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

[muffy]

Segelkatt:

Thanks for replying. There is no reason to wreck your back when you don't have too. Even my own sister laughs at me when I use my cart. I have to walk with a cane and that only leaves one arm to carry groceries. I have to have a cart to carry mine when I have two weeks worth.

 

[Alicia88]

Sometimes its very difficult when a child has 2 different sets of rules. Aislyn just threw a big fit because we told her she needed to take a nap. "My mom doesn't make me take a nap!" Well, you're not with your mom and you didn't take a nap yesterday and you were very cranky yesterday evening because you were tired. So, you're taking a nap.
She'll be 5 next month. She's still young enough for naps and if she's going to get super whiny by 7 if she doesn't have one, then I think she still needs one.

 

[arouetta]

Rant.....

So part of it is my own darn fault. My bike hasn't been ridden in 2 weeks and I waited until this morning to get it back ready for the road. I left just a couple of minutes late...but I haven't been on a bike in 2 weeks. My speed was slower than normal and I felt terrible while riding. I got to my husband's place of work so I could use the car, I changed in their bathroom, and I spent several minutes in there feeling like I was going to vomit and not daring to leave the toilet just in case.

So I got to the hospital where I needed an EKG and a timed blood test. EKGs are walk-in, so it's not like I'm late for an appointment, but the blood test is timed and I was walking in the door right when they should have been taking my blood. I told the receptionist that I screwed up, left late, since it's a timed blood test I asked if she could do a rush job. And she did. I said the same thing to the woman registering, and I have never seen anyone type that fast, she did do a rush job. I got to the desk for blood work, told that receptionist the same thing. She said sure and pointed me to the waiting area.

20 minutes later I'm still waiting. 20 minutes for a timed blood test that I said flat out needed to be done ASAP. I am right at the point where the data collected would be worse than useless. Actually harmful if the doctor goes by the data. I go back to the receptionist and I tell her that I need my paperwork back as my blood could no longer be taken. She rushed off, I was assuming to get my paperwork, and then she popped out the side door and told me I was next in line and it would only be a minute. I said "It can only be a minute."

5 minutes later I'm still waiting. So I go back to the desk and say I need my paperwork back. The receptionist rushes off again, I thought getting my paperwork, and this time the lab tech pops out the side door and is urging me to have the blood taken right then. Nope. Worse than useless, downright harmful. She pushes some more. Nope, just give me my **** paperwork. She says no one told her it was something called stat. I pointed right to the receptionist and said I told her it was a timed blood test. The lab tech kept going on about stat and how those patients are processed first and no one told her. I pointed to the paperwork where it said "12 hours", and said it's a timed test. She said that no one told her I needed blood taken by a certain time. You will not believe the fight I had to do to get my paperwork back instead of agreeing to a useless blood draw. Worse than useless blood draw.

I spoke with the patient advocate, she said she would go to the lab work manager to figure out what went wrong. She also agreed that I should have been expedited since it was a timed test, even though a test order from 6 days ago couldn't be listed as stat.

The problem is transportation. My husband can be an ***hole at times, much as I love him, and the biggie at this point in our lives is use of our sole car. Because he is a manager he does need to have ready transportation, but he gets all fussy if I ask to use the car to go out of town too often. So while I got it today, I'm not sure if the fight for tomorrow is worth it. The only other option though is ride my bike to the nearby lab, and I don't want to ever go back there. The tech at that lab deliberately hurt me when putting the needle in.

 

[Margret]

I have a friend who is about to get a hysterectomy. She's been told that the doctors aren't sure what is causing her problems; she doesn't test positive for cancer, but the surgeon said he suspects it's "acancer," apparently all one word. Does anyone know what this means? A Google search produced nothing.

Margret

 

[segelkatt]

Segelkatt:

Thanks for replying. There is no reason to wreck your back when you don't have too. Even my own sister laughs at me when I use my cart. I have to walk with a cane and that only leaves one arm to carry groceries. I have to have a cart to carry mine when I have two weeks worth.

