My lifelong very high cholesterol is finally catching up with me. I have a genetic kind, Apo E Type 3 Hyperlipdaemia, which was diagnosed over twenty years ago. The kind of cholesterol it affects is the Triglycerides, which is also associated with Type 2 Diabetes. I’ve struggled with my sugar levels ever since but have managed to avoid Diabetes so far, keeping myself in the Impaired Glucose Regulation category. The tablets for the cholesterol, Fenofibrate, increase my risk of clots and, after a leg fracture, I suffered a Pulmonary Embolus and more recently, after a trip to India, a Deep Vein Thrombosis. I’m, therefore, on anticoagulants for life. Slowly, my renal function has deteriorated, most likely due to some furring of the Renal Arteries, and my blood pressure has risen. I now, officially, have Hypertension and Chronic Kidney Disease as well but all of these conditions are related, one leading to another. I’m at the early stages. The tablets newly added to my regime are more to prevent further damage. More annoying is that stress, largely work related, has increased my stomach acid, streaking my innards with tracks of ulcerative erosions and giving me reflux. The usual tablets for this cause me to visit the toilet six plus times a day. The second choices are simply not available because of a manufacturing cock-up and an interruption of supplies from Europe. As a result, the only way I can manage it is to eat a bland diet that already has to be low in fat, salt and sugar. Still, it should make it easier to lose the stone I need to for my kidneys and blood pressure.
I’m lucky. I may be taking five different medications, plus vitamin D, a relatively side effect free theoretical insurance against Covid 19, but I don’t feel unwell at all.
I know others on The Afterword have posted about their experience with far more serious conditions and none of us are getting any younger. I thought it may be time for people to check in and tell us how you are getting on or, maybe, share if you wish to if you haven’t before.
I was diagnosed with hypertension and high cholesterol in my late 40’s and have been on drugs that have kept me at normal levels since (I’m am now 55).
Fenofibrate is an old but effective drug for high cholesterol levels but statins are better, might be worth discussing that with your GP?
Good to know you are doing well, Wheaty.
I’m taking a statin too.
Good to hear.
I have high-ish (though not high enough to spark my doctor wanting to take any major action) cholesterol levels and am very aware that my Mum died of a sudden heart attack when she was 75. Not taking anything for it other than trying, and failing, to cut down on cheese and other dairy products.
Other than that I’ve been lucky so far. Heart rate is slow, body mass within where it should be and I recently have had precautionary tests for bowel cancer and also for my prostate which have been clear.
Lower back has been behaving itself lately as well – doing twice weekly online gym exercises class for blokes of a certain age has been brilliant for overall flexibility and keeping aches and pains at bay.
Oh, and I should have said, tigger, that I’m sorry to hear of your travails. Not least the stress at work levels. That can be a real bastard and there is clearly a lot of it around at the moment. Hope you manage to keep on top of it.
Thanks. The stress is a lot, lot better now, just as everyone around me is going crazy!
😀
Keep it up Blue Boy and you’ll live for ever.
My balance isn’t great because of the ankle. I’ve discovered some great exercises called LiFe exercises. I stand on one foot cleaning my teeth (spatter my shirt with toothpaste a bit more often), stand with one foot of the other, the random position, when cooking or washing dishes and go up stairs on the balls of my feet, heels up.
Wow Tigger, hope it stays under control.
I have fairly high BP and have been on medication for a couple of years. I also have Sleep Apnea and have a CPAP machine. It helps, but I rarely feel rested after sleep.
My main health issue is Crohn’s Disease, was diagnosed more than 20 years ago and until 2013 I went through various types of medication without much improvement. Constant visits to the bathroom and occasional extreme stomach cramps where the pain was so bad that I almost wanted to end it all rather than suffer any more.
I was also on some medication for a while because of gout and in 2013 the side effects of this, combined with my Crohn’s medication caused acute anemia. I went to hospital in an ambulance where the nurse informed me that my white blood cell count was the lowest she had seen in 40 years! So I got there just in time, had 3 blood transfusions while spending Christmas in hospital and was let out after about 4 or 5 nights.
Was referred to a Crohn’s specialist who has changed my life. I now inject myself once a week with Humira which controls the inflammation in my bowel, and I have been more or less symptom free for about 5 years. Am behind on my blood work though in this horrible year. The injections cost nearly $1000 each, thankfully covered by work health insurance. Not sure what will happen when I retire or am out of work as this is likely lifelong treatment.
Also I am 58, my father died at 59 (stomach cancer) which scares me a bit.
And getting my flu shot this afternoon
Honestly, my ailments are minor compared to yours. Crohn’s must be a devil to live with and there’s me complaining about a bland diet. sleep apnoea can’t be fun either.
I’ve already surpassed my dad’s lifespan and my mum is fitter than me at 83!
Good for mum! Should add my Crohn’s is of relatively medium severity, have never been hospitalized purely because of it.
And I started running 4 years ago, and still try and do it every week, health and weather permitting. Did a half marathon last year which went pretty well apart from ending up in the Emergency Room!
That’s odd – the route is usually well-marked.
Ha ha. Ironically the run was in aid of emergency services. Paramedics were everywhere!
I guess I’m lucky: a daily acid blocker for my Schatzke’s ring, which isn’t what it sounds. No shortage of PPIs here, unless it was ranitidine you are missing, @tiggerlion . Bp is ok, weight middling. Sticking to booze limits, Spanish booze limits, that is, and never smoked. No happy pills for 6 years and mindful of how to avoid finding myself needing them.
It’s the Ranitidine or its relatives I can’t get hold of. Sounds like you are just on the one tablet. That’s a good result at our age.
Mrs M was on Ranitidine until recently and it’s apparently been discontinued.
I used to take ranitidine too, but I got started on a daily dose of omeprazole 4 or 5 years ago and if I watch what I east and drink and, er, keep things moving, it pretty much keeps on top of it. I still took ranitidine if I needed it later in the day though, and was a bit worried when it got taken off the market, but a pharmacist recommended these big chewable Gaviscon tablets to me. I was a big sceptical, but they’ve worked every time, once I’ve picked it out of my teeth that is.
@tiggerlion – you’re in the health profession I think, so you probably got introduced to the Brumaxatac hangover cure in your younger days. I first heard of it when I worked in Brighton A&E and my mate (a fellow A&E nurse) gave me some tablets before we commenced a lengthy drinking session. Not the kind of tablet you’d usually get offered in a Brighton pub in the mid-90s, but a concoction from the medicine cupboard. Brufen (ibuprofen), maxalon (metoclopromide) and zantac (ranitidine). He assured me I’d wake up with no hangover and fan my brow if it didn’t work! It was like finding the meaning of life. It also works as a cure the next morning, with plenty of water, so when I was in a London A&E a year later it was a regular sight of half a dozen of us lining up at the medicine cupboard straight after handover on an early shift. Then back to saving lives.
Not sure whether it would work as well on this clapped out 51 year old body as it did when I was 26, but for a few years in my youth it made the morning after much easier. I stopped drinking a few years ago cos of my stomach anyway, but the thought of having a skinful nowadays and being able to get up and be of any use the next morning is fantasy.
I spent the eighties drunk, hungover or working. Or any combination thereof. Without something similar to that concoction, I wouldn’t have functioned at all.
I have high blood pressure which is managed by a daily dose of amlodipine. Lockdown plus living on my own has propelled me to my highest weight ever. If i was any more sedintary I think I’d be dead.
The cherry on the bun (belgian bun usually) is a daily vertigo attack which usually arrives unannounced. It rarely lasts for more than 15 to 20 seconds, but it’s enough to mean I have to sit / fall / hold on to something, and more often than not sleep for an hour or so to “reset” my balance. It’s a by product of my deafness in my right ear – Menieres disease to give it the official title.
I have occasional spells of a week or so without an attack, so I can start driving again, even get out for a walk. God knows, I need the exercise. But then it returns and I find myself unwilling to leave the house and the proximity of my often needed bed. What triggers it remains uncertain – stress (quite likely), salt (maybe), caffine (I’ve cut down), red wine (oh come on), chocolate (leave off), cheese (not happening).
I’m lucky that my attacks are short and compared to others, small. I’ve mostly been able to work round attacks, so few of my colleagues even know I suffer. If there was any disease compatible with lockdown it’s this one.
I think I’d seriously struggle with Meniere’s, particular being deaf in one ear. I had a brief episode labyrinthitis many, many years ago. I’d rather be blind in one eye.
I suffered from a few vertigo attacks last year. I’m putting them down to stress and worry. My wife spent 3 months in hospital after a serious operation. ( I mentioned that here to some rather splendid messages of support for which I’m very grateful). I was all over the place for a little while.
They were short in duration but nonetheless did almost have me off my feet.
More importantly, Mrs B is at home and continues to improve.
Hats for Mrs. B then! 🎩🎩
Thanks Twang.
Never had the healthiest of lifestyles or diets, and up til now I’ve been just chipper, and the lucky bugger that I am, I remain ailment free (unless you count a nasty dose of athletes foot that just will not go away (3 months and counting – doc says no cause for concern as it is much much better than it was 6 weeks ago).
