lonemagpie

Separate from the events of the convention, the weekend was interesting test of the state of my health. Not having control what's in the stuff I eat, coupled with a buggering up of routine, and random rather than programmed amounts of activity and stresses meant my blood sugar was all over the place (not into dangerous levels, but inconvenient) - so I must watch out for that any time I'm away having meals in hotels for multiple days.

I also at one point was looking for a particular person, was pointed to where he was, and, because of the colour of his jacket in a dark room with flashing coloured lights, walked straight past him because I literally couldn't see him in that colour/shade environment of a disco. Which means I think, even with the eyesight improvement, next time they ask if I want to register as partially sighted I might actually agree to do it.

I also know a lot of people who have mobility issues and lack of spoons, and was somewhat shocked, to see by direct interaction and comparison, that by Sunday evening I was as bad (with my left foot, whose heel I busted 30 years ago, as well as the blood thing). Cos I'm usually fairly... Able. I mean, I run around fencing and fighting in medieval armour, for fuck's sake...

So, I have to admit, though the panels and talks and stuff I did at the convention were great fun, health-wise that was a pretty disatrous weekend.

For those wondering, that's the fourth of the initial five double eye injections down. I'm now missing only about three letters of the entire chart from the vision test beforehand with the right eye, and six or so with the left. They did manage to hit a vein in the right eyeball, so it now looks like the bottom half of the white is filled with blood (this doesn't show from the inside, nor is there any discomfort apart from the usual in both) - I wonder how many ebola scares I'll cause in town.

On the diabetic front, they looked at the numbers, still happily in the sixes, and sent for a blood test to check the three-month score (so I didn't hear that at the time, as a different department had borrowed the machine) - the plan is now to discharge me to the GP, do six-monthly blood tests, and prescribe tablets if the numbers creep up. In short, then, my oancreas is happy to continue to work with the right diet and exercise.

Then on the way home the first bus I could have got was over 10 minutes late, and so in such a hurry that the cunt didn't bother to stop for me.

Monitoring how my eyes are going, I fee; they somewhat bottomed out about three or four weeks ago, in terms of cobwebbing and interference with resolving text. The cobwebbing has reduced by around 60% from its worst since starting the tablets, and my reading-vision (if that's the right term) is better this week than it was a week to two weeks ago, though still worse than it was a month ago, (I'm comparing against the same book every few days, so I know I'm not being led astray by different types or fonts). So, that's somewhat reassuring, and I'm hoping the various treatments will continue to recover things.

Back from hospital and doped to the eyeballs. They did decide to install a few more upgrades, so I, based on last time, will doubtless be woozy for the rest of the weekend. Throat and gullet don't feel quite as raw as last time, so I guess theyve worked on a different bit of it.

On the upside, the gap till next time, they said, will be a whole six weeks - the longest gap yet.

If I'm being assimilated/Cyber-converted by stealth, I at least want to be Cyberleader and have the black handlebars.

For extra fun, my blood sugar before the op was down to 4.3, but at least that meant I got a couple of biscuits out of them afterwards...

Um, yeah, holding my head up to type is wearing after about five minutes. I wish I could get some of the sedative for home use - it'd be handy when Lesley snores. Guess I'll try to veg out to a DVD, but the chance of crashing to bed like last time is reasonably high.

What a romantic Valentine's weekend.

So, the diabetes is Type 2, and apparently a relatively recent development. They reckon that - well, they reckon everything about this is unusual, and I was able to confirm that there's a history of "unusual" in the family, not a history of diabetes. Anyway, yeah, they reckon that I'd been pre-diabetic, in danger of it, for years, but not actually diabetic yet because I'd (quite coincidentally in a general attempt to stay fit and healthy) been controlling it. Until this year, when there was a lot of stress (which raises blood sugars), illness ((which raises blood sugars), injury (which raises blood sugars), allergic crap (which... you get the idea) and a course of steroids for that (which *really* raise blood sugars). And then in order to get toe most recent couple of books done, I'd trashed all that controle, skipped meals all over the place, fuelled on cola and cornflakes, and basically... Well, Boom.

However, this means that it too has sort of been caught early - so it and the liver both decided to launch all-out attacks before they were ready and established, which is always a losing move.

Anyway, so they looked at my glucose test record, and declared I've got it under "rock steady" control (the most common number I see is 7.4, down from 9ish last month), and asked if I wanted to a) try switching to tablets, but that the tablets are more for overweight pateints which I'm not, and that they probably actually wouldn't necessarily be right for me. (Unusual, remember). Or, b) stop taking the insulin and see what happens - well, no, cos I don't want any repeats of the bleeding to death on the operating table thing - or c) my preference, dial down the insulin dosage and see what happens. To be on the safe side, they're booking an appointment for the New Year so that the consultant can decide what to do next. Until then I'm to continue with the insulin since I don't want to "see what happens", and if the glucose numbers drop to the 5s and 4s give them a bell to get a lower dosage determined.

They also said I could just do glucoe tests on alternate days if i want, but I actually like seeing an objective run of how the system's functioning, so I'm happy to continue.

FWIW, apparently one particular blood test gives them the sugar reading for three months. When I went in, it was 58, which was just above the diagnostic band for diabetes. Today it was 47, which is *below* the diagnostic score for diabetes. Since there's no actual cure for it, I'm assuming either, a) the insulin is keeping it down, but can probably do with the dosage being reduced, b) it's some kind of false reading since by November 3rd none of the blood in my veins was actually mine, so I dunno if the continuity really works - but they probably thought of that, or c) the new regeneration cycle is working a little too well...!

Yeah, so… Sorry I’ve been away - Spent three days vomiting blood a couple of weeks ago, then on October 27th my liver defected to Da’esh and tried to cut my throat from the inside - in fact it exploded due to damage from heretofore undiagnosed diabetes, and, well, one bleeding to death internally on the endo operation table, two surgeries, multiple blood transfusions, and ten days in hospital later….

“Nobody dies harder than John McClane” the Guyz Nite song says, and I beg to fucking differ.

While I was in hospital, the advance copies of Fortune And Glory, which comes out in January, arrived. I signed one with a message of gratitude to the doctors and the ward staff, and left it in the ward’s day room so that staff and future patients might find it diverting.

medically, this:




(Someone said it was "what Zorro's dad had" and then specified Anthony Hopkins, though I feel the urge to point out that Banderas in this movie is his apprentice, not his son, and Hopkins was the actual Zorro)

I do have the right shirt, sword, etc, but, trust me, it doesn’t look anything like as painful as it fucking is!

is happening to my elbow and wrist? Trapped nerve of something between the inner point of the elbow to the outer point of the wrist - bloody hurts and now I'm typing two-fingered and left handed..

puking my guts up at 4AM - not so much fun as writing about folks such as Zhang Guo Lao... So Asylum is off for us- if anybody wants the tickets, shout up

urg, the hot flushes, chills, and headaches stage, but at least I seem to be not still throwing up. Fucking bug…

And this is what happens when I spend a morning doing loads of metric-imperial conversions about space and stuff because all the science websites use metric and my publisher uses imperial….



(and the costochondritis/costo-chandral sep from getting in an awkward relationship with the arm of the couch last week, just where I'd previously had broken ribs, isn't helping...)