The "What's on your mind?" Thread -2017

[margd]

Darn it! I had put several comments in quote, then my internet connection burbed, I had to reboot, and I LOST THEM, and I can't remember what they were. OK, everybody, just pretend that I have responded with something loving, wise and witty to what you said, and we'll call it done!

Why what a coincidence! The same thing happened to me!

Alicia88 I remember hearing an old wives tale that claimed babies and cats don't mix because cats will sleep on baby's faces and suffocate them. The reasoning was that the warm breath of the baby attracted the cat to curl up there. A lot of people do seem to think that it's dangerous to have a cat near a baby for this reason and others, such as the danger of scratching or biting. I've never known anyone who had a serious problem with their cat and their babies, including me.

 

[arouetta]

The old wives' tale is that cats actually steal a baby's breath, killing them that way. The most likely explanation for the old wives' tale is that cats are attracted to the milk smell in the baby's mouth, which would explain seeing the cat's face in the baby's face (the position the cat takes when stealing the breath) and cats love miniature space heaters, which describes a small baby's body. So some unfortunate felines lay next to the unfortunate baby in the wrong spot and accidentally smother them, and other unfortunate babies simply die of SIDS when a cat is in the house and has been seen checking out the baby in the past.

 

[handsome kitty]

Alicia88 sometimes heartburn is caused by too little stomach acid. Try not to drink anything with your meals. It may help. Though I do remember those days of no room for food, air, and pee.

 

[Alicia88]

There's also an old wives tale that cats will steal a baby's breath. People are just stupid. When I pointed out that those were myths, her boyfriend said something about how babies shouldn't be around cat hair. I have no idea what he thinks he's talking about.
This is awesome:
Breaking Cat News by Georgia Dunn for May 11, 2015 | GoComics.com

 

[arouetta]

Eep. I was sitting on the floor without socks on and I noticed my toes are slightly grayish blue near the nail beds. I looked at my hands, they also have a gray-blue tint near the nail bed. It's kinda freaky since before now my nails turn purple when I'm cold, not blue.

This is a bit unsettling. I think I will be taking a very hot bath now.

 

[segelkatt]

Eep. I was sitting on the floor without socks on and I noticed my toes are slightly grayish blue near the nail beds. I looked at my hands, they also have a gray-blue tint near the nail bed. It's kinda freaky since before now my nails turn purple when I'm cold, not blue.

This is a bit unsettling. I think I will be taking a very hot bath now.

That is usually a sign of lack of oxygen in the blood which is why people with heart conditions often display this besides enlarged nails and "clubbed" fingers and toes, particularly if the condition is congenital although it may worsen with age. You may want to have an oxygen level test, these days that is pretty much standard whenever you see a doctor, they just put this little clamp on your finger for a minute or so. If it's too low (and I mean REALLY low, like under 60) it's time to find out why. You may have a heart condition and not know it. Or a low red blood count (anemia). All are treatable.

 

[arouetta]

Thanks for the suggestion of the oxygen test, my husband has one of those little pulse oxometer thingys. My oxygen is good, though my pulse rate was questionable (technically tachycardia).

I do probably have anemia though, I got a sneak peek at my recent bloodwork. Two tests were out of normal range and two more were barely in normal range. According to Dr. Google, those tests being off they way they were, every single one of them is signaling iron deficient anemia.

Which makes sense. My daily bike ride, despite no change in intensity, became a lot harder. The spot I always have trouble with, the only way to manage it with any semblance of style and grace was to force myself to pant far deeper and faster than my body told me I needed to do. That made me wonder if that meant I needed more oxygen than how instinct was telling me to breathe. And that started happening a couple of months after I blew off the diet, so instead of high protein I was lucky if I even ate peanut butter at some point during the day, much less meat.

 

[segelkatt]

Thanks for the suggestion of the oxygen test, my husband has one of those little pulse oxometer thingys. My oxygen is good, though my pulse rate was questionable (technically tachycardia).

I do probably have anemia though, I got a sneak peek at my recent bloodwork. Two tests were out of normal range and two more were barely in normal range. According to Dr. Google, those tests being off they way they were, every single one of them is signaling iron deficient anemia.

