Rich Z (WebSlave)

Rich, I've been thinking about your bruising. I've had issues for years with bruising, blood vessels rupturing in various places with varying degrees of severity. Had everything tested many times, could never really get a satisfactory explanation. I know that you have a reason in the meds you're taking and I'm not about to contradict your doctors on the need for them.

Maybe some of what I've learned might help you. Doctors at different points have suggested some specific supplements. I've found these to be helpful. First, Vitamins K1 and C. There are a lot of Vit. K2 products around these days, but you need K1 for clotting. Bilberry & grapeseed extracts are also useful. Topical arnica gel can help heal the soreness from bruises which are bothersome. I know too well that bruises triggered from inside, as it were, as opposed to being bruised because a tree branch fell on my head, can take longer to heal and be more uncomfortable while they linger.

There's a fair amount of science backing these particular supplements, especially from Europe. You should absolutely check with your doctor before you take or discontinue any supplements. I know you know, but I'll still state it; natural substances aren't inert or necessarily harmless just because they're natural. (They wouldn't do anything at all if they were.) Your situation is very different from mine, but these things have helped me. Not fixed, but definitely improved things.

Sent from my SM-A716U1 using Tapatalk

Actually I was taking an OTC supplement that contained vitamin K1, put it also has potassium in it, so I had to discontinue it when I started taking that Ramipril. Plus I am not sure taking something that promotes clotting while I am also taking a blood thinner to help prevent clotting is going to be a real good idea.

I will tell you, the more I read about medications concerning side effects, incompatibilities with other drugs as well as things commonly considered as beneficial (citrus, bananas, etc.) the more I am really hating being on any drugs. And heck, then I read about the chemo drugs that Connie has been taking and it about makes my hair stand on end. A lot of this stuff seems like it is designed to fix one problem and cause three more. Sort of a pharmaceutical gold mine of keeping people having to continually buy their products.

Well, I only have to be on blood thinners for a year, and I don't intend on staying on that Ramipril for very long. And as for the atorvastatin I am also taking, heck, I don't know about that. Apparently there is a risk of long term use causing liver problems. On top of that, I have been reading it can causing ringing in the ears (tinnitus) which I have had for decades from playing in a rock band in my younger days, and shooting guns a LOT when I was younger. Seems to me that the ear ringing gets worse later in the day after I take the Ramipril, so maybe this is one of those compatibility type problems where the effects are stacking.

Like I said, not crazy about this drug stuff even one little bit.

I have always suspected that doctor's make commissions off of the drugs they prescribe, and whether true or not, it sure seems like doctors are very quick to try to get you on as many drugs as they can. And then they will prescribe drugs with warnings to NOT stop taking them until you consult with your doctor first. Who, quite likely, is just going to tell you to continue taking them.

Heck, I am even afraid to take Tylenol for a headache, or occasionally when I have felt very congested late at night from sinus drainage, Benadryl. Who knows what can happen with that witch's brew drug "soup" in my system?

One of these days I fully expect to just spontaneously burst into flames from the chemicals inside of me. Might just be a matter of me hitting the right (wrong?) chord on my Genos keyboard arranger and the frequencies interacting with the drugs will make me go **POOF** like a lit flare!

Yeah I suppose K1 might be less than desirable if you're on a blood thinner. I souks probably not yet and communicate with humans when recovering from a migraine . The grapeseed and bilberry extracts don't promote clotting, though. They reduce bruising by helping to strengthen the blood vessels themselves. There is excellent scientific data about bilberry extract in this regard.

Sent from my SM-A716U1 using Tapatalk

Thanks for your suggestions and hope the migraine goes away soon. I get them myself every now and again. Interestingly enough, when I had my heart attack, they gave me some aspirin laced with nitoglycerin while in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. For a few days afterwards, I got all the earmark preliminary visually disturbing signs of an impending headache but they never developed into an actual headache. So something in that nitro stuff must trigger that sort of visual reaction in me. Even after the effects wore off, I still had visual anomalies. My vision would just jump. Hard to explain, but it was like having a computer with a bad video card with sections of the display jumping around. Very odd effect.

