DVT And The Yeti...A Funny Thing Happened To Me

Yeah, sounds like the worst joke ever....

So I had been working out pretty hard and had a pulled muscle in my calf.  Man did it hurt!  Like getting kicked by a horse with spiked shoes.  Day 3: I woke up writhing in pain in the middle of the night.

Day 4: I was telling someone about this ridiculous pain and now awkward limp when the light bulb (more like stadium lights) went off over my head.

I went to the ER and sure enough, my experience with a past blood clot confirmed I had another, twelve years later.  It's three inches long and....well, I sort of blacked out at this point.  Then something about painkillers, self-injections and they started me on some right then and there.

I don't care what the medical journals say, I can tell you that I have taken these painkillers every four hours for the past 29 days and I've had no withdrawal symptoms whatsoever.  Another government cover-up!  The fact that I usually lose my train of thought mid-sentence has more to do with the drones that the medications, I'm sure of it!

But that's a whole other.....zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Huh?  Where was I?

Oh!  The nurse then told me no shaving for six months.

That perked me up, "I'm sorry, did you say no shaving?"
"Yes." she said stoically, like I asked her the time.
"For six months?"
"Yes." A little more irritable now.

Then I laughed and laughed and laughed.  Not shaving for me would be like....

Remember Merida?  The Scottish Princess from Disney's "Brave"?  That's what my hair looks like.  Waist length and looks like I stuck my finger in a socket while wet.  Which I may have done, I don't really remember.  Because blood clots hurt and I deserve to feel (nothing) better!

Blood clots form for a few different reasons.  

You sit immobile for extended periods of time.  I recommend if you're on a flight to yell "Hallelujah!" really loud, speak in tongues and dance down the aisle.  The drink cart will move out of your way, but if you get tased, have your limbs zip-tied, then you will get a clot and die anyway, but you might as well go out having fun.

You recently had surgery...this goes back to being immobile, in which case, instruct your relatives to sue on your behalf.

Laziness.  Watch a lot of TV?  Afraid of leaving the house (agoraphobia)?  Then stay active cleaning and re-cleaning or you'll get a clot.

It could be in your genes, or your birth control pill, but either way, you'll get a clot.

The important thing to remember is 30% of people diagnosed with a clot die within the first 30 days.  That's a statistical fact fro  the CDC.  Which means 30% of the people who know they have a have a clot and are being treated will still not make it...

Good thing I feel nothing.  When it comes to narcotics, good advice is medicate freely. After all, pills solve all of life's problems or they would be advertised at every commercial break.

Wait, what was I talking about? (yawn)

Shaving.

I am almost six foot tall.  Not shaped like a telephone pole.  Auurn hair, curly and natural.  I have to shave my legs twice a day or I start collecting dust bunnies, pet hair, or anything else that will stick to the velcro growing on my legs.

Married women and very single women don't shave in winter.  I do.  I shave twice a day every day.  I have to.  If I spent six months without shaving I'd look like a Yeti.  Why a Yeti and not Sasquatch?  Because Yetis are supposed to have reddish hair.

Villagers would chase me with pitchforks.  The National Enquirer would have cover shots of me through my window.  Children would run in fear as rednecks hunted me....  Hey!  You haven't seen my legs so you don't know!  Maybe I'm more like Gossamer, remember the giant red bundle of hair with tennis shoes from Bugs Bunny?

ZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.  Huh?

Then....they sent me home from the ER, but gave me injections (Lovenox) I had to give myself twice a day.  This fourteen inch needle with a jagged edge and filled with acid had to be injected into my stomach twice a day.  By myself as my family cowered in another room.  Wimps.

I have to take Warfarin (Coumadin) daily.  This is an anticoagulation drug, more commonly known as a blood thinner.  It's a medication that was brought onto the market originally as rat poison.  So the conspiracy theories about doctors trying to kill of the population is true. Just saying.

This medication thins the blood to a degree that they say if I knick myself shaving I'll bleed to death.  I have to tell you, I'll risk it (see above photo).  Worth it.  If you have a DVT, the universal balance is not tipped in your favor and you know why.  I suggest you right a few wrongs.  Maybe just get out of bed.  Your call.

I have a DVT, and it's awful. I have pain, bedridden, pain, constantly cranky, and, um, pain. I also have a ham where my ankle used to be.

If my clot breaks off and travels to my lungs (pulmonary embolism), this blog also serves as my living will. I want to be stuffed in the iconic grizzly pose and placed in the corner of the living room where I will scare the crap out of my husband until the end of days.  

Put me on a wheeled base so I can travel from room to room.  And no hats & Hawaiian shirts either!

Now if you excuse me, I think I need another nap!

The Ridiculous Kinder Egg Ban

Does anyone remember Kinder Surprise Eggs?  Those chocolate eggs with a creamy lining and a toy inside?

The chocolate wasn't the best I've ever tasted and the concept is not new, but I certainly do miss those little buggers.  Sort of like toys in my cereal.  You didn't know what you'd get, but you knew you'd get an extra something to brighten your day.  

Like a fortune cookie, eating the outer part after you started playing with what came inside.  

"Kinder" is the German word for "children". Kinder is also the old fashioned word for children in Dutch.  Logic tells me that these eggs were made for children, but even as an adult, I liked to get them just to see what was inside.

Kinder eggs are not allowed into the United States because of the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act prohibits embedding “non-nutritive items” in confections.

