Bronchitis and Glasses

Ragweed seems to be in bloom again. I have yet to see any, but I've been fighting bronchitis for the past week, and that comes in with the ragweed. I actually managed to avoid it last year, and just had problems with asthma, colds, and sinus infections. But for the two winters before, I had chronic bronchitis until the cold weather set in and killed all the pollen. I'm hopeful that it won't last so long this time though, and I'm doing what I can to fight it off. I've been taking some decongestants, which seems to help a lot, so if I keep on that, maybe this will go away sooner.

I did make an interesting discovery last week, which I probably wouldn't have made had I not been sick. A few years ago, I got glasses and wore them for a while, then didn't seem to need them anymore. Since then, I've worn them occasionally, but not regularly; when my allergies were at the worst, they would put pressure on my eyes and irritate them, so I'd sometimes wear my glasses while reading or on the computer if I was getting a headache. I would sometimes test them out, and didn't really notice any difference in my vision when reading with my glasses. Well, being sick this past week, I haven't felt up to doing much. There were some crochet projects I wanted to start, so I've been working on my crocheting a lot. Earlier in the week, I was watching a movie and crocheting, and realized it was putting a lot of strain on my eyes to look back and forth between the tv screen and my crochet project. I put on my glasses and felt much better. The next day, I wore my glasses whenever working on something like that, then that evening, I went to the store with Mama and left my glasses on. At one point when we were in the van, I took them off the clean them. I suddenly realized that everything outside the van was much more out of focus, and my eyes really had to work to focus on things. Looking back and forth between various objects, trucks, signs, etc., my eyes had to adjust and work to focus. I put my glasses back on, and I could see ever so much better! I had no idea how bad my vision was because that was normal to me. I think that when I would have any problems with my eyes, I would blame it on allergies; I believe a lot of "sinus headaches" I got were actually caused by strain from my eyes, not from sinus problems. Now when I don't wear my glasses, I'm amazed at how quickly I get a headache. I still forget to put them on sometimes after waking up or taking a shower, as I'm not completely used to wearing them, but I soon remember and put them on. At least I've stopped hitting them. At first, I would reach up to scratch my face or be signing to Sarah, and I would hit my glasses, not used to them being there. But I'm glad I found out I need to wear them!

Various Updates

Here is an article by WorldNetDaily regarding Abraham Cherrix and the judge's ruling, but I can't find anything about the appeal they made today. The state has threatened to put him in juvenile detention with drug dealers if he doesn't comply, or to put him in a foster home. Whatever happens, they're determined to give him the treatment, if they have to take him away and strap him down in order to do so. I find it astounding that they can take someone away and do that because they don't like the medical decision a person made. I fully agree with the decision Abraham and his parents have made, and I think it's tragic that the government is trying to control this aspect of our lives. Please be praying for them as they continue to fight for their rights. I'm about to watch Abraham on Hannity and Colmes.

I had a lot of fun Saturday. I took a class on Sacred Harp singing, which I enjoyed. I took that workshop last year as well. I love singing the harmony, though we had to hit some rather high notes in the section I was in! I also took a workshop on playing the tin whistle, which I'm learning. Then I took a beginner's flatfooting class and learned a few basic steps. Two of the people in that group were cloggers, so they told us about clogging and its history and taught a couple of clogging steps. I think that was the part I enjoyed most. I also played in a few hours of jam sessions. My favorite part then was when most people were eating dinner; we had a smaller group(about ten people) and we played a lot faster. After all that, there was a concert, which I enjoyed a lot. There was a wonderful autoharpist, Jo Ann Smith, who played the autoharp beautifully. You can listen to clips on her site.

As a lot of you probably know, I joined a traditional music group back in the spring. They're breaking for the summer and starting up again in September. Even before the break, I was trying to decide if I wanted to keep playing with the group or not, but I've decided not to go back. The music is nice and I enjoy it sometimes, but that's not the kind of music I want to devote a lot of time to playing. It would take up one night a week to meet with the group, practice during the week, then possibly performances from time to time. I'd rather spend that time on other things, or other kinds of music.

I've also decided I'm not going to be doing much more running. I haven't been running in about two and a half weeks because it's just so hard on my lungs. Even if I'm not feeling bad from the asthma, if my lungs are bothering me in the least, I can't push myself to run because of the asthma. Even if something like dancing or walking doesn't bother me, running is much harder on my lungs and I can't take a lot of it. The times I can run are so sporadic, I'll start getting my muscles and feet used to it, then I won't be able to run for a while, so by the time I can run, I'll have to get used to it all over again. Then after running once, I might not be able to run for a couple more weeks, then I just have to start all over again. So because of my health, I think it's best not to push it.

Also, I think we have a cold going around the family now. Hannah, Rachel, and I all woke up feeling bad today, and it seems to be a cold. At least, I think that's what I have, and they're having similar symptoms.

You can't see any changes yet, but I'm working on changing the layout of our evangelism site now. I'm hoping to get that up within the week. After that, I'll probably work on changing my other site around and fixing it up.

Medical Treatment

I think this is a very sad example of both how our rights are being denied and how our lives are trying to be run too much by others. This 16-year-old boy is having to fight for the right to decide how he should be treated medically. He went through chemotherapy for Hodgkin's Disease, and was effected so adversely from the chemo, he almost died. He feels certain that he would die were he to undergo another chemo treatment. He and his family want to try to treat the disease naturally because of the effects the medical treatments had on his body. However, social services have stepped in, charging the family with medical neglect and trying to get a court order saying Abraham must go through another round of chemo, and the family is facing the possibility of losing custody of him. I'm trying to find a more recent update on the case. It is interesting to note that the family homeschools. Here is the link to a good blog entry about the issue, and this article speaks of the possibility of Abraham being put in jail for refusing the treatment.

Though much milder in comparison, I've gone through a lot of trouble with asthma medicines making me really sick, so lethargic I was doing well to walk through the house, and the doctor wanting me to take a higher dosage. I could tell how my body was reacting well enough that I knew the medicine was making me sicker, and more medicine would only make me worse. The doctor didn't think that was it, but it was later proven that medicine could indeed have those side effects, and up to 80% of asthma deaths are caused by those so-called preventative drugs. Sometimes patients can tell better than doctors how their bodies will respond to something, though doctors can think they know everything and should have the right to decide. We should have the freedom to decide for ourselves. It's also tragic that the parents could be threatened with losing custody for simply trying to do the best thing for their child's health. It's not as if they're against it while the son wants the care. It's astounding to me that the doctors and social workers want to be able to tell this boy what to do when it's his life and his body, and he even says another round of chemo would kill him. What kind of "American freedom" is that?