To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive

I'm not dead!

Sun, 05 Mar 2023 02:14:16 GMT

I'm not dead! Not that this was in question, although it could have been.

...Let me back up.

Round about January 2022, I got a sinus infection that would not go away despite multiple antibiotics. I eventually got kicked to an ENT in November, who did a CT scan and found my entire left sphenoid sinus (the one behind your eyeball) and most of the adjoining ethmoid sinus were completely blocked. The bone around those sinuses had grown and thickened quite a bit, which means I probably had the infection for at least a year, if not longer. The bone separating the sinus from the brain and optic nerve is only a few millimeters thick, so the infection could eventually have gotten to my brain or eyes and done very bad things.

Needless to say, I agreed to have it surgically evicted as soon as possible, which turned out to be February 15. My body had tried to wall off the infection with more bone, so the ENT had to basically break open the sinus like a really gross pinata, then flush it out with several cups of saline. While he was in there, he fixed my deviated septum--he actually had to do that to even reach the sphenoid sinus, it was so far to the left--and removed some other excess tissue on both sides.

Upon culture, the infection turned out to be MRSA, because of course it did. Luckily, the lab confirmed it was susceptible to Bactrim, so I took that for a while after the surgery.

I'm 2.5 weeks postop and hoping that eventually it all stops hurting. The first night (it was a day surgery) was agonizing even with Norco, and the next four or five days were still pretty bad even with good painkillers. This was in part because you have to sleep sitting up for several days, and even though I splurged on a fancy pillow system to do so with, I didn't exactly sleep well.

I got the plastic splints they stitch in place to hold the healing septum in place removed after one week, which helped with the pain, but ever since I've been stuck on the same plateau. I'd characterize it as "Distracting and quite unpleasant without drugs; still noticeable but ignorable with tramadol and/or Advil." I will say the area of pain is slowly getting smaller; now it's mostly my front teeth and the very front of my septum. I guess nerves that got severed are waking up or something.

The swelling is supposed to take a couple of months to fully subside, so the jury's still out on whether it will help me breathe better. Right now I don't feel a ton of difference from before. Maybe it's a bit easier.

Anyway, that's been my last few weeks.

On top of all that, my employer is offering a free medical weight loss package that involves some kind of nutrition class and (free!) semaglutide, aka Ozempic or Wegovy or so on. I decided to take advantage of it and got my first dose this week...only for the auto-injector pen to malfunction last night, spraying the drug all over me rather than into my thigh. Hopefully the doctor's office or the drug company will replace it, as happened when one of my biologic meds did the same thing.

I've heard that these drugs basically shut up that voice in your head that tells you to eat every moment of every day, which is my problem. I can make the decision to stay away from the food that tastes good and eat the food that tastes less good but is better for me 3-4 times a day. Once we get to snacking or eating 8-9 times a day, my willpower fails.

I'm a little concerned about what happens when one comes off of this drug, but the NP who prescribed it to me said there's been success with putting people on Metformin after so they keep the weight off. I'm already on a very low dose of Metformin because I had a borderline fasting glucose reading last year and figured what the hell, apparently it's a miracle drug and with an autoimmune disorder I'm already predisposed to diseases of inflammation like diabetes, so I might as well take it.

I also got told to start eating 20-30 grams of protein at each meal, which seems absolutely absurd to me, but I'm trying. You can't really do that without eating ridiculous amounts of meat or via things like protein shakes. I'm not that into meat (and it's expensive anyway), so I tried a protein shake tonight. It wasn't as terrible as I remember them being years ago, actually, so this might be viable long-term.

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SKATES THAT FIT!

Thu, 21 Mar 2019 23:59:32 GMT

My second attempt at custom boots, this time with Avanta, arrived, and they fit. They fit so, so incredibly well. I skated for more than an hour this morning with ZERO pain or numbness. I mean, nothing. It was like wearing stiff sneakers. The first time! Without breaking them in! Hell, with my old Jacksons it took two years to be able to skate for an hour without taking them off halfway through, and I never got to a point where they didn't hurt at all.

As you might imagine, I am over the moon. I truly thought I was going to have to stop skating. (I would have, if these didn't work.) I've spent the last 20 months either off the ice or on it in painful 5-10-minute spurts (or in broken-down boots I couldn't do much in), so going to the rink had frankly become kind of a dismal experience that I dreaded. Because of boot issues, I pretty much stopped learning new things back in summer 2017. Now I can look forward to skating, and have lessons again, and learn new stuff!

