Medical Question.

I have a question about health stuff. I am NOT whining, I do not mean this in any way to be a complaining type of thing here.

I don't have insurance, there is no way I can go to the doctor. I could pay the office visit, but of course there will be tests/labs stuff like that. I thought maybe somebody else has been through this and could tell me what could possibly be going on.

I have some arthritis, not terrible or anything, it's Osteoarthritis and is in some but not all of my joints. No problem, very common, I deal with that fine. But the past few weeks, I've had pain in some of my muscles. Not bad pain, but enough to make me kind of worried about it, because I've never had it before. It's in my shoulders, upper back, and neck all the time, and is in my legs part of the time. Pain that feels like a bruise, but it's not bruised or hot to the touch or anything. No redness. And pain that's usually relieved by Excedrin or Ibuprofen.

What could cause muscle pain? It's sure not physical exercise, I can tell you that. lol. It's not 'sore' muscles. I can't think of anything like the way or places I sit or sleep that are different. No changes in lifestyle. I am overweight enough to have problems, but have never had this problem.

Also, I've run a very low fever lately, didn't know it until the past few days. It's fine for hours or days, then I get a headache and achy feeling and it finally occurred to me that it felt like I had a fever, and out of the maybe 5 times I've taken it, 3 times it's been 99-100.5. That might even be very normal. I know it doesn't have to be 98.6 to be normal.

I have high blood pressure, could that have anything to do with it? I don't have diabetes or anything else. I also have some allergies this time of year as do most of the people I know. Could that have anything to do with it? I've never heard of muscle pain from anything like that, but I don't have much medical knowledge at all.

The only other thing, is...I still have pain from my October accident, where I broke 2 ribs and my breast bone. NOT bad pain, just very mild but constant pain. And it hurts more when I yawn or take a deep breath. But not bad like I'd go to the emergency room or anything like that.

This is bothering me mentally more than physically because I don't know what's going on. I've tried to find things online, but they talk about Fibromyalgia and things like that. I don't think it's anything near that serious.

Okay Docs and Moms (most moms have more medical knowledge than most docs I think...lol), whadda ya think?    Sicko Jan

Friday Movie

Pat and I went to see Nim's Island last Friday. It is so good. I dreamed of living on an island in a treehouse when I was growing up. I thought it would be the most wonderful thing. I didn't grow up on the beach, but it was only about 5 miles away. And as much time as I spent in trees, another few hours a day and I would have been living in one. So when I saw this movie, I cried for that little girl in me. I lost a lot of those dreams, and they just came flooding back with the movie.

And the grown-up me can totally relate to Jodie Foster's role as an agoraphobic writer. I fight agoraphobia at times, and sometimes it wins. But like her, I could go out to help someone. Undoubtedly. Especially a child.

Now the movie is very unrealistic, in many ways, but it's a movie, not a documentary. Kids will love it, you can take any age to this movie, it's got enough adventure to be exciting, but not anything that I think would bother even young kids. It's rated PG, but I can't think of why it's not G. I don't know anything about ratings anyway.

Here's a link:   http://www.nimsisland.com/

Technorati Tags: Nim's Island,movie

Quirks?

The rules for the tag are as follows:

Link the person who tagged you

Mention the rules in your blog

Tell about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours

Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them

Leave a comment on each of the tagged bloggers blogs letting them know they've been tagged.

I don't have any quirks. They are 'special features'. If I did have quirks, they would be spectacular!

1. I like to be alone. A lot.

2. I'm a very impatient waiter. If I have to wait in line or for something, I usually occupy myself by counting in prime numbers.

3. I don't answer the door unless I'm expecting someone. I only answer the phone if it's family.

4. I have to know the names of plants and animals around me. No, not like Rover the dog. But I don't have to know their Latin names, so it's not weird, right? ?

5. I have to have a stack of new reading material at all times. I cannot run out.

6. If it's a day with a lot of social anxiety, I must have my baseball cap on if I go out of the house. Or if I'm playing baseball.

Whew, I hope no one shows up in white coats to get me after they read this. Won't matter...I don't answer the door!

So, I'm tagging: who hasn't been tagged? Pat, Curtis, Pecaso Pat

Catching Up

Busy week, haven't even been blogwalking. Going to hang out for a while,see what y'all are up to. Jan

LUNA MOTH PHOTOS

Here's some photos of the Luna Moth. I always feel it's a personal blessing when I see anything very uncommon in nature.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: Luna Moth,moth

Pineapple Upside-Down Cupcakes

I made fish, rice, asparagus and fresh tomatoes for supper. I made Pineapple Upside-Down CUPCAKES for dessert. YUMMO! Didn't know how they'd turn out, just experimenting, but they're great. Immediately took some to the neighbors so that we don't eat them all..., cannot afford to buy bigger clothes.

