We need a bit of luck and happiness in our lives.

Dear Bloggers,

One of my best mates is bullied at work, very audible as mature people act like infants. However, it got me to think, why does it give such a mental chant ?
So here are a few tips for the victims, or should I tell them cheer up and start to look at the bright side of life:




1. Luck: What exactly is happiness and how to obtain it?
Luck or should we call it happiness it is like a butterfly, all of sudden it is there and the next moment it was gone.
And that's good because fortunately these are moments that you should remember.
It is not constant, because then you would not sense it anymore.
It is like your norma surrounding. If you are being there every day, you're eyes would not catch the beauty of it anymore.
If you are going there on holiday it is new and you see how beautiful it is.
Luck, has to touch a string in you.

To obtain luck or happiness you have to leave something or to do something and that is precisely the intention of it.
You need to do something for it.
It is also your luck so you know yourself how to obtain it.
Maybe not always consciously, but unconsciously you know.

Happiness or luck is personal, feel inside yourself or go for it, do it or look for it, because most happiness you get trough looking and feeling.
You also need to be a more feeling person from deep within yourself and bring those feelings out.
Everyone has luck within him or herself, but you have to dare to show it to the outside world and dare to believe in yourself that it is there for you.
It is not needed to be big things that make you happy and feel good.
Happiness or luck is an intense love for yourself in a loving environment or situation.
So it is not about the other but about yourself.
Everyone must work for his own happiness, then you will get a confluence of the happiness of each other that radiates an intense love so very happy to be great for everyone.
As a large waterfall that starts small and grows.



2. Intense Living:
The weather here is nice and sunny so naturally we should exchange some ideas on paper.
See that butterfly, he lives an intense and short but he lives as if it was his last day.
He enjoys the sun and even the rain.
For example, you should live like it is your last day.
Not really, but intense, try it, but it will still not be easy.
And of course you do not want to think that it is your last day, but intend to live like it.
Look at people who are seriously ill, as they live there life if it depends on it.(an expression of your own, Old Sailor).




3. Anxiety and satisfaction:
But there are many more important things in your, and my life that are absolutely worth it.
That fear is and that is something we don't have but you do and that is actually a wrong thought or feeling, because you are being influenced by that fear and loose all your energy in it.
That is it, you lose energy with it and you have to get this from somewhere else again and where do you get that from?
So try to be the boss over your fear.
As you get this already during your childhood.
Fear is the greatest enemy of human happiness, it can even be in the way of your happiness if you let fear dominate.
Learn to deal with it in certain situations that require courage of you.
If you are overwhelmed by fear discarding a portion against love and talk to your friends.
You know that helps.
But you must itself begin to overcome.
This is another step to happiness and satisfaction.
Oh, yes, satisfaction, even something.



4. Lessons of life:
Oh dear, life is too good and too interesting to ignore it and let things lie around.
You say: that you onlylive once, that is an expression and life at the moment is of course only once, but you take so much with you to the next lives.
And the next time now on earth or anywhere else, it does not matter.
So see it as little things that you meet in life, and sometimes undergo.
Although it is not always fun, later you are proud of it, that you had to do this and you will see what you have learned out of this.
Life, whether you live your or our lives, and the lessons are very beautiful lessons that is something that you can take from me.



5. Old and enjoy:
Just as you think if someone is 80 that his time is coming soon.
This is a brainwashing.
You people should also not so busy and concerned with your age.
Age is not important.
It is not how long you've lived but how you have lived.
You may become very old but if you are 100, but had no fun in your life, you have reached the 100 but it also makes no sense.
Then you better become 60, but have enjoyed every minute of it.
Enjoy what you have and everything you are experiencing in life and that "you" does not include the stuff that you have, but what you have around you, the overall picture, people, friends, children, the place where you live, the whole, enjoy it. And the small precious moments of intense luck or happiness enjoy it and remember for what you are living.
You live to enjoy, not to be annoyed.
Enjoying makes life so much more precious, fuller and happier but you usually do not make any time free for it, or you normally run very hard past it.



As I wrote last time: And I think what messes us up the most is that we all have this perfect picture of the way things should be.. Well there will never be a perfect picture. The advice from my side is don't let your head hang down and fight this crazy situation as long as you believe in yourself, you will be someone.
So turn your face to the sun and the shadows will fall behind you.

The Old Sailor,

Slowly we are getting somewhere!