...Once I remember the old stuff. I haven't skated for the last three months, so today was pretty wobbly, but you know, at this point I'm simply grateful to be able to go around in circles. The rest will come back.

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I started planting things in my garden this weekend. Snapdragons did well last year, so I got more, and some phlox for phun. I planted a bunch of gladiolus-type bulbs. And I'm trying spinach this year. We probably have 4-5 weeks till it gets hot enough to bolt, so to be honest I expect maybe two salads out of my crop (assuming the local critters don't eat it), but that would be cool. I picked a few leaves the other day to put on a sandwich, and they definitely taste better and fresher than store-bought.

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Finally, since the last time I posted here, I got a new diagnosis added to my list: Asthma. Yes, apparently sometime over the last year I became a closet asthmatic. I had a cough that started back in July and just never really went away, so I asked my doctor about it at my physical a couple of weeks ago. I was thinking persistent low-level sinus infection with drip that was irritating my cough reflex, but the sinus x-ray came back clear, so we started a trial of Advair (daily inhaled steroid). It was miraculous. My cough silenced within an hour of taking the first dose. I also noticed about a 25% improvement in my chest capacity upon inhaling the first dose, too.

Ah, well. At least it's fixable. I like diseases that are fixable.

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Fannish and other

Sat, 17 Nov 2018 04:31:41 GMT

I watched The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina over the last couple of weekends. ( Some spoilery thoughts )

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I got the fourth iteration of my custom skates back a couple of weeks ago, and they are indeed much closer approximations of my feet than the previous three tries. They actually have enough width in the ball and toes, and enough depth in the toebox, and a wide enough tongue to encompass my massive instep and beefy ankles. I've been able to go progressively 3-5 minutes longer at each session before my feet go numb, so I'm up to 20 minutes as of today. I can't repeat that after taking them off and putting them back on (at that point I only get 5-10 minutes), which is unfortunate, but perhaps I can one day get to an hour.

They were ever so slightly too long, but I fixed that myself by wearing an Achilles tendon gel sock thing, which pushes my foot forward just enough to be in the right spot over the blade. Nicely, it also prevents the back of the boot from cutting into the back of my ankle, as it was doing before I started wearing these.

The blade still feels very weird, but that could be because on my old one, I had BF shave down the drag pick to keep the relationship between pick and rocker accurate as the rocker flattened out, and now I have both pick and rocker back. Nevertheless, I finally managed a spin on Tuesday where I didn't feel like I was inches from death, so. Yay. I have sit and scratch spins kind of back, and I've attempted some laybacks, but no camels. Part of my spin trouble may also be that I'm going at turtle speed for everything due to THINGS FEELING DIFFERENT, so as I adjust to the new skates they may get better. One thing that may get better faster is back spin, because we've mounted the right blade farther in than it was on my old skates, and I could tell I'm actually hitting the right spot and getting my weight over it on my attempts today.

I accomplished weeny versions of waltz jump, salchow, and toe loop today(!) as well. It's been a long time since I jumped, so that was exciting. I don't think I want to go back to beating my head against a wall with the other jumps, at least not until I master back spin, but I'd like to retain these.

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My right shoulder hasn't really been right since I took a fall about two months ago and wrenched it trying to protect my head. It's now gotten harder to ignore. It might be the AS deciding to attack a new joint, or it might be 34 years of bad posture and sitting in front of a computer catching up with me. I should probably see someone about it, but I know they'll prescribe physical therapy, and as a five-time PT veteran, I have enough exercises I'm supposed to do four times a week for the rest of my life. I don't want more. :(

(On the other hand, I need to continue using a computer mouse to retain gainful employment, so I may have to anyway. Ugh.)

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And another thing

Fri, 01 Dec 2017 01:44:15 GMT

I'm not allowed to exercise until the test results come back (and I would assume if it is the tumor I can't exercise until it's gone), so no skating until at least Wednesday. :(

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ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!

Thu, 30 Nov 2017 23:28:44 GMT

I go to the doctor for high blood pressure, and she says, "You probably have a tumor."

Specifically, she thinks I have a pheochromocytoma, which is a noncancerous adrenal gland tumor that resets your adrenaline and other stress chemical levels to "getting chased by a tiger" at all times. That would explain the new-onset high blood pressure and my heart rate hanging out between 95-110 over the last week (and probably the last couple of months). It typically presents in young women and causes low potassium, which I also have.

She's running bloodwork to test for it now; if that's indicative of adrenal malfunction, then we'll do imaging to find out where the thing is. (Sometimes they detatch and wander away from the adrenal glands.) Then there will in all likelihood be surgery to take it out. Presumably it will be soon, because if you type this into Google you get things like "fatal if left untreated," which are not reassuring.

