So all kinds of shit is numb now, and I'm debating whether or not to go back to the hospital. I emailed my neuro, which is like pissing in the wind, and asked her to call in a course of steroids for next week...at least this way I have a few more days to decide and if it gets worse then the drugs will already be in the cancer center. Sick.
I tried to do the cross training class this morning but just got upset because it's hard to run when your feet are numb. I bailed and bouldered instead, which made me a lot happier. Bouldering doesn't bother me - stomping around on my numb feet bothers me.
On the bright side, I feel pretty strong and a few people have said that I've lost a few pounds...
The drawback of the steroids is that it's 5 days of feeling like a cancer patient and sitting still for 3 hours while you get a drug that will make you temporarily insane. And it might not work. At the moment I'm not feeling any weakness, so I count that as a positive.
On the minus side, admitting that I have a problem and having a doctor call in drugs sort of blows my coping mechanism to smithereens. My coping mechanism is to just pretend like I'm "totally fine." And really, I am totally fine. It's just numbness...I'm still planning on hiking up Middle Pal with John this weekend - I mean as long as I can walk, why not walk? If it makes no difference at all, why worry? On the other hand, if the drugs are going to reduce the inflammation in my spine/brain and prevent any further damage, then what's the harm? Other than the copay and losing a week out of my year. Time is precious - going to the infusion center for a week just disrupts everything. The drugs make you feel like shit, it's hard to be active, it's hard to think and it's hard to sleep. Plus facing head on the fact that I'm "sick", and realizing that I may not be "fine" forever.
On the other hand, we're all going downhill, and none of us ever know what shit lies beyond the next minute. I just have a diagnosis.
Oh yeah - emails and calls of encouragement/advice are welcome.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Food journaling
I've always wanted to keep a food journal for a little bit just to see how I eat over time. My cross-training instructor suggested dailyplate.com and I'm very impressed. It's free, very well organized, automatically does an autofill search for what food you're logging, can do any serving size, automatically produces stats of what you eat over different time periods, and more. I've already turned a couple of friends on to it...but don't take my word for it, try it yourself.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Saturday, August 21, 2010
shorter and harder
Just got back from the hulk with Ethan. We did Positive Vibrations, and it is definitely a great route. However the wind and being freezing all day crushed me. I was wearing a hat under my helmet, a lightweight down coat, a softshell and long underwear, and we were in the sun and I was still freezing. Fortunately we both climbed well and everything went smoothly.
Highlights include me gagging at a belay because I was dehydrated, didn't eat enough, and my body wasn't happy with the altitude, seeing Lucho and Matt on Airstream, helping Ethan get his alpine multi-pitch groove on, and watching a forest fire that broke out near our camp. Oh yeah, and getting 175 dollar tickets each for not having wilderness permits. Whoever left their campfire unattended has bad karma coming to them, because it ruined everyone's good time. I've already resigned myself to setting aside a certain portion of my income for these situations, since it's practically a natural law that if there is busting to be done, I'll be the one that gets busted. At least our shit didn't burn down with the forest - my car keys were in there!
The Hulk is a gorgeous piece of granite and the rock quality is AMAZING. Justifiably, it's popular now and there were quite a few climbers up there.
I didn't bring my camera since Ethan had a helmet cam and a regular cam, so I'll direct traffic to his blog or have him send me some of the footage and photos.
It was a long day. We could have gone faster, but even still, almost every pitch is 160 to 200 ft. We were psyched to have an 80 meter rope...we definitely used it between the pitches and the rappels.
Highlights include me gagging at a belay because I was dehydrated, didn't eat enough, and my body wasn't happy with the altitude, seeing Lucho and Matt on Airstream, helping Ethan get his alpine multi-pitch groove on, and watching a forest fire that broke out near our camp. Oh yeah, and getting 175 dollar tickets each for not having wilderness permits. Whoever left their campfire unattended has bad karma coming to them, because it ruined everyone's good time. I've already resigned myself to setting aside a certain portion of my income for these situations, since it's practically a natural law that if there is busting to be done, I'll be the one that gets busted. At least our shit didn't burn down with the forest - my car keys were in there!
The Hulk is a gorgeous piece of granite and the rock quality is AMAZING. Justifiably, it's popular now and there were quite a few climbers up there.
I didn't bring my camera since Ethan had a helmet cam and a regular cam, so I'll direct traffic to his blog or have him send me some of the footage and photos.
It was a long day. We could have gone faster, but even still, almost every pitch is 160 to 200 ft. We were psyched to have an 80 meter rope...we definitely used it between the pitches and the rappels.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
cloud seeding?
Good to see that the Bureau of Reclamation has a new way to sustain itself now that dams are no longer in vogue.
