NapoBloMo-Day #21

The only thing that can be said about today, is that it hasn't started well & I think the ending may be even worse.


Today was my first non-stress test. That was a fairly uneventful event, (4 very pregnant people in lounge chairs hooked up to electrodes) until I noticed that the contractions graph was having ACTUAL JUMPS on it,& at this point in the process, I have no business having contractions. The nurse noticed and asked A. if I was feeling them and B. how far along I was. No, I'm not feeling them. (yes, they are actual contractions) What the Sam's Hill?? As far as the heartrate/variability/baby moving went, he is very active.

And then it was time for the ultrasound. I was feeling pretty bummed/on the point of tears over the contractions when the doctor came in and asked how I was (answer "overwhelmed") which he assured me was perfectly understandable on the verge of the beginning of the end. The placental blood flow & everything looked ok, the amniotic fluid index has actually gone down 2 points & the contractions are likely perfectly normal, given the increased amniotic fluid index. As long as the contractions aren't painful there is no need to be overly concerned. See you in a week.

With my nerves freshly shot from that, I got to schedule an emergency appointment with my eye doctor for the large black "floater" that has been swimming around in my right eye for the past 2 days. (the thing shows no signs of going away,initially I thought it was from a headache but nope) I had my eye appointment for the year in October (which showed things to be absolutely perfect, D-wise) but apparently my right eye didn't get the memo. (so here I go again this afternoon)

I think I'm falling apart.

FFL: One Eye at a Time

The left eye. Pipelined from the aorta, it is an important indicator of A.heart health and B.the beginnings of an d-related eye problems,they will start here.(generally)

One of the great things about FFL, every year they have an ophthalmology team that does eye screenings everyone with diabetes. Grandparent to child, they don't care..they just want the word to get out there & you to show up. You fill out a questionairre, they do a bp/pulse screening, and take pictures of your eyes with a high-res camera.(without eye dilation drops) It doesn't substitute regular eye dilutions, but its something you can take to your ophthalmologist should something pop up. This was my second year going, so I was somewhat anxious to see what, if anything,had changed from last year when they said I had minor deposits on my right eye lens. This is common enough on artificial lenses, but still not something I wanted to madly spread/cloud the vision/require YAG laser to burn a hole though. Fortuantly for me,it hasn't spread, and both retinas look happy & healthy.(knock on wood)If you're there next year..definatly schedule an appt.,eye health is something every PWD needs to take seriously.

The Eye of the Storm

Snow is coming down. Real white stuff, flying thick and furious. Of course it came at the absolute best time...yesterday I drove down to my eye exam, not thinking that it would do anything today. (it NEVER does)


Like most eye exams,I was in there over three hours(par for the course), they refuse to put my married name on there(I've also been trying to fix that for 1+ years). I think I'll just give up at some point. Visual fields, resident with his medical student in tow. Nice enough, and had a last name that could actually be pronounced/remembered. Dilation. Comment about my lack of perfect control,which I tuned out. Back out to waiting room. Back in again. Bright lights, more drops.


"Hmmmmm-ummmm-hmmmmm-lookright-look left--look up===look down---hmmmm"

"They don't look too bad."

"WHAT?WHAT does that mean? No proliferative or nonproliferative damage????"

"No diabetes changes."

Sigh of relief. Another test, the Hess test. That measures the amount of double vision, and that has changed slightly since the last visit. Recheck in 6 months.

Came home today...in slushy junk/traffic jams(4 hours drive) and had to go straight to microbio lab(1 pm, was late to boot) because they DIDN'T CANCEL school. Stupid.(the entire world is shutting down and they don't). First major snow.