1/19 I am laying in bed, yes it is early in the evening (only 6PM) and I am prone on my heating pad. With all trouble I am having with my hip just a few hours in the car causes me to be in a great deal of pain. So now the first thing I want to do when I get home is to settle in bed with the heating pad and wait for the meds to kick in. I can't take the suggested dose of my pain meds while working during the day so by evening I am relatively miserable.

I am looking forward to Tuesday and having this surgery, I am optimistic that this procedure will solve my problems and I am hoping that the connected lower back pain will instantly disappear.

I have been trying to complete the preventive maintenance that will be due while I am out and I really should make a trip to WV tomorrow but I dread the drive. The hospital that I need to go to is 5 hours one way from home and if I did not need to get this work done If would never make a drive like that on a Friday. On a normal day before I began to have problems with my hip that is how long the drive would have been. Now however I have to stop and walk every 30 minutes, which slows me way down. Oh well regardless of how long it will take to get there and back I must get the work done.

1/23 I just discovered that I never posted this... it turned out that I did not go to WV on Friday and instead spent the day shipping parts back to the factory and sending my loaner equipment out to my co-worker who will be covering my territory. 

It was a good thing that I did not go because we had an ice storm come in and by 10 PM the roads were treacherous.

Awake in the storm

I love my animals but they can be so frustrating. Like tonight... it is 2  AM on Jan 23 and I am awake and have been so for a couple of hours. We are currently in the midst of a doozie of a thunderstorm and I have a dog that is terrified of storms. Poor Blaze is an older Border Collie that I rescued 2 summers ago who must have had a bad experience in a storm. Nothing that we do helps... and when he is really scared and can't get into a "safe" space he freaks out and chews on the walls. It is very frustrating to have him tearing up the walls he has even chewed a hole through a 4" cat door to get into the bathroom. Last week when I was away and my son was home during a storm Blaze was biting the door frames trying to get out of the room where Dan had him trapped and into a space that he felt was "safe". 

I have no solution to the problem and haven't broken down to get him the "Thunder shirt" yet. Supposedly they help dogs to feel more secure. The meds don't work unless given an hour in advance and of course I am not quite adept at picking up disturbances in the atmosphere and then I miss the opportunity to get the dog medicated. The same problem applies with the shirt. . . someone has to be around to put him in it. And since I travel for work this is problematic.  

Tonight I thought I would try to make something similar to the thunder shirt... so I took my security glow in the dark vest that I got for walking in the dark and put it on him. . . he seems to like it ok. Although it is not quite as snug as the Thunder shirts would be... so when it is thundering he is still freaked out. 

He loves our Black bathroom and feels secure in the corner by the toilet (see above photo) Blaze is a Black Border Collie so he is really difficult to see next to the black walls!

He also likes to lay in the alcove behind the laundry hamper. . . I made him a tent over the hamper and he has not yet come out of it so maybe a tent is the answer. Who knows. 

My house is like a zoo I have 2 dogs and 4 cats. And for a 2 month time frame a guest dog who is blind. 

A typical day on my bed...I have my leg propped up and all the critters around me. Kind of unusual all 4 cats on the bed. Marley, Mama Kitty, Sgt Tibbs and Sasha.

Rex our blind guest dog enjoying the snow.

Mamma Kitty she is 19 yrs old

Typical day in bed.  Three of the cats and one dog with me.

Arya, Sgt. Tibbs and Sasha.

Marley and Rex laying on the floor.

Blaze on the floor beneath Arya and beside Rex.

So on top of Blaze's issues tonight the fun began about 10 PM with the guest dog Rex... having GI problems and then not being able to walk. Once I got his mess cleaned up and calmed him down he was able to walk just fine but at first my son thought he was having a seizure... just what I need tonight. 

As you can see from the photos I am generally surrounded by the all the critters which is going to be problematic on Wednesday when I come home from the hospital on crutches. It will be quite a challenge navigating around the house and between the four legged critters. I will definitely have to slow down and maybe knock them out of the way with the crutches... we shall see. 

It seems that the storm has abated for now so hopefully we can all get some sleep. 

Ta Ta

The Roller Coaster Ride Continues

Life is like a ride on a roller coaster...for a while you are climbing the  hill and things are exciting and you are full of anticipation for what is too come and then suddenly you are over the precipice and hurtling down. Zipping along the ride up, down over and under until suddenly you are stopped and leaving the ride. 

