. And very little wind. Sounds like perfect bicycling weather to me! I'm also hoping, if I have enough energy, to take Lily for a walk. I might actually take her over to the forest path, as dogs are allowed there as long as they're on a leash. So I'm thinking I'll have a late morning bike ride and then get Lily into the car and head over to the forest for a walk. I'm going to take it slow and easy on the bike ride, since it'll be my first ride of the year. I don't want to overdo things right away. But I am so excited to get my bike out! My bike is so pretty and fast and fun and I just love riding it. (Did I mention my bike is neon green with bright blue tires? It's seriously the most flashy bike ever, ha ha.)
 
Yes,you posted a picture a couple of months ago.I agree it's gorgeous.Please give it the once over and check everythings OK.as it's been hibernating for awhile.I can tell you're excited.I would have liked to get out today,but it's just got windier by the hour.It's OK having the wind at your back,but sooner or later you have to ride into it.Have a great weekend and be safe.
 
Oh yes, absolutely, I'm going to put air in the tires and grease the chain and make sure everything's in good working order before I head out on my bike. I have a small bag under the seat of my bike, and I keep a couple of tools in the bag just in case. I've got a mini air pump attached to my bike too in case my tires should deflate. I also always make sure to bring my cell phone and some emergency cash with me - if worse comes to worse, I could always call for a cab to take me and my bike home (my city is very bicycle-friendly and many cabs here have bike racks on them - city buses also have bike racks on them). I always like to have a backup plan and to be prepared for the unknown, so if my bike or I should become incapacitated, I'll still be able to get home safely.

It's very windy here too today, and rainy. It's cold and just plain yucky, it's a very good day to stay indoors! So I'm fortunate to have a gym in the same building where I work, I won't have to go outside at all.
 
Hubby carries our tools,but I have a small bag on the front for keys,phone and change etc.I can also cram my ball cap and gloves in.
I was wondering earlier if your hubby's cousin (?) had been in touch to do some training with you.? I remember you mentioning it a while ago.
 
Good memory! Hubby's cousin has not yet contacted me, but it's only been a few weeks since we've discussed it and she's well aware that I've had ongoing health issues (she works in healthcare so she's quite an understanding person). She's also on vacation right now, her facebook is suddenly full of photos from Florida. April is still early days to even be bicycling here, we could easily still get more snow in April or even into May, so I'm sure she'll want to wait until a bit later in the spring or early summer before we start planning hikes or bike rides. I remember last year, my grandpa died on May 14th, and it snowed on that day. I'm only bicycling tomorrow because of the rare nice warm weather.
 
My hubby was really impressed when I told him about the bike racks on taxis and buses.I can understand not being to keen about fitness when you're spring/summer is late starting.A few years ago,when our son was visiting from OZ we went up to Scotland first week in April, and snow drifts were at car height,so there's even a possibility we might get some.But we in this part of the country haven't had snow worth a mention for four years.
 
Yeah, I actually have never taken my bike on a city bus, but I've seen others do it so I know it's possible. Out of curiosity I just googled it and found very specific instructions for how to put your bike on a bus in my city. Good to know! I almost never ride the bus, but it's a good option to have as a backup plan just in case. Here's the instructions in case you're curious:
https://www.cityofmadison.com/Metro/planyourtrip/bikeRacks.cfm

We get a bit of every type of weather here, we tend to have cold & snowy winters and hot & humid summers. So we're in that weird phase right now where it might be freezing cold one day and feel like summer the next. :p We don't really get much of springtime per se, we just get alternating winter and summer. Today feels like winter, it's very chilly outside, but tomorrow it will feel much more like summer. I have to say, though, that our past few winters haven't been nearly as snowy as normal. I had bought snowshoes maybe 4 years ago, and I haven't been able to use them for at least the past 2 winters. We just haven't gotten enough snow! That's pretty odd for us, we're in a northern state and not far from Canada, so we usually get more snow.
 
I did it! Got my road bike out for a short ride. It was not super easy at first, though. As I said, I greased the chain and I was trying to put air in the tires. But for some reason, I just couldn't get the tires to inflate properly. I tried my small hand pump and I tried hubby's air compressor, and I was at it for at least 30 minutes, but I just couldn't get the tires to fill up. Finally I got frustrated and got myself dressed and ready to go and brought my bike outside to the driveway. The tires were still half flat so it was obvious I wasn't going anywhere. I tried again in the driveway and this time, magically, the tires inflated right away. :p I don't know why but trying it in my driveway always seems to work. I've done that before too.

