Category Archives: Health

September 6, 2011 · 8:39 am

Happy new year

Everyone knows the real New Year begins the day after Labor Day. January 1st is just a date that brings a new calendar but not much else of significance.

Historically, school starts the day after Labor Day, though many jurisdictions have bumped it to August. Congress is back, Washington traffic will build to its usual awful and the white shoes of those who observe proper etiquette are aptly stored in boxes until next May.

It’s time for resolutions. Last Labor Day, I gave up coffee, but the old demon has dripped back into my life. Time to filter out that and other bad habits that brewed over the summer—the trips to Baskin Robbins, the chips and dips, the carbonated beverages.

It used to be that Labor Day was marked by the Jerry Lewis Multiple Dystrophy telethon, but this year it was a condensed telethon sans Jerry. In honor of Jerry—and because I was a little down—I spent much of yesterday on the sofa, watching a marathon of Jerry Lewis movies on Antenna TV.

Several times over the weekend, I heard from parents who had dropped their freshmen off at college. While sitting with a friend Sunday night, we traded observations about how the college drop-off has changed over the last 30 years.

After filling multiple carts at Bed Bath and Beyond, parents now haul truckloads of electronics, appliances, shelving and bedding (coordinated between roommates) into kids’ dorms, make their beds, set out their color-coded file folders on their neatly organized desks, hang bulletin boards, place their folded tee shirts and underwear into school-issued dressers, set out mailing supplies for writing Grandma, and leave them behind with hugs, tearful goodbyes and as much advice as we can hurl at them while pulling out of the parking lot.

I shared with my friend a memory of moving into my freshman dorm. Granted, I was just moving across town. Regardless, on the night before classes began, I packed one large turquoise pleather suitcase, grabbed an afghan I had crocheted that summer, watched Jerry Lewis sing his ceremonial “You’ll Never Walk Alone” and drove myself to college.

It’s the day after Labor Day once again and I’m looking forward to a happy New Year. It was kind of a weird summer for me, so I’m not particularly sorry to leave it behind. Here’s to a new school year, to resolutions, to fabulous fall fabrics. And to Jerry Lewis.

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August 16, 2011 · 8:42 am

Meet Mrs. Trumbull

I got a Kindle for Christmas.

Late last night, seven months and three weeks later, I turned it on for the first time.

In yet another battle of man versus very small machine, I won. It took more than three hours, but my Kindle and I are now on a last name basis. It’s such a simple device. How could it have been so difficult?

I won’t go into all the gory details; or maybe I will. It was a  chicken-and-egg, O. Henry, Catch 22 kind of thing. I had to connect the device to a wireless network in order to use it, but my wireless password contains characters that the Kindle doesn’t support. Or so said the nice lady at Amazon’s help desk at midnight last night.

I had spent about an hour reading various chat threads about this technical conundrum and read all of Amazon’s instructions, each of which began with “Connect to a wireless network,” when I finally gave up and called. (After doing business with Amazon.com for 10 or 15 years, this is the first time I’ve spoken with a live person.) She confirmed I had to have the guy who set up my password change it for me. Unfortunately, for him and for me, but especially for him, he is gravely ill in the hospital; I guessed he wouldn’t want to take my call. The only option was to contact the wireless router manufacturer for help. I was two-and-a-half hours into this adventure, and not looking forward to bringing in another party, especially as I expected this would involve crawling under my desk in the wee hours.

The story took a turn. Despite Amazon’s telling me the device could not support my password, I did a little fancy fingerwork and tricked the Kindle into accepting it. I registered it and gave it a name. I don’t know why devices want us to name them; it’s not like they’re our pets, but I went ahead and did it. If my Kindle were a pet, and considering my existing pets are named Ricky and Lucy, and I was still high off a recent Lucy marathon, then it would stand to reason that I name my Kindle Mrs. Trumbull.

I chose a book and ordered it. Lo and behold, the book is now in the good hands of Mrs. Trumbull.

When I saw Midnight in Paris earlier this summer, I promised myself, once I activated the Kindle, I’d re-read some Ernest Hemingway. That’s going to have to wait.

The first book is … drum roll … The Inside Tract: Your Good Gut Guide to Great Digestive Health by Gerard E. Mullin M.D., and Kathie Madonna Swift, M.S., R.D., L.D.N., Foreward by Andrew Weil, M.D.

Why? I won’t go into all the gory details.

I’ll just say my condition didn’t improve with a three-hour dose of tech diff.

 

 

By the way, is it me or would the average adult suffer late-night indigestion upon reading the following message from the Amazon help desk:

When setting up your WiFi, please make sure of the following:

-Your Router is B/G-Wireless Compatible and not broadcasting solely in Wireless-N Mode.
-You will need to know what encryption you have. If you have WPA encryption, your WiFi password will work, however if you have WEP encryption, you will need to use your 8 or 10 character WEP Key.
-Make sure that your router is not filtering MAC Addresses.

