Objects in Motion

We're not in such a great place right now. Okay, a pretty bad place. Husband has lost his job, which means no money, no insurance -- well, you get the idea. Without insurance, my meds alone are 1200 a month. He's diabetic, which means he needs meds too. Which he's ignoring, but I'm used to that.

He COBRA'd my insurance so I'd have it through July, which actually enabled some real progress to finally be made with my last neurologist visit.

Bad News: Add Occipital Neuralgia to my list of Things Wrong With Pooka

Good News: It earned me a trip to (wait for it) ... A PAIN CLINIC!

My appointment at the pain clinic is this Thursday for a nerve block on my occiptal nerve, which -should-, theoretically, take care of the worst of the break-through and OMFGSBJ Can I Die? headaches.

I'm supposed to be there several hours. I already got the phone call, with the "no food after 8:30, clear liquids only" orders. So I know it's not just a background and history visit. People trying to HELP me. Whodda thunk it?

So it's going to be two days late to be a 'real' birthday present for me, but who counts when it's a GOOD present, right?

Pain relief. Better than freakin diamonds, as far as I'm concerned. Oh, who am I kidding, I don't really like diamonds anyway. Better than a new 260 gb hard drive and a 21" flatscreen monitor. Yeah, now THAT works!

Yep. I'm turning 38 tomorrow.

No fretting over aging at this point, I mean, I'm already poking 40 with a short stick, and my body is going about its unnatural business and aging faster than my years spent breathing anyway. Maybe it's a flux in quantum mechanics, or my body is going by "mileage" instead of "years". I suppose that would quantify out why my body is definitely trying to push the 65+ range instead of a nice perfectly normal 38.

So, the List:

--Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy/Complex Regional Pain Syndome (RSD/CRPS)
--Fibromyalgia (which I argue with after the new findings)
--Thoracic Outlet Syndrome (same argument, just symptoms misread)
--Osteoarthritis
--Arnold Chiari Malformation I
--Cervical Spinal Stenosis
--Peripheral Neuropathy
--Occipital Neuralgia


Quite a doozy to look at, huh? And of course, I'm already wearing bifocals, which I knew I needed, but never realized how much till I had them, and suddenly I could read things again without doing the "find the right distance" dance.

The List sort of destroys the whole "aging gracefully" concept. There's very little graceful about me anymore. I stay bruised from stumbling, bouncing into things, and half the time not even feeling the impacts that leave the marks.

About the only part that IS aging gracefully is my face. Which is weird, since that's one of the places that usually shows signs first. But no, you can look at my hands and tell, but I am surprisingly free of most wrinkles and lines on my face. Granted, my face is now so gaunt that there's not much to help make wrinkles visible, but trust me, I've LOOKED for them, and I really don't have the things.

I guess you take what you got, and that has to be good enough.