My morning routine

Good morning everyone, I hope you all slept well, I certainly did. As well as I could anyway with a nasogastric feed tube in my nose and taped to my face and oxygen prongs up my nose as well. Ah, what a picture of seduction each night I am. When I came out of hospital this time I was ready for bed with all tubes in place, I looked at myself in the mirror and started to cry. Brad wanted to "celebrate" my homecoming and I looked at him and said, "Why would you want to have sex with me?" He took my face in his hands, kissed me and said, "You are beautiful" and I could see that he felt that way. It was so beautiful and so very typical of Brad.

So I begin my day by downing around 15 tablets in one go, pure skill I know, with my favourite drink, Glucolyte. Others pay for sports drinks yet I get the powdered satchets from the hospital, all souped up with salt, sugar and extra vitamins and minerals the us cf's lack and I mix it with water and drink it during the day. Dehydration is a huge issue for cf's as it causes our already thick, sticky mucus to become even more so and become harder to bring up which causes all sorts. So it is majorly important that I stay hydrated so I drink glucolyte religiously. At first I hated it, I used to vomit at the taste, a kind of salty lemon flavour. But now after years of drinking it I love it, but only when its icy cold. Room temperature and I start dry retching again, burk!

Now its time to nebulise! I nebulise ventolin to soothe my airways and this takes around 10 - 15 minutes, generally I do this while I check my emails. After I will do my physio, I have a device called an acapella, which I breath into. It vibrates the air back into my lungs and simultaneously helps to hold my airways open and this moves the mucus from my lungs then I cough and spit it out. I am supposed to do this every single day without fail but some days I start and just don't bring anything up so I just use the acapella when some mucus is lodged and I can feel it yet can't get it up myself through breathing techniques. Exercise is vital in cf, it is basically another form of physio and I get an enormous workout just walking up my front steps, there are 20 of them! When I'm really not up to it Brad carries me upstairs and I kiss him once for each step, that's our payment system!

The picture above is my everyday use tablets organisation. Each month I get my medication from the hospital and I have 4 of the blue and white tablet organisers. I put an entire days worth of tablets in each container, separated into am and pm and the compartments snap apart so I can take it with me in my handbag if I go out. I also have to monitor my blood sugar levels which is in the black rectangular bag and the basket also contains the stuff I need to use when putting the nasogastric feed tube in at night, such as litmus paper, tissues. I am a horribly lazy person and I have discovered over the years that if something is not within arms reach of me then I just won't use it, therefore I keep this basket on the dining table and can grab the tablets I need instantly.

love
K