Health

We'd scheduled a weekend at a beach house a couple of months ago, and even though I was still feeling pretty lousy, I thought to myself, "Self? You're going to feel lousy whether you're at home or whether you're relaxing with a view of the ocean."

'Self' thought that was a pretty good way of thinking about it, because after all we weren't out to do anything more strenuous than read books and watch movies.

We went with another couple that we hang out with a lot, but hanging with them is just like hanging with ourselves. If it were anyone else, I probably would have canceled, but they're very easy to be around. I was either laying or sitting 95% of the time.

We went out yesterday for about an hour, because their son (one of my FAVORITE kids) brought one of his friends with him and he wanted to buy a souvenir for his mom.

Sidenote- the poor kid didn't realize what the coffee mug REALLY meant that he bought for his mom. I just couldn't tell him because he was one of those really geeky kids that would have turned inside out with embarrassment. I'll let his mom explain it to him. The mug had a picture of a pirate who had a sword with a thong hanging on the end. The caption read, "Give up the booty".

Yeah.

This outing turned out to be a pip because it provided me with my favorite story of the weekend. I was accosted by a do-gooder while we were out.

I have a sweatshirt that reads:

Social Engineering Specialist
Because there's no patch for human stupidity


It's Information Security Geek humor. If you don't know what it is, here's a long explanation for you. If you don't want to look it up; in a nutshell- social engineering is tricking people into giving you information that you shouldn't have.

Anyhoo.....

I saw a woman who seemed in her 50's looking at me with disdain. I saw her point me out to her husband and then she marches (and I mean MARCHES) up to me and loudly says, "Would you like to explain to me what you mean by that shirt?" She was clearly out to expose me as a fraud to everyone on the store. I don't think she was more than three inches away from my face; pointing her finger at.me.with.every.syllable.

I was a little shocked by her tone and volume, but answered her question. I explained that I'm an information security manager and this is just good geeky humor. I started to explain what social engineering is (always the teacher, right?), and why the shirt was SATIRE but she stopped me and said that she knows what social engineering is because she's a trainer for a credit union. She then apologized for 'calling me out' in front of everyone in the store. I was my usual gracious self, but awfully sad that this wasn't caught on video because it was HILARIOUS.

I wanted to tell her that she's not nearly as clever as she thinks she is because A REAL social engineering 'specialist' would never advertise their career choice because it's kind of hard to trick people when you're telling them that you're a con artist.

We passed her again on our way back to the car and she held up her fist in solidarity and said, "sisters in security, right?"

Yeah, right.

As for me, I am feeling better. I'm not 100%, but the tart stuff doesn't send me over the edge in pain anymore. I tested it out on water with a lime squeezed in it last night. I can drool without pain- yay! I'm not going to tell my co-workers about the mumps because I was the butt of too many jokes when I had scarlett fever a few weeks ago. I also don't want people to freak out that I'm some sort of Typhoid Mary. I told my manager that I had 'intestinal distress'. You know--- what normal people get and something nobody wants to hear details about.

I hope y'all had a fab 3-day weekend. I'm planning to spend the rest of the day sitting on my couch, and visiting my friends. Can you believe I was not on the computer for 2 days in a row?

See ya in the 'hood.

It's not often that I call in sick, even though there has been plenty of opportunity- right? I was up all night (slight exaggeration) being sick. When my alarm went off this morning, I was so out of it that I couldn't even find it. Eventually I managed to call my manager and let her know I wouldn't be reporting to work today. I'll bet that was an interesting call to receive. I'm sure I sounded GREAT!

On top of that, I'm still having tons of pain in the left side of my jaw and I've noticed something strange and wonder if the doctor was wrong with the TMJ diagnosis. Whenever I eat something tart (or even think about it) it causes a lot of pain in that area. It's like there's something wrong with whatever makes the saliva gland work. I've called the doctor's office to see what, if anything, can be done. I'm waiting for the nurse to call me back.

My doc gave me exercises to help with the TMJ, when she diagnosed it last week, and I've been doing them religiously, but it is getting worse- not better. I looked up more exercises to do on the Internet and found one where you stick your finger inside your mouth and rub toward the back of the mouth. Ready for a really AWESOME mental image? Doing that makes me drool like a huge waterfall. Maybe I should invest in a bib if I'm going to continue these activities.

I nosed around on the Internet to see what might case pain when the saliva gland is doing its thing- and I found mumps. Of course, I wouldn't put it past me to have mumps since:
A. Last year I found out that I have no immunity to any of the childhood diseases
B. I became a proud card-carrying member of the Scarlet Fever club just a few short weeks ago.
C. I'm a genetic freak of nature

So yeah, we'll see what the nurse recommends when she calls back.

UPDATE:

Wow- that was the quickest call back I've ever received. The nurse talked to the doctor who said that I may or may not have mumps (HELPFUL!). If I do have mumps, I'm probably toward the end of it and there's nothing to do but wait for it to take its course. Just think! If I do/did have mumps, I was the most contagious when I was in NYC! Spreading the love everywhere, right? On the plane, in the subway, meeting celebrities.... Maybe I ought to check out the paper in a couple of weeks to see if there's a strange outbreak of mumps in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

....I'm going back to bed now. Bleh. I feel crappy.

So, I haven't mentioned my latest health 'experience' because I'm sick of even thinking about my health, and I can't imagine you're getting much pleasure from reading about it. Alas, this is just too stupid to not blog about it.

Soooooooooooooo...

