Forgive me for using such a well known and trademarked phrase. I can remember being in high school, class of 1982, and a lot of my peers found this funny.
Well I'm sure a lot of people of my generation have now learned this can be a very serious matter. All it takes is just a tiny stretch for something just a little outside of our reach and the next thing you know, and you've bent your knees just beyond 90 degrees with no chance to get them straight again. There you are, on the floor with one bad arm, two weak knees, and no hope to roll onto any side where you can even get your knees under you. Normally, if I'm reaching for an object that is on the floor, I know to take special precautions. e.g. I will often slide the object between my feet, stand over it with a walker and gently bend both knees to a 45, and pick up the stupid thing. However, there are times when you reach for something that's not exactly that simple, and so all of those cautionary techniques just don't come up to memory. In this case, I was wiping the front of the bathroom counter, and I reached too far. I knew I was in trouble before I was halfway down, but it was too late.
So I am screaming through the house for anyone to come to my aid. There is no answer. I don't hear any sound that would suggest there are humans in the house. Even my dogs which I had praised in the last post are on the other side of the closed bedroom door. Though there would have been nothing they could do, as I hadn't trained them, and they aren't service dogs.
I do have my phone, and can call and text. I know Laura is out providing transport for one of the kids. In fact, I was in the middle of a text with her as we were working some other details out.
"Is there anyone in the house? I can't get up." I send her. She gives me a rundown of where she believes everyone is. Apparently, Dustin IS in the house but is taking a shower and Theresa has walked Lenore half way to the HOA pool. I doubt what Laura is saying because I hear no water flow.
I resolve at this point that very soon I will talk to each of my neighbors and see if I can get them on a help me list and add to my phone contacts, but it don't help me now.
Laura says it's a little past 3 pm, and Matthew should be on his way home soon.
Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out how to get my legs under the center of my body mass on my own. It's truly an engineering problem and I should be able to work this out - the trouble is that most of the machines I would use are compromised by pain or other weaknesses. Understand, it's not cancer that really causes me so much grief but it's what it is doing to my body each day that is the problem.
My walker is actually beyond my reach at this point too. Honestly, I was just going to the master bath sink trying to get my urine bottle, because one of the many gifts that this cancer has given me, is incontinence in certain occasions, so I keep a urine bottle because I doubt I can make it from my bed to the toilet in time. I expected to get support just by holding the counter top. BTW this also means my pants were below my knees when I fell, but at this point, I am beyond embarrassment, and will take help from any that can provide it.
I straighten my legs on the floor, and by rolling and alternating butt cheeks I'm able to pull my pants up little by little. This helps, because it's one less distraction to consider. Again I try to figure out which knee is strongest, and that I can bend enough to get under me.
Laura by this time had texted Matt to try to speed up his walk home from McDonalds about 1.5 miles away. Matt does arrive, and once we pick the critical knee, he pulls my right arm until I am kneeling on my right knee. A short pause to get circulation flowing through the back of the knees, and one final push up and I'm on my feet with my walker supporting me. Since I had been texting, I was able to measure the total time I was down. It was only 24 minutes, but when you don't know when help is coming it can seem a lot longer. Also, sometimes people in this circumstance might be in more need. For example, it may be Winter, and the victim might be on a cement floor losing body heat to the ground. There can be other factors where this is more dangerous. Thankfully, it wasn't that bad for me, when all is considered about this fall.
My objective in this post was to try to convey the fears and the pain someone with limited physical capacity goes through when trying to do something as simple as standing up when you're on the floor.
Thankfully, I am losing weight. Officially, I'm 242 pounds now. This is important, because it's hard particularly for untrained care givers to help me up.
When we were living in Arkansas, we had a neighbor who was very big, (larger than me anyway) and Laura had called me over because he could not get up from the floor. He was beyond my strength to lift and at that time in my life, I had been doing 500 pound squats in the gym. I used to have 19.5 inch calves, and 18 inch arms.
Well that's all been going away in recent months, but I think it will be for the better as others will have to help me move more as time goes on. It's sad to see my legs shrivel up like this, but I'm not looking for a mate any more. That part of my life has gone.
But even as I was in my 'prime' in Arkansas, this fellow was very difficult to lift, and all I could think to do was to help him into a kitchen chair so his legs could rest and circulate again. I'm happy to say I was able to get him up into the chair, but it also took some substantial silent prayers.
So all in all, it was a good day, and I thank our Holy Lord for getting me through it.
Tuesday, June 28, 2016
Dogs and Pain Levels
It's not something that Dr. Krivitsky would ever prescibe for me. I have some indication that he might not be much of a pet lover at all. But I feel I must assure the world that dogs have been a vitally important component of my pain control.
This morning, I woke at 07:30. Lately, I have been getting up much later though a month ago, I planned for a 06:30 wake up and an immediate set of pills which include 10 mg of methedone. However, I've been slipping in my morning routine because I can't call any doctor's office until 09:00.
Today I was clearly at PL 10 and in tears. Sure I took my methedone and my 'break through' 10 mg of Oxycodone, but I've also come to know these pain meds take 15-20 mins before I feel any relief.
But then there are dogs! These wonderful creatures that were put on God's green earth for no other purpose than to serve man.