Tell your sister and anyone else who laughs or gives you funny looks that they are behind the times. People here in California have been using carts to haul their groceries into the house for several decades now and you know what they say "as California goes so goes the nation". We are very health conscious here and don't do stuff that will hurt us if we can help it. There are even carts that go up stairs, they have an extra set of wheels.

 

[segelkatt]

I have a friend who is about to get a hysterectomy. She's been told that the doctors aren't sure what is causing her problems; she doesn't test positive for cancer, but the surgeon said he suspects it's "acancer," apparently all one word. Does anyone know what this means? A Google search produced nothing.

Margret

What kind of problems? And how was it "acancer"? Is there a "bcancer" also? This makes no sense. Was it written that way as it could not possibly be spoken that way? The doctor should explain. Or maybe your friend needs a second opinion. This sounds fishy. Since it's only a suspicion of cancer she has plenty of time to check this out, nobody should rush her. If she has insurance that does not let her have a 2nd opinion she can go to Planned Parenthood, they do cancer screenings also.

Depending on her age she should also ask if her ovaries also need to come out as they are the ones that make hormones which keep her from going into menopause before her time with all the nasty side effects that happen when hormones are cut off suddenly. Sure, they can be replaced but who needs that when one's own body is perfectly capable of manufacturing them? Suspecting cancer with no evidence, not even pre-cancerous cells, sounds like somebody is trying to make some money with a surgery.
Alas, doctors have been known to do that as I had written a while back about my young friend whose doctor said she needed a Caesarian because her baby was "running out of room" and 2 weeks later she delivered a 6'8 healthy boy the usual way. "Running out of room" my foot! That doctor had never heard of women having 10+ pound babies or twins or even quadruplets and they don't "run out of room".

 

[arouetta]

I have a friend who is about to get a hysterectomy. She's been told that the doctors aren't sure what is causing her problems; she doesn't test positive for cancer, but the surgeon said he suspects it's "acancer," apparently all one word. Does anyone know what this means? A Google search produced nothing.

Margret

First thing I thought of was benign tumors, adenomas. They can turn cancerous, but more often they don't. Having uterine adenomas can really mess up your insides and cause super crazy bad menstrual cycles. Hysterectomy was pretty much the only option for large benign adenomas until maybe 10 years ago when less drastic options like cauterizing the inside of the uterus became available. However if it is adenomas and the doctor suspects at least one has turned cancerous, hysterectomy followed by biopsy of the suspect tumors is probably the best bet for a long happy life.

 

[muffy]

Tell your sister and anyone else who laughs or gives you funny looks that they are behind the times. People here in California have been using carts to haul their groceries into the house for several decades now and you know what they say "as California goes so goes the nation". We are very health conscious here and don't do stuff that will hurt us if we can help it. There are even carts that go up stairs, they have an extra set of wheels.

I would love to live in California. Yes, I've seen the carts that go up the stairs on commercials. I'll tell my sister that the next time she laughs at me. She has a husband to carry in the heavy stuff.

 

[Alicia88]

My sister had a biopsy of a lump on her thyroid. It came back "highly suspcious" but not definitely cancerous. They gave her the option of having the lump removed, which could result in another surgery later if more lumps formed, or having the whole thyroid removed. She decided to take the safe route and have her thyroid removed. It was good that she did because when they got it out, it was full of cancer.
Maybe the biopsy just isn't coming up right for some reason, like with my sister. A second opinion is never a bad idea.

 

[segelkatt]

I would love to live in California. Yes, I've seen the carts that go up the stairs on commercials. I'll tell my sister that the next time she laughs at me. She has a husband to carry in the heavy stuff.

Nice that she has a pack horse but not all of us have one and what happens when the pack horse gets sick or dies? Bet she'd get a cart herself then.

