Thanks For Nothing Blue Cross

I'm a little irritated and my brain hurts. I'm still trying to figure out the logic they use in making up their set of rules. I was given a perscription of priolosec that necessitated 60 pills be dispensed in order to double up on the dosage as required before I go into my next 'scope procedure. Well Blue Cross will only allow the pharmacist to dispense 34 pills. Thanks for the thought Blue Cross, but that's pretty much useless to me. Now given it's sunday there's no one at Blue Cross or at the gastro enterology department of Beth Israel, it'll probably be the better part of a week before I can get this straightened out. I'm just baffeled bc it's not like Prilosec is a popular street drug, people aren't feinding for some ant acids. I give over a quarter of my paycheck to these a-holes and in return I get to run around and spend most of my day on the phone playing the "which medication will my insurance cover" game. *DANCE PUPPET DANCE*. So much for supposedly being the best insurance carrier.

Zumba FAIL

I was super pumped this morning when I found a zumba class that actually worked right in to my work out routine. I have never taken Zumba but I've seen you tube clips that made it appear super fun.
What I Expected:





What I got



So as I and another lady waited outside the room for another class to end (which was 15 minutes late I might add), we made small chit chat and another older lady arrived. Apparently this lady was the "instructor", we were caught off guard since she was out of shape and not prepared. Ok. So to make things a little more awkward I was one of two people in attendance in this "class". The instructor puts on the head set and starts to play some awful out dated salsa music. Great. She proceeds to "warm up" without letting us know what the hell is going on. Now, not that I'm an expert or anything, but judging from previous classes, and dance instruction, I was under the assumption that there would be some kind of instruction going on. Apparently not in this class. Not only did she not tell us what she was doing, everything seemed to be completely random, nothing made any sense and to make it even better she was out of breath, so anything she did say was with a heavy accent and in between gasps of air. So needless to say I did not enjoy my first Zumba experience, the lady who was in the class with me was also greatly disappointed, she said "there's a reason we were the only two in there", and said that there was another Zumba class taught by a good instructor who would actually TEACH you something on Monday nights. I'm not sure if this uncoordinated white girl is up for it, we'll see how much humilitaion I can handle for one week.

We Put The "Fun" In Disfunction

Main Entry: en·abler
Pronunciation: \i-ˈnā-blər, -bəl-ər\
Function: noun
Date: 1615

: one that enables another to achieve an end; especially : one who enables another to persist in self-destructive behavior (as substance abuse) by providing excuses or by making it possible to avoid the consequences of such behavior


My uncle is dying of alcoholism. No pity party for me, as there is a long family history of tension and drama, but the person I feel the worst for is my grandfather. I can't imagine outliving my own child. However my grandfather is his own worst enemy. He is your classic enabler. My grandmother was also a fall down alcoholic when she was alive, going as far as drinking nyquil for the alcohol content. I don't know if my grandfather refuses to recognize that there is a problem, or just doesn't get it because there was no such thing as "alcoholism" when he was growing up and raising his own family.


My uncle steve is a functional drunk, the kind of drunk that if he tried to sober up, it would kill him. When he was able to come over his eyes were always glazed over his gait and speech were always slow and deliberate, often commenting on irrelevant and non sensible things. He was always nice enough to us kids, and did help out grampa from time to time. I'm told that he never had ambition, even when he was younger. A degree in architecture from Wentworth hangs in the old office of the building company he had with my grandfather 35 years ago. Uncle steve was left in charge of the business when my grandfather retired, and he promptly drove that into the ground. He was a firefighter on Cotuit with my grandfather and both my parents. When my father got hired on Mashpee, my uncle was also offered a job. He didn't want it. Then my uncle hurt his back climbing a ladder some 30 years ago. And that was it. He hasn't worked since. His house is in shambles, and it doesn't even look like a house. To see it, you'd have to look for it on school street. All the trees & shrubbery's are overgrown. It looks like the house from the movie "The House Of 1000 corpses".