I actually was taking bilberry for a while as a vision health sort of supplement. We ran out, and I don't think Connie has ordered any more. I probably told her not to, since I was feeling maxed out on pills to be taking.

I don't think I ever have taken any grapeseed extract. When I was breeding the corn snakes, I used to give it to both the snakes as well as put it in the water bottles for the rodents. About drove Connie nuts having to put a couple of drops into every rodent water bottle, though. She was taking care of the rodent colony, and this just made the process longer for her.

I will admit that when I went in for that second stent, I was VERY apprehensive about it. With the easy bruising I was thinking my arteries could be darn fragile and not take well to having things shoved through them to the heart. Getting a coronary artery to rupture while implanting a stent would have been one of those "complications" that my cardiologist mentioned. Things could have gotten real ugly then. And honestly, I was half expecting that to happen since I felt my vascular system had been weakened by the pills I had been taking since the heart attack. But, none of that happened, fortunately.

But honestly, the thought has crossed my mind that since I had those arteries in my heart blocked, what are the chances that arteries in other parts of my body don't have some sort of blockage too? Surely there isn't any reason why ONLY those coronary arteries would be affected, is there?

That's interesting about the nitro. Back in the day my dad carried nitroglycerin for heart problems. I was his shadow, and it was often just him and me out someplace on the farm. I don't remember when I was first taught how to give him one "just in case." I didn't realize it was still in use for emergencies.

I had a migraine rx at some point that included some cousin of belladonna which I found scary as heck but very effective. Since my shock in 2015 I've had a lot of weird migraines as compared to the ones I used to have, and a lot of weird visual nonsense including fun times with double vision. The Foreigner version was much more fun, lol. But I don't usually have that much visual migraine aura, though. I get olfactory aura, a charming scent of burning hot electrical wiring. I've sent my poor husband on many a search for a stench only I can detect.

I do understand the worry about what else is going on in veins I can't see. I had the first idiopathic blowout in a thigh vein when I was in my early 40s. That was followed by a few others in other places, including a thankfully minor but totally terrifying stroke. Lots of tests and lots of medical bills later, and all I can tell for sure is few things I don't have. Can't really say what the problem is. But the bilberry and grapeseed extracts have helped. At different points I've run out of one or the other, and if it's not replaced, I'll start having trouble again in a couple weeks or so. Restart the supplement, and things will improve in a couple more weeks. I learn slowly but I do learn (sometimes). I haven't run out of these in a couple years.

That was a ramble. Sorry. The supplements haven't fixed the logorrhea. Anyways, I hope you keep recovering and Connie keeps getting through things with success.



Sent from my SM-A716U1 using Tapatalk

Yesterday I picked up the mail at our post office box, and in it I got a bill from a urologist. What?? I vaguely remember someone coming into my hospital room to ask me about the blood in the urine I had after that second stent. I told him it was likely because they OD'd me on blood thinners and by 10pm or so, the problem had resolved. He just nodded his head, made some notes on his clipboard, then walked out saying he hoped I was feeling better.

So any sort of doctor can just walk into your hospital room, uninvited, and then charge you for it? I certainly did not ask to see a urologist. I was pretty sure I knew what the problem was. So I am not sure if I should just throw the bill into the trash, or send it back with a piece of my mind attached in a memo, telling them where they can stick that bill.

Oh yeah, I just thought of something. Right before I was about to be discharged, some girl came in also claiming to be either a urologist or representing a urologist. She asked the same questions, and I gave the same answers. Wonder if this means I will be getting another bill from either the same urologist or another one looking for easy money?

Heck, the last time I totaled up in my head what the list prices are for both Connie and I this past few months, I came up with around a half million dollars. That was not even including the prescription medications we have gotten. Anyone going through what Connie and I am without having health insurance might as well just eat a bullet, as the bills will just destroy you financially. Fortunately our Medicare and CHP supplementals are paying most of the bills, and most of that money coming out of pocket is coming out of our Health Savings Accounts we both set up years ago. But those accounts are starting to run thin by now. I am thinking, perhaps naively so, that I am pretty much out of the woods with my heart issues, but heck, Connie is certainly FAR from seeing that light at the end of the tunnel. I have to stop reading stuff online about the average prognosis of ovarian cancer victims or just as certainly, my heart is going to just stop cold one of these days reading that stuff.