But … that same doc expressed concern at lifestyle and other annoyances/twinges/pains, and blood tests planned to check for onset of Type 2 Diabetes and/or “anything else” (their words, not mine).
Beer, fags, greasy food, and a sedantary existence are not ideal (apparently)
Like me, it’ll catch you up in the end. Why not try cycling? My eighty year old uncle got a bike. At first, he was buggered just going round the corner. Now, he does miles and miles a day.
Lockdown and being at home has usually involved a daily walk (or did when it wasn’t peeing down).
Did consider the bike idea back in April/May time but (surprisingly?) few to be found local to me – I don’t think bike shops suffered as much as other businesses early on.
Thanks for the prompt Tig
(certainly beats swimming – or drowning as I term it. Guess who can’t swim at the age of 50?)
YouTube is also your friend. Plenty of exercise there.
I’m currently doing Qi Qong with Lee Holden. Nice and gentle, good for the balance and very calming.
Sorry to hear about everyone’s ailments.
I’m actually in the lucky position (at the moment anyway) of being relatively healthy. I have always been lucky that regardless of diet, lack of exercise etc, my cholesterol, blood pressure and the rest of the standard markers were all okay. I’ve had a comprehensive health screening every year which has always been relatively clear – the main exception being that I was overweight (BMI hit about 28-29). Even then my BP whilst on the higher side was still within limits.
I gave up work a year or so ago and decided to get fit and lose the excess weight. A regime of daily swimming with breakfast after exercise (effectively making it one of these time restricted diets) led to losing more than 20kg and bringing my BMI bang in the middle of the range. BP is also down. Aside from the measurables, I feel much much healthier these days.
I was having a similar conversation on health with one of my swimming buddies and that I’m proud of the fact that at approaching 54, I am not on any medication.
Saying that, my mum died of cancer at 59 and my late dad had heart issues, along with various other family members having a diabetes and dementia, so I know the risk is there (I actually feel that dementia is going to be one of the biggest risks for folks in old age and they improve management of heart related and seem to get better and better at curing various cancers). I guess all I can do is continue to try and maintain a healthy lifestyle.
I fancied swimming but all the baths are closed. Are you doing anything else instead?
Well here in Singapore the pools only closed for a month in. the initial lockdown in April….
When I started my fitness binge after giving up work, I was also going to the gym for the exercise bike ( I really hate running / treadmills etc). I started with a few days a week but then settled into exercise bike 3 days a week and swimming every weekday (I don’t usually bother at weekends). The thinking was that I wanted cardio exercise from the bike and then calorie burning / strength exercise from the swimming. However recently I figured that I actually get more cardio from swimming anyway (according to the heart rate monitor) so the exercise bike wasn’t really adding anything. Hence these days it’s just swimming, which I still maintain is the most “complete’ form of exercise. It does help though that we are in a 25-30 degC climate and it’s an outdoor pool, which makes it all very pleasant.
I have to make do with the exercise bike. 😞 For now.
Swimming’s brill! Starting the day with a swim makes me feel great the whole day. I’m kind of obsessed with it (and have been for about 20 years). Pool closure is the worst aspect of winter lockdown for me.
Really missing the swim – or pensioner soup, as my son helpfully puts it…
A waterprof mp3 player – £15 on ebay. I was up to 5 mornings a week pre-plague and then again recently…
My mum died of a coronary artery rupture and so I’ve been checked for similar weaknesses and no-one has yet said don’t take out any subscriptions…
Local GP puts all over 60’s on a statin, because he realises that we’re all lying bastards when it comes to the what do you eat / drink / smoke / snort part of the MoT. He also helpfully points out that we’re not so much all living longer as dying more slowly….He really is a tonic !
“Don’t take out any prescriptions” – arf!
I’m fine, apart from being a bit mental, which is more like a way of life than a condition.
Started on a BP tablet last year which seems to be working well (maybe too well, as I’m holding it to blame for recent erectile difficulties – fortunately, me complaining about Little Sew is a bit like someone from around here complaining about how difficult it is to work the roof on their convertible sports car – “and how often, in the average year, do you use that..?”)
It looks like the beginning of arthritis in my toes – no pain or anything.
Finding it really hard to get out exercising now that the grimness of Winter has descended AND have been doing a lot of “fuck it” COVID eating at the same time. Have almost completely resisted the booze, though, so points to me.
Sláinte, everyone!
If ever the sun comes out and you fancy a quick spin, you can buy a little blue pill over the counter. 😉
Ooh Mr T! Are you suggesting I start juicing?
Actually, I don’t think the tablet we gave the world is available over the counter in Ireland (still makes it easier to get hold of than condoms were when I was a young lad..)
Yay, I love these threads where I get to show off me ailments! Still got bilateral tumours on the acoustic nerves inside my head, leaving me deaf in one ear, so far. I might have this genetic condition (NF2) where I lack the gene that surpresses tumours as I seemingly have small tumours on my spine too. But like the Tiggerlion, I feel fine and you’d never know to look at me that I have health issues. (If anything, you’d be somewhat taken aback by my striking beauty.)
I’m having a nightmare with my doctor who is typical of an Italian state worker in that he doesn’t seem to give a fuck about his job and having to deal with the public is apparently just an unwelcome hassle. He’s called me in for appointments then not shown up, given me a hearing test then lost the results. He’s useless. I’ve spoken to a couple of other doctors and have received conflicting advice (Surgery! No, radiation! No, wait and monitor!). I wish I could afford to go private.
Tiggerlion, “six plus times a day” to the loo: isn’t that fairly normal?
I was visiting the loo so often, I had to take music with me!
My bowels are normally once a day like clockwork – half an hour before I wake up.
But we talking 1s or 2s? 2s I’m once a day, first thing, like clockwork. But 1s I’m like 500 times a day (I’m not, that’s an exaggeration for effect, but certainly more than six). What a fun discussion!
Oh god yes. Peeing is extremely frequent and increasing in the night, made worse by the all the water I’m supposed to drink.
I was visiting the loo so often, I had to take music with me!
Afterword t-shirt…
👏👏
Nobody noticed my joke (not an original).
*sulky face*
Soz!
I did notice and it reminded me of this
And there was me thinking that having dodgy hips was a curse – sounds like I’m a lot luckier than others ! I had a hip resurfacing 15 years ago on my left hip and have just (July) had a complete hip replacement on my right hip. All caused (I think) by playing a lot of sport to no great standard.
My commiserations to all for your woes !
A total hip replacement is no picnic. Make sure you look after it so it lasts as long as possible.
Fit as a fiddle me. Nobody would guess I’m 93. Well, apart from the dodgy knees and chronic back pain that is. More worrying is arthritis spreading through my hands. I can barely write something down on the shopping list without yelping and according to my lovely French doctor (I see her twice a week just to check she’s ok) it’s only going to get worse.
Thank god there’s a music blog I can go to where I can forget about all my ailments….
Are you typing this with a pencil in your mouth?
Improve. Stay well everyone.
I guess I’m not doing too badly on the whole. Cracked a couple of teeth during the course of this bloody awful year which are painful but tolerable until I can get them sorted out.
My arthritic hip is becoming increasingly a problem. It’s getting more and more painful. I need it replacing but that doesn’t seem likely to be on the agenda for some time. I exercise it and the rest of me but I pay for it afterwards with increased pain and stiffness which is discouraging but I persevere. I take Naproxen for the inflammation but it doesn’t really improve matters but again I persevere. Finally just this past week I had a telephone consultation with my doctor about it. He prescribed co-codamol which I collected from my pharmacy last Thursday. Unfortunately the side effects of nausea and vomiting have been horrendous so today I haven’t bothered taking any. I have still spent the day literally in a cold sweat with occasional bouts of vomiting. I prefer to be in pain tbh. It’s difficult enough trying to paint when I’m in pain but feeling constantly nauseous makes it really difficult. Painting comes first. Everything else is secondary.
That’s it with medical science. Side effects can be worse than the problem. Co-codamol sends me off my head and Naproxen and its siblings ruin my stomach. Here’s hoping I don’t need painkillers any time soon. I might have to resort to Cannabis! 😉
I think it’s probably best to keep your hip moving but not so much you make it worse. You must be tempted to spend hours engrossed in the painting in the same position.
Have you tried Qi Qong?
I’ll check Qi Qong out. A low impact exercise regimen I assume. I take Omeprazole along with the Naproxen to protect my stomach and I try to have days without taking anything as much as possible. I’m not keen on taking prescription medications unless I really have to. I gave up smoking weed twenty years ago.
I live like a fu*king monk. No sex, no drink, no drugs, I gave up smoking, I don’t gamble, and I only eat once a day. Sheesh.
I stand to paint, I have always done so. It feels right for me. Less constricted. I usually start around 5:30 am and I work straight through to noon. I used to work in the afternoons as well but I don’t anymore as I get tired and start making errors so I read or listen to music nowadays instead.
I lead a quiet life.
I found naproxen to be as much use as somebody patting me on the head and saying “there, there, there”. It’s the first thing that got stopped when I saw my Pain Specialist. He referred to them as tic-tacs.
Crikey, do you really want to know? Even by my standards it would be a lengthy post!
Hurr
(my ailment right there… no therapy can shift it)
An old Shetland crofter woman, in response to someone listing their ailments said “I think it best that we just take you outside and shoot you”.
