The final days of semester, particularly winter semester, are quite challenging for university music students. Okay, all students in general, but music students have the added stress of Juries. For the jury, a music student must play for a certain period of time-20 or 30 minutes at my university, depending what year you are in-for a panel of a few members of the faculty. They then grade you, and this one space of 30 minutes makes up 60% of your mark for Major Practical Study, which is a full 6 credit hours of your year. Needless to say, it is something that you are preparing for all year, and do not want to mess up on! My first and third year juries went pretty well, my second year jury, not quite as well, but still okay. This year...I have no clue what is going to happen. I know my music, that is not the issue. What is the issue is my breathing, and now my irrational fear of getting nervous again. Okay, perhaps not entirely irrational. But I basically did NOT get nervous when performing on my flute until this past music festival, and it was an issue.
Each day this week I have come home hoping, praying, and expecting to find a letter from the hospital letting me know when my next appointment with the internal medicine specialist is. Given that we have now pretty much ruled out asthma...I NEED to know. My second-worst nightmare has basically come true, in that my flute playing has been seriously affected at times. Not to mention that it's frustrating and even downright frightening at other times.
Basically, today was one of those days when you get in a mood where you want to punch something and cry, all at the same time. It was probably around choir that I began wanting something very special, that I can never have again. My mom's hug. Now, to clarify on this...if my mom was alive, she wouldn't be aware of how stressed I felt...that just would not be something I told her. But that doesn't stop my brain and heart from wanting the best feeling in the world...
As I have been saying to people...
4 papers
3 recitals/concerts
1 presentation
1 exam
1 jury.
April 18th, I will be finished. This is both terrifying (in that it is so close), and relieving...
Off to bed...with books to do research for one of my papers...
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired.
A few years ago I heard that phrase, but I never imagined it would apply to me, and certainly not at this point in my life. Until November, I really did consider myself to be quite healthy. Sure, I was short, and sure I'd struggled with anxiety/depression/ED-NOS...but physically, I was fine. I could run, I hadn't had anything more than a cold in four years (not since Nov 2007 when I had bronchitis), and there was nothing that was really warning me that something was about to happen. It all came about with a bit of a bang, so to speak. When it comes down to it, I guess I have a habit of having things be 'spectacular', whether good or bad. December 7th was definitely a spectacular bad example of this habit.
I know that I am blessed, and that God is with me...but at times like this, when I struggle to get breathing properly, and I'm feeling so frustrated and hopeless, and unsure (should I phone my family doctor and set up an appointment? would that do anything? Am I allowed to phone my internal medicine specialist and mention that things are getting worse, not better? Are they going to be sending me a letter to let me know of another appointment time given that they will very soon-if not already-have the negative results from the asthma test?), I feel very alone, frustrated, frightened...
I just want to be ME again, the ME I was before November 14th when things first started to go wrong (although that was the day my stomach started going wrong, my lungs were the next day). Playing my flute is, well, it's ME. Nothing, nothing, NOTHING is more frustrating than when I cannot play my flute properly because of my breathing. And I sound like a broken record, but this is how it is.
As I dealt with things with my mom before-the unsurety of things-I am now dealing with that myself. Obviously, this is a different situation, and it is not (right now) life or death.
Random bible verse for tonight: Luke 6:27-28 "Later, as Jesus left the town, he saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at his tax-collection booth. "Come, be my disciple!" Jesus said to him. So Levi got up, left everything, and followed him."
I know that I am blessed, and that God is with me...but at times like this, when I struggle to get breathing properly, and I'm feeling so frustrated and hopeless, and unsure (should I phone my family doctor and set up an appointment? would that do anything? Am I allowed to phone my internal medicine specialist and mention that things are getting worse, not better? Are they going to be sending me a letter to let me know of another appointment time given that they will very soon-if not already-have the negative results from the asthma test?), I feel very alone, frustrated, frightened...
