Where Every Day Is An Adventure.

Man, am I getting tired of being all complainy. I really try hard to look at the positives, which is sometimes quite difficult, being the normally gloomy pessimist that I was born. But things do just keep getting better and better (she said sarcastically).

Needed labwork yesterday to check on the worrisome hypercalcimia and to make sure my white count, platelet count, and hematocrit weren't taking a dive. Went to the lab bright and early -- well, at 10:00 -- and there was a room full of people. The tech said, "Sorry, Ma'am, we're closed," which seemed odd because there was obviously a room full of people and it was, after all, only 10:00 in the morning. I must have looked non-plussed, because she further explained, "After I see all these clients, I'm closing up." It seemed perfectly normal for me to ask when she would reopen. She replied, "I have no way of knowing, Sometime this afternoon, but you'll have to check back to find out the afternoon hours."  This struck me as a very shoddy way to run a business. Still, I had little choice.

We took fancy take-out lunch to one kid (well, as fancy at Taco Bell gets -- for some reason the kids think it's haute cuisine) because he was having a particularly rough time and I hoped it would make him feel better.  Then we walked around Walgreens for 45 minutes, because, why not? We drove back to the lab, found out they would be open again at 1:00, so did defensive driving maneuvers in the parking lot for a half an hour, just in case a zombie apocalypse broke out while we were inside. You never know.

Blood taken, went home, just in time to go back and start picking up kids. Another day shot!  Dropped one kid off at drama and took the other kid to get some Taco Bell for dinner -- important rule: if one kid gets Taco Bell, the other kid must also get Taco Bell within 24 hours or there is a rip in the space/time continuum.  Or as Nicky calls it, a rip in the space/time condominium.

Got kid back from drama, came home, opened the fridge. The fridge was not on. Checked around, found the breaker for that part of the kitchen (stove and fridge) was tripped. Switched it back, it tripped again.   Once more, with the same result. Pulled up info from the interwebs which said, "If a tripped breaker immediately trips again, DO NOT TRY TO FLIP IT BACK ON."  Oops.  Clearly said to call an electrician immediately before your house burns down and you all die. This was alarming. Not as alarming of as the smell of smoke in the hallway, though. It turned out to be from a power strip in the boys' room which was kind of scorched. Yeah, no idea. Unplugged it and threw it away. By this time the alarmed feeling was definitely increasing. Unplugged fridge and stove. Tried to calm kids down. Debated whether we could all fit in the car, along with the dogs and cats, overnight in case the house did decide to burn down. This seemed unworkable. No help from any quarter. Didn't want the food to go bad, so took the extension cord that runs the washer (the laundry room outlet that regularly runs the washer had shorted out about 18 months ago -- and there's also a shorted out outlet in one of the bathrooms -- yes, the house was apparently wired by meth-addled woodchucks and is probably a deathtrap in ways I haven't even considered) and found that if I plugged that in in a different hallway, we could alternate plugging appliances in. So most of the time we'll run the refrigerator off the extension cord, only unplugging it when we have to do laundry. And we can unplug that if we have to plug in the oven, or simply only eat things that can be heated in a microwave or eaten cold.)

And, yes, you're asking why I haven't called an electrician. Well, like doctors, electricians like to charge for their skills. Unfortunately doctors have already taken up all the money, and there is currently none left over for electricians. (Which is also why we have no working heater in the house -- hoping for a mild winter!)  Come to think of it, though, if we lived totally without any utilities for a while, we might be able to afford to choose one item to get repaired! Maybe we can score a reality show about people who live like pioneers, or possibly cavemen!  Really, there's opportunity everywhere you look.

Also, went back to the oncologist today to check yesterday's labwork. My WBC, RBC, Platelets, and Hematocrit all look good. So no expensive Neulasta shots to boost my immune system. Yay! But -- and there's always a but anymore -- the high blood calcium is yet higher and and the parathyroid hormone analyte is also way high  The good news is that doesn't indicate any kind of cancer. The bad news is that it does indicate a wonky set of parathyroid glands. This, unfortunately, necessitates seeing an endocrinologist that is located over an hour away (because that's the only endocrinologist anywhere within driving distance that is covered under my insurance). It also means another surgery to remove my parathyroid glands. Yippee! The trifecta. I asked if this was something that needed to be done soon. My oncologist replied, "Well, soon-ish. Within the next two months."  I asked because, even though I have already hit my out of pocket insurance limit with copays alone, it's all happened so fast that nothing is showing up on my insurance yet. And being that they won't take my word for it in any fine doctoring establishments that I am currently frequenting, I'm still paying hundreds of dollars in copays every week, with no end in sight. The copay well has run dry. After this week, it will be a choice between copays or eating food or defaulting on all the household bills. I'm supposed to be on a conference call with my insurance company case worker and the benefits department tomorrow to see if we can get all the claims expedited, but, honestly, at this point, I don't hold out much hope. Maybe they'll take an organ in exchange for enough money to pay for the next chemo round. Although I'm starting to get low on the organ front. I think most of the ones I still have left are pretty vital.  So we'll see.

I was recently told that my health problems are "very convenient" and quite burdensome to the delicate sensibilities of certain people. Something about making me too sympathetic for some people's tastes.  To which I say:  Why, yes, this is all very convenient!  Just as I planned it. Muhahahahahahaha. Even I can't understand my own evil genius.

So there, I groused about it, and now I go forward. I don't think people are bound to feeling sympathetic to me, because as bad as things are, there are tons of people who have it worse. Lots of people who have things that are waaaaay worse. Things I probably couldn't even imagine dealing with. And there are people who suck, and have to live with the fact that they suck, while at least I feel pretty good about myself 90% of the time. (And of course there are people too self-involved to realize how much they suck, but what are you going to do? Live and let live. I'll worry about myself, thanks.) In some respects, I'm quite, quite fortunate, and don't think I'm not grateful for that.

Message for the day? I don't think I have one. I've expended a lot of words in a lot of different mediums lately -- should that be media? I dunno anymore. And for all I say, a lot of times it just feels like messages in a bottle or scraps thrown into a wind storm. But at least saying things gets them out of my head. It's the only way I have left to deal with things, because every other avenue has been blocked off or bricked over or shunted into another dimension. Every signpost I relied on for the past 20 years to show me the way to safety has been systematically dismantled and burned until there aren't even any ashed left. So maybe the message is, as usual lately, to do your best. Do what you need to get by, to stay sane, to protect yourself and those you love. Sometimes it's a little to much to try to save everyone or help everyone, especially those who see your help as a hindrance (or an evil plan).  Do what you can, when you can. Pick your battles. Decided which hill is the one you're bound to die one, the one that is truly worth it,  and make that one count. Think good thoughts for those who have it tougher than you, no matter how tough you have it.  Because no matter how tough you have it, there's ALWAYS somebody who has it tougher. Understanding that helps you keep your perspective and stalls the little pity-party that sometimes springs up. It's all right to feel sorry for yourself. To feel pissed off. To rail at the unfairness of something. To scream at someone that this, this right here, is the final straw. To want someone to hold you or take your side or just make you feel that everything isn't an unmitigated disaster, to make you feel safe, to tell you everything is going to be okay and make you believe it. But sometimes all you've got is you, and it seems like that's just not going to be enough. So you cry or fall apart a little, or even a lot. And after you've got that out of your system, go forward. There's no other direction that's going to take you anywhere good or anywhere worth being. .