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: cupcake,cupcakes,pineapple,yummo

Happy Luna Moth

Hey, I caught a Luna Moth. Caught is probably not what I did. He was in front of a store on the hot concrete, not moving. I thought he was dead. I took some pictures of him, then I picked him up and he barely moved his wing. So I took him home and let him go. On the way home, I had him in a cardboard box, and he started to move a little, by the time I got home he was flapping his wings! I opened the box to let him down gently in the grass, and he flew away! He was Oh So Happy!

I'll send my photos later, but here's what he looks like:

 

Technorati Tags: Luna Moth,happy

 

Here's a link for him:

http://www.enature.com/fieldguides/view_default.asp?curGroupID=2&source=&parkid=&fromWhere=&searchText=&allSpecies=&shapeID=977&lshapeID=0&curAbbr=&lgFromWhere=&curPageNum=1&lastView=default&lastGroup=2&lastRegion=&lastFilter=4&lastShapeName=&trackType=&curRegionID=2209&size=&habitat=&fruit=&color=&sortBy=family&viewType=default&curFamilyID=&regionSelect=Southeast&regionZIP=

FLDS Kids

I'm off today, had an appointment this morning, and now I'm home for the day. I've had the news on, and am upset over the FLDS situation and how it's being handled.

I cannot believe there is a question on whether or not the FLDS children should be returned to their mothers.

Return them? To be r**** at a young age by their fathers and/or other older men? Or to live in an environment where other girls are? To live in an environment where this is ever, ever okay?

What are people thinking? This is nuts. As in most domestic violence cases, the men are being left alone for the most part. Why do the women have to leave their homes? Why do the children have to be uprooted? They are the ones who have already suffered the most, going through the most suffering now, and the ones who will go through the most suffering in the future. (Of course, our shelters are full of women and children who have been beaten and r**** while their abusers are at home. But I'm trying to just write about the current FLDS situation.)

The women should be willing to go through deprogramming and counseling if they want to retain custody of their children. The children at this point should be everyone’s priority. They should have complete protective care, with the help of agencies and volunteers. There should be provisions for the mothers to live in a supervised shelter with their children if they are in a sound counseling program.

On the news, they are even saying how important it is for the children to be with their mothers. They're kidding, right? The mothers are abusive and neglectful. I believe they don't know what they're doing. They have been brainwashed beyond any type of rational thinking. People can get used to just about anything, believe and accept most circumstances, most behaviors as 'normal'. And as far as the kids go, kids love their parents. As a counselor, I saw little kids so excited, so happy, to see a parent, to go home with a parent, who abused them horribly.

Technorati Tags: FLDS,abuse,kids,domestic violence,news,deprogramming,brainwash,shelter,custody,social work,counseling,parents

Are You Hungry?

What do you like for supper/dinner? And is it supper or dinner? What do you have at least once a week? What do you not like? If you don't live alone, how would you eat differently if you did? How often do you eat at fast food places? What do you like that's more regional food? Do you watch The Food Network? What are your favorite programs if you do? Do you like to cook? Jenny, Help with this one!   Jan

Light Bulb

Again, we've gone from 79 degrees to 30 and snow within a few days. I've got to go cover some of the more tender blooms out there. Even the doggies have their coats on. I had no idea dogs liked clothing. All three love to wear clothes and will bring you a jacket to put on them. They need clothes because the groomer they went to has no idea what a puppy cut is. Nope, didn't know she didn't until the poor little shaking, shaved things came out from the grooming area. At least their hair's growing back in fast. I'm also thinking how plain the color white is. Bichons kind of look like cotton candy anyway, and Kool-Aid is totally non-toxic, and comes in all different colors, and doesn't stain as much as food coloring. Hmmmm.....

So, anyone had any nice cupcakes lately? LOL, sounds like a euphemism to me. But you know me well enough to know I really do mean cupcakes. Possibly with sprinkles. giggle  Jan

 

Eeyore's Anxiety

Depressed with tons of anxiety this week. Yuck. I try to let Snoopy and his happy dance, or Tiger and his energy, or Calvin with his ever faithful companion Hobbes and their ADHD antics, serve as my role models. Really, Hillary and Oprah are reaching a little too high for me right now. But no, Eeyore is the only one who will play with me a lot of days. He is kind of cute though. At least I'm not in any danger of loosing my tail, that's for sure.

So, anyway...I need a job that I WANT to go to. I know Googillions of people have jobs they hate, and it might be asking a lot, but I want to WANT to get up and go to work in the mornings. Most mornings, anyway. I'm having to turn down a painting job that I was looking forward to because of my physical limitations right now, and a lot of jobs I've had and liked, are too hard physically now.

I need a stay at home, computer oriented job. What can I do?   Jan

Sue T-Rex Extraordinaire

SUNSHINE and 75! Great day today. Sunshine on my anything makes me happy. LOL. Did not work today. Did not make money. DID go to the Gray Fossil Site, that's about 10 miles from here. I used to be a Geology major for a while...in school, and still love things like this. The very famous T-Rex, named Sue, is visiting. It's usually at the Chicago Field Museum, and it's been visiting here this winter. The Gray site is new, and making history just about by the day. Very exciting stuff.