Hell, the Biden administration wants to help with debt forgiveness for student loans? Screw that! Put that money towards people with crushing medical bills where it will do a WHOLE lot more good. People who got student loan bills did so voluntarily. Many people who have gotten severely into debt with medical bills likely didn't have any say in the matter when they got struck down by severe health issues. Yeah, I know some people could present the argument that many severe health issues were caused by choices in life style. Maybe so, but how many people who first got hooked on cigarettes REALLY expected to get lung cancer from it? Most people think they are superman until they get hit in the gut HARD by kryptonite.

Ah, just bitching. I was reading an article in the local newspaper the other day written by a woman who runs some sort of grief counseling business. This article just happened to be about the grief from losing a loved one. So I read it, although I never read any of her articles before. Sheesh. According to her, when Connie goes (hopefully not for a while) my future is predicted that I will just become a mean and bitter old SOB. Well heck, you mean I will get WORSE??

Aw, dammit all to hell...

I went to exercise the Onan generator today, and the damn thing won't start.

That was after I discovered that one of the mosquito magnets was out. Propane tank was empty and the battery was dead. So I fixed that. Then a few hours later, the other mosquito magnet was dead. That just needed the propane tank replaced. So we are now out of propane tanks that are full.

A day or two ago (time and days just run together now) I hear Connie yelp in the kitchen. She said her potato peeler just broke. Looked like part of the metal sleeve holding the center rod in place just broke off. We looked around for it, but couldn't find it. RED FLAG ON THE FIELD!

So while I am looking for potato peelers online for her, she comes into the den. I just happened to be looking at automated potato peelers, so when she saw my computer screen she just yells out "Oh, HELL NO!!" She isn't all that keen on contraptions, even labor saving devices, when it comes to the kitchen. When I calmed her down and said I wasn't really going to buy anything like that she told me of the next calamity. She said yesterday when she was washing dishes, she heard the garbage disposal make a racket like she had dropped something hard in it. So she shut it down and didn't think anything of it. Till today when she tried to use it again, and it just hummed and didn't run. So that metal piece we couldn't find apparently dropped into the disposal and had now jammed it up. So, here we go....

I had to bring over some tools and especially an inspection camera (you really NEED something like that at the strangest times) so I could try to see down there inside of the disposal. Not the easiest thing to do anyway. All the while I am thinking that I am going to have to pull that disposal out to try to work on it, and even then, quite likely I will have to wind up ordering a new one anyway. Sigh..... But anyway, I didn't have a clue about what should look normal looking down into a garbage disposal. But there was a flat piece of metal (I was expecting to see a curved piece like what would have broken off of that potato peeler.) that looked like it might be jammed in there. But getting it out was a different story. Yeah, I could get my hand in there, but didn't do me a lot of good. I had a long pair of needlenose pliers, but I couldn't grab that piece of metal. I then tried a much smaller paid, but that meant sticking my entire hand down there and then there was just barely room to actually use those pliers. I couldn't grab it, but I did manage to move it, and then the rotating part of the disposal could then be moved manually. But that piece of metal was still in there somewhere. So what the heck. I was pretty much convinced I was going to have to buy a new disposal anyway, so I told Connie to stand back, as I was just going to turn it on and see what happens. Miraculously, it worked. I guess that piece of metal thankfully just passed on through. Either that or it is still lurking in there waiting to jam up again.

But it seems like every day there is a new headache popping up. This is on top of our medical issues, especially Connie's where it seems we are just in some sort of limbo right now. She is getting bouts of depression, worrying about why it seems like no one gives a damn about her from all the doctors she has been exposed to lately.

