Sitting here going through the April Wizard (geek alert, non-geeks flee while you can), and ....
Well, let's be honest. I'm considering a stealth attack on wherever my ex-husband currently lives. With my luck, though, he's already ditched everything. Grr.
See, Wizard is running lots of "Top #" lists in this issue. Like the Top 100 Comic covers of all time. Picture Pooka with little squinty annoyed eyes getting squintier by the moment as she realizes just how many of these comics she actually owned -- at one time, before the troglodyte gave me the infamous 30 to pack.
I managed to hang onto most of my Moon Knight comics. Teen Titans, New Mutants and X-Men were all lost, as was (gasp sigh hissy fit) my stash of Detective and Batman comics. And Cerebus. And Alpha Flight, Wolverine, and X-Factor. And Cloak and Dagger. Hellblazer. And ... Man, I just can't go on.
Grr. Growly grrr.
The thought of all the #1s alone ... Grr.
Of course, since it's the April issue, I'm not sure how much of the rest is accurate, but: Coldsmoke, BB: RoTJ to be released UNCUT on DVD on April 23. Ditto for Justice League. LOTS of animated titles, including some Batman that I've been screaming about them not having on DVD to hit the shelves in April. We'll see how accurate that is. (Jon? Frisco? Any serious news there?)
(And Pssst ... either of you guys have a spare or access to a spare of the 10c Adventures Batman?)
Non-geeks can come back now. If I go on my liver will implode or something.
Big hint -- when faced with a divorce, give up trying to "be nice" to make it easier. You're gonna get SO totally screwed.
Sunday, March 31, 2002
Monday, March 25, 2002
TGIM
I never thought I would say this: Thank God it's Monday.
Started this post an hour ago. This is as far as I've gotten. Not a great sign.
Another Monday, another week without PT. I'm thinking that's a sign, too, but I'll refrain from actually voicing what I think that sign points to. I'm sure it would just start another fight that I'll back down from and end up feeling worse than ever.
I may look brave to some of you, but the reality is that I honestly and absolutely loathe confrontation. It's part of why I get such lousy medical treatment, because I just sigh and resign myself instead of questioning or arguing. I don't have any support to fight back, and I just can't do it alone unless I am totally fed up and angry over it.
More and more I find myself hoping that they'll finally tell me that I have something terminal, just to get one specific person to act like it matters. It's a pipe dream on that level because I'm honestly not sure that even that news would make it through.
Guess I'm a little blue. I'm sure someone will cheerfully tell me to see a shrink and that I need to up the dosage. If they do, I'll just send them the RSD latter stage photos that I posted semi-privately the other day and ask them if THEY would be Shiny Happy Stupid if they knew they might end up looking like that for the short amount of time they survived.
Yay, RSD increases your risk of sudden fatal heart attacks. This one might kill me after all. And the peasants rejoiced.
I need more caffiene. DG forgot to start a pot this morning. I'm not physically capable of handling fragile glass at the moment, so I guess I'm stuck with soda. Yay. Not.
And as if this weekend hadn't been crappy enough ... My monster will be here next weekend!
DG told me, and I started stuttering again almost immediately. I wonder if I can get out of the visit by pointing out the multiple underlines and heavy blank ink of "***AVOID STRESS!!!!!!!***" that Captain Ed left on my PT paperwork. Not that I've gotten to visit Ed for over a week.
I think I may lock this entry. I'm just too tired to deal with some of the bullshit if I left it open for everybody to read.
Ever been too tired to qualify as tired? Yeah, me too. This is soul-deep. I know it will go away, it always does. It just takes time. Last week was really hard on me both physically and mentally, and now I get to pay the tab for all that "Fun."
I'm trying to get over the urge to entertain in my journal instead of using it to help work through all the things going through my head. It would be easier if I hadn't had so many bad experiences trying to do just that.
It's not that misery loves company, I think that's somewhat incorrect. What misery really wants is for someone to say, "Aw, poor baby, everything is going to be all right." I know that I have definite comfort issues, somewhat pertaining to not getting sympathy, support, or even a reaction to my failing health. Comfort was not something I got as a child, and especially not while I was a teenager when I really needed it the most. I was never told that it was going to be all right. I was told that it was probably my fault. I wasn't told that it was going to get better. I was told that I had screwed this up and was probably going to keep screwing up because I couldn't do anything right. When I knew what I wanted from life, I was told that I was wrong, that *I* could certainly never do that and why should I even bother trying. Comfort and support withdrawn, thank you for playing.
A little voice tells me that I could have gone on ahead and done what I really wanted to do. That little voice has no logic to it, it's just the stubborn little me that won't die. Thank God. Instead, logic pointed out that if I tried to do what I really wanted to do that I would fail spectacularly because it honestly couldn't be done without support, particularly the monetary kind. I ended up shuffled to a college that cost maybe 1500 a semester, TOPS. My baby sister's school was over 18,000 a year. Do the emotional math on that one.
If I'd had the balls and the knowledge of just how unhappy with my life I'd end up, I'd have said "Yeah, Fuck You, lady" a whole lot sooner and ended up on Parris Island with a real chance to reach my own goals.
But, I was short on brass and long on an abusive boyfriend and had had it hammered into my head for so many years that I was supposed to do what THEY wanted me to do and to hell with my own ideas that I was totally incapable of taking the steps to take control of my own life.
Um.
This wasn't how this post was supposed to go. Yay me, and pass the detergent cause I'm airing the dirty laundry.
Knew I shouldn't have mentioned the monster coming up here. "Hi there, I'm your adopted mother and I'm going to totally fuck up your head for the next week and I'm not even there yet!"
Yeah, fuck you, lady.
Started this post an hour ago. This is as far as I've gotten. Not a great sign.
Another Monday, another week without PT. I'm thinking that's a sign, too, but I'll refrain from actually voicing what I think that sign points to. I'm sure it would just start another fight that I'll back down from and end up feeling worse than ever.
I may look brave to some of you, but the reality is that I honestly and absolutely loathe confrontation. It's part of why I get such lousy medical treatment, because I just sigh and resign myself instead of questioning or arguing. I don't have any support to fight back, and I just can't do it alone unless I am totally fed up and angry over it.
More and more I find myself hoping that they'll finally tell me that I have something terminal, just to get one specific person to act like it matters. It's a pipe dream on that level because I'm honestly not sure that even that news would make it through.
Guess I'm a little blue. I'm sure someone will cheerfully tell me to see a shrink and that I need to up the dosage. If they do, I'll just send them the RSD latter stage photos that I posted semi-privately the other day and ask them if THEY would be Shiny Happy Stupid if they knew they might end up looking like that for the short amount of time they survived.
Yay, RSD increases your risk of sudden fatal heart attacks. This one might kill me after all. And the peasants rejoiced.
I need more caffiene. DG forgot to start a pot this morning. I'm not physically capable of handling fragile glass at the moment, so I guess I'm stuck with soda. Yay. Not.
And as if this weekend hadn't been crappy enough ... My monster will be here next weekend!
DG told me, and I started stuttering again almost immediately. I wonder if I can get out of the visit by pointing out the multiple underlines and heavy blank ink of "***AVOID STRESS!!!!!!!***" that Captain Ed left on my PT paperwork. Not that I've gotten to visit Ed for over a week.
I think I may lock this entry. I'm just too tired to deal with some of the bullshit if I left it open for everybody to read.
Ever been too tired to qualify as tired? Yeah, me too. This is soul-deep. I know it will go away, it always does. It just takes time. Last week was really hard on me both physically and mentally, and now I get to pay the tab for all that "Fun."
I'm trying to get over the urge to entertain in my journal instead of using it to help work through all the things going through my head. It would be easier if I hadn't had so many bad experiences trying to do just that.
It's not that misery loves company, I think that's somewhat incorrect. What misery really wants is for someone to say, "Aw, poor baby, everything is going to be all right." I know that I have definite comfort issues, somewhat pertaining to not getting sympathy, support, or even a reaction to my failing health. Comfort was not something I got as a child, and especially not while I was a teenager when I really needed it the most. I was never told that it was going to be all right. I was told that it was probably my fault. I wasn't told that it was going to get better. I was told that I had screwed this up and was probably going to keep screwing up because I couldn't do anything right. When I knew what I wanted from life, I was told that I was wrong, that *I* could certainly never do that and why should I even bother trying. Comfort and support withdrawn, thank you for playing.
A little voice tells me that I could have gone on ahead and done what I really wanted to do. That little voice has no logic to it, it's just the stubborn little me that won't die. Thank God. Instead, logic pointed out that if I tried to do what I really wanted to do that I would fail spectacularly because it honestly couldn't be done without support, particularly the monetary kind. I ended up shuffled to a college that cost maybe 1500 a semester, TOPS. My baby sister's school was over 18,000 a year. Do the emotional math on that one.
If I'd had the balls and the knowledge of just how unhappy with my life I'd end up, I'd have said "Yeah, Fuck You, lady" a whole lot sooner and ended up on Parris Island with a real chance to reach my own goals.
But, I was short on brass and long on an abusive boyfriend and had had it hammered into my head for so many years that I was supposed to do what THEY wanted me to do and to hell with my own ideas that I was totally incapable of taking the steps to take control of my own life.
Um.
This wasn't how this post was supposed to go. Yay me, and pass the detergent cause I'm airing the dirty laundry.
Knew I shouldn't have mentioned the monster coming up here. "Hi there, I'm your adopted mother and I'm going to totally fuck up your head for the next week and I'm not even there yet!"
Yeah, fuck you, lady.
Saturday, March 23, 2002
Save. Me. Please.
Thing 1: "Heather's got a boyfriend, Heather's got a boyfriend."
Me: "Oh? Is he the same one she was calling an 'asshole' yesterday?"
Thing 1: "Marshall? Yeah. Heather's got a boyfriend, Heather's got a ...."
Thing 2: "You shut up, jackass!"
Dear God, give me strength.
Me: "Oh? Is he the same one she was calling an 'asshole' yesterday?"
Thing 1: "Marshall? Yeah. Heather's got a boyfriend, Heather's got a ...."
Thing 2: "You shut up, jackass!"
Dear God, give me strength.
Tuesday, March 19, 2002
Pooka's Test Kitchen
Yet Another Notice from the Pooka Testing Kitchens:
Gummy SweeTarts Rabbits are indescribably Ucky.
::chew chew chew chew:: Mastication does absolutely nothing to change them from their lapin form to something even remotely edible.
::chew chew chew:: I fear that they go into the stomach in the same toxic shape as they entered the mouth. I think they're supposed to be in traditional SweeTarts flavours, but I wouldn't put any money on how close they come to acheiving it.
"Tangy," sez the bag. The bag lies.
"Candy" sez the bag. I consider this a lie as well. Goodyear might produce something like this, were they to tint their tires pastel colours.
"Try our funny, yummy, gummy varieties," the bag sez. Let's inspect each part of this sentence in turn.
"Funny." Yes, calling it candy or a food product is most amusing.
"Yummy." On what fucking planet does this actually apply to the crap I'm chewing?
"Gummy." Yes. Yes. Here we have some semblence of accuracy. Gummy. Yes, yes they are, in the way that an infant's teething ring could be considered gummy. Nowhere does this honestly indicate edibility, so I'll let this stand.
"Varieties." So far, I've found ... nasty gummy, foul gummy, and what the fuck did I just put in my mouth gummy. I guess we have to let this one slide as well.
A very very frightened part of my mind is babbling in horror over where the 3 g of Protein in the gummies might come from. And they're even Kosher!
There are just some questions that one should never ask.
Not only shall I avoid purchasing such a thing ever again in the future, I feel the uncontrollable urge to walk into the bedroom and beat DG with the remnants of the bag for bringing them home in the first place.
::chew chew chew:: Anyone want one?
Gummy SweeTarts Rabbits are indescribably Ucky.
::chew chew chew chew:: Mastication does absolutely nothing to change them from their lapin form to something even remotely edible.
::chew chew chew:: I fear that they go into the stomach in the same toxic shape as they entered the mouth. I think they're supposed to be in traditional SweeTarts flavours, but I wouldn't put any money on how close they come to acheiving it.
"Tangy," sez the bag. The bag lies.
"Candy" sez the bag. I consider this a lie as well. Goodyear might produce something like this, were they to tint their tires pastel colours.
"Try our funny, yummy, gummy varieties," the bag sez. Let's inspect each part of this sentence in turn.
"Funny." Yes, calling it candy or a food product is most amusing.
"Yummy." On what fucking planet does this actually apply to the crap I'm chewing?
"Gummy." Yes. Yes. Here we have some semblence of accuracy. Gummy. Yes, yes they are, in the way that an infant's teething ring could be considered gummy. Nowhere does this honestly indicate edibility, so I'll let this stand.
"Varieties." So far, I've found ... nasty gummy, foul gummy, and what the fuck did I just put in my mouth gummy. I guess we have to let this one slide as well.
