How healthy are you?

 We are both managing some health issues. I know many of you can empathise. Thank you for your kind words. Mine are slowly improving, thankfully. We were talking about how we still feel pressure to achieve something during the day. Joseph Brian has that persistent cough, without many other symptoms. He has to use his puffer regularly, which is new to this stage of his life. He's never had asthma or anything. Teaching I used to get bronchitis and laryngitis. I haven't had a cold in ages! Most of my symptoms are eased, except for a bit of vertigo. I can manage 10 minutes on my elliptical machine. 

JB had his quarterly PSA test Friday. It is an adventure, but he makes an appointment at the lab (no charge as we live in Canada), and has the blood test. He usually needs them to use butterfly clips (green thing, below), in order for them to get a vein. 

For Christmas he was given this type of rechargeable hand warmers, as it help to get the vein. You plug them in and charge them, then insert them into the soft sock. They don't fit under gloves, maybe mitts would work!

He tried them, and found that it took a couple of hours for them to get up to temperature. Something we will have to remember. It is the same with the chemical ones, just so you know. They never warm up in time.

The good news is that it was an experienced nurse (we won't say 'old'!) who got it first time. What a relief. Sometimes they try his hands and both arms! Here he was in 2022 and 2020!

The next thing he has to do is go online to check the results. They were good! The PSA test is something he has to have prior to his Lupron injection this month since his prostate cancer surgery in 2014. This is good news, again. 

Our Ottawa kids have rented a hot tub for February! Here is Jean-Luc (my SIL) Friday night, Caitlin must have taken the photo! Isn't that a fun treat? Saturday was partly sunny, which makes for a nice relaxing adventure.

Here's to February!

Rainy Crumbly Acres

💉JB took off for his quarterly PSA blood test. The poor man had to come home. They did not have a butterfly needle. He schedules the appointment first thing in the morning to get it over with.

He was told to come back after lunch. At 13:00 hours, off he went. He had to stand in line, along with drop ins and people with appointments. His leg was getting sore.  They should have had 3 staff working, and there was only one. One nurse was on lunch. The one nurse would do intake for a couple of people, and then do the lab work, and see to another two people. Slow as molasses. At least it is free for us, despite the company being a for-profit. 

Yes, Red, I heard gunshots. It sounded like someone practicing. This is what I thought. This is the country, and it is what some people do. I loathe it, but there you go!

☔While I complain about the rain, it cleared up Tuesday morning, and I did some weeding. I put the bird feeders away. I don't want to risk bear coming back. We are back to rain today, Wednesday. The Ottawa River is quite high, and we could do with some sunshine! 

The storm is still moving counterclockwise!

You can't even see us on the radar today!

The Periwinkle is blooming!

Cinnamon must miss Percy! This is a fish with batteries. He slept there for a couple of hours and every time he rolled over, the fish would wiggle.

Three 🐣ROBIN eggs, and 3 🐣PHOEBE  eggs in the shed! This is my handy paint roller/mirror I Macgyvered to watch over the eggs. 

The phoebe nest looks great. I just cannot quite see into it. The eggs are teeny. This egg is from 2013.

We seem to just have one red squirrel, but barring name tags... The little twerp was eating the new leaf shoots on the horse chestnut tree. Next, he is cleaning up under the bird feeder.

Ah, bright yellow tulips!

Monday, I needed to get out and during a break in the rain, off I went. I fetched the SD Cards, and wondered what was dropping onto the surface of the frogpond. Yes, you may laugh. Yes, it was rain. How could I be so slow?!

Across the pond, you can see the trees beginning to grow leaves.

The large white pine at the other end of the meadow. There is a puddle in the middle of the meadow. 

It is beginning to go green.

The water is quite high, nearly up to the dock.

You can see the height of the water just 4 days ago.

Butch from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

Gramma Camp – Week 24 Wednesday

 Izzy popped out of bed at 7. She had to wander down the hall to check the time. I was in the bathroom. We'll put a clock in her room. She had a fun virtual visit with her friend, H., before school.  I nagged her to make her bed and do her teeth before the school helicopter arrived, or "Momma will rip my head off!" to quote Grampa. He is a card. 

Grampa went for his quarterly PSA test. He was successful, booking it online last month. The results came in on Thursday. All is good. We'll keep up the treatment plan. He met someone managing his prostate cancer for 12 years. JB began antiandigens in 2017. He has small veins, and he always has to remind them to use the butterfly needle. It took two tries. The poor man. 

