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Medical stuff and anger management
Apr. 20th, 2006 11:37 amAnyone who knows me knows I tend not to lash out directly at people. I learned from watching my parents fight that the best plan is to calm down before discussing whatever it is. Unfortunately, when things really really upset me, sometimes my body reacts in painful ways.
I'm working through the anger, remembering how sweet my mom is when she's sober. It's the alcohol that does this to her. I am powerless as far as she's concerned. All I can do is to calmly ask her during a sober moment, to let me know ahead of time when she has included uncooked alcohol in any dish. Let me make my own decision about what goes into my body. Part of me wants to inform her that she needs to make sure she has something set up for her care should she need full time care someday. If she's drinking and smoking, neither my sister nor I will take care of her. We already made that decision decades ago, but now isn't the time with this violation of my trust so recent.
I'd had a bad headache for the last two weeks. I was hoping my new glasses would fix it but they didn't. I thought it might me my chair/workstation setup at work and found a better chair. It helped reduce the intensity but the headache stayed. Monday I was angry and headachy and decided it was time to seek medical advice. They had an appointment for me late Tuesday morning that would work with my early Tuesday morning dentist appointment.
Tuesday I woke up with a charleyhorse on the left side of my neck. I think it's all that anger I was carrying around.
My dentist was very gentle and didn't aggravate it. He did say the loose tooth needs to come out on its own before he fixes it because he's afraid of damaging the root by getting it out now. So I get to gross Eric out for a while longer by wiggling it at him. That's fun. ;)
I had about an hour to kill between appointments so I indulged my car with a professional oil change. It took longer than I planned and I got to my doctor's office a few minutes late. I would have been on time, but they have construction going on and they had the driveway to the parking structure stopped for about five minutes.
My doctor put me on Flexerall for the next month followed by a half dose for the following two weeks. She also referred me to a physiologist for physical therapy. During the exam it turned out I was running a low grade fever. Maybe this was part of the reason I felt like crap?
Since my doctor was very near Eric's office and it was nearly noon, I called to see if I could join him for lunch. He did one better and said he'd take me to our favorite Thai food restaurant. During lunch I didn't feel any better and decided to go home instead of to work. I had a chiropractic appointment later in the afternoon and no school that night. Taking it easy was the plan. I called my chiropractor and left a message asking for an earlier spot if she had one. Then I decided on the way home to take care of the paperwork from the Educational Disability Department at my school. I kept missing them after work. After that I went straight home to rest.
Of course, trying to rest was impossible. First the EDD office called to tell me I'd missed signing a page and could I come back in to do that. I had an appointment to talk to the counselor there the next morning and promised to sign it then. I no sooner lay down than my chiropractor called. Getting up hurts like hell and I grumbled all the way to the phone. I had asked her to call my cell which was on the bed with me. She thought she had the number and erased the message before she discovered she didn't.
Once we figured out I'd show up 30 minutes early to have hot packs on my sore muscles someone was knocking at the door. PG&E needed access to the utility pole in our back yard. They were pounding something into the wooden pole and then started up noisy machinery. I wondered if they were cutting our holly tree, but they weren't. I did get a number to call for someone trained to cut trees that touch high voltage wires. It got away from us, you see.
My neck was still stuck after the chiropractic session. I have orders to apply cold and hot packs. That helped release the muscle, but the bones are still stuck.
I got an appointment to see the Physiologist this morning. It's unfortunate that I'm still stuck in the middle of my neck when it's the upper vertebre and headaches that made me go this route in the first place. X-rays show narrowed disc space on either side of C5, the one that had an old whiplash injury from my teens. I also have bone spurs causing muscle spasms. He didn't even focus on the upper two vertebre at all. Now I'm to call an MRI center in preparation for cortisone injections. There will also be physical therapy. Physical Therapy I expected, the rest has me worried.
I don't want cortisone injections. This is scary. I want my neck to be back to usual before the MRI so what gets treated is not a temporary complaint, but the chronic one.
I'm working through the anger, remembering how sweet my mom is when she's sober. It's the alcohol that does this to her. I am powerless as far as she's concerned. All I can do is to calmly ask her during a sober moment, to let me know ahead of time when she has included uncooked alcohol in any dish. Let me make my own decision about what goes into my body. Part of me wants to inform her that she needs to make sure she has something set up for her care should she need full time care someday. If she's drinking and smoking, neither my sister nor I will take care of her. We already made that decision decades ago, but now isn't the time with this violation of my trust so recent.
I'd had a bad headache for the last two weeks. I was hoping my new glasses would fix it but they didn't. I thought it might me my chair/workstation setup at work and found a better chair. It helped reduce the intensity but the headache stayed. Monday I was angry and headachy and decided it was time to seek medical advice. They had an appointment for me late Tuesday morning that would work with my early Tuesday morning dentist appointment.
Tuesday I woke up with a charleyhorse on the left side of my neck. I think it's all that anger I was carrying around.
My dentist was very gentle and didn't aggravate it. He did say the loose tooth needs to come out on its own before he fixes it because he's afraid of damaging the root by getting it out now. So I get to gross Eric out for a while longer by wiggling it at him. That's fun. ;)
I had about an hour to kill between appointments so I indulged my car with a professional oil change. It took longer than I planned and I got to my doctor's office a few minutes late. I would have been on time, but they have construction going on and they had the driveway to the parking structure stopped for about five minutes.
My doctor put me on Flexerall for the next month followed by a half dose for the following two weeks. She also referred me to a physiologist for physical therapy. During the exam it turned out I was running a low grade fever. Maybe this was part of the reason I felt like crap?
Since my doctor was very near Eric's office and it was nearly noon, I called to see if I could join him for lunch. He did one better and said he'd take me to our favorite Thai food restaurant. During lunch I didn't feel any better and decided to go home instead of to work. I had a chiropractic appointment later in the afternoon and no school that night. Taking it easy was the plan. I called my chiropractor and left a message asking for an earlier spot if she had one. Then I decided on the way home to take care of the paperwork from the Educational Disability Department at my school. I kept missing them after work. After that I went straight home to rest.
Of course, trying to rest was impossible. First the EDD office called to tell me I'd missed signing a page and could I come back in to do that. I had an appointment to talk to the counselor there the next morning and promised to sign it then. I no sooner lay down than my chiropractor called. Getting up hurts like hell and I grumbled all the way to the phone. I had asked her to call my cell which was on the bed with me. She thought she had the number and erased the message before she discovered she didn't.
Once we figured out I'd show up 30 minutes early to have hot packs on my sore muscles someone was knocking at the door. PG&E needed access to the utility pole in our back yard. They were pounding something into the wooden pole and then started up noisy machinery. I wondered if they were cutting our holly tree, but they weren't. I did get a number to call for someone trained to cut trees that touch high voltage wires. It got away from us, you see.
My neck was still stuck after the chiropractic session. I have orders to apply cold and hot packs. That helped release the muscle, but the bones are still stuck.
I got an appointment to see the Physiologist this morning. It's unfortunate that I'm still stuck in the middle of my neck when it's the upper vertebre and headaches that made me go this route in the first place. X-rays show narrowed disc space on either side of C5, the one that had an old whiplash injury from my teens. I also have bone spurs causing muscle spasms. He didn't even focus on the upper two vertebre at all. Now I'm to call an MRI center in preparation for cortisone injections. There will also be physical therapy. Physical Therapy I expected, the rest has me worried.
I don't want cortisone injections. This is scary. I want my neck to be back to usual before the MRI so what gets treated is not a temporary complaint, but the chronic one.