A very very frightened part of my mind is babbling in horror over where the 3 g of Protein in the gummies might come from. And they're even Kosher!
There are just some questions that one should never ask.
Not only shall I avoid purchasing such a thing ever again in the future, I feel the uncontrollable urge to walk into the bedroom and beat DG with the remnants of the bag for bringing them home in the first place.
::chew chew chew:: Anyone want one?
Sunday, March 17, 2002
If I leave here tomorrow...
"If I leave here tomorrow, will you still remember me?"
A question for the masses: If something were to happen to you, does any member of your family/immediate close-by circle of friends know to tell the friends you've made online?
Does your family even know about your circle of friends online? Your significant other? If you were in an accident, would we ever find out?
Missing persons, missing faces.
Do you have a "Just In Case" security net set up?
Now that the question has been posed, think on it a bit.
Despite the emotional attachment we have to friends we have made online, how much do we really know about them? A first name, maybe a last? A phone number? Maybe?
Could you, if asked, name both the first and last name of twenty of your online friends? Ten? Five?
If a story aired on the news, would you recognize the name? Their location? Or even a face?
Do you even know what most of your online friends look like?
The unfortunate reality is that there is still a line drawn between flesh and electronic. The media blasts us with the potential horrors of online stalkers and psychopaths while failing to acknowledge that the psychos would be there if you were offline as well.
One world only reflects the other. You're just as likely to be knifed in a dark alley by someone you meet in a nightclub as by someone you talk to online. You're just as likely to be raped by someone you've met in a bookstore as you are by someone you met online.
So why the fear? Why the line at all? What makes it so different if someone online asks for your phone number as opposed to someone in the flesh? Is it the immediacy of the judgement, seeing that person right there before you that you can judge worthy or not? Does the lack of a face and a voice make that great of a difference?
Or is it something simpler, that friendships made online are more disposable? You don't have to clean up after them if they come over, you don't have to throw them out if they stay too late or close the door in their faces at four a.m. You can just sign off. You don't have to get dressed up for them or wear makeup. You don't have to be dressed at all.
That convenience is a drawback when Need arises. You isolate yourself too far, and when you realize that you really need someone there, right then, there's no one but the illusion of friendships you've created because you've kept them too far away.
For you, how much "personal" information about yourself is too much?
How much personal information FROM someone is too much?
Should there be a "minimum requirement" of knowledge before you take a step to meet someone face to face?
What quality makes you decide to share your information?
Do you have am offline Contact List in case of emergency?
Do you have one for your online friends as well? If not ... why not?
A question for the masses: If something were to happen to you, does any member of your family/immediate close-by circle of friends know to tell the friends you've made online?
Does your family even know about your circle of friends online? Your significant other? If you were in an accident, would we ever find out?
Missing persons, missing faces.
Do you have a "Just In Case" security net set up?
Now that the question has been posed, think on it a bit.
Despite the emotional attachment we have to friends we have made online, how much do we really know about them? A first name, maybe a last? A phone number? Maybe?
Could you, if asked, name both the first and last name of twenty of your online friends? Ten? Five?
If a story aired on the news, would you recognize the name? Their location? Or even a face?
Do you even know what most of your online friends look like?
The unfortunate reality is that there is still a line drawn between flesh and electronic. The media blasts us with the potential horrors of online stalkers and psychopaths while failing to acknowledge that the psychos would be there if you were offline as well.
One world only reflects the other. You're just as likely to be knifed in a dark alley by someone you meet in a nightclub as by someone you talk to online. You're just as likely to be raped by someone you've met in a bookstore as you are by someone you met online.
So why the fear? Why the line at all? What makes it so different if someone online asks for your phone number as opposed to someone in the flesh? Is it the immediacy of the judgement, seeing that person right there before you that you can judge worthy or not? Does the lack of a face and a voice make that great of a difference?
Or is it something simpler, that friendships made online are more disposable? You don't have to clean up after them if they come over, you don't have to throw them out if they stay too late or close the door in their faces at four a.m. You can just sign off. You don't have to get dressed up for them or wear makeup. You don't have to be dressed at all.
That convenience is a drawback when Need arises. You isolate yourself too far, and when you realize that you really need someone there, right then, there's no one but the illusion of friendships you've created because you've kept them too far away.
For you, how much "personal" information about yourself is too much?
How much personal information FROM someone is too much?
Should there be a "minimum requirement" of knowledge before you take a step to meet someone face to face?
What quality makes you decide to share your information?
Do you have am offline Contact List in case of emergency?
Do you have one for your online friends as well? If not ... why not?
The Voice of Reason
I cannot help but wonder at what point I became the Voice Of Reason.
On the surface I suppose it seems relatively simple. I'm older than some 75% of my friends and acquaintances, have two children and a relatively stable long-term marriage, so long as DG isn't being A Guy at the moment. If there's something I haven't been through, well ...
That's where it gets more complex. Personally, I can't see how anyone could see me as anything resembling sane and stable. My body is falling apart around me, we're completely broke and struggling to make ends meet, and sometimes it's just Too Much for even me.
There's a LONG running joke. "You gonna be okay?" "Always am." I'm lousy at quitting. I'm good at falling apart, and then picking the pieces back up. In a way, letting yourself fall apart every now and then helps keep your liver from exploding due to everything you bury. I've never met a person capable of letting every single thing slide off their backs without having some problem with the internal pressure it causes.
I have my faults. There's a pretty damn long list of them. To me, they're glaring and brash and rude and unacceptable.
Voice Of Reason, my fat white Irish ass.
Yet consistently, people come to me.
I don't know if they're coming to me for answers. Sure, I've got an answer for everything, and straight answers without some twisted humour cost you a hundred bucks extra. I don't know everything. I don't pretend to know everything, and I sure as hell don't know how to solve everything, either.
I don't know if they come to me because no one else will listen. Listening, I'm good at. Listening without making comments ... now that's another matter entirely. That I can't do.
I don't know if they come to me because I'll tell them they're being silly and that's what they need to hear. I don't know if they come to me to have me validate their own responses, or to provide that extra voice telling them if they're right or wrong to help them make a final decision.
I don't know.
I've never enjoyed politics. Back in the years when I was actively involved in the SCA, I was dragged into the murk of Knowing The Game and playing politics with the big kids. I knew everyone Important and what who was doing to who and all of the behind the scenes crap that really took all of the fun out of it. It didn't stop me from being good at it. I knew how to play it, I learned from some of the best. But I loathed it.
Getting away from it and starting over elsewhere helped for a while, but eventually I found myself in the same position because I was good at it. I walked away again.
I'm the mediator. I always have been. I have problems saying No. I end up in the middle by sheer accident more times than I care to remember.
It happens online a lot. DG has a talent for pissing people off. When he does, they come to me. I don't get that. "Your husband is at it again." "So?" "Well, can't you ..."
No. I can't.
I'd like to think that I'm a somewhat sarcastic and heartless Evil Overlord ... so why the hell do they bring it to me? Because he's better at being an asshole?
I've been through this with RP partners, too. One specific character just made the head of a particular forum foam at the mouth. I mean he HATED my partner to the point of trying to find some 'legal' way to have him banned. There wasn't one, but every time we showed up, I'd spend the next three or four days dealing with the aftermath.
My partner was never once approached over it. Never.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not really complaining about the whole Voice Of Reason thing except on those levels which are just plain silly. If you have a real and serious problem with something that someone else is doing, take it to THEM, particularly if the other person you are trying to get involved has absolutely no idea what is going on.
I just don't fully understand it.
And I feel very, very old sometimes.
I'm not fishing for answers here. I'm not sure that I'd completely believe any answers handed to me anyway. I definitely still have some serious self-esteem problems.
But I'm feeling introspective lately, and this was among the little bubbles that danced around on the surface until it finally nagged me into babbling about it. For those that read my journal for the questionable humour, I should probably apologize. There hasn't been much of that at all lately, and I'm not sure when there will be again.
It's a phase, you know, and I think I'm getting too old to grow out of them quickly.
In the end, though, it's still Just Me, Pretending To Be.
On the surface I suppose it seems relatively simple. I'm older than some 75% of my friends and acquaintances, have two children and a relatively stable long-term marriage, so long as DG isn't being A Guy at the moment. If there's something I haven't been through, well ...
That's where it gets more complex. Personally, I can't see how anyone could see me as anything resembling sane and stable. My body is falling apart around me, we're completely broke and struggling to make ends meet, and sometimes it's just Too Much for even me.
There's a LONG running joke. "You gonna be okay?" "Always am." I'm lousy at quitting. I'm good at falling apart, and then picking the pieces back up. In a way, letting yourself fall apart every now and then helps keep your liver from exploding due to everything you bury. I've never met a person capable of letting every single thing slide off their backs without having some problem with the internal pressure it causes.
I have my faults. There's a pretty damn long list of them. To me, they're glaring and brash and rude and unacceptable.
Voice Of Reason, my fat white Irish ass.
Yet consistently, people come to me.
I don't know if they're coming to me for answers. Sure, I've got an answer for everything, and straight answers without some twisted humour cost you a hundred bucks extra. I don't know everything. I don't pretend to know everything, and I sure as hell don't know how to solve everything, either.
I don't know if they come to me because no one else will listen. Listening, I'm good at. Listening without making comments ... now that's another matter entirely. That I can't do.
I don't know if they come to me because I'll tell them they're being silly and that's what they need to hear. I don't know if they come to me to have me validate their own responses, or to provide that extra voice telling them if they're right or wrong to help them make a final decision.
I don't know.
I've never enjoyed politics. Back in the years when I was actively involved in the SCA, I was dragged into the murk of Knowing The Game and playing politics with the big kids. I knew everyone Important and what who was doing to who and all of the behind the scenes crap that really took all of the fun out of it. It didn't stop me from being good at it. I knew how to play it, I learned from some of the best. But I loathed it.
Getting away from it and starting over elsewhere helped for a while, but eventually I found myself in the same position because I was good at it. I walked away again.
I'm the mediator. I always have been. I have problems saying No. I end up in the middle by sheer accident more times than I care to remember.
It happens online a lot. DG has a talent for pissing people off. When he does, they come to me. I don't get that. "Your husband is at it again." "So?" "Well, can't you ..."
No. I can't.
I'd like to think that I'm a somewhat sarcastic and heartless Evil Overlord ... so why the hell do they bring it to me? Because he's better at being an asshole?
I've been through this with RP partners, too. One specific character just made the head of a particular forum foam at the mouth. I mean he HATED my partner to the point of trying to find some 'legal' way to have him banned. There wasn't one, but every time we showed up, I'd spend the next three or four days dealing with the aftermath.
My partner was never once approached over it. Never.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not really complaining about the whole Voice Of Reason thing except on those levels which are just plain silly. If you have a real and serious problem with something that someone else is doing, take it to THEM, particularly if the other person you are trying to get involved has absolutely no idea what is going on.
I just don't fully understand it.
And I feel very, very old sometimes.
I'm not fishing for answers here. I'm not sure that I'd completely believe any answers handed to me anyway. I definitely still have some serious self-esteem problems.
But I'm feeling introspective lately, and this was among the little bubbles that danced around on the surface until it finally nagged me into babbling about it. For those that read my journal for the questionable humour, I should probably apologize. There hasn't been much of that at all lately, and I'm not sure when there will be again.
It's a phase, you know, and I think I'm getting too old to grow out of them quickly.
In the end, though, it's still Just Me, Pretending To Be.
Tuesday, March 12, 2002
T.G.I.Forget it
Have any of you had even a remotely decent experience at a TGIFriday's?
We went to our local one for the first time around 3 years ago. To say it was a disaster is putting it mildly. The food was cold, incorrectly cooked, service took forever, and the food tasted flat out bad, even after numerous attempts to get it fixed.
Fast forward 3 years, and a little back in time from today since I'm only now bright enough to remember to complain and ask.
What the hell, we'll try it again.
In three years, it not only had not improved, it had gotten substantially worse. Keep in mind that the place is in a highly strategic position on the highway in a long strip of other restaraunts. They definitely aren't out of the way or difficult to access.
The place was mostly empty, maybe 10 others in the entire restaraunt.
At least two of the napkins on our table had been drawn on by previous customers. Two of the plates in the stack had debris and food particles on them, including a broken toothpick -- not just residue from the washer, but things flat out left in place by the bus staff.
It took forever to get seated. In an empty store. Trying to find an empty table among all of them was more than the hostess could handle.
Thing 2 had a larger serving of food in her kids meal than I did in an adult dinner.
And of course the amazing vanishing waitress. God knows she wasn't actually too busy, she just didn't care. Empty drinks, dirty plates, used napkins ...
I'll call it strikes two and three, man. Game over.
Is this standard for the chain, or did we just get lucky?
We went to our local one for the first time around 3 years ago. To say it was a disaster is putting it mildly. The food was cold, incorrectly cooked, service took forever, and the food tasted flat out bad, even after numerous attempts to get it fixed.
Fast forward 3 years, and a little back in time from today since I'm only now bright enough to remember to complain and ask.