Dear Bloggers,

Do I have to call myself a “sick” man?
I went to the rheumatologist this week and it was getting a bit closer to a verdict, at least it is not rheuma, but on the x-ray of my lungs there were some doubts and I will be send to the next specialist.
On the second of June, I have an appointment with the lung specialist.
To do some more tests and hopefully to elimenate the Besnier - Boeck disease.
This disease is also quite good in hiding, although if you get the granulomas on your skin they are pretty obvious, I would say.
I have just been wandering why this disease is so hard to figure out, as we are having so much knowledge in this western society.
Oh... for crying out loud can somebody tell me what is going on.
I found the following item on the wikipedia site.(this is pretty depressing, nice stuff for rainy days.)





Sarcoidosis (sarcoid = sarcoma-like, -osis = a process), also called sarcoid or Besnier-Boeck disease, is a multisystem disorder characterized by non-caseating granulomas (small inflammatory nodules). The cause of the disease is still unknown. Virtually any organ can be affected; however, granulomas most often appear in the lungs or the lymph nodes. Symptoms usually appear gradually but can occasionally appear suddenly. The clinical course generally varies and ranges from asymptomatic disease to a debilitating chronic condition that may lead to death.





The cases that it leads to death are not even 5% but it seems to be difficult to diagnose it.
Maybe it might be more positive if they can elimenate sarcoidosis it will be diagnosed as fibromyalgia, a very painful but not destructive disease.
(anyway I will be placed on a course together with my wife how to deal with the pain and how to deal with practical things in life.)
Also for my partner is this a complete turn around and she will have to learn to help me in so many different ways.
As it will be difficult for the both of us to deal with the fact that I cannot do certain things in life anymore and she has to offer a helping hand.





Fibromyalgia (new lat., fibro- fibrous tissue, Gk. myo- muscle, Gk. algos- pain), meaning muscle and connective tissue pain (also referred to as FM or FMS), is a disorder classified by the presence of chronic widespread pain and a heightened and painful response to gentle touch (tactile allodynia).[1] Other core features of the disorder include debilitating fatigue, sleep disturbance, and joint stiffness.

I was also send to dietician to loose some weight and get another style and rythm of eating.
As soon as they have diagnosed what it is, I will be send to a fysiotherapist to learn to move in the right way and have breaks in between and to force myself to rest, eventhough I have a good day.





It is great to finally know what it might be, but on the other hand it is scarey.
Thank god the sun is shining on this cloudy medical future.
Well let me end with the following qoutes:"That pain doesn't hurt me, neither does life, it doesn't matter what happens, I will survive!" and "I think what messes us up the most is that we all have this perfect picture of the way things should be.. So turn your face to the sun and the shadows will fall behind you."

The Old Sailor,

painful fingers

Dear Bloggers,

If you find yourself moved to write me about something, you may reasonably expect to get an answer.
That isn’t likely to happen, though, and I’d like to tell you why. I simply cannot be your pen pal.



Three or four months ago I woke up one morning, showered, dressed, grabbed a cup of coffee and jumped in my car to go somewhere.
That was when I discovered that overnight, without warning, my right hand had so enfeebled itself that I couldn’t turn the key in the ignition.
The rest of my body seemed to be aswell affected, so I reached over with my left hand to start the car, meaning to ask my doctor what the hell was going on this time at the next chance I got.



I will start from the beginning I went to my own doctor and told her about my stiff fingers and being totally stiff in the morning hours.
As we came to the conclusion that I had mentioned this last winter as she looked through my files.
We blamed it on the cold and moisty weather and that it would disappear when springweather would come.
A few months later I took up the talk again as there was no progress in my situation.
There are good days and there are bad days.
It is getting so bad that getting up in the morning has become a challenge.
The morning stiffness is the biggest issue, after a hot shower I am getting slowly in motion.

I ended up talking to a doctor of internal diseases and an eye doctor, being subjected to various high-tech tests.
What’s going on appears to be a rheumatological problem.
Fortunately for me, they take their time about it, but they’re pretty thorough.
The fingers of my right hand are the worst affected so far.
What makes that annoying is that I use that hand for writing.
At least the first draft of a lot of my blogs was written by hand.



That option is no longer open to me, because my handwriting, always atrocious, is now often quite illegible even to me.
Also my job is getting to heavy and it is bitter if you have to give up on something you like.
One of the biggest problems is the fatigue attacks and the sleeping disorder.
Being tired all day is very heavy, but I am starting to turn things around.
The pain I am living quite good through, although it is hard sometimes.
I try to see the positive sides of my situation.
If I go out for a walk to get my body in motion, I breath in the fresh air and enjoy what nature is showing.