I don’t think I’ve reached that stage yet. But, when the time comes, I would like to die like a dog; surrounded by loved ones at an appointed time, quick and painless.
Just the Nobby Stiles, thankfully. Running four times a week since first lockdown has improved my bad back (old nursing injuries), but hasn’t shifted the stone I could do with losing.
Dementia?
Bum grapes (TMFTL)
Chalfonts. Rockfords. One shouldn’t laugh…
This is mine.
Superficial siderosis is a rare and potentially devastating syndrome caused by recurrent subarachnoid haemorrhage with accumulation of hemosiderin and other iron-containing pigments in the leptomeninges, brain surface, brainstem, cerebellum, cranial nerves, and spinal cord.
Basically the brain takes umbrage at this, I’ve a weakened right leg but luckily I’ve taken delivery of a device that stops the foot from dropping this means I can at least walk further than before and less chance of going A over T as it also affects my balance.
The tablets I take are the same ones for MS which my pharmacist says cost £4200 a jar for 100 tablets which I take four of a day. I can only get one jar at a time because of the expense (not paid by me luckily)
Having had two younger friends die in the last three weeks I count myself lucky at least.
Best of wishes to all of you.
Type 2 diabetes for about 9 years now – luckily never had any effects and not had a day sick in about 15 years. BP higher than it should be but not dangerously so. Take Statins but cholesterol level is 3.9 to 4.1 so I dont understand why they dont take me off them.
I was doing aqua 3 times per week before lockdown 1 and as soon as that came along I was getting pain in my right bicep and shoulder. Chiropractor treatment did bugger all so went private. MRI scan revealed torn tendon which I hope to improve sufficiently with physio to avoid an operation.
Back in September I was in Venice on holiday and got a number of mosquito bites. Subsequently I have had issues with severe itchy skin which has driven me nuts on occasion. Anti histimine cream has soothed it but not entirely eradicated it – worse when I just get out shower. I could really do with doctors advice but the only appointment you can get these days is a telephone one which is about as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike. I know @retropath2 will chide me but the only people benefitting from telephone appointments are the doctors themselves.
@stevet :duly chided. Wrong doctors 😉
Send them a photo by email, Steve.
Hubert, keep the faith.
All things considered: lucky to be alive.
2017-2018 increasing levels of unexplained sickness, more antibiotics than you can shake a stick at.
Nov 2018 – flu that didn’t clear.
Dec 2018 – strong sense that I’m about to die. Doctors can find nothing wrong.
Jan 2019 – admitted to hospital with pneumonia, empyema, lung abscess & sepsis
A week from death
Surgery to remove infection from lungs probably three weeks too late, hardened pus like cement removed.
Survived
A year later discovered that this is caused by a rare blood condition.
Pain from surgery is still immense. Many things I cannot do any more.
Two lessons:
If you know you are sick, don’t let the doctor fob you off
Work stress can kill
Good God! You’ve been through the mincer! I hope you continue to improve from this point on.
That reminds me. I must count my blessings.
I try to look on the bright side.
Many funny things during my hospital vacation. Student nurses wanting a selfie next to the 5 litres of pus drained out of my chest. Man opposite shouting ‘shed!!!’ randomly. Man next to me saying’NEED A POO’ often and failing to deliver.
Down side was hearing another person with a ‘do not resuscitate’ order die in horrible agony from a sepsis induced heart attack.
I get angry when I hear Covid deniers. I didn’t have it, I was a year early, but the outcome was similar to some of the worst cases
If anyone wonders why I don’t take pop music so seriously these days, this is the reason
Oh, and I’m now addicted to codeine
I only took Codeine once for back pain. It made me very constipated, so much so that I had to buy over the counter laxatives, the only time in my life I’ve needed to. The Codeine didn’t help the (severe) pain either but I’ve refused Codeine ever since.
Codine – took it once, made me throw up so hard any level of pain seemed preferable.
A mate of mine visited the doctor seeking relief for constipation, and was also prescribed over the counter laxatives. “I was hoping for the sort you could use in the bathromm” – he was hugely pleased with his rapier wit. Less so with the doc’s response – “I suppose we could try some ketamine too”.
Jeez Smiles that sounds awful. I just hope it all works out. Sounds like it’s at least to some extent under control. 🤞
Thanks! The main thing now is to keep away from sources of infection and to get regular blood tests to monitor for any worsening of the condition. The codeine thing I’ll crack at some point, but concentrating on being alive first of all.
Good luck.
High blood pressure is under control with Ramipril and Felodipine. I’ve lost a couple of stone during Covid, due to exercising more and eating better (I used to live a lot in hotels). I get out most days on my bike and I also use the cross trainer in the garage. Both are good for my arthritic knees although my current temporary work for the Royal Mail is fine for exercise but not so good for my knees and feet. I start on the vans next week which will suit me better while still keeping reasonably active.
I don’t have any trouble from my Nickel allergy which is kept at bay by Fexofenadine and my back is the best it’s been in years, probably due to not lifting the sort of awkward stuff I used to pre Covid. I wouldn’t say I’m pain free, plenty of aches and pains in my knees mainly but not the sort of back trouble I used to get which would leave me twisted in agony for days.
All in all, at 56, could be worse.
So far, I haven’t had any arthritic pain but, then, I don’t have a physically demanding job.
A blanket best wishes to you all and I hope things improve.
I’m not too bad actually. I’ve always been somewhere on the margins of lazy/sporty, going for bike rides, periods of jogging, squash, balanced by probably too much grog and rollies when I was younger but I’ve always been a healthy eater and never been over weight. It looks like things were heading that way 5 years ago so I counted the calories for 9 months and lost a stone and a half and have remained 13 6 which is ok. I could easily be under 13 if I was super good but where’s the fun in that in these difficult times? Gave up smoking 10 years ago and I’m mystified why I ever did something so stupid.
I had a nasty brush with excess stress bordering on crack up a few years ago which left me in a bad way but I’m mostly over it though I think it takes some time to really get over that sort of thing. Still have the odd wobble but getting there.
My main gripe at the moment is I try to get a swift 20 mins walk in at lunchtime and 45 – 60 mins in the evening but something went ping down the outside of my knee which runs into my calf and bloody hurts so I’m hobbling rather than swiftly walking at the moment.
I had a most unpleasant week a few years ago when I thought I might have lung cancer but though the initial scans showed something weird it turned out to be nothing. TFFT.
Ah. Things that go ping. They are often more painful and take longer to heal than broken bones.
The lung cancer thing sounds scary. I suppose, as we get older, we can all expect a Cancer scare, or worse.
We’re all thriving, it sounds.
I’m on statins, amlodipine, risperidol, something for gout … seeking to lose a few lbs to avoid metabolic syndrome as my liver is akin to fois gras, and may still cause hallucinations and keep you up all night. Plus short sight, a frozen right shoulder, and a slowly recovering psoriasis which was harmless but itchy and unattractive (though relative to me in a bathing costume, probably preferable).
I think it is right to look after one’s health,but also agree with Kingsley Amis that a lifetime of self-denial is not worth an extra four years on the psychogeriatric ward.
The way I look at is, if I take care now, I will increase the number of enjoyable years.
Whilst dying more slowly?
The batteries might run out.
I feel terribly guilty reading all this, you poor sods. It’s very unfair because I do everything wrong and the only thing I have to do is take statins for familial hyperlipidemia+bad behaviour. I feel like I’ve been riding my luck for decades.
My sleep went for a burton during lockdown but I’m pretty sure that was too much screentime and not enough exercise. I think the one thing keeping me alive is the fact that I walk eveywhere. That and all the rutting, of course.
Take care fellers….
Keep hurr-ing, Moose.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-54964487
770 per 100k. Jeez. Take care, Moose.
Oh come on, I don’t want to stand out. People would look!
Stay well all of you, please. You’re all far too entertaining and erudite to do without.
At 56, at the time of writing, I have no cause yet to complain.
My back has been giving me trouble for about 3 years or so now. Due to my typical Southern Commuter routine for what must be nearly thirty years now. Train journeys in and out and then sitting at a desk 5 days a week and not enough running, jumping and standing still to compensate during the leisure hours. Sciatica manifested first. Painful as all fuck. It’s merely a symptom of lumbar pain so I had to sort that out with physiotherapy and yoga.
While I was starting to get used to bending and stretching I opted for an operation to inject a dosage of painkiller into the lumbar region. It was meant to provide some relief from pain for anything between 2 to 6 months. It didn’t last very long at all as far as I recall. While in as day patient for the procedure the nurse seemed concerned by my blood pressure and advised having it properly diagnosed. I haven’t yet. But will.
Anyway, I seem to have found a favourable combination of physio stretches and yoga moves that ease the sciatic nerve and have improved my posture. I need to do them at least 3 times a week. My back is still not right though it’s far far better. I stand far straighter and have been told that’s added an inch to my perceived height.
I need my teeth sorted though. I have gappy teeth anyway – and can’t for the life of me understand why my parents never thought to sort them for me as a child – and they’ve always embarrassed me to a degree. I never smile in photos. Recently I managed to chip one of the front ones so they look like nothing on Gods earth now.
