Birthday posts are coming...
...but it's been a very busy and, ultimately, very tiring couple of days. I've been surprised at the level of fatigue I am feeling. I'm sure it is not connected to my mother's birthday, so I've been mulling about what it might be.
    In the meantime I discontinued the lisinopril yesterday. After just less than two days without it I noticed incipient swelling in her legs and feet this evening; neither unusual for most people nor uncomfortable for her but alarming to me because it happened so fast. This morning she could well have been pronounced "dehydrated" and I made sure she consumed a full 16 ounces of water before we took off for MPNC's play. This evening though, with very little additional liquid of any type throughout the day, she was surprisingly hydrated. I think the lisinopril actually has a good effect on her despite it's tendency to lower her blood pressure and I think this good effect has something to do with protecting her from unusual and unmanageable (without the wasting effects of diuretics) water retention. It is certainly much gentler than giving her furosemide (which I haven't had to administer since before her colonoscopy; the last time I reported, here, giving her furosemide was the last time she took it) or any other deliberate diuretics.
    Now, my problem is how to keep her blood pressure up and continue the lisinopril, which I will resume in the morning. I know a lot about lowering blood pressure from simply being a relatively avid reader of current media, as current media is overwhelmed, at the moment, with health advice on such subjects as lowering blood pressure. I can't remember the last time I read anything about how to deliberately raise blood pressure. I'll need to research this. I suppose adding a bit more sodium to her diet will do the trick. As well, the higher altitude in Prescott should help. Although people who wish to lower their blood pressure are counseled to take more exercise, in my mother's case, because of her COPD and the fact that she moves little and slowly, more movement might prove to raise hers a bit, certainly at least for awhile until her body becomes accustomed to more activity. At any rate, movement will probably help to normalize it. Trying to get her to move, of course, is constant work but I'm used to it and she is moving more as it is, especially when she can use the wheel chair, despite her protests about using it.
    I was asked, earlier this week, by a woman at Mom's hair salon who uses a strangely technological looking walker (I mean, how technological does a walker need to be?!?) why I didn't get my mother one like hers. For a few reasons, actually. First of all, we have the wheelchair and on any particular trip Mom uses it occasionally to sit, so it's useful. As well, it doubles as a dandier shopping cart than the walkers I've seen when Mom wants (or I cajole her) to push it and this pleases her. I can't see any reason to add a piece of equipment to our household that would be redundant and not nearly as serviceable. Granted, my mother is the only person I've observed using her wheelchair as a walker and shopping cart but neither my mother nor I have a problem with being the "first" or the "only" doing anything. Our shared attitude toward other people not doing what we're doing for whatever reason is either, "That's their choice," or "Too bad for them." Curiously though, the woman showing off her gadget-walker couldn't seem to accept our decision. She argued with us that we really ought to have one, almost to the point of me wondering if perhaps she had a financial stake in us buying one. It was as though she felt that our choice somehow invalidated hers. Well, once again, a walker's her choice, and, too bad for her if she can't accept ours.
- posted by gail rae @ 23:49   email...this post