Category: Personal Observations

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Yes, I am an Netflix junkie. For someone who works as many hours a week as I do, I am finding sleep is getting in the way of my Netflix viewing.  In fact, work is getting in the way, too.

So my sister and my niece have been bugging me to watch Supernatural for quite a while. I did watch parts of the first episode about five times, but never thought it worthy of my precious viewing time.  That is until I came up with a plan:

I agree to watch one episode of Supernatural and they have to watch one episode of Parenthood. We discuss, and we move on to the next episode.  They agreed.

Let’s just be clear, neither of them has kept up with the bargain. In fact, I have inside information that they are currently watching General Hospital.

Nevertheless, I am plugging away with my part of the deal, good guy that I am. Yet, even this early in Season One, I have issues.

  1. So far, it seems like every episode starts with something really scary.  Since I was a kid I have had issues with scary.  I used to make my friends lock the doors and turn out the lights if we watched something scary so that shadows didn’t freak me out. I used to sleep over at my friend Phyllis’s house after watching Twilight Zone because I didn’t want to drive home alone.  When I was young I used to get a running start and leap onto my bed at night because I was afraid to get my feet too close to the edge of the bed (you know, someone under there could grab me).  You get the idea.  In each episode of Supernatural I have seen I have had to close my eyes and just “listen” at least once.  My sister and my niece did not warn me about this.
  2. Since I never finished Episode One, Season One, there are things I don’t know and my sister will only tell me, “keep watching and you will figure it out.”  This, too, is unacceptable and I think I deserve better than that.
  3. Season One, Episode 12, “Faith.” A Preacher claims to be a healer.  There is a lovely young lady with a brain tumor who needs to be healed but Sam and Dean naturally have to find out the truth behind the healings. They learn that black magic is behind the healings (the Reaper comes for a person of “ill-repute” in exchange for the life of the “good guy” who gets to be healed).  So the brothers stop the process because they say no one can “play” God, and the brain tumor lady doesn’t get saved.  Now isn’t that a bit problematic?  Are they not playing God by deciding the brain tumor girl can’t get healed?

Finally, after complaining about the show for so long, I find it hard to believe that it is now 1:00 in the morning, I need to get up for work at 5:30, and I am currently watching Season One, Episode 13.  I will probably fall asleep before the end and have to watch it again, but somehow that doesn’t seem so bad.

I am looking forward to discussing Parenthood with my sister and my niece. After that, they can watch Charmed so that we can all cry about the final episode together. That, my friends, was viewing perfection.

Drop me a line and let me know what you are currently binge watching. It’s kind of fun, isn’t it?

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Truth is funnier than fiction.

Daniel Ginsberg, MD, FACP's avatarWorld's Best Site - Thoughts on Medicine and Other Topics

Have you received a survey after you visit your doctor? You may be surprised to learn that how you rate them may affect their pay, their mental health, and even possibly your health.

Surveys, as administered by Press Ganey, and the CG-CAHPS,  are questions regarding various aspects of the care patient’s receive. Although that may seem reasonable, besides potentially incentivizing bad medicine, it’s exaggerated because they only count “top box” scores. That means on a scale of 1 to 5, only the 5 scores count, so that getting a 4 is no different than getting a 1, and if the score is 0 to 10, then only a 9 or 10 count. The scores only count if you answer “Always,” except for the question, “Using any number from 0 to 10, where 0 is the worst provider possible and 10 is the best provider possible, what…

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I am overweight. There are a variety of reasons for this, among them depression, spinal stenosis, poly-articular arthritis, and an obsession with food as the antidote to all that ails.  It is, as many know, a vicious cycle. Eat, gain weight, get more depressed, eat again.  At some point one becomes numb and develops the ability to look in the mirror and not see, talk to people but not look them in the eye, and become a shell of former self.  That was me.

When my spinal stenosis became so bad that I could not walk more than a few steps, my weight sky rocketed.  Post surgery, I felt well for a short time, started walking and began  one of my many diets – and failed. Within a month, my back started hurting and one of my legs started to become numb and itchy and I was driving through McDonalds every morning to buy a small mocha frappe, no whip (I had the lingo down, naturally), about a million calories a serving.