So after that I was able to have a good ride. I did about 5 miles, I rode over through the park where the zoo is (the zoo was packed!) and that was a nice little ride. I didn't want to overdo things since it was my first ride of the year and I didn't want to make my arthritis mad again, so I kept it short.

It's a pretty gorgeous day out so I also walked Lily. We just went for a walk down the bike path in my neighborhood, I had thought about taking her to the forest path but I decided not to as we'd have to get in the car to go there and I just wanted to walk and be done with it without too much fuss. So she had a nice walk.

On our way home from our walk, a couple of young girls, maybe high school age or so, were smiling at Lily and they said hello to me and one of them then said, "Your dog just made our whole morning!" So I asked if they wanted to pet Lily, and they did, and they were clearly in so happy that they got to pet a corgi. It was really sweet.

I think it's supposed to rain again tomorrow. If I can get myself organized then I'll try to have a weights workout at home.
 
That was a really good day then.It made me smile.I'm hoping to get out tomorrow,the weather looks good.The rest of the week is pretty much booked.The charity shop is collecting the stuff tomorrow.We brought it down from the attic today and it's taking up a lot of space.They said they'd come between 8-30am and noon.The sooner the better,then we can get out on the bikes.
 
I woke up yesterday morning and I was sore from my bike ride. But, I had expected to have leg or butt soreness - nope! The soreness was all in my shoulders! That was odd. But, since I was sore, I decided to skip working out yesterday. Don't want to injure myself so I listened to my body and had a rest day. Did some cleaning with hubby and went grocery shopping and did laundry and all my usual weekend chores.

Work is already a big bag of stress so I'm going to hit the gym today. I really need a workout! I'm looking forward to lifting weights and offloading some of this stress, even temporarily. I'm buried under a pile of work and I have to re-do some things that I did last week, ugh. The one bright shining light in my day is the gym! It's my happy place, it's where there are no spreadsheets, ha ha. It's just me and my music and my body feeling good and healthy for a change. I can't wait for my workout today!

Tentative plans this week are to lift weights Mon, Wed, Fri. Hopefully a bike ride again on Sat, as the weather looks like it'll be really nice again. Maybe a walk tomorrow or Thurs, depending on the weather (once again, it's supposed to rain a lot this week). My dad and brother are going to see my grandma on Saturday, but I don't want to go, I can't risk having another bad visit with her on top of all this stress I'm already under. I need some time away from my grandma before I go see her again, it's just too hard when she's having a bad day. So instead I'm going to focus on me and have a bike ride on Saturday.
 
Apart from your work stress you're sounding very positive.It's probably a good idea not to visit granma,you definitely don't need a stress overload.How has your pred taper gone this week ?.....The charity van came at 10-30am thank goodness.I think they got a shock when they saw how much there was,but it was all good stuff so they were quite happy.It's going to help a hospice,but I will never let so much stuff accumulate again.When I buy something,I will immediately take spare stuff to the charity shop.It's too easy to put it in the attic,out of sight.Managed to get out for a cycle too,so all in all a good day.
 
The work stress is really beating me down lately, though. It's been maybe worse today than it has so far and that's really saying something. I've spent a good chunk of the day buried under piles of work while trying not to cry at my desk. Tomorrow won't be any easier, either, if anything it'll be harder. The new big boss will be here tomorrow to meet with some of the managers and I suspect that more layoffs might be announced. So we'll see what happens. I'm not looking forward to it.

I did have a good gym session for the most part. When I went down to the basement to change into my gym clothes, I went to use the bathroom - and I found that somebody had recently puked in there. Great. I know that stomach viruses are very contagious and can linger both in the air and on surfaces - I tried not to breathe and not to touch anything, but of course you can't touch nothing and you have to breathe. I did wash my hands super well and made sure not to touch my face, but that wouldn't stop me from breathing in germs. So, depending on what made the person barf, I may have been exposed to a tummy bug. That made me worry a bit ever since. I really hope I don't catch it, that's the last thing I need on top of everything else.

Aside from possible germ exposure, I had a good workout. Did everything I wanted to and felt fairly strong. My legs did feel a little tired once I got warmed up, but they were still strong enough to get through my workout just fine. I had a few belches but other than that my GERD was quiet. Arthritis was quiet too.

The weather report is making it sound like rain tomorrow but only in the morning, so hopefully I'll be able to take a walk tomorrow in the early afternoon on my lunch break. I'm sure I'll need to get away from work, and the forest is my other happy place besides the gym, so I'd love to get out to the forest path for a nice walk to de-stress.

