Someone that follows my blog sent an email to me the other day, asking if I was alive as I have not been writing. Yes, I am alive! What can I say? I have been busy but honestly I just haven’t had the zeal to write on my blog, write my book or even journal….
Tag: Adjusting
Surviving Without Air!
I recently took a vacation and I decided at the last minute not to travel with my supplemental oxygen. What? Are you crazy man? Yep, you read that correctly. I decided to hop on a plane for a 7.5 hour trip with supplemental oxygen. If you are here for the first time, just a quick…
Breathing Easier
When jets are at altitude, the inside of the plane is pressurized to simulate earth at about 8,000 feet. For a person with breathing problems, any altitude above 9,000 feet can cause problems. In the last year I had my fair share of air travel. I have seen the inside of JFK a total of…
Is Everyone Deaf Or Do I Have Super Hearing?
I love music. I like all music except for jazz and rap. I listen mostly to pop music. I love any music with a good beat. I love to play music loudly in my car sometimes when it is a song I especially like. In spite of my love of loud music, there is a…
Easing Into Daylight Savings Time
I work weekends so I really don’t like when the clocks spring ahead on Sundays because I lose an hour of sleep, so my wife and I came up with a way to ease into it. Starting on the Wednesday night we set all the clocks ahead 15 minutes and then each next day another…
Stumbling Is Another Opportunity To Dust Myself Off And Start Over
What can I say about this disease. It seems I make a step forward and then another one back or sometimes even two. For those of you that are now coming across my blog for the first time, I have a disease known as sarcoidosis and in 2007, I found out that it was in…
The Weekend Revisit Of: The Only True Healer Is You
I came across a blog recently that was written by a person with some of the same conditions that I have – heart failure and pulmonary hypertension. The tone of the writing was very angry and bitter towards both the diseases and the establishment.
The Most Selfish Thing A Person Can Do
I get daily emails of top news stories for my town and surrounding areas and in close proximity are two large bridges that span the mighty Hudson river and a major train line that goes into New York City. Every week, sometimes more than once a week, someone kills themselves by jumping off one of…
Wise Words Wednesday : Wayne Dyer #2
Kindness, Always Kindness Originally Posted on MAY 11, 2012 If you find yourself in a confrontation of any kind with anyone, be it a family member or a stranger, before reacting ask yourself, “Is what I am about to say motivated by my need to be right, or my desire to be kind?” Then pick…
Losing The Battle But Never Giving Up On The Fight
“You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it” – Margaret Thatcher This is my fifth or sixth attempt of coming off of prednisone and again it failed miserably. I started weaning off in November and had pain that was tolerable, and in the middle of February I decreased the dose…
Wise Words Wednesday : Wayne Dyer
Forgiveness Originally Posted on MAY 10, 2012 Revenge, anger, and hatred are exceedingly low energies that keep you from matching up with the attributes of the universal force. A simple thought of forgiveness toward anyone who might have angered you in the past will raise you to the level of Spirit and aid you in…
The Weekend Revisit Of: No Matter What You Do, I Send You Love
When I decided to return to massage school, I was assured by the school that they will work with me and my conditions. The school has been swallowed up by another corporation and the rules have changed. Of course now everyone is back tracking and claiming they never said as such, and that they were…
Could I Be Developing An Allergy To The Cold Or Is This Sarcoidosis Raising Its Ugly Head
For the past couple of weeks, when I come in from the cold, a few minutes after, I get this horrendous prickly feeling all over my torso, neck, jaw line and upper arms. It is the most irritating feeling, almost as if my skin is being attacked by a thousand little biting insects. I looked…
The Weekend Revisit of: Dangers of Statistics
DANGERS OF STATISTICS Originally posted April 24, 2012 I read a blog today by a heart failure patient who had just crossed their two-year mark of being diagnosed, and according to them, the statistics state that with their particular condition, they had a 50% chance of living for two years. This person apparently is convinced…
My Dreaded Registering With “The Man” Has Finally Come
Ever since developing cardiac sarcoidosis and getting my AICD implanted, I dreaded that one day it would affect my ability to get my driver’s permit. I love to drive, even in traffic. In summer my job requires that I drive an average of 4,000 miles in that time, and sometimes a 2 1/2 hour trip…
Prednisone Withdrawal Symptoms Worse Than The Actual Side Effects?
