What has changed?

I feel much better than expected today but there are a few noticeable differences. First of all continuous hiccups. This was worrying me yesterday already by I was too tired to think much of it. As the only new type of medication was the Dexamethasone today I searched the Internet for clues. I found several. Apparently the Dexamethasone may trigger hiccups. In the article the hiccups were suppressed with low dose oral Metoclopramide. I must call the hospital what to do about these hiccups.

Dexamethasone is also used to treat many inflammatory and autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis. I’m now wondering if there is anything I can or should change to the medication for my Rheumatism. In the end I’m taking quite a high dose of Metatroxate (15mg per week) and Naproxen (1000mg per day).

My leg has recovered a lot but control over micro-movement (especially rotating the ankle joint and bending the knee) are even more affected (have become worse).  My right arm feels “heavy” which could mean that the Glioma is approaching the functional areas for initiation and control of my right arm. I’m typing this entire post without break so it may no as bad as it may seem.

Warm rain

It has been raining most of the week and today I didn’t leave the house. Tomorrow I have the MEG and MRI and they occupy my thoughts. I keep telling myself that it will be fine, I know I will be fine, but still .. I got up late this morning, stiff from the rheumatism in my legs, back and hands and muscles in my back sore from the flu. I feel like an old man but because of my age do I not qualify yet. Breakfast (toast with apricot jam and a cappuccino) helped me to get back on track and I worked the remainder of the morning and most of the afternoon.

Today’s task was to create up-to-date organisation charts with all staff and management of my region in them. It is the same old story, managers don’t talk with each other and provide me (eventually) with crap data. Why don’t they check their output and why don’t they check with eachother on standardization issues. I’ve been working on this task for days now and the result is poor. I’m disappointing my manager and that feels bad. I have given one manager an ultimatum, sort your stuff buddy or else ..

My wife is not feeling well. She had some pork a friend in Taiwan made for her and she probably ate too much of it. It made me realize how fragile we are. We depend on each other completely. I’ve stopped making sense I think? I got an e-mail from a good friend yesterday and I decided to send an answer today. She is one of the few people asking how Monling is doing. I find that very considerate. I believe I said it before, I think that Monling has a even tougher time than me.

It has been raining most of today. It is winter out here and it should be freezing cold but it is not. Monling said that this weather is almost like winter in Taiwan. The only difference is that we have a heating, on Taiwan they normally don’t. Must be cold out there now. In Taipei there is a hotel with a beautiful spring bath (onsen) and in this bath they have a “tropical rain forest”: a very large shower (1m x 2m) with a perforated ceiling from which hot water is pouring down like warm rain. It is a wonderful experience .. there is so much water coming down that it is difficult to breath!

Yesterdays session with the psychologist resulted in a few actions on me: talk to the MEG operator, ask for more information on the MEG procedure, try to have the MRI in Sonata (short MRI) and talk with Monling to agree on signals for communication. I didn’t do any of them. Was I too lazy or too busy? No, I don’t think so. Am I pushing the limits of my fear for being buried alive? Yes, perhaps. Well, we’ll see how the MEG and MRI will go tomorrow. I’ll keep you posted.