Happy May Day! Weird how it feels more like June. It's in the 80s here and I'm indoors enjoying the cool of our well shaded house, having fled the afternoon heat. Still, the warmth and sun are overall a pleasure to have back. I'm being super bold and have ditched my compression sleeve for a few hours. For almost a year with the onset of lymphedema I have been wearing a sleeve during all my waking hours. Recently my arm has been feeling a bit better, leading me to think that I might be able to try going without the sleeve for periods of time under certain circumstances. We shall see. For starters I'm going to see how it goes if I go sleeveless during times when I'm just sitting around, reading or whatever. I'm always going to have to wear it when I'm using the arm, engaging in physical activity in warmer weather, or flying of course. It would be so nice not to have to wear a sleeve all the time. It's such a little thing but I just long for the freedom of sleevelessness- from the physical comfort perspective (I've always HATED restrictive clothing) and because I'm pretty vain. Obviously having the lymphedema has required me to suck it up. Finding compression garments that aren't hideous via Lymphedivas has been helpful. In addition to helping me look decent, and maybe even kind of cool in an artsy, punky sort of way (which conveniently suits me), it has freed me from having to go to the scary, creepy land of pinkdom that is the local, all-things-breast-cancer, supply store.
