but refresh for the latest from this great blog- Transcending Borders
Yonge Street, Toronto, ON
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Welcome!
Filed under Nature, pictures, poetry, Re-blogged
Some pictures, a story, some good other things to read
Pictures from my kids phone-photo blog (always click for full size- I do not skimp on size):
Pictures from the site that shall not be named:
![[gt] Daisy](https://moon-soup.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/gt-daisy.jpg)
These are animated- if they don’t work automatically, click them to nudge them along:
![[ani] nice catch](https://moon-soup.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/ani-nice-catch1.gif)
How I spent last weekend or….
The waiting room at Urgent Care
I was actually on my way to Best Buy to ask why the headset didn’t work, got there, noticed that my left foot was numb.
I knew my ankle was sprained, at least, and nobody seemed to think it to be a big deal. Especially given the bigger deal of the rip-roaring pain throughout my left leg that was caused by the ruptured disk that was squishing the nerve- But the ankle did look kind of dramatic. Although swelling had gone down over the past week (it was a week ago Saturday that I slipped on it), the bruising was spectacular. I personally have never seen anything like it. It has been blue-black from my ankle to the bottoms of my feet including my toes. So, given that the bruising was still awesome and the numbness was new, I thought it would be prudent to go to Urgent Care at Kaiser (in the Sunnyside complex).
The Urgent Care nurse who checked me in asked to see it, I showed it to her (sounds like a porn intro). She immediately had me go get X-rays and blood-work and I was shuffled through those places and put in the Urgent Care waiting room.
It would seem that the short phrases “waiting room” and “Urgent Care” were paired together for maximum contrast in the use and mis-use of the English language. You could probably do a whole – never mind, I digress…
I noticed that the group around me stayed pretty consistent. New people arrived here and there. A couple times someone’s name was called and they were taken back to what I decided was the “Exam Area” (I made up that phrase- I am easily entertained). I never saw anyone come back out of this Exam Area. After being in the waiting area for about 45 minutes a nice young lady came out of the hidden areas where people were sometimes taken (the ones who were never seen again, as far as I know) and she announced that there was currently about a 2 hour wait for getting in to see a doctor at “Urgent Care”.
She apologized, smiled and went back behind the closed doors.
I began to speculate about the true nature of this hidden dimension I had so innocently and glibly labeled as the Exam Area- maybe it was actually a place where the “disappeared” were being dissected and barbecued! (Had I eaten anything yet today? Were my thoughts being perverted by hunger?) I remember thinking there was some grease on the scrub-top worn by the announcer lady.
I closed my eyes to try and explore the smells around me- was there a faint odor of BBQ?
I was shaken from this macabre vision by something that at first seemed almost as unsettling. Sitting across from me and seeming to notice me only as I noticed him was Jess from the hospital- our volunteer coordinator. I hadn’t seen him arrive, it was as though he had materialized from thin air. He said that he had a cactus thorn embedded in his finger. There was no mark that I could see but he explained that it was buried deeply in the flesh of the finger, had no egress from it’s lodging and was causing him pain and distress. I have no reason to disbelieve him except that his story was so outlandish. What is he doing handling cacti?
Time passed. I kept myself entertained with a variety of “Twilight Zone”esque stories that could take place in the Urgent Care waiting room.
I eventually got to see the doctor. He very quickly ascertained that I would need to go back to X-ray because when I had come in they had not taken pictures of my ankle. They did have good shots of my toes but he was uninterested in those.
Hours later I was sent away with a big apparatus they referred to as a “boot”. The numbness was caused by the inflammation and blood from a slightly torn ligament and something else that he tried to draw a picture of. The nurse told him his drawing was poor and unrecognizable.
the end
Other more better stuff:
‘Freedom is an Adventure Without End’ – Don Juan
Sound:
Filed under animated gif, animation, comedy relief, mp3, Mystic Poetry, Nature, personal story, pictures, Re-blogged, sound bite
ISCARIOT ~ (A sacred traitor)
Filed under Re-blogged, Spirituality
Yet another update
Sick of this yet? I am.
Monday they gave me my steroid injection in that messed up L-5. The doc said:
“This could cause more discomfort in the short term. It could take 2 to 3 weeks to reach peak effectiveness in terms of pain relief. It is important to remember that this is not going to heal the damage to your ruptured disk or the apparent damage to the herniated disk adjacent to this one. Also, you may get no relief at all- but it’s better than a 50% chance that this will relieve some pain when it reaches maximum effectiveness. Also, as with the oral steroids, the injection will cause elevated blood sugar and you will need to manage this very closely. Ready? Here we go.”
The worst part was the lidocaine injection. Ouch.
Did I mention that I sprained my ankle on Sunday? or was it Saturday? It was difficult to tell how bad it was until I saw the radical bruising from my calf to my heal on my let foot. I am not picking up my left foot as well as I would ordinarily. It’s hard to notice the weakness in that side of my leg, especially when I’m using heavy pain meds. I heard the pop when I twisted the ankle but didn’t take it seriously. After all, it didn’t feel like much. (01-bad-attitude). Ha ha.
So, 48 hours or so following injection, it hurts more than before. I am mostly getting by on only one 2 mg hydromorphone every 4 hours. Night is the worst. Still can’t sleep well, awake often. Now my right leg is hurting. Makes sense that this would occur since I’m relying on it more than I even realize.
Filed under personal story, Uncategorized
Today
Hi! Changes that are noticeable as of today: My initial response to steroid shots in the spine have been a very bad night pain-wise, feeling pretty good today (of course, it must be taken into count that in the past 16 I have had 4 mg of hydromorphone every 4 hours along with an unknown amount of vallium), my ankle sprain from a couple days ago has bruises that are quite dramatic to look at but very little pain associated (see above), my spirits are good, I still have a lot of work to do about work, if you contacted me recently, I am still thrilled that you contacted me, I am tracking things rather poorly that involve use of brain functions but I don’t care.
This post is mostly a reposting of something I sent to Katy. Thanks Katy! You are teh roxors!
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![[p art] LMAO](https://moon-soup.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/p-art-lmao.gif)
Good news/ bad news
The good news is that I have diagnosis and something along the lines of what to expect. The bad news is that I have a diagnosis and a fair idea of what to expect.
One ruptured and one herniated disk.
They tried the oral prednisone, very bad side effects related to blood sugar. I will be getting steroid injections. These will cause some blood sugar problems but shouldn’t be as bad. There is good reason to expect some relief from pain for a while; that is, they are cautiously optimistic.
Bad news is that the damage is severe and will take quite a while to heal. The steroids won’t help with that, they will just, hopefully reduce my reliance on narcotic pain meds. I could be unable to work for months. It could be longer.
I need to very quickly and deliberately find a way to live on a lower income. It most likely will include downsizing my living situation to a room or studio apartment.
I feel good though, it’s not overwhelming right now. Things will be okay, just need to adjust. For once in my life I have no one besides myself to take care of and that makes a huge difference for me in terms of stress.
It’s all good.
Ronald Mc Du Fu
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