The Warranty Expires at 50

When I spoke to my cousin while he was recuperating from surgery in a hospital bed he said, "It's like once we turned 50 the warranty expired and everything broke." I couldn't agree more. The poor thing was groggy from undergoing surgery to repair his arm which he screwed up pretty bad after slipping in the shower and crashing through the glass doors. His house was built the same year as mine, 1957 and he had his original doors. We had them for a couple of years until we had our own "shower door incident." As my daughter was taking a shower one of them fell on her (don't even ask how that happened because we still haven't been able to figure it out.) She was stuck against the wall and screamed for us. When my husband rescued her he then ripped the doors and metal track off with his bare hands. "I always knew these doors would be a problem!" Luckily the glass never shattered on her and she escaped unharmed.

Safety glass was a thing of science fiction back in the 50's so when my cousin went crashing through his doors shards of glass sliced so deeply into his arm that he had to push his own bicep in. Standing over 6'7" he's not a small guy so it didn't surprise me that over a dozen EMT techs, police and firemen had to dislodge him from the metal frame that was keeping him prisoner. Only by the grace of God and his quick thinking to use a towel to make a torniquet to stop the massive bleeding is he still around today. One EMT told him, "With all the blood you lost, if you were a smaller guy you'd be dead right now." He has another surgery scheduled in a couple of days to have some nerves removed from his leg and placed in his arm so he could get feeling back in some of his fingers. "Did you ever think we'd be the ones saying, 'I've fallen and I can't get up?'" he joked. No, I never did.

The way I've been feeling lately I keep having visions of driving around in one of those motorized Hover-round vehicles you see on the commercial. Only difference is in my vision I gun the damn thing right over the edge of the Grand Canyon. I'm not enjoying getting "old." My mind is still sharp, I think, but my body won't do what my mind wants it to do. There are some days when my hands cannot hold three pound weights. I'm just waiting for the day my fingers slip open and have the weight crash onto the toes that hurt when stepping on the ground.

I've been working on a cross-stitch for my grandmother. The package says it's a "weekend project." Between my eyes blurring and my fingers stiffening it's already taken three weeks and I'm only half done. At the rate I'm going my grandmother will be 101 before I finish it. Yes, she's going to be 100, and still has all her faculties. Heck, she lived on her own until 95 and was still cooking Sunday suppers to whoever would go to her house. I got some of her genes, but I doubt I got the longevity one.

Typing and even texting is more of a chore now. While texting just a couple of letters in response to my daughter, "k, cya," my thumb hurts. As I massaged it I noticed the RA damage is starting to show. Damn, this is a quick-moving disease. I thought the methotrexate was supposed to stop the joint damage. Besides making me feel like I was hit by a truck two days out of the week, filling my mouth with a metal taste, possibly destroying my liver and causing me to stop self-medicating myself via alcohol, I'm beginning to doubt the chemo pills are doing any good like I thought they were. I fear my body has built up a resistance to it already. I've doubled up once already and dread my doctor will double it up again after he sees my lack of progress at my next visit.

I sometimes think my biggest mistake was "cleaning up" years ago. Thanks kids! All I know is that when I was staying out til all hours and partying, other than a brief hang-over, I felt fine. I ate what I wanted, when I wanted and still remained thin, had luxurious curly hair, was never tired, and felt healthy as a gazelle running from a lion. And I never ever went to doctors. Those days are long gone. Now I feel like the the gazelle that has become feeble and is left behind by the pack, just waiting to be devoured.

I wish someone had offered me the extended body warranty...for a change I would have taken it.

Vitamin D Follow-Up

This is a follow-up post to the one I wrote recently questioning the whole Vitamin D deficiency fad. In my previous post I questioned if the recent spate of D deficiency was a scam perpetuated by Vitamin D lobbyists. After receiving a bill from my husband's doctor's lab and the Vitamin D testing lab I am now questioning if the lab lobbyists have a test tube (or sponsorship) in it as well.

To take a vial of blood out of my husband, without even seeing the doctor, the lab charged $88.00. The lab who performed the sole test of determining how deficient my husband was charged an additional $200.00. That's $288.00! Since he was prescribed the mega dose of D he has to be retested every 2-3 months. I haven't received my lab bills yet (the insurance company sent me a letter saying they need more information because Lord knows I want to scam them into taking unnecessary blood tests) and could only imagine how high they're going to be since I also had cholesterol testing, a complete blood count and a liver panel done besides the D test.