As for my grandma, yeah, I just can't handle any more stress right now. I know she doesn't mean to do it, it's the dementia and not her, and I do feel kind of crappy about purposely avoiding her. But I have to take care of myself first and foremost. Honestly, even a good visit with her is somewhat stressful, because she can't remember anything that I told her even 10 seconds ago, so even if we're talking about nice things there's a lot of repeating myself and keeping the conversation simple enough so that she can follow it, etc. I just can't see myself doing any of that right now. What I need to do on Saturday is take care of me, and right now that means getting on my bike and going for a ride.

Pred taper is still going well - I went down to 6 mg last week Thursday and so far so good there. The real test will be in a few days when I try tapering to 5.5 mg. Awhile back, when I had tried to taper from 6 mg to 5, it was very problematic and I flared up, so I'm a bit worried about how this upcoming taper will go.

And of course, if I do end up catching a stomach bug, I won't taper until I'm recovered. Hopefully I won't even have to think about that, though. Hopefully I haven't caught anything and the basement barfer just had food poisoning or something non-contagious like that. (And let's hope they don't strike again on Wednesday when I go back to the basement for another weights workout!)
 
Oh, and I think I've said this before but if not - one of my favorite thrift shops also benefits hospice. :) So I always feel good about donating there and shopping there. Good for you for donating so much stuff to a good cause!

Your attic sounds like my basement, it's easy to put stuff down there and forget about it. That was the bulk of the cleaning we did this past weekend, the basement was a huge mess yet again (mainly hubby's fault, my area was still relatively neat but you could barely walk through his area). I got really mad about it on Saturday when I was trying to put air in my bike tires - we don't have a garage, but we have a walk-out basement, so we keep things like bicycles and lawnmower in the basement. I could barely get my bike out and there was barely any room for me to try to get air in my bike tires in the basement, so I told hubby that we needed to clean up and throw a bunch of stuff away. We did! We threw away lots of unnecessary things (old boxes, etc) and did a lot of cleaning & organizing. So for the time being, it's neat and clean and organized again. How long it stays that way remains to be seen. (I give it 2 weeks tops!)
 
Hmm, I'm having a rough morning. Last night, between 1 AM and 3 AM, the power went out in our house at least 3 times. I woke up 3 times, that's for sure. We have a white noise machine that we turn on when we go to sleep, and of course when the electricity goes out the white noise machine turns off. And every time it turns off, I wake up. So I slept very poorly because of that, and my guts don't like it when I sleep poorly. So I'm having a rough guts morning. It was just enough that I called in sick to work. I don't think I could deal with all that work stress on top of my guts feeling like this today. So I'm staying home and resting. No walk for me today but that's okay, I think rest is best today. (And if I'm honest, I really didn't want to be in the office today anyway with the big boss being there.)

I don't think I actually caught a tummy bug, though. I'm mildly nauseous and had some d but that's very typical of me when I don't sleep well. It doesn't feel like a bug, it feels like my guts are just unhappy about the lack of sleep. If I can manage to nap today then that should help.
 
Take it easy and watch some trashy TV in your PJs,but knowing you you'll find something to keep you busy.I had a walk into town to pick up some scripts and do a bit of shopping, then we went out on the bikes this afternoon.I was a wee bit tired but it's a nice day and we might not get out again this week as we've stuff to do every day and friends visiting.
I did get a lovely soft suede waistcoat/gillet.It's dark green with brass studs on the corner of the pockets.It cost all of £1.....I have seven now,in different colours and fabrics,but I wasn't going to miss it at that price.So all in all a productive day.Feel better soon and catch up with your sleep if you can.
 
Still not feeling well today. Starting to wonder if this is a taper fail. I'm having all the usual symptoms - diarrhea, some nausea & no appetite, a lot of cramping including cramping that's waking me up at night, fatigue, chills, etc. Ugh. Called in sick to work today and going to call my GI when his office opens at 8 AM (it's not quite 7 AM here now).

Fitness is on hold until I can get this figured out and feel better again. In the meantime, I fortunately just recently bought more yarn so I have plenty of crocheting to keep me occupied.
 
I still feel like crap. :( Called my GI yesterday and talked to his nurse and she said she'd get the message to him, but I didn't get a call back. I'm going back up to 7 mg pred because I need to be functional. I was up at least 3x last night with diarrhea, and then later cramping woke me up. I'm so sick of this!

Still feeling horrible so I'm calling in sick to work, again (thank goodness for family medical leave - I can't be punished for calling in sick more often than the average person because of my chronic illness). Going to try to get myself feeling well enough that I can at least work tomorrow and then have the weekend to rest some more.