 

[Alicia88]

I got in trouble the other day for carrying groceries in. Apparently, I was supposed to come inside and tell John I was back so he could go out and carry them in. Dangit, I'm not pregnant, not an invalid! Lol
I'm also not allowed to feed the cats unless the bag is less than half full.

 

[arouetta]

Alicia88 Unless I'm mixing the posters up, hearing you say "I'm not pregnant" is kinda concerning.

 

[Alicia88]

I meant to say, I'm pregnant, not an invalid. Shoot, I can't think straight these days. Lol

 

[Blakeney Green]

Alicia88 Unless I'm mixing the posters up, hearing you say "I'm not pregnant" is kinda concerning.

I think it was just a typo and she didn't intend the first "not."

 

[Margret]

First thing I thought of was benign tumors, adenomas. They can turn cancerous, but more often they don't. Having uterine adenomas can really mess up your insides and cause super crazy bad menstrual cycles. Hysterectomy was pretty much the only option for large benign adenomas until maybe 10 years ago when less drastic options like cauterizing the inside of the uterus became available. However if it is adenomas and the doctor suspects at least one has turned cancerous, hysterectomy followed by biopsy of the suspect tumors is probably the best bet for a long happy life.

Certainly the feeling my friend got was that he meant "pre-cancerous." She's menopausal, and couldn't have children even before, so she won't miss that particular organ, especially since it's been causing pain lately. She's been assuming that they'll take the ovaries as well; I told her to make sure of that (since she wants them gone, and this whole thing has the hallmarks of hormones written all over it), because enough women have complained about the routine removal of ovaries that they no longer do it automatically.

Nice that she has a pack horse but not all of us have one and what happens when the pack horse gets sick or dies? Bet she'd get a cart herself then.

During the lean years, when we were living just off of downtown Denver in a poor neighborhood, and could afford neither a phone nor to keep our car running, I got a cart to go grocery shopping by bus. Wheeled, with a basket and a handle and the basket was more vertical than a traditional shopping cart. This one would hold two paper grocery bags in the bottom and another two stacked on top. I couldn't conceivably have managed without it. However, now that we're in a house with a garage, it would do me no good for groceries at all. The biggest problem is getting them up the steps. If I still had it I'd probably use it for the shopping mall and S.F. conventions, though.

I got in trouble the other day for carrying groceries in. Apparently, I was supposed to come inside and tell John I was back so he could go out and carry them in. Dangit, I'm not pregnant, not an invalid! Lol
I'm also not allowed to feed the cats unless the bag is less than half full.

Alicia88 Unless I'm mixing the posters up, hearing you say "I'm not pregnant" is kinda concerning.

Alicia88 , you're having trouble doing anything that involves bending over, and I bet you're having backaches. It's easiest to carry heavy things close to your body, even to brace them on your belly; that's just basic mechanics, and right now it's impossible for you to do it that way. I agree that pregnancy is not an illness, but as long as John wants to pamper you, you may want to consider allowing him to do so.

Margret

 

[Margret]

What kind of problems? And how was it "acancer"? Is there a "bcancer" also? This makes no sense. Was it written that way as it could not possibly be spoken that way? The doctor should explain. Or maybe your friend needs a second opinion. This sounds fishy. Since it's only a suspicion of cancer she has plenty of time to check this out, nobody should rush her. If she has insurance that does not let her have a 2nd opinion she can go to Planned Parenthood, they do cancer screenings also.

Depending on her age she should also ask if her ovaries also need to come out as they are the ones that make hormones which keep her from going into menopause before her time with all the nasty side effects that happen when hormones are cut off suddenly. Sure, they can be replaced but who needs that when one's own body is perfectly capable of manufacturing them? Suspecting cancer with no evidence, not even pre-cancerous cells, sounds like somebody is trying to make some money with a surgery.
Alas, doctors have been known to do that as I had written a while back about my young friend whose doctor said she needed a Caesarian because her baby was "running out of room" and 2 weeks later she delivered a 6'8 healthy boy the usual way. "Running out of room" my foot! That doctor had never heard of women having 10+ pound babies or twins or even quadruplets and they don't "run out of room".