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July 29, 2011 · 10:19 am

A hiatus from Hades

Have the searing heat and the national debt debate got you down? A scan of newspapers, Internet and television news and Facebook posts, not to mention those oft-forgotten personal conversations, shows a pretty grumpy America. We’re hot and we’re mad and we wonder how things could get any worse. Hrumph.

As I thought this morning about what to wear that would absorb the perspiration, and dreaded doing all the things I have to do today and over the weekend that involve going out in the 100-degree weather, my calendar spoke to me.

It happens that I’m scheduled to visit two hospice patients today and tomorrow. One visit involves taking an elderly patient out to an appointment. This woman asked me yesterday if I wanted to cancel because she was afraid the heat was going to be too much for me. This is the same woman who, when I expressed my condolences for the recent passing of her husband, said, “Thank you, but there are so many people worse off than I am.”

This is not intended to be about how people experience grief or face their mortality, or even to talk about who’s worse off than whom. We’re all entitled to our own feelings and, when it comes to misery, there’s no hierarchy.

But I’m choosing to see it that way this weekend. Yes, it’s 115 degrees in our cars. Yes, our country is swirling down with the Ty-D Bowl man in his little boat, taking our personal savings and investments right along with it.

But for the next two days, I’ll be with people who are facing some pretty unpleasant issues as well. My plan is to live in their realities for a while, and hopefully exchange the humidity and the national brawl for some perspective.

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July 7, 2011 · 8:28 am

Transition

My husband used to say that summer doesn’t really begin until the Fourth of July. I think he meant it in the context of the Dewey Beach calendar, but I suspect most beach resorts look at it the same way.

This summer, I definitely believe it. Even though we’ve already had our summer vacation, it feels as though everything we’ve done since Memorial Day has been an orchestrated lead-up to this week.

Mostly, we looked forward to and planned for the arrival of my brother’s family for the Independence Day holiday and worked backward. Between my work travel, our beach vacation, my dental surgery and a few other obligations, the open time slots were scheduled for buying groceries, pre-preparing meals, cleaning the house, getting the yard in shape, washing the car and making beds. This was the fun part, the anticipation of our visit with our nephews and their parents.

They’re gone now, we’ve done about eight loads of laundry and it’s eerily quiet around here.

It’s time to think about the rest of the summer, drum up some more business, conjure up blog ideas and send belated greetings to a lot of people whose birthdays came and went during the frenzy.

I still have a bit of a junk food hangover. Today will be my day to clear my mind and my body and make the switch over to official summer, before the rest of it slips away.

Oh, and I’ll try and think of something more interesting to write about tomorrow.

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July 1, 2011 · 9:19 am

Global cooling

It’s July in Washington. The weather is forecast to be sunny and 90 degrees, with 40 percent humidity, for the next 10 days. Ah, sweater weather!

This time of year, I don’t go anywhere, except maybe the beach, without a sweater.

Now that we finally have central air in our home, I sometimes put my bathrobe on over my clothes.

Don’t get me wrong; I welcomed A/C with open, goosebumped arms. It’s great. I sleep like a baby.

But overall, I feel that air conditioning is overdone. Do humans really need to spend their days and nights in 65-degree temperatures? I don’t know about you, but too much A/C makes my nose run, gives me a headache and makes my muscles ache. Can we just tone it down a little and maybe save the planet in the meantime?

The last office in which I worked was like a walk-in refrigerator. While my burly Norwegian colleague controlled the thermostat on our hallway, our boss came in every morning and did a Mister Rogers ritual, exchanging suit jacket for cardigan sweater. Everywhere I go—the mall, the grocery store, the movie theater, church, any hospital, every office building, every airplane, airport and restaurant—the air is cranked so high (or is it low?) that I can barely function without cover. When I travel, I carry a big shawl that doubles as a blanket. I can’t recall a flight in the last few years on which I haven’t buried myself under it. I’d wear gloves and a nosebag if I thought to pack them.

Are there any environmental scientists or engineers out there who can tell me how much energy could be saved by bumping up thermostats up a few degrees? Wouldn’t businesses also save huge amounts of money? Could we put a dent in our nation’s economic and environmental troubles with a simple flip of a switch?

If you agree, let’s huddle together and make it happen.

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June 29, 2011 · 8:40 am

I’ll never go om

I hate yoga.

When was the last time I tried it? 1969.

Progressive thinkers that they were, my parents made me take yoga when I was ten, believing it would help me to become more focused and improve my grades. I may have told you this before. Every Saturday morning, they drove me into the city for class. While my friends were eating Cocoa Puffs, drinking Tang and watching cartoons, I was saluting the sun and hating every minute of it. I decided then that when I finally had complete freedom to make my own decisions, I’d never go within 10 feet of a yoga mat. Forty-one years later, I’ve held to it. I also remain one of the least flexible (and least focused) people I know. Such is the price of freedom.