Two in a million people get this. I am literally one in 500,000. (My doctor, after closing the door to my exam room: "I'm excited about it! Well, not for her, but...")

I would like to be normal and boring for a while, please.

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How a routine clinic visit turns into a day in the ER, by my crazy body

Thu, 23 Nov 2017 02:49:11 GMT

This was not how I'd planned to spend my Wednesday. ( In which I go to the clinic for strep throat, but wind up in the ER. Because OF COURSE I DO. )

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News

Tue, 13 Jun 2017 00:19:11 GMT

Good news: Yesterday I wrote almost 800 words on the Northern Exposure fic I've been working on in various iterations for at least ten years. (Like most, I have a "Joel returns to Cicely" story in me; mine's just taking a while to expurgate itself.) I also pulled out the not!drawerfic for the first time in almost three years and added about 200 words to it. I may finish it one of these days.

More good news: I added a folded-up blanket to my computer chair and reduced my hip pain by about 80%. (The chair has a mesh seat, so it dips more in the middle than at the sides; I evened it out so it's relatively flat now.) I still went to my first PT appointment, but we didn't do much besides add a couple of stretches, and he reminded me of how to properly do some of my exercises. We have a follow-up appointment next week, and then I'll probably be sprung.

Mixed news: I got a big girl bed (a full) instead of the twin I've had forever, and the mattress is VERY firm. Ultimately I think this will be a good thing, but wow, did I ever have a backache when I woke up this morning. To the point where the first thing I did upon getting out of bed was order a 2" memory foam topper.

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Frequent flyer

Thu, 01 Jun 2017 23:53:58 GMT

I start round five of physical therapy in a week and a half.

I'm trying to look on the bright side--this is mechanical, not yet another manifestation of arthritis, and thus might be fixable. The official diagnosis is "hip abductor tendinopathy," rather than the bursitis I thought it was. Problems in the hip/back/pelvic area are, per my orthopedist, "like chasing your tail." Fix your back, your hips start hurting. Work on your hips, your back starts hurting. Some people find the magic balance that makes neither hurt. Some people keep going back and forth forever and dear god I should at least get some points on my credit card for this.

Grrr.

On a more pleasant note, I had a ton of energy last weekend and cleaned the crap out of my apartment in preparation for having a Chandra this weekend. I think the exertion attempted to start a flare--I can usually tell by now that when my hands start hurting that things are about to go south--but I was already planning to pregame for her visit with steroids, so I started that and boom, I feel decent. Minus the front/outsides of my hips hurting, which are not solved by steroids, which is how we know it's mechanical and not arthritis. However, my "full-spectrum CBD infused gummies" came today, so perhaps I will feel better about that shortly. (These are legal because they don't have marijuana in them, just hemp extract. You can get them on Amazon. I got some hemp seed oil pills earlier that didn't do anything, but supposedly it was the wrong part of the hemp, or didn't include the right protein/ligand/whatever? I figured this was worth a try, anyway. At worst I'll have some expensive gummy bears.)

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Feh.

Mon, 06 Feb 2017 22:55:44 GMT

Arrrrggghh. Teeth, why do you keep trying to escape? The molar I had a filling in a few weeks ago, and which hasn't settled down since, is either developing an abscess and will need a root canal, or has a crack and will need to be pulled. Since it's me, my money is on the more complicated one, but the round of antibiotics I'm about to start should be diagnostic (feels better = infection = root canal; feels the same = fracture = implant).

I told my dentist that if it's the latter I'm skipping the attempt to save the tooth with a crown and going straight to the implant. He said that ordinarily he'd recommend trying to save it, but in my case, he agreed we might as well go straight to pulling the damn thing.

Ugh. In less annoying news:

1. My dad took me to Memphis on Saturday to visit the new Ikea store and get a dresser and nightstand, then we put it together on Sunday. Not only do they look nice, they are all wood for a great price, AND I didn't hurt nearly as much as I thought I would after either the 6-hour round trip drive or five hours of putting furniture together. Maybe the Humira is working after all.

2. I've seen two coyotes in the last three days. One was on the way to Memphis, in a field by the interstate, and one was trotting along a path in the golf course I drove by on my way home from the dentist today. So pretty and fluffy!

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That bionic body may need to be put on hold.

Tue, 03 Jan 2017 00:05:43 GMT

Long story short, I don't have a crown on my implant anymore.

