here we go again with the VCD stuff...

I think I am finally making some headway. Finally.

When I would go to speech therapy she would comment on getting on the floor and doing belly breathing and then I should be ok for a while and maybe have to come back later and do it again to get back to center etc. I was all 'do what?' because as soon as I would get up, I would be struggling again.

I went to therapy Tuesday and once again we started the session on the table breathing. And then we talked more about changes I could make at home to help relieve stress.

And then Wednesday came and I had a massage. {cue angelic music}

Wednesday's massage was with the owner and was very different from the one last week. There was more stretching and she worked specifically on opening up my rib cage. And from then on I was breathing better.

And since Wednesday I could do some breathing on the floor and really get up and enjoy some 'good time' when I wasn't solely focused on breathe in, breathe out. Lather rinse repeat. Also I have been adding in some chamomile tea and some passionflower tea...both of which are very calming and stress relieving.

I am not there yet. Not by a long shot. But I am finally improving and that is encouraging to me.

Can't wait for early next week. Another massage. And perhaps this week, my speech therapist will release me.

So I am making the move from surviving to thriving. One breathe at a time. One speech session at a time. One massage at a time. One cup of tea at a time.

I am looking forward to putting this chapter of my health behind me. Except for the massage part. I'm hanging on to these gals. : )

the massage

So I went for a massage Friday. I will start with, yes it was nice. I told the hubs that I will want to continue those even after I get well. Made hi$ day. ; )

I went to a small place...my daddy would have called it a hole in the wall joint. It is located in the 'old'/historic area of one of the suburbs near me in a converted house. The waiting area 'out front' is really the old living room. And behind the front desk, is the kitchen etc. Not super fancy but very clean and well appointed for the task. And the entire office and their therapy is very medically oriented which is what I need. Kind of like a compliment to speech therapy. Another therapy.

I met my therapist and she took me to a room. We chatted about what was going on with me and talked about what she wanted to do etc. And the best level of undress. So I undressed and crawled on the HEATED table (yes please) and under the covers..and cradled the pillow she had for me. I can't lie flat on my tummy so she modified everything to make it more comfortable. One shoulder side and then the other. And then some time on my back while she reached under and worked on my neck and back some more and then my neck and arms from my back. It did hurt some, but I am tied up in tense knots. She was barely applying pressure at times and it was still touchy but it was ok. I asked her to lighten up her touch a few times, but I also tried to balance that with her trying to do her job on me.

This week I am going to see the owner because she works on people differently than the girl I had last week. And one of the guys there is great with neck work, so I may end up seeing him at some point. I am more comfortable with all of 'it' since I've been there and met them. I don't think I would feel too weird having a man work on me at some point. I think both the males that work there are super good and very ethical workers. So if I need a guy at some point, I can be open to that.

Did it help? Yes. But not long term. I'm simply not loosened yet. But I could see that it did help some. I am thinking about dropping the crunchy dr for this because it's quite expensive to go to him and then there is massage on top of his fee. Yikes. I can replace him with a chiropractor that takes my insurance and then I'm down to the cost of the massage. (and drop the acupuncture part) Much better. I can get many massages for one crunchy dr office fee. (we file and get a minimal amount back, so it is always a consideration). It's not that I don't love him, I just can't afford that every week or two.

My therapist noted that one part of my shoulders was supposed to be pointing in another direction but it was pointed at her. My muscles have pulled my bones way out of whack. And she said that chiro is very complimentary to this work because she can pull my muscles to where they belong and watch them go right back because of the bones. I have a couple of good leads on a chiro. One very near by and the other about a half hour away. Next door to crunchy dr, coincidentally. And his chiro, coincidentally. So I know he is good. So those are all things that may take place in the future.

I have some good moments. Few. I can get relaxed when I lie down and breathe easier but as soon as I get up it's a struggle again. Boo.  I also quit my scrip for sleep and melatonin is doing the trick and I am able to fall asleep decently. So that's an improvement. I know I will get there. It is just hard. Sometimes I really want to just cry..and I have...but it makes my breathing worse. But I have faith that I will get there. Keep praying for me. Hugs and love, my friends. : )

boring VCD update

Another boring update on my VCD...this is mainly for me so I can remember everything. But feel free to follow along. ; )

So the past week and a half haven't been so great. I had therapy Tuesday and it was mainly discussing what I'm already doing and thinking about some things differently. She set me up to have four additional sessions, because I have all the mechanics 'but I'm not there yet'. yeah.