Many of my friends and acquaintances do yoga and love it. Being barefooted, moving slowly in a quiet room, is not my cup of chamomile tea.

However, I am aware that yoga has changed vastly in the decades since I first experienced it so unpleasantly.

For example, I recently read about something called “Laughter Yoga.” I might be able to warm up to that. Also called hasyayoga, this discipline involves self-triggered laughter that spreads among people in the class. I assume this enhances the workout in some way.

I’m a fan of contagious laughter, though perhaps not enough so to combine it with exercise forcibly. I laugh plenty in Jazzercise, as my friends and I make faces, exaggerate our dance steps and share dirty jokes on the floor. But that’s genuine, not contrived.

I know there’s also “Hot Yoga,” which involves exercises performed in extremely hot and humid temperatures. Sounds like weeding the yard in July to me.

We have a friend who’s into all sorts of other kinds in a big way, so much so that he recently took a break from his career to focus on yoga full time. As part of a side project, he recently invented something called “In Sink Yoga.”

Setting aside my overall clumsiness and lack of muscular flexibility and strength, I might also find this doable. Here, take a look:

I love this for so many reasons. Did someone say “cleaning fetish?”

Maybe for his next video project, he’ll do Om on the Range.

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June 9, 2011 · 8:57 am

Drill baby

Who would have thought I’d wake up today with a fat lip? Not I, but my endodontist did.

Yesterday I had a bit of dental surgery. I didn’t know it was surgery until I was being sewn up and given a set of post-surgical instructions.

I knew I was to have two root canals. And I knew one would entail entry from the gumline, or apicoectomy/periradicular surgery. I just didn’t think enough about it to build any expectation.

In 51 years, I’ve never had so much as a cavity, so dental work is alien to me. I did have a root canal 24 years ago; I remember it vaguely, with no major trauma associated. Then, eight years ago, while in Arizona, I broke off a front tooth and had it repaired by a hack in Tucson. It turns out shabby work was done to both teeth, numbers 9 and 10 or, as I affectionately call them, the gray one and the brown one. As a result, both had to be re-done.

To sum it up in numbers, I had five shots of Novocaine, two root canals during which three x-rays were taken, six stitches in my gum and, after a $500 discount, a bill of $2,125.00.

To sum it up in words would require some illustrative excerpts.

Not realizing the air conditioning had gone out in the dental office on a 100-degree day, I thought my blazing body and projectile perspiration were symptoms of an anxiety attack. The endodontist brought in a fan and apologized for the heat. I said, “Oh, good, I thought it was just me,” to which he replied, “It’s not that I don’t think you’re hot…” I took his attempt at humor as a compliment.

When the whole procedure was over, the Novocaine had gone to my head, my vision was blurred and, as Bill Cosby once observed, my face was sliding off of my skull and my bottom lip was in my lap.

After receiving my post-operative instructions and a prescription for pain pills, the doctor pronounced me free to go. I asked the nurse, “Would you please hand me my glasses,” to which the doctor replied, “You’re wearing them.”

What? You don’t know the Cosby routine? Have a listen. I finally understand what he was talking about.

By the way, did you know that, when your face is swollen, your wrinkles disappear?

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June 1, 2011 · 7:49 am

Not so gym-dandy

What’s the temperature in your gym? Yesterday mine was 98 degrees.

Once, when I said something in a post about going to the gym, my son chimed in. “Don’t lie, Mom. You don’t go to the gym.”

Rude accusations aside, he was wrong. I do go to the gym. I don’t go to a health club or a fitness center or a recreation facility. I go to a gym.

Remember gym? Big room, wood floor, retractable bleachers and a basketball hoop at each end?

Yeah, the gym. I happen to exercise at one owned by a local Boys & Girls Club. It’s not air conditioned; typically it’s about 10 degrees warmer than the temperature outside. Not only that, when I work out really hard, it spins around.

This is a pivotal time in my workout cycle. My current eight-week session is about to expire, hopefully before I do. My cue is, when I start to see spots, it’s time to back off.

I dragged myself back there yesterday after recovering from a bout with my respiratory illness. The air was like melting Jell-O. I made it though my one-hour class, motivated by knowing I’ll need to put on a swimsuit and a party dress within days. As if one workout were going to do magic. So I plowed through, periodically stepping outside into the 90-degree heat to take a breath.

I need to find a summer exercise alternative that isn’t going to cost me a flabby arm and leg.

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May 24, 2011 · 10:48 am

All or Nothing

Over the years, I’ve come to learn that I operate at two levels, All or Nothing.