But all things considered I’m alright and thanks for asking.
Get your blood pressure checked. I first had a blood test showing my high cholesterol aged 19. I ignored it for twenty years! Don’t be a fool like me.
Knees a bit creaky, occasional bursitis in my left hip (apparently in the tradition of housemaid’s knee and tennis elbow, bursitis in the hip is called weaver’s bottom) but I’m glad to have reached my mid 50s with nothing chronic and no regular meds. Unless that is you count a daily loratidine in summer, because I’m ridiculously sensitive to insect bites. Unless I take preventative measures a simple mozzie bite will swell to the size of a ping pong ball and take weeks to heal, which is bad news because those buzzy little bastards love me.
You must be tasty. It’s true. Mozzies love the taste of certain people. I’m repulsive.
Yesterday – Friday the 13th – was the fifth anniversary of my near fatal heart attack. If I didn’t live within a ten minute ambulance ride of Papworth I’d have gone into cardiac arrest, according to the docs. Stented and back home in a couple of days.
Took six months off and returned to full time work but it was as if a switch had turned off in my mind – though colleagues would argue it hadn’t been in an “on” position for several years – and struggled to really care about corporate life from then on. Did my rehab – disco dancing in the village hall – and have taken all all the meds religiously since then.
Redundancy two years ago was tricky mentally – all the usual loss of status (and salary) stuff but a decent payoff left me with plenty of time to fart about. This time last year realised I was getting depressed, putting on weight and we seemed to be working through the wine subscription a little too quickly.
My annual health check revealed a “fatty liver” – lovely – so stopped drinking and bought a new dog – a bouncy bolshy retriever – and now out walking everyday for three or four miles through the beautiful ancient woodland that patchworks the Cambridgeshire landscape. It’s done wonders for my physical and mental health and knackers the dog which is a real bonus. Diet a bit wayward recently but doing much more cooking these days and post-lockdown will be back on the straight and narrow.
Naturally, every minor chest pain is another heart attack – a headache a brain haemorrhage which did for most of the males in my family – but overall in better condition that I’ve been for a while.
Sounds like you are doing really well. I like the sound of Disco Rehab.
I’ve been thinking about retirement but I’ve no idea what I’d do with myself. I’m sure my mental health would suffer for all the reasons you list and more. However, somehow people get through it.
Crikey O’Reilly, are we a representative slice of the population at large? Ah well, here goes…
I continue on the usual cocktail after my (largely self-inflicted) heart attack in ’05 – statins, aspirin, beta-blockers. I’ve had no trouble since then, so presumably they and the stents are doing the job.
Looks like I’ve got away with the prostate cancer since radiotherapy in ’16 – PSA continues down near zero, with last result the lowest yet. Consultant isn’t prepared to let me out of the woods yet, but she reckons another year of low scores should do it.
By which time, of course, I may have pegged it from the COPD (also self-inflicted, if I knew then what I know now etc…). I’m permanently short of breath, although if I manage to get a good long walk in I break through some sort of barrier and things get easier. Which is increasingly difficult as things start to hot up and get more humid in Brisbane – the plan was always to spend the winter in Blighty, thereby avoiding a Brisbane summer, but COVID has scuppered that. Locals tell me that Brisbane summers are getting worse…
And there’s the sleep apnoea of course, diagnosed by Mrs thep constantly poking me (not in a good way) to see if I was still alive. Like Dai, I’ve just ‘invested’, if that’s the word, in a CPAP machine after my sleep test pronounced me a serious case. It’s weird and uncomfortable; I suppose it’s helping, but I don’t feel any more rested. The machine phones home, so I get messages…’Seems like you’re having trouble, Mike. Why not call your sleep consultant?’
Apart from all that, tickety-boo! Hope everything works out for everybody.
You have quite a collection of ailments there. Enough for a boxed set. But you’re active and as sharp as a tack and still capable of looking after twins!
I hope I am, but I haven’t seen them in the flesh since February 7…apart from a brief socially distanced hello/goodbye in the street on my way to the airport in July. It’s a great and as of now unending sadness that I won’t die of, so didn’t think it worth mentioning here!
You’ll be near the front of the queue for the vaccine. Give it six months. Fingers crossed.
*cracks knuckles*
Well, I’ve been Type 1 Diabetic for 43 years.
I have missed most of the major complications thus far, excluding the eye issue back in 2010 when I had to have a vitrectomy and reattached retina. My right eye vision is…not great, but not life impacting.
I’m attached to an insulin pump, which communicates to my CGM, which is invaluable in managing my BG. For those who are conversant with such stuff, my last A1C was 5.9. I was really happy about that, until I found out that Covid mortality was centered around those with a 6.5 A1C. Either side of that and your odds dropped, which is counterintuitive to someone who has been told that stable low BG is best for all things.
I take a statin for cholesterol, and Lisinopril for BP – last BP was 110/65.
My left knee currently has two cartilage tears and enough arthritis that my physio asked when the replacement was due. The right knee is about three years behind the left.
I wrenched my back in September and was diagnosed with lumbar spondylosis, to which the physio added SI joint issues.
Currently that’s it – I’ll spare the litany of sports injuries that helped get me to here.
And I consider myself fit and healthy!
I’d say 5.9 is one side of 6.5. The better side. Besides, Scotland keep winning.
All other things to one side, 5.9 is better. When it comes to Covid mortality, not so.
Welcome to Sydney Sitheref2409 – I MUST say I copied & paste & printed your AOB re: arrival & quarrying here & your introduction to it – I give it to she who must be obeyed to forward to our relo’s etc in the UK showing them how it is really done for survival & restarting a close to “normal life” as we can get. I am glad to read that it was “pleasant experience” for you, as it has NOT been for everybody.
BUT BUT ALWAYS A BUT – HOW DID YOU MANAGE WITH ALL YOUR AILMENTS TO “PROCURE” A VISA?????
Skippys don’t need a visa to return home – Poms & other “aliens” do – that was how OZ government used to describe people entering & passing thru’ customs in the good ole days.
Oz is very strict on “infectious diseases/ailments” such as TB etc that can impact on our medical resources.
Anyhow all the best enjoy your stay/life (If emigrated here) especially as we are now coming into our summer season -hoping lockdown quarantine is NOT too daunting for you. Stay Covid safe & remember to Slip, Slap & Slop – Skippys know what it means.
regards Jack
What are ‘Skippys’?
The posts make no sense without that context for me.
There y’go.
https://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/british/skippy
For the uninitiated it is this “Pom’s” endearing term for Australians or in the vernacular Ozzies – I’ve earned the right – paid me (OZZIE) taxes for over 50 years, have been known to call ’em a lot worse when it is England vs Aus. games of footie (Soccer/League/Rugby).
We’re here for a minimum of 3 years, possibly 4.
I’m the dependent of a US Federal employee (Air Force civilian) posted here under a SOFA (Status Of Forces Agreement)
@sitheref2409 I hope they allow you out from under the sofa from time to time!
How’s it all going? I missed your post about you having to come on after.
In the grand scheme of things, it would be churlish to complain about anything. I’m 5 days away from leading a normal life with my wife, and 15 days from our unit being complete with the dog.
Which is what I keep telling myself, and what I kept saying when I was going through the Texas Experience. Sharon and I have a great opportunity and life experience ahead of us, and these minor inconveniences need to be borne with grace – which isn’t my default setting.
(Get back to me in a while when I’ve been refereeing in 43 degrees!)
Well enjoy your time here – you will probably get to see a lot more of this wonderful country than we will in the near future- with very little restriction – border covid closures exempt as part of the SOFA agreement.
Feels like I’m missing out. I’ve got the hypertension, who hasn’t at 56. Apart from that, nothing to note. I suspect my liver is planning coup at some point, that or the prostate, but I might get a few more trouble free years.
Since the initial lockdown I’ve become one of those sad middle-aged lycra-clad Strava cyclists, but as a result I was fitter than ever until a month ago. Unfortunately the change in the weather restricts that, so there’s a commensurate restriction to be made in calorie input. I haven’t done that part yet and it’s alarming how quickly an old body turns to lard. But generally, pretty happy, for now
I’m not sure Hypertension is inevitable in middle age. We need to go back to the post war period when there was rationing. We were all lithe and slim and, on average, died ten years earlier.
Actually, the research shows our calorie intake hasn’t increased a great deal since then but we exercise much less, machines taking over the heavy housework and getting to and from work. We also smoke much less. Public Health are never happy are they. A spare tyre round the middle is the price we pay.
My advice is to get a mangle and start handwashing your clothes.
Physical ailments? I have ’em. I’m 67. But I imagine anyone else would find them as tedious and uninteresting as I do. As tedious and uninteresting as I find theirs (no offence).
Au contraire, mon chapeau, I think we all might find some much needed cheer and merriment to help sustain us through these troublesome times.
Upsies!
Thanks for taking the trouble to let us know.
No trouble, Mike. Just a point of view that may differ from yours. If I don’t find my own ailments interesting enough to talk about, why should I find someone else’s? But thanks for taking the trouble to thank me for taking the trouble.
What makes you think anybody would be interested in the fact that you find physical ailments tedious and uninteresting?
