Thursday, March 06, 2014
& oh btw Happy Birthday
I'm just a few days shy of my 50th B'day and already I got a one-year membership offer from the AARP in the mail yesterday (didn't know they did this that early)and if I join now I get a free tote bag. Then for practically the whole past year my doctor has been peppering our discussions with the subject of colonoscopies. I feel like a vampire, I've been alive for half a century already. There's something gauche and vaguely offensive imo about all of this as I feel you should enjoy your birthday without incident instead of others overlaying it with dreadful reminders. It should be a light and happy time no matter what your age but in this case instead of thinking about a birthday cake with candles they got me thinking about the ass then the AARP got me thinking about my mortality (how much more time do I have?). Hell instead of downloading the latest issue of the Nat'l Review why don't I just subscribe to Arthritis Today? So is a colonoscopy indicated at the exact stroke of midnight as soon as you turn the big 5-0? I think it has more to do with our cultural OCD obsession with round numbers that end in zero. Remember all the media coverage of the 47th anniversary of JFK? didn't think so. Maybe in a few years time, hell maybe in a few months I'll get a brochure from Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. I've pretty much decided after much thought and Internet sleuthing the full hardcore 4' colonoscopy is off the table for me and I've said as much. As well I don't need a handy travel bag with the AARP logo just yet but thanks just the same. I pretty much just want to enjoy my birthday so leave me alone. You turn the 1/2 century mark and they got one foot in the grave for you already. Lastly conservatives have spent a lifetime talking about the importance of the rich and powerful that they can make you feel pretty insecure about yourself. Of course the sex-drenched men's magazines don't help matters and don't take into account all your romantic failures so when you put the two together you're supposed to be a Trump or a Koch Bros. who gets laid all the time. Better yet after you're done with me you can put a birthday candle in there and leave the tote bag on the side:)
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Happy birthday! Just take the day for you, do what you'd like to do, no matter how crazy it might be (if you're like me, read the fine print on your insurance policies before you go with 'no matter how crazy') have a great day! :)
ReplyDeleteOn so many levels it seems the 50th B'Day milestone is one of the most important. Not imo but medically (added focus on the lower digestive track) and culturally (see the AARP) whereas I just wanna enjoy the day. My sitemeter is getting more modest by the day. BB hang around a while.
ReplyDeleteAs I recall, I went past 50 sometime in the last century and yes, it is about the same
ReplyDeleteas 49 or 51. (Next year is my 50th anniversary). It is hard to ascribe major life changes with birthdays: I think I reached my intellectual peak sometime in first grade, ya know? Gave up speed skating in my thirties, jogging in my forties and
tennis in my fifties. A few years back, I gave up trying to negotiate big city freeways and have figured out how to navigate country roads and avoid going down a center
lane at 75 mph trying to figure out where my exit was. I regard that as contributing to
less road rage. Speaking of traffic, the local community is up in arms over the intersection between Walmart and Costco. The traffic engineer has been getting
reports of six, even seven cars at the stoplight! Being Idahoville, he is less concerned about accidents than someone getting shot. Happy Birthday, Z-Man,
next thing you know you will be turning gray!
49 or 51 the same as 50, so true. I mean do the polyps have the same obsession with round numbers ending in zero as the rest of us do?
ReplyDeleteHope you had a nice birthday.
ReplyDeleteHaving to stay at work AGAIN with weather. This one was unplanned. I am sans medication ergo no sleep and i am pretty rippin. None of this is good.
ReplyDeleteBirthday is next week, March 14th to be exact. I hear providers have to be in compliance with the new health codes come Oct. 1st and none of it is pretty. Expect more calamities.
ReplyDeleteFinally slept after 42 hours.
ReplyDeleteDo they have insomnia figured out yet? yeah just like they got tinnitus figured out. Tesh gives up tips and says how important it is to get those daily-required 8 hrs. of sleep per night but what gets me is people like Tesh act like we plan on a fun night of sleeplessness.
ReplyDeleteIf im not medicated i dont sleep. Its part of mania.
