Author: admin

Watering my garden with tears this morning.

Today I woke up and discovered on Facebook that a friend of mine from my plant swap passed away.  She was not only an incredible gardener but a crazy creative person creating Barbie Doll windchimes combined with found objects from the beach and bottle trees and so much more. Her home burned a few years ago, and we shared that misery talking about my daughter’s house fire at the last plant swap. She was a nurse. Her last post on Facebook is about how the allergies are killing her. The pollen count is high, and I even took allergy meds yesterday. She was alone when it happened. I don’t know, but I heard she could not breathe. My heart is broken. Somehow my life feels so much more vulnerable knowing that this woman can be taken.

I have been waiting for a time for my lawyer to go over the final papers she has sent.  She has postponed twice. I just can’t have something like this happen and leave my daughter in a legal mess. I woke up and decided that having something is better than having nothing, so this weekend I vow to get all the legal papers signed, notarized and copied.

This entire thing is so tricky.  I’m going without oxygen but started coughing terribly last night. I appear to be o.k. one minute and then a couple hours later I feel pain. I really have no idea what my body is trying to tell me.

A cousin contacted me via Facebook and asked if I knew the medical history of the family.  Medical history—it is such a strange thing. How do you ask siblings, and sometimes family strangers about their most private things?  But that is what I am doing. My cousin was specifically curious about her heart. Monday I go for my stress and heart tests.  Each test I feel apprehension, but elated with positive results or sometimes at least answers to questions.

With the death of this friend, I feel so vulnerable.  I’m focusing on health and life, but it is time to get these legal affairs in order. I feel that death is playing a game of hide-go-seek and wants to pop out at any moment and say boo.

Plant things, make life, share, and create crazy things. Life is short no matter how long you live. Eat it up like a six-year-old child savoring a chocolate shake at the best diner with your dad.

Pusche

 

If you remember, I have been studying single women for a while. They intrigued me and felt so foreign to me like wild animals on the Serengeti. However, there is a particular type of woman that I yearn to find and friend. I am one of those people that believes and puts things out there in the universe and trusts it will come. I am searching for strong tribal women. I desire to gather mature women who are wise and vibrant. Women who embrace life and believe that age is just a number and does not define who they are and what they can or can not do.

I’m not sure where to find these women. But I trust my journey will bring more of them into my path. I desire to find, not to acquaintances, but I am searching to develop deep, and lasting friendships. However, with each tribal women that cross my path, even if it is just for a moment or a brief encounter, They encourage my soul and lift me up. I hope I can be that type of encouragement for others.

Tribally yours,

Pusche

I have known about diaphragmatic breathing for a long time. It is breathing in through your belly. It is an essential tool to learn in meditation and for breathing. This video tells you more, and you can google diaphragmatic breathing to find out more information. 

Learning to get a deeper breath in any way that I can is important. It goes to say that the diagram is a muscle.  As  I began to exercise I wondered, could I strengthen this muscle? Of course, singers know about diaphragmatic breathing, and I wish I could find a pulmonologist therapist that worked with the voice as I know this would help me a great deal, and I would find it more fun that breathing into a tube.

Instead, I opted for trying to strengthen my diaphragm. That means increasing my core strength. I have joked for a long time that I am coreless. I had no desire to get a core, and I knew I didn’t have one. But strengthening my core now was a life-saving technique. If I could do that, I would raise my chest, strengthen my diaphragm and perhaps get more breath.

Here is an excellent article showing your diaphragm 

I also began to use a weight on my diaphragm as I was practicing my breathing as in this video.  However I don’t use books I have a medicine ball. 

Because I was wanting to strengthen my entire core I also added some other basic exercises to my routine. Here is the list.

Planking- I never thought I would be planking at 57. But planking uses many muscles.
Bicycle Crunches– yep I’m doing crunches on the floor.
Ankle touches– These seemed quite easy to do and made me feel more accomplished than crunches.
Seated medicine ball crunches– I purchased a 10 lb ball years ago and decided to use it. These are easy and fun.

I have a Lifeline 30lb resistance cable that I purchased for $9.00 and I love it. I do many things with it and it is fun. A core exercise is the Wood chop.

What has happened with all of this? My waist has become smaller. Just a few weeks ago I ha my hans on my waist and thought, this can’t be me. I could not believe there was so much room under my ribs. It must be working. I’m standing up straighter and I would like to think it is helping my breathing. It also helps that I am losing weight which is less for my heart and lungs to have to deal with. So, In general I’m excited with the outcome.