Long story long:

My crown started wiggling on Thursday night, because of course it would on the eve of a four-day weekend. It didn't hurt at the time, so I put off the emergency call to my dentist. It started hurting more over the weekend, until I finally gave in and called him today, and he very kindly agreed to open up the office and see me this afternoon.

Here's how his monologue and my thoughts went.

Dentist: Gosh this rarely happens--
Me: Have you met me?
Dentist: --but I think the screw holding it in has come loose.
Me: So I literally have a screw loose?
Dentist: I can usually get the crown off by pulling on it. Let's see.
*futile tugging ensues*
Dentist: Gee, that always works. I've only had to drill a hole in the crown to access the screw once before!
Me: Today will be your second time.
Dentist: I'm going to have to drill.
Me: Why am I not surprised.
*dentist drills, crown and screw come out*
Dentist: I've always been able to get the cement off with boiling water before. I don't have a stovetop here, but I'm sure it'll come off in hot water in the microwave!
Me: NO DON'T SAY THAT YOU'VE JUST TEMPTED IT!
*dentist attempts to boil the cement off*
Dentist: I just don't believe it--
Me: I do.
Dentist: --the cement won't come off. Oh, well, I'll take it home and boil it on my stovetop tonight. It'll be ready tomorrow.
Me: Why don't we make it for next week when I'm coming in any way for a filling ~~just in case~~?

My body, I swear. If it can go wrong, IT WILL GO WRONG.

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Pain in all its many permutations

Mon, 10 Oct 2016 01:07:40 GMT

Ugh. I got distracted talking to P before the freestyle session started yesterday and got on the ice with my blade guards on. I was hanging on to the boards with my left hand and managed to sort of let myself down gently, so it didn't hurt at the time. Today: OUCH. My whole left side is screaming at me.

On the bright side: I have a lot of drugs for that.

I think also have to eat some crow. Three days into the prednisone, and my lower back/sacroiliac pain is GONE. I walked my dog around the block today without back pain for the first time in over two years.

I guess this means I need to admit I have ankylosing spondylitis and should start the Humira. I'm glad I at least know turning off part of my immune system should help, rather than winging it on a hope and a prayer. And it'll be nice not to be in constant pain, assuming the Humira works as well as prednisone.

(Bad side: The steroids did nothing for all of my other joints, including elbows, fingers, thumbs, knees, ankles, and toes. But the back pain is 70% of my daily pain, so I guess that's okay. And perhaps the Cymbalta will take care of the other joints in time.)

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Good news

Sun, 14 Aug 2016 03:59:21 GMT

I have a trifecta of good health news from this week, for the first time in years:

1. I got my dental implant (the metal rod part; the actual false tooth/crown will be put on in three more months) on Monday, and aside from that day and night, there's been almost no pain. I only used a few of the good painkillers the dentist prescribed.

2. I bit the bullet and got a myofascial release/deep tissue massage for my abdomen yesterday in an attempt to untangle some of the scar tissue left behind by last summer's surgical adventures. It hurt SO MUCH while the therapist was doing it and last night (there's a reason I scheduled it for a week in which I would have narcotics...), but today it's amazing. I had no idea how restricted and tight everything was in there, and now walking is like MAGIC. It's like gravity has been turned down; picking my leg up to take a step is comparatively effortless. Skating, too, has improved. Getting my leg up for a jump or a camel spin is much easier. (She worked on my lower back and butt as well, since those muscles tend to tighten in order to stabilize the loose SI joints, but so far I haven't noticed improvement. Maybe that just takes longer than a day.)

3. Most amazing: My mucocele, that annoying spit-cyst on the floor of my mouth that's been hanging around for a couple of months, up and disappeared. I can't even tell it was there. It's essentially unheard of for these things to go away on their own, so FINALLY, I am medically unusual in a good way!! :D

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Hysterversary

Fri, 13 May 2016 22:38:38 GMT

Facebook reminded me that yesterday was my one year hysterversary. I still have mixed feelings about it, given all the complications that followed, but they're about 90% good feelings.

...Especially because I just finished a round of prophylactic amoxicillin for my bone graft. I found out the hard way in 2014 that my body completely ignores birth control in the presence of antibiotics. (The hard way involved an ER visit because I thought I was going to bleed to death.) I still have my left ovary, and right now it's basically doing a dance and yelling, "OVULATION PAR-TAY!!!" I suspect whatever bits of endometriosis are still clinging to my abdominal cavity and other organs are joining in as well. It started up again two days ago, and it is a very, very familiar pain. Dialed down about 80% because the two major offenders are no longer there, but nevertheless, it makes me glad to also have a stash of good drugs for the pain of the tooth extraction/graft.

