(no subject)

I’m annoyed with myself. Last night, around 2:00, I was half to three quarters asleep and somehow got the idea that Cordelia no longer needed painkillers, so I deleted all the alarms on my cell phone that would tell me what to give her when. Fortunately, I woke up further before we’d gotten much past when she was due for the next dose, but… That could have been bad. And I had to recreate all of the alarms. The times are easy enough; it’s remembering whether this particular dose should be ibuprofen or Tylenol that’s hard.

Also, when I got up to give Cordelia medicine at 7:00, my left ankle (so not the one I injured last year) hurt a good bit. That kept me from getting back to sleep between then and when Cordelia needed me to help her get to the bathroom. It mostly is hurting at rest and doesn’t seem to be worse when I put weight on it, but it feels like it should hurt more when I put weight on it, if that makes sense. I’ve wrapped it to see if that helps at all.

Cordelia’s pediatrician’s office sent me an electronic copy of the form for the school so that they’ll give Cordelia medication in the middle of the day. Unfortunately, there were two problems. The first was that the dose was wildly wrong. It said 4 milliliters when it should have said either 20 milliliters or 4 teaspoons. The second problem was that the words 'Error! Reference not found.' covered the bottom of the first page, obscuring the text that was supposed to be there. I have asked them to correct and resend, but I’m not sure when they’ll get to it.

Cordelia’s friends persuaded her to sit at the dining room table for a couple of hours, playing games. We used a stool with a folded blanket on it to prop up her leg since having it hang down hurts a lot. They played Apples to Apples, either Jr or Disney (I wasn’t paying attention to that) and Pandemic. They actually won the Pandemic game.

Cordelia tried to go out the front door yesterday afternoon with me behind her and her friend in front of her, but she got too scared that she’d fall and didn’t make it even onto the porch. There’s a step down from both the front door and the back door to their respective porches. I haven’t measured, but my best guess is between two and four inches. I’m pretty sure that Cordelia will feel safer doing this with Scott because she knows that he can carry her if he has to. Scott spent a good bit of time last night, after we were in our bedroom, looking at instructional videos online to find out how to use crutches on stairs.

I emailed Cordelia’s teachers and principal to ask if we could have a meeting before Cordelia faces a full day at school. Cordelia has asked for that, and I think it’s reasonable and shouldn’t take very long. She just wants to talk to her two main teachers (or even just her advisory teacher) to be sure that we have a plan for things like where she’ll sit in each class and who’ll carry her stuff from class to class and whether or not she gets an elevator key, and, if not, how she will reach the person who needs to give her access to the elevator when she needs him. Cordelia thought we could do the meeting before school on Wednesday, but I also suggested after school on Tuesday. The teachers may not go for after school because they’ll be coming off of the over night field trip, but if they’re willing, I think it would be better not to have the deadline of school starting hanging over the conversation.

PSA

If you read my journal regularly and I haven’t either given you access on DW or friended you on LJ, let me know. I’m going to start trying to remember to lock more personal information about Cordelia. She would rather I just never mention her, but I’m not willing to do that when she’s such an important part of my life. This journal is for my own future self as much as it’s for other people, probably more. Also, it helps a lot to hear from other people that what she and I are dealing with is stuff other people have dealt with and survived.

I may end up making a Cordelia filter so that people can opt in, but right now (and for the next few weeks, probably), I really don’t feel like I can handle thinking that much.

(no subject)

I ended up taking an Ativan this afternoon when I realized that part of my exhaustion and achiness and headache was accumulating anxiety. I’m still pretty darned tired, but the headache is gone, and I think my ankle’s not hurting quite as much. I’m still craving sugar like crazy, and I would still like a cup of coffee (I was desperate enough to see if powdered milk would work as a creamer, but I couldn’t get it to dissolve).

My father called to check and see how Cordelia is doing. I warned him that I’ll be calling in a week or two to ask for family medical history. He thinks it’s not a problem that I haven’t called Grandma in so long because she tires out fast and doesn’t enjoy phone calls. She can’t hear very well now. She also can’t see at all, so if I write her a letter, it will have to be with the assumption that my aunt, uncle, or cousin will read it to her. I think I might do that, assuming that I can come up with things to say that aren’t all about the stresses of the last year.

My mother and step-father still haven’t. I tried calling them again last night and got their answering machine again. I’m not sure if that means they were out again or if they’re traveling and didn’t tell me they would be. It just seems weird that they’d be traveling less than a month after getting two puppies. If they have gotten my messages and not called me… Well, that’s normal for them. It doesn’t mean I’m not disappointed. I wish I weren’t, but somehow I can’t detach enough to just say, "Yeah, that’s the way they are."

One of our friends bought Cordelia some stuff off of her Amazon wishlist. She’s currently working away on a coloring book of abstract designs while rewatching season 3 of Avatar: the Last Airbender (we’re at Boiling Rock). So far, I haven’t persuaded Cordelia that a thank you email from her would mean more than one from me.

I pulled a bunch of fairly light and humorous movies out of our DVD collection, things Cordelia has never seen. So far, she’s not willing to try any of them. I’m not sure if she has the context for Monty Python and the Holy Grail or Galaxy Quest, but one of them might be worth trying. I think some Jackie Chan stuff or Romancing the Stone or Meatballs or Adventures in Babysitting are surer bets. I also noted that the first two Christopher Reeve Superman movies are in at the nearest branch of the library. I think she’d enjoy those. She’s dubious because she thinks all DC movies are grim and hugely violent and not even remotely funny, just generally no fun.