65 Fresh Air

29 December 2016

With our two offspring here, every moment is filled with action. Even writing down good intentions fails with the perpetual distraction. But, it is a nice distraction and we will miss them when they are gone.

One piece of good news is that I am making progress in healing my lungs. For my daily walks I can make it all around the island which is 2.5km. When I started I was only walking about half that distance and was breathing quite hard and needed occasional rest stops. Now I can walk fast with just normal deep breathing. I expected the improvement because I haven't been aspirating. I know this because I have minimized my swallowing.


Just after my last swallowing study I had some deterioration in my swallowing ability so I have avoided swallowing to allow my lungs to recover. There has been a small improvement in my swallowing over the past week but I think we still have a long way to go. I have my next swallowing study on the 10th of Jan so there is still time for recovery and I remain optimistic.

One exciting piece of news is that I received a drone as a Christmas present from Mike. We have been having a lot of fun learning to fly it and we are getting quite proficient. It will be the main weapon this Summer to scare off the Canada geese. All we have to do is remove the camera and add bomb racks for the fireworks and we are go! I learned recently that the geese bring lots of tics as well as their huge quantities of poop. It is likely that the reason we are tic free compared to our neighbours is because we discourage the geese from landing around the house.

I am really missing being able to eat food. It was more difficult than I expected to sit down at meal times and watch everyone else delighting in the tasty treats. We always have a steak fondue on Christmas eve and I just had to leave the dining room part way through the meal. Cheryl's cousin and Uncle will be joining us for new year which will be very enjoyable so long as I close my eyes for the wine and cheese consumption!

I hope you all have a happy new year and a great 2017.