Flippy - I Rant, You Read
Monday, February 12, 2007
the wee hours
Ack, Ptooey, It’s Cystoscopy Day
I’m not looking forward to my 11am appointment today, although I’m hoping it’ll give the urologist some answers about what’s wrong. Maybe something simple and easy to fix. Something, perhaps, that requires one piece of dark chocolate per day for the next two weeks, and then voila!, cured. Hey, a girl can hope. I can’t wait until, oh, 11:30am tomorrow, when it should all be over. While the ultrasound was intrusive, at least it didn’t have the same ookiness factor as the cystoscopy. I know they say they’ll use numbing gel, but just the idea of anything going into my urethra makes me shiver. Clearly, I’m a person who’s never had to be catheterized. My only surgery was for my herniated disc, and it was only a 45 minute operation, and I was home before primetime tv started. Speaking of herniated disc surgery, everyone wish Leigh (from the last entry’s comments) good luck with her surgery today. Let’s hope it relieves her pain right away, and that she’s back to a normal life in a few weeks, after some lovely rest at home with pain meds, good books, good snacks, and good tv.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
the wee hours
What It Feels Like To Be Me, On The Fatigue-Ridden Days
I woke up this afternoon at 3:45pm, after having gotten 12 hours of sleep. That’s pretty rare, but if my body wants to stay asleep twelve hours, it probably needs it. When I work up, I felt horrible. I could barely move, I was so sore. I took my meds - Oxycontin, Oxycodone, Neurontin, and Protonix. I started to feel okay after maybe 90 minutes. I felt pretty decent after about two hours. We sat down at around 7p to watched the taped Leafs game. I was doing a little work on the computer while the game was on. We had dinner at 11p. Right after dinner, I was totally exhausted. Like “I had the flu” exhausted. If like me, you’re fantastic at basic math (haha), you’ll know that that’s about eight hours of being up and around...and I’m ready for bed. Right now, I’m typing this with my head on my knee, with my eyes shut. My fingers are working, but the rest of me is too tired to sit up straight.
I went back to the pain management doctor on Friday for a checkup. He got the results of my bloodwork - I’m anemic and my bloodwork shows that I have inflammation somewhere. He ordered more bloodwork to get at the specifics. He said that it could be related to my bladder issue though. Also, I now officially have the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. Since I already knew that on my own, I guess the good news is that the tests show that I don’t have Lupus or Rheumatoid Arthritis. I never thought I had RA because I don’t really have the symptoms, I don’t think. I’m relieved that I don’t have Lupus, although it remains to be seen if fibromyalgia is any better, practically speaking. In the long run, yes, it’s much better to have FMS. Right now, it seems similar to some of the Lupus symptoms...and now that I’ve read about them, I’m glad Lupus has been ruled out.
Okay, I’m too tired to post. There’s so much I want to rant about, but these days I’m having to save most of my ranting energy for either working...or getting up and going to the bathroom. I hope my appointment on Monday with the urologist takes care of the peeing issue for me. It’s been getting worse and it’s really stressing me out, man. If that gets fixed, hopefully some of the anxiety that goes along with it will disappear, which should help my fibromyalgia a lot.
One thing that I’ve been thinking about lately - when did I actually get fibromyalgia? This all seems fairly new. I’ve been in pain before; carpal tunnel, back pain, etc. But I’ve never had the overwhelming fatigue or the all over pain until fairly recently. I’ve been thinking that my surgery actually was the last straw that led to the fibromyalgia. It fits the criteria and it fits the timing. I think it’s pretty sucky to get surgery that fixes one thing and gives you another. I protest...tiredly. I know that my surgery was definitely successful in fixing the specific pain that I had from the herniated disc. There was no mistaking that pain. This pain is just an icky all over kind of pain. The only severe pain I have that has a specific location all the time is the pain in my left hip, which I usually get when we’re grocery shopping or out doing something. It’s all so weird. And asking for extra pain meds makes me feel like a drug addict, but honestly, I’d be a drug addict that got absolutely no joy or high from my meds, which kind of makes using them for that purpose moot. When I take the meds, I get three possible outcomes: one, my pain goes away; two, I feel nauseous; or three, nothing. The high...never there. I did get a little stoned from my Lyrica when I was taking it, which is one of the common side-effects. But, it definitely made me feel better in other ways too. It’s too bad it was so expensive and that my insurance doesn’t cover it. 90 pills - $199.99 (I was prescribed 2/day) and 270 pills - $599.89 (don’t you like that it’s only .89 versus the .99 in the smaller number?) It is interesting that no matter what the dosage, from 25mg pills to 300mg pills, the price is the same. That’s nice for people who have to have their dosage upped. Well, if I make a ton of money, I’ll tell the doctor to prescribe whatever he wants, although Lyrica makes people gain weight too. I like the weight loss that is the result of feeling crappy and stressed out.