I'm sorry if I may be heavily prejudiced against cats, but cats don't truly have the same kind of empathy that dogs have. If given lineup of people and one or two of them may be in pain, a dog will seek out the people in pain, while cats would just stop at the first person that knows how to pet a cat the way they want to be petted. A cat will seek for his own comfort, a dog wants to comfort others even at the expense of his own comfort. Have you ever watched a dog try to get a baby to stop crying? Have you seen the baby sometime hit, pinch or otherwise mishandle a dog? How does the dog react but to maybe lick the baby's face or somehow try to change the context of how the baby handles him?
The dog's first response is not to abandon the child, but to somehow comfort as best a dog can.
Here is an example of the late Sirius.
(Unfortunately, it might not render on your mobile device. I have wrestled with it for hours, no file format seems to work.)
He was Dustin and Lenore's dog that was killed in the fire last May 21st. Dustin is of course getting Lenore used to the dog, and mostly he's trying to teach her to say 'puppy', 'dog' or some other word to identify the dog.
As you may recall, Lenore has a hearing disability, which is half the reason Laura and I get to watch her. Because a regular day-care is very poor at making sure she's wearing her hearing aids at all times so she can develop proper speech.
Sirius takes a few pokes in the face from Lenore, but is not disturbed in the least. Dogs have come to know this is simply how human babies act, and will simply return the favor with a generous slobber to the face.
Now of course, food snacks will distract a dog entirely, and they at that moment will become very self centered until they have either earned the snack, stolen the snack, or the snack is no longer available.
But removing this distraction, dogs desire to comfort people. The next point is that the pain relief dogs provide is instant. You do not need to wait 20 minutes for relief.
My mother recently tried to get a new puppy, but it didn't work out well as the puppy had a little too much energy for her to handle. Part of the problem is that it has been many years since last she had a dog in the house, and might not know how to read a dog's behavior or what's needed to calm them down.
(Remember: a tired puppy is a good puppy and an exhausted puppy is an excellent puppy.)
What I also would suggest, is that as a dog owner, if you have a few grey hairs yourself, it may be easier to go to a shelter and look for a dog with some grey hairs as well. An older, adult, dog will be a bit more sedate. And while you don't get to train the dog from his first moments, if you're not a very skilled dog owner, you really won't be missing much. And you still get that wonderful dog that will nudge you to lift your spirits, or take some of that pain away.
A dog won't complain about your moaning and cries through pain. He'll only trying his best to make those sounds go away. Never will your dog complain, 'I've heard enough from you! Can't you get over it? It can't be that bad.' No, you can cry and cry and cry forever into your dog's fur and he won't mind in the least.
This morning, I woke at 07:30. Lately, I have been getting up much later though a month ago, I planned for a 06:30 wake up and an immediate set of pills which include 10 mg of methedone. However, I've been slipping in my morning routine because I can't call any doctor's office until 09:00.
Today I was clearly at PL 10 and in tears. Sure I took my methedone and my 'break through' 10 mg of Oxycodone, but I've also come to know these pain meds take 15-20 mins before I feel any relief.
But then there are dogs! These wonderful creatures that were put on God's green earth for no other purpose than to serve man.
The dog's first response is not to abandon the child, but to somehow comfort as best a dog can.
(Unfortunately, it might not render on your mobile device. I have wrestled with it for hours, no file format seems to work.)
He was Dustin and Lenore's dog that was killed in the fire last May 21st. Dustin is of course getting Lenore used to the dog, and mostly he's trying to teach her to say 'puppy', 'dog' or some other word to identify the dog.
As you may recall, Lenore has a hearing disability, which is half the reason Laura and I get to watch her. Because a regular day-care is very poor at making sure she's wearing her hearing aids at all times so she can develop proper speech.
Sirius takes a few pokes in the face from Lenore, but is not disturbed in the least. Dogs have come to know this is simply how human babies act, and will simply return the favor with a generous slobber to the face.
Now of course, food snacks will distract a dog entirely, and they at that moment will become very self centered until they have either earned the snack, stolen the snack, or the snack is no longer available.
But removing this distraction, dogs desire to comfort people. The next point is that the pain relief dogs provide is instant. You do not need to wait 20 minutes for relief.
My mother recently tried to get a new puppy, but it didn't work out well as the puppy had a little too much energy for her to handle. Part of the problem is that it has been many years since last she had a dog in the house, and might not know how to read a dog's behavior or what's needed to calm them down.
(Remember: a tired puppy is a good puppy and an exhausted puppy is an excellent puppy.)
What I also would suggest, is that as a dog owner, if you have a few grey hairs yourself, it may be easier to go to a shelter and look for a dog with some grey hairs as well. An older, adult, dog will be a bit more sedate. And while you don't get to train the dog from his first moments, if you're not a very skilled dog owner, you really won't be missing much. And you still get that wonderful dog that will nudge you to lift your spirits, or take some of that pain away.
A dog won't complain about your moaning and cries through pain. He'll only trying his best to make those sounds go away. Never will your dog complain, 'I've heard enough from you! Can't you get over it? It can't be that bad.' No, you can cry and cry and cry forever into your dog's fur and he won't mind in the least.
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
Visit with Doctor Today
This was just a check up with the palliative care tea
m. Not much to note other than my official weight has dropped to 242 pounds. Dr Krivitsky was concerned about it, and to me it's just a symtom of not feeling great about finances.
