How's February shorting you? ~ 28 days of mini-rants

The BBQ Pit
41

Unexpected freak snowstorm on Sunday night ended up cancelling school for two days. Of course, it was the first two days of my husband’s business trip to warmer climes. I shoveled the drive and made the kids shovel the sidewalk (so we can tut disapprovingly at the 75% of our neighbors who haven’t done this), but the kids have been driving me bananas. Yesterday my son’s whining that we were out of Pop Tarts led me to risk driving to the grocery store to get more. I then got stuck on the hill going to our neighborhood and couldn’t get home. I ended up having to park at the bottom of the hill and walk the groceries home. (I was able to get the car up the hill in the late afternoon when it was warmer, but I’m worried about getting home from my noon appointment today.) Once I did get home? “I guess I should have told you this before, Mom, but we’re out of tortillas.” :smack:

They are in school today and I am blessedly alone. I have nothing to do because my part-time job hasn’t given me any work since before Christmas, but at least I have the house to myself.

Another big storm is expected this weekend and Monday.

42

Not to dispute the diagnosis, but the anxiety could be driving the diabetes. I’ve had several instances where I’ve gone to a doctor under severe emotional stress and shown pre-diabetic blood sugar levels, but then they go back to normal as soon as my mood stabilizes. I would keep an eye on the blood sugar, but prioritize the anxiety problems:

  • having less anxiety will have a larger and more immediate effect on his (and your) happiness
  • high anxiety will be an enormous impediment to eating less junk/comfort food
  • a less-stressed body may bring blood sugars down without further intervention

Of course, continue to consult with your medical professionals, and don’t let the blood sugars get worse!

43

I’ve heard that before, too, that anxiety can make your blood chemistry worse. I brought that up to my husband as well and he knows he admitted he’s avoiding dealing with those emotional issues. But at least while we were chatting he called a GP and got an appointment. We have a meeting with the therapist Saturday and he asked if I was going to bring Monday up; I said he could do so or I would, but I think we need to.

44

My mother’s hyperglucemia has disappeared since 1) her diverticulitis finally got excised and 2) she was put on a minuscule dose of anxiety medication. She’s not self-medicating either the tummyaches or the anxiety with tons of simple carbs any more.

OTOH for Dad and me it’s cholesterol that shoots up when we’re anxious. I’m sure one of the problems with the Culture of Fear we live in is that it’s driving a lot of people to overeating and to eating the wrong things, and in turn this ends up meaning obesity, hyperglucemia, hypercholesterolemia…

And no, pills aren’t the best response, nor do they work for everybody. The one time my doctor insisted in having me try that same anxiolithic, I just got sick; tallied another med in the list of “mood altering stuff I shouldn’t even look at”.

45

My arm is swollen. I have 16 tiny holes from my foster cats claws and the death grip he put on me. (It was a incident in which he got loose in the car). I may have a temp. I feel kinda crappy. God, I’ll probably have to go to the doctor. Isn’t there a real Cat-scratch fever?

46

Don’t know about real Cat-scratch fever, but it sounds like your arm is infected. Get thee to a doctor.

My friend’s Lucifer cat (yes, that’s her name and for good reason) bit her father’s hand. Four deep bite marks by his thumb. Infected and on antibiotics. Most cats don’t mean to kill you. Lucifer would like to.

47

Absolutely - remember what the cat is scratching at with those claws in the litter box. Got bit/scratched by our cat once (my fault) and by the time I was convinced to go to the doctor, he suggested another day might have led to amputating the finger (and it was only two days after the bite at the latest).

They aren’t always dangerous, but at the first sign of infection, get it looked at.

48

I finally started passing my kidney blockage! A lot of sand and a little bit of gravel. I have a strainer so I can keep tabs on when I can stop taking the vasodilator. One of the pieces of gravel was a triangle about 1 1/2 mm on each side. I think it was the culprit for starting the blockage.

The relief is immense but I also managed to strain my left top thigh muscle (probably twisted wrong while writhing in my sleep). The leg works to squat or bend but lifting is a no go. Slathering on icy gel and using a heating pad gives a bit of relief so hopefully it heals quickly.

49

I got through the government shut down with no pain and only minor inconvenience, and I know was lucky and am grateful.

But. I have my annual check ups with all my various med-type people in early January, and the bills have started to come in. Generally I get those ‘Dr. X can bill you for $Y’ statements from Medicare fairly fast, but I expect they are churned out via ‘non essential’ personnel, so who knows this time?

Do I go ahead and pay what the Dr,'s office bills, and hope they’ve gotten it right this time? (I had several discrepancies just the past year.) Do I make them wait until the official word comes? (That hardly seems fair.) Yeah, they’d probably reimburse me for any overpayment (or put it on account or something) but I’m really anal about keeping my finances straight. :frowning:

Damn Trump.

I read he’s supposed to go in for his annual physical shortly. I hope they discover a whole handful of really annoying, painful and embarrassing problems and the records leak.

50

And a quick follow-up cat-scratch story:
My brother, back when he was a kid, got scratched by one of our cats - which was a regular occurrence. No big deal. A few days later he was sitting in science class and blah, blah, blah; “blood poisoning can sometimes be detected by the appearance of a red line coming from the infected site”.
“Like this?”, he says.
Aaaaaand, off to the school nurse. Calls my mom. Whips him off to the doctor who carves a large chunk out of his hand and gives him several very painful antibiotic injections. (we, my brother and I, were not very fond of this doctor)

Back to school the next day with a good story and a large bandage.

