The month seems to be flying by! I had always heard that time goes faster when you get older and I never actually believed it, but it sure seems like it's true.

Bill had a monitor check yesterday in the wee hours of the morning and the results this time were not good. He apparently has a lot of fluid build-up this time, unlike December when everything looked good. He said he hasn't had any weight gain but he has had some shortness of breath and being tired. Of course he put that down to helping Ron get this project finished. He is concerned about it enough that he talked about it some after we went to bed, not just when he told me that they had called.
Of course these are just the monitoring people. They can interpret the reading but they can't adjust his meds or anything. All they can do is show the results to the doctors. He has appointments all day long on February 15 so we will probably find something out then.

It bothers him so that he can't do what he wants to do! He says he doesn't feel depressed about it, just kinda of discouraged. I think his mind kind of tells him that he can do everything he did before and then his body lets him down.

I told him that I can tell that he has deteriorated some just by looking at him and watching him. I don't think he realizes how many little catnaps he takes watching tv. for example. I keep trying to tell him to stay in bed in the morning instead of getting up so early with me. I also wish he would tell me when the shortness of breath happens. He does tell me that he is tired but that's all he tells me. I told him the shortness of breath was a major danger sign that he needs to pay attention to, but, stubborn man that he is, he won't do it.

We'll see after the dr visits if I need to definitely retire or if just tweaking some drugs will work to help. Keep the prayers coming. We wouldn't be this far if it weren't for them.

Happy New Year Everyone! I hope that everyone had a blessed Christmas and is looking forward to the new year. Our Christmas was special again this year. Bill's sister and her husband came up from Florida. This was the first time they had been here and, we found out later, the first Christmas they had spent away from home! We had a wonderful visit with them. All Shirley wanted for Christmas was snow and a fire in the fireplace. The fire was easy to do, and we had fires daily. It also helped that it was really cold! It also snowed Christmas morning! Nothing stayed on the ground, but it was pretty as it was falling. Don wanted a winning lottery ticket so Bill put some scratch-off tickets in everyone's stocking. Don ended up winning $20! Talk about your perfect hosts!

Bill has been pretty tired since they went home last week and he's having a hard time dealing with things going on in the church. We are probably going to leave this church and find another. He's been very upset about it and it's affecting his sleep and his appetite. He's going to council with a respected friend and former pastor for some guidance in this.

No dr. appointments until the middle of February and the extra amiodorone has kept his heart rate around 70. That's a little higher than normal, but not in the danger area at all. He will probably have that amount reduced when we go to Memphis next month. A device check was done either right before or right after Christmas and everything looked fine. It didn't show any rapid heart beats or fluid build-up.

People have asked if he is still on the transplant list. The answer is yes. Even though it seems like he's been on it forever, it's still been under 2 years and the average wait for a heart is 18 months. We are just past 20 months. It's become a way of life, not even thinking about it. We don't sit and wait for the phone to ring, and we're not afraid to leave the house in case we miss the call. We just make sure that 1 of us always has our cell phone.

All for this time. I'll try to do better to keep this thing updated this year. As I said before, this journey has days and weeks and months when nothing happens. And we lead very normal, boring lives!

Blessings to all!