Adventures in health care

Well, here we go again.

Blood glucose is up. The A1C is basically a continuous 3-month average of your blood glucose. 7.9. Normal is 4-7. Previously I'd been down around 6.4. This isn’t surprising, since in Toronto I wasn’t really taking care of myself, and not really being careful with my sugars. Belgian waffles and all. So I can work on that.

Iron is down around 129, which is lower than it was when I started the iron supplement (and started the adventures in health care with the multiple colonoscopies, gastroscopy, abdominal CT, etc.). I’m told one of my drugs may cause false lows with the standard iron tests. On the other hand, my ‘total iron bindability’ (in scare quotes because I’m not sure what it is or how you measure it) is elevated, which is associated with anemia and not caused by the drug. So we’re going to have to have another look at that somehow.

Two liver enzymes elevated. Will check for hepatitis (argh) and if that’s negative they’ll have to do an ultrasound on my liver. I’m told that fatty deposits in the liver can raise your enzymes. I’m also assuming odd masses and whatnot can do the same. Not worried, but this could be a serious adventure. I had an echocardiogram once. That was ultrasound. And every pregnant woman I know has had several. And of course people are starting to use ultrasound as a research tool in phonetics, so I should add it to my research profile, I guess.

Meantime, and speaking of fatty deposits, the weight is up. I’ve gone from too fat to way too fat, so i’m working on that. Being careful with portion sizes and veggies and so on—like I should have been doing all along, but, well, I was distracted in Toronto.

Two pieces of good news in all of this. The cholesterol looks really good. Total about 4.7 and LDL down at 2.9. I assume that makes the HDL something like 1.8. For my American readers, I have no idea what those numbers look like in American. I know that normal is below 4.something or 5.something, but it’s been long enough that I don’t remember what the normal range is in American. Something in the back of my head is chanting ‘<134’, but I don’t know.

Also my wonderful doctor always gets low blood pressures. The last time it was in it was 100/65. Low enough that she quizzed me about lightheadedness (almost never) and talked about possibly adjusting my meds accordingly. At home, when I check, I usually get something like 125/85, but whatever. The CPAP therapy (for the sleep apnea) is supposed to help with the blood pressure (i.e. the OSA is implicated in raised BP, so treating the OSA should moderate the BP), so maybe that’s what’s going on. It certainly isn’t adjusting the appetite or peeling off the weight like it was supposed to.

But dwelling on the good—the cholesterol and the BP. Yay me. Now to get the weight down, get the blood sugar back under control, and whip my liver back into shape.

A new malady

Long time readers may recall my previous bout with what I call "Nintendo Thumb". Back in December of 06, when Zelda:Twilight Princess came out, I settled in for several weeks of Nintendo-induced bliss, followed by some days/weeks of seriously Nintendo-induced pain. This came from swelling in my right first (thumb) carpo-metacarpal (where the base of the thumb meets the wrist) and metacarpo-pharyngeal (where the thumb meets the hand) joints. Supposedly due to repetitive stress injury resulting in tendinitis (according to published descriptions of similar maladies, and which I think should be spelled 'tendonitis', but nobody consults me about these things), it comes from mashing buttons or control sticks with your thumb for hours on end.

The new Wii has added a new twist to this, which I am going to call "Nintendo Wrist", which I felt the beginnings of last night and decided to give it a rest. The wireless controller for Wii games has a bunch of accelerometers or something like that in it, such that depending on the game, you can point the controller, swing it, or shake it, to accomplish various things. In Super Mario Galaxy, you both 'spin' Mario and make Mario 'throw' (things in his hands or, properly powered up, fireballs). Both are critical moves at various points in the game.

And if you're like me, you get stuck at anything requiring what you might call timing or skill, so you have to do them over and over again until you get it right and hopefully you don't have to do them again for a while.

Motor learning tells us that if you practice these things for a while, sleep on it, and then try again, your brain magically rewires your systems for all the control you were trying, unsuccessfully, to master during your first practice. So the logical thing to do, when you get stuck doing some combination of things in a game, is to practice a few times, work out what you want your body to do, and then go to sleep. It should be easier the next time you do it.

So last night, when I was stuck on a desert level, where you have to spin out of whirlwinds and fly, helicopter-wise, short distances, then jump up walls and spin yourself out of launch stars and then do it all again, I started to feel a funny twinge in my right wrist.

The smart thing to do would have been to save the game, quit, put the controller down and go to bed. But that isn't how Nintendo Wonks work.

So I kept at it, sometimes having to spin/fly/jump/fall/jump/climb/jump/spin through the same combination probably a dozen times when I messed up on one maneuver (sp?) or another, all the while wondering what damage I was doing to my wrist.

Well, in the end I managed to finish the level, and today my wrist doesn't seem particularly worse for wear. But I should probably take a break from stressing it for a while. Maybe next week, when I'm on the road anyway....

Adventures in health care

Turns out, I'm anemic.