Which makes sense. My daily bike ride, despite no change in intensity, became a lot harder. The spot I always have trouble with, the only way to manage it with any semblance of style and grace was to force myself to pant far deeper and faster than my body told me I needed to do. That made me wonder if that meant I needed more oxygen than how instinct was telling me to breathe. And that started happening a couple of months after I blew off the diet, so instead of high protein I was lucky if I even ate peanut butter at some point during the day, much less meat.

Anytime you don't have a balanced diet something is bound to go wrong sooner or later. If you are trying to loose weight just eat everything you always eat but eat only half of how much you ate before. Human beings are designed to be omnivores, i.e. eat veggies and meat, like bears. If you want to gain weight you need to eat more (bears do that before they hibernate), it's really very simple.
Does your physician not give you a copy of any lab results? He/she should, mine certainly does and you are entitled to it, that should not be something to which you should have to "sneak a peek". Any tests that are badly out of usual range, not just a point or two, should be addressed by your doctor, if not then you need a new doctor who WILL discuss it with you. Don't let them talk "over your head" either, doctors should communicate with their patients in a way that the patient can understand.
If you are suffering from iron deficiency then you need to take an iron supplement but don't do it on your own, discuss it with your doctor.
How do I know so much about this? My late daughter had a severe heart defect, she was constantly bluish looking because of it but she also had very thick blood and had to take blood thinners, she ran out of steam very fast, huffing and puffing. When you live with someone who has a particular medical problem you learn very fast all kinds of things about that condition, sometimes you can even suggest a course of action that the doctor had not thought about although it was known, even doctors cannot remember everything all the time.
My late spouse had kidney disease, so I learned about that. I have two grandchildren who are both on the spectrum at various points, so I learned about that.
There is much info on the internet but one cannot rely on that by itself, one does need info from a specialist (doctor) to make sense of it.
I also learned a lot about cat health the same way. The point is to WANT to know, not just let someone else worry about it.

 

[arouetta]

Thanks.

My psychiatrist ordered the blood tests and told me to start a new medicine at the same time. In the next couple of days I need to get a different blood test and an EKG to see how I'm responding to the new medicine. After those tests are done is when I see him again. The lab has already made the initial blood test results available, which is how I got the sneak peek.

Being a psychiatrist (actually a psychiatric nurse practitioner), there's not a lot he could really do for anemia. I've already started the iron pills.

When the weight was just falling off is when I was doing low carb/high protein. I just couldn't mentally handle dieting anymore which is why I'm not back on it. Being off it though, I'm just eating what I'm craving and if that craving is french fries and hot chocolate and cheese, that's what I'm eating. I'm really massively craving carbs for some reason.

 

[segelkatt]

I do hope you also have a regular doctor, a General Practitioner, who would take care of your everyday aches and pains, colds and headaches, sprains, scrapes, rashes etc. That's also the one who should give you a physical once a year and check your heart, lungs, kidneys and blood and send you off for a mammogram and pap smear. That's how you stay healthy, catch things before they get bad.
Your nutritional intake is pathetic but as long as you don't overdo it or take some vitamins to round out what you don't get from what you eat you should be ok, for a while anyway. But do watch your weight, you don't want to put back on what you lost which is hard, I speak from experience. See-sawing with your weight is not good for one's health. Take care.

 

[muffy]

I don't understand that, either. In the case of the woman who lost 100 pounds and had the cat put down because she met a man who was interested and "said" he was allergic (interesting choice of words there, BTW), I think we must be talking about someone who was desperate for a boyfriend and extremely low on self esteem, with no real experience with dating. And I think that she has absolutely no chance of finding a good man until she grows a backbone and stops letting herself be dictated to and stampeded into rash actions just because a man gives her some kind of deadline, but since I don't know the woman I may be reading more into it than I should.

Margret

Judy was low on self esteem and was desperate for a boyfriend. She was also recently divorced when this happened. She gained all her weight back and never got another boy friend. She was abused by her step father when she was a kid. This happened a long time ago and she has sinced passed away.

 

[arouetta]

I do hope you also have a regular doctor, a General Practitioner, who would take care of your everyday aches and pains, colds and headaches, sprains, scrapes, rashes etc. That's also the one who should give you a physical once a year and check your heart, lungs, kidneys and blood and send you off for a mammogram and pap smear. That's how you stay healthy, catch things before they get bad.
Your nutritional intake is pathetic but as long as you don't overdo it or take some vitamins to round out what you don't get from what you eat you should be ok, for a while anyway. But do watch your weight, you don't want to put back on what you lost which is hard, I speak from experience. See-sawing with your weight is not good for one's health. Take care.