I overhear my grandfather talking to once of his friends in the kitchen "You know that boy worries me, his color's not right". He's referring to my Uncle's eggplant complexion. You see, my uncle has drank himself into circulatory failure, among other things. Then the falls started. my uncle fell twice with in the past week. The rescue came both times because my cousin Craig (who is also a functioning alcoholic) was not able to help him up. My Uncle was just diagnosed with CHF (a result of his drinking) and the hospital is still running tests to find out what else the alcohol has destroyed. I'm guessing Gout is also going to be added onto the list, Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome, Alcoholic Liver Disease, and probably others.



I was just stunned and frustrated at the same time by my grandfathers comment. Really grampa? You really don't know what's wrong with Uncle Steve? I don't know if he's afraid people will judge him because his son is an alcoholic, like people will think it's 'his fault'. With my grandmother, I think that he believed that she was "always that way" and there was no name for it really, and when there was a category for it, it was viewed as a "weakness" or something to be ashamed of. Views have changed drastically since then, but when you have someone who is so set in their ways its damn near impossible to change their mind, even if you're trying to help them.


My grandfather is an enabler with other family members to. People take advantage of him to, and it pisses me off to no end, especially when there's not a damned thing I can do. My grandfathers niece (my father's 1st cousin) constantly drops by, using our home as her personal motel, dragging her business (and annoying yappy ankle biter dog) about. She's also an enabler. Her useless drain on society adult son Jeff is constantly in and out of the psych ward, has no job, lives in section 8 housing bc he's on disability for bi polar. Yep, apparently you can claim disability for a common non life threatening (etiology wise) psychiatric disease. Jeff is 40 some odd years old, but bums gas & cigarette money off his mom, and she comes down to deal with his doctors appointments. My grandfather finally stopped lending him money. The thing that kills me is that my grandfather gets annoyed with these people and yet he continues to let them walk all over him.


And my other useless drain on society relative, Craig (as above mentioned, my cousin, Uncle Steve's son), is also a functioning fall down alcoholic who was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes at 3 years old and never developed mentally past the age of 15. Diabetes, drunk and a chain smoker. Good combination. His big claim to fame was working at Filene's basement until the closed, and his "band" that use to practice in my grandfather's shop. They would come and practice at all hours, leaving the place a mess, with beer cans and god knows what else. I'm not one to start trouble, but when you ash and spill beer on my kid's beach toys, I draw the line mother fucker.


My grandfather, being deaf as a door nail, wouldn't hear them "practice". But I would. When I'm trying to put my kid to bed and sleep for the midnight shift, you bet I would. My cousin would never listen to my grandfather when asked to turn it down or come during certain hours. Shutting the power off didn't stop them either. Finally they were kicked out. The "band" broke up shortly after.


It's really amazing to me, as in the case of my father and his brother, that two people could be raised in the same house, but be two completely different people. All be it, 9 years apart, that aside, they both had the same opportunities, same parents, same up bringing.Two completely different people. My father has a successful career and beautiful family. My Uncle Steve, not so much.


Even with my son, my grandfather gives in. 8 am and this kid is running around with a mouth full of cookies. Really?! I know my grandfather truly believes that he is helping in all of the above situations, but it really infuriates me that he doesn't know, or maybe doesn't WANT to see, that people take advantage of him because of it. I just hope for his sake that Uncle Steve holds out until after my grandfather leaves this world. It's not a good sign when your 87 year old father is in better health than you are.

Fighting The Power

I watched possibly the most profound documentary today. America The Beautiful, a film by Darryl Roberts, explored this nation's obsession with perfection and beauty. While this obviously isn't a new unexplored territory, the film really hit home for me. Having struggled with eating disorders and body image issues since puberty, I felt empowered after watching this film. I don't want to give too much away, but I will share this : The film opens with the story of a gorgeous new model Gerren Taylor. She is a young black model who is 6 ft tall and a size zero, truly an exquisite beauty. They show Gerren at a model party on a roof top, filled with half naked, topless models (though she is not one of them), gallavanting around with bottles of booze ... then the narrator shares Gerren's age ... 12. A TWELVE YEAR OLD RUNWAY MODEL. WHAT. THE. HELL.