My friend is on Medicare; they do cover it. She's had lots of bad doctors in the past, and recognizes them when she encounters them; she likes her current doctors and trusts them and I'm not about to argue with her about that.

Basically, despite being older than me she's begun having periods again, very painful periods. The choice is between a D&C and a hysterectomy, and her choice is to simply rip everything out, since right now their only function appears to be to cause her pain. So she's already decided on surgery; that is not an issue, timing is the only remaining issue. She doesn't want to do it in December, which leaves November and January, and her doctors are sufficiently concerned that they're willing to give her precedence for a November date.

The thing is, ovarian cancer is one of the really nasty ones; very hard to catch early, a terribly painful death, and, as we've already discussed in this forum, the blood test for it isn't conclusive. This means that, since it isn't showing up on ultrasound, there's a reasonably good chance that she's lucked out, that she has ovarian cancer but it's shown up early enough to be curable by surgery. Under those circumstances I think she's made the right decision.

It appears that this particular surgeon has either coined a new word himself, or a change in terminology is in progress right now. (The medical community seems to do this every so often, as the general public begins to understand medical terminology, and we can't have that!) Since Google doesn't have it yet it seemed like a good idea to ask whether anyone here recognized it. My guess is that "acancer" is a synonym for "pre-cancer," or possibly, as suggested by arouetta , it means a pre-cancerous adenoma.

Margret

 

[Alicia88]

Yes, I know I should let him pamper me. I've just never liked not being able to do things for myself. But I suppose I should suck it up. And, yes, I'm having a lot of back pain. Out doesn't help that I broke my back when I was 16 and it's been a problem ever since. Pregnancy has multiplied that issue. I had a compression fracture of the T6 vertebrae and was told that I got very lucky as I should have died or at least been paralyzed. So, I can't complain too much. I do, anyway.
Admittedly, my cats are entitled little brats but Aislyn is being a huge drama queen. They have instituted a "movement tax." If you walk by one of them, you must give pets. Otherwise, they reach out and tap toy with a claw to remind you. So now Aislyn makes a huge production of tiptoeing around them whining that they're going to scratch her. They don't actually scratch, it's just a claw tap. It doesn't hurt or leave a mark. They just want their due. Lol. I'm gonna go ahead and call it sibling rivalry.

 

[tallyollyopia]

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.

AWM had a fight with DD's family shortly after I was born. At the time (unbeknownst to me until I mentioned Alicia88 's problems with her LS) AWM had this large (about twelve pound) black cat named Sasha, and Sasha was allowed to sleep with me in the crib. DD's family (parents, brothers, and sibs-in-law) told AWM that the cat would "steal my breath" and AWM responded by laughing her little rear off. So, I didn't really meet that side of the family until after AWM and DD got divorced. (Side note: Sasha cat had to get rehomed--we lived in Germany at the time, and AWM loved the cat too much to subject her to the horrors--and they were horrors as recently as the early 2000's--of pet quarantine when we moved back Stateside. I'd like to point out that neither of my sibs grew up with a cat--or any pet at all since for most of their early childhood we lived in a place with a no pets lease--and I'm the only one that didn't have breathing problems.)

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

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.

YOU NEED A DOCTOR! Blue is a sign that the flesh is getting almost no oxygen and that is not good!

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.

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.

There are a lot of things (nail polish, dirt in the wrong place, etc) that can screw up the reading in both directions. If you have alcohol pads, clean your finger and nail first and then take the pulse ox test. Oh, and you may find this helpful:

Iron-Rich Food | List of Meats, Vegetables & Meals | American Red Cross

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.

Personally (and this has a tendency to unnerve people) I have five levels of pain: Negligible, Annoying, Work Through, Medicate, and Doctor Now.