I just want to be ME again, the ME I was before November 14th when things first started to go wrong (although that was the day my stomach started going wrong, my lungs were the next day). Playing my flute is, well, it's ME. Nothing, nothing, NOTHING is more frustrating than when I cannot play my flute properly because of my breathing. And I sound like a broken record, but this is how it is.
As I dealt with things with my mom before-the unsurety of things-I am now dealing with that myself. Obviously, this is a different situation, and it is not (right now) life or death.
Random bible verse for tonight: Luke 6:27-28 "Later, as Jesus left the town, he saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at his tax-collection booth. "Come, be my disciple!" Jesus said to him. So Levi got up, left everything, and followed him."
Thursday, March 15, 2012
...and again...
And again, I find myself working on my paper in a squatting position. Upside? I breathe better this way. Downside? It's somewhat uncomfortable in other ways. At least I am writing in my bedroom at home, with my door shut, where no one else can see me.
Today hasn't been all that bad, all things considered. I was able to breathe pretty well for my small ensemble coaching at 11:30-12:30, even though I was standing almost the whole time. I did have some issues in Wind Ensemble, but changing positions a bit seemed to help some of the time...my new way to get at least one or two normal deep breaths without seeming strange is to pretend to stretch downwards. Well, okay, I actually am stretching, but that is not the main purpose for me! I can do this from my chair as well, it's not quite as good as when I stand up and then bend forward, but it helps a bit. I can't do the sitting squat position that I figured out in choir yesterday because my conductor is a bit more stringent on posture (and I can't blame him), but sometimes leaning forward a bit helps, or even just moving from side to side or something. None of these help immensely, but getting one satisfactory breath every so often is enough to be 'okay'.
The shocker today was that I COULD NOT get the water bottle-your basic Aquafina water bottle-that I bought because I couldn't find my metal water bottle open no matter how hard I tried with both of my hands. I had to ask someone to help. It brought back some bad memories of how my mom couldn't open pop cans, or the bottles of her Ensure, or anything like that. And by bad memories, I mean BAD memories. It was almost harder watching my mom become dependant than it was when she actually died. Yet, there I am this afternoon, having to get someone to open my water bottle. Did I mention that I am a very independent sort of person? I was the 2 year old who, when offered two choices of outfits would pick a third one-a perfectly acceptable one, mind you-and insist upon it! I refused to let my friend help me move a little table once because I had to prove I was independent and could move it on my own, which in the end resulted in my first incident of self-harm (I was barely 7 years old, if that) as I once wrote about.
I did have a couple of unexpected headaches today, one that started near the end of my small ensemble coaching, but was cured with tylenol and then one that started after I finished teaching tonight and was on my way to my piano lesson. It made me a little less successful than usual, but these things happen from time to time.
I'm still just plain frustrated with myself, and with the hurry-up-and-wait of the medical system. Yes, I am VERY VERY VERY VERY glad that I have universal healthcare. Did I mention that I appreciate it a TON? And I appreciate the internal medicine specialist that I was referred to. But, what I am frustrated at is this general picture that has developed:
-heart guys (the internal medicine specialist) thinks it's my lungs
-respiratory therapists thinks it's my heart.
See the issue? I don't care what it comes down to, so long as I can breathe! There is little that is more frustrating and frightening than having difficulty breathing.
Today hasn't been all that bad, all things considered. I was able to breathe pretty well for my small ensemble coaching at 11:30-12:30, even though I was standing almost the whole time. I did have some issues in Wind Ensemble, but changing positions a bit seemed to help some of the time...my new way to get at least one or two normal deep breaths without seeming strange is to pretend to stretch downwards. Well, okay, I actually am stretching, but that is not the main purpose for me! I can do this from my chair as well, it's not quite as good as when I stand up and then bend forward, but it helps a bit. I can't do the sitting squat position that I figured out in choir yesterday because my conductor is a bit more stringent on posture (and I can't blame him), but sometimes leaning forward a bit helps, or even just moving from side to side or something. None of these help immensely, but getting one satisfactory breath every so often is enough to be 'okay'.
