Potato, Tomato, Red Meat & Wheat

Try to eliminate those items from your diet & just see how difficult it would be. Yet, that is what my new book, "Eat Right for Your Blood Type" tells me I should avoid. Believe me it is difficult, and there are many, many more it suggests I should avoid, but I thought that if I can avoid these four as much as possible then I'll be doing pretty well.

I'm type "A". The natural vegetarian. I'm not surprised with that at all. I'll do my best to follow the book's suggestions, then perhaps I'll see an upgrade in my general well-being. If that does happen, then I'll be much more diligent about eliminating/introducing different foods into my daily diet.

So much for chili and spaghetti, huh?

I Opened Joe's EOB

One emergency room visit. One EKG. One IV med for pain. Blood panels, CAT scan, yadda, yadda, so-on and so-forth. 8145 and change is what it would have cost Joe and I for his visit to the ER last month. The kicker? Not getting diagnosed with anything.

However, upon returning to work two days later... two co-workers (one happened to be Joe's regular doctor) made a visual diagnosis. Then was told to go home, and not return to work for 7 days. What was it that caused all the trouble? Shingles. An exacerbation of the same virus that causes chicken pox.

I can't imagine how one would begin to pay medical bills without having insurance. Joe talks about patients in the heart hospital all the time that have no medical coverage. Recently one comes to mind. A thirty-one year old male from Clinton, just released, will likely have a $250K medical bill follow him home. At least that's what Joe estimated his bill to be. After all, he was in the hospital for two weeks.

But, Eighty-one hundred dollars? Just for an ER visit? Un-fucking-real!

Diagnosis Pending

Today may be the first steps in understanding many of the physical problems I've been forced to deal with over the past several years. I had thought that the stresses my life had been presented in that time was the main contributor to why I always felt terrible. But now, my life is quite different. The major stresses I once experienced in daily life are no longer present. As I told my doctor... "my life has never been better". The professional, relationship, financial, and social components of my life are all in sync and have harmonized so that I live quite an easy, happy, and fulfilling existence. But in contrast to that harmony, I am always in pain. It is much worse at times (such as now), and I'm smart enough to realize the the pattern has been cyclical. In addition to the pain, I also experience a bit of confusion (I've always been a neat-freak, and that bothers me to no end to not be able to organize as well as I once did), numbness in various parts of my arms and legs, episodes of itching that can bring me to tears (without any evidence of rash or redness), and also an annoying blind spot in my field of vision that has been present since August of last year.

I was so frustrated in not being heard by my previous physician that I sought-out a practitioner that would be more in tune with me and the problems I presented. The problem I wanted addressed first was my sleep apnea, and I now have that problem under control. But when I presented all of my symptoms to him yesterday, his response was... "You definately have my attention!" Then he asked "Why didn't you tell me about everything earlier?" It was then that I just started to cry. "Because I feel so bad, I didn't know what I had said and what I had not..."

Today, I will have an MRI. Maybe now I will start getting some answers. Feeling so bad maybe won't be as difficult to deal with if I am able to know what is causing it.

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Update:
I am very displeased with my doctor's lack of follow-up. Apparently, the MRI was only indicative of impacted sinuses, which I have no doubts I would have. But I know that cannot be the only cause of everything else I deal with on a daily basis.

I now have an appointment with a Neuro-Opthamologist at UAMS. In fact, he's the director of Neuro-Opthamology at the Jones Eye Institute. Dr. Joseph Chacko. Perhaps he will be able to determine why I have two permanent blind spots in my vision, one in each eye, and also at precisely the same area of visual field. Homonymous Quadrantanopsia. And if he's able to determine what caused that, then perhaps he will see more of what is going on with me. All the symptoms are classic Multiple Sclerosis indicators. I hope not, but at least with a real diagnosis, I could begin treatment and maybe even resume what mimics a normal life. Even if it is MS.