The test results came back the next day. They are good, no change.

I'm still playing Scrabble with Caitlin online. Can you tell I like math and graphs? 

Despite the forecast, we had 2 mm rain, topped by about a cm of snow. 

It is snowball snow!

  Isabelle was having fun in the snow. 

She made a snowperson. She fetched some conifer cones from under the spruce tree.

  Close eyes, after the after dinner show! ( ♪♫♩ Old Macdonald had a farm!)  They were filled with a few smarties. 

COVID–19

Ontario is finally getting it together. We've an Ontario schedule for vaccines. JB will be in May. I'll be sometime later. The fooferaw online is awful. Complaints all over the place. Politicians getting shrill and bitter. Journalists asking stupid questions. Gen. Hillier was outlining the plan, and they said they were clueless about what he just said. We've had month to prepare for this, and we've just heard that our Premier is delegating all this to our 34 healthcare networks. This makes sense, but surely they should have been prepared for this earlier. 

They've vaccinated people in long-term care, and retirement homes. The next step is tricky. People 80+ will be signing up online. Unfortunately, there are issues with access and transportation to the vaccination centres. 

Here, in the boonies:

COVID-19 Vaccine Clinic Sites Begin

The Leeds, Grenville and Lanark District Heath Unit, along with many community partners, are pleased to start providing COVID-19 vaccine at on-going community clinics in Kemptville today, and Almonte on Thursday and in Brockville and Smiths Falls in the next few days. All appointments are booked ahead of time and there are no walk-ins. Read this news update on our website.

Onward and upward.

Prostate cancer in a time of COVID–19

OK, let me vent, as I am wont to do! This is our life. Last month JB had a COVID–19 test. It was quite the deal. (BTW – I worked 20 minutes on this post at 6 a.m., and 'New Blogger' wouldn't save it. Ticked me off, I tell you.) This month he needed a PSA test.

This has been our quarterly adventure, for several years:

a) book a PSA test (mid-June)

b) check the PSA test results online (a day or so later)

c) if all is well: order the injection from our pharmacy (10 days before the injection date)

c) arrange for the injection either at the GPs office or our local ER (July).

It has to be this order of operations. If anything has changed, indicated by the PSA test results, then it is possibly an appointment in Ottawa, and an examination of the treatment plan. These are the test results so far. I graphed them. It begins at 0 where JB had surgery. His PSA should have been zero, but they didn't get it all with the robotic surgery. After his PSA tests rose enough, we began a course of quarterly Lupron injections. His PSA tests dropped dramatically to >0.008.

The Winter injection was done in the GP's parking lot, full PPE gear, in a snowstorm. This one won't be so bad!

PSA Test

The spring project is to get hubby's quarterly PSA test, prior to his quarterly injection/cancer treatment, an injection. I tried online. It did NOT go well. I tried 5 times. I could not book an appointment online.

 

JB phoned, and there was a message, "Due to extreme volumes we are not answering phones at this time."  He decided to just show up and hope for the best.

PSA Test June 16 

Now, we don't pay anything for tests that are on the OHIP list. Yet, LifeLabs is a for-profit company, collecting our tax dollars, to provide these services. They were woefully understaffed, with only two women. They said it was due to COVID–19. Presumably, staff have it, as well. 

9:15 a.m. – He left to try a line up. There were about 6 people inside the Lab with 9:30 appointments. The process is slow. Most of the customers had masks on, and were seniors. There was a 45 min wait, with 10 people outside lined up in the sun. JB made the suggestion to move the line up to shade! All followed. (He used to be a manager!)

What irks us is that they haven't even hired a receptionist, to relieve the pressure on the two nurses. Only two of them dealing with 15 - 20 patients an hour.

They closed up at 11 a.m. for lunch, taking in the one person left who'd had an appointment. By then, there were more people in line. 

In the meantime, I managed two phone calls demanding I pay up, or I will be prosecuted. Thankfully, we pay all our charge cards every month. I knew it was a scam. The second robo call voice finished with, "Have a blessed day." I sat and snorted, while Josee sniggered, as well. 

[spam call #1 if you are curious!]

By 11:15 the test was done and he was home. Both arms, he has small veins.

Phase one is complete. We now wait to see the results online. In the meantime, we put it out of our minds until the next step.

UPDATE: This morning we checked online, and his PSA is stable at >0.008. This means that the Lupron is still working, keeping the prostate cancer at bay. We are good.

Next stage: Lupron injection.