Right after my therapy session, I called my crunchy dr to see about coming in for another adjustment and some more acupuncture. So I did that. The acupuncture was much more comfortable this time than last. Needle placement different. Weird, but much better. He also wanted me to do some saline nebulizer treatments to moisten things up. I tried it some tuesday and yesterday but breathing out of my mouth makes me feel like I'm hyperventilating by the time the neb treatment is over. Say it with me...in through the nose and out through the mouth. I caught myself doing that with my neb and that's not going to do me much good. lol

Then yesterday my VCD was out of control. And I cried off and on all day. Several reasons. Some of which I can't go into here, but I also read that things can be worse the next day after acupuncture including being weepy and feeling worse.  So I don't know what to make of that.

And today is better. So maybe it has to get worse before it can get better. I dunno.

I have been taking a scrip that is really for drainage every night to help me sleep. I wasn't very fond of needing to do that. So last night I took a melatonin and hoped for the best. I was able to rest decent. Cat was tearing around on the bed and that woke me up. I also woke up with a headache in the middle of the night. Not surprising since I was awake/asleep/awake/asleep several times. I didn't really want to 'take' anything so I took some ginger. On an empty stomach. Which might have been a mistake. Feeling off today, even though my breathing is better.

Tomorrow I am getting a massage. I'm hoping I don't have to go through the same 'next day is worse' routine like I just passed through. My speech therapist encouraged me to get a massage at a place like Massage Envy which is a chain. They were kind of afraid of me. So I found a place in a nearby suburb that specializes in dealing with people with medical issues through massage. Much better fit. That is tomorrow morning bright and early. Kind of excited but nervous too. Kind of awkward. Never had a massage. Never really wanted a massage. But I also want to breathe.

She also recommended that I look into restorative yoga which is fancy for a lot of breathing with some manipulatives. I looked into it but I was not comfortable with it and knew I would not be able to 'relax'. So I am passing on that one. Kinda dread having to tell her I skipped out on that.

My therapist is a breathing nerd so she has done many of these things and overcome many challenges in regards to her own voice in her lifetime. She is such a sweetie.  This really isn't a journey I would wish on anyone but I'm thankful there are people like her with the knowledge to help.

don't clear your throat

I went to speech therapy today. And the biggest take away from today was DON'T CLEAR YOUR THROAT. When I do that, my VC bang into one another. And I do it the whole stinkin' day long. Don't be me. lol

So she got me a small bottle of water to swallow I sip with all the gunk...instead of clearing my throat. Helps. Some. I think clearing my throat is a habit just because I have a lot of gunk from allergies.

We walked around a little bit and did some 'rescue breathing'..this time one sniff in and three pursed exhales, lather rinse repeat. Helps. And she let me feel around her middle to see what proper breathing is supposed to feel like so I can feel it on me too. Yes we probably looked like a weird pair walking around outside holding each other around the middle, but at this point, who cares. LOL

And she showed me how to feel the anatomy of my throat and do some different massage techniques at different points. Interesting..again...more than I ever wanted to know about my throat. lol

But she feels like I am making progress. Slowly. But I'm getting there. She is encouraged by where I am today. And that encouraged me.

She did tell me she is going to amend my care plan to include two more sessions just to get me more comfortable and get me across the finish line.

I adore my therapist. : )

PS..when I spelled "swallow" up there, I accidentally spelled it "swaller" which was immediately followed by a 'you might be a redneck' joke inside my head. ; )

update on my vocal cords

I'm learning more about my vocal cords than I ever wanted to know.

Did you know that clearing your throat makes your VC bang into one another?

Did you know that by learning a certain swallow technique, you can massage your VC?

Did you know that sniffing with your nose (two or three times) opens your VC?

Did you  know that sitting and leaning over so that your tummy is touching your thighs forces the rest that the upper body needs and also forces the diaphragm to work?

Did you know that the 'trick' to teaching the VC to relax is prolonged exhalation coupled with some inhalation tricks?

Did you know that sniffing a couple of times, then pursing your lips like you're blowing out a candle with a long exhale can relieve some of the severity of the weird hyperventilating kinda stuff I've dealt with?

Did you know that with VCD, lying on the floor and attempting to relax, helps the diaphragm to kick in and help relieve the stress up top? (including the double sniff and slow audible exhale thru the pursed lips)

ME NEITHER!

As you can see, speech therapy has been an enlightening experience.

I can say that perhaps today, so far I have not felt horrid. I call that a win at this point. I did my stretching and floor belly breathing before I did errands this morning and I didn't feel like a basket case while I was gone. Was I still short of breath much of the time? Yes. But it was't over the top.  And I could do some rescue breathing ("blowing out the candle") and not feel just completely awful.

I am also learning that I am extremely "tight" in my shoulders and upper body and trying to remind myself to gently stretch certain muscles when things start going south.

