Wow, it’s already Saturday, but only just barely 3:15 as I write this. Apparently I forgot to comment here yesterday.

Briefly, yesterday was okay, but not stellar. My numbers, in brief — at 4:00 a.m. my reading was 107.

Having looked it up online, there’s 22 grams of carbs in a single slice of whole wheat bread, 0.6 grams in a hard boiled egg, 0.0 grams in a teaspoon of mayo. So, I smooshed the egg to crumbles, added the mayo (and salt/pepper), spread it on a single slice of bread for lunch. With an apple (25 grams), eaten an hour later, I’m almost at 50 grams for lunch.

A diabetic ‘healthy’ meal aims for 45-60 grams, so I’m good.

“The American Diabetes Association’s goals for blood sugar control in people with diabetes are 70 to 130 mg/dL before meals, and less than 180 mg/dL after meals.”

2 hours after the egg-and-bread, my reading was 177, but another hour later (so 2 hours after the apple), it was only 156. I probably should have eaten the apple the same time as the sandwich.

I think I may be getting the hang of this. .

I’m up in the night again because that is apparently my ‘new normal’. Not counting trips to the bathroom I got roughly 4 hours of sleep. The pain down below is ridiculous, especially since they haven’t pinpointed the cause of it. But for now the routine is to just accept the pain, take two cups of coffee, two or three aspirin, wait two hours and I’ll be relaxed enough to try for more sleep.

Yesterday my ex-wife’s father died. He fell a few weeks ago and broke his hip, had to go in for surgery. I don’t know the details, whether he never left the hospital or whatever, but he died. My kids loved their grandparents and were close. He was 88 years old, they’d been married 68 years, had 5 kids, and loads of grandkids, great-grands, and even several great-great-grands. So he will be missed.

My daughter was scheduled to take me to Kroger yesterday, but then news came that her grandfather died, and she really needed to be with her mother. I understand that, and it’s okay. My daughter-in-law said she could take me today, and that’ll work out just as well for me. I know the whole rest of the family will be focused on dealing with Alvin’s death. I’ll try to find a suitable condolence card to send to my ex-wife. Most such cards seem to be filled with platitudes and religiosity, so I may just need to find a blank card and write my own thoughts.

One thing I’ve been grappling with is my immediate surroundings. I’ve had ideas and work projects piling up in the living room in various stages of completion — various yarns prepared for dyeing, knitting and crocheting projects, and so forth. As one meme says, “I’m not cluttered, I’m surrounded by ideas.” But trying to focus on my health and avoiding/minimizing fluctuating pain levels, it is stressful to sit here and see these things staring me in the face and I can’t do anything much about them. So in a spell of feeling good, I properly packed up several things with labels and moved them to the work room. They are there now, waiting patiently for me to get better, but not constantly harassing me 24/7. This is a good thing in the short term for the. mental health aspect — clearing my space and moving away the things I cannot deal with at the moment.

The vascular surgeon didn’t call yesterday. I’ll send a note to my PCP on Monday to ask about what I’m supposed to do. I know an aortic aneurysm can be fatal if it bursts, so I’m still scared to do much in the way of exertion. In my younger days I would have been full of youthful bravado and machismo, thinking “Oh hell, I can do this, come what may.” Like the time just two days after one of my hernia surgeries, I took the pain meds and vacuumed the house — totally not a smart thing. I’m older now and not so willing to take certain risks.

So anyway, the aspirin is starting to work on my lower parts and soon I’ll be able to sleep again. 🙂