Here I go again. I have lost count of how many times I tried to wean myself from Prednisone. I am on this drug now for 10 years, 8 months and 23 days, and I tried to come off of it multiple times, all with disastrous results. I was being kept on a maintenance dose…
Here I Go, Again!
I haven’t written anything to this blog for a while and frankly it’s because I have no inspiration. The blog was originally meant to be my posts about living my life with Sarcoidosis, but really, I don’t have very much to say anymore on my condition that hasn’t already been said. Then I got an…
The Weekend Revisit Of “Crossing Bridges”
Originally posted on April 22, 2012 On a recent trip into NYC for my ICD interrogation, my wife and I took a train down town to see the 9/11 memorial. We have not been there since the buildings fell. Prior to the attacks we were often in the North Tower as my brother had his…
Prednisone Withdrawal Is No Fun
Today marks exactly 10 years, non stop, that I am on Prednisone for sarcoidosis. The side effects of this medication can be horrendous, but thankfully my experience in those ten years were just mostly mood changes, thining skin and some weight gain. I am told that for being on it so long, my weight gain…
Before You Can Really Get Help, Learn About Yourself
Exactly ten years ago today, I got a call from my doctor to confirm that my test results were positive for sarcoidosis. The day before, I came out of the hospital after a three day stay for an open lung biopsy, the test to determine if sarcoidosis was indeed active in my lungs. To date,…
The Saturday Revisit Of “Letting Go Of My Old Self”
Originally Posted March 9, 2012 Letting Go Of My Old Self One thing about having a chronic condition, and in my case, more than one, is that you need to accept that your life, in one way or another, will change forever. I remember the day before I had my defibrillator implanted I knew that…
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Written by Basil Rene © 2016 All Rights Reserved
Snapshots Of My Life: It’s Just Freaking Wine
“Green apples” said my best friend sitting next to me. “I get a hint of banana” added another friend sitting to our front It was my turn to illicit a response, and I sat there, forty plus eyes trained anxiously on me, waiting to hear my words of wisdom. After all, I was, so far,…
The Saturday Revisit Of “Why Do People Suffer?”
Originally Posted January 3, 2012 I was telling my wife about an email I received from someone telling me that they have suffered from sarcoidosis for many years, when she interrupted me and asked “Why do people suffer?”. The question stopped me in my tracks and I realized the sheer power of words and their…
Do I Look Like An Old Woman To You?
I am on prednisone now for ten years straight, without ever taking a break. My dosage has been as much as 70mg to as low the current 5mg. I am on what the call a “maintenance” dose, which translates to “because you are on prednisone for so long, your body can't make its own, so…
I Should Be Fed Up, But Remarkably I’m Not
In 2006 when I entered Putnam Hospital Center to have a failed bronchoscopy to determine if I had #Sarcoidosis of the lungs, little did I know that journeys to hospitals and medical centers would become the norm. Later that year I had an open lung biopsy, by far the most painful procedure I ever had,…
Who Came Up With Only Twenty Four Hours In A Day?
It has been an exhausting past few months, and admittedly, my blog has suffered the consequences. There is so much I wanted to write about, all sitting at the tips of my typing fingers, but never to make it onto the virtual keypad of my tablet. I am physically and emotionally exhausted. My body is…
Family Politics And Being Able To Let Go
My eldest brother and I never had a close relationship. We are seven years apart and always fought through my childhood. In my teens and twenties, we tolerated each other, and then now we barely communicate. Some years ago, he and his wife became part of a “born again” church, and he wrote to me…