There's a lot of evidence that physicals are actually more harmful than helpful. An article that interviewed doctors estimated that only one person every year in the US actually learns of a condition that wouldn't be caught otherwise. Meanwhile thousands of people every year are put through needless worry and invasive testing due to false positives. The doctors interviewed said that once they saw the statistics they now no longer recommend yearly physicals.

As far as mammograms, once I heard that if you don't come out of there bruised it wasn't done right I said nope. There's no cases of breast cancer in my family, so I'm not going to allow someone to hurt me that bad in the name of medical treatment. Pap smears, I am not willing to have objects shoved up my vagina, and you know what they call insertion of items down there against a woman's will. Once I got my tubal ligation and they could no longer blackmail me to submit to that by withholding birth control I never got another one. Even if I had been exposed to HPV, 90% of people who get HPV ( even the nasty cancer ones) no longer have it 2 years later because the immune system is just that great. And TMI, diabetes in men can cause some serious issues in the bedroom so I've had a few recent years where I could not possibly have been exposed.

I'm on medical leave right now so no exercise and I'm still losing weight. Slowly, but the scale had a new low number today. All I want are carbs but at least I'm not wanting a lot of carbs. And as far as everyday aches and pains and colds, my body seems to be extremely healthy. There's been more than one time in my life where I got sick to the point of needing a doctor and found out I needed a new patient appointment because I hadn't been in there in over 2 years so they dropped me as an active patient. My brain is sick but that's a specialist issue, my shoulder isn't doing so hot but that's also a specialist issue, I have an eczema thing going on that regular doctors have failed three times to cure so that's probably going to be a specialist issue. The rest of me doesn't seem to get to a point where I need a doctor, which I think is great.

 

[Alicia88]

My grandma is 87 years old and hasn't been to the doctor (other than for glasses and dentures) in 40 or 50 years. She says she's not sick so why bother? And she's in great health. She has arthritis, but at her age that's to be expected. She says people get sick because of doctors.
As far as pap smears go, we all hate them but like you said, they withhold birth control unless you get them and I don't want to have a baby every 9 months.
Aisyln, my step daughter, is getting dropped off today for Thanksgiving. We havent seen her since summer because she started preschool and her mother moved too far away for weekends to be a thing.

 

[segelkatt]

Let me say up front that I don't care if someone is of the opinion that doctor visits are not necessary or are even harmful as there are people who live to a ripe old age without ever seeing a physician. On the other hand there are plenty of people who would have lived to a ripe old age if they had seen a doctor for that little nagging pain that they just ignored.

Mammograms should NOT hurt and bruises are just unacceptable. The new machines just push enough to get a proper picture, no pain at all, I just had one.
Being an old lady I do not need birth control but if I did and my doctor said I need a pap smear to get the prescription I would find another doctor. I would then march myself to the nearest Planned Parenthood office to get a prescription there and then to the drugstore for a good supply of condoms. The times of having a baby every year are over. If your man does not want to use one then he is out of luck and there is the door. If he then decided to rape you have him put in jail. Good riddance as he does not care enough about you.
If I had not had a yearly check-up with blood test, urine test, thumping my chest, listening to my heart and lungs, palpitation of my belly and a rectal exam I would not be here. No kind of cancer in my family but there I was with a stage 3 colon cancer and it was growing fast. No symptoms of any kind.
When I was 40 and past the baby bearing stage but had bad cramps every month my uterus (but not my ovaries) was removed which stopped the awful cramps, who needed those.
Having specialists is fine but each one just sees that part of you and is not concerned with the other parts. A GP sees the whole picture and how the parts and their treatment all go together. This is especially helpful when it comes to drug interaction.
When I kept complaining about constant diarrhea and nothing would stop it I was finally referred to a specialist who prescribed a drug that is usually meant for cholesterol. However, as I had told him that a piece of my colon had been removed during the cancer surgery he hit upon this particular drug because good results had been seen with it in people who had a "short gut due to surgery".
I will say no more about medical issues besides that Americans are some of the sickest people in the world because they eat lots of processed junk food and don't eat enough veggies that were not treated with all kinds of poisons.