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.

(Not that her mother moved away, but that you get to see her!)

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.

There are places that just don't have a Planned Parenthood or Planned Parenthood equivalent available. (For instance, they've been banned from my entire state.) I don't know if this is true across the board, but I've noticed a distinct rise in doctors who seem to be against any kind of contraceptive--when AWM went to the ER there was even one who stopped into the room to give me (I wasn't even the patient!) a lecture on how latex is a carcinogen and I shouldn't be allowing my boyfriend to use them! (He was not the doctor who saw AWM--I made sure of it. And I lodged a formal complaint about him with the nurse's station.) Point: it might just be the hoops the doctor is required to go through to be allowed to prescribe the birth control.

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.

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.

Poor baby!

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.

When RB was little, and had just been diagnosed with Asperger's (before it was changed to a spectrum), the psychiatrist he was seeing put him on a combination of anti-anxiety, antidepressant, and two or three others that I can't remember just now. AWM told him to pick one medicine, he accused her of trying to kill her son by medical neglect, and RB got a new shrink.

 

[tallyollyopia]

It is an uneasy sort of night
I see stars, but oh!
This night feels stormy.
A vicious little wind
Gusts hard,
muttering imprecations
as it kicks the fallen leaves
across the yard and down the drive.
The leave rise up in aggitation,
whirling in a frenzied dance,
then spin away, running before that wind.
No living thing is out tonight
No car upon the road
Not one cat prowls
There is only me, and
the ghosts of yesterdays,
and the wind...
the wind...
the wind...
It is an uneasy sort of night

Uneasy indeed. You need a kitty cuddle!

She wouldn't believe you if you did tell her but EVERYONE knows that Hekitty is a queen!

I have to shopping tomorrow too so I'll be dealing with the crowds in thee grocery store too. I still have no idea what we are having and DD is zero help. I was thinking about making roast beef with mashed potatoes and salad. She likes that. The kids LOVE roast beef.

I hope they help either cook or clean!

I go grocery shopping every two weeks. I can't imagine doing it once a month. Do you have a car? I have a lawn cart thing I use to bring my groceries from my car into my house. Everyone laughs at me but I need it for the heavy stuff.

Own it! Back when I started high school I had a rolling bag for my books (I hated it, but that's not the point) and I had several classmates try to mock me and make fun of me for it, so I got one of those air horns and would blast it down the hall as I changed classes. The laughter stopped. (And the bag was made really poorly--it only lasted a couple of months.)

Around here most people have a cart to haul groceries, laundry, cat litter bags, dog food bags, anything heavy. I also use it to haul my recyclables to the blue bin in the garage where the dumpster is.They look similar to a store's grocery cart but without a child seat. They fold up flat. I live in a 3 story building with an underground garage and I hate shopping. So I buy like $200.00 worth of groceries at a time. Although there is an elevator and I live on the second floor I certainly would not want to go up and down 10 times to haul all those groceries in my arms. So the cart it is. Nobody would laugh here. I also see in other places where people don't have cars that people take their carts to the grocery store when they go shopping. This is like "doggy bags" people used to ask for in restaurants pretending that they were taking their leftovers to their dog. Now it is expected that one asks for a box and it is NOT for the dog. Carts are the same, no stigma on that, why wreck your back when you can wheel your stuff?

Sometimes its very difficult when a child has 2 different sets of rules. Aislyn just threw a big fit because we told her she needed to take a nap. "My mom doesn't make me take a nap!" Well, you're not with your mom and you didn't take a nap yesterday and you were very cranky yesterday evening because you were tired. So, you're taking a nap.
She'll be 5 next month. She's still young enough for naps and if she's going to get super whiny by 7 if she doesn't have one, then I think she still needs one.