Here's the Chicago Field Museum site for Sue:     http://www.fieldmuseum.org/sue/

 

Here's a couple of our sites here:

Main Site:

http://www.grayfossilmuseum.com/

 

This has a little about Sue and the Gray site:

http://www.artmuseumtouring.com/Gray_Fossil.html

 

Will have photos soon.      jan

Sea Pony

OD'd on dreams. Too many to remember anything but bits and pieces.

One was a very long dream. A lot happened before, but at one point, I was going to go somewhere with 2 friends. They were rich and had a Dad that was like a real person, and a mom that had her nose up in the air and was somewhat horrified at them being friends with me. They had a very different life at home, like rich people had different customs, clothing, and a different 'reality' than I did. (I know that's somewhat true anyway, but it was in a weird way in my dream). So I was going to go out on their boat, a medium sized cruiser, for the Fourth of July. We were out there to see the fireworks over the water, there was a parade in the little town. (This was a town that I'm often in in my dreams, so there were a lot of familiar places and things going on.

The water was rough up near the shore, and I kept seeing something very large sticking up out of the water, told myself it might just be a rock ledge, visible when the waves subsided. I thought to myself though that it might be a whale. It was kind of translucent and a pale yellowish whitish color.

In the meantime, we came across several species of sea life in rather shallow water. One was oh so cute...it was a sea pony! Not a little version of a seahorse, it looked just like a pony, only it was maybe a foot high and maybe weighed 3 pounds.

Another very (ahem) interesting animal was a tiny elephant looking type of species. it was like a tiny elephant, not much bigger than the sea pony. It was white with different colored spots on it.  It also had a strange outer appearance. The skin was like one of those balls you can get for babies, it had cube-like bumps on the surface. So, anyway...it was very cute, but when I reached down and picked it up, it shocked me and I put it down and it was trying to bite me.

The large thing I kept seeing poking up out of the water was getting closer, and I pointed it out, and we went over to it. They started saying, oh, yes, that's a blah blah blah, and I was very excited saying I know what it is, I know what it is, and I started singing Puff the Magic Dragon.

Oh this is too much, I gotta go for now.   Jan

 

Technorati Tags: weird dreams,dreams

Fire Notes

Wet leaves don't burn. Only about 10% were wet. I thought the dry ones would burn and dry out the wet ones and they'd burn. Nope. Lots of smoke though. I left my window open. I think my smoke alarm doesn't work. cough cough cough         Jan

Spring's Here!

Hey, it's here. Spring! Flowers and birds and sunshine. Who'd a thunk it a month ago? It's in the 60's and sunny and so very beautiful. My computer is in front of my open window, there's sunshine on my bed (next to the computer in front of aforementioned window). If it didn't have my clean laundry on it, I'd lie down in the sun. That's an incentive to fold my laundry if I ever heard one!

I haven't been home much the past few days and had tons of housework to do today. The housemates left early and I've gotten just about everything done. Can NOT get anything done with them here. I'm going outside to play. I mean to work. I better rake those ol' leaves up. Right now.   Cya.    Jan

Kids Update

Update on kids. The mom came home yesterday. She was in an emergency shelter for addictions and mental illness, awaiting placement in a 28 day rehab. There are still no beds available so they sent her home to wait. Her husband made sure she had drugs and money waiting for her at home. I am disappointed, but after years of doing social work, not really that surprised. She was picked up by her 'friend' anda fellow addict. They were NOT coming home until last night. The mom said how good it was to be out, and she couldn't wait to go get her hair done, and hang out with friend.

Wait a minute....she had a sick 2 year old daughter and a 6 year old son at home who had not seen her in over a week. Now the kids didn't show any signs of wanting to see her, but still. The baby's had a cold with a lot of congestion. They both have asthma, and they always have congestion. They had been to the doctor last week though, and the baby was on an antibiotic, and both on Sudafed and Tylenol and Cingulair. She runs a fever whenever the Tylenol wears off. Now I know this time of year, especially with a child in the family in school, it's very common for kids to pretty much have cold and allergy symptoms most of the time. But most mom's would prefer to be with their feverish 2 year old.

I am trying very hard to not make judgements. I do understand, that I do NOT understand much of anything about addictions. I don't pretend to know what that must be like, but I feel a lot of love towards those with a drug problem, even though it causes such terror, death, and abuse to others. I find myself thinking 'she should' 'she should', and I'm trying not to. I would like any type of response from anyone, and especially anything from those who have had an addiction or who work in that field. When I worked as a domestic violence counselor, one place was a YWCA shelter that was mostly for addiction rehab, and about a fourth for a domestic violence shelter. I've thought of going into that field, but don't plan on doing any type of social work at this time. That sounded silly when I think of the social work I do during most weeks....lol.

Anyway, I'll go get some work done. Maybe. Take care, be kind. Love Ya All  Jan