I also off-handedly find out that Katherine and Laura are cooking up yet another one of thier plsns without inviting my input. I am told it's because they think I might say 'no' to thier plan. Forgetting of course, 'no' is often the correct answer when all risks are considered, and it really isn't me they are really excluding, but some very obvious faults that they shouldn't overlook, but that they want to overlook until it's too late. My point being that with my help, we can avoid disaster before it occurs, and that big family descisions like this should have as much input from both parents.
Time and again daughters will do this sort of thing with mothers, and never have they learned how un-happy it makes thier dads, and how fruitless it is to attempt to exclude dad, because in the end we do find out, and we dads are frequently predudiced aganst the plan because we never got to participate in the early stages of planning.
Add to this, that in my present state of health there's little I can provide to the family than some well considered guidance. I can feel really hurt when mother and daughter first try to keep such secrets from me.
If it's truly a bad idea, it just makes it all the more difficult for me to overlook or find ways to help mitigate the risks of the plan, and maybe find the one critical change that can make it a good idea that all can be pleased with. In the end, mother and daughter are far more likely to get a 'no' when they approach problems this way, and far more likely to get a 'yes' if everyone gets the chance to think about it early enough.
m. Not much to note other than my official weight has dropped to 242 pounds. Dr Krivitsky was concerned about it, and to me it's just a symtom of not feeling great about finances.
I also off-handedly find out that Katherine and Laura are cooking up yet another one of thier plsns without inviting my input. I am told it's because they think I might say 'no' to thier plan. Forgetting of course, 'no' is often the correct answer when all risks are considered, and it really isn't me they are really excluding, but some very obvious faults that they shouldn't overlook, but that they want to overlook until it's too late. My point being that with my help, we can avoid disaster before it occurs, and that big family descisions like this should have as much input from both parents.
Time and again daughters will do this sort of thing with mothers, and never have they learned how un-happy it makes thier dads, and how fruitless it is to attempt to exclude dad, because in the end we do find out, and we dads are frequently predudiced aganst the plan because we never got to participate in the early stages of planning.
Add to this, that in my present state of health there's little I can provide to the family than some well considered guidance. I can feel really hurt when mother and daughter first try to keep such secrets from me.
If it's truly a bad idea, it just makes it all the more difficult for me to overlook or find ways to help mitigate the risks of the plan, and maybe find the one critical change that can make it a good idea that all can be pleased with. In the end, mother and daughter are far more likely to get a 'no' when they approach problems this way, and far more likely to get a 'yes' if everyone gets the chance to think about it early enough.
Sunday, June 19, 2016
Still No Heath Insurance
While yes I have elected to use COBRA, and the confirmation papers printed from the website state that I have 45 days from the date of the election to send my premium. The insurance won't pay any claim until after I pay the first premium. Howver, my checking account only exceeds my premium by twenty dollars and I really don't like drawing it that low withou assurance that LTD is actually going to kick in and pay me half a month's benefit.
The think that ticks me off is that I am 'covered' in that any costs i incurr will still get paid if i first pay out of pocket, and then turn in a receipt.
What kind of red tape nonsense is that? I explained my intention to pay the premium Friday, and there's nothing in the confirmation receipt or the elections page which says I must make immediate payment of the premium. It says I have 45 days.
Well now that Laura tells me there's a new donation in gofundme from a high school class mate, I guess I will make that premium payment tonight. Dr Aggarwal wants an MRI of my shoulder to try to make sense of the trouble there.
I've deferred it since I had no coverage until now. So time to schedule that this week.
It sure would make a huge difference to have a servicable shoulder agaian. One extra arm to catch me when I fall, or simply one extra arm to pet the dogs.
Also, last night Dustin decided to move in with us for a couple of weeks, so it would also be another arm to hold Lenore with.
The think that ticks me off is that I am 'covered' in that any costs i incurr will still get paid if i first pay out of pocket, and then turn in a receipt.
What kind of red tape nonsense is that? I explained my intention to pay the premium Friday, and there's nothing in the confirmation receipt or the elections page which says I must make immediate payment of the premium. It says I have 45 days.
Well now that Laura tells me there's a new donation in gofundme from a high school class mate, I guess I will make that premium payment tonight. Dr Aggarwal wants an MRI of my shoulder to try to make sense of the trouble there.
I've deferred it since I had no coverage until now. So time to schedule that this week.
It sure would make a huge difference to have a servicable shoulder agaian. One extra arm to catch me when I fall, or simply one extra arm to pet the dogs.
Also, last night Dustin decided to move in with us for a couple of weeks, so it would also be another arm to hold Lenore with.
Monday, June 13, 2016
COBRA is the Clear Winner
Just this past Saturday, we finally got the COBRA continuation letter. I made phone calls today to confirm that if we pay our COBRA premiums, we would be continuing the United Healthcare policy that we had up until 5/31.
This means the $4000 family out of pocket that we've already paid will continue to the end of the year. We've maxed out our out-of-pockets, and will have to pay nothing but our premiums for the rest of the year.
So all of Laura's diabetic meds and all my specialized meds like the Zytiga ($10,000 / month), will have no out of pocket costs until January. I also got confirmation that a) since I'm on SSD if we choose, we can continue COBRA for 29 months from May 31. We also are not locked in, and since the yearly out of pockets will reset in 207, we may shop fir a better policy in December and switch to that if it's truly better.
This means I can get that MRI of the left shoulder without additional cost.