Obviously no fitness for a little while. I have been crocheting a lot. :p I finished the blanket I was working on, thinking about starting either a scarf or trying to make a sweater vest today. I saw a girl on a TV show wearing a really cute, long, loosely knit sweater vest and it looked like something I could make.
 
Ah,Cat !!! you were doing so well with your taper.Do you think it is to blame for you feeling unwell now ? Maybe it's not that at all,but if your G.I isn't getting back to you,you'll have to use your own judgement I suppose.I get that you need to function properly.Please give yourself time,and I don't mean a few days.As soon as you feel really well,add a few extra days before you resume your fitness regime.
We've had a run out to a market town about 45mins drive.I went to pick up a book I've had on order mainly (don't like e books)but of course I had to look in the charity shops.I got a nice black vertically quilted jacket,a good brand,for £10 and a huge multi coloured scarf for £2-95.The book cost more than both of them together.So I'm a happy bunny today,but sad that you're poorly again of course.Sending hugs.
 
It was right around 6 mg the last two times that I had taper fails, so I'm certain that that's what's happening again. Talked to my GI on the phone today and the current plan he came up with is to split the dose of my LDN. I'm currently taking 4.5 mg at bedtime. GI wants me to try 2.5 mg twice a day. He said that he read somewhere (I never read this statistic) that 10% of people on LDN will experience nausea, diarrhea, etc. So he wants to rule out that LDN is causing my issues and he feels that splitting the dose will alleviate any chance of it being the cause of my symptoms. So presumably I'll try this and try to taper again and have the exact same taper fail issues. The plan then is to lower my dose of LDN, probably down to 2.5 mg per day. Some people do better on a lower than usual dose (4.5 mg is what is recommended for IBD, but that dose doesn't work for everybody and some people benefit much more from an even lower dose). So, that's the plan. And if lowering my LDN doesn't work then I'm going to push for sulfasalazine. I'm on Lialda and I don't think it does a whole lot. Sulfasalazine is a bit stronger - also has a higher risk of side effects, but I'm willing to try it. Sulfasalazine also helps joint issues so it could help my arthritis too.

I'm feeling okay-ish now but I think that's because I've barely eaten today. I've had 3 glasses of chocolate almond milk and a few mouthfuls of rice and that's it. I feel pretty weak due to lack of nourishment, but at least I'm not cramping nor nauseous. I'll take whatever improvement I can get. And since I've gone back up to 7 mg pred, I should continue to feel better since that seems to be the magic number for me.

Ha ha, I actually do like e-books - they help me not be a hoarder. :p Anything that helps me reduce clutter is a good thing! I do still read plenty of regular books, but when it's an option I usually opt for an e-book.

My plan is to go back to work tomorrow after being out sick the past 3 days. I think I can manage one day of work and then rest up all weekend. I've been doing a lot of crocheting, I finished the blanket I was working on and started making a scrap blanket (using up my scrap yarn and making many colored stripes) for my youngest niece. I have a feeling I'll be working on that blanket a lot more over the weekend.
 
I hope there's not to much stress at work Cat.Take lots of deep breathes and close your eyes and count to 10,but not while your walking of course.
 
I was so crampy and felt awful again this morning, so I ended up calling in sick again. I just couldn't muster up feeling like I was able to work. Ugh. I think/hope I'm finally on the downhill side of this, though. Hopefully by the end of the weekend I'll be feeling a lot better.

A development - instead of splitting the dose, we're tweaking my LDN dose. After talking and emailing with my GI, I'm wondering if 4.5 mg is just too high of a dose for me. The "low dose" part of LDN is very important, ideally you want the dose to be very low. I don't understand the science behind it, but at any rate, I'm trying a lower dose than I've been at to see if that helps at all. Going to try 2.5 mg. Got a call from the compounding pharmacy and it's ready for me to pick up, so I'm going to drag myself out of the house tomorrow to go get that.

The weather is looking lovely and I'd really love to get outside, but rest still seems best right now. I'm sure it'll start raining again as soon as I'm feeling better. ;)
 
I'm glad you decided not to work....I hope the new LDN script is the answer to your troubles Cat.I know you were excited to get on it and thought it would work miracles for you.So here's hoping a little tweek will make a difference.
 
Yeah, I did hope that LDN would be a miracle for me, and so far it isn't. It has done some good for me, like I can definitely tell that it's made a difference, but it's not a miracle. I was hoping that it'd be the thing that would help me get off of pred and stay in remission, and so far it has failed to do that.