The shocker today was that I COULD NOT get the water bottle-your basic Aquafina water bottle-that I bought because I couldn't find my metal water bottle open no matter how hard I tried with both of my hands. I had to ask someone to help. It brought back some bad memories of how my mom couldn't open pop cans, or the bottles of her Ensure, or anything like that. And by bad memories, I mean BAD memories. It was almost harder watching my mom become dependant than it was when she actually died. Yet, there I am this afternoon, having to get someone to open my water bottle. Did I mention that I am a very independent sort of person? I was the 2 year old who, when offered two choices of outfits would pick a third one-a perfectly acceptable one, mind you-and insist upon it! I refused to let my friend help me move a little table once because I had to prove I was independent and could move it on my own, which in the end resulted in my first incident of self-harm (I was barely 7 years old, if that) as I once wrote about.
I did have a couple of unexpected headaches today, one that started near the end of my small ensemble coaching, but was cured with tylenol and then one that started after I finished teaching tonight and was on my way to my piano lesson. It made me a little less successful than usual, but these things happen from time to time.
I'm still just plain frustrated with myself, and with the hurry-up-and-wait of the medical system. Yes, I am VERY VERY VERY VERY glad that I have universal healthcare. Did I mention that I appreciate it a TON? And I appreciate the internal medicine specialist that I was referred to. But, what I am frustrated at is this general picture that has developed:
-heart guys (the internal medicine specialist) thinks it's my lungs
-respiratory therapists thinks it's my heart.
See the issue? I don't care what it comes down to, so long as I can breathe! There is little that is more frustrating and frightening than having difficulty breathing.
Pulmonary Function Test
Despite my best efforts to make my lungs misbehave, they didn't. Instead, they worked quite well for the whole of the pulmonary function test. This was one point when I wanted them to be their normal messed up selves, and they decided to be a healthy normal. Great. Meaning that we basically learned nothing. Because nothing was wrong at the time, even if I DO have asthma, we couldn't tell, because the bronchiodilator naturally did nothing as nothing was wrong at that moment in time! VERY frustrating. All the bronchidilator did was raise my heart rate/blood pressure a bit and make my hands shake, which I was told was a normal response (I did have to take four puffs of the inhaler, so it probably was quite a high dosage).
The main thing that came out of this for me was three words that a flute player NEVER wants to hear in relation to their physiology: "Low Lung Volume". Now, this was a thing for me that stood out, simply because I have always been able to phrase with the best of them, meaning professionals. I'm not even kidding, I can give as much power and sustain as long as the two professional flautists that I have played with from time to time in the city's symphony when the youth symphony would team up with them. To be honest, even when my breathing is normal, I seem to be taking a few more breaths than normal when I play.
My overall thoughts were intense frustration...because all the test really did was cause me to miss two classes, spend an hour or thereabouts breathing into machines, and two hours on the bus commuting from the university to the hospital and back again. I guess I wait and see what Dr. H says...
The best case scenario is that this is asthma that just wasn't picked up by this test. If it IS because of my aortic insufficiency, it's a whole different ball-game...in particular because my body is then more sensitive to it than other people's. It also means there is no 'easy fix'.
Let's just say that I want to see Dr. H SOON to get a handle on this. I naturally started having problems breathing-although not as severe as on tuesday-about three hours AFTER the steroids, which would have of course worn off by then anyways. Sigh.
I wonder if it is possible to get addicted to the positions that I breathe best in...it certainly feels like I could. Perhaps at some point I will grow less awkward with them, but for now, I definitely feel uncomfortable with people seeing me in them for that purpose. I mean, yes, squatting down on the floor to pick up something, fine...ending up practicing like that for 45 minutes...slightly strange. Yes, I am glad that I have found a couple of positions that work to breath much better, and I have perhaps even found a modified squatting position that works for when I am sitting down-it involves slouching forward a bit, and having my legs bent under the chair...I discovered this in choir-but I don't want to have to use them!
Life. Just when you think you have things figured out...
