3/25/2026

 Wednesday, March 25, 2026

1954 Pope Pius XII's encyclical "Sacra virginitas" (On consecrated virginity)

2024 UN Special Rapporteur said there are “reasonable grounds” to believe Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza in a report "Anatomy of a Genocide."

In bed around 8:30, half awake from 5:15 till 5:40, when I got up for the weigh-in,     140/71/33 100 207.2. 36/30/63/35

Morning meds at. 7:00 a.m.  Ranolazine at 6:00 a.m. and 5:45. p.m.  

Symptoms:  Yesterday, a lot of lightheadedness, using the rollator a lot.

Today, Very tired this morning, even after a decent night's sleep last night. Also, slight lightheadedness in the morning, not as bad as yesterday afternoon.  The dizzies got more significant later in the morning, only when standing, not when sitting.  Still with me in the afternoon.

The botched discharge process at the hospital and change of medications, on top of the 5 days of hospitalization, has shaken my heretofore confidence in the VA's medical care.  I've done more research about congestive heart failure, arrythmias, PVCs, bradycardia, and treatment options and think my conditions with all of those condtions is more serious than I had thought.  The problem of lightheadedness is my major concern.  It sounds like not much of a problem, but it invovles a substantially greater risk of falling down, which means risk of breaking a hip, e.g., or of hitting my head and experiencing a brain bleed.  These are potential life-altering events.  The lightheadedness is a common side effect of the Ranolazine medication I'm on and I'm surprised I've received no counseling about this, either at the hospital or otherwise.  On a relateed manner, I note that I am increasingly aware of the fact that, were it not for Geri being here with me, I'd be in an assisted living faciltiy, or at least a congregate "independent living" facility for the aged.  My major accomplishment today was taking two trips to the bird feeders to refill the tube feeder and the tray feeders.  I want to add another one or two seedcakes to that feeder as well, but all I could handle this afternoon was the two short walks from the garage where I keep my stock of birdseed to the front of the house where the feeders are.  I thought I had "lost a step" after the week of hospitalization last September/October, but I'm worse after the latest hospitalization.  I'm increasingly useless.  It would be prudent to sell our house and move into an apartment or condo (or some 'facility'), but Geri's not ready for that and I hate the thought.  Just dealing with the process of prepping the place for a move would be daunting.  Geri would have to handle almost everything, and she's just a few weeks away from her 82nd birthday (and her new knee has been giving her problems lately.).  Much to consider.

From 3 years ago today:

Finished reading Gilead: "While I am thinking about it - when you are an old man like I am, you might think of writing some sort of account of yourself, as I am doing.  In my experience of it, age has a tendency to make one's sense of oneself harder to maintain, less robust in some way."  John Ames' frequent description of himself as old and tired, the metaphor being "ember," dull and gray but with an internal heat and fire, ready to be refulgent again when the Lord breathes life on it.  I was struck by "one's sense of oneself [being] harder to maintain," how true that seems of old age, the age with little new except daily diminishment, little to look forward to but more diminishment, but filled with so many old memories, 80+ years of memories.  The good ones fade away, the regretful ones linger and haunt.  The good ones are almost all of the goodness of others - mother, sister, Uncle Jim, Aunt Monica, Brother Coogan, Wally Halperin, Johnny Flynn, Troy Major, Father Matthew, so many nurse-nuns - while the regretful ones are of my own failings, ingratitude, cowardice,  selfishness, vanity, pettiness, indifference.  It's curious that Marilynne Robinson named her fictional town "Gilead."  I suppose  she intended her novel to be healing, affirming.  "There is a balm in Gilead / To make the wounded whole / There is a balm in Gilea / .To heal the sin-sick soul. / Sometimes I feel discouraged / And deep I feel the pain / In prayers the holy spirit / Revives my soul again"  For those without the faith of a John Ames or Marilynne Robinson, hope comes harder.

From 2 years ago today, when I was in really bad shape with undiagnosed and untreated polymyalgia rheumatica and kvetching about it:

I'm losing the physical and mental energy to write.   I suspect I may abandon this journalling project one of these days.⁺⁺ I've never been entirely sure why I do it in the first place except perhaps that I have no attractive alternative, certainly not watching television.  Reading is increasingly difficult for me except on a Kindle or on my laptop with its ability to enlarge fonts.  There's certainly enough wretchedly bad news to read about, to think about, and to write about but I haven't much energy.  I am bowled over by how seemingly fast I have gone downhill with these chronic pain problems, with the interstitial cystitis assortment of pains lasting about a year and a half (?) only to be resolved by surgery and replaced by rotator cuff and various arthritis pains, all debilitating and at least semi-crippling.  At least as distressing as the physical pain is the cognitive decline that has accompanied it.  It's very noticeable to me, both in terms of executive function and in terms of increasing short-term memory problems and confusion.

About one month later, I stopped writing in these notes for about 16 days.  With the PMR, it was too painful to hold my laptop and type.   On April 26th, I stopped writing until May 13th, when I was finally diagnosed with PMR and put on prednisone.  Daily and nightly thoughts of suicide, similar period to when I was beset with ulcers in my bladder years before.