One Sick Mother

Slow Progress, Some Good News

Some people have been calling/emailing me about my health, so I guess I owe some updates on that front.

So #30 (who specializes in ..um  ...I forget the name but it has to do with metabolic processes) and I have been speaking for a few weeks. It turns out that he didn't BELIEVE me when I said that my seizures happened when my blood sugar is "high" (for me that means like 104 =bang slap happy normal for most people), and when my sugar is low (mid-40s to 70s) I feel a lot better. I guess repetition worked because he finally started to think about what processes in the brain might be causing this reaction in me. He said that the problem will be testing for these theories, and pointed out that whatever it is, it is likely very rare. I pointed out that if whatever-it-is ISN'T rare, then one of the 29 other doctors -none of which  are stupid, would have figured it out already.  I have wanted to document and chart this blood sugar thing a little better, but I can't find my feckin glaucometer anywhere. I think I put it in a 'safe place', which means my heirs will probably find it after I'm gone and they are cleaning out me house. Or it will immediately show up right after I buy a new one.

So #30  talked to a few colleagues (bless him)  and he wants to do an MRI specstroscopy of me brain. Fine.  I call the MRI peeps. I need pre-approval. OK. I call the insurance peeps. They need to get the request from the doctor, not me or the MRI people. OK I call #30's office and ask about it.

....and hear crickets.

I call back the next week. More crickets (and it's only May!).

Eventually, I call and manage to get the doctor himself. THEN shit starts to happen.  I don't understand why in a top hospital in NYC, a highly respected and highly sought specialist has to do his own administration. Talk about a waste of resources!

So after at least two weeks, we are now close to getting the pre-approval for the MRI. Then I will have to schedule it and actually go have it done. School is out in a few weeks so this is cutting it fine. I asked #30 if I should be in a seizurey state for the test. And he said something like "I didnt' know you had such control over it. Well, yes. I can get them to start no problem. I usually just have to eat a large meal or in take a big chunk of sugar, fast. It's getting them to stop or -better yet-  not occur that's the trick.

I am curious to see what shakes out of this test, if we can ever make it happen.

Good News

I saw Matinee Idol Doctor the other week to check on the early Glaucoma he had said was there back in 2006. I am supposed to go back every six months and it had been over two years. I got my wrist slapped for that. However, the good news is that my eyes have not changed at all since then and I can go to yearly visits. Hurray.

It was funny, because this guy seems to have a rather spoiled clientele and he seemed to think I would be put-out leaving empty-handed; no prescription, no Dire Warnings (he likes his Dire Warnings, that guy), no additional tests. In contrast, I  was delighted!  I fairly bounced out of there, unencumbered by prescriptions, Dire Warnings or additional tests. It is a rare doctor's appointment where I leave without at least ONE of those, or else a shrug and an "I-don't know-why-don't-you-contact-X-obscure-specialist?".

So yeah. good news.

...and then George, my favorite cat got sick...

More about that next time.

Why, Indeed?

Recently, I was talking to someone who has read a lot of this blog, particularly  the pieces I wrote on herbal remedy scams. This person knew that these pieces (most of which are listed in the top left column of this blog, if you are curious) involved hundreds of hours of research and documentation and they asked me the simple question:

Why?

Why put so much effort into this?  It wasn't my job, I didn't get paid and -apart from the people who commented or e-mailed to thank me (and some to challenge me)- I got no real recognition for this effort.

Funny, but "why" It isn't an easy question to answer.  I could list plenty of things I didn't want out of this work: I didn't want payment. I didn't want thanks (although it is nice to receive), I didn't want recognition. I guess I wanted...

...Justice. 

That's probably the best single word for it, but it still doesn't really explain it all, because justice for whom? And how does putting this stuff on the Internet achieve that aim?

Hmmm.  I was at a rare loss for words.

I have been pondering these meaty issues a lot; -questioning my own motivations and the workings of my own mind, which are not always very obvious to me (and I pity my friends). After a day or two,  this poem I learned in high school came meandering into my head. The first line did, anyway:

"Since the wise men have not spoken, I speak that am only a fool"

That's sort of it. I had to speak because nobody else could or would.  I dug up the rest of the poem, to see if it fit, too. it is below. I think it is kinda-sorta-not-really suitable to my situation. At the time of writing, Pearse was in prison facing execution for his role as a leader of the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland, when the Irish equivalent of the Declaration of Independence was um... declared. Actually It was proclaimed.  By Pádraig Pearse himself, if you don't mind. Not sure the difference, exactly but there you go. If he was still around, he could probably tell me. And correct my punctuation.

In this poem, Pearse is defending a lifetime spent as a campaigner and a rebel and his decision to lead a rising against the British. And here I am trying to justify a bit of research. Our situations aren't very comparable, really. Yet I can definitely identify with Pearse's idealism and willingness to speak out against perceived wrong.

The Fool

By Pádraig Pearse

Since the wise men have not spoken, I speak that am only a fool;
A fool that hath loved his folly,
Yea, more than the wise men their books or their counting houses or their quiet homes,
Or their fame in men's mouths;
A fool that in all his days hath done never a prudent thing,
Never hath counted the cost, nor recked if another reaped
The fruit of his mighty sowing, content to scatter the seed;
A fool that is unrepentant, and that soon at the end of all
Shall laugh in his lonely heart as the ripe ears fall to the reaping-hooks
And the poor are filled that were empty,
Tho' he go hungry.
I have squandered the splendid years that the Lord God gave to my youth
In attempting impossible things, deeming them alone worth the toil.