When the numbness started to become distracting and uncomfortable, I went to see the neurologist, sure he was going to tell me that it was time to go back to the surgeon.  Imagine my surprise when I learned that I had Meralgia paresthetica, a fancy term for compression of the lateral femoral cutaneous nerve, or in other words, I was so obese that fat was pressing on the nerve on the front of my thigh causing numbness and tingling.  I was devastated, humiliated, fat, numb, depressed, and the worst of the FFF’s (a little nickname my sisters and I share). I had hit rock bottom.

How could I have let this happen? What happened to that little girl who only ate to live?

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That’s me in the blue dress, with my cousins on a beautiful sunny NY day.

I am not really sure when I made the change from thin, healthy, happy Marie to the person that I used to make fun of, the one who stands in the back in group pictures and can never find anything to wear. Karma is real. Send it out into the universe and eventually it will return.

Then one day, I saw “before and after” pictures of the younger sister of one of my dear friends. She had lost over 70 pounds and looked fabulous. I decided to take a chance and ask her what kind of journey she was following.We talked for a while and it felt good to admit to the psychological problems I had with eating and weight loss. I laughed until I cried and decided to take the plunge on my absolute last ditch effort at any eating plan before deciding on bariatric surgery. Yes, of course I had considered that.

At just about the same time as I made the decision to start another diet, I just happened to find a set of Melmac dishes I had been searching for on E Bay for almost a year – the dishes I grew up with and felt a need to own again. Funny how thing work. Perhaps there is a master plan.

Dishes

 

The dishes arrived about a week before my meal replacements, in almost perfect condition and almost exactly as I had remembered them.  Much to my surprise, the dishes were so much smaller than the usual dinner plates I have been using for years.  The cereal bowls I remember from my youth are tiny compared to the bowls in my cabinet.  I started to put two and two together – the size of dinner ware and flat ware has increased over the years in proportion to my own weight gain. Coincidence? Probably not.  Nevertheless, I took a chance on E Bay (God, I LOVE that site) and found mid-century forks, spoons and knives to add to my collection.  Lo and behold, they are substantially smaller than the mismatched set of silverware I have been using. Putting two and two together yet?

So now I am on a health and weight-loss journey with the help of an amazing coach, a great support group, a few meal replacements, and a Lean and Green meal on my awesome Melmac plates with my awesome forks and knives with the cool vintage wooden handles. I am re-learning to love the whole process of the meal, not just the food. The dishes are the perfect size for my portion controlled meal, and life is really looking up. If only I had my pastel Tupperware cups to drink my water. . . but I digress. . .

I am about to place my third order for plan meal replacements. I have lost ten pounds, have not “cheated” even once
as there is no need to, and my obsession with food is gone. I have a very long way to go, but the road ahead is clear. I am getting closer to finding me every day.

This is a journey I feel confident about. I could write a book on all the diets I have tried before and why this one is the one that works for me and maybe someday I will.   Accountability is important, but having all the right tools at the right time is even more important than that. Check back in every once in a while if you want to follow my progress. I may even post a picture. Who knows, while finding me, I may be able to help you find you.

 

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Max and Cookie taking a walk on a rainy day.

Max the Chihuahua and Cookie the Cat- the Story of a Broken Heart

We adopted Max when he was six weeks old.  Cookie arrived about a week later, likely the same age.  They became best friends.  In the beginning, we took Max for walks four to five times a day.  Cookie came on our walks almost from the start. We bought her a collar and leash, but once the leash was on, she sat down and wouldn’t move.  We stopped using the leash, but she continued on our walks.  When they were younger, Cookie would come home when Max did.  But after a while, Cookie became the neighborhood explorer, coming home whenever she pleased, but always before we went to bed.

Max was never a very healthy dog.  He had scoliosis and walked on an angle, his back legs always towards the right and his front legs and head sort of to the left. If Max stopped, Cookie stopped, if Cookie wandered away, Max would wait patiently for her to catch up.  On the rare occasion that I kept walking and allowed her to get out of sight, Cookie would cry until we walked back to her and then we would continue on our journeys.

At home they would run around and play with each other and nap together on the couch.  Our older cat, Valentine passed away when they were about three, and we quickly adopted Clara and Cleo and then they were four. About five years ago we adopted Trixie, a lab/pit mix and then they were five. Throughout the years, Max and Cookie remained best friends.

