Tonight's picture was taken in October of 2006. Mattie got this little pumpkin in preschool and apparently carved it himself. Naturally I was always concerned if Mattie was using anything that I deemed could hurt him (hot glue gun, a hammer, etc), but Mattie proved to have very good fine motor skills and was a natural builder.
Quote of the day: We all die. The goal isn’t to live forever, the goal is to create something that will. ~ Chuck Palahniuk
Despite waking up early, I was running around the house this morning and was very stressed out. I developed a migraine while I was sleeping last night and it carried into today. No matter how I am feeling, I have to pull it together and function. I got everything done, but it was close to impossible getting my mom out of the house by 9:30am, in order to drive to her test and doctor appointment.
My mom had a pulmonary function test scheduled for today. Her pulmonologist sees her every 6 months, as does her cardiologist. I have concluded my parents are getting much better medical care under my direction, then they were receiving in Los Angeles. They rarely saw their doctors there, only when problems arose. I am very upset with my parent's long-time doctor in Los Angeles, as he saw them aging and did not take a pro-active approach with their care. I reached out to this doctor many times in the last five years and each time he blew me off. As you can imagine from reading this blog, I don't take well to being blown off.
Any case, my mom took a pulmonary function test in April. At that time she was symptomatic with her bronchial condition. My mom hates this test and gets very anxious and stressed out over it. So my role is to normalize her fears and help her emotionally through it. Fortunately the tech is fantastic!
Pulmonary function tests (PFTs) are noninvasive tests that show how well the lungs are working. The tests measure lung volume, capacity, rates of flow, and gas exchange. The machine looks like a phone booth!
My mom had to sit in this chair and a soft clip was put on your nose. This is so all of the breathing is done through the mouth, not the nose.
Then she was given a sterile mouthpiece that was attached to a spirometer. For thirty minutes she was put through four different tests that involved inhaling and exhaling in different ways. Thankfully we learned that her lung condition is stable!
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