ReplyDeleteThis is strange but I got or thought I got a fairly good decent night's rest last night but felt waves of tiredness washing over me at work. I hope I don't have the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome in addition to my other ailments. I honestly think it's the place or the people you work with to be more specific.
ReplyDeleteDon't get hysterical. Maybe your blood sugar was just a little low.
ReplyDeleteHave you tried watching "Keeping Up With The Kartrashians before bedtime?
ReplyDeleteBut in serious medicine I have shingles now for the third time.
ReplyDeleteShingles that often is quite rare. How's your immune system?
DeleteApparently not as good as I thought. The even more interesting thing is that I get it in the same spot (on my neck) and at the same time of year (usually April). It really is weird. Neither of the relapses have been anywhere near as awful as the first one.
ReplyDeleteHmmm, the periodicity suggests some sort of annual allergic reaction; have you checked that out? Some allergies are known to mimic shingles, which
Deletefollow dermatomes; your symptoms seem to be in the dermatome c2/c3 area and I'm not sure what the diagnostic criteria might be for either
one.
A question for the doctor: how do you know if you have kidney stones or hip bursitis?
ReplyDeleteIMO, hip bursitis is a localized pain, usually at the point of the inflamed bursa, It can
ReplyDeletebe more painful at night and typically responds temporarily to NSAIDs. Kidney stones typically are a generalized pain across the lower back, often intense, constant and unaffected by NSAIDs; sometimes so painful as to be accompanied by
nausea. Those would be the initial assumptions, awaiting x-rays and other clinical
assays. Dr. House would consider avascular necrosis or incipient SJD : he would go see Dr. Cuddy and demand a spinal tap, urinalysis and a particularly robust colonoscopy. :)
This definitely falls into the ole TMI category so I promise not to gross out. Had some wine Sunday night, woke up the next day early to go to work and had a bad case of what we in this area call the trots (as in you have to trot to the bathroom if you catch my drift). Kinda repetitive that day but seemed to clear up yesterday but last night had just a glass of that Australian wine called Yellowtail and same thing happened today. So I was reading just the other day they add what are called sulfites to most wine as some sort of preservative even though sulfites occur naturally in the wine-making process. Turns out however that some people, a small % of the population are somehow allergic to these sulfur compounds. Both times it acted like a colon cleanser to me yet I've had wine in the past that people have given to me at Christmastime and had no problems. It's legally required to add on wine labels "Sulfites Added" and most wine has them. What are your thoughts? I think I'm gonna avoid the vino altogether from now on.
ReplyDeleteWhat else had you eaten?
ReplyDeleteSulfites are fairlyubiquitous across the food spectrum. In beer & wine, they are fermentation residuals. There are reports of people with sensitive GI tracts getting the Green Apple Quicktrot
Deletefrom sulfites, although sulfite allergies typically are asthmatic reaction. Another possibility are the polyols (alcohol sugars) which are in wine: there
are about a dozen types, all or any of which could affect the digestive process in a sensitive individual.
It's weird because I can more than tolerate hardcore liquor. As for what I ate that's easy as since I've been trying to shed a few pounds I don't pick at night and the main meal I had when I came home from work there was no adverse reaction from that for literally hours afterwards. My digestion has never been that great during my lifetime probably owing to things like work stress and doing too much but very rarely have I had something like this. Federal gov't doesn't allow sulfites to be used on fresh fruits and vegetables that are eaten raw. Good foods to eat for an upset stomach - bananas of course and apples that are peeled first because of the pectin. Look I'm kinda like Saty here, I get things out of the blue you can't readily explain.
DeleteAs I understand it, hard liquor has no sulfites as it is distilled; unless they
Deleteshow up as impurities if/or when color, such as caramel, aging in oak, food coloring or wood charcoal is used. Even then, the amounts are miniscule. Vodkas, Gins and most Scotch should be free of sulfite. You seem to tolerate brandy fine, right?
The moral of the story is stick to the bourbon. I've heard it said brandy is the most healthy or least harmful of the hard liquors, after all they don't put scotch in those St. Bernard casks for blizzard victims.