And there are other threads
Yes, Dai. But my comment is about physical ailments. So making it on the thread about Metrobolist would have been inappropriate.
Is there a thread about Metrobolist ? I must have missed that – what did we all think ? Better or worse than the original MWSTW ?
I’m waiting for the Bowiexperts judgement. I like it.
I wish this Davie Bowed character would give it a bleedin rest. It’s another album every six weeks.
Well, you were, Mike, enough to spend your time mashing the keyboard twice so far. My comment was on topic. Starting from the premise that I’m bored by my own ailments – see? That’s the point, really. I have them but I find them uninteresting to talk about. Isn’t that a point of view that has its place in a thread about ailments?
And what makes you think that anybody would be interested in your opinion that you find my opinion that physical ailments are tedious and uninteresting is tedious and uninteresting?
We’re all bored by our own ailments. I’m not saying you’re not allowed to be equally bored by yours. A lot of people have opened up about personal stuff that matters to them. They won’t be at all surprised to hear that you find their contributions tedious and uninteresting of course, but I’m questioning the need to tell them so in such a tone-deaf way. Most of them are asleep of course…
I don’t think I said anywhere that I’m against the idea of people opening up and sharing, did I?
“They won’t be at all surprised to hear that you find their contributions tedious and uninteresting” – I shouldn’t need to repeat this, but I will, as it’s a fundamental point you seem unwilling to grasp. I find MY OWN ailments a drag to list, or even think about. I prefer not to. It would follow, logically, that I find other people’s boring, too. It’s not like I’m posting my own list and telling everyone to shut up.
As to everybody being bored by their own ailments – this thread seems to offer evidence to the contary. Notthatthere’sanythingwrongwiththat.
My way of dealing with ailments is not to dwell on them, to find something else to think about, and to (cornily) count my blessings that I’m not as badly off as many. You, possibly.
As to being tone deaf – thanks for that, Mike – does that really require a hyphen?
Yes.
😂 No soup for you!
But not tone deafness, apparently. Grammar are shite.
And anyway, according to this Scientific Test, tone deafness is not one of my ailments:
tonedeaftest.com
Thanks H.P. For bumping up the comment count.
You may be uninterested in your own ailments but now you’ve teased us, ‘I’ve got some but I’m not telling you,’ I’m sure I’m not the only one interested. Besides, I do recall you started a thread on physical ailments some years ago. It’s where I learnt the word ‘ailments’. You told us about one of yours in the OP. How is the rash?
This thread has turned bloody depressing. And just to rub it in, I’ve got an email in my Junk folder this morning offering me 50% off from “Walkinbathsforseniors.com”
Actually, for a demographic with an average age of what? Sixty? We are doing rather well, with a few notable exceptions.
Lodey.
Make your own Walkinbathsforseniors by simply slicing down the side of your recycling bin, attach hinges add a seal, (also doubles as a playful bathtime companion) hey presto a walk in bath at little cost.
Simply ask your plumber to up-end your bath to a vertical position- hey presto! A walk-in bath!
Some might object that the water would all go to the bottom. To them I say, “What do you think standing-water is then?”
Numpties.
Let the mockers mock, say I! They laughed at the Titanic, and the Delorean, and this novel and affordable hygiene solution combines the verticality of the one and the ease of access of the other.
Tig, I saw your thread was looking like tumbleweed so turned in a signature oh-so-humorous comment in the hope that some old trout would rise to the bait and boost your numbers. I have, on last count, 73 minor ailments, three of which defy diagnosis (including the rash on my teeth). I have a job at the local hospital as a demonstration model for trainee doctors and nurses. My spleen has been featured as centrefold in Lancet, and I am in great demand on the medical entertainment circuit with an act that climaxes in me demonstrating an intimate condition only previously familiar from the dark web.
Marvellous!
I preferred HP’s earlier stuff.
Well. In September 2018 I was having a lot of trouble eating. Just couldn’t swallow solids well and ended up living off soup. GP had given me pills for ulcers but they did nothing so I got a second opinion from one of his colleagues who sent me off for an endoscopy. Which is very unpleasant, but not as unpleasant as the results, because there was oesophagal cancer there which was what was stopping me from swallowing.
The NHS went into overdrive and within a few months I had been for an ultrasound endoscopy, CT scan, MRI scan, PET CT scan, plus a staging laparoscopy during which I had a jejunal tube fitted so I could have food pumped straight into my jejunum. A few months of chemotherapy reduced the tumour down to operable levels and last year I went in to have it removed in a 12-hour operation that removed my oesophagus, and stretched out my stomach to replace it.
After a week in ICU and a week on a ward I was sent home. 2 days later I went to the local hospital to have the 59 staples removed from my scars and felt a bit unwell. High temperature, fever, pain, etc. I called the GP to try and get a prescription for heavy-duty painkillers but she came out to see me and sent for an ambulance. It turned out that I had pneumonia because my internal stitches had come loose.
Another operation, followed by another week in ICU, and another week in a ward. This time I wasn’t in such a rush to get home! A bit of recuperation was followed by another course of chemotherapy and a staged return to work before my sick pay ran out. Last september I finally got the feeding tube removed and after more scans and endoscopies I got the all-clear!
Because of all that I now feel brilliant. I am only supposed to eat meals about the size of a cricket ball, have to avoid bread, can’t drink anything with a meal, can’t concentrate for too long and so on, but a few weeks of hardly being able to move, having more tubes than London Underground, and relying on nurses to wipe your arse puts it in perspective and stops me complaining because I know how much worse it can be.
I am currently about 6 stone lighter than I was two years ago, weight has been stable all this year. If it isn’t raining I get my 10,000 steps in every day. And I get to eat loads of chocolate to stop me losing even more weight 🙂
The downside was having to throw out all my clothes and buy a complete new wardrobe. Kicking myself because I bought some new suits and shirts for work and only got to wear them a few times before starting to work from home.
Just waiting for another operation to fix the incisional hernia from the big op. No rush for that, but it does mean I am reluctant to do any sort of exercise other than walking in case I strain something.
I know it all sounds grim, but I just keep thinking how lucky I am that it did not happen a year later before covid bunged up the hospitals. I had so many appointments for tests, consultations, chemo, physiotherapy, sometimes going to three different hospitals within a week for different reasons. What I had was only just operable. I think that any delays would have killed me off.
Glad to hear you are in better shape.
@Skuds. Did the chemo affect your hearing? My wife had to forego her last of three treatments because it was making her deaf. She had a combination radiation chemo treatment. Throat cancer also. All clear so far. Non smoker and non drinker btw. Me. I drink and smoke for twenty. Not a thing wrong. 🤷♂️
Blimey o’reilly, @skuds , that’s a tale and a half: “more tubes than London Underground”. Hope the first GP handed in his or her stethoscope in shame. Or had it took.
The first GP is well past retirement age and nobody wants to see him.
We are always constantly amazed to find he is still working there. Maybe he is a senior partner or something.
From what I have learned in the last year or two, my set of symptoms should have set alarm bells ringing and sent me for a camera down the throat as a first resort.
Senior partner? No. He will have retired for a week or so and will now be raking it in working four days a week. Everyone I know has at least one if these bed-blockers at their local surgery. This wouldn’t be possible if we didn’t have a chronic shortage of doctors, especially GPs.
I’m sure ending freedom of movement will sort all this out.
…er..
Oi, careful with that tarbrush, Tarquin. Officially I too am retired yet working, 3 1/2 days. Uncertain about “raking it in”, but drawing my superann alongside it certainly helps keep the wolf in virgins. I have every suspicion my esteemed colleague in the north is similar.
Yes, however I do take your point about those hanging on in (the) quiet desperation (of, often, their colleagues). But, in the absence of any new blood entering the biz, frankly we have an issue….
Me, I’m a year away from Vera, Chuck and Davetime, and two from OAP, that and paying off me mortgage being my intention. These divorces don’t come cheap. As my similarly thrice spliced wife said, as I mused over where we would be, had we met first time around, loaded, probably!
No. My hearing was fine.
Amongst other things I did get the fingers and toe syndrome – which is an official medical term I believe – but mostly on the fingers. I actually lost my fingerprints after a couple of months so had to remove fingerprint access on my phone.
The annoying thing was that whenever I asked the hospital about any of it and asked “is this normal” they always said “it is for you” because it is the first time that particular combination of drugs had been applied to my specific body chemistry.
I had smoked for about 40 years but gave up 5 years ago. I had to have loads of tests on lung, heart and liver function to make sure I would be fit enough to survive a pretty big operation and was amazed to find that I was actually quite healthy in those areas.
Wow, Skuds. You timed it perfectly really. So pleased you are doing well now.
The week after my diagnosis I took my motorbike theory test, but because of chemo I couldn’t do the practical. By the time I was recovered enough from the op to handle a big bike we were into lockdown.
When lockdown lifted I took some lessons and managed to get a mod 1 booked (which I failed) but there was no chance of re-booking the mod 1 and then doing mod 2 before the theory certificate expired. Re-booked the theory and couldn’t get a slot for 2 months, by which time we were locked down again. Now rebooked for between xmas and new year.