One of the arguments made by the fashion designers in the film in regards to why the models are so skinny, was that the material is too expensive to waste on "bigger" sizes that "no one will buy". Right. Personally, I think that the runway designs, for the most part look ridiculous. In addition, I know that I in no way resemble that 6 ft tall size 0 model, so it is even less appealing to me. If they had "normal" sized woman parading around on the runway I might pay attention, because I could realistically envision myself wearing that outfit. Also, as a side note, ever notice that most of the clothes on the sale rack are a size 0 or 2? There's a reason folks.



The film continues to delve into the subject of social responsibilty, and really sheds light on the fact that we really need to re evaluate our whole sense of self, because this whole standard of "beauty" is literally killing us, our mothers, sisters, nieces and daughters are taught that they are not good enough from the womb. A disturbing statistic shared in the film is that almost 1/2 of all 4th graders are on a "diet". Eve Ensler, an American playwright most famous for the "Vagina Monologues" made a comment that stuck with me:
"There was a great expierience I had when I was in Africa.This woman in the fields of Nyrobi, I asked her 'Do you like your body?'
And she looked at me like I was crazy. 'My body? Like my body?I love my body!
I love my hands, my fingers! My finger nails, they looks like little crescent moons. And my arms! My arms are so strong!The carry me along, they are so strong!
And my legs are so stong they can hold a man...'Eve said to this woman "I don't know how to do that, I don't know how to love my body". The african woman responds "Why, what is wrong with your body?". Eve responds "well I have this stomach..." . The african woman interrupts her "Your stomach? Your stomach is meant to be seen!". The woman explains (pointing to a tree in the field) "Do you see that tree ? Do you like that tree?"Now the woman points to another tree" Now looks at this tree. Do you like that tree? Now do you say 'this tree is not pretty because it does not look like that tree'?".


I had never thought of beauty like that before, and it makes perfect sense. We as a culture are so saturated with this poisonus expectation of 'beauty" that it completely corrupts our sense of self. If I was ever asked if I liked my body, I would never think of commenting on something like my strength.


Another interesting point that was made in the film was in reference to western cultures influence on the beauty standard. A professor in boston who had studied the people of Fiji noted that within the 3 years that television was introduced to the island, that 11% of the naitive children had developed an eating disorder. That's the kind of statistic you'd find in an average highschool. If an ancient, well established culture such as the Fijian's, whom have a deeply rooted culture and tradition, can be so drastically changed in 3 years, can you imagine how this is affecting our own culture?


It's a struggle, and a conscience effort, but I am loving and accepting myself how I am. I am also making damn sure that I tell my daughter how beautiful she is every single day, and making sure I don't critisize my own body in front of her. I never thought about it before, but a big part of this is a learned behavior. You grow up watching your own mother, who you think of as perfect pick apart her own body, what as a child, are you supposed to think of your own body that your mother gave you?

"Normal" Need Not Apply

It's not exactly a secret that I'm a medical anomaly, an enigma of sorts.It's never what you think it is. Normal doesn't apply to me. I've had somewhere in the ballpark of 18 surgeries in my life, and those are the ones I can remember. For almost a year I've had severe dysphagia to the point where I actually choke,can't breathe, and the thought of "I don't want to die, please god no" actually goes through my mind. I've gotten to the point where I'm teaching my almost four year old to dial 9-1-1 if mommy chokes. So I start with my ear,nose & throat doctor whom I've been a patient of since I was born, the man is nothing less than a genius, and has literally saved my life on more than one occasion. He does the spelunking of my upper airway with a tiny little light in the office and says that my upper airway is bright red, likely the result of acid reflux. So I start various antacid treatments and proton pump inhibitors, I never felt the acid reflux, but apparently that can happen. I tried somewhere along the lines of half a dozen meds with no change. I do the barium swallow, drink some nasty chalk milkshake from hell, and swallow a big horse pill so they can watch me choke and almost throw up on myself. I watched the x ray while I was doing this, and could see how everything went to the left, the pill sat in my throat for MINUTES, not seconds before it finally went down, and you could see the stomach acid erupt like mt vesuvius. So I get referred to a gastroentorologist, lets just call him "Dr.Pepper" ... you'll understand why in a minute.