ReplyDeleteI go through my share of brandy myself. Doubt a Christian Brother would lace his
ReplyDeletestuff with sulfites, ya know?
Maybe doctors can recommend sulfites as part of that big pre-colonoscopy cleanse day. You know I had this thought yesterday, it's a common thought of mine but it's disturbing when you stop to think of all the CRAP we're putting into our systems on a daily basis not to mention poisons. I was always big on junk food growing up but even I was turned off by those Snowball things and Little Debbies too. I mean even as a kid you knew there was junk and then there was junk. On the plus side you eat enough of this stuff and they won't have to embalm you.
ReplyDeleteI got physically ill when i was stuck at work eating crap for 2 days. Never again. You never know how well you eat until you dont.
ReplyDeleteIt's almost like sometimes you're better off not eating. Usually when I feel that way I don't eat for awhile which is easy because you don't have much of an appetite anyway but it's the only way to purge the shit out of your system.
ReplyDeleteKnew a guy that went to a naturopath weekly for a colon cleansing . Odd guy,
ReplyDeletehe thought the holocaust was a hoax and carried a 9mm pistol. I'm thinking when
he died of prostate cancer, he had a clean colon.
There's been some criticism lately over the PSA blood test. Some feel it's not all that indicative and is used mainly to sell prostate operations which means big bucks the world over. But you're right what good is a spanking clean colon if you have a bug colony in your brain?
DeleteI went to high school with a guy who was a real porn hobbyist but who refused to curse even substituting "darn" for "damn" and "heck" for "hell." Maybe he figured he was counterbalancing his vices.
ReplyDeleteMy doctor is on the young side. Since he brings up the subject of colonoscopies fairly frequently I asked my friend about this. He said if he's hinting around about a colonoscopy he should buy me dinner first. Someone else had some great advice, she said ask him if he's had one.
ReplyDeleteIt seems the protocol for colorectal exams starts at age 50, barring
ReplyDeletesuggestive symptoms. If nothing is found, they recommend another in seven years:
removal of polyps, they recommend another in five years. Yes, the med establishment has pushed hard, and with significant success, colorectal cancers
having come down some 30%. Being a senior specimen, I've had three: a nuisance
to be sure, but frankly easier than getting a crown or root canal. Yeah, I know-
'root canal' could be another name for a colonoscopy. Was chatting with an even
older fellow, he said back in the day they only put the patient part way under. He
was awake and the machinations resulted in a long loud fart. He was the only
one in the room that laughed.
I would think the procedure is stressful on the doctors performing it and they'd want to do less of them (makes a person wonder). Not too long ago I brought in mathematics and probability theory re colonoscopies and used the example of let's say you take the same difficult route to work everyday, cloverleafs and overpasses on parkways and you're pretty good at it but the math odds would seem to be do it a couple thousand times and you'll be calling your insurance co. making a claim. Same deal with colorectal exams, seems a tricky procedure with intestinal curvature and the thing torqueing at times and it seems the old veteran hands at this have become quite comfortable doing them and that kinda concerns me but we've been over this ground many times before.
DeleteBut I guess what I find somewhat offensive is the doctor doesn't exactly ask you your opinion and you're the consumer so to speak, it's up to you and you have the right to refuse but they talk in such a way that if you didn't know the law you'd think it WAS the law. I mean if a woman has the right over her own body why can't doctors talk the same way when they're talking about YOU?
DeleteThe primary care folks do follow the colonoscopy guidelines, but I've never heard of a forced colonoscopy (outside politics). Had a doctor one time whose sole cure for everything was thryroid pills. Last time I had a PSA, I questioned it, given the current literature, but went along when she
Deleteexplained it was better than referring me to a proctological professional.
Regarding your boycott of the 'butt-lite', here is some grit for your mill .
Wow BB those are great links and most excellent articles written not by fringe people but respectable folk. That's kinda what I'm getting at, let's have a debate about this instead of just accepting things. Used to be we questioned things. Trouble is the medical establishment has a history of ganging up on other medical people who have a different opinion from the norm (Dr. Andrew Wakefield, Dr. Lorraine Day et al.).