What the hell, we'll try it again.
In three years, it not only had not improved, it had gotten substantially worse. Keep in mind that the place is in a highly strategic position on the highway in a long strip of other restaraunts. They definitely aren't out of the way or difficult to access.
The place was mostly empty, maybe 10 others in the entire restaraunt.
At least two of the napkins on our table had been drawn on by previous customers. Two of the plates in the stack had debris and food particles on them, including a broken toothpick -- not just residue from the washer, but things flat out left in place by the bus staff.
It took forever to get seated. In an empty store. Trying to find an empty table among all of them was more than the hostess could handle.
Thing 2 had a larger serving of food in her kids meal than I did in an adult dinner.
And of course the amazing vanishing waitress. God knows she wasn't actually too busy, she just didn't care. Empty drinks, dirty plates, used napkins ...
I'll call it strikes two and three, man. Game over.
Is this standard for the chain, or did we just get lucky?
Sunday, March 10, 2002
Pet Peeved
Pondering a Pooka's Pet Peeve: Our National Anthem at sports events.
This has been just driving me crazy for some time, and I still can't quite figure out the reasoning behind why this is done in this particular fashion, so I'll submit the argument for your dissection.
WHY, when performing the National Anthem at a sporting event, do 90% of the singers perform the number in such a way as to make it TOTALLY impossible for anyone in the audience to sing along?
Isn't this considered a participatory thing anymore? Are we supposed to just nod our heads and wait with hands over hearts for the singer to stop turning it into a Broadway show?
Instead of being able to join in as I was brought up to do, I sit and cringe and wait for the warbling to end, surrounded by hundreds of other people who are feeling the same lack of cohesiveness.
Instead of a show of appropriate patriotism, it's a one man show, and each man seems to need to try to outdo the ones that came before.
Or worse, the ones that turn it into a dirge. Ouch.
I know it's not a huge problem in the greater scheme of things, but if we're going for togetherness, why the heck can't we seem to pull it all together?
This has been just driving me crazy for some time, and I still can't quite figure out the reasoning behind why this is done in this particular fashion, so I'll submit the argument for your dissection.
WHY, when performing the National Anthem at a sporting event, do 90% of the singers perform the number in such a way as to make it TOTALLY impossible for anyone in the audience to sing along?
Isn't this considered a participatory thing anymore? Are we supposed to just nod our heads and wait with hands over hearts for the singer to stop turning it into a Broadway show?
Instead of being able to join in as I was brought up to do, I sit and cringe and wait for the warbling to end, surrounded by hundreds of other people who are feeling the same lack of cohesiveness.
Instead of a show of appropriate patriotism, it's a one man show, and each man seems to need to try to outdo the ones that came before.
Or worse, the ones that turn it into a dirge. Ouch.
I know it's not a huge problem in the greater scheme of things, but if we're going for togetherness, why the heck can't we seem to pull it all together?
Monday, March 04, 2002
But this one goes to 11
Thing 2: (checks watch) "Wow. Two minutes. That's good."
Me: "What's two minutes?"
Thing 2: (shuffling) "Um. But it goes to eleven."
--
I *think* Thing 1 is trying to play air guitar to Metallica.
I'm not entirely sure. Maybe she's just having a seizure.
Me: "What's two minutes?"
Thing 2: (shuffling) "Um. But it goes to eleven."
--
I *think* Thing 1 is trying to play air guitar to Metallica.
I'm not entirely sure. Maybe she's just having a seizure.
Tuesday, February 26, 2002
Just skip this post.
Why do I insist on wanting to know more? Is it out of the hope that someone somewhere will say something better? That someone will give me some hope on this?
I feel pathetic right now. This is just ... overwhelming. Really. And it's a train wreck because I can't make myself walk away and stop reading it. I'm posting it for me, and I'm not even sure why I'm doing it.
No one else needs to wallow in my pool, but please feel free to push this whale back into the water.
A footnote: "b RSD causes TMJ disease and vice versa. The two usually coexist. Injections or operation for TMJ disease due to RSD aggravates the condition."
Aha!
"The dysfunction changes to dystrophy manifested by edema, hyperhidrosis, neurovascular instability with fluctuation of livedo reticularis and cyanosis - causing change of temperature and color of the skin in matter of minutes. The dystrophic changes also include bouts of hair loss, ridging, dystrophic, brittle and discolored nails, skin rash, subcutaneous bleeding, neurodermatitis, and ulcerative lesions.
It is accompanied by sympathetic dysfunction in all four extremities as well as attacks of headache, vertigo, poor memory, and poor concentration. The spread through paravertebral and midline sympathetic nerves may be vertical, horizontal, or both. "
Shit. I'm apparently closer to the evil 2 than I thought. Well ... the bruising, ridged nails and breast ulcers are accounted for, aren't they?
Oh. Well. That settles it, doesn't it? Apparently the number of stages depends on the one writing the article, and it goes from 3-4 depending on the author. I'm *well* into Stage 2 by most of them and partially into 3. It looks like they split stage three into two levels, one having the most extreme and "final" misery of this damn thing.
"RSD is a definitive chronic pain syndrome called by several different names such as reflex sympathetic dysfunction, (stage I), reflex sympathetic dystrophy (stage II), "
Man, I have to stop reading up on this. This is depressing enough without knowing more.
"RSD is accompanied by a certain degree of inflammation in practically all cases. This inflammation may be in the form of swelling (edema), skin rash (neurodermatitis), inflammatory changes of the skin color (mottled or purplish, bluish or reddish or pale discolorations), tendency for bleeding in the skin, skin becoming easily bruised, inflammation and swelling around the joints as well as in the joints (such as wrists, shoulders, knee, etc.) which can be identified on MRI in later stages, and secondary freezing of the joints.
The fourth component and pre-requisite of diagnosis of RSD is insomnia and emotional disturbance. The fact that the sympathetic sensory nerve fibers carrying the sympathetic pain and impulse up to the brain terminate in the part of the brain called "limbic system". This limbic (marginal) system which is positioned between the old brain (brainstem) and the new brain (cerebral hemispheres) is mainly located over the temporal and frontal lobes of the brain. The disturbance of function of these parts of the brain results in insomnia, agitation, depression, irritability, and disturbance of judgment. Insomnia is an integral part of an untreated RSD. So are problems of depression, irritability and agitation. "
And ...
"This can be in the form of flexion deformity of the extremity, difficulty with walking, flexor withdrawal of the muscles of the extremity, and lumbar and cervical paraspinal spasm. As a result, the patient develops muscle tension headaches, as well as spread of the muscle spasm to the facial muscles with resultant stress on the temporomandibular joint (TMJ) and severe pain and spasm around the TMJ.
With passage of time, the same phenomenon results in chronic trauma to the TMJ as well as clinching of the teeth and trauma to the teeth. The patient develops severe pain in the distribution of trigeminal nerve (sensory nerve for the face) and develops moderate migrainous vascular headaches (trigeminal vascular headaches). In later stages of RSD the immune system becomes disturbed, and the patient develops poor oral hygiene and dental deterioration.
Long-standing unilateral (one sided) spasm of cervical paraspinal muscles causes increased input of pain into the upper portion of the cervical spinal cord. As a result, a referred pain develops with resultant facial pain and secondary muscle spasm around the TMJ and the jaw. The same referred pain causes migraine headaches, TMJ pain and chronic stress on the teeth with dental deterioration"
Can someone please explain to me how every single doctor until now MISSED all of this?
Look at all the fun of the final stage!
1. Failure of the immune system, reduction of helper T-cell lymphocytes and elevation of killer T-cell lymphocytes.
2. Intractable hypertension changes to orthostatic hypotension.
3. Intractable generalized edema involving the abdomen, pelvis, lungs, and extremities.
4. Ulcerative skin lesions which may respond to treatment with I.V. Mannitol, I.V. Immunoglobulin, and ACTH treatments.Calcium channel blockers such as Nifedipine may be effective in treatment.
5. High risks of cancer and suicide are increased.
6. Multiple surgical procedures seem to be precipitating factors for development of stage IV.
RSD will leave significant residuals and will stay with the patient for the rest of their life under the following conditions:
1. Misdiagnosis.
2. Delayed diagnosis after two years and longer.
3. Additional trauma due to surgical procedures at the area involved with RSD (e.g., "tarsal tunnel", "carpal tunnel" surgery "rotator cuff tear" surgery).
4. Prolonged improper treatments such as ice application, inactivity, abuse of narcotics and benzodiazepans, etc.
5. Sympathectomy, amputation, or insertion of a needle in the area of scar of RSD for injections, blocks, or other purposes.
6. Prolonged litigation with resultant emotional aggravation and delay in treatment.
All right. This is me just walking away. No more.
The hard part of the cold front has just hit, so I'm gonna crawl into bed and pretend I'm not freezing and that my hands aren't starting to burn and swell despite the meds.
I feel pathetic right now. This is just ... overwhelming. Really. And it's a train wreck because I can't make myself walk away and stop reading it. I'm posting it for me, and I'm not even sure why I'm doing it.
No one else needs to wallow in my pool, but please feel free to push this whale back into the water.
A footnote: "b RSD causes TMJ disease and vice versa. The two usually coexist. Injections or operation for TMJ disease due to RSD aggravates the condition."
Aha!
"The dysfunction changes to dystrophy manifested by edema, hyperhidrosis, neurovascular instability with fluctuation of livedo reticularis and cyanosis - causing change of temperature and color of the skin in matter of minutes. The dystrophic changes also include bouts of hair loss, ridging, dystrophic, brittle and discolored nails, skin rash, subcutaneous bleeding, neurodermatitis, and ulcerative lesions.
It is accompanied by sympathetic dysfunction in all four extremities as well as attacks of headache, vertigo, poor memory, and poor concentration. The spread through paravertebral and midline sympathetic nerves may be vertical, horizontal, or both. "
Shit. I'm apparently closer to the evil 2 than I thought. Well ... the bruising, ridged nails and breast ulcers are accounted for, aren't they?
Oh. Well. That settles it, doesn't it? Apparently the number of stages depends on the one writing the article, and it goes from 3-4 depending on the author. I'm *well* into Stage 2 by most of them and partially into 3. It looks like they split stage three into two levels, one having the most extreme and "final" misery of this damn thing.
"RSD is a definitive chronic pain syndrome called by several different names such as reflex sympathetic dysfunction, (stage I), reflex sympathetic dystrophy (stage II), "
Man, I have to stop reading up on this. This is depressing enough without knowing more.
"RSD is accompanied by a certain degree of inflammation in practically all cases. This inflammation may be in the form of swelling (edema), skin rash (neurodermatitis), inflammatory changes of the skin color (mottled or purplish, bluish or reddish or pale discolorations), tendency for bleeding in the skin, skin becoming easily bruised, inflammation and swelling around the joints as well as in the joints (such as wrists, shoulders, knee, etc.) which can be identified on MRI in later stages, and secondary freezing of the joints.
The fourth component and pre-requisite of diagnosis of RSD is insomnia and emotional disturbance. The fact that the sympathetic sensory nerve fibers carrying the sympathetic pain and impulse up to the brain terminate in the part of the brain called "limbic system". This limbic (marginal) system which is positioned between the old brain (brainstem) and the new brain (cerebral hemispheres) is mainly located over the temporal and frontal lobes of the brain. The disturbance of function of these parts of the brain results in insomnia, agitation, depression, irritability, and disturbance of judgment. Insomnia is an integral part of an untreated RSD. So are problems of depression, irritability and agitation. "
And ...
"This can be in the form of flexion deformity of the extremity, difficulty with walking, flexor withdrawal of the muscles of the extremity, and lumbar and cervical paraspinal spasm. As a result, the patient develops muscle tension headaches, as well as spread of the muscle spasm to the facial muscles with resultant stress on the temporomandibular joint (TMJ) and severe pain and spasm around the TMJ.
With passage of time, the same phenomenon results in chronic trauma to the TMJ as well as clinching of the teeth and trauma to the teeth. The patient develops severe pain in the distribution of trigeminal nerve (sensory nerve for the face) and develops moderate migrainous vascular headaches (trigeminal vascular headaches). In later stages of RSD the immune system becomes disturbed, and the patient develops poor oral hygiene and dental deterioration.
Long-standing unilateral (one sided) spasm of cervical paraspinal muscles causes increased input of pain into the upper portion of the cervical spinal cord. As a result, a referred pain develops with resultant facial pain and secondary muscle spasm around the TMJ and the jaw. The same referred pain causes migraine headaches, TMJ pain and chronic stress on the teeth with dental deterioration"
Can someone please explain to me how every single doctor until now MISSED all of this?
Look at all the fun of the final stage!
1. Failure of the immune system, reduction of helper T-cell lymphocytes and elevation of killer T-cell lymphocytes.
2. Intractable hypertension changes to orthostatic hypotension.
3. Intractable generalized edema involving the abdomen, pelvis, lungs, and extremities.
4. Ulcerative skin lesions which may respond to treatment with I.V. Mannitol, I.V. Immunoglobulin, and ACTH treatments.Calcium channel blockers such as Nifedipine may be effective in treatment.
