Top 3 Tuesdays: Fellow Spoonies, tell me…

Welcome to the twenty-sixth day of the National Health Blog Post Month Challenge hosted by WEGO Health.  Every day during the month of November I will be writing a new blog post related to health and living with a chronic illness based on given prompts provided by WEGO Health.

Today’s prompt reads:

Top 3 Tuesdays: List three questions you have for other patients.

As I have yet to meet another patient with the same condition as myself, I have decided to ask questions that could be answered by any patient with any chronic illness.  This prompt could provide excellent dialogue between myself and readers of the blog, so please comment if you have any answers to the questions that I will ask during the course of this blog post.

How do you make spending time in bed fun?

As I am writing this post; I am doing it from my bed.  Today, my legs have decided not to work and so I am forced to being stuck in bed; unable to walk or even stand.   I hate being stuck in bed; I find it dull and tiresome as there is only so much one can do from bed.  I am fortunate to have my own television set in my bedroom, which thanks to my parents has access to satellite television, as well as my iPad in which I can watch films from my own collection or through those shown on Sky or through Netflix.  However there is only so much reading and watching television a girl can do before becoming bored.  Therefore, one question that I wish to ask other patients is: How do you make spending time in your sick-bed fun and tolerable?

How do you cope with hospital appointments and make attending more bearable?

I know that no patient likes attending hospital appointments, but no matter how much I try, I am always so nervous before leaving the house to travel to the hospital.  When that letter first lands on my doorstop; the nerves begin it kick in, and the appointment is the only thing that is on my mind until the appointment day arrives.  The night before, I feel sick and anxious, with thoughts running through my mind about what will happen at the appointment; what the doctor might say and generally imaging all the worst case scenarios.  As a result my next question for other patients would be: How do you cope with endless hospital appointments? How do you relax before an appointment?  Are there any routines you have to make the day fun and tolerable?

How do you cope with living with a long-term health condition?

My my final question for patients with chronic illness, like myself would be related to how the cope when the illness becomes too much to handle.  Lately, the dizziness that I constantly live with anyway, has become even more severe.  In addition the pain, fatigue and weakness in my legs has also worsened.  As a result of struggling with this, the depression that often accompanies chronic illness has reappeared and I have been struggling to cope in dealing with everything.  So, my final question, would be: How do you continue to cope when your illness becomes too much to handle? How do you distract yourself from the pain, depression and other symptoms you experience?

There are my three questions for other chronically ill patients.  Do you have any other examples of questions to ask to other patients?  As ever would love to hear your thoughts, comments and suggestions! And don’t forget to comment below if you have any answers to the above questions.  Thank you xxx