Don’t mess with infected bits people.

51

So I’m an assistant scoutmaster for a local BSA troop. I’m about ready to throw in the towel.

Our group consists of about 15 boys, the scoutmaster, and two assistant scoutmasters. The scoutmaster works a rotating schedule at a local mill, so 4 weeks of day shift and 4 weeks of evening shift. That means, of course, that every other month he’s not there for all 4 weeks. This causes two problems: first, we don’t have enough leadership during the meetings to effectively guide the boys. This isn’t hugely critical because the older boys, who are all Life rank, can pretty much take care of themselves. But the younger boys can’t—they still need guidance.

Second, and IMO a much bigger problem is since the Scoutmaster is gone for 4 weeks at a time, when he comes back he’s totally in the dark WRT the goings-on of the past month. We (that is, me, since the other ASM is pretty worthless) have tried to take notes during the 4 weeks that he’s gone and then get him up to speed on his first day back, but he never was interested so, I stopped doing it cuz I’m not going to waste my time.

So the end result of all this is a dysfunctional, poorly led group that pretty much functions as a social club for boys. We don’t do much “scout” stuff like camping of hiking or building fires and setting up tents. I work weekends and, when I joined, made it clear that I would do whatever I could to help—but weekend campouts had to be shouldered by somebody else. The result? No campouts. Even though both the Scoutmaster and other ASM have weekends off. In fact, the other ASM is a disabled vet who doesn’t work at all.

Finally, it’s slowly dawned on me that the committee chair and the scoutmaster and the other ASM apparently have numerous discussions about the troop, discussions that don’t include me. This makes me feel like a drooling simpleton that nobody likes: the kid who’s ostensibly part of the team but never leaves the bench and isn’t invited to the after-game celebratory ice cream parties. I just received a text from the committee chair informing us that he won’t be at the regular troop meeting tonight but reminding us to come to the committee meeting next week because we need to discuss the Philmont trip next year.

We haven’t discussed a Philmont trip in any way, shape, or form. But after some back-and-forth texts it became apparent that the scoutmaster, other ASM, and the pastor of the church we’re chartered through have been planning this for some time. My boys are both in the troop and have heard nothing about this.

So fuck it. If it wasn’t for my boys wanting to stay I would’ve bailed months ago.

52

Fucking Wells Fargo! Their systems have been down all morning. I can’t access my accounts. I want to buy a new phone and I’m afraid my card will be declined. This doesn’t affect just me. It seems to be nationwide. Fuck them sideways with a cactus.

53

Indeed. This is my bank, and I’m also a shareholder. After this nonsensity and the fake account scandals, I’m ready to sell my stock and move my accounts elsewhere.

54

Peeved more at myself than anybody else … finished the infusion chemo, and the oral chemo/radiation and am on treatment vacation waiting for some imaging before we decide where to go next … I have had neuropathy in my hands and feet since more or less May and it just occurred to me to get toe socks to limit the sandpaper between the toes sensation back in November … sob Now the neuropathy is sort of getting better in my hands but slightly worse in my feet … but at least I have my toe socks.
[I don’t care if I never get the feeling back in my feet, but I really miss my fingers *sigh*]

55

So, I went to the Doctor. He said they were indeed infected. Got them cleaned out, which burnt like a SOB. I’m on 10 days of Cipro. I know it’s gonna make nauseated. The nurse who squirted the nasty stuff in my 16 scratches went on and on about the ugly cat scratches and bites she’s seen. Running a low grade temp. Advil on board.

56

Very sorry they were infected but very glad you had them dealt with.

Hope you feel much better soon.

57

Glad you got the scratches taken care of Beckdawrek. I’ve been very careful with cat scratches ever since my former co-worker’s ex-husband died of blood poisoning caused by a dog scratch. He apparently ignored all the signs of infection until it was too late and died in the ER. Now I make sure to clean any cat scratch with rubbing alcohol. Peroxide be damned, I get out the big guns.

58

They cleaned mine with betadine. Boy it burned. I’ve got to redo it myself tomarrow. As my forearm swelled the little scratches opened up a bit. It looks weird. Like little red eyeballs staring at me.

59

My cat scratch protocol:
[ol]
[li]Soap and water[/li][li]Witch Hazel[/li][li]Rubbing Alcohol[/li][li]Tea Tree Oil[/li][li]Neosporin (with the topical anesthetic[/li][/ol]

Usually the scratches aren’t too bad, so I’ll skip steps 2, 3, and 5. The longer and deeper they are, the more steps I add.

60

If you have solid pills you are lucky. The greatest evil invented is the capsules–they produce burps of death.

Today’s festivities were what I thought was a fistulagram–but it was a full workover and tuneup that needed anesthesia. Happy happy, joy joy. If this works maybe I can get rid of the PermaCath before it catches the Plague.

It’s quite interesting how life is now that they have sucked eight kilos of water out of me in the last two weeks. When they get me “dry” I will need new glasses–my nose is not long enough!