Wet Dog Wednesday

 

It's Been One Of Those Nights

 

                                                                

                                                                                      Give me a minute . . . or two.

Happy Memorial Day

Religion in a Nutshell

 

Late as Usual

 Really hurting here, guys. This is a short one.

Hey Everyone

If you are so inclined to buy Union-Made food and picnic supplies this weekend. Then please check out this list before you head to the stores this Memorial Day weekend. Also Ben and Jerries is Union-made buy a shit ton of their ice cream. I usually check the internet to see what products are UM and I have to say there are quite a few.

 

I'm Back

Yes y'all, I'm back. I'm still in the middle of a bad back attack but it's a little better. This past week Monday morning, I wasn't able to sit or stand longer than a minute hence the reason to take time off. Let's just say it was quite awful. It was brought on by changing the sheets on the waterbed when I felt a sharp pain in my lower back and I couldn't stand straight. I was in tears. I got my husband to drive me to the ER and they took x-rays and did countless other things and then hooked me up to an IV and wanted to keep me overnight. Nope ain't doing that shit. So finally after a few hours of crying the second doctor on ER duty (I liked him, he was nice) set me up with a really great anti-pain cocktail in my IV. I don't remember what was in it but I can tell you after they kept me for another hour for observation, I was sent on my merry little ol' way. I flew home almost of my own accord and went to bed right away after I let y'all know I would be out for a few days. I slept until Tuesday morning. My husband called my spinal doctor for an emergency appointment and it was set up for Tuesday. Lucky me.

I went to see my Spinal Doc on Tuesday afternoon on an emergency and he shot me up again to take the edge off a little. He almost salivated over the x-rays and MRI CD pictures that I brought with me. I guess he was hoping to pay off his wife's new car or buy a new fishing boat or whatever when he saw the damage. He said I have a pinched nerve between the L3 and L4 on my left side which explained the lightning bolt pain running up and down my left leg, butt, and lower back. He said the degenerative disc disease and facet joint osteoarthritis of L3 to S1 is progressing slowly up my spine. He told me this same exact thing 16 years ago but then it was between S1 and L5 at the time. I have no discs between S1, L5, or L4. He wants to alleviate the pain by going in and putting spacers from L5 to L3. Yeah, that's a hard NO all around. I've already done the research on anything that could help or hurt my condition a year ago from rods to spacers and it's not good for elderly patients over 70 years of age with degenerative disc disease and facet joint osteoarthritis or Lumbar Spinal Stenosis (LSS) as it's called. 

Anyways, my doctor asked me how I got though my life with this pain. I smiled and said it's like going through heavy labor pains every minute of the day 24/7. You get used to it after awhile. Then I told him I'm not going back to the injections or RFO, they don't work on me anymore and it's a waste of my money. They last only 3 months when they should last 2 years. I heal too damned fast. Also, I said that I'm 86ing the much needed surgery that he was pushing on me because the downside outweighs the good. You see, there is a chance the spacers could crack my vertebra in my spine and or fall out of place if I turn or stretch my back which would then require more surgery to fish them out and what not. The rods don't help and cause more pain and limited movement for the patient too. No rest for the wicked. So, that's a hard FUCK NO. 

I really didn't use the F word but he got the gist of where I was coming from on all this. He said physical therapy and pain meds was my last hope. I told him I've been doing TENs, PT and drugs for almost 7 years now.  Way before the shots and TENs I was working with a high level of pain since 1992. He was really in awe of my ability to control my pain levels for so long. He was the one who started with the blocker shots and the bilateral radiofrequency oblations back in 2009. Look up RFO. It's a sweet procedure to go through while awake, lying on your stomach and the doctor doesn't wait for the local to take affect before he starts jamming hollow foot long ass needles into your back and inserting the foot long probe into them, burning the nerves of your facet joints to kill the long term pain. Yeah, good times. A bone marrow tap is much more fun.

Right now I'm really pushing it, as it were, by sitting longer than 20 minutes to write all this shit and my pain level is maxing out. I'm usually doing my stretches, back exercises twice a day, walking intervals on my treadmill for 20 minutes twice a day which is quite easy with my TENs unit running, wearing my back brace religiously, I shouldn't say that, I'm an atheist. Sometimes when the beast (pain) is often giving me a level higher than 8 and the TENs isn't helping I lie down on the other heating pad in the bedroom with a pillow under my knees for while and meditate. It's hard to do but I can do it. I can tame it to a 6. Everything I'm doing to control my pain, I have done every waking hour of the day and sometimes at night, I learned from going through countless hours of physical therapy over these many years. Stuff I can do there is a waste of my money because I can do the same thing at home.  