5. High risks of cancer and suicide are increased.
6. Multiple surgical procedures seem to be precipitating factors for development of stage IV.
RSD will leave significant residuals and will stay with the patient for the rest of their life under the following conditions:
1. Misdiagnosis.
2. Delayed diagnosis after two years and longer.
3. Additional trauma due to surgical procedures at the area involved with RSD (e.g., "tarsal tunnel", "carpal tunnel" surgery "rotator cuff tear" surgery).
4. Prolonged improper treatments such as ice application, inactivity, abuse of narcotics and benzodiazepans, etc.
5. Sympathectomy, amputation, or insertion of a needle in the area of scar of RSD for injections, blocks, or other purposes.
6. Prolonged litigation with resultant emotional aggravation and delay in treatment.
All right. This is me just walking away. No more.
The hard part of the cold front has just hit, so I'm gonna crawl into bed and pretend I'm not freezing and that my hands aren't starting to burn and swell despite the meds.
Saturday, February 23, 2002
Well. So. Now what?
Finally got some sleep. A little more clear-headed today.
While the drugs didn't put me to sleep, once I got there, I *stayed* asleep for a change. Woke up and got up without much more than the usual "omigod I have to move now" aching. No sign of drug hangover after beginning dose of Neurontin.
So busy being in shock yesterday over the diagnosis that I pretty much forgot to mention everything that did happen.
Nerve damage in my left hand is confirmed now. The good news is that nerves can regenerate, if they have a chance to stop being damaged. Therapy and the new meds might give me a chance to be able to hold a pen again.
My Raynaud's (which fibro can mimic) is actual Raynaud's and relatively severe. It's a problem with capillaries not doing their job right, so blood flow to extremities can be limited. Cold aggravates it something awful -- just holding a cold can of soda can spark it -- so one of the main treatments is to make sure the extremities stay warm. Gloves and socks, man.
I need to find gloves that work with it AND the RSD. So here's what I'm looking for, if you stumble across them. I need a glove without thick seams in the fingers or no fingers at all, rather like the arthritis gloves with no fingers, that don't stop at the wrist. I need ones that go to mid-forearm at least. Just cutting the fingers out of long gloves won't work because the seams will still get in the way of typing and other fine motor skill activities.
My FMS is actually relatively minor. Yes, I do have reaction in almost every trigger point when tested, but it's the RSD that really screws me over on pain. The IBS is really the worst of the fibro effects for me.
Knowing what part of the fog is and isn't fibro is easier to tell now. Now that I KNOW what to look for, I have a good idea of which is currently making me STOOPID, FMS or RSD. Fibro is more of a general ditzy fog with the blank stares and mild forgetfulness.
It's the RSD that makes me completely unable to parse and understand things sometimes -- like being able to file away and recall small details. Not being able to remember the LJ cut-text code, no matter how many times I look it up, is one of them.
RSD is usually linked to some sort of trauma (Reflex Sympathetic -- like post-traumatic stress, this attacks the nervous system). Surgeries can do it as well as injuries. Considering how many surgeries I had in a VERY short span, it's possible that sparked it. We know that I have some weird strain on my neurological system anyway. Between the Cubital Tunnel, the nerve damage in my hand, and the weird injuries linked to nerves and capilliary disfunction in my feet (the little weird bone infection in my foot spawned by them and I can't even remember what it was called anymore), it's not real surprising.
However, RSD usually manifests in the single, main traumatized limb. I have RSD, quite pronounced, in all four limbs, plus my head -- I do the weird swelling blotchy burn on my face and neck as well. RSD can spread in time across the body to other limbs if uncontrolled like mine has been.
But I didn't think about it until we'd left the doctor's office and DG brought it up. About 13 years ago or so, I had a really bad riding accident. A friend of mine and I were out on her horses and had to cross a road to get to the next field. Like dumbasses, we rode across it (two lane asphalt) instead of leading the horses. A car full of frat dicks drove by and honked.
The honk spooked my mount. I was thrown backwards off the horse, my right hand tangled in the reins. I hit the asphalt head-first. Knocked me out for a short time. Broke two ribs, my pinky (from the reins) and had one hell of a concussion. Roo said that she honestly didn't expect me to be alive at all. She said that when I hit, my head made the wet "pumpkin drop" splatting sound.
Direct trauma. Head, neck, spine. It could explain everything, including some of the more extreme memory damage. All my headaches, the migraines just getting worse, the dizziness that I've lived with for years, all of it.
It explains why none of the usual suggestions of causes and treatments haven't worked.
It explains why things like Flexeril and narcotic meds don't work. My brain doesn't process them correctly. It explains why my trembling is SO bad, why the muscles seize an I lose control of them.
Hell, I fell out of the computer chair last night when my leg seized. I hadn't had one that bad in a while. Total loss of control so bad that it literally threw me out of the chair with no chance to stop it before I hit the floor.
We'll never know what brought it on for sure. I do know that the splotchies and burning did NOT show up until after the accident, around the time that DG and I married. I've done it since we got together, which was after the fall. I don't remember it ever happening before.
It has also been manifesting in my face during that time -- which is why they always suspected lupus but I always tested negative. I get the butterfly rash, raised and puffy and red. But it's the RSD.
I am going to ask, once we get the therapy started and insurance is caught up with the program, for an MRI. It's possible that it might tell us more and help us figure out how close I am to the danger zone of stage two to three.
I don't like to lose. Liya and I have that much in common. I didn't give in when the doc told me I WOULD lose the use of my left arm and hand without surgery. I said Let's Do it without even thinking hard. Fix it.
And after the surgery, I fought to get it back. My recovery was so spectacular that I didn't have to endure the months of therapy to bring my hand back to full. I had regained full range of motion in my arm by the second visit after the staples were taken out.
If it means that half of my day is spent in therapy to try to force the RSD into remission, so be it. I'm not fool enough to think that it won't come back. I've got too much else wrong with my body, and the first new trauma can and probably will set it off all over again and then I get to repeat the therapy.
But I will not let it win.
I may be a mouse, but I'm a damned stubborn mouse.
While the drugs didn't put me to sleep, once I got there, I *stayed* asleep for a change. Woke up and got up without much more than the usual "omigod I have to move now" aching. No sign of drug hangover after beginning dose of Neurontin.
So busy being in shock yesterday over the diagnosis that I pretty much forgot to mention everything that did happen.
Nerve damage in my left hand is confirmed now. The good news is that nerves can regenerate, if they have a chance to stop being damaged. Therapy and the new meds might give me a chance to be able to hold a pen again.
My Raynaud's (which fibro can mimic) is actual Raynaud's and relatively severe. It's a problem with capillaries not doing their job right, so blood flow to extremities can be limited. Cold aggravates it something awful -- just holding a cold can of soda can spark it -- so one of the main treatments is to make sure the extremities stay warm. Gloves and socks, man.
I need to find gloves that work with it AND the RSD. So here's what I'm looking for, if you stumble across them. I need a glove without thick seams in the fingers or no fingers at all, rather like the arthritis gloves with no fingers, that don't stop at the wrist. I need ones that go to mid-forearm at least. Just cutting the fingers out of long gloves won't work because the seams will still get in the way of typing and other fine motor skill activities.
My FMS is actually relatively minor. Yes, I do have reaction in almost every trigger point when tested, but it's the RSD that really screws me over on pain. The IBS is really the worst of the fibro effects for me.
Knowing what part of the fog is and isn't fibro is easier to tell now. Now that I KNOW what to look for, I have a good idea of which is currently making me STOOPID, FMS or RSD. Fibro is more of a general ditzy fog with the blank stares and mild forgetfulness.
It's the RSD that makes me completely unable to parse and understand things sometimes -- like being able to file away and recall small details. Not being able to remember the LJ cut-text code, no matter how many times I look it up, is one of them.
RSD is usually linked to some sort of trauma (Reflex Sympathetic -- like post-traumatic stress, this attacks the nervous system). Surgeries can do it as well as injuries. Considering how many surgeries I had in a VERY short span, it's possible that sparked it. We know that I have some weird strain on my neurological system anyway. Between the Cubital Tunnel, the nerve damage in my hand, and the weird injuries linked to nerves and capilliary disfunction in my feet (the little weird bone infection in my foot spawned by them and I can't even remember what it was called anymore), it's not real surprising.
However, RSD usually manifests in the single, main traumatized limb. I have RSD, quite pronounced, in all four limbs, plus my head -- I do the weird swelling blotchy burn on my face and neck as well. RSD can spread in time across the body to other limbs if uncontrolled like mine has been.
But I didn't think about it until we'd left the doctor's office and DG brought it up. About 13 years ago or so, I had a really bad riding accident. A friend of mine and I were out on her horses and had to cross a road to get to the next field. Like dumbasses, we rode across it (two lane asphalt) instead of leading the horses. A car full of frat dicks drove by and honked.
The honk spooked my mount. I was thrown backwards off the horse, my right hand tangled in the reins. I hit the asphalt head-first. Knocked me out for a short time. Broke two ribs, my pinky (from the reins) and had one hell of a concussion. Roo said that she honestly didn't expect me to be alive at all. She said that when I hit, my head made the wet "pumpkin drop" splatting sound.
Direct trauma. Head, neck, spine. It could explain everything, including some of the more extreme memory damage. All my headaches, the migraines just getting worse, the dizziness that I've lived with for years, all of it.
It explains why none of the usual suggestions of causes and treatments haven't worked.
It explains why things like Flexeril and narcotic meds don't work. My brain doesn't process them correctly. It explains why my trembling is SO bad, why the muscles seize an I lose control of them.
Hell, I fell out of the computer chair last night when my leg seized. I hadn't had one that bad in a while. Total loss of control so bad that it literally threw me out of the chair with no chance to stop it before I hit the floor.
We'll never know what brought it on for sure. I do know that the splotchies and burning did NOT show up until after the accident, around the time that DG and I married. I've done it since we got together, which was after the fall. I don't remember it ever happening before.
It has also been manifesting in my face during that time -- which is why they always suspected lupus but I always tested negative. I get the butterfly rash, raised and puffy and red. But it's the RSD.
I am going to ask, once we get the therapy started and insurance is caught up with the program, for an MRI. It's possible that it might tell us more and help us figure out how close I am to the danger zone of stage two to three.
I don't like to lose. Liya and I have that much in common. I didn't give in when the doc told me I WOULD lose the use of my left arm and hand without surgery. I said Let's Do it without even thinking hard. Fix it.
And after the surgery, I fought to get it back. My recovery was so spectacular that I didn't have to endure the months of therapy to bring my hand back to full. I had regained full range of motion in my arm by the second visit after the staples were taken out.
If it means that half of my day is spent in therapy to try to force the RSD into remission, so be it. I'm not fool enough to think that it won't come back. I've got too much else wrong with my body, and the first new trauma can and probably will set it off all over again and then I get to repeat the therapy.
But I will not let it win.
I may be a mouse, but I'm a damned stubborn mouse.
Pretending to be
Just me, Pretending To Be.
Well. Nothing has really changed. Really.
I didn't just find out that I have something terminal, that I'll finally get lucky and the miserable pain will actually get to end -- how's that for a silver lining, but no.
I finally have a diagnosis that EVERYONE will take seriously on top of other Bad Things. The words "possible remission if we've reached it in time" are scary.
BUT Talk about no bloody respect. No, it can't be nifty and KILL me or anything, no, it's happy with just MAIMING my fat white ass and letting me go. Like branding a fucking cow, here's your wheelchair, mooooooooove along.
"Might as well put a potato on a string and drag it through South Boston ..."
Nothing has changed. I'm still in the same pain I was. I'm not any more fragile, I'm not going to suddenly crack and go climb a clock tower (face it, I couldn't make it up ten steps) or drop dead.
I'm still me, for whatever that's worth.
God has seen fit to once again prove to me, however, that not only does he have a really really sadistic sense of humour, but he really likes to draaaaaaag the joke out.
I have Four, count them, Four conditions that will not just up and vanish. Asthma is fickle. Fibro has No Cure. Raynaud's has no cure, plus the groovy possibility of bodily dismemberment -- call the gang, green is here. RSD can take all four of my limbs away from me, eat away at my brain and leave me as some sarcastic fat chick in a wheelchair with cybernetic drug pumps stashed in her body.
They'll push me and stab me and burn me and scar me until something ELSE finally makes me drop dead. How @$&*#$ ironic.
Who the @#$*& comes up with this? What do they do, have some sort of Predestination Bingo Night, Winner #$#*& takes all?
Coldsmoke also wants to know why the same doofus that cooked up these hairbrained plot twists of mayhem had to sink the final nail in the coffin with blue balls.
BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!