If 2.5 mg LDN doesn't make a big improvement for me then I'm going to push my GI to try sulfasalazine. I've tried almost all the mesalamine formulations (Asacol, Asacol HD, Delzicol, Pentasa, Lialda) and they don't do a whole lot for me, but maybe sulfasalazine would help a bit more.
 
Cat-a-Tonic said:
I was so crampy and felt awful again this morning, so I ended up calling in sick again. I just couldn't muster up feeling like I was able to work. Ugh. I think/hope I'm finally on the downhill side of this, though. Hopefully by the end of the weekend I'll be feeling a lot better.
Click to expand...

Stress definitely plays a factor in your health, so I wouldn't doubt that what's going on at work is causing some of your problems right now. My health was pretty good until the last 3 months when stress at work went up due to turnover and my anxiety worsened. Mental health plays a huge factor in physical health and my physical health is definitely suffering. I was seeing an ENT for vertigo/dizziness and hearing issues and that has worsened in the last 3 months (I'm seeing a specialist ENT this coming week; I believe I have undiagnosed Meniere's disease instead of the migraine-associated vertigo because I have more symptoms of MD - plus, I don't have migraines anymore). Not only has the vertigo worsened, but I'm having issues keeping my hormones controlled again, which caused the ovarian cyst so I've made an appointment to see an endocrinologist who specializes in PCOS next month. I'm also seeing a new psychiatrist on the same day. I've also used my EAP program at work to get 3 free appointments with my old therapist which has really helped. I'm already noticing an improvement in my mental health.

Anyway, I hope things at work calm down soon so you can start feeling better. I'd feel pretty bad, too, if I felt like my job security was threatened. :(
 
Thanks, MissLeopard. Yeah, work has absolutely been a nightmare of stress lately. It's sort of been a perfect storm of stress. Our old regional president, who I really liked, was basically ousted, and we got a new regional president, who I don't really like (she seems very gruff). So my workload has increased a lot because I've been continuing to do my usual spreadsheets, plus I've been doing new spreadsheets for the new president - and I found out that she doesn't even like spreadsheets. Oh, great, since spreadsheets is basically what I do, that's just fantastic and does make me worry about my job in particular. My boss has been off for 2 months because she had major surgery, so usually she helps me when I get stressed or overwhelmed, but without her I've just been quietly becoming very overwhelmed. My one co-worker in my department is purposely screwing up at times because she wants to be laid off, and my other co-worker was first busy with a huge project and now is on vacation so she hasn't been able to help me with anything. It's just all been a gigantic mess.

I'm sorry to hear your work situation has been stressful too. It really sucks when you spend a big part of your day (life, really) at a place that causes such stress. But I can't not work, I need not only the income but of course the insurance too - my husband works as a chef and he gets zero benefits at his job, so we both rely on my insurance. If he got insurance then I could possibly quit or go part-time and we'd be okay financially, but the insurance thing is why I have to keep working full-time. It's really hard sometimes but it'd be impossible to live with a chronic illness and no insurance. (Yes, I do sometimes fantasize about moving to somewhere like Canada where they have single-payer universal health care.)

At any rate, I picked up my 2.5 mg LDN just now, so I'll start that at bedtime tonight. I've had zero appetite for days now and I've lost about 6 lbs, so I picked up some potato chips while I was out. Sometimes when nothing else sounds appetizing, I can eat a few chips. So I'm trying that. I also got some yarn, bought myself some chocolate (no desire to eat that right now though which is very sad because I love chocolate), and for good measure I bought myself roses too. When I feel so crappy like this, I tend to buy myself presents. I've heard the term "survival bribe" - where you buy yourself presents or do nice things for yourself in order to keep on going and keep doing what you have to do to get through the day. I guess I needed a bunch of survival bribes today.
 
Oh, I forgot to add - MissLeopard, I've dealt with vertigo as well. Mine was due to labyrinthitis (inflammation in the inner ear, sometimes due to a virus and sometimes due to unknown causes - mine was unknown causes). Vertigo is absolutely horrendous, my least favorite symptom EVER. It made me barf so much (my second least favorite symptom), it was just the worst that I've ever felt. At least in an IBD flare, I can take myself to the bathroom - with the vertigo, my husband had to take me to the bathroom the first few days, and after that I'd sort of pinball myself off of the hallway walls until I made it to the bathroom, and often by the time I got there, I'd be so nauseous from all the movement that I'd have to barf. It really, really sucked. So I definitely feel for you, I know a little bit about Meniere's and it's not something that I'd wish upon anybody. I hope you can get that diagnosed and treated so that the vertigo isn't too horrible.
 

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