going on vacation to boston, maine and new hampshire till july 13…i might write from there, i might not. i might write when i get back, i might not…happy summah everyone!
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humpty bumpty June 25, 2009
I was driving with my big daughter (age 12) and we passed (flew over) 2 bumps in the road, put there for the purpose of slowing people down. One had the word “HUMP” painted on the road in front of it and the other had the word “BUMP” painted on the road in front of it. My daughter asked me, “what’s the difference between “bump” and “hump?”
After a momentary pause, I told her “if you hump you will get a bump.”
She actually thought I was funny.
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morongo, really? June 23, 2009
Back in college in my marketing class, we learned about the power of subliminal advertising. We looked at magazine ads for alcohol that had barely perceptible pictures of penises and other body parts embedded in the ice cubes in the glasses of scotch and that was supposed to make you drop everything and run right out to buy a bottle of Chivas.
There is a casino (you know, a place where people go to part with their money and get nothing in return) outside of Palm Springs called Morongo. They advertise on television here in L.A. and every time I see their ads, I am baffled by what seems to me to be anything but subliminal. Admittedly, this is a casino owned by Native Americans and the name is, presumably, of Native American origin and I mean absolutely no disrespect here, (I just googled Morongo, but couldn’t find a definition) BUT…Is it just me or does anyone else notice the irony of the name here? Moron go. It amazes the mind.
Don’t even get me started on the word therapist…
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P.S. I have complete respect for the Native American’s right to self reliance through the ability to provide opportunities for folks of all races, ethniticies and nationalities to part with their money.
The following is on the Morongo Band of Mission Indian website:
The new $250 million Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa is the largest private sector employer in the region employing more than 2,400 people and serving thousands of patrons daily. The casino’s revenue production provides the foundation for the tribe’s economic diversification.
yes, we can June 19, 2009
O.K. ladies, anyone recognize this conversation?
My little one finished year 1 of preschool and brought home 2 absolutely beautiful finger paintings. My husband came home from work a little while ago and observed the loveliness of the artwork. So far so good, but here’s where it gets…shall we say fucking annoying?
J-“I really like these paintings that she made.”
me-“yeah, they are great.”
J-“Can we get some frames for them and hang them up?”
me-“Can we get some frames? Yes, we can. You can go about 4 minutes over yonder there in that there direction (as I motion with my hands in a general westward direction) to a place called Aaron Brothers Art and Frames and buy some frames and then come home and hang them up.”
Yes, we can. (I wonder if Michelle Obama originated this phrase.)
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Can I get a witness?
Can anyone relate? C’mon I know you can. I love to cook. Or at least, I used to love to cook. I used to plan really good meals, whole dinner menus, even. And, I used to shop, go to the farmer’s market for the best, freshest, organic produce to have all the right ingredients in the house. We used to have dinner parties consisting of fabulous food, wonderful wine and witty repartee. And I did all this in a fairly small, cramped kitchen with crappy appliances. Then something happened. Or many things happened. 3 kids happened. 3 kids who don’t eat any of the same foods except pizza, burritos or macaroni and cheese.
And then something else happened. We remodeled our kitchen with beautiful countertops and stainless appliances and a prep sink and opened it up to our den, creating a “great room.” And then pain happened. Pain that makes me tired and makes me lose my appetite. Do you know what it is like trying to plan dinner when you are tired and have no appetite or nothing just sounds good and the kids don’t like the same food and your husband could be late from work on any and every night of the week? Probably you do know. I end up throwing out more perishables than could feed a small island and we order in food enough times in a week to stimulate a small economy and I feel like a loser of a mother because I don’t have dinner, steaming in its serving bowls, on the table every (or any) evening and I hate it. And then I remember the starving children in Africa and I feel guilty for being such a spoiled, whiny bitch.