So the adventure continues!
This means the $4000 family out of pocket that we've already paid will continue to the end of the year. We've maxed out our out-of-pockets, and will have to pay nothing but our premiums for the rest of the year.
So all of Laura's diabetic meds and all my specialized meds like the Zytiga ($10,000 / month), will have no out of pocket costs until January. I also got confirmation that a) since I'm on SSD if we choose, we can continue COBRA for 29 months from May 31. We also are not locked in, and since the yearly out of pockets will reset in 207, we may shop fir a better policy in December and switch to that if it's truly better.
This means I can get that MRI of the left shoulder without additional cost.
So the adventure continues!
Friday, June 10, 2016
Not Out of the Woods Yet
This is what my recruit company commander MS1 Recefrente was fond of saying when we were getting close to our graduation. I doubt I'll forget his face or his thick Philipino accent.
I just completed a call with the adjuster for Prudential's Long Term Disability policy. And while i should be getting the full 60% of my pay, the problem is they will deduct dollar for dollar any other income I may get. This includes Social Security Disability.
I've been working on this new budget pretty hard, and it looked like we were very close to making it. Well, today's news is that essentially I will have no SSD because every dollar gets deducted from LTD. That leaves me with a gap of about 25K per year.
I'm in a bit of dispair, because just when it seemed it would all come together, I find the numbers will still not add up.
As MS1 says, "You're not out of the woods yet".
I just don't know how to put it together now.
I also have no money to pay our health insurance premium.
Oh and on top of that, I'm having a bad pain day.
I'm at level 7, and i don't have enough strength to roll out of bed without assistance.
Please St. Joseph, I need help from here!
I just completed a call with the adjuster for Prudential's Long Term Disability policy. And while i should be getting the full 60% of my pay, the problem is they will deduct dollar for dollar any other income I may get. This includes Social Security Disability.
I've been working on this new budget pretty hard, and it looked like we were very close to making it. Well, today's news is that essentially I will have no SSD because every dollar gets deducted from LTD. That leaves me with a gap of about 25K per year.
I'm in a bit of dispair, because just when it seemed it would all come together, I find the numbers will still not add up.
As MS1 says, "You're not out of the woods yet".
I just don't know how to put it together now.
I also have no money to pay our health insurance premium.
Oh and on top of that, I'm having a bad pain day.
I'm at level 7, and i don't have enough strength to roll out of bed without assistance.
Please St. Joseph, I need help from here!
Thursday, June 9, 2016
Budget Squeeze
It is looking up for once everything gets stable, but there are some timing gaps to fill.
Tomorrow, Prudential will be calling me just to collect a few more statements on my case to determining if I qualify for the Long Term Disability, which I believe I should.
If awarded the maximum, I should be getting a direct deposit on the 24th of each month. So of course I have to manage that my pay comes in monthly, but I have done this before. The trouble is that I have run out of a lot of money and there is no buffer or "floor" left in my checking account which means this first first check will hit me when I'm dry.
The first check should cover from June 11th to June 24th (The 24th is Laura's Birthday co-incidentally.) but as I'm running so dry, I will be receiving checks in arrears to my expenses until I can get a floor saved up. Not a very good place to be when trying to explain this to creditors.
Social Security has already approved my disability, but those deposits won't show up until September.
Now all told, this means I will be living at about 87% of my regular pay while I was working. So I consider myself very fortunate because I have not prepared for retirement, and this is a comparatively high level when you consider people living off of Social Security alone.
It's nothing to sneeze at, but numbers are numbers and they must balance.
The LTD checks barely keep us afloat, for all our fixed expenses like mortgage, utilities, and such. It doesn't cover food, nor will it cover the health insurance premiums. Once Social Security is in place, I think we can swing it all, but we've got a couple of months of robbing Peter to pay Paul before we can begin to catch up.
I have contacted USAA directly too look at thier health care coverage, and there is a plan that looks like it fits. It's a bit unusual to choose, because the co-pay is 100% until the deductibles are met. However, since we know we should hit those deductibles each and every year, the total cost of premiums and out of pocket deductibles will be about 20K per year.
It will still be a tight squeeze for sure, and it requires that there is cash up front but it seems to be the only thing that gets us going.
I still have a good back log of medical bills from 2015 and 2016 before I hit my maximums.
I hate to beg, but I guess I need to do it. If you can offer any help, please see our gofundme page set up by Pat Crawford.
Tomorrow, Prudential will be calling me just to collect a few more statements on my case to determining if I qualify for the Long Term Disability, which I believe I should.
If awarded the maximum, I should be getting a direct deposit on the 24th of each month. So of course I have to manage that my pay comes in monthly, but I have done this before. The trouble is that I have run out of a lot of money and there is no buffer or "floor" left in my checking account which means this first first check will hit me when I'm dry.
The first check should cover from June 11th to June 24th (The 24th is Laura's Birthday co-incidentally.) but as I'm running so dry, I will be receiving checks in arrears to my expenses until I can get a floor saved up. Not a very good place to be when trying to explain this to creditors.
Social Security has already approved my disability, but those deposits won't show up until September.
Now all told, this means I will be living at about 87% of my regular pay while I was working. So I consider myself very fortunate because I have not prepared for retirement, and this is a comparatively high level when you consider people living off of Social Security alone.
It's nothing to sneeze at, but numbers are numbers and they must balance.