Because you don't even get a coffin, in fact, you just might live forever (or at least it will seem that way) because you're going to 112, tooling around in your little wheelchair cybercoach, and some fat bastard in a bus is going to run your ass down just as you finally beat that very boss in ....
Aw, game over.
Uh. Shit. This was not where this post was meant to go, but there it is.
I never really contacted with the denial stage here. I went from relieved to stunned, to borderline panic to bloody annoyance and finally to generally taking the whole thing in with the same sarcastic crap that's seen me through the last thirty years and seems determined to drag me kicking and screaming through the next thirty more.
If you got to laugh -- or at least crack a grin, yes, you the Doo of Voo -- then I guess my real work here is done.
And until that time when the thundering grey dog comes bearing down on your ass with all the forces of heaven and hell behind it and you're looking for a port in any storm and not even God appears to be listening, you just keep your hand on the grip because when you're facing The Man at last, you'll know he's finally played his last card. You just do what old Jack Burton does ...
Oh come on, what? Do you want to live forever?
I'm Channeling Me, Pretending To Be
pooka who would like to point out to the world at large that SHE IS STILL FREAKING AWAKE!
Well. Nothing has really changed. Really.
I didn't just find out that I have something terminal, that I'll finally get lucky and the miserable pain will actually get to end -- how's that for a silver lining, but no.
I finally have a diagnosis that EVERYONE will take seriously on top of other Bad Things. The words "possible remission if we've reached it in time" are scary.
BUT Talk about no bloody respect. No, it can't be nifty and KILL me or anything, no, it's happy with just MAIMING my fat white ass and letting me go. Like branding a fucking cow, here's your wheelchair, mooooooooove along.
"Might as well put a potato on a string and drag it through South Boston ..."
Nothing has changed. I'm still in the same pain I was. I'm not any more fragile, I'm not going to suddenly crack and go climb a clock tower (face it, I couldn't make it up ten steps) or drop dead.
I'm still me, for whatever that's worth.
God has seen fit to once again prove to me, however, that not only does he have a really really sadistic sense of humour, but he really likes to draaaaaaag the joke out.
I have Four, count them, Four conditions that will not just up and vanish. Asthma is fickle. Fibro has No Cure. Raynaud's has no cure, plus the groovy possibility of bodily dismemberment -- call the gang, green is here. RSD can take all four of my limbs away from me, eat away at my brain and leave me as some sarcastic fat chick in a wheelchair with cybernetic drug pumps stashed in her body.
They'll push me and stab me and burn me and scar me until something ELSE finally makes me drop dead. How @$&*#$ ironic.
Who the @#$*& comes up with this? What do they do, have some sort of Predestination Bingo Night, Winner #$#*& takes all?
Coldsmoke also wants to know why the same doofus that cooked up these hairbrained plot twists of mayhem had to sink the final nail in the coffin with blue balls.
BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!
Because you don't even get a coffin, in fact, you just might live forever (or at least it will seem that way) because you're going to 112, tooling around in your little wheelchair cybercoach, and some fat bastard in a bus is going to run your ass down just as you finally beat that very boss in ....
Aw, game over.
Uh. Shit. This was not where this post was meant to go, but there it is.
I never really contacted with the denial stage here. I went from relieved to stunned, to borderline panic to bloody annoyance and finally to generally taking the whole thing in with the same sarcastic crap that's seen me through the last thirty years and seems determined to drag me kicking and screaming through the next thirty more.
If you got to laugh -- or at least crack a grin, yes, you the Doo of Voo -- then I guess my real work here is done.
And until that time when the thundering grey dog comes bearing down on your ass with all the forces of heaven and hell behind it and you're looking for a port in any storm and not even God appears to be listening, you just keep your hand on the grip because when you're facing The Man at last, you'll know he's finally played his last card. You just do what old Jack Burton does ...
Oh come on, what? Do you want to live forever?
I'm Channeling Me, Pretending To Be
pooka who would like to point out to the world at large that SHE IS STILL FREAKING AWAKE!
Friday, February 22, 2002
Take 200 of these, and don't call me
I've seen gourmet recipes shorter than the instructions on my new meds.
Prednisone to start to control the RSD. Yum. Nasty foul stuff. 60 tabs, well, at least I'll be breathing well. Label print was switch to a font smaller than the "X refills remaining" text to fit it all on.
Excuse me, but I'd like to make claim that I deserve to use the F word here, thank you.
FUCK! The damn bottle Prednisone has a worse coating than the dose-pak ... ie, it powders slightly in mere movement, so when you take one ... WHAM, you gotta shave your tongue and it feels like the floor of a NY movie theater. This is gonna be a LONG three weeks.
I'm currently considering Death as an option.
Itty Bitty Elavils to up me from 75 to 100. She was Not Happy with the wussy Elavil dosage at all, especially after finding out how long I'd been stuck there with it not helping. She gave me enough Elavil at 25 mg that I can take 125 if the 100 doesn't work after a few days.
I also got ... more Zanaflex (YAY, SAMPLES!) -- which Cigna should cover automatically because RSD is a seizure-class disorder.
And the crowning touch for my nighttime digestion ... Neurontin. Starting at 100, and working up to 200, then 300, all in itty bitty precise directions on the itty bitty label.
Dude, I CAN'T fog and forget this. She is SO cool to cover my ass like that.
Course, it doesn't change the fact that YES, I AM still awake!
Or that it still hurts to move. Or that it still hurts to NOT move.
But ... having the spasm/seizure swelling splotchy scarlet and purple Pooka furnace kick in RIGHT THERE at the office ... is Priceless.
For everything else, there's a really big hammer.
Take one as needed.
Prednisone to start to control the RSD. Yum. Nasty foul stuff. 60 tabs, well, at least I'll be breathing well. Label print was switch to a font smaller than the "X refills remaining" text to fit it all on.
Excuse me, but I'd like to make claim that I deserve to use the F word here, thank you.
FUCK! The damn bottle Prednisone has a worse coating than the dose-pak ... ie, it powders slightly in mere movement, so when you take one ... WHAM, you gotta shave your tongue and it feels like the floor of a NY movie theater. This is gonna be a LONG three weeks.
I'm currently considering Death as an option.
Itty Bitty Elavils to up me from 75 to 100. She was Not Happy with the wussy Elavil dosage at all, especially after finding out how long I'd been stuck there with it not helping. She gave me enough Elavil at 25 mg that I can take 125 if the 100 doesn't work after a few days.
I also got ... more Zanaflex (YAY, SAMPLES!) -- which Cigna should cover automatically because RSD is a seizure-class disorder.
And the crowning touch for my nighttime digestion ... Neurontin. Starting at 100, and working up to 200, then 300, all in itty bitty precise directions on the itty bitty label.
Dude, I CAN'T fog and forget this. She is SO cool to cover my ass like that.
Course, it doesn't change the fact that YES, I AM still awake!
Or that it still hurts to move. Or that it still hurts to NOT move.
But ... having the spasm/seizure swelling splotchy scarlet and purple Pooka furnace kick in RIGHT THERE at the office ... is Priceless.
For everything else, there's a really big hammer.
Take one as needed.
Welcome to the Last Day of the ... no, wait
Okay. Some days you really wonder why you crawled out of bed. Especially when there's a doctor's appointment involved.
Yes, the Pooka has Fibromyalgia. It's a "minor concern" right now ...
Think and chew on THAT phrase for a minute.
Yes, I have confirmed Raynaud's Phenomenon, Primary -- severe. "Why in God's name do you not have socks on your feet, girl?" I got my butt chewed for Birks. Course, DG DID lie to me about how warm it was outside. I knew I had it, and knew it was pretty bad, but even she seemed impressed by the degree. My hands and feet performed their gold medal skate for the doc, doing the whole shebang.
Cuz, um, Raynaud's can cause gangrene and your fingers and toes can rot off if you don't keep them warm enough so the blood will circulate. I'm supposed to wear gloves and socks as long as it's below 70-75. Like, fingertip to elbow gloves to help with ...
This is where I sort of lose things.
The Pooka has RSD. Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy.
It doesn't get any better than how it sounds right there.
This post gets really long after this, going into details about RSD.
RSD is often progressive. It's also incurable. It can be treated, but many patients (that don't kill themselves, I looooove how the notes point that out -- "Emotional depression developed to such a degree that suicide was the final outcome in many of the cases." -- yeah, nice) end up in wheelchairs, with implanted drug pumps just to make it day to day.
Burning Pain, aching pain, shooting pain, swelling, limited mobility, hyper-sensitivity to slightest touch, withdrawing from commotion, short term memory loss, depression, living on a tight rope between doing too much, causing pain, and doing too little, causing pain, these and many more are symptoms of Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy Syndrome.
As RSD progresses, the abnormal pain of the sympathetic nervous system has an effect on other areas of the body and can result in total disability as muscles, bones, skin and the autonomic immune system become involved.
The first indication of RSD is prolonged pain usually more severe than the injury. The symptoms are severe burning pain in a localized area, intense sensitivity to temperature and light touch, and a color change to the skin.
There are several stages to RSD, which progress at different rates in different people. Initially, there is swelling and redness in the affected area.
Next, the area becomes blue and cold, with increased pain and stiffness of ligaments and joints, and Osteoporosis may become evident.
Finally, there may be a wasting of affected muscles, contraction of tendons, and a definite withering of the affected limb. In all of the stages, severe chronic pain continues to be a major complaint.
Many patients who are not treated early will experience spread of the disease and this may become a lifelong problem. Even with early treatment this may become a chronic condition.
I wasn't caught early. I'm between Stage One and Stage Two of the syndrome.
Treatment can send RSD into remission. It may subside for years and then recur with a new injury.
There are many other symptoms that an RSD/CRPS patient may have, including movement disorders (difficulty starting movement, increased tone, increased reflexes, tremor, muscle spasms), weakness, fatigue, skin rashes, frequent infections, migraine headaches and others could be found as more data is accumulated.
(Remember my mystery flush and hives? I was going into a flare up. Now I know. And knowing is half the battle. Too bad I'm gonna lose the war.)
CLINICAL SYMPTOMS OF RSD
Pain is the first and primary complaint, described as extremely severe and burning & aching in nature
Swelling and joint tenderness
Loss or diminished motor function
Muscle spasms
Increased sweating
Changes in skin temperature and color
Bone softening - patchy osteoporosis
The disease causes constriction of vertebral arteries resulting in poor circulation to the brain stem, this in turn causes poor focusing of eye muscles, and poor balance, dizziness and migraines.
This constant pain in the limbic system (Frontal and Temporal lobes) causes poor memory, irritability as well as insomnia. Antidepressants such as Trazodone or desipramine and better control of the pain seem to improve these symptoms. This goes along with paravertebral and epidural blocks.
The person suffering may develop abnormal function of the sympathetic system causing constriction of the blood vessels to the brain. When the blood vessels are constricted in the distribution of vertebral arteries in the cervical spine and in the distribution of the blood vessels providing circulation for the brainstem, the person develops attacks of dizziness, white spots, migraines and difficulty focusing with the eyes. All of this is due to the brainstem dysfunction, which has the responsibility of coordinating our eye movements.
Many patients develop hostility towards any individual coming in close proximity, reflex from trying to protect affected hypersensitive limbs from contact.
So.
I get to deal with fibro which is aggravated by the RSD. Mmm, double the symptoms, double the pain, double your FwordI'mstillnotusing fun.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go indulge in a completely out-of-character screaming fit of hysterics.
.... appends.
NO, wait, there's more! I forgot the one bright point (other than an answer for so much unexplained and ignored symptoms that have been wrong with me for years).
I was told to .... NOT avoid caffeine. Yes, yes, brothers and sisters of the sacred bean. Coffee may actually HELP the Pooka, balancing out all the weirdness that makes me shake and shimmy like a big ole vat of Jello.
No, wait. That was just me trying to put on my jeans. Never mind, carry on.
Yes, the Pooka has Fibromyalgia. It's a "minor concern" right now ...
Think and chew on THAT phrase for a minute.
Yes, I have confirmed Raynaud's Phenomenon, Primary -- severe. "Why in God's name do you not have socks on your feet, girl?" I got my butt chewed for Birks. Course, DG DID lie to me about how warm it was outside. I knew I had it, and knew it was pretty bad, but even she seemed impressed by the degree. My hands and feet performed their gold medal skate for the doc, doing the whole shebang.
Cuz, um, Raynaud's can cause gangrene and your fingers and toes can rot off if you don't keep them warm enough so the blood will circulate. I'm supposed to wear gloves and socks as long as it's below 70-75. Like, fingertip to elbow gloves to help with ...
This is where I sort of lose things.
The Pooka has RSD. Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy.
It doesn't get any better than how it sounds right there.
This post gets really long after this, going into details about RSD.
RSD is often progressive. It's also incurable. It can be treated, but many patients (that don't kill themselves, I looooove how the notes point that out -- "Emotional depression developed to such a degree that suicide was the final outcome in many of the cases." -- yeah, nice) end up in wheelchairs, with implanted drug pumps just to make it day to day.