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suck my….or a funny thing happened on the way back from recess June 17, 2009
With the school year wrapping up, I am reminded of an incident that took place when I was a third grade teacher about 10 years ago. I had a wonderful child in my class named Nicholas. Nicholas was a lovable 9 year old, extremely smart, identified gifted actually, but also, quite learning disabled. Fact was, he couldn’t read. He could put together very large puzzles, however, like nobody’s business. The unfortunate thing was that his mother was quite uneducated, and came from a very rural and poverty stricken part of Mexico. She never spoke to him during his first few years of life because she couldn’t imagine why one would talk to a baby since a baby couldn’t talk back. Naturally, she never read to him either. Nicholas was at a big disadvantage when it came to the written word. Nicholas attended special class for about an hour or so each day with our special needs teacher, Lisa, to address his learning disability.
One bright morning, as I walked across the playground on my way back to my classroom at the end of recess, Nicholas came running up to me, quite agitated.
N-“Mrs. M., Mrs. M.”
me-“What is it Nicholas?”
N-“Mrs. M., Andrew just told me to ‘suck his (and here he leaned in very close to me and whispered and spelled), d-u-c-k.'”
I paused, trying to compose myself and reply with the level of seriousness that the situation warranted, all the while wanting to burst out laughing.
me-“I am very sorry to hear that Nicholas. That was a very mean thing to say. I will talk with Andrew right away and I assure you this won’t happen again.”
Recess ended and we went into the classroom for a math lesson or some such thing.
At lunch, I went immediately to Lisa’s classroom and told her the story. Then I told her she really needed to work more with Nicholas on spelling.
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Why does this not surprise me? June 16, 2009
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Eighteen-year-old Jessica Terry, brought slides of her own intestinal tissue into her AP science class and correctly diagnosed herself with Crohn’s disease. “It’s weird I had to solve my own medical problem,” Terry told CNN affiliate KOMO. “There were just no answers anywhere … I was always sick.” For years she went from doctor to doctor complaining of vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss and stomach pains. They said she had irritable bowel syndrome. They said she had colitis. They said the slides of her intestinal tissue were fine, but she knew that wasn’t right. “Not knowing much about a disease you’re growing up with is not only nerve-wracking, but it’s confusing,” Terry told theSammamish Reporter. So when local pathologists stopped in to teach students in her Biomedical Problems class how to analyze slides, the high school senior decided to give her own intestines a look. What she found? A large dark area showing inflammation, otherwise known as a granuloma–a sure sign of the intestinal disease. To confirm her suspicion, she checked in with her teacher. “‘Ms. Welch! Ms. Welch! Come over here. I think I’ve got something!” she shouted. Mary Margaret Welch, who has spent 17 years teaching science at Eastside Catholic School, had a feeling Terry was on to something. “I snapped a picture of it on the microscope and e-mailed it to the pathologist,” Welch said. “Within 24 hours, he sent back an e-mail saying yes, this is a granuloma.” The finding impressed doctors. “Granulomas are oftentimes very hard to find and not always even present at all,” said Dr. Corey Siegel, a bowel disease specialist at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. “I commend Jessica for her meticulous work.” While Terry’s glad to finally have answers, she now knows she’ll have a tough road ahead. Crohn’s disease is an incurable, though treatable condition caused by inflammation in the intestines. It can cause malnutrition, ulcers, pain and discomfort. Still, she looks towards the future with optimism. She’ll begin nursing school in the fall and hopes to have a kid’s book on Crohn’s disease published. nufced |
A Tale of Two (or 3) Doctors June 11, 2009
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” -Charles Dickens
It has been a while since I wrote of my medical stuff. Probably some sort of psychological avoidance issue. Or possibly because of the amount of time that I have been dealing with it of late, the last thing I’ve been wanting to do is write about it. But there have been some new developments so I feel obliged to share them.
As soon as I was adequately recovered from the last angiogram, I began intensive work with my chiropractor-2-3 times/week. The work was hard, deep and usually left me feeling pretty crappy for the next day or so. The good news was, that we were seeing some definite, although not permanent, improvement. We at least felt that we had honed in on the root of the trouble. The bad news was that we weren’t really sure what she was doing that seemed to help and if her work would/could have any permanent effect.
