Breathing Deeply: My Life With Cystic Fibrosis

Day. n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent. --Ambrose Bierce




Yesterday I came home from work and growled "augughghahghahghahga!!!!" before I flopped onto the bed. No really, that's what I said. The commute home was absolutely TERRIBLE. I don't think my speed exceeded the low teens at any point. What should have taken 20 minutes, took 80 minutes. As if that wasn't bad enough, I had to pee. Oh yeah, and I took my frustrations out on my poor husband over the cell phone while I was trapped on the freeway. No permanent damage done though, he accepted my apology.

Rather than whine and stomp around the apartment for the rest of the evening, I decided to vent by getting some actual work done. Sometimes I like to make a "done" list instead of a "to do" list. It's a very empowering thing to look over a sheet of paper and see that some real progress has been made. Here's what my "done" list looked like.

• Folded the load of whites
• Put away the whites
• Loaded the dishwasher
• Wiped the kitchen counter
• Emptied the trash can in the kitchen
• Cleared off the kitchen table
• Straightened up the coffee table
• Made the bed
• Ate a snack
• Ate dinner
• Ran the remaining loads of laundry
• Apologized to Brad for being mean on the phone
  

I know, it's all less than remarkable stuff, but to me it was a great night. I think the most impressive part (at least in my mind) was that I only spent about 2 1/2 hours on it. I was very energized and gratified to get so much accomplished. It was actually Brad's idea awhile back that I start learning how to break things down into bite-sized pieces so that I don't feel so burned out. I used to keep a checklist that would say "clean up" and would put all kinds of pressure on myself to clean up EVERYTHING at once. Needless to say, that rarely happened.

So, all in all, yesterday was a day of personal victory over my tendency to be overwhelmed by the racing thoughts of OCD that would normally keep me from getting anything accomplished. I even got to bed on time and sleep soundly for most of the night. I had one minor coughing spell about midnight, but I got that under control pretty easily. Even that wasn't too bad since the stuff I coughed up didn't have much color to it anymore. Tobi and Zithromax must be doing the trick! That reminds me. It's Wednesday, I need to take Zithromax when I get home.