Which went reasonably well, I suppose. I had to go back on Monday for more painkillers, because I R Slow at healing, but other than that all seems okay. I have stitches in my mouth that are irksome. I picked up some clove oil at Walgreens the other day because I was running low on my second round of hydrocodone and wanted to stretch it as long as possible, and though I didn't expect it to work, it really did numb up the whole area very well for about half an hour and then provide a few hours of pain relief. The only downside is that when I use it, I smell like a Christmas ham. Ah, well.

Since this appears to be the health news dump post, I'll also tell you that my physical therapist assigned me an AMAZING exercise this week. It's this thing where you put your hands and one knee on a bed and bend the other knee for several reps. Really works the butt muscles I need to engage when I walk, and she says over time it should make it more automatic for me to use them when walking. Yahoo.

And, to end on a high note, although I've had a cold/cough for over a week now, it hasn't bugged my bladder at all. :D :D :D Crossing my fingers that I'm strong enough now for this pelvic floor disorder to be on its way out!

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Various health things

Wed, 09 Mar 2016 02:19:22 GMT

Physical therapy update: There are 77 muscles in the human back,* and my therapist is determined to strengthen every one of them in order to hold my pelvis in place. I'm doing what feel like a lot of shoulder exercises for a pelvic problem.

I apparently have a case of contralateral pelvic drop/trendelenberg gait, so we're also doing a whole lot of butt exercises. I'm still on the every other week plan, which is good because these exercises seem to take a while to take root; it takes me several days to find the muscle she wants me to work with each of them (apparently this is common with loose joints), then to build up strength.

I'm still loving the KT tape over the sore spots on my abs. Excellent stuff.

* According to the first result Google spat up at me. I take no responsibility for accuracy, but that sounds good.

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I had my first dental implant consultation today. I really liked this dentist; he was thorough and detailed in his explanations and answers to my questions and very nice. When I told him I was allergic to dental acrylic, he asked the dental assistant to make a note to look up hypoallergenic dental acrylic options (even though I wouldn't actually need a temp crown for this procedure). Then he said that while he'd done lots of these and was happy to do mine, the dentist he went to when he needed an implant had done a ton and if I would be more comfortable with him he'd happily send me over...and it turned out to be the one my dentist wanted me to go to anyway.

That said: When he was describing what a cracked tooth looked like and how it (dis)functioned, he opened a drawer that was FULL OF OLD TEETH. AND PULLED ONE OUT TO SHOW ME. Saying, "I pulled this tooth out of a girl, and as you can see..."

I don't know, man. This guy seems great, but the trophy drawer of teeth is a bit offputting.

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Adulting in myriad ways

Tue, 08 Mar 2016 02:50:16 GMT

Look at me, being all adulty! I have not one, not two, but three consultations lined up with dental implant doers. Admittedly, this mostly came about because the first one I called couldn't see me for a month and I thought that was ridiculous and so kept calling until I got a better answer (tomorrow, for the record).

The pain receded a bit today, probably because I used half my weekly NSAID ration on it, so I may actually make it through the next week's post-redone-root canal-see-if-it-worked period without begging someone to take some pliers and yank this tooth from my head, and if I'm really feeling great I might even be able to go another week on the off chance it just needs longer than usual to actually work. (That would be good, because the second consultation isn't until the end of the month and I'd like to make some kind of choice... I guess I could always get my regular dentist to pull it and then worry about the implant later, but then that would be three visits to the dentist rather than just one, and god knows I don't need to take more time off work right now.)

Of course, now the question becomes how this procedure will go wrong and become another Kafkaesque health nightmare, but let's pretend for a minute that something will actually work.

*

In less imminently painful news, I received an unexpected tax refund this year--I have it set to withhold as little as possible and I typically wind up paying the feds fifteen bucks or so every February, so either jumping a tax bracket changed things or someone in HR hit a button and reset my preferences. Anyway, it was almost exactly the amount of the pretty skating dress from my poll a few weeks ago, so...I bought it. :)

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Agent Carter etc.

Wed, 02 Mar 2016 03:18:18 GMT

( A few scattered thoughts on the Agent Carter finale )

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My tooth hurts more after getting the second root canal than before. I wish I could say that surprised me. Thirteen days until the endodontist will consider it enough time to have settled and I can get this thing pulled out of my head.