I find that my life has many similarities to the roller coaster...right now I am on the hill heading up ... and into surgery on Tuesday and looking forward to having my hip repaired so that it will stop hurting. However yesterday I had an appointment with another Orthopedic surgeon regarding my shoulder which hurts as well and I was informed that on top of the bone spur which the local hospital identified...they see a torn rotator cuff. Surgery would be followed up by 6 months off work.  Holy crap

And now the ride is heading down. 

I was thinking about just having the shoulder surgery while I am out with the hip but then I talked with someone in the office a little while ago and they said that if someone is out more than 6 months they will be terminated. That just blows! I emailed the HR office to find out the really deal on the benefits, but if that is the case then I can't do both surgery's in a row. I would need to take off two different times and insist that I come back to work before the doc really would like for me to do so. 

I know that many people have the shoulder scoped and go right back to work a few days later but they generally don't have a job that requires lifting heavy equipment. If I could guarantee that I would not be lifting with my right arm then he would let me go back to work. 

PVNS

PVNS~The new bane of my existence.

My story begins like this... I began to have problems with my joints when I was pregnant with my oldest son, Andy is now 24 and I have had pain in both hips off and on all this time. I have also had issues with my right shoulder ever since I torqued it while sledding with my boys in the winter of 94 or 95. 

Dan age 21

Andy age 24

Three years ago on August 15 2008 I had gone to dinner with a friend in the Village of Yellow Springs Ohio http://www.yellowspringsohio.org/ Dinner and cocktails were quickly followed by a walk through the shops and checking out the end of summer activities. We had decided to walk across the street to see one of the performers, who was spinning fire on the corner and I was half way across the street when I was struck by a car. I flew up into the air and landed on my right shoulder. 

The car had clipped my right hip and tossed me, luckily the driver was going only about 15 miles per hour and I ended up with no broken bones or bruises . . . my sandals never even flew off of my feet. What I did get out of the incident was a traffic ticket for jay walking and a court appearance.  And the driver got nothing since the cops said she was not at fault since I was not in the cross walk. What saved me at court was that the village had not repainted the cross walk on the street and there was no designated walk zone. . . so I did not have to pay a fine or repair her vehicle. Lucky me . . . or so I thought until recently. 

Around the same time frame as this accident the company that I work for http://www.mindray.com/na/homepage/home.html  changed the vehicle that we drive. So when I began to have pain in my left hip, lower back and swelling in my left leg, I attributed it to the change in vehicle and the long hours in the car. The swelling and pain would go away when I would get out of the car and walk. And I found that exercise always helped so I generally felt better in the summer months when I was most active and much worse in the winter when the weather was cold and all I want to do is hibernate.

About a year ago I had an appointment at my Chiropractor and he was adjusted my SI joint caused me to have severe pain in the left hip. I honestly thought that I had a broken hip but I did not go to the doctor or have x-rays at the time and after about 6 weeks the pain went away. Then this last August 2011 I had a repeat experience at the Chiropractor and even mentioned to him ahead of the adjustment that had had an issue with the prior adjustment and he said he would try not to do the same thing. Unfortunately the exact same pain occurred.This time I made sure I went to the doctor and had an MRI and Xrays. 

At my follow up appointment with my family doctor I was told that I had "femoral thickening" and he was referring me to a local Orthopedic doctor who was a hip specialist. I immediately went home and did an internet search on what the heck "femoral thickening" was. . . all of my research indicated that it was a cancer issue. 

Three weeks later, after getting my self completely worked up and terrified that I had cancer I finally saw the Orthopedic doctor. I had had a dream the night before this appointment in which I was going to have to have my entire leg amputated because of cancer and I was worried about how I was going to make a living. The first thing out of the doctors mouth was that he did not think it was cancer. . . but to be safe he wanted to refer me to an Orthopedic Oncologist at The Ohio State University Hospital to confirm that it was not cancer. 

This was another worry ...so the Ortho guy did not think it was cancer but he did not know ... I finally got in to see the Dr. Joel Mayerson http://ortho.osu.edu/directories/faculty/joelmayerson/ the Orthopedic Oncologist and he is the one who said that it was not cancer but PVNS. 