 

[Alicia88]

Condoms are fine, I guess but I find them annoying. I prefer to take a tiny little pill once a day and not worry about it. I'm too scared of the side effects that can happen with some of the other options and the pill has never caused me any issues so I'll put up with the pap smears. They've reduced the frequency to every 3 years now. Better than yearly.
Aislyn is here. Actually, she's spending the day with John's mom since he has to work and she has the day off but she's gonna drop her off this evening. We'll have her for a week and her mom just agreed to letting us have her for Christmas and all summer. I hate that we're not going to see her much anymore, but there's not much that can be done. They live a few hours away so weekend visits aren't much of an option. None of us can afford the gas to drive back and forth that often. It's rough when parents separate and then don't live close.

 

[Blakeney Green]

It's storming outside and I think Toad is stressed about it. She's been glued to me and has been "nursing" on my shirt on and off all evening.

 

[Alicia88]

I just found a flea. So, we need to treat again. I found a 6 pack of advantage ii on Amazon for $55. It's for cats 9 lbs and over. That's what we get for the boys, but Marcy isn't quite 9 lbs. I just weighed her. Well, I weighed myself then picked her up and weighed myself again. She's around 8 pounds. Would it still be ok to use the 9 lb meds?

 

[arouetta]

A GP sees the whole picture and how the parts and their treatment all go together. This is especially helpful when it comes to drug interaction.

I disagree with that part. I have seen quite a few general practitioners in the last 21 years. Every time they hear my medication list they will flat out tell me that my little personal cocktail is well past their experience level. And every now and then the primary care doctor will hear my current cocktail and prescribe something else for whatever acute issue I have going on, and then the pharmacist is the one to say "Are you sure you want this?" for very good reason.

When I have multiple doctors prescribing multiple things, I don't trust my PCP. Not in the slightest. I go to WebMD and Drugs.com and use their interaction trackers and then when picking the medicine up I ask to speak with the pharmacist and let him or her check for interactions as well. I trust it only when the pharmacist signs off on it.

 

[segelkatt]

I said I was not going to comment on medical issues anymore. However, I remember something that happened to a distant relative: His elderly parents were not doing well but he had not seen them in quite a while because of the distance involved, this was before internet and all that. When he finally did see them he was appalled at the shape they were in, their speech was terrible, they were forgetting things, they did not get around very well, their doctors had said they should consider wheelchairs or at least walkers and maybe they should give up driving. Then he saw all the medications they were taking and he hit the roof. He had been trained as a medical doctor but was not practicing that, instead he was the health office of the county in which he lived. He took all the medications away from them, took them to the local medical center (one of the best in the nation) and had the doctors there start from scratch. A month or so later his parents were on less than half of the number of medications than they had been taking before, they felt clear headed again, their speech was as it had been when he had last seen them before, they got around better and were just generally in much better shape than before and there was no more talk about giving up driving. These were educated people with advanced college degrees but they trusted their doctors to help them feel better with one more medication. Both of them lived another 10 years, no walkers, wheelchairs or other devices to "help them live a better life"; they did not need them. And they did not need all those meds either, just a few.
The point of this is that sometimes it is best to start all over with new doctors, especially when you are taking what you call a "cocktail". I am constantly bugging my doctor if I can just stop taking this or that and she had better have a good explanation why if she says no. I have eliminated 3 of them that way. Now that I have lost quite a bit of weight my blood pressure is down also so I will see if I can stop or reduce that medication also.

 

[arouetta]

Partially because good doctors eventually switch practices and partially because I have no issue with "firing" a bad psychiatrist, I've seen a lot of doctors. While each psychiatrist has his or her personal preference as to which medication to use, my cocktail has remained quite consistent - a mood stabilizer, an anti-psychotic and an antidepressant. One keeps me from going manic, one keeps me from getting depressed, and one keeps the delusions of conspiracies and people looking for opportunities to hurt me at bay. Sometimes I can go a few years without an antidepressant, sometimes I can't. Sometimes (like right now) my brain is under less control than it should be and I need two mood stabilizers, sometimes one will do. But the cocktail pretty much stays the same, as far as drug classes go. I can't do with less, not if I want to not become a monster.

Okay, so what little diet I was adhering to is completely gone. I bought a pumpkin pie and Monster trail mix while at Target. But on the plus side I didn't have a breakdown while shopping for lunches and I didn't cry in the parking lot afterwards.