Superhealer with only minor glitches

Happy New Year everyone!!  I hope that you all have had a healthy and joyous December celebrating that which you celebrate.  We celebrated health, and life, and family, and nourishment, and nature, and recreation.  And probably other things, but these are the themes I picked up on. 

I had a couple of doctor's appointments in mid-December, and at one of them I passed my brain test with flying colors!  Dr. Radiation Oncologist tested my brain with various physical tests:  I had to follow his finger with my eyes, turn my head as instructed, kick my legs as instructed, and stand with my eyes closed and my arms out in front of me without falling over.  And I could do all of these things!  So, no brain damage from radiation has manifested yet!  Huzzah!!!!

The glitches I've experienced are likely from other damaged parts, namely my ears.  My ears have a very loud ringing in them, and the left one in particular feels very full; more full than it did before whole-brain radiation.  The result is that I am very susceptible to motion sickness and mild dizzy spells if I move too fast or too much.  The good news is that if I sit down for awhile or take a nap, I feel much better.  I consider this to be a pretty minor glitch in the scheme of things; I feel extremely grateful that after everything my brain has been through, it still seems to be functioning "normally".  The doc told me to keep doing what I'm doing!  So...we're on the right track with the healing thing!

My watery eyes seem to have resolved.  My tastebuds are still not normal.  My hair is not growing back yet.  I don't have much energy yet, but I have resumed some gentle aerobic exercise in hopes that that will help.  It seems to me that too much of being sedentary feeds more sedentariness, but I'm still taking it easy.  The body's messages are pretty clear right now. 

My potassium is low for some reason.  I was told to eat bananas and potatoes to get it back up, and Dr. Google also suggested beets and spinach and beans and tomatoes.  These are all things I already eat quite a bit of!  Low potassium is giving me foot and hand cramps (my left index finger completely seized up the other night when I was trying to floss!) and tingling in my hands, so I'm trying to eat MORE of these things.  Should be easier to do now that the holiday food fest is over. 

One night at dinner my nose started bleeding.  The kids were moderately alarmed, but it wasn't a bad nosebleed.  The radiation damaged my sinuses.  I was told to put some Aquaphor on a q-tip and gently put some up there.  That seemed to resolve it pretty quickly.  I didn't really have any further nosebleeds.

I'm messing with the steroids!  I'm down to 1.5 mgs in the morning AND evening!  This is an achievement!  I just achieved this yesterday, so hopefully it goes okay--I tried this before Christmas and had two super crummy days and so bumped the dose back up.  So far, crumminess is less.  I have an MRI on Thursday, so we'll see what that shows.  I'm hopeful for a dead Lloyd and reduced swelling!!! 

Happy holidays!!