Life Is Full of Ups and Downs

I know, it's somewhat of an overused saying, and I almost used another one - Life is like a roller coaster, but managed to resist (for now anyway).


Wow, it's been a couple of weeks now since this head flu knocked me around and quite honestly, I'm still not 100% over it.


The Codral Cold & Flu pills I was taking had some effect on drying up my nose, but they also had a downside - they really dried my mouth out overnight.  It took me a day or two to realise why my throat was so dry, so I stopped taking them and low and behold, the dryness abated after a couple of days.


By that stage, fortunately I was feeling well enough to "risk" going drug free and by and large, I have coped well.  As I said earlier, I'm still trying to shake the remnants - a goal not helped by the current cold snap that seems hell bent on keeping me sniffling for weeks to come.  Fortunately I've still got my nasal spray, but there is another down associated with that.


You see, I've started getting blood noses again.  Today was a pearler - I blew my nose when I got up and spent the next 10 minutes trying to stem the flow of blood.  All day I've had to resist giving my nose a good blow, and when I've succumbed, it has largely been blood as opposed to "nasal congestion".  It normally settles down after a day or two, so just another fun thing to deal with.  Fortunately, the bleeding nose is not too frequent an occurrence, but inevitably, the timing is inconvenient.  Taking nasal sprays during these times just doesn't really work.


Another up and down.  Melissa, my osteo, is making good progress with getting my upper left quadrant loosened up and working again.  The range of movement is certainly improving and my posture is returning to a more normal upright stance.  Great, but thanks to my cold, I've gone backwards over the last couple of weeks.  Seems when the system gets blocked up, the muscles, etc in the upper torso contract.  Hmmm.  And to add salt to the wound, I've also been getting headaches caused by all of this.  I initially blamed my new pillow, but after being beaten up by Melissa, my sleep pattern has now returned to normal.  Well almost.


Just before the cold took hold, I'd started to basically sleep through the night again. Wow, was that great.  It took a couple of nights to actually accept it, but it was one of those changes I was happy to embrace.  The damn cold soon fixed that.  My liquid intake has increased again during the time I've had the cold, so I'm up during the nights again.  I try to convince myself this extra flushing is good for me, but I'd quite honestly rather have the sleep.


So, as you can see, things are a bit up and down at the moment.  I think the ups are starting to overtake the downs (muted yippee) and given it is now only a month before the anniversary of my treatment ending, I'm not going to let these "annoyances" hold me back from moving forward.


Despite all of this, there is one overriding positive - it is life itself.  This time last year I was still engaged in an all out war with cancer and the fact I've come out of it the victor sure as hell trumps anything else being thrown at me - see, the PMA lives on.