I mentioned to my therapist this week that it's been a long haul for me because this has been going on for about six weeks. She said yeah but its only been six weeks. I wanted to slap her. ; ) But then she said she had a patient that had it for two years because nobody knew what it was. So yeah, only six weeks. I would seriously have lost my mind in two years time.

But thankfully I am beginning to see tiny little rays of sunshine every now and then peeking through the dark clouds that have been all I could see for a while. : )

learning to breathe

So I've been sick. About a month ago I started having pretty severe trouble with my asthma, so I immediately went to my gp, who did a steroid shot and sent me home. She said that if I didn't get better, we would need to do a chest xray...which I was so hoping to avoid. But my breathing problems did not go away, so I got a chest xray. Which was normal...praise God! But I continued to have problems. So my gp wanted to send me to a pulmonologist but I couldn't find one near me taking patients so along the way I discovered that I might need to see an ENT. I saw her and she immediately sent me to an allergy asthma dr she trusts. He treated me for my asthma being out of whack and for about ten blissful days, I was symptom free.

But the the trouble started creeping back. My allergist told me if I started feeling like things weren't going well, to call because he wanted to listen to me when it was really bad. So I called. And he listened. And he backed away from listening to MY THROAT and exclaimed that he thought he figured out the real source of my problem. My vocal cords. I was all do what??? Vocal cord dysfunction...or VCD as it's called for short.

So he sent me to speech therapy which I visited last week for the first time. One of the first things she told me was that I was "lucky" enough to have found a dr that even knows what this is! And for only the second time during all of this, I have felt a ray of hope that I can be helped. You see...my vocal cords are shutting instead of opening when I breathe.  And because of all of that, my body is doing some strange things. Like using my shoulders and my chest muscles (that's a funny one) to breathe instead of my belly. So unless I am lying down, my belly muscles don't do any of the work of breathing. Its exhausting. And I constantly feel short of breath. Every once in a great while, I feel like I got a good breath with much stretching and contorting.

I am leaving out plenty in this story. Stuff like going to the ER with this and being told at one point by a nurse at my gp's office "so what if I give you the results of your xray today or not, you still won't be able to breathe" after listening to me beg (!!!) to hear my xray result on the same day it was done. And being discouraged from visiting the ER by another nurse at my gp. Mind you neither of these people are even remotely thinking about the fact that I am gasping for air. And neither had a clue what was wrong with me. (jerks) And it had been for a time by then.

So yes, it's been a very slow journey. I learned exercises for my shoulders and neck first and now some breathing exercises. She said it takes a minimum of a month to figure this all out and get relief. I am exhausted and at the end of my breathing rope. This has been and continues to be an incredibly difficult journey. Please pray for me. I appreciate it.

Project Life App

I have been a scrap booker since my kids were little.

I've gone from trying to 'do' every. single. picture when they were little...because hello...every single pic was so cute when they were little, to just trying to do vacations.

And even that can be overwhelming. 300-500 pics for a one week vacation. Yes, I pick through and find the best ones, but sometimes ya just want to show different ones for different reasons. And even picking just the best stuff, y'all that's still A LOT of photos.

And a lot of time. And a lot of effort. (And a lot of mess.)

And guess what...all of that stuff is in short supply around here.

So the other day I saw that Project Life has an app for Apple now.  So I downloaded it.

And y'all..I don't EVEN know where to start with this.

It's easy.  It's fun. It's cheap. (app is $2.99) And best of all, IT'S FAST.

As in, since I got it just a couple of days ago, I've made five (!!!) really cute pages. That's five more pages than I've managed to complete in lo a many years, my friend. I haven't been this excited about anything scrap book related in YEARS.

I have wanted to 'go digital' for a long time because of the less mess and less paper, but they are always so complicated. But guess what...this is an app! It's easy! It fits in the palm of my hand. I can do it anywhere.  Did I tell you it's easy? I started playing with it and right away I had it figured out and was creating something really cool and fun. I also love that the app comes with four very different 'kits' with very different color palettes of 'papers'. As in...I can create for a while with just what came in the app. But other kits are available and they are cheap too....99 cents and $1.99 is not bad. And after that, they are mine to use over and over..unlike a special sticker or piece of paper that once I've stuck it down, it's used forever.

Once pages are done, they can be saved to my camera roll, posted on all manner of social media or just about anything else you would want to do with them. They can also be uploaded to places like Persnickety Prints for printing. Y'all...they print an 8 X 8 square page for 99 cents. (you can also print a 12 inch square for slightly more, btw) I can't print photos and buy papers and do it all for a buck!

This isn't a sponsored post, by the way. I just think this is so cool.

OK...I'll shut up now so we can look and some fun scrap book pages, k?

Cute, right? : )