He said it so quickly that I missed it and had to have him repeat it for me. The MRI showed a distinct nodule in the joint that he felt could be removed via a hip arthroscopy so he referred me to a colleague of his that specializes in hip scopes. Dr Thomas Ellis http://sportsmedicine.osu.edu/ourteam/physicians/thomas_ellis/ has been perfecting the procedure and has become very proficient doing the hip scope so that patients would not have to have their hips opened completely up. I met with him for the first time on Dec 4, 2011 and I was very impressed. We scheduled my scope for Jan 24th and at that time they will do a biopsy to confirm the PVNS diagnosis. 

Today Killing Time

Is it odd to want to write in this large font? Does it annoy you to read it? I think I am finally on the way to understanding how this blog site works and I think I really like the larger font ... hold that thought....

Does this seem right? I think it looks much duller and is so small. and yet they call this font "normal".

And of course this one is just ridiculous. 
So I am going back to my first selection "large" and will stick with it from this point forward. 

I am having issues tonight! I have been trying to figure out how to post a pdf file on to Face book ... this is making me crazy. . . and then it occurred to me that I just started a blog page maybe just maybe I can link it from here, unfortunately I am having a problem learning this blog site design stuff as well. 

Is it possible I am getting old and my learning curve has gotten slower?

Does Blogging = Narcicisim?

I am curious in this day of instant connections and tweeting and posting have we as humans become more narcissistic? Does the desire to post our every thought and moment make us more self focused and less interested in what is going on the the lives of those around us?
In any gathering today look around you and you will observe that over 50% (numbers pulled out of thin air) are not even paying attention to their surroundings but are staring at the little screens on their phones and making no effort to connect to the live humans that are sitting on the other side of the table or across the room from them. 
This problem is not limited to the adults today, the proliferation of portable electronic games, which the kids today refuse to leave home without, teach the younger generation that life without portable entertainment is not cool. 
When my boys were little the gaming industry had not advanced to the portable devices yet and we made up games  to entertain ourselves. One of our favorites was battle ship drawn with pencils on the back of place mats at which ever eating establishment we happened to be at at the time. The premise of the game is you draw a "base" for each player one opposite sides of the page then add in islands or other things in the middle of the "ocean" which will make the battle more interesting. Each player is permitted 5 "battle ships" and they are denoted by different shapes (ie: x's vs o's or triangles or squares). Using only a pencil or pen placed on the beginning ship location the player flicks their pen across the page giving their "battleship" a path heading into enemy territory...where the line disappears is the point where you stop your turn and redraw your ship. The next player attempts to "blow up" your battle ship by aiming their "battle ship" to intercept yours.  A ship is destroyed if the line intersects directly across the location of the opponents "battleship". 
Does everyone follow? I know it sounds complicated...but it is a game that is free... and keeps children entertained for long periods of time and promotes interaction with others. 

Intro Day 1

You would think by the title of this blog that I am a person with a dis-associative personality but this is not really the case, although at times I wonder what is missing. 

I have never attempted a blog, have never kept a journal on a consistent basis, and yet I have aspirations of one day throwing away the drudgery of the working woman's life to become a slave to the written word. I admire people like Nora Roberts and Janet Evanovich and many others who have kissed  the Blarney stone and can churn out one book right after another. Most days I don't allow myself the down time to give my brain the free reign it needs to create a new story...or to even work on the one that I have been writing for the last few years. 

I decided recently to invest in a tablet so that I could take my story with me and work on it any time that I have a moment of down time. And interestingly enough I have worked on my story more in the last 2 weeks than I have in months. I am very pleased with my selection of tablet... I got the Dell Streak 7. I know I know it is NOT the Ipad or the Kindle or the Nook but I happen to like it better. The size of the Ipad is too large for my hands and the Kindle and Nook while amusing are both lacking something ... the Streak 7 is just the right size for my hands and is very sturdy. Here is a link to the Dell site....
http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/mobile-streak-7/pd
So I just discovered while looking at this link that this unit is no longer available. Strange but true. Sorry about your luck I love mine. I am sure most people would think it is strange that I wanted an device that is different than what "EVERYONE" else was getting. I have never been a fan of the Apple products, yes I know they work well and are very fun to have etc. etc., but there is something about being part of the pack that I resist.  
So now that I am set up with a device to write any time any where I plan to begin by tormenting the people in the vast interconnected web with the ramblings of my mind. 
Good night and good luck.