Burning Pain, aching pain, shooting pain, swelling, limited mobility, hyper-sensitivity to slightest touch, withdrawing from commotion, short term memory loss, depression, living on a tight rope between doing too much, causing pain, and doing too little, causing pain, these and many more are symptoms of Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy Syndrome.
As RSD progresses, the abnormal pain of the sympathetic nervous system has an effect on other areas of the body and can result in total disability as muscles, bones, skin and the autonomic immune system become involved.
The first indication of RSD is prolonged pain usually more severe than the injury. The symptoms are severe burning pain in a localized area, intense sensitivity to temperature and light touch, and a color change to the skin.
There are several stages to RSD, which progress at different rates in different people. Initially, there is swelling and redness in the affected area.
Next, the area becomes blue and cold, with increased pain and stiffness of ligaments and joints, and Osteoporosis may become evident.
Finally, there may be a wasting of affected muscles, contraction of tendons, and a definite withering of the affected limb. In all of the stages, severe chronic pain continues to be a major complaint.
Many patients who are not treated early will experience spread of the disease and this may become a lifelong problem. Even with early treatment this may become a chronic condition.
I wasn't caught early. I'm between Stage One and Stage Two of the syndrome.
Treatment can send RSD into remission. It may subside for years and then recur with a new injury.
There are many other symptoms that an RSD/CRPS patient may have, including movement disorders (difficulty starting movement, increased tone, increased reflexes, tremor, muscle spasms), weakness, fatigue, skin rashes, frequent infections, migraine headaches and others could be found as more data is accumulated.
(Remember my mystery flush and hives? I was going into a flare up. Now I know. And knowing is half the battle. Too bad I'm gonna lose the war.)
CLINICAL SYMPTOMS OF RSD
Pain is the first and primary complaint, described as extremely severe and burning & aching in nature
Swelling and joint tenderness
Loss or diminished motor function
Muscle spasms
Increased sweating
Changes in skin temperature and color
Bone softening - patchy osteoporosis
The disease causes constriction of vertebral arteries resulting in poor circulation to the brain stem, this in turn causes poor focusing of eye muscles, and poor balance, dizziness and migraines.
This constant pain in the limbic system (Frontal and Temporal lobes) causes poor memory, irritability as well as insomnia. Antidepressants such as Trazodone or desipramine and better control of the pain seem to improve these symptoms. This goes along with paravertebral and epidural blocks.
The person suffering may develop abnormal function of the sympathetic system causing constriction of the blood vessels to the brain. When the blood vessels are constricted in the distribution of vertebral arteries in the cervical spine and in the distribution of the blood vessels providing circulation for the brainstem, the person develops attacks of dizziness, white spots, migraines and difficulty focusing with the eyes. All of this is due to the brainstem dysfunction, which has the responsibility of coordinating our eye movements.
Many patients develop hostility towards any individual coming in close proximity, reflex from trying to protect affected hypersensitive limbs from contact.
So.
I get to deal with fibro which is aggravated by the RSD. Mmm, double the symptoms, double the pain, double your FwordI'mstillnotusing fun.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go indulge in a completely out-of-character screaming fit of hysterics.
.... appends.
NO, wait, there's more! I forgot the one bright point (other than an answer for so much unexplained and ignored symptoms that have been wrong with me for years).
I was told to .... NOT avoid caffeine. Yes, yes, brothers and sisters of the sacred bean. Coffee may actually HELP the Pooka, balancing out all the weirdness that makes me shake and shimmy like a big ole vat of Jello.
No, wait. That was just me trying to put on my jeans. Never mind, carry on.
Tuesday, February 19, 2002
Half a Brain Sandwich
Apathy. Ya know I couldn't care less.
I think that's a nice working title.
Feh. All right, I'm really only posting to give Sammi something new to read. Not that this will break any literary records or set some sort of fecking standard for intelligent posting.
That's Witchy's fault. Now I'm doing the whole fecking fecking thing.
I need another quirk like I need another hole in my head.
Shit. I'm starting to put the feckin . between lines like I do in Android. Too much feckin time spent in there. Had to remove 3 . so far from here.
Cuz ya know I need another period like ...
Prolly should look up the early symptoms of menopause. This is weird.
Had to delete another fecking . there.
A Luna Bar, 2 liters of Mr Pibb and a pack of clove cigarettes has yet to be proven effective for anyone's RDA. I don't recommend it to anyone, either.
.
Dammit.
.
Double fecking dammit.
.
Okay, just shoot me. I don't care, fine, if they wanna be there I'll just bloody well let them stay so there how the hell do ya like them apples, huh?
.
What happened to the thousands of overrun Turbie Twist commercials? Not that I mind the absence, it's just weird to mark the fads and fluctuations of consumerism on television. Maybe it's just my not watching much TV that's to blame.
.
Mmmm, stomach cramp. Fibromyalgia taps me on the belly, just to make sure that I know it's still here.
.
Not gone yet.
.
Nope, I'm still here.
.
Okay, I'm leaving now.
.
Psych!
I feel like half of a brain sandwich.
Starting to think Sybil's monitor problem deals more with a weird memory leak/strain. The green dancing ants don't show up during boot, or on any of the logo screens. They were here before my reboot, and are gone after it. Kinda weird.
I know its not the card, the other monitor was fine until it would no longer remain connected right.
"Ginger Spice closed mouthed on eating disorder" Do you suppose the irony in this headline was intentional? Seems a bit too clever for modern journalism.
Microsoft is being sued again. Anyone surprised? Dint think so.
Women's Team USA is kicking hockey butt. Yay.
Now where the hell are all the applications for a new lackey? Do you people have any idea how hard it is to be an efficient Evil Overlord without any fecking lackeys? What the hell is up with that?
I want my fucking minions, dammit.
I think that's a nice working title.
Feh. All right, I'm really only posting to give Sammi something new to read. Not that this will break any literary records or set some sort of fecking standard for intelligent posting.
That's Witchy's fault. Now I'm doing the whole fecking fecking thing.
I need another quirk like I need another hole in my head.
Shit. I'm starting to put the feckin . between lines like I do in Android. Too much feckin time spent in there. Had to remove 3 . so far from here.
Cuz ya know I need another period like ...
Prolly should look up the early symptoms of menopause. This is weird.
Had to delete another fecking . there.
A Luna Bar, 2 liters of Mr Pibb and a pack of clove cigarettes has yet to be proven effective for anyone's RDA. I don't recommend it to anyone, either.
.
Dammit.
.
Double fecking dammit.
.
Okay, just shoot me. I don't care, fine, if they wanna be there I'll just bloody well let them stay so there how the hell do ya like them apples, huh?
.
What happened to the thousands of overrun Turbie Twist commercials? Not that I mind the absence, it's just weird to mark the fads and fluctuations of consumerism on television. Maybe it's just my not watching much TV that's to blame.
.
Mmmm, stomach cramp. Fibromyalgia taps me on the belly, just to make sure that I know it's still here.
.
Not gone yet.
.
Nope, I'm still here.
.
Okay, I'm leaving now.
.
Psych!
I feel like half of a brain sandwich.
Starting to think Sybil's monitor problem deals more with a weird memory leak/strain. The green dancing ants don't show up during boot, or on any of the logo screens. They were here before my reboot, and are gone after it. Kinda weird.
I know its not the card, the other monitor was fine until it would no longer remain connected right.
"Ginger Spice closed mouthed on eating disorder" Do you suppose the irony in this headline was intentional? Seems a bit too clever for modern journalism.
Microsoft is being sued again. Anyone surprised? Dint think so.
Women's Team USA is kicking hockey butt. Yay.
Now where the hell are all the applications for a new lackey? Do you people have any idea how hard it is to be an efficient Evil Overlord without any fecking lackeys? What the hell is up with that?
I want my fucking minions, dammit.
Saturday, February 02, 2002
Cluex4, sold here, for only 19.95
There are people in the world who Do Not Get It.
Some of these people never will Get It. Ever.
Some have to be hit with a very heavy Cluex4 to Get it. Even then, they may have trouble with Getting It.
There are those who just haven't heard it put the right way, and so do not Get It but have a good chance of both Getting and Retaining It.
For those, here is a short, quick and dirty primer.
1. The world does not revolve around you.
2. No matter how hard you try, the world will never revolve around you. You're a person, not a red giant.
3. Attempting to force others to treat you as though the world revolved around you will only leave you lonely, bitter, and living with many many cats that will feast on your flesh when you die lonely, bitter, and forgotten.
4. Attempting to force others to treat you as though the world revolved around you will seriously Piss People Off.
5. Nobody likes a busybody. Really. Remember Mrs Kravitz? If you're too young to remember, we're too old to give a fuck. Walk away, m'kay?
6. The world does not revolve around you.
7. Approximately 99.9999999% of the world couldn't possibly care any less about your saga. No matter how you dress it and apply makeup, save the drama for your mama because everyone else is basically already bored shitless with hearing you do the same song and dance every fucking single day.
7b. You can only do the same thing so many times and still have someone believe it. People do talk. People do remember. It's called a Reputation. I know that's a big word. It means something important.
7c. Two or three different faces in public just makes you look stupid. Saying one thing on one front, then something entirely different on another, and saving a completely different face for another -- while keeping all public -- not only makes you look stupid, but everyone will eventually catch on that you're just about as sharp as a sack of wet mice because you can't keep your story straight.
7d. Lies don't get better with more embellishment. You will get caught.
8. "No," really means "No." It does not mean Yes. It does not mean Maybe. It does not mean "please whine at me till I change my mind." It does not mean "please stalk me and follow me everywhere and give me no rest at all until I finally tell you yes out of sheer fear for my life, or change my name, face, and phone number to avoid you."
No means No. No. N-O. Look it up sometime.
9. The world does not revolve around you.
10. The world does not revolve around you. I cannot stress this point enough.
Say it with me. "The world does not revolve around me."
Knew you could do it.
Some of these people never will Get It. Ever.
Some have to be hit with a very heavy Cluex4 to Get it. Even then, they may have trouble with Getting It.
There are those who just haven't heard it put the right way, and so do not Get It but have a good chance of both Getting and Retaining It.
For those, here is a short, quick and dirty primer.
1. The world does not revolve around you.
2. No matter how hard you try, the world will never revolve around you. You're a person, not a red giant.
3. Attempting to force others to treat you as though the world revolved around you will only leave you lonely, bitter, and living with many many cats that will feast on your flesh when you die lonely, bitter, and forgotten.
4. Attempting to force others to treat you as though the world revolved around you will seriously Piss People Off.
5. Nobody likes a busybody. Really. Remember Mrs Kravitz? If you're too young to remember, we're too old to give a fuck. Walk away, m'kay?
6. The world does not revolve around you.
7. Approximately 99.9999999% of the world couldn't possibly care any less about your saga. No matter how you dress it and apply makeup, save the drama for your mama because everyone else is basically already bored shitless with hearing you do the same song and dance every fucking single day.
7b. You can only do the same thing so many times and still have someone believe it. People do talk. People do remember. It's called a Reputation. I know that's a big word. It means something important.
7c. Two or three different faces in public just makes you look stupid. Saying one thing on one front, then something entirely different on another, and saving a completely different face for another -- while keeping all public -- not only makes you look stupid, but everyone will eventually catch on that you're just about as sharp as a sack of wet mice because you can't keep your story straight.
7d. Lies don't get better with more embellishment. You will get caught.
8. "No," really means "No." It does not mean Yes. It does not mean Maybe. It does not mean "please whine at me till I change my mind." It does not mean "please stalk me and follow me everywhere and give me no rest at all until I finally tell you yes out of sheer fear for my life, or change my name, face, and phone number to avoid you."
No means No. No. N-O. Look it up sometime.
9. The world does not revolve around you.
10. The world does not revolve around you. I cannot stress this point enough.
Say it with me. "The world does not revolve around me."
Knew you could do it.
Wednesday, January 30, 2002
Cabin Fever
Thing 2 has been repeating "Hokey Pokey" over and over and over and over with no other words for the last half hour solid. Try to imagine this in your head, in total monotone, with no pause for breathing.
Thing 1 is screaming like someone stabbed her in the foot and pulling her hair and throwing paper because her sister won't shut up to let her do homework. Had Thing 1 come home and done her homework instead of running off for "rehearsal" for the talent show that I was basically told I couldn't attend (ahem), this wouldn't be a problem. Now it's after her bedtime, and she's still screwing around AND fighting with her sister.
DG won't stop screaming at the kids for not shutting up, but otherwise goes right back to his game without actually doing anything other than screaming.
Me, I'm looking up plane flights outta here.
Is this what you call Cabin Fever?
Thing 1 is screaming like someone stabbed her in the foot and pulling her hair and throwing paper because her sister won't shut up to let her do homework. Had Thing 1 come home and done her homework instead of running off for "rehearsal" for the talent show that I was basically told I couldn't attend (ahem), this wouldn't be a problem. Now it's after her bedtime, and she's still screwing around AND fighting with her sister.