The main thing that came out of this for me was three words that a flute player NEVER wants to hear in relation to their physiology: "Low Lung Volume". Now, this was a thing for me that stood out, simply because I have always been able to phrase with the best of them, meaning professionals. I'm not even kidding, I can give as much power and sustain as long as the two professional flautists that I have played with from time to time in the city's symphony when the youth symphony would team up with them. To be honest, even when my breathing is normal, I seem to be taking a few more breaths than normal when I play.
My overall thoughts were intense frustration...because all the test really did was cause me to miss two classes, spend an hour or thereabouts breathing into machines, and two hours on the bus commuting from the university to the hospital and back again. I guess I wait and see what Dr. H says...
The best case scenario is that this is asthma that just wasn't picked up by this test. If it IS because of my aortic insufficiency, it's a whole different ball-game...in particular because my body is then more sensitive to it than other people's. It also means there is no 'easy fix'.
Let's just say that I want to see Dr. H SOON to get a handle on this. I naturally started having problems breathing-although not as severe as on tuesday-about three hours AFTER the steroids, which would have of course worn off by then anyways. Sigh.
I wonder if it is possible to get addicted to the positions that I breathe best in...it certainly feels like I could. Perhaps at some point I will grow less awkward with them, but for now, I definitely feel uncomfortable with people seeing me in them for that purpose. I mean, yes, squatting down on the floor to pick up something, fine...ending up practicing like that for 45 minutes...slightly strange. Yes, I am glad that I have found a couple of positions that work to breath much better, and I have perhaps even found a modified squatting position that works for when I am sitting down-it involves slouching forward a bit, and having my legs bent under the chair...I discovered this in choir-but I don't want to have to use them!
Life. Just when you think you have things figured out...
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Better day in some ways, worse in others
Okay, so today I was psychologically a LOT better than yesterday. Physically, the answer is worse. My breathing was so bad a good chunk of the time that I was actually wondering if I should bus down to the urgent care center. Actually, at one point I was wondering if I was starting to have an allergic reaction because I was eating dinner...but it didn't seem to get worse.
Certain things seem to help, two positions work. One is bending over, and after looking at a diagram of the heart again it makes sense. I have aortic valve insufficiency, which means that some of the blood is flowing back into my ventricle when it should be going through the valve and into my aorta. If I'm bending over so that I'm basically upside down...gravity is probably helping to reverse that. The other weird position that helps, and I have NO clue on this one, because logic tells me it shouldn't (research says that it actually increases the sound of the murmur of aortic insufficiency), is squatting. I found that out randomly tonight. I always find things out randomly...in this case, I found that out while squatting to put my flute together. I had been breathing REALLY badly (this was right after eating dinner), and so being able to breath a lot more normally was a VERY nice thing!!! I basically practised the whole 45 minutes that I did squatting. I had to shift around a bit to keep my feet from losing circulation, but there was no denying that it worked. Every time I tried to stand and practice, my breathing would get really messed up again. I ended up working on my paper squatting a bit as well...which looked REALLY strange. At least in the practice room I had the door shut, but writing the paper I was in the open!
Yes, I was working on my paper for Research Methods! With some pretty good success, actually! I wrote close to 1000 words today in a pretty short amount of time, and was having fun too. I should be able to get it finished tomorrow. THAT will feel so amazing.
Tomorrow is my pulmonary function test. Let's just say I want answers, and I want them SOON. I can't play properly, I'm frequently having trouble breathing that's bothersome (at the least)...Is it too much for a flautist to ask to be able to breathe properly all the time?
So that was my day. Good on some points, but ARGH on breathing. Life, I guess.
Certain things seem to help, two positions work. One is bending over, and after looking at a diagram of the heart again it makes sense. I have aortic valve insufficiency, which means that some of the blood is flowing back into my ventricle when it should be going through the valve and into my aorta. If I'm bending over so that I'm basically upside down...gravity is probably helping to reverse that. The other weird position that helps, and I have NO clue on this one, because logic tells me it shouldn't (research says that it actually increases the sound of the murmur of aortic insufficiency), is squatting. I found that out randomly tonight. I always find things out randomly...in this case, I found that out while squatting to put my flute together. I had been breathing REALLY badly (this was right after eating dinner), and so being able to breath a lot more normally was a VERY nice thing!!! I basically practised the whole 45 minutes that I did squatting. I had to shift around a bit to keep my feet from losing circulation, but there was no denying that it worked. Every time I tried to stand and practice, my breathing would get really messed up again. I ended up working on my paper squatting a bit as well...which looked REALLY strange. At least in the practice room I had the door shut, but writing the paper I was in the open!