Was it folly or grace? Not men shall judge me, but God.
I have squandered the splendid years:
Lord, if I had the years I would squander them over again,
Aye, fling them from me !
For this I have heard in my heart, that a man shall scatter, not hoard,
Shall do the deed of to-day, nor take thought of to-morrow's teen,
Shall not bargain or huxter with God ; or was it a jest of Christ's
And is this my sin before men, to have taken Him at His word?
The lawyers have sat in council, the men with the keen, long faces,
And said, `This man is a fool,' and others have said, `He blasphemeth;'
And the wise have pitied the fool that hath striven to give a life
In the world of time and space among the bulks of actual things,
To a dream that was dreamed in the heart, and that only the heart could hold.

O wise men, riddle me this: what if the dream come true?
What if the dream come true? and if millions unborn shall dwell
In the house that I shaped in my heart, the noble house of my thought?
Lord, I have staked my soul, I have staked the lives of my kin
On the truth of Thy dreadful word. Do not remember my failures,
But remember this my faith
And so I speak.
Yea, ere my hot youth pass, I speak to my people and say:
Ye shall be foolish as I; ye shall scatter, not save;
Ye shall venture your all, lest ye lose what is more than all;
Ye shall call for a miracle, taking Christ at His word.
And for this I will answer, O people, answer here and hereafter,
O people that I have loved, shall we not answer together?

Of Spammers and Vitamins

When you write a medical blog and talk about herbal remedies and ingredients and alternative medicine -even if it is usually to bash them, as I do (it's absolutely NO fun to write about the good shit that works -not that I have really found any, anyway), you start to get all sorts of interesting comments and e-mails regarding herbal remedies and cures.

It make my job a lot easier when the scammers start to come to me directly. It saves me going out to look for them.  I have to laugh though, thinking that if they only took a little time to research me, they wouldn't walk both feet into the lion's bitch's den.

I had reason to open my Spam folder yesterday, and there were tons of e-mails promising me cheap Viagra, illegal Adderal and all manner of prescription drugs from Canada. I have to laugh at all these mails, which are so obviously scams they are not even worth mentioning here usually. 

The other big spammer I get is for Russian porn. For some reason the Russian pornographers seem to think there is a healthy market here on this site for their wares. I have no idea why this might be. Rightly or wrongly, this is what I think of when I think of Russian women:

 

Here is my sterotypical image of Russian men:

 

So the thought of Russian porn is not a happy one for me ('specially when looking at the guy second from the left!). OK so I know these probably aren't shining examples of current Russian pornstars, but I wouldn't be willing to take that chance. So Nothankyouverymuch, Russian pornographers. You should program your spambots to target somewhere else. It would save us both some time.

In addition to fake prescription drugs and Russian porn, I get the traders in "supplements" and other "natural remedies", with lists of mad stuff; single ingredients- that they will happily sell to me from overseas.  I sometimes look at these lists, idly wondering how much might be poison. Some of the entries really make me wonder what kind of fools they usually deal with. And I am by no means an expert!

A list from one company had a lot of vitamin-and-nutrient-sounding stuff thereon. Fifteen pages of them, including some vitamins I hadn't been aware existed. Primarily, because they seem to have made them up! Yes, folks: Makey-up vitamins seem to be the very latest in preventative healthcare. These are fun for me to explore, especially when I combine them with slang "vitamin" definitions from the Urban Dictionary...

We have Vitamin M, which the vendor claimed was Folic Acid. However, "Vitamin M" is also slang for money!  So here's me thinking, I could order this and get a bunch of capsules full of those shredded manky old dollar bills you can get from the US Mint.  Yum! Or if it is really Folic Acid, I wonder what comes in their B9 capsules?  And I'm sure the Urban dictionary could come up with a good alternative for Vitamin B9. It's not there yet, but suggestions are always welcome.

Vitamin P in the urban dictionary is ...well, you can go look it up (While OSM is not exactly PG13, there are some terms of which I am not fond). According to the jokers who e-mail me, their "Vitamin P" contains Rutin, a type of flavinoid. I could easily see SNL doing a pretty good sketch on confusing those two terms up.  Not enough that I would actually buy any, though.

My erstwhile providers had two different version of Vitamin U: One was Methylmethionine sulfonium chloride, which I have seen referred to as "Vitamin U" elsewhere. But until someone with a medical degree tells me it is good for me, I am disinclined to try it. I am even less inclined to try their other Vitamin U: Chlorine.  Isn't that toxic?  Didn't chlorine gas kill a bunch of soldiers in World War...Something?  And isn't it a tad irresponsible to have two things with the same name,  one potentially good for you, and the other potentially harmful?  Yeah I thought so. because that won't cause any confusion at all...

And to add insult to injury, there is no good Urban Dictionary definition for Vitamin U. I needs to find me one, as that may become the only valid definition for the term.

These guys also have two versions of vitamin H. The first they claim is D-Biotin (isn't that really B7?). The second is blank, which make me very curious to know what might really be in there?  The Urban Dictionary definition of "Vitamin H" is Heroin, which made me giggle at the thought of what might happen if Grandma took the wrong vitamin...

I was disappointed to find the list of vitamins that my would-be suppliers provided was incomplete when compared to the Urban Dictionary, because I really want to try some Vitamin Q, which according to that revered tome is defined thus:

A vitamin so elusive it's found in the subtle recesses of the alphabet... Also the secret ingredient used to make Gatorade, clones and Chuck Norris.

 

I really need me some of THAT! (where can I get it, I wonder?)