I go to the day surgery office of Dr.Pepper for an endoscopy. After the procedure Dr.Pepper exclaims that there was nothing structurally wrong with my esophagus, and there was no sign of damage by acid reflux. Um K. So I continue to choke or have food get stuck in my throat for weeks afterwards and then receive a call from Dr.Pepper's office to schedule an appointment for a follow up. Dr.Pepper might have found "something" but he'd rather discuss it in his office. Of course you do, you need your $10 co pay, maybe thats just me being cynical. But I digress... Anyways at the follow up Dr.Pepper more or less says he's "guessing" my choking episodes are being caused by something called Eosinophilic esophagitis. Which in layman's terms, means that my esophagus is having a local allergic reaction to an unknown source, and swells, hence causing my choking episodes . The only way to diagnose this is by taking a biopsy of the tissue from the esophagus, which he did, but they way it was conveyed to me was that there "wasn't a lot" of eosinopil's (the allergy cells), but it was elevated, so he was guessing that this was what it was.


splendid


So I went on a course of meds that was supposed to help treat this "allergic reaction". And surprise surprise, nothing happened. On my last appointment I told him that the medication was not working, and this is what he had to say (paraphrased)


"Well as long as you don't become malnourished and lose too much weight you'll be fine, unless you want to go on a long term schedule of prednisone, but that makes people fat and crazy"


fabulous Dr.Pepper, and where did you get your medical license, the online college of medicine of the cayman islands?!


I'm no doctor, but I'm failrly certain that the continuation of choking spells over a prolonged period of time cannot be favorable for the structure of my esophagus ... I'm just sayin .....
So with the lack of a satisfactory answer from the local butcher, I called up Beth Israel of Boston to make an appointment with an actual gastroenterologist. I just really don't think that this "diagnosis" is correct, and that this "Dr's" answer was satisfactory. Normal has never applied to me, so making your "best educated guess" isn't going to cut it Dr.Pepper.

The New Year

My first post of the new year, unfortunatley I don't have anything terribly exciting to share. I'm well on my way into my debt management plan, so if everything goes according to plan I should, in theory, be credit card debt free in 3 years or so. Which coincidentally, is around the time my car should be paid off, so needless to say I am very much looking forward to the year 2013. Husband and I were able to pull of Christmas without using the evil plastic, and while it was hard and stressful at the time, I'm so glad we didn't swipe out souls away this year. It really is invigorating to know that I will be able to tell the credit card companies to suck it.





Husband and I actually made time for eachother this past friday night, and had an amazing date at Amari's in Sandwich, which by the way, hands down, best restaurant on cape in my opinion. It's an Italian place, so I automatically thought "pasta & sauce", and husband even wondered why I picked it (my tomatoe allergy). Oh no friend, this place kicks the crap out of Olive Garden, let me tell you. Amazing! Our appetizer was mushrooms stuffed with lobster& crab, bacon wrapped scallops & shrimp marinated in some kind of amazing sauce. Dinner was more than you could ever possibly eat, while it is a few bucks (plan on spending atleast $100 if you have an appetizer and adult beverage), it is totally worth it.


I started midnights for the winter, which is a nice break from the day time shift, I get to spend more time with my kids, and I can actually plan doctor's appointments on a day other than my only 2 days off. Hopefully I can get some schoolwork done at night so I can spend my days playing with my babies. I might even do the swimming lessons with MJ again at at the Sandwich highschool, which should help circumvent his energy since I haven't heard back from Boston in regards to his "behavioral" testing(ADHD).


So far so good, I'm hoping 2010 will be a productive year, and I'm going to continue to work on myself :)