Well, that's not what the doctor said. The doctor said my 'hemoglobin was down', and that I seemed to be 'holding on tight' to iron. I have no idea what that means. My Hb is at 131 (I take it that that's grams per liter), where 'normal' for men is 140-180. So a) I'm now on an iron supplement, b) I have to go off the iron supplement and follow a special diet for several days to do the Occult Blood test, and c) after that, it's off to the GI specialist.

Could be a diet thing. I did check through all my meds and none of them specifically mention iron absorbtion problems. Assuming I'm not bleeding internally or have any of the more dire possibilities, which are really very remote in the circumstances, the obvious solution is to eat more red meat. Yay. I love red meat. I always assumed too much.

I assume that has consequences for the cholesterol and the B12 (or one of those Bs, I forget which, which is only available through red meat or supplements). But whatever. I'm not worried. Except for the forthcoming adventures in medical testing, which I don't expect to be a problem, but won't be any fun.

Did I mention my vacuum cleaner is still in the trunk of the car?

It's Tuesday. I woke up sort of late, meaning on time, but late in the sense that I had meant to get an early start.

I started my day at StB hospital, to have some blood drawn for some tests. I'm supposed to do it a week ahead of an appointment, but the appointment is on Thursday and I forgot about it until Saturday and didn't have a chance to go in yesterday.

I then had a 'baby' apple pancake at the Original Pancake House. Yum. And sat and had a coffee at the coffee place at the Forks, working on some notes regarding my latest Acting-Head crisis. Which we're going to have to suck up and pay for, and in the scheme of things it's not that much, but really, I'd rather not go begging for money from the Dean considering I've already done stuff to to make his life miserable. So I noodled out some questions for some others that might lead to some solutions I didn't/couldn't/wouldn't think of on my own.

Then I went to Diamond Sports & Medical supply, where I hoped to find a thick yoga mat, and better blocks. And maybe a knee pad for those lunge positions. Didn't find squat. Spent a long time playing with the stretchy bands and tubes and things they use in Pilates and stuff, and considered the purchase of a distance-gripper thingy and a bedpan as a gift for a friend of mine (long story, to be shared some other time).

Then I went to the mystery bookstore and bought some books, now that I'm back to reading at night.

Which was originally going to be the topic of this post. I've just discovered Jim Butcher's "Dresden Files" series, featuring one Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden, the only openly practicing Wizard known, who works as a sorcery consultant, sort of a PI of the supernatural, out of an office in Chicago. Good voice, well drawn characters. Lead with a shady past. Funny and atmospheric, lots of great supporting characters (my favo(u)rite being Bob, the lascivious air spirit who lives in a skull in Harry's basement). Good supporting characters with inner and outer conflicts. Not 100% sure about the world, the way magic works in this universe. But lots of hints of more to explore (The White Council, a Vampiress owner of a pricey escort agency, the mysterious Nevernever, a Warden with a sword and an axe to grind. And a mortal crime boss to get in the way--I particularly loved the line "I've never had a Godfather, but I do have a godmother, and she is, as it happens, a faery." Or something like that.) So I went looking for book #2 at the mystery place, which of course they didn't have. The did have #9, the new one, which apparently just came in, but I have to read things in order or it just doesn't work for me. Ended up buying some other stuff, but I'll have to go elsewhere to hunt up the rest of the Butcher novels.

So after all that, I did some shopping, bought groceries, and now I'm contemplating doing a whole lot of cooking so I can save some time as I go on this week. Really need to do laundry at some point. And get my new vacuum cleaner out of the trunk of the car.

Notes from Camp Dipso-Manee

My mother's remedy for sore throat consisted of equal parts lemon juice, honey, and whatever booze was in the house. I remember getting this in a baby bottle as a child, and later in a squeezee bottle (like for ketchup or mustard) to squirt it directly to the back of the throat. I don't know how medicinal this was, and how much of this was getting the child drunk enough to stop whining for five seconds (my mother raised six children, so I presume those respites while the child slept it off were quite precious).

My mother's solution to teething, I recall when watching her with my nephews at the appropriate moment in their lives, involved pouring some whisky over ice, dipping a finger into it and rubbing it on the child's gums. I never saw my mother take a sip from the glass in between gum massages, but I presume that was part of the deal.

Okay, so when I've gotten sick, I've taken to mixing up combinations of lemon and honey and some kind of booze (lately crown royal, just because a) I live in Canada now and b) it's what I had in the house that wasn't tequila), and taking it by whatever means seems appropriate--by the spoonful or two to take the edge off the sore throat, a squirt from a squeezee bottle for the same purpose, a couple of spoonfuls in some hot tea to keep everything loose and moving.

Since my current illness does not involve sore throat, so much as mobile congestion, I haven't dug out my squeezee bottles. On the other hand, I have been trying to force liquids, and my new thing is mint lemonade. This consists of a glug or two of lemon juice in the bottom of a 900 ml cup, a few spoons of sugar substitute to take the edge off the lemon. Fill the cup with water, and top with a glug (or two) of peppermint schnapps.

Aaaaah.