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Footwork

Sun, 07 Feb 2016 23:24:19 GMT

I tried out alternating mazurkas into a split jump into a toe loop today. It felt pretty good; hope it looks the same way, because I think it would go nicely with the plinky bits at the beginning of my program music. Depending on how well I stick the landing of the split jump, I can aaaaaalmost go into the toe loop without having to put my left foot down and stabilize for a second before I start the inside three turn into the toe loop.

After that I went to the grocery store and bought a knee brace for my left knee, because I can stand it no longer. I think I may actually be unconsciously compensating for it and thus making my right SI joint hurt. Bah. The brace feels nice now, but the pain is intermittent (classic chondromalacia returning), so it could be a coincidence. We shall see.

I also bought some excellent orange ginger herbal tea and some chocolate-covered pretzels, because they were on sale and tasty. Yum.

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Skating progress report, with added nerdery

Sun, 11 Oct 2015 01:57:00 GMT

Today I accomplished what must be the most ridiculously-named skating move, twizzles on one foot. Huzzah! BF has done a twizzle exercise in each of the three Curry classes I've taken with him, and this was the first time I didn't have to do it on two feet.

I also accidentally did back three turns on one foot. Well, really cruddy ones that were way too far forward on the blade. I didn't actually realize that's what I was doing until I was halfway down the ice on an exercise that consisted of a forward inside three to an immediate back outside three, and by that point it was too late to freak out. Yay?

P was pleased with my brackets that I discovered on Tuesday that I can do. I can still only do the forward ones, inside on both feet and outside on the right foot. I'm not doing them on a figure like in that video, just on a hockey circle or a line. We moved on to counters (same caveats as above) and revisited rockers (forwards only, etc.).

You may be wondering exactly what the difference is between all these turns. ALLOW ME TO ELUCIDATE! There are four kinds of turns on one foot, the three turn, the rocker, the counter, and the bracket. All of them can be done eight different ways (forwards or backwards entering on an inside or outside edge on either the left or right foot), but for example, let's say you start all of them going forwards on the right foot on an inside edge. At that point, the difference becomes whether you stay on the same edge after the turn or not (and consequently whether you change circles) and if you have to couterrotate your upper body or not.

Three turns are the easiest because you change edges (thus staying on the same imaginary circle) and you turn your upper body in the direction of the rotation. Your tracing looks like the number 3, with the first rounded part your entry edge, the point in the middle the turn, and the second rounded bit the exit edge, hence the name.

For a rocker, you still get to turn your upper body the direction you're going, but now you have to stay on the same edge. This will put you on a new imaginary circle, which is harder than it looks. Do you see in the videos how the bracket turn keeps the woman going in the same direction back around to the point on the line she started on, while the rockers and counters send her off to a new area of the line? If you don't change edges when you turn, you have to start a new circle.

A counter is like a rocker in that you'll stay on the same edge/start a new circle, but this time you have to turn your upper body against the direction of your rotation. Trust me when I say that bit of trickery takes months to learn. It's kind of cool in that you bounce a bit when you do the turn, and your hips and shoulders flip so much that it looks a little like magic when you watch one done, in a way that the non-counterrotated turns don't. (To their credit, they look smoother.) You don't really expect someone to turn that way out of that position, so you can easily blink and miss it.

Finally, a bracket is like a three turn because you change edges and stay on the same circle. Or, if you're me, sometimes your inside brackets will turn into inside counters because you didn't change edges and wandered off the circle. Uh. Anyway. You can also do cool stuff because of the counterrotation and edge change, such as this thing I am very far from getting up the skill or bravery to do.

Well, that was fun. P and I also worked on loops, as in the figure, not the jump, which I cannot find a video to show you because YouTube makes it impossible to filter out the jump videos, which are far more numerous. I...think I hate loops, actually. The less time spent on them, the better.

We also did loop jump, which I would also prefer not to think about. She says I have exactly the right entrance and just need to jump the damn thing instead of going all fetal and doing barely a half loop. I think I grind to too much of a stop to do much of anything. I suppose it will be a work in progress for some time.

Finally, my left foot power pulls have gotten almost as good as my right foot ones, both forwards and backwards.

I wore my new SI belt for part of this morning's practice and then for the Curry class this afternoon. I think it helped a little? I suspect it will do better for walking, when I sometimes have to press my hands against my hips to keep from (feeling like they're) trying to fly apart on me, or like they're grinding against my spine at the attachment point. I'll have to walk the dog tomorrow and experiment.

