What better place to bare one’s soul than in the BBQ Pit? I was up all night pondering the ‘interesting’ path my life has taken the last couple years, and discovered to my dismay that I’m feeling sorry for myself this morning. So I ask you please to rip me a new asshole so that I may laugh at myself and quit being stupid.
Here’s a short synopsis of my life the past two years…
Prior to two years ago I was working as an IT Engineer/Administrator, supporting a multi-billion dollar computer’s manufacturing facility, their shipping warehouse, and one of their 600 seat call centers. I volunteered to work their mid-shift solo for six months, but the gig was so rough that they could never find anyone to replace me so I wound up staying there for the better part of three years (avg about 55+ hours a week). My last year, I knew we had a baby on the way, (2nd, ten years after the first) so I picked up a second job - a six month contract working 20+ as an Administrator at a local University. I also started doing contract work on the weekends installing small networks at doctor/dentist’s offices.
Right near the end of my six month contract, I started feeling really lousy all the time. Talked it over with the wife, and we decided I’d stop the extra jobs and see if it was the lack of sleep, or stress that was causing me to feel rotten. Heh, wonderful timing - PC sales were in the toilet, I’d just finished my MCSE (supposed to be 10% pay raise) and my boss all but fires me for it. Never did give me the raise, but did move me to days. They wound up hiring three people to take my place. Did that make my bosses think, Wow! This guy must have been killing himself… no. My bosses thought: Shit! There’s no money in the budget to pay three more salaries, need to let someone go. Boss - my ‘friend’ - pulls me aside and all but tells me I’m history, but offers to let me resign if I want. Told him I’d been feeling lousy and maybe resigning and taking time off would be for the best. (Place where I was working shut down a couple months later so it was a good decision).
After a few weeks with no improvement, I break down and go to the doc. A simple physical and big surprise, I have Type 2 Diabetes and my cholestorol/triglicerides are through the roof. (triglicerides are supposed to be around 100; mine was almost 2000. Aye, two freaking thousand.) It was so high the doc thought the test was screwed up and ordered another round. They send me to a Diabetic Institute and I’m told that I have some metabolic syndrome where the fatigue, Diabetes et. all, are only symptoms of a bigger problem. They want me to take some shitty drugs, (one of which was the one that caused liver failure and killed people).
I had done a little research and decided to forego the drugs and try to improve my numbers with diet and exercise first. First six months were rough, but I got the sugar relatively down, (hovering between 150 - 250). the next year I did very well - sugar usually between 90 - 150 and triglycerides down as low as 200, but had zero energy; it was like I turned ninety. Doing simple things for my wife like the laundry would put me on my butt for hours. Docs wanted me to go on Lipitor to see if they could pull the tri/cholestorol down, but wife’s insurance wouldn’t cover Lipitor, and we couldn’t afford it. And the ‘next tier’ drug didn’t do squat.
Early this year, my body finally gave out. Heh, took the family for a walk after breakfast one morning, and began to feel worse than usual. Went home and after another half hour and still feeling rotten I broke out the tester: blood sugar was 450. Oopsie. (I guess some people go into coma at 350 and I was walking around carrying the baby… doh.) Get tested by the docs and tri’s are back up over a thousand.
Sooo, now I’m taking a buttload of pills, and damned if I can get my sugar below 150 in the morning. My kidneys are bleeding protein, my pancreas is giving all signs that it’s just about ready to quit altogether, and my wife’s insurance won’t pay for hardly anything. Simple 15 minute physical tasks like mowing my front yard now take me 45 minutes and I’m useless for the rest of the day, and usually the day after that. Many Diabetes sites recommend walking 10,000 steps a day; I’m exhausted at 2500.(So I do two to four reps with a couple hour break in between - some days are better than others - and feel like I’ve run 10 miles) . (To put this in perspective, I unboxed and set up 97 PCs and their 19" monitors in one night by myself between service calls a few weeks before I resigned; the Day shift assigned two people to work on it full time: they set up around 40).
Our household dropping to one salary and increasing medical expenses have put me in debt to my eyeballs. It’s fairly obvious that I’m not getting ‘better’ so this week I finally went to the Social Security office to see about applying for disability. They’re telling me 5 to 6 month processing time, about a 95% denial on first claims, and if/when they do approve me, I’ll get a thousand a month.
I’m a vet, and if I want to apply to the Veteran’s Administration for medical care, they’re telling me it’s a minimum of a year to be processed and then anywhere between six months to two years (or more) on the waiting list to get seen by medical staff.
Finally, my memory has been gradually slipping these past couple years, but has really taken a nose dive the past six months. The Neurologist doesnt’ know what’s causing it and I’m scheduled to go to some memory disorder specialists at the State University (he wanted to send me to John Hopkins or Duke but laughed when I told him the name of my insurance company). If I had to take a rough guess, I’d say I’ve forgotten 70% of everything I’ve learned. It’s so bad I couldn’t go back to IT even if my health was restored; I’ve forgotten virtually all my technical information and before I took that IT position I was an Instructor, teaching the damn stuff.
So the good news is I most likely will drop from a heart attack before I become a drooling idiot. Did sort of want to see my son finish high school, but now I’m trying to hang on a couple more years to see him make it to kindergarten.
Sorry for the book and the whining. My wife and kids are all healthy and I’d trade my health for theirs in a heartbeat so I guess I should be content. But, I’ll tell you I didn’t expect to wither away like this; I turned 41 a few months ago, and sales people ask me all the time if I qualify for Senior discount… ack.
