Cookie wisdom

• A sense of humor is one of your greatest assets.


• A part of us remains wherever we have been.

Where to start? (medical version)

Life has been a bit hectic as of late and since I haven't been keeping up with LJ, things are a bit of a blur. In particular order, here are some health-related updates:

• Thanks to some blood-work done by my gastroenterologist that threw up a red flag, I have been recently diagnosed as diabetic. My A1C is 10.1 - far past the 6.5 (or below) for a normal person. While I am not on meds yet, I no doubt will be soon.


• My back was throwing fits a few months ago and since then I've gone through a set of back x-rays and an MRI, injections to my SI joints, and am currently undergoing spinal decompression.


• My knees have been cranky on and off for a while now. X-rays show some arthritis and the left knee got a cortisone shot a few weeks ago. After seeing Dr. Truong today, her recommendation is to inject them with Supartz (a lubricant). Now to get insurance to pay for that.


• On the evening of October 12th I ended up in Anne Arundel Medical Center due to food poisoning. The one and only time this entire season that I ate faire food (a pork chop) it made me ill. Getting sick in a privie is decidedly not fun. daecabhir, dreamtigress, August, and Mr. Tessem all took such good care of me until we left for AAMC. Going to the ER in garb made us the freak show for the night. daecabhir's Catskill mocs really got a lot of attention and we answered a lot questions about faire. One way to squick all of the ER nurses is to let them you know that you had to get sick in a privie. After spending the night in AAMC, I was released after I was able to keep a light lunch down. Thanks to renniecub and insegnante for letting a very tired Panda crash for another night.


• Back in September, I underwent an endoscopy which revealed mild gastritis as well as some damage from reflux. Five biopsies were taken as well. After the somewhat nerve-wracking wait, we learned that all biopsies came back clear.


• Due to my on-going tummy issues, the gastro doc wanted me to do a gastric emptying study. This fun little test requires you to consume radioactive scrambled eggs and have your abdomen scanned several times to see what happens. When I asked about glowing in the dark afterwards, I was told that no, I wouldn't, but that I would get a super power. (I am still waiting!) On the morning of the test, I learned that I would have to undergo a pregnancy test - even though I am 49, have been sterilized twice, have fibroids, and am peri-menopausal. To add insult to injury, this test must be done by blood and takes an hour to perform. If I refused, the hospital would not perform the need GES test.

There's probably a lot of things that I have missed, but it's getting close to bedtime.