It also seems to help my (re)current bladder issues, which leads me to suspect I'm now one of the 10% who gets urinary troubles with SI joint dysfunction, which happens because your bladder nerves run through that area and can get irritated. I have my cortisone shots next Monday and an appointment with a urogynecologist the following afternoon, so SOMEBODY is going to fix this, by God. I'm hoping that if the cortisone doesn't take care of it, then at least being able to go back to doing all my back exercises will. Or maybe there will be drugs. Ones that work instead of making it worse, like the gabapentin that I discontinued after a week because I kept having horrible nightmares and then waking up to pee two or three times a night.

...This surgery. It's the gift that keeps on giving. I'd do it again, because having a reproductive system like mine was completely unlivable, but I could do without the problems it has caused.

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Really big needles

Tue, 06 Oct 2015 23:59:27 GMT

Welp, it's come to cortisone shots in my back. This weekend pushed me over the edge. I still wonder if I might need different PT exercises to focus on the muscles that have atrophied after surgery/recovery, but for right now I'll take the cortisone bandaid that will let me start doing any exercises at all.

Unfortunately, it's not for two weeks, so tomorrow I need to message the office again and request something for the interim. I didn't realize SI joint injections were such a big deal that they require a 1.5-hour appointment and are scheduled this far in advance. Not to mention I have to have someone drive me home and take the rest of the day off work, but I'm not getting sedated? I assume this means I get a Valium or something. A nurse is supposed to call and explain a few days before. Uh. I thought it was zip in, get a little local anesthetic, get the shots, get out and back to work within thirty minutes, not this whole procedure. Apparently not.

Anyway, movement makes me feel better right now, especially the gliding movements of skating rather than the clumpy ones of walking, so I went to practice, where I taught G about choctaws and he showed me a better way to do a toe loop. It would never have occurred to me to drop the leading arm before the jump, but it did feel better. Huh.

Also, my inside brackets used to turn into counters on the exit edge, but today my inside counters turned into inside brackets. Progress?

Back to lying flat on my back. Uuuugh.

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Pain, pain, go away

Sat, 04 Jul 2015 15:49:00 GMT

The first three days back at work went better than I feared but worse than I hoped, recovery-wise. (Work is fine. I picked a great week to come back.) I did okay in the mornings, but my abdomen started hurting by noon, so I ended up taking three halves of a pain pill each day to cover afternoon, evening, and night.

This would be so much easier if I could take ibuprofen or Aleve right now. Instead, I have to wait until the pain gets bad enough that I feel justified in using my dwindling Percocet stash on it. Tylenol by itself is a waste of time; frankly, I'm not even sure why that alleged painkiller exists.

I see my gyn late next week for another follow up, so maybe he'll give me something. I don't think he wants to, and honestly I don't want more--I'd much rather not be hurting. Maybe Tramadol? Something to step down with? Or maybe I can tough it out until I see the kidney doc in two weeks and with any luck get permission to take NSAIDs again.

*

Apparently there's now a trailer for the new "adult" Muppet show coming out this fall.

I like the idea of a new show, but actually hearing Kermit say, "She turned my life into a bacon-wrapped hell on earth" is just bizarre. I always think of the Muppets as completely G-rated.

Speaking of which, I fell down a Muppet-shaped hole in the internet and discovered that these days, Oscar the Grouch occasionally pops out of recycling bins. The times, they are a changin'.

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Free at last

Tue, 09 Jun 2015 21:40:00 GMT

I'm hooooooooome! I have to follow up with the kidney people this week to be sure my labs still trend in the right direction, but other than that I'm free as a bird. Really hoping this is all behind me and I will have no more complications from any of these surgeries or treatments or whatever.

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So much hospital.

Mon, 08 Jun 2015 09:39:11 GMT

I haven't been posting because I haven't had the energy, but in short, my medical saga continues. Three days ago (two? Four? Time runs together here) I was diagnosed with something called acute kidney injury. In other words, my kidneys were overwhelmed by one of the drugs I'd been getting, probably one of the IV antibiotics, and I have to stay in the hospital until my labs look better. This will hopefully be in the next day or two, but no one really knows. It shouldn't be serious or permanent, at least.

Either the kidney thing or the new oral antibiotics I've been getting have left me with literally no appetite (or worse--let's just say Zofran is my friend right now). I'm existing largely on Popsicles and pudding at the moment. Trust me when I say it's not a weight loss plan I'd recommend. Not helping is the fact that my body doesn't seem to react quickly enough for these doctors, as when I didn't produce a bowel movement in good enough time and they pumped me full of laxatives, with predictable results. Let's just say there was an incident which led me to lose all modesty and leave it at that.

