4/21/24

 Sunday, April 21,2024

Lights out last night around 9:30, pit stop around 10:30 and again at midnight when I let Lilly out, another at 1:30 when I turned the lights on again and moved to the sunroom.  At 3 a.m., I return to the tv room and try again to sleep with my right shoulder, arm, wrist, and hand still badly hurting. . . At some point, I listened to my VA hypnotherapy recording and maybe dropped off to sleep for 10 or 15 minutes, but up again at 4:45 with very bad 7 or 8 pain in my right hand and both shoulders. let Lilly out again, opening and closing the front door was a bit of a challenge.  I moved back to the sunroom around 5 to sleep, at some point nodded off sitting up straight, and woke up at 6:15 with an achy neck.  My right hand pain was better but unable to clench a fist.  Right shoulder pain is still there but a bit reduced in intensity with very limited ROM.  I'm wondering if the 1,000 mg. of Tylenol helped.

Pain, etc.  I had quite a bit of pain in my right shoulder yesterday right up to what I am euphemistically calling 'bedtime', really recliner time.  The pain continued and included my right wrist and hand and areas in between despite 1300 mg. of Tylenol at bedtime and Lidocaine patches on both shoulders.  I'm regularly using my walking stick now rather than my BritStick to keep from applying pressure directly on the palm of my hand(s).  It took three trips of stick-stabilized baby steps to move to the sunroom: one to turn on the light, a second to transfer my water bottle, and a third to transfer my laptop.    I took another 1000 mg. of Tylenol at 5ish. 

I'm grateful for the celebration of Geri's 80th birthday yesterday.  I think it was all she had hoped for.  She brilliantly planned a meal of Italian beef sandwiches, green salad, pasta salad from Gloriosa's on Brady Street, kettle chips, and a big, delicious cheesecake from Costco.  It was all delicious, appreciated by all, and saved her from a lot of prep time in the kitchen.  David helped with the kitchen prep work as usual, and everybody pitched in with the cleanup except Ellis and me.