If you are interested in finding out more about my little problem then you can go online and look up the extensive articles and some pictures and videos about it. Try looking here: https://www.mayoclinic.org/, here: https://my.clevelandclinic.org/ or here: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/ . Use Lumbar Spinal Stenosis (LSS) as the key word lookup. There are a lot of  articles listed plus procedures to stop or control pain that I have described to pick and choose from. Trust me, the Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Mayo Clinic are the first and second best sites in the U.S. for all medical info and John Hopkins comes in a close 3rd. WebMD is bottom of the barrel pickings when it comes to medical information and where to get help so don't waste your time or effort. 

So, yeah, I'm back. Besides, I have that idiot fuckwad TЯ☭mp and his butt leeches RepubliCONS in Washington DC to taunt all day long. It's my job now. I can't go out and walk around protesting for obvious medical reasons. I have congressmen and women of both the House and Senate on both sides of the aisle to agitate with phone calls and countless emails. We have to cause Good Trouble to push them to do the job we are paying them to do. Then there are my blog memes to post to keep y'all smiling and entertained which I dearly love doing. I now know what JackieSue got out of it. I live for it all. It may take me almost forever to post my blog shit but it WILL get done. Anyways, what's a grown old woman to do? I have to keep busy or I'll get into some really bad good trouble. I'm too pretty for jail, baby, and I'm all out of bail money. 

May the odds be ever in my favor. 

Let the pain games begin.

HOTLINES FOR HELP :

The Trevor Project US LGBTQ : (866) 488-7386 

US Suicide Prevention Lifeline : (800) 273-8255 

LGBT US Hotline : (888) 843-4564

Trans Lifeline : (877) 565-8860

US Runaway Safe line : (800) 786-2929

US Domestic Violence Hotline : (800) 799-7233

Domestic Abuse Helpline for Men and Women : (888) 743-5754 

online help :   https://DAHMW.org

Child Help National Child Abuse Hotline : ( 800) 422-4453 

hearing impaired : (800) 222-4523.

RAINN  Sexual Assault & Harassment Hotline : (800) 656-4673 

or to chat online at :   https://online.rainn.org

National Street Harassment Hotline : (855) 897-5910

Anonymous Hotline : (888) 510-BABY

You can legally hand your unharmed baby age up to 30 days old to staff at a hospital, police or fire station and walk away.

online help :   https://saveabandonedbabies.org/

Elder Abuse Hotline : (800) 252-8966

Recovering from religion with issues of doubt and non-belief. 

For online help :  https://www.recoveringfromreligion.org/    

OR DIAL : 

US & Canada:  84-I-Doubt-It  that's  (844-368-2848) 

UK +44 20 3856 8791

Aus +61 3 4505 2402

Alcohol and Drug Abuse Helpline and Treatment : (800) 234-0420

Alcohol Abuse and Crisis Intervention : (800) 234-0246

Alcohol Hotline Support & Information : (800) 331-2900

National Mental Health Hotline : (866) 903-3787

Text HOME to :  741741  from anywhere in the United States  24/7, free, confidential. Crisis Text Line (CTL) is here for you.

Suicide and Crisis Lifeline : DIAL   988  

new three-digit number in the United States.

National Call Center for Homeless Veterans : (877) 4AID-VET 

that's (1-877-424-3838)

VA National Caregiver Support Line : (855) 260-3274 

(M-F 8am-11pm, Sat 10:30am-6pm)

Veterans Crisis Hotline :  Dial 988 - then press 1  

-OR-   Text :  838255

-OR-   DIAL : (888) 457-4838) 

 Anonymous, free help for veterans, members of the military, and their families.

Boystown National Hotline : (800) 448-3000 or TTY: 800-448-3000 

Assists youth, and their family/friends, who are affected by self-harm and other issues.

National Association of Anorexia Nervosa & Associated Disorders : 

(847) 831-3438

 

National Human Trafficking Hotline : (888) 373-7888   

-OR-  Text : 233733

Warmlines are for when you need someone to talk to but are not in a crisis  

Online :   http://warmline.org/        

This site lists warmlines by state.