The problem is that it's not just two sets of rules: it's at least three. Think about it--she's old enough to be in school, which is very different from her home with Mom. She may have to go to day care after school (some children do), which is an entirely different set of rules from that. If she gets babysat at all, the babysitter will have different rules than her Mom as well, and you mentioned they recently moved so it's all different and new to her, and now she's moved again (it feels like moving that young) with yet another set of rules. (I'm not saying to not stick with your given rules--she'll walk all over you if you don't.) Point is--it's understandable for her to be a little bit cranky.

Rant.....

So part of it is my own darn fault. My bike hasn't been ridden in 2 weeks and I waited until this morning to get it back ready for the road. I left just a couple of minutes late...but I haven't been on a bike in 2 weeks. My speed was slower than normal and I felt terrible while riding. I got to my husband's place of work so I could use the car, I changed in their bathroom, and I spent several minutes in there feeling like I was going to vomit and not daring to leave the toilet just in case.

So I got to the hospital where I needed an EKG and a timed blood test. EKGs are walk-in, so it's not like I'm late for an appointment, but the blood test is timed and I was walking in the door right when they should have been taking my blood. I told the receptionist that I screwed up, left late, since it's a timed blood test I asked if she could do a rush job. And she did. I said the same thing to the woman registering, and I have never seen anyone type that fast, she did do a rush job. I got to the desk for blood work, told that receptionist the same thing. She said sure and pointed me to the waiting area.

20 minutes later I'm still waiting. 20 minutes for a timed blood test that I said flat out needed to be done ASAP. I am right at the point where the data collected would be worse than useless. Actually harmful if the doctor goes by the data. I go back to the receptionist and I tell her that I need my paperwork back as my blood could no longer be taken. She rushed off, I was assuming to get my paperwork, and then she popped out the side door and told me I was next in line and it would only be a minute. I said "It can only be a minute."

5 minutes later I'm still waiting. So I go back to the desk and say I need my paperwork back. The receptionist rushes off again, I thought getting my paperwork, and this time the lab tech pops out the side door and is urging me to have the blood taken right then. Nope. Worse than useless, downright harmful. She pushes some more. Nope, just give me my **** paperwork. She says no one told her it was something called stat. I pointed right to the receptionist and said I told her it was a timed blood test. The lab tech kept going on about stat and how those patients are processed first and no one told her. I pointed to the paperwork where it said "12 hours", and said it's a timed test. She said that no one told her I needed blood taken by a certain time. You will not believe the fight I had to do to get my paperwork back instead of agreeing to a useless blood draw. Worse than useless blood draw.

I spoke with the patient advocate, she said she would go to the lab work manager to figure out what went wrong. She also agreed that I should have been expedited since it was a timed test, even though a test order from 6 days ago couldn't be listed as stat.

The problem is transportation. My husband can be an ***hole at times, much as I love him, and the biggie at this point in our lives is use of our sole car. Because he is a manager he does need to have ready transportation, but he gets all fussy if I ask to use the car to go out of town too often. So while I got it today, I'm not sure if the fight for tomorrow is worth it. The only other option though is ride my bike to the nearby lab, and I don't want to ever go back there. The tech at that lab deliberately hurt me when putting the needle in.

I don't normally advocate this (the situation with AWM being the reason why), but if you have a smartphone you might consider getting a ride share app like Uber or something, just for emergencies like this.

I have a friend who is about to get a hysterectomy. She's been told that the doctors aren't sure what is causing her problems; she doesn't test positive for cancer, but the surgeon said he suspects it's "acancer," apparently all one word. Does anyone know what this means? A Google search produced nothing.

Margret

Well, it's not another term for fibroids, which is what I first thought. (I know that's not very helpful.)

What kind of problems? And how was it "acancer"? Is there a "bcancer" also? This makes no sense. Was it written that way as it could not possibly be spoken that way? The doctor should explain. Or maybe your friend needs a second opinion. This sounds fishy. Since it's only a suspicion of cancer she has plenty of time to check this out, nobody should rush her. If she has insurance that does not let her have a 2nd opinion she can go to Planned Parenthood, they do cancer screenings also.

