Doctors Orders!

It’s been a couple days but I am back with my update from the doctor. All in all the appointment went better then I thought it would. I was afraid that with how bad my shortness of breath has been he would put me on oxygen but my O2 stats show that even being short of breath my lungs are compensating so my oxygen saturation is hanging around 95%, which is low for me but not close to any red flags.
My PFT’s however are down even more. Let me just say when I am standing in the little PFT room and I do the breathing thing and the guy goes “awesome, you did great!” apparently he means I put in a good effort, not that my PFT was actually good. I was very disappointed when the Doctor told me that my PFT’s are now down to 31%.  The low PFT score wouldn’t bother be as much except for the fact my PFT’s haven’t increased in over 6 months. They have been going down when I am sick, and then just leveling off not increasing when I get better. Hopefully this time it will be different I can at least get back into the mid to high 30’s by mid June.
The medications I am on are Colisten and Cefepime, unfortunately for me I am already having side effects. The common side effects i’ve had previously were tingling and numbness in the mouth and teeth, but it is currently being extra tingly and numb. I am also encountering a constant bad taste in my mouth, which isn’t that bad just kind of annoying. The best side effect for the first time in nearly 3 years I can smell! By that i mean I can smell EVERYTHING. I lost my sense of smell a few years back after tackling a series of severe sinus infections. It is really strange to me to be able to smell things now, I hope this will be a permanent side effect, i like to smell things.

The worst side effect I am starting to experience is my joints locking up. When I was on IV meds in Feburary I had the same issue, it got so severe the Doctor switched my medications. Right now it’s only in my right knee and ankle, but the last time it went from both hips down and in my wrists and elbows. I can play through the pain so far, but the last time I wasn’t able to walk for about 3 days and I am really scared that it will happen again, I don’t want any permanent damage. I also don’t want to switch the medications though either, I am resistant to a lot of the medications that are normally used to treat my strand os Pseudomonas, so it would be nice to stay on the medications that are both sensitive.

I will be on the IV Antibiotics for the next 3-4 weeks, and if worse comes to worse I will restart all my training after that. I am confident that I still have enough time to make my 10 Miler in October and to reach my 13 Minute Mile pace. I’ll just have to work extra hard after this dose of medications.

I’m sure it will all work out for the better, but wish me luck!

You have to walk before you run

Okay so my walk today may be nothing to brag about, but this is the first walk I have tracked. Seeing a documented time for my walk makes me excited! I finally have a way to show my progress and really compare past to present, well future pasts to future presents. I don’t have any really fancy technology that I am using, it’s just a cheap little sensor that I got from Apple. It pairs with the Nike+ iPod app, and it only cost me about $15 to order it brand new on Amazon. I haven’t tested it out a ton with this being it’s first use I did notice a couple glitchy things with it, it didn’t start tracking my walk right away and it kept resetting the pace time to zero, but that all could have been user error. I’m just really excited to be making progress! I am sure with these little devises you get what you pay for, and while I would love to buy a fitbit bracelet I just can’t see spending the money on one as a beginner.

I went on my first real walk with my Dad and his dog Bear. When I told my dad about my intentions of running a combined marathon this year he told me that he would walk and run with me. Having my dad do this with me makes me excited! We get to make progress together, even though I anticipate it taking me longer to get to the finish line I know I will make it!

Hopefully tomorrow I can go on an even longer walk. I am starting with walking to make sure that I have the lung capacity built up before I attempt any kind of faster pace movement. It doesn’t take much for me to have a coughing fit and to get winded. In the past i’ve even encountered decreased oxygen to the point that my limbs started changing colors and going numb, so I’m working on easing into it.

I am hoping that this exercise will help increase my PFT’s (Pulmonary Function Test) they’re pretty low for me and have been since around november. My PFT the last time I went in for an appointment was around 33% it would be a welcomed miracle if I could get them into the 50’s which is where they were about 2 years ago.

To hopes for progress I say, lets keep moving forward!