My point is that if all the restrictions could screw up something as simple as getting driving tests booked I do not want to think how difficult it must be for anybody going through what I did during this time, so yes the timing could not have been better really.
Maybe fate is thinking, I’ve saved him from cancer, I’m not going to let him kill himself on the road?
But, yes, that’s why we need to control the virus. If the NHS is too busy dealing with Covid, it can’t keep addressing new symptoms suggesting cancer, heart disease, strokes etc.
Oh fuck. Was that the Ivor Lewis procedure you had? Really glad you’re doing well.
I had to look up Ivor Lewis. It looks like what I had, but my surgeon didn’t go for the keyhole approach but the one that leaves a pair of very impressive scars and involved breaking ribs and deflating a lung.
I was OK with that, on the basis that I would be asleep anyway.
47 and no health scares yet. Touch wood.
Apart from a couple of brief periods in my life I’ve always been a bit chunky, but I just don’t have the willpower to be a true healthy eater .
Walking seems to work for me. I walk about two hours most days with the dog, rain or shine. I feel hardy, if not fit, and never been sporty.
47!?? Yir jist a bairn!
Hardy? Those types live forever. I bet you’d survive a nuclear holocaust.
Looking forward to Mad Max world. I’ll do fine.
Tom Hardy, ha ha.
Well after more than ten years of taking Lexapro , a seratonin inhibitor for anxiety / depression I have stopped. It was triggered by a marriage breakup and estrangement with my son. The latter happily resolved some time ago. But I am remarried and now retired planning to build a house at Inverloch – not the one in Scotland. So what do I have to stress about ? So I stopped them and guess what? I feel fine.
That is one less pill from the collection I swallow for asthma and reflux. And apart from this awful spring hayfever the breathing is far more manageable too. Being retired means no commute on a germ filled train to a germ filled office, plus COVID lockdown eliminated this year’s flu season and a lot of colds being transmitted which really do me over ordinarily. So not complaining, apart from the new ache that seems to appear every other day.
That’s perked me up. I think I will celebrate with a spliff.
Good on yer, Junior. Those preventer inhalers are a god-send.
Good Man!
Blimey, some of you have really been through it – thanks for sharing, and good luck with everything.
I’ve been on occasional omeprazole for many years for my stomach, which from time to time gives me gyp for no particular reason, although spicey food is generally a culprit. That was pretty much it until 3 years ago (I was 67 at the time) when I finally persuaded my GP that perhaps there was more wrong than people thought as I couldn’t pee properly when I was up in the night….physical exam of the prostate again…hmm, maybe a bit enlarged, nothing unusual, but I’ll refer you….very sceptical consultant at the hospital examined me again….hmmm, maybe a bit enlarged, can’t feel anything, but I’ll send you for an MRI scan. This revealed an anomaly on the front of the prostate which, after a biopsy, turned out to be a lowish grade cancer. I had the bugger removed and have been fine since, except for initial erectile disfunction which pills didn’t help, but is OK now.
I’m telling you all this because I had to really persist with doctors and this could easily have been missed, so don’t ignore symptoms!
My only other issue is my gums – apparently I have a condition afflicting around 5% of the population whereby my gums recede, and I think the change to my body chemistry due to the above issue has accelerated that and I am losing teeth. Dentures are looming next year I think.
My weight is OK – my wife has been on a slimming world regime for some years (she lost over 5 stone by the way, so it works!) – so diet is healthy. I play tennis a couple of times a week and thankfully am free of arthritis and so on. I have younger friends who have MS and Motor Neurone Disease so consider myself very lucky at 70. My Dad lived to 80 and was a lifelong smoker, so I’m hopeful I have a few more years here!
Medicine remains an art as much as a science. NICE guidance is often perceived as being black and white, especially if you read just the summaries. Prostate Cancer is particularly tricky. If we lived long enough, all men would get it. Then, there’s the issue of distinguishing between the tigers and the kittens.
But, you are quite right. No-one understands your body better than you. If something has changed don’t allow yourself to be fobbed off.
It’s great that you are healthy now. Good luck with the teeth.
What he said. Nobody is more of an expert in you than you. A much more important question to ask about any symptom is not if it is a lump or a different colour or leaking/bleeding, but is it different for you. The others may, of course, matter, but changes, any change from ‘your’ normal is what matters.
Didn’t they used to say your age is roughly the percentage of the chance you’ll get prostate cancer?
Since most men over 65 die with it rather than of it I think, probably yes.
It’s my understanding that everyone gets cancer in the end. People live longer, detection is better… The future is literally cancer.
In other news the survival rate for life is nil.
Rather raises the question: to be, or not to be and whether it’s nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them. I reckon it might seem attractive to die, in a way. It’s just like going to sleep, innit? No more. And by a sleep, to say we end the heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to. It’s a consummation devoutly to be wished, in a way. To die, to sleep. But (oh-oh!) to sleep, perchance to dream; aye, there’s the rub; for in that sleep of death, what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause. There’s the respect that makes calamity of so long life: for who would bear the whips and scorns of time, the oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely, the pangs of dispised love, the law’s delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes, when he himself might his quietus make with a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that the dread of something after death, the undiscovered country, from whose bourn no traveller returns, puzzles the will, and makes us rather bear those ills we have, than fly to others that we know not of?
Them’s my thoughts on the matter.
Blimey, Gary, you can’t arf rite wurdz an’ that, innit?
Don’t be impressed. He nicked that off BA Robertson.
Mel Brooks’s Hitler Rap, you uncultured shower…
I notice in adverts asking for money for cancer research, they terrify everyone by saying one in two of us will get it (as though it’s just one disease)! That’s because we are living longer, avoiding other types of death and we have to die of something.
(That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t donate to Cancer research.)
One in two? Could I please request that whoever I’m paired up with gets it. And could I request who I get to pair up with?
You can ask but you won’t get. It doesn’t work like that.
I’d be very happy with basal cell carcinoma of the skin, the least harmful of all cancers. I’m an unlikely candidate, though, despite fair skin and baldness. I’ve never liked the sun and always wear a hat outdoors (wearing one indoors is just silly, Mr Edge and Mr Costello).
I’m nailed on for prostate cancer. At least I get loads of scans and assessments as routine.
My spinal cord tumour was an ependymoma, so that didn’t use my turn up. Growing slowly since childhood apparently, and rare to be where it was (c-spine). It was a ruddy whopper too. But fairly easy to get out in one piece, just unfortunate where they had to slice, but could have turned out a lot worse. Been having new symptoms this past week though. I don’t like new symptoms, because once I get them they tend to stay and join the rest.
New symptoms always worry me. Shouldn’t you seek some advice?
I’ll see if it persists. It’s not so much new symptoms as a new area. To date all my problems are below the surgical site, as you’d imagine. The only time problems go uphill is if my neck is particularly bad and it brings on a migraine. I can tell when that’s coming straight away now though, so I can pre-empt the pain with a couple of paracetamol and rest. Somebody told me that 2 paracetamol with the tramadol boosts the effect big time and doesn’t give you the additional problems that having 2 extra tramadol brings. It was a great tip.
But twice in the past week I’ve had a very sore neck and the top of my head feels like there’s 50 needles stuck in it. Just gently brushing my (extremely short) hair doesn’t half hurt. It’s clearly a nerve thing, as I get similar feelings elsewhere from time to time, so I’ll just have to keep an eye on it. If it persists I’ll give one of my neuro doctors a ring. I only recently had a full brain and spine scan, so I know there’s nothing changed in that respect. I just have to rest my neck, support my head till the neck pain dies down and the pains at the top of my head then settle down. Just annoying that the bit of me that got away without theses weird nerve responses has now joined in. C’est la vie,
Having read your Meds list elsewhere on this thread, I don’t think you can do much else.
Good luck.
Reminds me of a discussion I always had with a Uni friend of mine who went on to become an actuary – i.e. working out the probability of people dying for insurance purposes. My point was that surely the probability was 1…….
We’re an unhealthy bunch aren’t we. I’m not well, but there are quite a few above that I wouldn’t want to trade places with. I’ve always been prone to bouts of unwellness, mainly related to my asthma, which has caused problems and many trips to/stays in hospital over the years, and I was known as sick boy before I even started with the symptoms of what completely changed my life.
I started off with neck pain in January 2002. We’d just moved office, so I had put it down to my new desk not being set up right, but then I started vomiting, like, all the time. I’d smell someone’s cup of tea and vomit, I’d get in the shower and the hot water on my face would make me vomit. It was a rotten time. I also was having a lot of problems with my left knee, which often would make me stop in my tracks, unable to walk. Anyway, I got a new job in the City, which came with private healthcare, so the missus got me to get a referral to see someone. I saw a rheumatologist in Harley Street who sent me off for a scan of my knee, which showed a small tear, but nothing which should make it so painful and lock up so often, but he only x-rayed my neck. That came back to bite me.
The next symptom was chronic constipation (it was awful), which eventually led to me having some extremely unpleasant tests. They couldn’t find a reason for it, but that’s because nobody asked me if I was taking a lot of over the counter medication for my painful neck. If they had I could have got away without having litres of air and litres of horrid fluid shoved where I didn’t want it. My neck continued to be painful, but I was having physio, so the weekly rub downs were just doing enough to mask the symptoms somewhat. Foolishly, I was doing the old stiff upper lip thing and kept telling my Specialist I was okay. It drove my then fiancé nuts.
