We've had a pretty decent week for a change, although Saturday was not a pleasant day. It was more of the same behavior that had plagued us.
We did go to Brianna's 16th birthday party. Ironically I sat between my two husbands as we sat on the sidelines. It's a good thing we all get along!
Sunday morning Bill again decided that we were not going to church. This time it was not weather related as it was a beautiful, warm, sunny day. I decided that we needed to get out of the house anyway and just go somewhere, anywhere. We decided to head to the Ozark foothills and drove to Hardy, AR, about 2 hours from us. This is a watersports area, rafting, canoeing, tubing, and lots of trout fishing on the Spring River. We used to go there frequently for relaxing week-ends before Bill got sick, but hadn't been for a long time. There was not much traffic and it's a pretty drive at times. Seeing cut and bare cotton fields is not pretty, but you have the good with the bad. Anyway, got there about 1 and found a restaurant and had lunch, then bought gas and came home, taking a different route that the navigation system recommended. It even took the same amount of time. But, we were both relaxed the entire day and did some talking about different things. We've also decided that we need to do this at least once a month, and we don't have to wait for a week-end to do it. We shall see if we keep it up.
The rest of the week was a normal week, no flare-ups of the depression. Bill went through some clothes and weeded out all that were too big for him, which was most of what he found. He didn't realize that I had already gone through the clothes and the ones he was trying on were the ones I had already pulled. Oh well, it gave him something to do to occupy him.
I think that is what bothers him the most. Since he is so limited in what he can do, it's hard to find things he can do. Of course, I'm an enabler in this too, and I really have to work on that. It's just so much easier for me to do it than wait for him to do it. So, we both have things to work on.
There you have it, our week in review.
Glad you had some nice weather to enjoy an outing!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I can't remember if I've asked you this already, but does Bill use any supplements to replace what the medications rob from him? If he's on Mag oxide, that's not the most bio-available form for other things, like depression, although heart tx patients are frequently put on it. A better form might make worlds of difference for depression.
ReplyDeleteSo far the only thing he's on is Calcium w/Vitamin D. All of his numbers are good as far as that goes. He has suffered from depression before and after his last heart attack in 2007 all of the signs of depression were gone. He was still in therapy when we went to Mayo. He gets more labs done in a couple of weeks and I can access them on line and the results are sent to Mayo. I'll do some research on this to see if maybe it would help. Thanks for the suggestion.
ReplyDelete"A 500mg calcium pill would cause depression within one hour, extinguished by the ingestion of 400mg magnesium."
ReplyDeleteThere are many articles on the benefits, but here's one to get you started, if you are interested.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201106/magnesium-and-the-brain-the-original-chill-pill
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16542786
ReplyDeleteThose are both very interesting articles. I went back over his labs for May, August and November and they are all smack in the middle of the normal range on Magnesium and all the other electrolytes. But, I think I'll check with Stephanie Monday to see what she thinks. He was experiencing several of the symptoms listed so it's worth a shot. Thanks for the info!
ReplyDeleteHe takes 1800mg of Calcium a day due to some osteoporosis and has since the transplant. He had taken magnesium but was taken off of that 2 years ago.
ReplyDeleteTesting for magnesium isn't necessarily reliable on regular labs.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.easy-immune-health.com/magnesium-level.html
Assessing magnesium status is difficult because most magnesium is inside cells or in bone. The most commonly used and readily available method for assessing magnesium status is measurement of serum magnesium concentration, even though serum levels have little correlation with total body magnesium levels or concentrations in specific tissues.
ReplyDelete