DG won't stop screaming at the kids for not shutting up, but otherwise goes right back to his game without actually doing anything other than screaming.
Me, I'm looking up plane flights outta here.
Is this what you call Cabin Fever?
Tuesday, January 29, 2002
Wonder Fiend Powers, Activate!
Thing 1: "Mom, when she goes to school next year, will I have to walk her across the street to kindergarten?"
Me: (brushing Thing 2's hair) "Well, Daddy will probably help walk her over at first, but yes, you'll be walking together."
Thing 2: (turning in mid-brush) "I don't HAVE to go to school. Not with HER."
Me: (sigh, here we go again) "But honey, you need to go to school to learn so you *can* take over the world."
Thing 2: (sighs, rolls eyes at me) "Duh, MOM, I have SPELLS that will do that for me!"
---
Thing 2: "Aha, I was co-rrect!"
Me: "You're a fiend."
Thing 2: "I am a co-rrect fiend!" (squinty evil eyes) "Cuz I am SMART!"
Me: (brushing Thing 2's hair) "Well, Daddy will probably help walk her over at first, but yes, you'll be walking together."
Thing 2: (turning in mid-brush) "I don't HAVE to go to school. Not with HER."
Me: (sigh, here we go again) "But honey, you need to go to school to learn so you *can* take over the world."
Thing 2: (sighs, rolls eyes at me) "Duh, MOM, I have SPELLS that will do that for me!"
---
Thing 2: "Aha, I was co-rrect!"
Me: "You're a fiend."
Thing 2: "I am a co-rrect fiend!" (squinty evil eyes) "Cuz I am SMART!"
Monday, January 28, 2002
Epic!
I have a confession to make.
The Pooka does have a vast weakness for epics of a grandiose scale. Nay, not even a weakness for that is too simple, too mild. It is a passion, one carried from womb to now when the womb used and worn out is my own.
(The Pooka hath also benefited somewhat from the merits of a good stiff glass of Tully tonight, so bear with her.)
Epics indeed, on the scale of the greats like Tolkien, of movies grand and limitless like the Great Escape, or Good, the Bad and the Ugly, or even the humourous epic of It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. My tolerance for such vast visions is limitless. I am the watcher, the subservient idolator ready to cast my soul to the wind to earn the favour of yet another epic narrative to capture my attention.
It has been a night to encapsulate such visions. A young Clint Eastwood, grim, impassive, but with that subtle impishness in those blue eyes that drags you merrily into the full grasp of a true rogue at work ... to the brother of that same vision, as the Cooler King denies his imprisonment with every bounce against concrete walls.
For the novice, for the poseur: I am their Bitch. Period.
Give to me the illustrative epic. I do not wish for a trite happy ending, but for the ending as it is written for the stars and not for the frail psyche of a human spirit. Give me death, give me life, give me the grandest of struggles to both surpass and embrace them both.
I submit, I surrender.
Good night.
The Pooka does have a vast weakness for epics of a grandiose scale. Nay, not even a weakness for that is too simple, too mild. It is a passion, one carried from womb to now when the womb used and worn out is my own.
(The Pooka hath also benefited somewhat from the merits of a good stiff glass of Tully tonight, so bear with her.)
Epics indeed, on the scale of the greats like Tolkien, of movies grand and limitless like the Great Escape, or Good, the Bad and the Ugly, or even the humourous epic of It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. My tolerance for such vast visions is limitless. I am the watcher, the subservient idolator ready to cast my soul to the wind to earn the favour of yet another epic narrative to capture my attention.
It has been a night to encapsulate such visions. A young Clint Eastwood, grim, impassive, but with that subtle impishness in those blue eyes that drags you merrily into the full grasp of a true rogue at work ... to the brother of that same vision, as the Cooler King denies his imprisonment with every bounce against concrete walls.
For the novice, for the poseur: I am their Bitch. Period.
Give to me the illustrative epic. I do not wish for a trite happy ending, but for the ending as it is written for the stars and not for the frail psyche of a human spirit. Give me death, give me life, give me the grandest of struggles to both surpass and embrace them both.
I submit, I surrender.
Good night.
Thursday, January 24, 2002
A Look Back - A Pooka's Retrospective
I remember the exact day in my life when I knew that something was really, really wrong with me.
My Junior year of high school, my insomnia and nightmares hit a real peak for me. I couldn't sleep, I couldn't pay attention, my grades slipped. I was miserable. I was also confusing the hell out of everyone. I couldn't sleep, but I was always exhausted and trying to sleep. To me, that made sense. If you can't, you get tired, and you try, but you can't, so you get worse and so on.
Friday night is prime time for high school teens -- no school the next day, and the week is over.
Me, I came home around 3:30, took off my clothes, and crawled in bed. This time, I was so painfully exhausted (everything HURT) that I actually fell asleep.
And stayed that way.
It was around 9 that night when they finally found me. The door to my room had been slightly closed, but open enough that you could see most of the room and that obviously the lights were off. They'd found my books, so they knew I'd at least BEEN home.
No one ever thought of looking in bed.
My boyfriend was in a total panic (I remember him trying not to cry when he found me, yes, HE looked, not my parents), and my parents were, not surprisingly, mad.
I got yelled at for it. By my parents. For being home where I was supposed to be. Hello, Houston? We have a problem.
But I knew then that something really had to be wrong. I wasn't crazy. All the weird aches, weird reactions to medications, the insomnia ... something had to be there.
It took them another 15 years to give it a name.
Fibromyalgia. Fibromyalgic Syndrome. FMS. Fibrositis.
It has a lot of names, but the symptoms are all pretty much the same. Only the severity changes. Each one of us handles the disease differently, each one of us has our own magical combination that will ease it and make it roll over and behave. Not all of us find that combination. Not all of us are taken seriously -- some never are.
It's a disease that affects mostly women, women in the child-bearing "Valium" Stepford years. Think of how long it took pre-menstrual syndrome to even be acknowledged, much less accepted as a reality. In a field where men still dominate, if you can't see it, smell it, or taste it, it's not real. When you can't stab someone with a needle or take an x-ray of it, it's not real.
I faced a lot of that. I faced even more of it before I got to the point where even an idiot could see that something was painfully wrong with me.
I was a hypochondriac. I was just lazy. I just wanted attention.
No, I just wanted to go to sleep and wake up like every normal person on the planet. I wanted to be able to go and run and climb and play without hurting, without knots tearing at my limbs and making them spasm and cramp. I wanted to be able to be with others without catching some virus that someone they were in contact with had, and they only passed it on without becoming sick themselves.
I wanted to be normal, and I never was.
Throw being massively hypoglycemic into the blend, and you get a real mess. My blood sugar was the cause of SO much pain for me and those around me. I would wake up with morning readings of 30 and 40. I remember a reading of 19. Damn near enough to kill a person.
I don't remember a lot of what happened during those swings. I faintly remember a lot of anger, tantrums, hysterics. I remember a lot of bruises from fainting, a lot of laughter and hard looks when I'd pass out in class, or stagger into a doorframe because I was too dizzy to keep my balance. I remember having a lot of arguments with a lot of people, and I know I wasn't even remotely coherent or logical. I just don't remember any of the details. They're lost to me.
I only remember that half an hour or so after someone finally stuffed food in my mouth, I felt better. Logic returned. I'd cry and apologize and never know why.
Cocktail for a maniac. Recipe for a broken heart.
Or classic early fibro symptoms.
The doctors were close, though. They had the right idea over the years, they just never managed to find the right solution. I give them a lot of credit for that. Some of the doctors really did try: Unfortunately, none of the results fit the bill.
I've been tested for lupus more times than the scar on my arm cares to tell. I've been repeatedly tested for rheumatoid arthritis, for Epstein-Barr (mono), Lyme Disease, Multiple Sclerosis.
I've endured wave after wave of miserable tests including a colonoscopy because they were determined for a while that I had Crohn's Disease, or colon polyps, or tumours, or ...
You get the picture.
Only when you start to piece everything together does it begin to make sense.
In the meantime, I watched my self-esteem and confidence dwindle to nothing. *I* knew there was something wrong me, and I knew it wasn't just in my head. There was too much proof that I wasn't crazy, but none of it matched up.
I bruise terribly. I rarely feel an injury, but I will bruise up black and purple and it definitely hurts then. After surgery, (or even my tattoos) I bleed more than I should. I've almost died in childbirth due to massive hemmorhaging. I've had a blood transfusion to keep me from dying.
My bloodwork is all clean. There's nothing in it to explain why my body doesn't want to heal. So I must be imagining it, even when the bruises say otherwise.
I've got more than enough proof that I don't sleep, and when I do, it's restless and harsh and full of nightmares. The list to affirm to that is a mile long.
Is it really surprising that no doctor has ever done a sleep study on me?
The most I've been able to get out of a doctor until recently was the confirmation of Raynaud's Syndrome/Phenomenon. I have abnormally cold hands and feet. Even now, my entire body is quite warm, but my hands are icy and ashen, the skin sagging around the bones and tendons. If I try to warm them, they will change colours from red to purple and back again, and I will be in serious pain. Touching ice, or even a cold glass is agony.
My feet do the same thing. Showers are sheer hell. By the time the water is warm enough on my feet, they hurt. Socks only marginally helps. My feet can be cold inside two pairs of socks and in boots.
All the little things add up. My husband was slowly watching me fall apart, and I know even he thought I was crazy for a while. He might deny it, but you know The Look when you get it, particularly if you've seen it time and time again.
The first real help came on a visit to his mother.
You see, my mother-in-law has Fibromyalgia.
Those little things made perfect sense to her. She's lived with them, too.
To be honest, at the time I didn't think much of what she had to say. I'd been told too often that it was all in my head. Here, take this pill and you'll be fine. Here, go see this shrink, this doctor, this ... whatever. There's nothing wrong with you that I can find, so go away.
And the little things kept adding up. Like having to cut all my hair off because I couldn't keep raising my arms above my head long enough to wash it, much less keep it braided so it didn't knot while I slept. I could not raise my arms above shoulder level. I'd get dizzy, they'd feel like they weighed a thousand pounds and it would HURT, oh God, it would hurt.
I've never, NEVER been comfortable with having my blood pressure taken. It can bring tears to my eyes, it's so painful. I get bruises and strange skin tears from cuffs.
Know what?
There's an FMS Trigger Point there. Go fig. You get a gold star.
Hugs became more and more painful. My hips wouldn't always want to work, they'd lock and send bolts of pain down my legs and into my back. My fingers would suddenly start shaking wildly. I'd drop things. I've never been known as clumsy, but that's certainly what I was turning into.
Then a weird series of events managed to turn my world around and give some sanity back to it.
My labor with Thing 2 was relatively normal by all standards, especially compared to the birth of Thing 1.
The next day in the hospital, however, scared all of us.
My bloodwork came back strangely. I started hurting after dinner, severe, sharp shooting chest pains. My blood pressure spiked, 02 levels dropped, and suddenly I was hooked to EKGs with oxygen going and people basically freaking out on me.
The next bloodwork apparently scared them worse. I was taken off food entirely and set up for an ultrasound.
My, look at the gallstone totally blocking the tube. Maybe that's why her liver is starting to fail.
I'd been in the hospital almost a week when they finally told DG he couldn't come in and stay most of the night. He asked why.
"Because she's no longer on the Critical Care list."
Ahem? Oh hell. Yes, they should have told us I was considered a Critical patient. I'm VERY glad they didn't. That would have just been more stress to handle in an already stressful situation.
I think I knew on some level how serious it was, though. Some of you reading this were around during that period, and possibly remember the letter I wrote in the hospital that DG posted for me. Even though they were trying to keep the new mom calm for Thing 2, I knew, and was scared.
Three months and 60 lost pounds later, after Thing 2 was a little more situated, I went into the hospital.
My gallbladder *had* to come out and my tubes had to be tied because I can't take most birth control and having another child probably would have killed me. We did all that at once to minimize side-effects. I still have problems with scar tissue from the gallbladder, and lots of "echo" memory pain.
But this is where the downhill spiral started. I was tired more often, suffered insomnia worse than before, and occasionally hurt for no apparent reason.
My arm was another *had* to. By the time I reached the surgeon, I'd lost all feeling in my hand and it was totally unusable. A knot of tendon near the TP had looped around my ulnar nerve and completely strangled it. They went in, removed the knot (and the nerve and muscles entirely), and totally rebuilt the inside of my arm to try to prevent it from happening again. I have some permanent nerve damage up in the arm itself, and the scar isn't pretty, but I have my hand back. Recovery time was actually shorter and I pushed myself enough that I have full use of my hand without having to endure the abuse of physical therapy.
My immune system joined the "abandon Pooka" bandwagon after this one. I can catch damn near any virus that even looks at me from a distance.
