Tag Archives: illness

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Remember when I said I hated digital health care?

July 13, 2025 Rivergirl 37 Comments

I’m changing that to despise.

After receiving worrying numbers on my blood tests, I waited for my primary doctor to contact me.

And waited.

And waited…

I called, but she wasn’t there.

I asked for a call back, but she never did.

So I succumbed to the technology I hate and sent her a message on the infernal digital portal.

Their statement…

At the end of the second day?

I got this.

Which puzzled and pissed me off… until I realized it fulfilled their two day time limit on answers and probably saved them grief from the powers that be.

Didn’t help me any though.

The next day?

This…

Let me get this straight…

I was sick, so I went to the doctors.

They drew blood to see why I was sick.

The results came back abnormal and the reason they give…. is because I was sick?

What kind of twisted medical merry go round is that? I know I was sick, that’s why I went and had blood drawn.

WTF?

Abnormal, but no reason given.

Abnormal, but not abnormal enough to worry.

It’s a good thing I’ve started to feel better by myself because they certainly weren’t helpful.

😡

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So much sadness….

April 5, 2023 Rivergirl 51 Comments

I don’t usually blog about deeply personal things, but the past week has been tough and my heart is too heavy for the usual fluff today.

It started with the death of one of my husband’s coworkers. An unexpected heart attack. He was 52.

The next day we learned an old childhood friend of my husband’s had passed from the cancer he’d been battling for years. Not unexpected, but still sad. He was 71.

We’ve also been helping to care for my husband’s elderly uncle who still lives alone at 91. His mind is strong, but his body is failing and he’s unable to do everyday things. We do his grocery shopping, run his errands and clean his house… and while I know he appreciates the help, he also gets very cranky with the invasion of his personal space. He really needs nursing home care now and though it’s not unexpected… it’s been sad seeing the slow decline of health of a once vibrant man.

But the situation that’s broken me is my SIL. A big hearted, funny, generous to a fault, deeply troubled woman who’s suffered from depression all her life. An unhappy childhood, an abusive marriage, a bitter divorce and a diagnosis of MS in her late 40’s led to a deep slide into alcoholism and opioid addiction. After trying to kill herself in 2010, we took her in and she lived with us for a year. We got her off the booze, the drugs and the cigarettes. We put over 30lbs on her frail frame, got her substance abuse counseling and psychiatric help and shared what she always tells people was the best year of her life. We gave her love and a fresh start and felt good about setting her up in a nice little apartment. But left to her own devices, the last 12 years have been a slow road to self destruction. Isolating herself from friends and family and smoking two packs a day led to COPD and emphysema and a total dependence on oxygen. Somewhere along the line she gave up on life and though we tried to help numerous times, you can’t save someone from themselves. Now… at barely 80 pounds, she’s dying in a hospice facility. We visited her yesterday and the literal husk of the woman we saw there broke both our hearts.

It is.

But damn, it’s a hard price to pay.

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I’m just going to say this once.

May 15, 2020 Rivergirl 46 Comments

And I don’t want to start a partisan political fight.

But I’m getting tired of people snarkily saying, “You know that’s not going to protect you.” every time I go out in public with my cloth face mask firmly in place.

Yes, I know it’s not going to protect me.… but it’s going to protect you against airborne infected droplets in case I’m asymptomatic, which apparently many of us are.

I protect you, and I don’t think it’s too much to ask that you protect me… and by default my older husband who has 3 major underlying health conditions that would make catching Covid 19 a possible death sentence. I’m not an alarmist, or a panicker. I’m level headed and calm, but when it comes to my husband’s life? I’m not taking chances.

I get that the economy can’t be shut down indefinitely. I understand people are suffering, and if I could trust them to protect others? I would have no problem opening businesses. But a lot of the people I know who are out there protesting in large unprotected groups have jobs they can work from home and steady incomes.

They’re just upset they can’t go out and play.

Yeah…. let that sink in.

Pubs. In Ireland!

If the Irish can stop consuming their pints in public? I think Americans can deal with a little piece of cloth if it helps save lives.

And to those who say the crisis isn’t that serious because they don’t personally know anyone who’s ill? We’re relatively lucky in Maine, we have a low contraction and death rate, but even here…. in my small rural town? I know people. Our neighbor who lives behind us has it. Our neighbor to the left’s parents have it, one severe enough to require hospitalization.

It’s here.

It’s everywhere.

As this sad picture posted by a childhood friend who lives in NYC can attest.

There are no sympathy cards because there are too many deaths. If that isn’t the definition of serious, I don’t know what is.

Rant over.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled program.

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Health or bust.

May 6, 2020 Rivergirl 20 Comments

In the midst of a viral apocalypse, it’s hard not to think about your health.

Am I safe? Will I be infected?

And if so, should I be binge watching Netflix… or picking out a granite color and font?

Thankfully I’m a very healthy person. One might say boringly so.

I’ve never broken a bone.

I’ve never had the flu, an ear infection, strep throat, the measles, pink eye or a cavity.

I still have my tonsils, appendix and wisdom teeth.

Until I was 48 years old, I’d never had the chicken pox either.

And trust me…. when I caught them from the husband because he came down with shingles?

I was not a happy camper.

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No, those aren’t pimples….

And if you think it sucked having chicken pox as a kid? Try doing it when you’re almost 50. It’s not only Hella uncomfortable…. but dangerous to boot.

Matter of fact, it was such an oddity to present at that age, all the doctors and nurses stopped by the exam room to take a peek.