10/5/2020 An eventful day

The trainer had told us that since I can't be on my feet very long at long that we need to have an electric treadmill to exercise Bridget. I had started watching for one on FB Marketplace & located one for free! Yay, free is one of my favorite words, lol! It was just over an hour drive away, but still better than paying a hundred, or more for one. While getting ready to leave I had some symptoms that are more unique to me. With EDS & POTS brain fog momemts are common, but at this point I felt disoriented, confused, would head out to take something to the van & walk the wrong way because I couldn't think straight. I also had trouble getting words out to answer, no stuttering, just couldn't engage my brain to know what to say. My head felt like a slight frontal headache, but barely noticable. I do get some of these symptoms during a POTS flare, but I didn't feel a flare at the time. Once we left home & I was sitting down longer, those symptoms began to leave, but left me feeling very emotional, & getting upset easily. It lasted over an hour & then I felt like myself again. The weather has been changing a lot lately. I'm wondering if it might have triggered something. I don't believe that I have ever had a silent migraine, but wondering if that might be what it was. Good thing is, it let up after only a total of a few hours & we were able to pick up the treadmill to have ready for Bridget. With the help of our son, I managed to make supper. Being a chilly fall night I thought chili sounded good for everyone. Our son Michael is vegetarian so guessing my way through without a recipe, I made up a vegetarian chili. He helped out by mixing up some mock corn bread (also known as millet bread). We use a basic corn bread recipe, but replace the wheat flour for one of our favorite GF blends, & replace the corn meal with millet flour. It tastes just like corn bread & has the same texture. Our gluten eating friends love it & say they can't tell it's gluten free. Corn dogs sounded good, but with my health issues I have to think of easy ways to do things. In this case I sliced up some all natural hot dogs, & mixed them in the millet bread batter. Once served, everyone topped their now corn dog bread with the chili. Despite the fact that I had to go extremely easy on the chili seasonings due to multiple sensitivities in the family, it came out pretty good. I'm usually pretty happy with my liquid diet of Kate Farms meal replacement drinks, but I was able to enjoy a small piece of corn dog bread as well. Of course it triggered the dysphagia, but it was worth it last night. After supper was finished a sharp pain hit in the center of my chest & hurting more with each breath. A feeling that I know all to well. Hello costochondritis, back for another round of turture are you. Most likely triggered by my coughing from the dysphagia (That corn dog bread was so good though!). Costochondritis is very common with EDS & is inflammation of the cartilage in the rib cage, typically where it attaches to the breastbone, or sternum. Thankfully by the time I got up in the middle of the night to let the foster pups out to potty, the pain was gone.

I have been trying hard not to think about it, but my medical PTSD is now flaring this morning as my doctor managed to get me in to see the neurosurgeon. My appointment is this afternoon. I'm terrified of new doctor appointments these days & especially any that have to do with neuro because most of them seem to have the worst attitudes. Here goes nothing, I can do this!