I really should set up another blog, or blog on Leigh-Ann’s Tired Girls blog when I’m whining about feeling crappy. I’m sure I’ve been a big disappointment to the huge number of people who came here in the past few days looking for information about Anna Nicole’s mother. I wrote one “Idiot of the Day” entry about her mom’s appearance on Nancy Grace a few months ago. My traffic tripled on Friday because of Anna Nicole’s weird and sudden death. Poor Anna Nicole - what a sad strange life she had. And here, to get stuck in your head, the theme song to Anna Nicole’s reality show. It shouldn’t just be stuck in my head.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
evening
Idiots of the Day - The Breast Cancer Society of Canada
Idiots. If exotic dancers want to help prevent breast cancer (their breasts...and lives are kind of important to them), what right does the Breast Cancer Society of Canada have to refuse the money? As someone who has previously donated to them (they’ll be on last year’s tax deductions, if we’re allowed to take a foreign deduction), I find it offensive that they would turn down any money, from anyone. I don’t care if Kiddie Porn Priests 4 Baby Sex are donating money to a good charity, I want the charity to accept the money.
Exotic dancers’ ‘stigma’ too much for charity
Last Updated: Thursday, February 8, 2007 | 11:22 AM PT
CBC News
The Breast Cancer Society of Canada has rejected the offer of thousands of dollars from a fundraising group of exotic dancers in Vancouver.
Exotic Dancers for Cancer holds an annual charity event in memory of a former dancer who lost her life to the disease.
Last year, the event raised $6,000.
However, former dancer Trina Ricketts said the society sent her an e-mail declining the money this year, because its major donors did not support a connection to exotic dancers.
She says the society has taken the group’s contributions in the past.
“I really feel that it’s a strong indication of the degree of the stigma that exotic dancers experience when an organization doesn’t even want to be associated with them for fear of experiencing the same stigma.”
Ricketts said her group is still looking for a cancer charity that will accept a donation.
The annual event will be held next month at a downtown hotel.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
the wee hours
Let’s See, Where Have I Been?
I think this has been one of my longest blog breaks ever. Believe me, I would’ve rather been blogging than...having a pelvic ultrasound (and no, not the external one that the silly girl at the radiology office said I was having), having many vials of blood taken out of my arm (the lab still had a Xmas tree up, and the place was totally depressing; however, the phlebotomist was a pro - nary a bruise did I get), making an appointment to have a cystoscopy on the 12th (if this last step doesn’t tell me what’s wrong with my worsening bladder, I’m going to have a hissy fit), figuring out a way to fix the very very bad financial damage of many many rainy days, most of which could not be foreseen, and working, working, working. Plus, lots of feeling like crap. My bladder has been extra bad lately. I tried to meet my family for breakfast early last Saturday (and you know how I hate early mornings, but I did it, I got up and ready and left the house on time), and I only made it a few miles away from home. It took me several panicky stops (I’m not sure if any of you know what those are like, but let’s just leave it at “not fun") and jumping out of the car and standing up. I finally realized that even if I was able to make it, I would’ve been like an hour late and totally miserable. I gave up and made a few phone calls, and made my way back home. The whole trip there and back took 40 minutes. Under normal, non-stopping circumstances, it would’ve taken five minutes in each direction. Blech, just blech.
The ultrasound was on Monday afternoon, and I left extra early so in case I had to make some stops, I’d still get there on time. During the ultrasound, I discovered one more thing that makes me have to, uh, go. When someone sticks something inside me to poke around and see if everything is where it should be. Makes me feel like I have to pee, it does. I didn’t, but laying in those stirrups, it gave me the same panicky feeling I get when I’m in the car and need to stop, only the tech wasn’t going to stop. The experience wasn’t the most fun in the world, but it was painless and quick, and I want this thing taken care of so badly that I wasn’t even embarrassed like I normally might be. It was more like, “Get it over with!” The tech was really nice, and spent most of her time looking at her monitor versus looking at any part of me, so that helped. Afterwards, Leigh-Ann and I (she went with me, to keep me company) went to the depressing lab that was a couple of blocks away. I left Leigh-Ann in the car with her reading material and suffered the lab on my own. It wasn’t bad. As long as I don’t have to watch the blood being taken, it doesn’t bother me. Then, like a good phlebotomist, she immediately put lots of pressure on my arm. I’ve had some that didn’t and I’ve had some truly amazing bruises. This woman was so good that right after it was done, I completely forgot about it. I never even got a tiny bruise, just one needle prick point.