The LTD checks barely keep us afloat, for all our fixed expenses like mortgage, utilities, and such. It doesn't cover food, nor will it cover the health insurance premiums. Once Social Security is in place, I think we can swing it all, but we've got a couple of months of robbing Peter to pay Paul before we can begin to catch up.
I have contacted USAA directly too look at thier health care coverage, and there is a plan that looks like it fits. It's a bit unusual to choose, because the co-pay is 100% until the deductibles are met. However, since we know we should hit those deductibles each and every year, the total cost of premiums and out of pocket deductibles will be about 20K per year.
It will still be a tight squeeze for sure, and it requires that there is cash up front but it seems to be the only thing that gets us going.
I still have a good back log of medical bills from 2015 and 2016 before I hit my maximums.
I hate to beg, but I guess I need to do it. If you can offer any help, please see our gofundme page set up by Pat Crawford.
Forever Living Homes
These were installed from Forever Living Homes.
We got matching oak rails for the main stair, and the stain was well matched. Though I have to agree with the girls that this much dark oak railing is a overkill for this area, and it's not what any designer would reccomend.
None the less, I really find I do depend on them to get me up and down the stairs especially when I have a high pain level day like I did Tuesday.
It's particularly helpful on the lower flight of stairs, for my right arm when I walk up. I can't use my left for support up or down the stairs which is why I need rails on both sides so that both going up and going down are covered.
All told, this cost $1,130 which was paid from your donations to the gofundme link. They are very much appreciated !
Believe me when I tell you they have already saved me from at least three potentially bad falls.
Pain Level 10+
It doesn't happen often, but when it does come up, it really knocks me out.
Last Monday night I started to have extra pain that work me out of bed so I took my extra Oxycodone "break through" medication. I'm currently allowed 10 mg every four hours as needed. Normally I have 10 mg of Methadone three times a day, so all told this can be a lot of pain medication.
Tuesday morning, my right leg was experiencing the most pain, with the left shoulder and whole arm taking up the rest. I was hitting pain level 10 as I was in tears at times. I had a 14:15 appointment to get blood drawn in preparation for Dr. Burgess's follow up visit Wednesday. While at that blood work appointment we decided to give the palliative care doctor, Dr Krivitsky, a call since his office was in the same plaza at CMC Pineville. His office agreed to squeeze me in.
Dr. Krivitsky did not allow more pain medication, but instead prescribed 5 mg of Cyclobenzaprine twice a day for 15 days. This is a muscle relaxant which should have countered the pain in the leg as the doctor found most of the muscles in my leg to be in perpetual cramp. At about 03:00 Thursday I finally felt the tide turn.
It was a very bad day, and Laura had to suffer through a lot of my moaning, pain noises, and had to move my legs for me at times. I also have to admit I wasn't very pleasant company. Come Wednesday morning though my legs were feeling fine and my arm was back to it's nominal pain level 2-3.
Today, I'm still running a good 4-5 for a pain level, my right knee is very weak, and I'm at max meds, but I hope for better tomorrow. I felt I needed to get a post out or two, because as you'll see, I still need some help.
This is the sort of day however that reminds me why I'm on disability. I can go through several days thinking, "Well this isn't so bad, maybe I could have worked today." But still as drowsy as I am much of the time, I am still designated as a non-operator on my car insurance, and I can't drive. So it would cost a bit to get me to work in the first place. (about $30 round trip via Uber) Ten once at work, I doubt I'd have the mental capacity or concentration to discover any bugs I was being tasked to fix, and I would probably be working on the wrong branch of code. Chances are, I would introduce more bugs than solve at this point.
I just have to continually face the fact I really can't be working.
Speaking of which, as of 5/31/2016 I am no longer an employee of Heartland Payment Systems, and I no longer have health insurance. The COBRA paperwork has not yet come through for me to choose it, and I have spent a few hours working the heathcare.gov website. And it looks to be prohibitively expensive. Hopefully I will find something that fits before too long. Perhaps that's another post subject.
Last Monday night I started to have extra pain that work me out of bed so I took my extra Oxycodone "break through" medication. I'm currently allowed 10 mg every four hours as needed. Normally I have 10 mg of Methadone three times a day, so all told this can be a lot of pain medication.
Tuesday morning, my right leg was experiencing the most pain, with the left shoulder and whole arm taking up the rest. I was hitting pain level 10 as I was in tears at times. I had a 14:15 appointment to get blood drawn in preparation for Dr. Burgess's follow up visit Wednesday. While at that blood work appointment we decided to give the palliative care doctor, Dr Krivitsky, a call since his office was in the same plaza at CMC Pineville. His office agreed to squeeze me in.
Dr. Krivitsky did not allow more pain medication, but instead prescribed 5 mg of Cyclobenzaprine twice a day for 15 days. This is a muscle relaxant which should have countered the pain in the leg as the doctor found most of the muscles in my leg to be in perpetual cramp. At about 03:00 Thursday I finally felt the tide turn.
It was a very bad day, and Laura had to suffer through a lot of my moaning, pain noises, and had to move my legs for me at times. I also have to admit I wasn't very pleasant company. Come Wednesday morning though my legs were feeling fine and my arm was back to it's nominal pain level 2-3.
