(no subject)

[stitchwhich]

My friends here have all been so busy. I've been a lump of lazy. Well, not really "lazy" so much as getting very little done since to move or think is a struggle. I've been down with a UTI. It seems to be the same one that I caught mid-July, took antibiotics for and then left for Pennsic. The second week of Pennsic featured the Return Of The UTI, so more antibiotics. Came home with a body swollen like crazy (a lot of us were struggling with water retention thanks to the weather) and feeling like crud. It took pushing to get anything done each day.

Four days ago while on the way to friends' house to help paint archery targets I had to ask for a detour to a Doc in the Box because my gut hurt very badly. Sure enough - UTI. More antibiotics. I'm on the third brand of drugs since this all started in July and I surely do hope that this stuff will kick the infection. A test done yesterday (third day into the antibiotic) had very bad stats and showed that what I am dealing with is a kidney infection. I guess that explains why it's been so hard to kick.

Mostly what I've been doing is laying in our bed or sitting in the living room half-dozing. I am so tired. I've been managing to do house chores at a minimal level, if one considers a load of laundry a day and a pot roast cooked "minimal".

Bossman is leaving for an event on Friday and I think he's relieved to escape me. I'm not much fun right now. The lack of anything worth watching on TV makes it even worse since we're still in the summer break between seasons. Usually we relax together by watching TV but reruns aren't cutting it.

So other than being complainy, I don't have anything to write about. I'm sure glad you do! Oh! my swimsuits came in the mail and they fit, and I now have adhesive stuff to help keep my monitor attached to me while I'm in a pool - and a bottle of adhesive remover that should make the every-ten-days removal easy. I hope. So whenever it is safe for me to jump into a public pool I'll be posting about how fun it is.

Comments

[danabren]

That sounds HORRIBLE. Fingers crossed on finally getting it cleared up :(

[montuos]

Not lazy at all! You have been and still are VERY BUSY INDEED fighting a difficult and well-entrenched infection. That takes energy, so please try not to push yourself too hard, or beat yourself up for not pushing, until that's firmly licked.

I hope you enjoy it lots when you are finally able to get into a pool again! That's a thing I miss too, but having chosen to grow my hair long when it doesn't respond nicely to blow drying, that's also a thing I'm no longer willing to do on a regular basis until I finally break down and cut my hair short again.

[stitchwhich]

Taking care of my hair is something I've been mulling about. I'm letting it grow out so it's guaranteed to look bad for the next year or so. I'm okay with that but I'm wondering about shampoos and conditioners - I don't use a conditioner on my hair but I also only wash it twice a week or so. Ramping up to a chlorine dunk three times a week has me thinking I might need to get conditioner. But the selection! Good gravy!

[montuos]

Oof! Yeah, it's definitely not just the couple of creme rinses we remember from our youth anymore!

Because of the chlorine, you're most likely going to want to wash after every dip in the pool, so you'll probably want a milder shampoo for using that often. (I learned the hard way in my youth that using a shampoo harsher than necessary irritates the scalp and makes it ramp up its natural oil production.) And since you don't generally use a conditioner at all, you're unlikely to want more than a fairly light one, unless the pool affects your hair badly.

On the good side, there are probably a whole bunch of different formulations specifically designed for chlorine damage. But it would be nice to know how much chlorine it takes to cause enough damage to need that; maybe just washing immediately would be enough? It's not like you're going to be in the pool all day every day like someone training to be an olympic swimmer, after all.

It might be worthwhile to ask around the pool what regulars there do for their hair, though.

[medievalbooks]

You will want to wash your hair after swimming. I generally rinse my hair at the gym to get most of the chlorine out and wash it the night or next day. And yes, conditioner will help especially if you are growing your hair long for the winter. Bottle of that stuff will last you a year. A tiny dab will do ya.

[cellio]

Ouch. I hope that now that you know it's a kidney problem, you can overwhelm it with superior firepower until it yields. (Those "you"s are plural, to include your doc.)