Tag: poisoning

Salt poisoning

I know I’ve mentioned the tea before. How when he makes me tea, but it’s not made ‘right’. It’s not every time. This morning, it wasn’t just not made ‘right’, it didn’t taste right. There was something in that tea – way too much of something. I suspect it was salt. I don’t put salt in my tea, so I have no idea how it would change the taste. The weird thing was, I didn’t recognize the taste at all. And it lingered on my lips, I basically tasted it all day. I never did figure out what it was.

My partner likes salt. A lot of salt. On everything. I figure because he’s on TPN, and getting liters of fluids every day, it counterbalances the amount of salt he takes in. Now, when I say ‘a lot’ I realize that is relative. So to be more specific, I’d say in a normal coffee mug sized cup, he puts in about 1/4th teaspoon of salt. He drinks maybe 6 cups of tea a day, so that makes about 1 1/2 teaspoon of salt. And when I say a teaspoon, I mean the eating utensil, not a measuring cup. That’s just the tea. He puts the same amount in/on anything he eats. A sandwich, soup, jelly toast, bananas. If I see him adding it, I panic and say ‘stop, stop! too much!’. That doesn’t stop him.

About 2 months ago, he came up to me and asked; I’m watching a show, and this guy kills someone with belladonna. Where did he find it? … I explained what I knew of belladonna, which isn’t that much. I asked him why he didn’t just google it. He says because I probably know it, and it’s easier to ask me than google it.

And so help me, it only dawned on me now, it might be because google leaves traces.

So I looked up salt and belladonna poisoning just now (if you find a search record, oh ye police officers) that was me 😉 The belladonna symptoms didn’t line up at all, but I found this quick google definition on salt poisoning:

Too much sodium in the bloodstream can damage brain cells, and lead to seizures, coma or even death. Fluid can build up in the lungs, causing trouble breathing. Other symptoms of salt poisoning include kidney damage, nausea, vomiting and weakness.

And yeah…. ticky box, ticky box. This past month, breathing has been worse than normal. I started a course of antibiotics and prednisolone, and it’s improving. Nausea and vomiting – I’ve been throwing up a lot. It takes a lot for me to throw up, I fight it as much as I can before I let it, ah, go. I had thought it was my new medications causing it, but … I stopped the meds, and it’s still happening. And it doesn’t seem to be after I eat, anyway, sometimes its 6-12 hours after I’ve eaten. But not that long after I’ve had a cup of tea. And lastly, the weakness, holy crap. This last week, I’ve been asking him to cook/get tea because, and I quote what I said: I feel really weak, and can’t do it. Can you cook something?

And it makes me sound so paranoid, damn it to hell.

Later today, he asked if I’d like another cup of tea. I said sure. And as I  handed him the cup, I said; no salt this time, okay? He was like: oh, did I put salt in? My mistake! Then he rambled on for like 2 or 3 minutes, telling me how he’s gotten the cups mixed up before, and have to ‘trade out our cups’, so I didn’t get his. Except, I have never gotten his cup. His physical cup. I’d recognize it. He lied.

I didn’t talk to him about my realizing he was trying to scare me to death (which he quickly gave up on, thankfully) because I didn’t want him to try something else. I didn’t want him to get inventive. But I’m starting to suspect he has, anyway.

As with the scaring me to death thing, salt poisoning can be an ‘accident’, and I think one of his criteria for my death is plausible deniability. It was an accident, officer. I don’t know what happened. *puppy eyes, bubbling sobs of sorrow* I’ve seen this act, he’s pretty good at it.

New Riffs on the Murder Theme?

Once you realize your partner is willing to go that extra step in inviting you to the great beyond, you have to ask yourself what limits will they impose on themselves.

So far, that I know of, he’s limited himself to trying to frighten my weak heart into stopping. This I know as well as if he’s written and signed documentation.

Last week-ish, he took the remnants of a roast chicken and made a broth. Basic broth adding the bones, boiled it a couple of hours and let it rest. And rest. I told him he needed to remove the bones and blitz the vegetable bits smooth. Three days later, it was still sitting in the pot, on the stove. Kind of a DIY salmonella kit.

On the fourth day, he drained all the bits and just left the liquid part, which, after two days, he put in the fridge. At that point, he also threw out the bones. Now, I didn’t say anything about salmonella, as JC on a pogo stick, he’s old enough to know.

I have noticed when I eat the food he prepares, my stomach hurts. And hurts for days. I’ve been trying to make sure I only eat the food I prepare but I can’t stand there for hours over it, guarding it.

He could add that broth to pretty much anything I make. It’s food poisoning waiting to happen.

He’s got a friend that comes over a lot. This guy wears enough perfume to fumigate a bus. I’ve asked my husband several times to please ask this guy not to wear so much perfume to our house as it reacts badly with my COPD causing me to stop breathing. He has literally said: I can’t do that it would be rude. I responded: Its ok for me to die, so long as you aren’t rude? What is rude about asking someone not to kill me? He didn’t say anything to that, because I think he was hoping I’d die over it. Hey, it wasn’t him! He didn’t touch me!