Also, my last 2 doctors, neither of whom do I respect (see May 21 post “A Bitch of a Week”), suggested that my problem was caused by my pain medicine and not the other way around. Although this seemed completely illogical to me, I was so desperate, that I think I was open to hearing just about anything. So, when they suggested I get off my pain meds, I was at least willing to give it a try. My fear was, what if I get off the meds and the pain is still there only now I get no relief, have no safety net? That concerned me, especially since getting off the drugs is a long drawn process which need to be undertaken with great care so as to avoid or at least ease withdrawal, which can be a very painful experience on its own. Also, neither of these doctors told me how I should do the withdrawal and neither referred me to another doctor who specializes in helping people wean gently off of narcotics. I was, yet again, alone in my journey.
So, I started calling around to different clinics or programs that were designed to help people kick their drugs. Only problem was, I wasn’t nor am I a drug abuser. Evidently one has to be a hard core addict or as rich as Miss Lohan or Spears to get any help. I was told point blank by 2 different admissions directors that they weren’t the place for me because I am simply dependent on my medicine to feel well, not addicted in order to get high. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. I did speak with one facility that would have happily helped me to part with a great deal of my money for the privilege of spending 28 days away from my family, attending NA meetings, etc.
Surprisingly, my playing around on the web landed me right at the internet doorstep of the most amazing perfect e-match of a doctor that I could imagine. Her website described someone who was the doctor equivalent of tall dark and handsome. Dr. Gayle was western trained and she is an M.D. Her field of specialty was gastroenterology (a girl after my own spleen), and internal medicine, but she had also studied with a medicine man on a Native American reservation and she became open to other ways of healing. She then learned about other healing modalities and now runs a completely integrated practice. She is well known in her profession and highly respected. She treats the body, mind and spirit as a whole and considers herself a partner with the patient to figure out a way to health and wellness. Imagine that! AND her practice is about a 20 minute drive from my house.
I called her office and was able to get in last Tuesday. And what happened next was truly amazing. We sat, I spoke, she listened. She took some notes and asked a few questions, but mostly she just listened. And then she stated quite simply and matter of factly, that she had a pretty good idea about what could be causing my pain. Just like that. At the end of our meeting she looked me directly in the eyes, put her hands on my arms and said, “We will figure this out.” And I believed her.
We all have a very large muscle that runs up the length of the torso, connecting at the hip and up near the diaphragm (the very diaphragm from where the median arcuate ligament was cut in my original surgery), called the iliopsoas muscle. Her thinking (which was confirmed on examination) is that this muscle has been in chronic spasm since the surgery, likely as a result of the body trying to protect itself from the trauma of the surgery. She said that it would account for all of the pain that I have described to her-the squeezing inside my body, the wrapping, the burning-all of it (other than the normal aches of being a grown up and having 3 kids and living in a stressful world). But not only that, she actually has a plan for dealing with the muscle. She told me that we have to break the cycle of the spasm and re-teach the muscle that it doesn’t need to be that way-that it can simply relax now. Not only that too, but she has a plan for breaking the cycle and that is through the use of magnesium injections which cause muscles to relax.
So, last week I had my first injection. I won’t say it was a pleasant experience, because it wasn’t, BUT at the end of the treatment, my pain was gone–GONE!. And for the nest several days I woke up without pain. It was truly amazing. She wouldn’t venture to guess how long the relief might be, planning several more injections-once a week for the next month and we’ll take it from there. I still take my meds because A. I can’t just stop them and B. there is no expectation that one shot is enough. In fact as the week has gone by, I have felt some pain creeping back in, but I am taking much less medication than I was even a week ago. I am scheduled for another injection this afternoon.
It’s too early for me to claim victory-way to early, but for the first time in a very long time, I actually feel hopeful…
More to come.
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Mothahhood 