And now it's fall

As of yesterday, it's officially fall, which is kind of a relief. It's felt fall-ish for a few weeks now, even though most of the trees are still green. The nights are blissfully cool and I haven't run the fan in the office in ages.

My flowers in the front yard are changing. The purple petunias, which bloomed vigorously all through the hot months, have gone mostly dormant, very few flowers. The snapdragons, on the other hand, are putting out their deep red blossoms, after months of just green (they did bloom in early summer). The cosmos are pretty much done, but the zinnias are FINALLY blooming -- three of them! And the fuchsia keeps putting out more flowers, even though the hummingbirds are gone. So it's like a completely different garden from a month ago. I didn't need to buy any chrysanthemums or fall pansies -- what I'd already planted was just waiting for its time. 

I know it's a pretty pathetic looking "garden" but it's a start, you know? This has been just a weed bed the last few years. Next year I'll try to do a bit more.

I didn't feel as depressed this week, probably because something else took its place. I'm on this new drug, Rybelsus, and its promised symptoms crept up on me over the past seven days. The first change was that I felt a little more energetic -- Rybelsus is supposed to raise your heart rate slightly, and maybe that's what that was. Then I began getting tired. At first I would get sleepy while reading to the kids, and then I started taking naps. On Wednesday, which is Late Start, I woke up at my usual 7 am and took my pill -- and then went back to sleep, because I didn't have to get up until 8. I woke up again at 9 am! The kids needed to catch the bus at 9:10! I screamed at them to get ready -- they made it out the door in time, but it was frightening. And then that afternoon/evening I took another long nap. 

The gastrointestinal symptoms didn't really appear until Friday. Saturday (i.e., yesterday) was the worst. Terrible diarrhea followed by terrible nausea. I had a Zoom call with old friends in the morning, and the whole time I kept thinking about how I was going to have to get off the call any minute or I would have an accident. Fortunately the call ended in time, but then I had to go out to lunch with my book group. At the restaurant (the Roadhouse Boulder Depot, where I'd never been), I didn't see anything on the menu that I could eat, but finally chose the Truffled Mushroom Skillet -- which was delicious, but much too rich. When I got home I went back to bed. I should have gone driving with the kids, but I just couldn't. 

Of course, Saturday night is Eat Out night, so I had to go out again. We went to Panera, where I had their squash soup in a bread bowl because I thought that sounded simple and easy to eat. Maybe I'd just had too much to eat that day, but the whole rest of the evening I thought I was going to throw up. Just awful. Not to mention how tired I felt.

When I went to bed, I thought -- I can't go through with this! I'll have to tell my doctor I can't take this drug. And then I started thinking... what does this remind me of? When have I had this feeling? Oh, morning sickness! The tiredness, the nausea that doesn't quite lead to vomiting -- though of course it sometimes does, but not always. It's just always there.

This drug makes me feel like I'm pregnant. And, you know, I survived being pregnant. So maybe I can survive this drug. They say the side effects wear off after a while. It should get better by the end of the first 30 days, and then I have to go up to a higher dose, at which point things will get much worse... but after a few more weeks I should feel better. So maybe by Thanksgiving I'll feel better. Or Christmas, if I'm unlucky. Right now I'm taking 3 mg/day, then I go up to 7 mg/day, and then I could go up to 14/mg a day, but I'm not sure I have to. I'll try to argue for sticking with 7 mg.

So now it's Sunday again. The nausea is hanging around the edges, teasing me. All I've had to eat so far today (it's about 2 pm) are two scones and two cups of tea with milk. I might get another cup of tea. I know I have to keep eating -- the nausea gets worse if you don't eat -- but I can't eat very much, or the wrong type of thing. I don't know what I can cook this week. No vegetable masses, like last week. Something very simple.

I should take the twins driving. I don't want to.

I want to go back to bed (despite not getting up until 9:30 am this morning). Maybe that's the best thing. I could read for a while and then take another nap. I've started reading the next book for the book group: The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese. It's very long, 715 pages, and I know I'm going to end up associating it with the nausea. (Like when I was pregnant -- I listened to a Pink Martini album, "Hang On Little Tomato," during the worst of the morning sickness, and now I can't even look at the cover without feeling sick to my stomach.) I've decided to sacrifice this book: I'm enjoying it, but I don't think I'm going to keep it, so might as well let it be my nausea book. Maybe by the time I finish it I'll start to feel better.