About six weeks or so ago, my left jaw started hurting. I chalked it up to teeth grinding and ignored it. Every time I opened my mouth, I could hear an unnerving grinding noise and it hurt. I kept thinking that it'll go away eventually because everything always does, right?

Not to mention that I'm SICK.OF.DOCTORS.

It continually got worse to the point where I started to take my 'cocktail' of night time drugs (*enough to put down an elephant, I'm sure) at about 6pm just so I'd go to sleep and not feel it anymore. This was about a week ago. Two days ago, I went to clean my ears with a q-tip and you would have thought I'd shot a bullet in my ear because, well, just WOW. It hurt like hell. Not to mention that I had an unpleasant knot in front of my ear.

Oh, and I kept dreaming that people were either punching me in the head, my jaw was falling off, and other assorted 'it's apparent that even though I was asleep, I was still feeling it' dreams.

I decided then, that it was time to go see the doctor. I went to see her today and the nurse was checking my vitals.

Low blood pressure- CHECK
Low pulse- CHECK (I was 58 today!)
When she took my temp she had a surprised look on her face and so I said, "I know, I have a low temp too- let me guess, it's 96.7"

She said that no, it wasn't low, that I had a fever of 101.2.

Hmmmm- in 'normal' humans, that would equate to a fever of almost 103.

As soon as the doctor came in and checked my ears she said that I have a nasty ear infection (hence the fever). She said that I also have a case of TMJ (that was what the lump was- it's fluid and the grinding sound is inflammation) and she gave me exercises to do- complete with pictures of a lady with an 80's doo (mall bangs, dontcha know).

I told her that I was flying tomorrow and the idea that I have an ear infection FREAKS ME OUT. Can you even imagine how that would feel? I flew with a sinus infection once and I was pretty sure that my brains would blow out of my head.

So, she hooked me up with some Vicoden (yippee!) and antibiotics and told me to take Sudafed about an hour before the flight takes off.

I'm taking all my camera gear, so plan to have some great pictures when I get back. I'll probably upload pictures while I'm there because I'm bringing my tablet computer (something I *STILL* need to blog about).

Wish me luck that I'm not crying with the rest of the babies when the plane takes off.

*Cocktail of 100mg seroquel + 1mg klonipin + 1mg requip. Any one of the three would probably knock a normal person on their butt.

I swear, if it weren't impossible for me to become pregnant, I'd be thoroughly convinced that I was no matter what test I took.

OH- here's a fun fact. Neither one of my sons showed up as positive on the pregnancy test, even 5 months into it with Cameron. I knew I was pregnant, but couldn't prove it. Poor kid, I'm surprised that he wasn't born 'special' because as everyone knows, I don't believe in suffering when I have a cold or any other illness. I took every medication under the sun with him.

Anyhoo- gah, I'm so nauseated STILL. It's like morning, noon and night sickness, but not every day, thankfully. I only get relief from taking my zombie meds and go to sleep. I never thought I'd be thankful that I bonked my head, but without the head-bonking meds, I'd not have zombie meds. See? There's always a bright side.

/pollyanna

I called my gastro's office and they're calling in a stronger anti-nausea medication for me. It's getting rather old, ya know? Thankfully, I've learned what makes the nausea worse and I'm avoiding it. Actually there are days that I'm not nauseated and I can eat now and then, but I never know what's going to send me running to the loo. <- Sarah, I used that word just for you.

Even so, I've been going into the office like a good girl. My manager told me yesterday that I looked glassy-eyed. She's catching on to what I look like when I'm feeling good .vs not so good. My face really shows it when I'm not feeling well, no matter how hard I try to hide it. She thanked me for coming in even though I was so nauseated and I told her that I was going to feel the same whether I was here or at home, so might as well impress the boss. It is awkward to get sick in the office though. I pray, as I'm running to the loo, that nobody is in there because I don't want to gross anyone out. I certainly don't like hearing that sound, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Tomorrow we're going to have dinner with the family to celebrate Casey and Jessica's birthday. I'm glad we decided to go OUT to dinner rather than have it in- that way, if I get sick, the smells from the kitchen won't send me over the edge.


I'm campaigning for an anti-nausea day celebration tomorrow. I hope you'll go to the polls and vote for this one.

Along with my bi-yearly liver function tests (LFT), I have a yearly blood test called "AFP Tumor Marker" which screens for cancer of the liver. The chances of developing liver cancer increase exponentially every year after 10 years of chronic liver inflammation. I'm on year (counts fingers) 22 of documented liver inflammation, so you can probably imagine that I'm a little wound up until I get the results of this particular test along with the yearly ultrasound.

We're good to go for another year, except that my ultrasound showed enlarged bile ducts. This is a new one for me, because years ago I was told by a bile duct specialist that my ducts were abnormally small. He oughta know, he's had to roto-rooter them a couple of times and put in temporary stents.

Along with all of that, my LFTs are extraordinarily high- one of them is 10x the high end of normal. I got a copy of the tests when I went to the gastro's office today for follow-up labs because I was curious why my new gastro was 'alarmed'. If nothing else, this will show my new gastro two things:

1. The flare-ups have nothing to do with alcohol, because I haven’t been able to even smell wine without it making me nauseated for a couple of months now.
2. That I don't complain unless there's something really wrong.

..actually, I err on the opposite side of that. I need to do a little bit more complaining and take better care of myself. I'm sure y'all can imagine how sick I am of doctors and hospitals, and why I try to avoid them....

So, the nurse said that the doctor was going to wait to decide what, if anything, to do with me after getting the follow-up labs. Let's hope that it doesn't include a referral to Dr. Kevorkian.