It was about a year later the other symptoms started. I was having weird twitches down my arms, shooting pains down my arms and back, and then I started to lose some power down my arms. I once carried the shopping a mile back to home and had to stop every 3 or 4 steps cos I was losing the grip on the handles, even though the bags weren’t particularly heavy. The pain by this time was unbearable. I had nerve conduction studies, which showed a lot of problems, particularly down my left side, so we hoped it was a problem with one of my discs. My weakness had got so bad by this stage that my wife was having to help dress me. I had a very embarrassing incident when there was a group of us on a train after a day out. I went to the toilet, but had to come back 5 minutes later to ask my girlfriend to come and help me cos I couldn’t unfasten my zip. The crunch came when we were away for the weekend and I couldn’t even use my knife and fork to cut a Yorkshire pudding.
The next morning I set off for work, but the pain was unbearable. My missus (sorry, I keep calling her different names, but it’s the same person!) had taken a morning off, so I rung her to ask if she thought work would think bad of me if I took a sick day, cos they knew we had been away for the weekend. I went home, but as luck would have it I had an appointment with my Specialist at lunchtime. I went down and he finally arranged for me to have a scan of my neck. I’m a trained nurse, so when they pulled me out of the scanner and said they were just going to do one of my brain I got the first inkling something wasn’t right, as it never said brain on the form. I went back down to see my Specialist a few hours later, where he told me I had a whopping tumour in the middle of my spinal cord. My missus was going to come to the appointment with me, but she got stuck on the tube and hadn’t made it. My Specialist was calm when he told me, so I was quite calm too. He said he’d referred me to a brain/spinal surgeon (the chap who saved the boxer, Michael Watson’s life) and gave me a hug on the way out, which was odd and a little disconcerting. It was only when I got halfway down the stairs that it hit me. How was I going to tell my fiancé, 6 months before we were due to get married? She was in the waiting room. That was a tough moment. The Specialist had given me my scans to take to the surgeon. They were frightening to look at.
Fast forward a month. By the time my operation came around I had gone downhill rapidly and could barely walk. My surgeon was impressed that I could stand up at all though. I had my op, took around 10 hours. They had to remove the bone from the back of my neck and cut into the spinal cord to get it out. The op went well. I don’t think I was really prepared for the post-op period though. I stayed in for around 2 months for rehab. I had to be taught to walk again, which was weird. My neck was so swollen initially that I couldn’t look down. I couldn’t feel anything at all below my neck, but somehow I managed to start taking steps a week or so later. I was having to have lots of help though and it reinforced my view of private healthcare. You got the best medical team for the surgery, great rehab, fantastic hospital food (I’ve never eaten as well), but blimey, the nursing care left a lot to be desired.
The first day on the ward after I had left ITU a nurse introduced herself as she came on the night shift, she didn’t come back in until 7am the next morning (I had been awake all night), by which time I had a pressure sore on my arm and the nurse asked me what I was in for!?! I guess she did’t listen at handover. It was hard though. Everything made me so tired, particularly eating, and I was so uncomfortable. A month later I was moved to the Wellington for rehab and that night I had the first of my bad headaches. When I say bad, I mean the worst pain imaginable. The pain made me vomit, the nurse took my obs and my pulse was 32 and irregular, my BP 50/30. They gave me a shot of morphine and…didn’t come back into my room for 7 hours. Unbelievable really.
I was allowed home on weekend leave the next few weeks and each time I had these bad headaches. I realised it was travelling in the car that brought them on. I really can’t stress enough how bad they were. It led to problems years later, when my pain increased and they did my pain score at pain clinic. “If 10 is the worst pain you have ever had where would you put your current pain?” When I said 4 they wondered why I was there, so I had to explain that the worst pain I had ever had was off the scale, so my 4 would probably have been 10 had I not experienced that.
Eventually I got back on my feet and was taught how to write again and what have you. I probably went back to work a little too soon, but the wife’s mother came home from South Africa and moved in with us for a little while. Years later when my role at work was helping people back to work there were times when I had tried everything and got nowhere, so I considered sending the mother in law round, cos it worked for me.
Anyway, I got back on my feet and things gradually got easier. My surgeon originally thought I would be in a wheelchair within 5 years, but revised that as I improved. Every doctor who has seen my scans are amazed I can walk though, which I never know whether it’s a good thing, i.e. am I going to have a rapid decline at some point? The problems were only really beginning though. The first new problem was that since surgery I have had tinnitus in both ears. It’s horrible. You don’t appreciate how nice silence is until you never have it again.
Obviously, I also had the problems you would expect from having a tumour that ate away your spinal cord and having had your spinal cord split open. There’s pain for starters, both muscular and nerve pain (I have taken a hefty 75mg of amitriptyline from 6 months after surgery (in 2003) and that is excellent and takes almost all the nerve pain away. It does have its side effects though. My eyes are blurry, particularly in the mornings, and I have a really dry mouth all the time, which has led to dental problems. I also have limited feeling below my neck. I can’t tell where my hands and feet are unless I can see them. This, along with a poor balance, has led to many accidents, the most gruesome of which was getting my foot caught between the pedal and the wheel of those big 4 seater bikes on holiday, ripping my big toenail clean off. The Spanish doctor didn’t speak very good English, so I missed the ‘brace yourself, cos I am about to pour iodine onto your exposed nail bed’. Despite the limited feeling, I certainly felt that.
But I am constantly damaging a hand or a foot. I get a lot of burns and I don’t realise I have cut myself until I see the blood. I’ve broken a few toes walking into things, the worst one being around 18 months ago. The toe didn’t look deformed, so I didn’t bother going to A&E. I should have done though, because I now suspect I broke a bone in my foot too. The pain is still there 18 months later, although it has finally
started to ease off.
I really started going downhill about 4-5 years ago though, and had to stop working, cos I just couldn’t tolerate sitting at a desk. And the more I use my hands the more numb and useless they get (you’ve no idea how long it has taken me to write this), so on occasion I lost the power in an arm completely, so I had to go and lie flat for a bit until it came back. I got myself referred back to a Specialist (12 different ones over the next few years actually) and I’m now on so much medication I have to have one of those little tablet boxes the old dears use. Some of the problems I have are caused by my knackered spinal cord, some are caused by the tablets, so I take other tablets to counter them. So my current ailments are…pain (lots of), poor balance, cardiac arrhythmia, asthma, chronic dry mouth, gastric reflux (I must have woken up choking at least 20 times – scary), very poor sleep, with some night terrors, sleep paralysis and hallucinations, bloating (some days I look 8 months pregnant), constipation (and all the problems that come with this), a small hernia, sore knee, painful foot, short term memory problems, I have a sac of spinal fluid that developed post-op and if that shifts and presses on the spinal cord I’m usually in for a very painful day, I’m unable to get comfy unless I’m reclining at 45 degrees, problems passing urine (cos of the knackered spinal cord, not prostate or anything like that), chronic fatigue (associated with all my other issues, not ME), difficulty walking, poor strength in my hands/fingers, poor concentration…sorry, I jumped around my body there, so I’m bound to have forgotten something. Oh yes, cos of the damaged spinal cord I get strange nerve responses and small pains, all around my body, constantly, like I am surrounded by people with pins who are stabbing me with them. I’d say I have around half a dozen of these little pains each second. Sometimes they can be sharp enough to make me jump, but usually they are just niggly and annoying. They happen so fast it would be impossible to tell you where they are. I just couldn’t keep up, but at any given time it feels like I have 6 needles shoved in me, which in itself is weird, cos when I actually have a needle shoved in me I can’t feel it! The only thing I’ve never had any trouble with is my liver. And medication wise I take amitriptyline, pregablin, tramadol, omeprazole, baclofen, symbicort, gaviscon and several food supplements. And I’m petrified of getting COVID. My asthma alone would be a problem, but with the rest of it too I’d expect problems.
But with all that I managed to carry on working until 4-5 years ago, albeit I was working from home towards the end. Fortunately, I’m not someone who ever gets bored (unless I have to do something I don’t want to do). I can quite happily lie in a scanner for 3½ hours lost in my thoughts. I spend my day listening to loads of music and watching loads of films/series, wishing I could find the energy and enthusiasm to get more exercise and the concentration to read more books. And reading all the posts further up there are folk worse far off than me. And if I could get rid of one symptom for an hour, the one I would choose is my tinnitus. The pain is awful, but with my medication and if I can get in a comfy position I can have some relatively pain free moments, but the tinnitus never goes away. I have learned to ignore it and the hearing aids help, but it really would be heaven to have an hour of silence. But definitely my tinnitus, if I could choose. Or the feeling back in my, ahem, down belows. That’d be good too…
It’s a shame you can’t put photos on here, because my pre and post op scans of my spinal cord are pretty amazing. The photos they took of my tumour inside my spinal cord, just after they had sliced into it, less so. The nurse came into my cubicle in ITU the evening after my op and said “I have your photos, I’ll pop them under your pillow”. I had to wait till my missus came in the following lunchtime to ask her to get them out to see what the nurse was on about. They’re pretty gruesome. I don’t know why they thought I’d want them. They come in handy for making people wince though.