DeleteRe the new colorectal blood test I asked my doctor about this twice. The test would be similar to a PSA and a colonoscopy would not always be indicated. Seems more sensible to me and it's already being used.
ReplyDeleteRobotics is the big thing in surgery these days: see lots of ads for how great they are. Also understand they have some problems, such as the
Deletelack of 'feel' the the operator (surgeon) has. Robots, I dunno- remember
a few years back in Japan where the robots worked all night in a car factory.
One of them inadvertently picked up a night janitor and spray painted him
to death. :)
I'm not comfortable with robots either but on the plus side they don't have unions.
DeleteThere's definitely a colovantage with some tests. The medical establishment is so dogged in pushing the traditional invasive colonoscopy and that turns many men away for their own personal and aesthetic reasons. I would think a blood test would widen the net of screening for those otherwise reluctant and my philosophy is more options not less. Which is preferable, that a man avoid screening altogether or at least get screened by some other method that may not be 100% but is better than nothing? Basically my doctor says they put you on some liquid diet the day before the 'scope but isn't that a form of starvation? thought Medicine was usually against that.
DeleteThey have made significant strides in non-
Deleteinvasive colorectal screening; as one Dr. noted, "If they won't get a
scope, it is better than nothing." Dunno, it's sort of like buying a house
with out looking inside.
5 out of 1,000 people who undergo colonoscopies have serious complications from the test itself. Try telling THEM colorectal cancer rates have come down from doing the test. As one of the doctors in your link within a link noted you're perfectly healthy when you enter the health care system and now you've got a problem.
DeleteOverall though I've always been more than a little suspicious of the mainstream medical establishment, after all they gave us the barbarism of chemotherapy.
DeleteThey are good at some things, not too good at others. Being suspicious myself, though, I'll take them over Kevin Trudeau, ya know?
DeleteI remember years and years ago I sent away for this guy's scheme at the time, you work at home licking envelopes or some crap and no sooner did I get the package I realized it's a pyramid scheme. I mean if it were the real deal and you could stay home and rake in a bundle the workplaces would be empty.
DeleteMy folks told me a sad story about they went to Mass one Sunday and the old man in the pew in front of them starting throwing up in the middle of the Mass so my Dad did a very Christian thing and helped clean him up. Paramedics came and all that but the old man explained he's undergoing chemo. Then I had an older neighbor years and years ago who had colon cancer and decided to forgo the traditional treatments and lived for another ten years. Not saying this is the paradigm I'm just sayin'.
DeleteHad an in-law that skipped chemo; pancreatic, expired forthwith. Her
Deletereasoning was that it is invariably fatal, why put up with hell for a few extra weeks. BTW, is that some sort of catholic sin- you know how they
like to hook you up to wires for a couple of years of coma?
I really think modern medicine should have moved beyond chemo by now. I get it that at the time they didn't know any other way to handle or manage it but C'mon! BB the Church's position on euthanasia is frequently misinterpreted. All I know is they've ALWAYS stated extraordinary measures need not be used to keep someone alive but ordinary measures like simple hydration and nutrition for example are morally required. Not sure how that gets turned into your wires for a couple years but have at it.
DeleteWires, tubes, hooked up to some machine that feeds you, waters you and filters your blood. You know, like being a plant or something?
DeleteSuch measures are indicated for temporary treatment, like induced coma,
blood loss, etc. For a 100 year old in great pain? Think not.
I'm personally not aware of any century-old man hooked up like this. These days the family's wishes don't matter as much as what the hospital board says. Had an uncle who passed and they don't waste any time removing somebody from life support believe me. The Schiavo case the family repeatedly offered to take care of her and take her off her estranged husband's hands and he merely went on some hearsay evidence like maybe she said she wouldn't want to live this way maybe blurting this out of the blue while sunning on the beach with a Sidney Sheldon novel. Anyway I take it you're not gonna live like a plant.
DeleteKosher bitcoin
ReplyDelete---what's next?
Yiddish libertarians, who knew?
Delete