Just in time for my tonsils -- which had been taken out when I was 18 months old -- to decide to make another appearance. They didn't entirely grow back, but a particularly nasty case of strep hit me, and settled into the new growth and BAM. 9 months solid of hell. I had strep a confirmed 4 times during that 9 months, plus pneumonia, and I was never NOT on an antibiotic. Pneumonia and strep really really SUCK when you're an asthmatic.
I developed my new deadly allergy to penicillin during this time, as well as widened my sulfa allergy to all sulfamides and cephalosporins. No antibiotic ever worked. I stayed sick a solid 9 months. I was in the middle of full tonsilitis when they said to hell with it and took them out.
There weren't any ways around them. Each one was sufficiently traumatic on its own to contribute to the fibro, together, a real mess.
This leaves us where we are today:
-I am often very scatterbrained, unable to retain information I've recently heard or read, sometimes unable to concentrate at all without tears and frustration at the inability to do so.
-I am often incapable of holding my children, or playing with them, or even meeting basic care needs.
-There are days when I physically cannot crawl out of bed, even to use the bathroom, without assistance.
-I cannot sleep. I am alternately exhausted and insomniatic (did I just make up a new word?).
-Sometimes it is all so bad that I wish they would find something fatally wrong with me, just so I know that it would be over soon.
The good news is that fibromyalgia won't kill you.
The bad news is that fibromyalgia won't kill you.
This brings me back to the original purpose and point of all my rambling.
You CANNOT do it alone.
Tomorrow, DG and I will have been married for eleven years.
I never could have made it this far without him.
We have been together through the bad, and the worse. We've seen death up close and had too many personal encounters with him, and together we've won past it.
There are days when we truly loathe each other, but beneath it is still what has brought us and kept us together. You just can't survive this much together and have something relatively small tear it apart.
And I could NOT do it alone. Not without him.
Thank you, honey, for eleven years.
You know why I leave "wonderful" out of that. We aren't perfect. We never will be. And neither of us pretend that we are, either.
Thank you for being there, even when I wasn't.
Thank you for being here for us now, even when I can't.
Thank you for trying to close the gaps that I make out of fear.
Thank you for making me hate you every now and then to bring things back into perspective.
Thank you for not letting me run away.
In shorter words: "Eleven years, and we haven't killed each other yet."
I love you.
~pooka
My Junior year of high school, my insomnia and nightmares hit a real peak for me. I couldn't sleep, I couldn't pay attention, my grades slipped. I was miserable. I was also confusing the hell out of everyone. I couldn't sleep, but I was always exhausted and trying to sleep. To me, that made sense. If you can't, you get tired, and you try, but you can't, so you get worse and so on.
Friday night is prime time for high school teens -- no school the next day, and the week is over.
Me, I came home around 3:30, took off my clothes, and crawled in bed. This time, I was so painfully exhausted (everything HURT) that I actually fell asleep.
And stayed that way.
It was around 9 that night when they finally found me. The door to my room had been slightly closed, but open enough that you could see most of the room and that obviously the lights were off. They'd found my books, so they knew I'd at least BEEN home.
No one ever thought of looking in bed.
My boyfriend was in a total panic (I remember him trying not to cry when he found me, yes, HE looked, not my parents), and my parents were, not surprisingly, mad.
I got yelled at for it. By my parents. For being home where I was supposed to be. Hello, Houston? We have a problem.
But I knew then that something really had to be wrong. I wasn't crazy. All the weird aches, weird reactions to medications, the insomnia ... something had to be there.
It took them another 15 years to give it a name.
Fibromyalgia. Fibromyalgic Syndrome. FMS. Fibrositis.
It has a lot of names, but the symptoms are all pretty much the same. Only the severity changes. Each one of us handles the disease differently, each one of us has our own magical combination that will ease it and make it roll over and behave. Not all of us find that combination. Not all of us are taken seriously -- some never are.
It's a disease that affects mostly women, women in the child-bearing "Valium" Stepford years. Think of how long it took pre-menstrual syndrome to even be acknowledged, much less accepted as a reality. In a field where men still dominate, if you can't see it, smell it, or taste it, it's not real. When you can't stab someone with a needle or take an x-ray of it, it's not real.
I faced a lot of that. I faced even more of it before I got to the point where even an idiot could see that something was painfully wrong with me.
I was a hypochondriac. I was just lazy. I just wanted attention.
No, I just wanted to go to sleep and wake up like every normal person on the planet. I wanted to be able to go and run and climb and play without hurting, without knots tearing at my limbs and making them spasm and cramp. I wanted to be able to be with others without catching some virus that someone they were in contact with had, and they only passed it on without becoming sick themselves.
I wanted to be normal, and I never was.
Throw being massively hypoglycemic into the blend, and you get a real mess. My blood sugar was the cause of SO much pain for me and those around me. I would wake up with morning readings of 30 and 40. I remember a reading of 19. Damn near enough to kill a person.
I don't remember a lot of what happened during those swings. I faintly remember a lot of anger, tantrums, hysterics. I remember a lot of bruises from fainting, a lot of laughter and hard looks when I'd pass out in class, or stagger into a doorframe because I was too dizzy to keep my balance. I remember having a lot of arguments with a lot of people, and I know I wasn't even remotely coherent or logical. I just don't remember any of the details. They're lost to me.
I only remember that half an hour or so after someone finally stuffed food in my mouth, I felt better. Logic returned. I'd cry and apologize and never know why.
Cocktail for a maniac. Recipe for a broken heart.
Or classic early fibro symptoms.
The doctors were close, though. They had the right idea over the years, they just never managed to find the right solution. I give them a lot of credit for that. Some of the doctors really did try: Unfortunately, none of the results fit the bill.
I've been tested for lupus more times than the scar on my arm cares to tell. I've been repeatedly tested for rheumatoid arthritis, for Epstein-Barr (mono), Lyme Disease, Multiple Sclerosis.
I've endured wave after wave of miserable tests including a colonoscopy because they were determined for a while that I had Crohn's Disease, or colon polyps, or tumours, or ...
You get the picture.
Only when you start to piece everything together does it begin to make sense.
In the meantime, I watched my self-esteem and confidence dwindle to nothing. *I* knew there was something wrong me, and I knew it wasn't just in my head. There was too much proof that I wasn't crazy, but none of it matched up.
I bruise terribly. I rarely feel an injury, but I will bruise up black and purple and it definitely hurts then. After surgery, (or even my tattoos) I bleed more than I should. I've almost died in childbirth due to massive hemmorhaging. I've had a blood transfusion to keep me from dying.
My bloodwork is all clean. There's nothing in it to explain why my body doesn't want to heal. So I must be imagining it, even when the bruises say otherwise.
I've got more than enough proof that I don't sleep, and when I do, it's restless and harsh and full of nightmares. The list to affirm to that is a mile long.
Is it really surprising that no doctor has ever done a sleep study on me?
The most I've been able to get out of a doctor until recently was the confirmation of Raynaud's Syndrome/Phenomenon. I have abnormally cold hands and feet. Even now, my entire body is quite warm, but my hands are icy and ashen, the skin sagging around the bones and tendons. If I try to warm them, they will change colours from red to purple and back again, and I will be in serious pain. Touching ice, or even a cold glass is agony.
My feet do the same thing. Showers are sheer hell. By the time the water is warm enough on my feet, they hurt. Socks only marginally helps. My feet can be cold inside two pairs of socks and in boots.
All the little things add up. My husband was slowly watching me fall apart, and I know even he thought I was crazy for a while. He might deny it, but you know The Look when you get it, particularly if you've seen it time and time again.
The first real help came on a visit to his mother.
You see, my mother-in-law has Fibromyalgia.
Those little things made perfect sense to her. She's lived with them, too.
To be honest, at the time I didn't think much of what she had to say. I'd been told too often that it was all in my head. Here, take this pill and you'll be fine. Here, go see this shrink, this doctor, this ... whatever. There's nothing wrong with you that I can find, so go away.
And the little things kept adding up. Like having to cut all my hair off because I couldn't keep raising my arms above my head long enough to wash it, much less keep it braided so it didn't knot while I slept. I could not raise my arms above shoulder level. I'd get dizzy, they'd feel like they weighed a thousand pounds and it would HURT, oh God, it would hurt.
I've never, NEVER been comfortable with having my blood pressure taken. It can bring tears to my eyes, it's so painful. I get bruises and strange skin tears from cuffs.
Know what?
There's an FMS Trigger Point there. Go fig. You get a gold star.
Hugs became more and more painful. My hips wouldn't always want to work, they'd lock and send bolts of pain down my legs and into my back. My fingers would suddenly start shaking wildly. I'd drop things. I've never been known as clumsy, but that's certainly what I was turning into.
Then a weird series of events managed to turn my world around and give some sanity back to it.
My labor with Thing 2 was relatively normal by all standards, especially compared to the birth of Thing 1.
The next day in the hospital, however, scared all of us.
My bloodwork came back strangely. I started hurting after dinner, severe, sharp shooting chest pains. My blood pressure spiked, 02 levels dropped, and suddenly I was hooked to EKGs with oxygen going and people basically freaking out on me.
The next bloodwork apparently scared them worse. I was taken off food entirely and set up for an ultrasound.
My, look at the gallstone totally blocking the tube. Maybe that's why her liver is starting to fail.
I'd been in the hospital almost a week when they finally told DG he couldn't come in and stay most of the night. He asked why.
"Because she's no longer on the Critical Care list."
Ahem? Oh hell. Yes, they should have told us I was considered a Critical patient. I'm VERY glad they didn't. That would have just been more stress to handle in an already stressful situation.
I think I knew on some level how serious it was, though. Some of you reading this were around during that period, and possibly remember the letter I wrote in the hospital that DG posted for me. Even though they were trying to keep the new mom calm for Thing 2, I knew, and was scared.
Three months and 60 lost pounds later, after Thing 2 was a little more situated, I went into the hospital.
My gallbladder *had* to come out and my tubes had to be tied because I can't take most birth control and having another child probably would have killed me. We did all that at once to minimize side-effects. I still have problems with scar tissue from the gallbladder, and lots of "echo" memory pain.
But this is where the downhill spiral started. I was tired more often, suffered insomnia worse than before, and occasionally hurt for no apparent reason.
My arm was another *had* to. By the time I reached the surgeon, I'd lost all feeling in my hand and it was totally unusable. A knot of tendon near the TP had looped around my ulnar nerve and completely strangled it. They went in, removed the knot (and the nerve and muscles entirely), and totally rebuilt the inside of my arm to try to prevent it from happening again. I have some permanent nerve damage up in the arm itself, and the scar isn't pretty, but I have my hand back. Recovery time was actually shorter and I pushed myself enough that I have full use of my hand without having to endure the abuse of physical therapy.
My immune system joined the "abandon Pooka" bandwagon after this one. I can catch damn near any virus that even looks at me from a distance.
Just in time for my tonsils -- which had been taken out when I was 18 months old -- to decide to make another appearance. They didn't entirely grow back, but a particularly nasty case of strep hit me, and settled into the new growth and BAM. 9 months solid of hell. I had strep a confirmed 4 times during that 9 months, plus pneumonia, and I was never NOT on an antibiotic. Pneumonia and strep really really SUCK when you're an asthmatic.
I developed my new deadly allergy to penicillin during this time, as well as widened my sulfa allergy to all sulfamides and cephalosporins. No antibiotic ever worked. I stayed sick a solid 9 months. I was in the middle of full tonsilitis when they said to hell with it and took them out.
There weren't any ways around them. Each one was sufficiently traumatic on its own to contribute to the fibro, together, a real mess.
This leaves us where we are today:
-I am often very scatterbrained, unable to retain information I've recently heard or read, sometimes unable to concentrate at all without tears and frustration at the inability to do so.
-I am often incapable of holding my children, or playing with them, or even meeting basic care needs.
-There are days when I physically cannot crawl out of bed, even to use the bathroom, without assistance.
-I cannot sleep. I am alternately exhausted and insomniatic (did I just make up a new word?).
-Sometimes it is all so bad that I wish they would find something fatally wrong with me, just so I know that it would be over soon.
The good news is that fibromyalgia won't kill you.
The bad news is that fibromyalgia won't kill you.
This brings me back to the original purpose and point of all my rambling.
You CANNOT do it alone.
Tomorrow, DG and I will have been married for eleven years.
I never could have made it this far without him.
We have been together through the bad, and the worse. We've seen death up close and had too many personal encounters with him, and together we've won past it.
There are days when we truly loathe each other, but beneath it is still what has brought us and kept us together. You just can't survive this much together and have something relatively small tear it apart.
And I could NOT do it alone. Not without him.
Thank you, honey, for eleven years.
You know why I leave "wonderful" out of that. We aren't perfect. We never will be. And neither of us pretend that we are, either.
Thank you for being there, even when I wasn't.
Thank you for being here for us now, even when I can't.
Thank you for trying to close the gaps that I make out of fear.
Thank you for making me hate you every now and then to bring things back into perspective.
Thank you for not letting me run away.
In shorter words: "Eleven years, and we haven't killed each other yet."
I love you.
~pooka
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