About a year ago, Max’s health started deteriorating.  He got cataracts and went blind.  He started falling occasionally and would cry in pain when I picked him up.  We went to three different vets who gave us oils and pain meds, but Max didn’t get better.  Cookie, on the other hand, remained healthy and happy.

Not too long ago, Max fell off of the curb and hit his head on a car.  I carried him home and Cookie came inside with us. As much as I knew it was going to hurt, I knew it was near the time I was going to have to say goodbye to Max.  I debated for about a week what the right thing was to do.  Finally I made the decision to say goodbye to my little friend. It was one of the hardest things I have every had to do as an adult.

All the animals knew something was different.  They were different.  Clara stopped fighting with Trixie.  Cleo became a cuddly lap cat and Trixie seemed to lose her puppy-like exuberance.  Cookie changed the most.  She spent more time outside than usual and one night, she wouldn’t come in at all.

It has been a month since Cookie has been gone.  Some of the neighbors think she was taken by a wild animal. I know differently.  Just as one spouse dies soon after the other, Cookie went off to die, alone, from a broken heart.

 

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Although the world is full of suffering,
it is full also of the overcoming of it.
– Helen Keller

 

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Perfect in purple, Angel in the dialysis unit at Tampa General Hospital

 

Background

My niece, Angel, is my sunshine, my inspiration, and one of the smartest and bravest people I know and she is far wiser than her eleven years.  She was born with Vater Association, a group of congenital deformities, among them only one barely working kidney. She had her first major surgery when she was only hours old. From the time she was very little she was on strict dietary restrictions, underwent hundreds of diagnostic tests, several reconstructive and spinal surgeries, long hospitalizations and required a complicated rewp-1458429169699.jpggimen of medicines several times a day.

She began dialysis at age four and was listed for transplant by six.  Angel was on dialysis for eight years when it became medically necessary to move her to the top of the transplant list.  Not too long ago, she underwent a successful kidney transplant and her entire life has changed in ways not many people could imagine.

How things have changed

Angel used to spend at least four hours in the dialysis unit three times a week.  Everything she did revolved around her dialysis schedule and her medical procedures done once an evening at 6:00 pm.  When I asked her how it feels not to have to go to dialysis any more she said it feels “weird and boring.” She finds it hard to fill all that extra time, except for binge watching Netflix. She said food tastes saltier now and she can drink as much as she wants. Her diet is only restricted by raw foods and grapefruits and she is not allowed to eat at buffet restaurants.  She has had chocolate for the first time and found out that she loves peanut butter cups.

Now that she has recovered from the actual transplant surgery, she is feeling much better. She has more energy than she had before and she is looking forward to traveling outside Tampa to amusement parks, fairs and Disney World. She still visits her friends and the nurses in the dialysis unit when she goes to the hospital for labs and for school. Her biggest goal right now is to go to “real school.” She has been going to home-bound school at Tampa General since Kindergarten!wp-1458429212037.jpg

Angel is an inspiration to me every day. She has a bigger heart than anyone I know. In 2010 Angel was a spokesperson for Tampa General Children’s Medical Center for Christmas.

Angel is also past winner of the American Kidney Fund Art Contest and was the was the guest at the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony at the Kidney Walk in Atlanta, GeorgIa in 2012.

Once she recovered from her surgery, the first public gathering she attended was a walk for Colon Cancer at the Al Lopez Park in Tampa.wp-1458448669906.jpg Truly her heart and her love for life  knows no bounds.

When she is out in public and wearing her mask, she wishes no one would ask her any questions.  However, she knows that is not realistic so she has created some helpful hints which you can read about in Part Two.

Looking towards the future

Angel plans to become a doctor in the future.  For now,though, she enjoys watching Grays Anatomy, Super Natural and How I Met Your Mother.  She is busy learning to sew so she can make quilts for the children in the hospital and learning how to play the guitar.  The future is bright and that is no surprise as she remains my only sunshine.

Addendum

Don’t let this article make you believe that this is all a walk in the park. It is a testimonial to Angel’s personality that this all seems so easy. For the second time in as many weeks, Angel again is in Tampa General Hospital, waiting for a sonogram.  Her urine output has been less than expected and she is swollen and a bit uncomfortable. As her mom, Lisa, reminds us, transplant is just another type of treatment, not a cure.