On Tuesday, we had invitations for a Microsoft Launch Event (Partner Track) at The Venetian. My bladder was horrible hell from the get-go, but there was no way we were going to miss that event. I can’t even count how many stops we had to make, but let’s just say it was b-a-d. Luckily, we made it to the event exactly on time and we each came home with a free copy of Microsoft Office Professional 2007. It’s worth $400+. I’ve installed it and for now, while it’s kind of neat looking, it’s not that useful for most people at home. Also, every time I save a file, it wants to reinstall, which is annoying me. I’m waiting for Leigh-Ann to use hers and see if she has the same problem. The new ‘07 setup is interesting. Instead of clicking on File in the upper left corner of the program, you click on the Microsoft logo. I guess it’s visually prettier. It also has Outlook ‘07, and again, it’s prettier. The feature I’m looking forward to using once I get the whole password problem taken care of (it happens to me every time I change email programs), is the shared calendar. So, Leigh-Ann I will be able to share a calendar online, while using different computers. It’ll be handy so when we’re making appointments (usually for the doctor), we’ll know not to make one on the one day of the month we have something else planned. You’d be surprised how often that happens. We rarely have any major plans, but you can be sure that if something else comes up that we want to do, it’ll be on the exact same day.
The financial mess - let’s just say that it’s on the path to getting fixed. I shouldn’t have waited so long, but I was scared and didn’t know what to do. Anyway, I talked to some very nice and helpful people, and worked out almost everything. There are some details that need a little more work, but my stress level went from, a on scale of 1-10, it went from a 12 down to a 5. Damn, I hope that doesn’t mean that I’ll gain the weight back that I lost because I was so stressed. :D Also, Leigh-Ann and I got a big raise at our main job. It’s a commission job and it’s now on a tiered scale, so if we work very very hard (and we did!), we will be well-paid for our success. If our employer is reading here, which I kinda doubt, but THANK YOU! I love this job. It’s the best job I’ve had since working at my brother’s tanning salon. Only, it’s better because I don’t have to leave home to do it. I have a great job, working from home (because, with my bladder and other health problems, I kind of have to), and I’m working with blogs and bloggers. It’s still work, and there are still frustrations (arrrgh, people who don’t write back when they say they will or sign something when they say they will, grrrrr), but it’s way better than digging ditches. It also gives me the opportunity when I’m feeling well to work long hours and hopefully start saving some money. And you know, it’s not like I’ve been blowing money either. Except for the occasional pricey computer-related item that is needed for work, my big splurges have been tea bags, coffee pods, and the occasional book...although we usually buy those with our Amazon gift certificates. Mostly, the extras we’ve spent have been on other people - family, friends, strangers. We like to buy gifts. We don’t buy them for each other (we didn’t get each other anything for Xmas), although I bought Leigh-Ann an interesting necklace for her birthday that was close to 90% off. The gift wrap & shipping was more than the gift, but the gift was pretty unique, if I do say so myself. And pretty.
Tomorrow, we’re going to my brother’s house for a family Super Bowl party. I’m torn because I want both Jesus freak coaches to lose. I want religion to stay out of my sports. I like sports, and I hate it when it becomes about anything but the sport itself. I think I’m rooting mostly for the Bears defense, as they were my fantasy football defense and they mostly did really well for me. They’re pretty awesome to watch. I just hope it’s a good game, and that there are some really good commercials.
Since I’ve been working (and stressing) so hard lately, I’m way behind on my blog reading. If I haven’t commented or you haven’t seen my IP even visiting your blog, it’s nothing personal. I truly haven’t had any real free time for fun blog reading, only work blog reading. Alas, my work blog reading list rarely overlaps with my fun blog reading list. For work, I mostly read legal, marketing, and tech blogs. Some of them are really great and fun, but I don’t have a lot of time to get too involved in them. I make sure they’re well-written, have enough entries, have been blogging long enough, and stay on topic. Then, I write to them and beg them to sign. I like when the blogs are written in a more casual manner, so I can write to the blogger in a more casual way. One blogger kept referring to me as Ms. Odegard versus just plain ol’ Flippy. So, I called him Professor. I refer to almost everyone else by their first name, as that’s how they blog.
Okay, that’s about all I have to say for now. I’ll try to write more frequent shorter entries, just to keep in touch.