On the bright side, one of my teams of doctors (I now have three) took me off continuous heart monitoring, which meant immediate movement to a much bigger, nicer room in a non-surgical ward. Plus not having to be hooked up to the heart monitor leads every moment is REALLY nice, even if I am still on IV fluids. And I don't think the medical students have found me yet, which cuts down a little on interruptions--those were getting to be a real bear, to the point where I broke down in front of one of them the other day and extracted a promise he would never come back and would tell all his buddies to stay away too. The only downside is this room is kind of hot, which my stomach doesn't like. Boo.

Anyway, being in limbo sucks, and I hope I get out of it soon. In order, I would really like to not be nauseated, have an appetite, and to get the hell out of here. Goat sacrifices, anyone?

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Gaaaaaah.

Wed, 29 Apr 2015 00:42:41 GMT

Every time I've traveled this year, bad things have happened health-wise. This time it's a Dread Disease that developed yesterday. I at first thought it was the flu, because I've never known a cold to have a fever as high as 102.5, which it was last night even with ibuprofen, nor to come with such severe muscle and joint aches. And the eyeballs-boiling-in-one's-skull feeling is, in my experience, unique to More Than A Cold.

However, the fever broke around noon today and I'm now back to my normal of 98.0. The only lingering symptoms seem to be a much slighter sore throat, vague fatigue, and extreme snot. So maybe it is a cold. Or flu, but ameliorated by my flu shot. I dunno, I just hope it doesn't come back or postpone my surgery. I had to reschedule today's pre-op appointment to next Monday.

(My uterus is behind this, isn't it?)

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Bits and bobs

Sat, 14 Mar 2015 03:00:51 GMT

Oh, Agent Carter, sometimes the fact that you are set in 1946 rather than the 30s kind of cramps my style. And by style I mean my knowledge of pop culture, which is far greater for the 30s than it is for the 40s.

I may be writing more fic. A few more fics, actually. They all basically revolve around the theme of "Jack Thompson flirts very badly, often confusing flirting with being an annoying jerk. Peggy Carter finds this simultaneously irritating, amusing, confusing, and intriguing. She also verbally kicks his ass a lot."

...Looking at some of my favorite pairings, I do believe I see a theme.

*

In reviewing my medical records, I found that I have an arcuate uterus. This is largely an incidental finding, as the jury is still out on whether the increased difficulty in getting pregnant and increased number of miscarriages for women with this abnormality is statistically significant. (Anyway, it's a moot point for me, obviously.) It doesn't affect anything else. What I found amusing is that it basically causes the uterus to have devil horns.

I feel like this explains so much. Perhaps I should enlist the services of an exorcist as well as a gynecologist.

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Skating again, finally

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 03:17:53 GMT

I actually managed to skate today for the first time in almost a week. It may not have been the greatest idea, given my blood loss-related tiredness (definitely having the new doctor check my iron levels; despite non-stop iron supplements, I suspect they are somewhere in the basement) and the combination of sinus freakout due to impending rain and teeth freakout due to my dentist drilling on the crown and the tooth next to it in the ten-months-ongoing-now effort to make said crown stop hurting*, but I didn't care.

The Tuesday evening session is usually crowded, but it was almost empty today, so I mostly did moves. (See above re: tired.) The three turn pattern is...I don't know if better is the right word, but it's different. I'm actually only doing six on the left foot and five on the right, so that's good, but the lobes are shallow. The right turn also insists on circling back on itself. Bah.

The Circle 8 is, like, 85% there. Inside edges are fine. Left outside edge is...well, it exists, but it's not pretty. I'm bent over so far I'm practically doing a spiral, my free leg is way out to the side, and I definitely have to force the last foot or so, but hey, it gets back to the center. The right outside edge is...halfway there. No one is surprised. Stupit uneven hips.

Back crossovers to back outside edges get better and better. I need to straighten my knee on the edges, but other than that they felt great. Deep and powerful and extended. I might one day have enough confidence to try a back spiral after this.

I did a lot of terrible toe pick spins and one amazing, beautiful 3- or 4-revolution spin where I finished and looked down at the near-centered tracing in astonishment, wondering, "Did I do that? Is that really my tracing and not someone else's?" Now if I could just re-create that.

* The current theory is that I've basically had a sprained tooth for a while due to the bite not being aligned. I did not know this, but each tooth is actually attached to the bones of one's mouth via a couple of very tiny ligaments. Since that nerve is gone, my dentist thinks the ligament is the part complaining.

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