Meanwhile, as I previously posted, since I too was D deficient even though I am a sun Goddess in the summer, my doctor wanted me to take 4,000 units per day. I bought the over-the-counter D, with the largest dosage I could find, 2,000 units, and began taking two pills daily. So how did that work out? It took me four days to realize the intense headaches I was experiencing began the day I began the D vitamins. So I dropped the dosage to half, one 2,000 pill a day. The headaches immediately ceased. I called the nurse at my doctor's office and left a message telling her to let him know I've halved his recommendations. Since I haven't heard anything back I'm assuming it's okay (that is if she even told him.)

Since I began taking vitamin D I was surprised to find out in my research that it has been used successfully to treat auto-immune diseases like RA. Now I don't know if it's because I added the Vitamin D to my daily pill cocktail mixture, or because my MTX dosage was increased, but whatever the reason I am thrilled to report that my rheumatoid arthritis pains have diminished greatly. Other than feeling wiped out two days a week from the MTX pills, it's a wonderful feeling. I'm still a little stiff and achy in the morning, but being a human barometer has ceased. I don't know when it's going to rain or snow and I have been able to double my aerobic, walking and weight lifting exercises, as long as it's not Monday or Tuesday.

I have been sleeping much better than I ever have in my life, except of course when the spirits are compelled to wake me, but that's my mind, not body. I've even continued to lose weight, although at a slower pace. Even my wedding band has begun slipping around my once sausage-like finger. And it's just in time to put some weight back on during this delicious holiday season. I simply must have my canollis, stroufflers and Venetians! Life is too short to not enjoy it to the fullest, and after the New Year I'll go back on the anti-sugar diet wagon.

Got Sugar?

Got sugar? No, not in your cupboard but in your blood! Suspect you may be a diabetic, or pre-diabetic but don't want to go to the doctor, spend mega bucks on a test and then flag your insurance company that you've got a new medical condition that they can use to increase your rates? Then get thee to a Walgreen's pronto!

Today and tomorrow from 10:00am to 6:00pm local Walgreens are offering free diabetic testing. And yup, there isn't any catch. They won't share the info with anyone but you. They're offering two tests...A Blood Glucose test which takes one prick of the finger and ten seconds to reveal the results. And a new test I just read about called the Hemoglobin A1C test which takes one prick of your finger, a little more squeezing to fill a larger vial, and then five minutes to reveal the results. The A1C test measures your average blood glucose over the previous 2 to 3 months.

Since I come from a long line of diabetics -- all my grandparents, and both of my parents -- and have some symptoms -- I'm very cognizant of the possibility of become diabetic. After I was diagnosed with RA and high cholesterol and high tri-glycerides I put myself on the Sugar Busters diet. The first two weeks I followed it to a tee but then got bored and made my own diet up. I try to not eat anything that has sugar or high fructose corn syrup, although sometimes that's just impossible. Even the crappiest cardboard-tasting "healthy" cereal has some sugar in it. So when there is I limit my intake to under 3 - 5 grams of sugar. Once in a while I will treat myself to a square of 85% dark chocolate. Two months since I've started I have lost 15 pounds, but it's not nearly my goal. Exercise is a vital component of keeping diabetes in check and I do strive to walk as much as possible. Weight lifting and aerobics have become more of a challenge since the RA and sometimes even walking hurts. To take care of that I bought walking sticks which helps my knees.

Even though I have lab work scheduled for next week, it's not to measure my sugar, only for liver (thank you Methrotrexate) and a CBC (thank you RA) and for cholesterol (thank you fatty foods) I figured I could save some bucks and go to Walgreen's to get tested. I did have breakfast so it wasn't a fasting test. The normal range for the Blood Glucose non fast should be less than 140 mg/dl. My level was 92 mg/dl. It took a struggle to get enough blood out of my finger (being anemic and all) to complete the A1C test but the tech finally got it. A normal level is under 7%. I registered 5.2%. Needless to say I am thrilled with these numbers. Looks like my lifestyle changes are working.

Diabetes is a very dangerous disease...what you don't know can kill you. A little sugar in your cupboard or coffee is okay,



a lot of sugar in your blood is dangerous, and could result in this...