I prefer All. All gives me the energetic mindset to pursue a goal, get a job done, live my life. Nothing? That drives me insane. I don’t relax well; it’s just not my nature. Even when I’m in a rocking chair, I’m rocking at full throttle, my mind in overdrive. Remember that I call myself word nymph, after the purple-headed wood nymph, which can flap its wings insanely fast.

Every once in a while, I get an unwelcome visit from Nothing. Sometimes, it just pounds on the door until I open it.

A few days ago, I felt a bug coming on. My approach to illness is to beat it down with a club. So I kept working, then through the weekend, I kept all of my volunteer and social commitments, as Nothing nipped at my heels. By Sunday night, Nothing had beaten me into submission.

As I lay in bed with a high fever, feeling like thousands of bees were stinging my epidermis, I worried about my Monday morning blog. But, as Nothing took over my brain, I couldn’t have cared less about the blog. By Monday, it didn’t have a chance, nor did anything else I had hoped to accomplish. I am going to be fine and am so confident of this that I have made new commitments for the latter part of this week and into the weekend. I’m giving Nothing a two-day pass; after that, it’s back from whence it came.

I have learned that I can go from zero to sixty in eight seconds. Deceleration must be forced upon me.

For now, I’ll give in to sleep. But I’ll dream of dangling participles.

See you tomorrow.

Is it “from whence it came” or just “whence it came?” “Whence” means “from where.” Wouldn’t “from whence” be redundant?

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April 28, 2011 · 8:26 am

Make a wish come true

Tomorrow, April 29, is World Wish Day, an occasion to highlight the good work of the Make-A-Wish Foundation in granting the wishes of children with life-threatening medical conditions.

The Foundation has lots of moving stories to tell about children and their families whom they’ve helped. I have one and I’d like to share it.

In 2006, Marcus was 15 when he was diagnosed with anaplastic astrocytoma, an aggressive brain cancer. The day he came home from the hospital after having received his diagnosis, his parents called his three younger brothers into the living room and, in honest yet age-appropriate terms, told them what would be happening in their family. The younger ones could already see the scar of a five-hour surgery and would soon learn about radiation and chemotherapy. This isn’t the time to tell the long version of the story, but Marcus courageously endured six weeks of radiation therapy (and the 180-mile daily drive to get it), followed by many months of chemo. He continued to go to school, play baritone in his high school marching band, enjoy video games and indulge his acute interest in World War II aircraft. Books, movies, documentaries, websites and model planes fed his passion for the subject, and stirred his ambition to join the Air Force.

Marcus was aware of the uncertain nature of his condition—including the fact that his extensive head surgery might hamper his chances of serving in the military—but he kept looking ahead. Make-a-Wish and a local Air Force base invited him to be a pilot for a day and fly in an F-16 flight simulator. They gave him his own flight suit and his wings.

He responded well to treatment, facing occasional worrisome reports from the doctor, and did a remarkable job of getting on with life, taking whatever medications and treatments were ordered as time went on. Still, an uncertain prognosis loomed.

When he was 17, he wanted to visit Pearl Harbor and tour the USS Arizona Memorial. The Make-a-Wish Foundation made it happen. In August of 2008, they arranged for Marcus, his parents and his three brothers, to fly to Honolulu for a badly needed vacation and tours of the historic sites.

While in Hawaii, Marcus began having headaches and nausea, which became so severe that he went to the emergency room. Brain scans were sent to his doctor in Utah. His doctor advised the family to stay in Hawaii for the duration of the trip and to have as much fun as they could, while managing Marcus’ pain and discomfort. When the family landed in Salt Lake City, Marcus went straight to Primary Children’s Hospital, where  it was discovered that his tumor had returned, was growing rapidly and was inoperable. Chemo might provide some relief and a remote chance of slowing the growth.

Marcus bravely said, bring it on, in whatever words he chose, but experienced the most violent reactions he had faced so far from the chemo. The next scans were discouraging, providing little hope. At the end of September, Marcus gave up treatment. He passed away on October 26th, and was buried with his Air Force pilot’s wings.

The point of this blog post is not to bemoan the evils of cancer or the unfairness of the impacts on its victims. The point is to share the news that Marcus and his family were able to live Marcus’ wishes of flying a fighter plane and visiting Pearl Harbor. The Foundation also knew how badly the family needed respite from two years of cancer hanging over their lives, and put them up at a lovely beach resort, where the kids could swim and enjoy each other, free from the grips of the “C” word.

Make-a-Wish can’t fulfill a wish for recovery. But it can make it possible for children all over the world who want to be police officers or pilots or whatever to achieve their dreams, even if they might never have the chance to be adults.

I’m grateful to Make-a-Wish and all who give to them for the gift they gave my nephew.

Please consider giving so others’ wishes might come true.

Happy World Wish Day.

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