Today, I'm still running a good 4-5 for a pain level, my right knee is very weak, and I'm at max meds, but I hope for better tomorrow. I felt I needed to get a post out or two, because as you'll see, I still need some help.
This is the sort of day however that reminds me why I'm on disability. I can go through several days thinking, "Well this isn't so bad, maybe I could have worked today." But still as drowsy as I am much of the time, I am still designated as a non-operator on my car insurance, and I can't drive. So it would cost a bit to get me to work in the first place. (about $30 round trip via Uber) Ten once at work, I doubt I'd have the mental capacity or concentration to discover any bugs I was being tasked to fix, and I would probably be working on the wrong branch of code. Chances are, I would introduce more bugs than solve at this point.
I just have to continually face the fact I really can't be working.
Speaking of which, as of 5/31/2016 I am no longer an employee of Heartland Payment Systems, and I no longer have health insurance. The COBRA paperwork has not yet come through for me to choose it, and I have spent a few hours working the heathcare.gov website. And it looks to be prohibitively expensive. Hopefully I will find something that fits before too long. Perhaps that's another post subject.
Saturday, June 4, 2016
Teachers vs Educators - Bernard A. DiNatale et ux
This may seem redundant that I would pit two words against each other like this, but I should say that we have many teachers in the United States, but few of them are truly educators. This is much like what Saint Paul had said
I was having a talk with my high school friend Andy Wallace, that began as a face time session, but I was talking too fast and starting to hyper ventilate, and we switched to IM chatting. We were talking about one of our outstanding educators Bernard A. DiNatale Jr. and Andy had found his obituary from 2013.
It's a nice obituary to be sure, but I feel that between Andy and I, there's more to be said about the man.
With a tiny bit of googling I found that his wife Carolyn a.k.a. "Candy" is still living in Dunstable, MA. As I had told Andy, he was not aware that "Candy" (who I can't get out of the habit of calling Mrs. DiNatale) was also my 3rd grade teacher at South Row Elementary in Chelmsford. Though I was living on the West side of Chelmsford, I was placed in Mrs. DiNatale's towards the end of my third grade through a state special needs program called 766. Actually, on that year, Mrs. DiNatale's class was being taught at Byam Elementary which was for the West side of Chelmsford, but for the following year, I repeated third grade and the class was moved to South Row, though it was on the other side of town.
As would be my legacy, I would often find myself in the care of teachers who were barely qualified for the job, and I could often embarrass them by pointing out their errors to the class. Well, that didn't win me many friends among the faculty, so the best thing was to get me tested, and make it seem like it was my problem and that I needed a special educator that was beyond the training of the teacher that I had been assigned. This was my first experience that taught me that people can tell small 'white' lies about others to manipulate the situation. Sure, my parents were divorcing that year, but does this mean I was so emotionally distraught that I needed special handling? Apparently it was enough to get me off of this one particular teacher's back even though I wasn't really that upset that my father was living somewhere else. To be honest, I was a little too self absorbed to really care much about such things. I still saw him on occasion, so it wasn't like he died or anything. But people were able to make the argument that I wasn't behaving right and this must be the cause.
These are the sort of teachers whom I would never remember, but Mrs. DiNatale was an educator of great talent.
She was tremendous help to my early formation. She provided the space I needed to grow, and a lot of good self paced lessons. I don't think I needed much more encouragement to have confidence that I was a smart kid. On the contrary, Mrs. DiNatale was able to talk me down gently and learn to better interact with my educators and peers, and not embarrass them quite so much. I recall we had a student named Jamie who suffered from a severe epilepsy and wore a hockey helmet all day long. In a typical classroom environment kids can be cruel, and Jamie certainly was getting the brunt of that cruelty. In Mrs. DiNatale's class, we all learned to be more accepting of people that were just a little strange. She created the right kind of environment for us all, so that we were able to grow through those years. Jamie found a safe place of acceptance, and we all learned that people come in many sizes, colors and abilities. Long before diversity education became all the rage, I was already well ahead of that trend due to Mrs. DiNatale's guidance.
Mrs. DiNatale got me to learn more about respecting other people's feelings than any could at that time of my life. This also included respecting the feelings of teachers.
I was able to phone Mrs. DiNatale yesterday, and though Mr. DiNatale had passed in 2013, she was able to describe the hole he still left in her life.
Later in high school, as Mr. DiNatale's student, one of the things that I saw was he taught his electronics class with the intent of making sure each student right then and there had learned enough about the trade that regardless of any further education they might receive, they were already prepared to meet the working world as an electronics technician. Here again, beyond the typical curriculum of electronics, Mr. DiNatale was able to provide space for individual students to explore beyond the course material.
There was a digital electronics board with discrete and-gates and or-gates and inverters from which I was able to make a three digit decimal counter and drive a seven segment display of this count.
I'm a little more comfortable calling Mr. DiNatale by his first name, because ironically he suffered from a touch of dyslexia, and had trouble being able to distinguish a small letter b from a small letter d. and since of course, those were his initials we had some fun with that.
I had created a custom logo for him that was a parody of the Atari logo, and I added to two outside symbols or regions of color a couple of semi-circular lobes to turn these into the small letters 'b' and 'd', and the center was turned into a stylized 'a'. the black "Atari" was turned into "Dinatari" which of course you'd pronounce with a thick Japanese accent. Of course it was hard for Mr. DiNatale to see all that because of the symmetry involved, but he seemed to enjoy it.