Also a good thing I got funding for Walker Lake tui chubs before there's any proof that cloud seeding will reduce salinity in Walker Lake...I have a feeling that even if cloud seeding worked, the water from the Walker River would still be WAY over-allocated.
There's got to be another solution.
Also a good thing I got funding for Walker Lake tui chubs before there's any proof that cloud seeding will reduce salinity in Walker Lake...I have a feeling that even if cloud seeding worked, the water from the Walker River would still be WAY over-allocated.
There's got to be another solution.
Monday, August 16, 2010
butterflies!
A coworker came by my cube today and asked me what I was doing tomorrow, because he had the opportunity of a lifetime. Since my plan was to sit in my cube all day, I was listening...
So tomorrow I'm going to the Antioch Dunes National Wildlife Refuge to count butterflies for my 8 hours! YAY! So psyched. I get paid to look for butterflies. Not too bad. It's been a good summer for field work and getting outside. I think I'm starting to like this agency gig.
And I'm getting a new cubicle, away from...things I'd like to be away from. Maybe I can not have my ipod on all the time now to drown out...things I'd like to drown out.
Additionally I climbed for the first time in 2 weeks or so. Jake and Jared and Stacy were there. It's fun to watch Jake and Jared talk about work - they're both electricians. Jake is so animated he could tell me about the weather and I'd laugh. It's awesome. Tomorrow another cross training class, and then maybe on Wednesday or Thursday I'll head back to the east side to do some climbing on the hulk. Who knows, things like that tend to have a high bail factor. I'm definitely psyched though.
One thing I'm worried about is that the last few days I've been wondering if I'm beginning to have an MS flareup. The top of my left foot feels weird, I'm feeling a little like foot drop might be coming on in my right leg...I don't want to think about it too much, but I don't want to ignore it either. I'll be so fucking pissed if I have to go sit in the infusion center and lose time in the mountains. Shit sucks. I'm sure I'm fine though. I mean what am I going to do? I'm not going to change my plans, unless I absolutely cannot walk. I wonder if I'm feeling weird because I had 2 weeks of traveling, and I forgot my auto-injector in the backcountry, so I was slack on the injections. When I got back on Friday night, I pretty much slept through until Saturday night. Is being that tired normal? I've also had a little bit of personal stress. But my diet has been good and I've been getting good sleep, so who knows.
Lauren left for Kenya yesterday. To say goodbye, we went with John to play croquet in a park. She got me excited about going to Africa again. Now that I've been spending more time at elevation hiking I'm a little more excited - I just need to keep it up. Tickets are 1500 bucks at the very very cheapest though, and it takes 2 days each way to get there. It's not a trivial thing to get there and back. Still thinking though. I try to take every opportunity like that that I can, just as a general policy.
So tomorrow I'm going to the Antioch Dunes National Wildlife Refuge to count butterflies for my 8 hours! YAY! So psyched. I get paid to look for butterflies. Not too bad. It's been a good summer for field work and getting outside. I think I'm starting to like this agency gig.
And I'm getting a new cubicle, away from...things I'd like to be away from. Maybe I can not have my ipod on all the time now to drown out...things I'd like to drown out.
Additionally I climbed for the first time in 2 weeks or so. Jake and Jared and Stacy were there. It's fun to watch Jake and Jared talk about work - they're both electricians. Jake is so animated he could tell me about the weather and I'd laugh. It's awesome. Tomorrow another cross training class, and then maybe on Wednesday or Thursday I'll head back to the east side to do some climbing on the hulk. Who knows, things like that tend to have a high bail factor. I'm definitely psyched though.
One thing I'm worried about is that the last few days I've been wondering if I'm beginning to have an MS flareup. The top of my left foot feels weird, I'm feeling a little like foot drop might be coming on in my right leg...I don't want to think about it too much, but I don't want to ignore it either. I'll be so fucking pissed if I have to go sit in the infusion center and lose time in the mountains. Shit sucks. I'm sure I'm fine though. I mean what am I going to do? I'm not going to change my plans, unless I absolutely cannot walk. I wonder if I'm feeling weird because I had 2 weeks of traveling, and I forgot my auto-injector in the backcountry, so I was slack on the injections. When I got back on Friday night, I pretty much slept through until Saturday night. Is being that tired normal? I've also had a little bit of personal stress. But my diet has been good and I've been getting good sleep, so who knows.
Lauren left for Kenya yesterday. To say goodbye, we went with John to play croquet in a park. She got me excited about going to Africa again. Now that I've been spending more time at elevation hiking I'm a little more excited - I just need to keep it up. Tickets are 1500 bucks at the very very cheapest though, and it takes 2 days each way to get there. It's not a trivial thing to get there and back. Still thinking though. I try to take every opportunity like that that I can, just as a general policy.
Sunday, August 15, 2010
password protection?
I'm thinking about password-protecting this blog. Please comment if you have any thoughts...
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