(that part makes me giggle)

Let's take a look at the FDA's standards on what's allowed in our chocolate (this is real):

Chocolate               

Insect filth

(AOAC 965.38)   Average is 60 or more insect fragments per 100 grams when 6 100-gram subsamples are examined

OR

Any 1 subsample contains 90 or more insect fragments

Rodent filth

(AOAC 965.38)   Average is 1 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams in 6 100-gram subsamples examined

OR

Any 1 subsample contains 3 or more rodent hairs

DEFECT SOURCE:  Insect fragments - post harvest and/or processing insect infestation, Rodent hair - post harvest and/or processing contamination with animal hair or excreta

Significance: Aesthetic

Aesthetic?  Aesthetic?!?  Because it looks bad if there's more???

US Consumer Product Safety Commission - recall of KinderEggs - 1997.  States (in part), “Some of the toys have small parts that present a serious choking and aspiration hazard to children under three years of age…  Ferrero said that it markets the product in other countries solely for children three and older and designs these toys to be assembled by older children.”  So the toys are specifically for over three, but were being recalled because the toys weren’t for under three.

(Kinder Eggs have the same warning as Legos)

A Florida woman & active duty military spouse started a petition years ago to Free the Egg.  #FREETHEEGG  (I can't believe I just hash-tagged)

She even got her tale mentioned in Food Network Magazine.

So if you miss Kinder Surprise Eggs or are just sick and tired of the government telling you what to do because you're too stupid to not eat and choke on a toy that is clearly labeled to be inside the chocolate egg....go sign the petition, write your Congressmen or Senators, any representative, but do something.  

If you're lazy like me, she has a form letter you can copy and paste to their email as well as links to find those that represent you.

Tell them you're sick and tired of being treated like an idiot and to give you your chocolate back!

Stand up, shout it, tell them we should be allowed to have chocolate from another country that has a cute toy surprise in it rather than bug parts and rat hair!

FYI:  The US Customs penalty for one ounce of marijuana is $500.  One ounce of cocaine or heroin is $1,000.  One Ferrero Kinder Surprise egg is $2,500.

What Was That Word?

How many of us have sat there and struggled to find that word.  It's on the tip of your tongue.  Starts with a...?  Sounds like...?  It's...  Something about...  Ugh!

Nope.  Nothing.  Drawing a blank.  It's a secret I don't want to keep.

I found myself at that road block this morning.  Struggling for nearly an hour searching the locked files in my brain, trying to open them just a crack for the slightest hint.  Google can't help when you don't know what you're looking for.

I ended up looking at funny Bigfoot memes and still don't know how I got there.

Is it age?  Lack of sleep?  What causes us to lose that one important little tidbit, just as you need it the most?

I could never go on Jeopardy.  I'd lock up like a mute and stand there with a blank stare the whole time.  "I'll take Answers That Elude me for $600, Alex."

This morning I must have had an out-of-body experience where I cleaved my skull open to physically look for the word because the massive pounding I suffered when I finally gave up was excrutiating.  And still I have nothing.

What's really bad is when you forget someone's name....as they are approaching you.  My husband says, "Hey, isn't that your friend?"  To which I reply, "Yeah, that's.......oh shit."

I can remember that Tonto's horse was named Scout, but I can't remember why I just walked into the kitchen.  I have a variety of post-its hung all over the house, stuck to my phone when I leave the house, on my computer monitor, the bathroom mirror, the refrigerator.

What really bothers me is when I go to write it down and forgot what I went to write.  Standing there with a pen in hand, poised over the paper.

I blame information overload.  When I was younger, we had to remember phone numbers of a select few.  Then it was phone numbers and one pin number.  Now?  I have to change my password every other week, and that's always fun.  

"Password must contain one capital letter, six symbols, five song titles, the meaning of life, the plot to The Great Gatsby, and a hug."  

Followed by my computer asking, "Do you want this computer to remember the password?"  Hell yeah.

Then I go to write it on a post-it (just in case) and forget what I created.

What's the bigger insult?  That you forget in the first place or that you remember at three a.m.?  How many nights have I woken up shouting random things?  I'd tell you, but I forgot.

"CHOCOLATE COSMOS!"

My husband is always confused, slightly afraid, and yet I feel so triumphant when it finally comes to me.  I feel empowered, like I just won a million dollars or.... wrestled a T-rex to the ground.

"STERNOCLEIDOMASTOID!"

It's like I've overcome Alzheimer's.  I finally beat it back and can remember things.  Not that I have the energy to write it down in the middle of the night.  Even if I did, I forgot to put a pad and pen by the bedside.

"MERVEILLEUX!"

My husband thinks I have Turrets Syndrome, but it only strikes in the middle of the night.  There's no point trying to explain why I shouted a random word since he wasn't in on the original struggle to search for it.  He wouldn't understand and yet I feel trying to enlighten him would only make waking him up worse, so I roll over and go back to sleep.  

Peacefully, of course, now that the war in my brain has been resolved.

He bought me a day planner so I'd remember things I had to do.  I forgot where I put it.  Really.

We all struggle with remembering things at one time or another, the proper spelling of a word, complex math equations, the name of someone you knew twenty years ago...

When I walk in a room and forget why I was there in the first place, then walk out and remember, then walk back in and forget again, it deserves a profane word.  Or two.  

Maybe six or seven while throwing something breakable!