There was also the day the Mr. DiNatale had discovered that I had brought a camping knife to school. And he did a perfect job of seeing to it that I never brought it back, and without reporting it to anyone. I can't tell you much about the circumstances of why I had brought it to school, but Mr. D had done the right thing to get me to reverse my conduct.
I owe quite a bit to each of the DiNatale's for keeping me out of trouble and setting me on the best course I could get in my life.
One of the things Mrs. DiNatale and I were talking about last night is the trouble that current teachers have to face where there are the forces of political correctness that would make it difficult for any such motivated educator to actually educate today's children in equally effective ways.
That should be a whole other post - but for now I will simply express my gratitude that the DiNatale's were the educators that they were and that the benefits of their efforts also reach down to another generation as I pass these lessons onto my children.
I Cor 4:15 For if you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, I have begotten you.This of course is the classic refute to the Protestant who holds up St. Matthew 23:9-10 as evidence that the Catholic Church is wrong to call priests by the title "father". St. Paul is clearly calling himself "father" and distinguishing himself from the ten thousand instructors in Christ.
I was having a talk with my high school friend Andy Wallace, that began as a face time session, but I was talking too fast and starting to hyper ventilate, and we switched to IM chatting. We were talking about one of our outstanding educators Bernard A. DiNatale Jr. and Andy had found his obituary from 2013.
It's a nice obituary to be sure, but I feel that between Andy and I, there's more to be said about the man.
With a tiny bit of googling I found that his wife Carolyn a.k.a. "Candy" is still living in Dunstable, MA. As I had told Andy, he was not aware that "Candy" (who I can't get out of the habit of calling Mrs. DiNatale) was also my 3rd grade teacher at South Row Elementary in Chelmsford. Though I was living on the West side of Chelmsford, I was placed in Mrs. DiNatale's towards the end of my third grade through a state special needs program called 766. Actually, on that year, Mrs. DiNatale's class was being taught at Byam Elementary which was for the West side of Chelmsford, but for the following year, I repeated third grade and the class was moved to South Row, though it was on the other side of town.
As would be my legacy, I would often find myself in the care of teachers who were barely qualified for the job, and I could often embarrass them by pointing out their errors to the class. Well, that didn't win me many friends among the faculty, so the best thing was to get me tested, and make it seem like it was my problem and that I needed a special educator that was beyond the training of the teacher that I had been assigned. This was my first experience that taught me that people can tell small 'white' lies about others to manipulate the situation. Sure, my parents were divorcing that year, but does this mean I was so emotionally distraught that I needed special handling? Apparently it was enough to get me off of this one particular teacher's back even though I wasn't really that upset that my father was living somewhere else. To be honest, I was a little too self absorbed to really care much about such things. I still saw him on occasion, so it wasn't like he died or anything. But people were able to make the argument that I wasn't behaving right and this must be the cause.
These are the sort of teachers whom I would never remember, but Mrs. DiNatale was an educator of great talent.
She was tremendous help to my early formation. She provided the space I needed to grow, and a lot of good self paced lessons. I don't think I needed much more encouragement to have confidence that I was a smart kid. On the contrary, Mrs. DiNatale was able to talk me down gently and learn to better interact with my educators and peers, and not embarrass them quite so much. I recall we had a student named Jamie who suffered from a severe epilepsy and wore a hockey helmet all day long. In a typical classroom environment kids can be cruel, and Jamie certainly was getting the brunt of that cruelty. In Mrs. DiNatale's class, we all learned to be more accepting of people that were just a little strange. She created the right kind of environment for us all, so that we were able to grow through those years. Jamie found a safe place of acceptance, and we all learned that people come in many sizes, colors and abilities. Long before diversity education became all the rage, I was already well ahead of that trend due to Mrs. DiNatale's guidance.
Mrs. DiNatale got me to learn more about respecting other people's feelings than any could at that time of my life. This also included respecting the feelings of teachers.
I was able to phone Mrs. DiNatale yesterday, and though Mr. DiNatale had passed in 2013, she was able to describe the hole he still left in her life.
Later in high school, as Mr. DiNatale's student, one of the things that I saw was he taught his electronics class with the intent of making sure each student right then and there had learned enough about the trade that regardless of any further education they might receive, they were already prepared to meet the working world as an electronics technician. Here again, beyond the typical curriculum of electronics, Mr. DiNatale was able to provide space for individual students to explore beyond the course material.
There was a digital electronics board with discrete and-gates and or-gates and inverters from which I was able to make a three digit decimal counter and drive a seven segment display of this count.
I'm a little more comfortable calling Mr. DiNatale by his first name, because ironically he suffered from a touch of dyslexia, and had trouble being able to distinguish a small letter b from a small letter d. and since of course, those were his initials we had some fun with that.
I had created a custom logo for him that was a parody of the Atari logo, and I added to two outside symbols or regions of color a couple of semi-circular lobes to turn these into the small letters 'b' and 'd', and the center was turned into a stylized 'a'. the black "Atari" was turned into "Dinatari" which of course you'd pronounce with a thick Japanese accent. Of course it was hard for Mr. DiNatale to see all that because of the symmetry involved, but he seemed to enjoy it.
There was also the day the Mr. DiNatale had discovered that I had brought a camping knife to school. And he did a perfect job of seeing to it that I never brought it back, and without reporting it to anyone. I can't tell you much about the circumstances of why I had brought it to school, but Mr. D had done the right thing to get me to reverse my conduct.