Yes, I was working on my paper for Research Methods! With some pretty good success, actually! I wrote close to 1000 words today in a pretty short amount of time, and was having fun too. I should be able to get it finished tomorrow. THAT will feel so amazing.
Tomorrow is my pulmonary function test. Let's just say I want answers, and I want them SOON. I can't play properly, I'm frequently having trouble breathing that's bothersome (at the least)...Is it too much for a flautist to ask to be able to breathe properly all the time?
So that was my day. Good on some points, but ARGH on breathing. Life, I guess.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Tears
Today, I just want to cry. Again and again. Not exactly sure why...I guess it just comes down to frustration, stress, worry, probably other chemical issues going on. Whatever the case, I am just wanting to curl up in my bed with my fleece penguin pajamas and my stuffed penguin Napoleon and sob my heart out. But, there is too much to do, so it's time to deny my feelings and get back to work.
I can't wait for wednesday.
I can't wait for wednesday.
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Frustrated
I am so utterly frustrated with my lungs. I just want to be able to breath properly all the time, not just for small snippets of time. The past two days have not been very good with breathing, and I am sick and tired of it. I also don't want to be having to lie down in the middle of the day, which has now happened three times in the past few days...wednesday, friday and today (perhaps it is an every-other-day trend?). Okay, so today's wasn't exactly lying down, but I did close my eyes for most of my friend M's 4th year clarinet recital. At least I wasn't sleeping though, I would not have been able to forgive myself for that! It was quite nice, and coincidently, I ended up sitting right behind her clarinet teacher, so I was able to tell her-and her mom!-that I saw him nodding a lot, keeping time with her playing, and being the first one to clap. All very good signs! Did I mention that I have now had problems breathing for almost FOUR months? I just want to be able to breath, and play my flute properly all the time. I know that that was part of why festival didn't go as I would have liked this year. I'm going to guess that it probably contributed to how nervous I became-out of the blue, and all of a sudden-when I basically don't get nervous before a performance. I have never really had problems with being nervous playing my flute. Piano, a bit, but even then it's never been something I couldn't handle. Tuesday's performance of the 2nd mvt of Bach's E minor sonata FELL APART. The first two lines were great, I entered confidently and with character, just as I rehearsed it, but when I hit the sixteenth notes, my fingers basically stopped functioning properly, and I really didn't get back into until the recapitulation at the end. The other classes weren't disaster-disasters but I certainly didn't play as well as I could have, and usually do. When I played my unaccompanied Telemann Fantasia #10, I was shaking so badly that I basically couldn't breath, and everything was so tight. It was pretty awful. And I only received an 84 in the class, ONE MARK away from moving on to Trophy class. I was SO ticked with the adjudicator, and she did it to a number of other people as well. I actually started crying after that. Her marks were really messed up though, as she gave a person who really flubbed everything up an 85, and then me and S, who basically played perfectly (although I took things a little slower) an 84. I am really looking forward to talking with my flute teacher L tomorrow...
All this makes me pretty panicked about how my jury is going to go in a few weeks time...and juries are worth a LOT more. And, it's my final jury of my music school career. Which is crazy, come to think of it. Also, my last performance assessment is due tomorrow. My last performance assessment ever. More craziness.
I suppose I should get on that performance assessment...!
All this makes me pretty panicked about how my jury is going to go in a few weeks time...and juries are worth a LOT more. And, it's my final jury of my music school career. Which is crazy, come to think of it. Also, my last performance assessment is due tomorrow. My last performance assessment ever. More craziness.
I suppose I should get on that performance assessment...!
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