I knew there was something else! As I went to get up I remembered. A couple of months ago I decided that part of trouble with my tummy was that I have a load of visceral fat, as a result of eating lots of cakes and other stuff that’s bad for you and not getting much exercise. So I looked up some good exercises to do, lay on the floor to do the first one and I noticed a little soft lump by my belly button. I have a hernia close to there and several cysts in an area that I didn’t really want to go into above, so I stopped my exercises before I started and made a GP appointment. It was during lockdown, so would only be a telephone assessment, so a couple of hours later I thought it best to take a photo I could text to the GP. But when I laid down again the small lump was now…well, it looked like I had a wine bottle just under my skin from my ribs to my belly button. Again, I have a great photo of this.
It turns out I have diastasis recti, which basically means I’ve split my abdo muscles and that was my insides poking through. A few months later and it’s still there, despite the exercises to stop it. Apparently it’s common in ladies during delivery. It looks awful though and is quite uncomfortable. Just another thing I have to learn to live with. I wouldn’t mind, but I hadn’t even started the exercises. It was my body rejecting exercise.
I would certainly not want to trade places with you, what an absolute ordeal… I think that your story, and many others (including mine) show clearly that we need to get much better at (a) admitting to ourselves if we aren’t well and (b) telling other people what is really going on.
Wow, Paul, you really are one hell of a warrior.
I too have mad tinnitus. The most bizarre thing about it is that of course other people have no concept of it. They chat to me merrily without realising I have a totally mental high pitched washing machine wooshing around in my ear the whole time we’re talking.
I haven’t experienced much in the way of pain, but your talk of “off the scale” reminded me of an operation I had just six months ago to remove a varicose vein. The doctor went happily up my leg burning at different points with a laser (I think – I couldn’t actually see, as a strategic curtain separated me from my legs). He didn’t use any aneasthetic and I felt a little pain, but nothing worth mentioning. But when he got to the top of my leg/groin area, he found the vein was tangled. So he just cut my leg open and yanked it out! Unbe-fucking-lievabe pain! Truly felt like torture, in the literal rather than figurative sense. I’d never experienced anything like it before. My previous worst was a toothache, but -as you put it- this knocked that down to a 4 on the 1 to 10 scale.
I was the last of five patients operated on that day and each operation took about an hour from beginning to end. I think the doctor just thought, “fuck it, if I have to give him anaesthetic now, I’ll be here another 40 minutes – let’s just go for it”.
Ouch! Doesn’t sound like fun. But don’t knock toothache. It can be awful. I remember sitting in the relatives room one night shift with my jaw against the radiator when I was having trouble with my wisdom teeth. I’ve had so much treatment to my teeth now though that I just let the dentist crack on without the anaesthetic. My face is the only bit of me I can feel properly, so I hate it when it’s all numb. I’d rather have a few seconds of pain, although root treatment takes a bit longer and can be pretty painful. It soon goes off though. Much quicker than the anaesthetic does.
The only time I regretted it was when got an infection beneath one of my back teeth. It was hurting a lot anyway and I didn’t realise how far down he was going to be drilling – right to the bottom really. It really did hurt and I have a high pain threshold these days. He did say that the treatment might not work, but the very next day it was unbearable. Just the slightest touch of the tooth with my tongue was like wiring it up to the mains. Luckily the dentist could fit me in, so as I sat in his chair and told him I wanted it taking out I paused and asked if he wouldn’t mind giving me the anaesthetic for a change. He said there’s no way he’d do it without, and then said he was very surprised I didn’t ask for it the day before because it was very deep and looked very angry. So I politely asked him that the next time he’s surprised at my bravery to let me know before he starts drilling, as there are limits to my bravery.
The pains I get from the fluid sac pressing against my spinal cord are similar to toothache, cos it’s nerve pain. Anybody with a trapped nerve would say the same. Nerve pain is horrible, cos there’s little you can do about it without taking medication or drinking lots of alcohol, which is what I did when I got snowed in at my dad’s one New Year’s Eve and therefore couldn’t get home to my tablets. I knew that by about 4am my pain would be horrendous, so had the bright idea of turning to booze. Drinking all night kept the pain at bay until I got home the next morning and took my tablets. Quite fun too, but not a long term solution.
I’m amazed how you cope. I confess, Paul, there are times I don’t read all your posts because of their length. Now I know the effort you have to put in, I promise I’ll read them all from this point on.
Sometimes, I feel like I’m in The Walking Dead, a constant struggle to survive. Lord knows how you feel!
I don’t realise I’m writing so much, cos I tend to write as I speak, and it never looks that long in the little box that you type in, but there have been many times when I’ve clicked the post comment button and winced when I see it on the page. If it’s any consolation, I’m constantly getting ribbed by my sister for the length of my text messages and they really do take ages, cos it’s the fine motor things I struggle with. My kids think it’s hilarious watching me try to pick something like a tablet off the floor.
You can post pictures, but as you say they are pretty gruesome so it’s probably for the best.
All I can do is wish you the best.
No, wasn’t going to post the gruesome ones, just the scans of my spinal cord with tumour and then my neck with a great big space where the bone and spinal cord used to be, with not much more of a string of spinal cord left around C4-C6 and a nice bit sac of CSF at the top. They’re pretty cool.
I took photos and kept them on my phone cos I was sick of people, mainly physios, disbelieving me. “No mate, it wouldn’t have been inside your spinal cord, cos to get that out they’d need to cut into your spinal cord and then the damage would be permanent” “[sigh] I’ll fetch one of my scans next week, but trust me, be easy on the back of my neck”
I`m not going to list my ailments.
Why?
Because I believe in self-healing.
No touching stone or crystal rubbish.
I believe in staying positive through rational thinking, concentrating on what is possible to acheive and working out the negative side and turning it around. Sounds daft but it works for me.
Yes it`s hard sometimes when I can`t carry out activities I once found easy to do.
However as the song goes. `Always look on the bright side of life.`
That’s the spirit, Baron. Keep up the good work.
I support Norwich City and my brain hurts.
Get Delia to make you someat with fish. That’ll sort your noggin.
I have hereditary high cholesterol as well, and every time I tell someone they tell me I need to eat less fat. Er, that’s not how it works I’m afraid. Diagnosed about 25 years ago, they immediately put me on the statins. Turned out I couldn’t tolerate them, aching from head to toe all day for a 28 isn’t normal. I ended up on a trial for a new treatment a few years ago, an interesting process to be involved in. After 4 years the trial was deemed a success and is now available on prescription here. A once a fortnight injection with an epi-pen combined with 10mg of Ezetimibe has dropped my level from 11 to around 4.5.
Then of course there’s the aching back and neck, and the tendonitis in both wrists and arms courtesy of a working life spent mainly in an office. This virus thing has meant working from home for the last 8 months, so a bit more exercise has been good.
That was pretty much my starting level too!
Everyone around me seems to be getting tendonitis or arthritis. Fortunately, I don’t seem to do very much repetitively.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/nov/15/nocebo-effect-cause-of-most-statin-side-effects-research-suggests?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Apart from statins and something for gout (drinking too much, I’m sure) I feel blessed. My most troubling condition is the start of arthritis in my right thumb and this due only to playing the guitar.
I wish everyone the very best future and best possible health.
Watch that liver! Statins, gout tablets and alcohol don’t do it any good if you aren’t careful.
Thanks Tigger. I’ll drop the statins and gout tablets.
Dude’s got his priorities fixed…
Good man!
Diagnosed – finally – with Crohn’s seven and a half years ago. Drugs alone didn’t control it, so put on a LOFFLEX diet. Gave up coffee, alcohol, along with anything which tastes nice. But, you know what, it was all worth it. I’m healthier at 50 than I have been since I was a kid.
I take 6-Mercaptoprine, which requires regular (currently 3 monthly) blood tests to check Liver Function. Because my intestines are not very efficient, I take iron, calcium, vitamin B, vitamin D supplements and, because the 6-MP makes my skin hyper-sensitive, an antihistamine.
For the first time in my life I am not a streak of piss, I don’t need a belt to hold up my trews, so my 50+ MOT mentioned cholesterol. I am an 11-stone fat bastard!
Mrs F asked me the other day if I ever got bored of eating scrambled eggs for lunch every day. “I got bored of food about seven years ago, but I have to eat something.”
Anything – everything – is better than shitting blood 12 or 13 times a day and painful cramps. Sorry for anyone eating their lunch…
You might say “I could never give up grog/coffee/choc” but you would if you had to.
I spend nothing on booze, coffee or takeaway food. I buy a lot more records…
I think my diet is moving towards yours with alarming speed. Good to know I could be an eleven stone fat bastard on it.
I started at 8 stone… not sure if LOFFLEX is a weight-loss regime. I eat more protein and fewer carbs, so my weight is now stable.
Having boasted about being fairly healthy I’ve been off work for two days with some sort of bug which make me feel dizzy and shattered – seems to be some sort of dehydration/food poisoning thing. This is day 3 and I still feel crap and am sitting here mentally debating whether to go “in” today….
Get a test 😉
Had on yesterday after some helpful PMs. Awaiting results.