Depending on her age she should also ask if her ovaries also need to come out as they are the ones that make hormones which keep her from going into menopause before her time with all the nasty side effects that happen when hormones are cut off suddenly. Sure, they can be replaced but who needs that when one's own body is perfectly capable of manufacturing them? Suspecting cancer with no evidence, not even pre-cancerous cells, sounds like somebody is trying to make some money with a surgery.
Alas, doctors have been known to do that as I had written a while back about my young friend whose doctor said she needed a Caesarian because her baby was "running out of room" and 2 weeks later she delivered a 6'8 healthy boy the usual way. "Running out of room" my foot! That doctor had never heard of women having 10+ pound babies or twins or even quadruplets and they don't "run out of room".

It might not have been running out of room, it might have been an elasticity issue; one of my aunts had that and while the baby was naturally delivered (at just shy of seven pounds) it almost killed her because she couldn't stretch with the contractions properly. The doctors didn't even think that was possible--and again, she almost died. (I have a lot of family that almost died in childbirth.)

My friend is on Medicare; they do cover it. She's had lots of bad doctors in the past, and recognizes them when she encounters them; she likes her current doctors and trusts them and I'm not about to argue with her about that.

Basically, despite being older than me she's begun having periods again, very painful periods. The choice is between a D&C and a hysterectomy, and her choice is to simply rip everything out, since right now their only function appears to be to cause her pain. So she's already decided on surgery; that is not an issue, timing is the only remaining issue. She doesn't want to do it in December, which leaves November and January, and her doctors are sufficiently concerned that they're willing to give her precedence for a November date.

The thing is, ovarian cancer is one of the really nasty ones; very hard to catch early, a terribly painful death, and, as we've already discussed in this forum, the blood test for it isn't conclusive. This means that, since it isn't showing up on ultrasound, there's a reasonably good chance that she's lucked out, that she has ovarian cancer but it's shown up early enough to be curable by surgery. Under those circumstances I think she's made the right decision.

It appears that this particular surgeon has either coined a new word himself, or a change in terminology is in progress right now. (The medical community seems to do this every so often, as the general public begins to understand medical terminology, and we can't have that!) Since Google doesn't have it yet it seemed like a good idea to ask whether anyone here recognized it. My guess is that "acancer" is a synonym for "pre-cancer," or possibly, as suggested by arouetta , it means a pre-cancerous adenoma.

Margret

Of course the general public can't understand what the doctors are saying--how would we know we were being ripped off?

Yes, I know I should let him pamper me. I've just never liked not being able to do things for myself. But I suppose I should suck it up. And, yes, I'm having a lot of back pain. Out doesn't help that I broke my back when I was 16 and it's been a problem ever since. Pregnancy has multiplied that issue. I had a compression fracture of the T6 vertebrae and was told that I got very lucky as I should have died or at least been paralyzed. So, I can't complain too much. I do, anyway.
Admittedly, my cats are entitled little brats but Aislyn is being a huge drama queen. They have instituted a "movement tax." If you walk by one of them, you must give pets. Otherwise, they reach out and tap toy with a claw to remind you. So now Aislyn makes a huge production of tiptoeing around them whining that they're going to scratch her. They don't actually scratch, it's just a claw tap. It doesn't hurt or leave a mark. They just want their due. Lol. I'm gonna go ahead and call it sibling rivalry.

 

[artiemom]

Margret From my medical vocabulary, I would take "a-cancer" to be a short form of
a-cancerous... meaning, a non-cancer... a benign growth. Women get fibroadenomas of the uterus, called fibroids. That is a fact of life, all women have them.

Or perhaps, the doctor was just saying, "this is a cancer"...

The fact that your friend is having post-menopausal bleeding is very concerning.. It is caused from hyperplasia of the uterine lining, and usually cancerous.
Any mass on the ovary, at this stage of life, has to be removed, and biopsied.