I owe quite a bit to each of the DiNatale's for keeping me out of trouble and setting me on the best course I could get in my life.
One of the things Mrs. DiNatale and I were talking about last night is the trouble that current teachers have to face where there are the forces of political correctness that would make it difficult for any such motivated educator to actually educate today's children in equally effective ways.
That should be a whole other post - but for now I will simply express my gratitude that the DiNatale's were the educators that they were and that the benefits of their efforts also reach down to another generation as I pass these lessons onto my children.
Pain vs Sleep
Thursday I spent most of it in bed sleeping, and then later, about 17:00 that evening I was at pain level 10 and in tears, so I took my 10 mg of Oxycodone and decided to wait 40 minutes before calling my palliative care docotor's office. Of course I was going to get an after hours response. but I wanted to be sure I had given the Oxy some time to work. Well it did take the pain down to about 6 or so, but I was ready for more relief and I called. Often these after hours contacts don't really achieve much because I will first get an operator who will then take down my complaint - then they phone a nurse practitioner who is supposed to call me back in 30 minutes. Then they get me to repeat the information I gave the operator, and they will pass that onto a doctor who will call me back in 30 minutes. And what do you suppose the doctor then does but ask me to repeat myself yet a third time.
Well after that process, I got a doctor who essentially told me to take a Tylenol.
But what this does do it get me flagged on a couple of phone lists so that both Dr. Krivitsky's and Dr. Burgess's office will call me in the morning. And while I am also working some of my outgoing calls, this sets up for a train wreck of phone tag between the various offices. It was a little after noon before I got everyone settled in.
I have been singing praises of Carolinas Medical Center for a few months now, and lets understand that is for the professionalism and skill of everyone on staff. But I do have to say there are two things that CMC consistently fails to deliver. The first is the recent change of the food vendor for the patients in the hospital. It's not really bad, but I do find myself rejecting 30-40% of the meals I'm offered. The previous vendor they had last September was excellent.
The second thing they are terrible with is their blinking phone system. Just yesterday, I was in to get an EKG and I had incorrectly noted the clinic where I was supposed to have it done. So I tried to call Dr. Krivitsky's office to get the instructions repeated. It was 2 PM Thursday - most of us would consider this normal working hours. I was greeted by a phone message asking me to leave a message and they would call me back.
Seriously? You can't answer the phone directly during normal working hours ? How inefficient is that ? Oh and they never returned the call!
I talked with Dr. Bobo, the Radiologist about it, and he says that the staff have frequently complained to CMC management that they have very difficult times being able to communicate with their patients because of this phone system that has been contracted. It's a problem with all CMC clinics.
Dr. Bobo also went on to say that most of the staff have their own personal cell phones to be able to get around the system and communicate with each other directly. e.g. Dr. Bobo can not get in touch with Dr. Burgess using CMC's phone system, they have to call each other on personal phones.
As a computer programmer who has built many types of automated systems, it just frosts my cookies to see such a terrible system in use, and to know someone is actually making money selling such a horrible system to a hospital. But further, I blame CMC for not waking up to the fact they have a problem and they need to dump their current vendor and get something that works.
I had intended to write and post this yesterday. I have quite a few things to report about yesterday!
Well I shall make that as a separate post today.
Well after that process, I got a doctor who essentially told me to take a Tylenol.
But what this does do it get me flagged on a couple of phone lists so that both Dr. Krivitsky's and Dr. Burgess's office will call me in the morning. And while I am also working some of my outgoing calls, this sets up for a train wreck of phone tag between the various offices. It was a little after noon before I got everyone settled in.
I have been singing praises of Carolinas Medical Center for a few months now, and lets understand that is for the professionalism and skill of everyone on staff. But I do have to say there are two things that CMC consistently fails to deliver. The first is the recent change of the food vendor for the patients in the hospital. It's not really bad, but I do find myself rejecting 30-40% of the meals I'm offered. The previous vendor they had last September was excellent.
The second thing they are terrible with is their blinking phone system. Just yesterday, I was in to get an EKG and I had incorrectly noted the clinic where I was supposed to have it done. So I tried to call Dr. Krivitsky's office to get the instructions repeated. It was 2 PM Thursday - most of us would consider this normal working hours. I was greeted by a phone message asking me to leave a message and they would call me back.
Seriously? You can't answer the phone directly during normal working hours ? How inefficient is that ? Oh and they never returned the call!
I talked with Dr. Bobo, the Radiologist about it, and he says that the staff have frequently complained to CMC management that they have very difficult times being able to communicate with their patients because of this phone system that has been contracted. It's a problem with all CMC clinics.
Dr. Bobo also went on to say that most of the staff have their own personal cell phones to be able to get around the system and communicate with each other directly. e.g. Dr. Bobo can not get in touch with Dr. Burgess using CMC's phone system, they have to call each other on personal phones.
As a computer programmer who has built many types of automated systems, it just frosts my cookies to see such a terrible system in use, and to know someone is actually making money selling such a horrible system to a hospital. But further, I blame CMC for not waking up to the fact they have a problem and they need to dump their current vendor and get something that works.
I had intended to write and post this yesterday. I have quite a few things to report about yesterday!
Well I shall make that as a separate post today.
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