The case of the mysterious toe

Well, not so mysterious. Just bloody. But I didn't want the title of this post to be 'The case of the bloody toe'.

Now, readers of this blog know that I've been suffering from some sensitivity problems, in the sense of not having much sensation, in my left little toe. So in spite of having recovered some of that sensation, or at least having gotten used to the lack of sensation, I try to be careful what happens to my toes. So imagine my surprise a while ago when I look down and see a) a lot of blood everywhere, and not all of it really fresh, and b) what looks like a serious wound on the tip of my right little toe.

It seems I took a clean slice off the very tip of my little toe. Doesn't hurt in the least, but getting it cleaned up was a chore, it being my toe and kind of far away, and then trying to get the bleeding to stop. Which took a long time.

I have no idea when or how I did this to my toe. I'd just gotten in from the drugstore, and I can't really tell if I bled all over the inside of my boot, but a nice clean slice like that looks like a cut from a blade rather than a scrape on sharp thing or something. Anyway, I'm not leaving puddles of blood everywhere I go now, so I suppose I'll survive.

Oh, so the reason I went to the drugstore was that I'm out of aspirin, expectorant, and cough suppressant. Being out of expectorant isn't so bad, because I think the need to keep things loose and moving in my lungs is now in abeyance, and now I just need to let it ciliate to the point where it's worth trying to cough it up. Hence the cough suppressant. Note to my students, if you ever want a crash review of your expiratory muscles (the ones that assist coughing)--well, I guess I wouldn't recommend bronchitis, but if you ever happen to have bronchitis otherwise, it wouldn't hurt to take the opportunity to review.

News from the sickbed

File this under 'too much information'.

I know it's good news when you finally start coughing up foul-tasting, yellowish chunks of stuff, because it means the inflection has cleared and your lungs are starting to expel(l) the detritus. But it doesn't make breathing, sitting, sleeping, or arguing with your dean any easier. Nor does the occasional but recurrent signs of fever--the feeling of being hot but shivering with clammy skin, followed by moderate comfort, then turning over and discovering a truly hot spot in your bed where some part of your body used to be.

So I've been lying low for a couple of days, taking long naps, drinking lemonade both hot and cold (sometimes laced with the aforementioned honey liqueur, or once some peppermint schnapps), trying to get well and avoiding unnecessary exposure to the elements.

So anyway, I'm still lying low, trying to avoid blowing out my vocal folds with all the coughing, staying hydrated (not to say a little schnockered(sp?)), and hoping to be well by Monday. Meantime, not a lot of laundry or housecleaning getting done. On the other hand, I've been making some killer soups and turkey sandwiches.

Another Thursday missed

Well, I didn't do an update on Thursday, mostly because I stayed home and did some tidying up. The upshot of which is in the afternoon, when I normally would have spent some time online catching up with stuff, I took a near life-changing three hour nap.

I love naps. I love naps more than sleeping at night. I tend to fall asleep faster, deeper, and wake up actually refreshed after a long daylight-hours nap than I do at night. Part of me wonders if I'm reverting to a pre-antidepressant, grad-school state of actually being afraid to go to sleep at night (for a number of neurotransmitter-related all-in-your-head kinds of reasons) but having no problem sleeping, say, between 7am and noon, and again between 3pm and 6pm. Which explains why all my best writing occured between 1 and 3am. Typical grad school kind of schedule, but not what you call mentally healthy.

I've always been a thrasher in my sleep, and my fancy new space-age mattress that is supposed to eliminate that hasn't. Which is not a problem, except that in the last few weeks instead of going to sleep on my back and waking up on my back, but in the meantime having traversed every possible angle and position--I used to go to sleep on my back, blankets nice straight and wake up that way, but with all my blankets turned upside-down. Anyway, lately I've been waking up with my upper body folded over onto my right, trapping my right arm under my body. Which would be fine--I guess my shoulders are unusually flexible in that direction--but it usually means my right elbow and wrist are flexed as well--so not only am I stressing the blood flow, I'm stressing my ulnar nerve, and setting off my intermittend ulnar palsy.

This is a new word for me, and I'm sort of enamo(u)red of it, in the way that when somebody gives you a new word for something that you thought only you ever experienced or thought about you feel validated. Ulnar Nerve Palsy is a condition where you get tingling/numbness, etc. in your ring and little fingers related to stressing the nerve, which runs along the outside of the elbow. Since I've been experiencing this in both arms, mostly from my habit of clutching my blankets up to my chin when I'm cold--which I almost always am in the morning--I've been trying to keep my elbows mostly extended in bed. Which works fine as long as I'm awake, and on my back, and warm, but whem rolled over on your side or belly it's hard to keep your arms straight. And apparently my body is trying to get me to sleep on my side. Or something.

One wonders if this is my (familial) history of snoring and/or apnea finally catching up with me. I'm really hoping it's just the 20 lbs I've put on in the last six months, and as I retake control of my diet and whatnot, I'll go back to normal. For some value of 'normal'.