Remains the computer.
That still works for me, but not easily.
I can still touch-type with my left hand (in the old days at almost about fifty words a minute not superfast but good enough) but the right hand can only hunt-and-peck with the forefinger.
Not that I was that good in typing with all fingers something I never learned eventhough I had a course in it.
Isn’t life hilarious?

This is bad news.
It’s horribly slow and prone to a million mistakes, which I have to correct as I go along, and, worst of all, after a page or two my right index finger begins to get pretty painful.
So my writing time, whether for blogs, letters or any other task, is limited. Therefore, at least until I finish a couple of things I really want to write, correspondence time is squeezed even harder than my cervical nerves.
A blog like this normally took me one or two hours, now it takes up to four days.



And listen, this isn’t a plea for sympathy.
Hey, I’m 41 years old.
That means that I am far luckier than most of the people I know in being still able to write at all.
It’s just to say that if you ever happen to think you should properly have had a longer letter or mail from me, or indeed any letter or mail at all, it isn’t that I don’t treasure you, it’s just that my fingers hurt.

The Old Sailor,

Spring has come at last

Dear Bloggers,

Spring has come at last to the low country.
Heralded in by the song of the frogs in the duck pond, the roaring sound of agricultural machinery is all around.
The air is alive with the constant song of native birds, the melody and harmony of all these birds is telling the story of the spring.

I used to say I can tell the season by my hands.
Yes, it’s spring.
A blister from shoveling, a blood blister from pliers, a torn cuticle from a hammer, a cut finger from barbed wire, and more.
My hands are swollen in the mornings when I wake up.
I do not like that feeling.
I know they have worked.
My hands are my tools.
Their idle time is over.
My wedding ring no longer fits.
I managed to squeeze it off, rather painfully, and now I am waiting to see if we can have it stretched to accommodate the swelling.
I miss the feel of the simple metal band, no longer there on my hand where I expect to feel it.



Also my hands and wrists are swelling up now and I have days that I cannot wear my watch as it is too painful.
And working in the garden is long time ago.
When I was diagnosed with costocohondritis and figured out that my body was my enemy in this case.
Ok I still was mowing the lawn on good days, but shoveling or redoing the tiles and oiling the deck has not been my job anymore.
Although my wife has taken over these jobs and my kids are helping to pick the weed, I really feel manytimes that I became useless.
Sometimes I sit down and cry as I can hardly bear it that my body has so given up on me.
Everyday is different and I experienced pain in the strangest places.
Although it hurts like hell every now and then, I keep on going as everybody tells me to keep in motion.


A good reason to keep on moving

A biking tour from 30km as in my “old days” I can dream about that, but if I can keep up on doing my daily tour of 3 km.
When I come home I am fully done and crash into a deep sleep on the couch.
What the **** has happened to the old me.
It is not that I want you to feel sorry for me but it can be mighty frustrating,
I try to enjoy life as much as possible.
There are enough negative people in this world.
I am doing my best to make my wife and kids as happy as I possibly can.

Living off in the countryside has given me the opportunity to experience my fair share of country stories.
Most of which, I really can not tell you… but here’s one that is rather appropriate.
It involves herbal love… and gardening!
The days that I was young I had a teacher who was much into herbs.
They lived very close to nature and they were nearly never sick.



Now I am having pain and the medical people can still not really figure out what is attacking my body from inside.
The only thing they give you are painkillers (bad motherfuckers) as you are being high of them all the time and your body is ending up with a lot of toxic waste.
When I asked the therapist if there was a friendlier way of taking the pain.
She laughed and said I cannot cure you but maybe I can make your live less painful. But do not expect miracles, well it is a bit short term but I am using a little less painkillers.
It is a herbal mix and I have too follow the schedule, let’s hope it will give more results on the long term.


The flower that might give some relief

My question is why are these people still placed in the corner of witches and charlatans?
Why don’t we look at nature as a pharmacy and we still have not discovered all curing plants.
And why are all these doctors so afraid of these natural healers is this only because of money?
I should think that they should join eachother and believe in eachothers knowledge. So we need to spend less money on finding the right medication by listening to the patient.
I am quite a sceptic if it comes to medication at all, but I am not afraid to try new things.

I am waiting for less rainy days in my life.

The Old Sailor,