Speaking of which, the new drug the oncologist is talking about using on Connie has as a COMMON side effect some nasty skin effects on the hands and feet, especially where heat and friction are concerned. Dr. Ellison said that applying cold to the hands and feet will help tremendously to reduce or neutralize that problem. So as soon as I learned this, I checked around and found cold pack gloves, and cold pack socks. Found this on Amazon, so I order the whole set. Status showed they would all be delivered on Tuesday, 09-06 with free shipping. Well, OK. But I don't know when Connie will be getting that chemo treatment, and I noticed that they offered faster delivery for $15 more as an upgrade. So heck, I decided to go with that. But wait, the delivery date hadn't changed. So I got on their chat and talked to someone about that. They said that the absolute earliest that package could be delivered was on Tuesday, 09-06. Well damn. So I wanted my $15 back. But they can't do that until the package actually ships and they can issue a refund. Why in hell they can't do an adjustment before hand baffles me, but honestly I just am not an Amazon fan anyway, so par for the course. I will just have to wait till Tuesday.

Then yesterday I checked status on that Amazon order, and it was showing delivery on Wednesday. WTH??? So again, I contacted Amazon via chat, and talked with two people there. Both said that on their screen they are seeing delivery on Tuesday. I refreshed my screen, tried a different browser, and even tried on the laptop, but I was still seeing delivery on Wednesday. So OK, guess I just have no choice but to wait. I figured if they shipped by Satuday using FedEx or USPS, Tuesday delivery was still possible. Monday is a holiday, of course, but I figured it was doable.

So I checked today, and delivery is showing for Tuesday again. Yay! But wait a minute! Shipped is UPS. Again, WTH??? There is no tracking number and it does not show as have been shipped yet. Today is Sunday. UPS is not open. Monday is a holiday. UPS is not open. So how the HECK is that package going to be delivered on Tuesday?

Here is the thing, I NEED that stuff before Connie gets her chemo treatment. Of course, as a side note, Dr. Ellison wants Connie's cardiologist to sign off on her getting that Doxil treatment. Connie emailed the cardiologist assistant on this past Thursday, but Dr. Ellison's office hadn't sent over the paperwork yet. So Connie got one of Dr. Ellison's staff to send that over. The assistant acknowledged receipt and said she would get that to the cardiologist and they would get back to Connie. Nope, didn't happen. So now what? I am thinking that the cardiologist is thinking Dr. Ellison can just go fly a kite. Oncology drugs is not her responsibility, and quite likely she just doesn't want her name on anything if the possible heart effects that Doxil can cause come to be. So I don't know what is going to happen. Connie doesn't know what is going to happen. Hence her feeling like she has become a hot potato that no one wants to grab onto. But if things suddenly do break loose and Dr. Ellison wants Connie to come in on Wednesday for chemo, and we did NOT get those cooling packs on Tuesday, then we have to postpone the treatment. Since it has been over a month since Connie's last treatment, are those cancer cells rallying because of the lack of continued treatments?

I swear, with all this going on, I am about to pop a blood vessel in my brain. Honestly, I do feel a tightness in my chest from the stress, so maybe that is getting ready to pop too.

I think that if it weren't for the fact that I might not be able to stop, I would just start screaming....................................

So, just to forcefully stick my own foot down my throat (yum! the taste of toes!) I just got an email notice a few minutes ago stating that the Amazon order I mentioned above has been shipped today.

This IS Sunday, isn't it? Honestly, I wouldn't bet a dime that it is with my brain so frazzed. Maybe I should go out and see if that generator starts up too.

Awe, yes, today is Sunday. Just try and relax. If it makes you feel any better, my brain is always frazzled!

Originally Posted by WebSlave

So, just to forcefully stick my own foot down my throat (yum! the taste of toes!) I just got an email notice a few minutes ago stating that the Amazon order I mentioned above has been shipped today.

This IS Sunday, isn't it? Honestly, I wouldn't bet a dime that it is with my brain so frazzed. Maybe I should go out and see if that generator starts up too.

A worker at the Amazon ship center put your package into the UPS trailer, hence the "shipped" status. UPS will pick those trailers up and move them; their big trucks do run on Sundays and holidays even though they don't do deliveries and their ship centers aren't open.