Medicine & Drugstore

After two straight weeks of exams, with 3-5 hours of sleep a night on average, I think I have a right to feel a little cathartic.

I learned this block that cathartic also means laxative.

I'm so tired that instead of "block" I typed "blood."

When I got home from exams, I drank pina coladas at my friend's apartment, tried to fall asleep in front of the pool, drove another friend to the airport, then picked up a fantasy novel that my boyfriend gave me a month ago and started to read it. As gripping a tale as it was (and it was!) I still fell asleep after fifteen pages.

My cat had to get an IV of subcutaneous fluids right before my respiratory exam, poor thing, and my boyfriend is still in the midst of what many graduate students consider to be tantamount to "academic hazing": the Qualifying Exam.

He's presenting his research idea tomorrow.  Naturally, instead of being helpful and supportive today, I got mad at him for not driving me to my last exam even though he'd only had three hours of sleep and needed a few more winks before he started his day. Then I spent the rest of the day apologizing. I hate doing that, and I've been trying so so very hard not to be mean to him during my exams. I suppose that I was suppressing a lot of emotions these past two weeks, and they all came flooding forth on the final day. Still, my behavior was uncalled for.

I just finished ironing my boyfriend's clothes for his presentation, and I'm about to wake him up from his 90 minute nap, which is all the sleep he's going to get tonight.. After much fiddling and re-wrinkling, I gave in and Googled "How to Iron a Shirt," placed my headphones securely in my ears, and watched in wonder as I learned that there is actually an order to the process (collar, then cuffs, then arms, then front panels, then back, then front panels again). After 90 minutes of ironing, the shirt looks as though a badger and a hobo were wrapped up in it as they fought tooth and nail for a box of Oreos...sorry, it's the only image my poor tired brain can come up with right now (and yes, I misused a preposition, something with which you must...deal...please).

Oh, but how I love him! And how I have been trying! I feel so horrible about messing up and getting mad at my boyfriend for something so idiotic, after all he has done for me--he drives me to school almost all the time and he takes care of me and came with me to the vet for my cat and kisses me and hugs me and calls me and and and everything else I could ever want. And yet I was mean to him. :(

This entry was posted on Friday, September 28th, 2007 at 2:00 am and is filed under Medical. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

1.  My birthday was yesterday.  I am a person who LOVES birthdays - mine and everyone elses.  Unfortunately, not everyone around me feels that way.  It was a nice day, though.  My dear husband got me a gorgeous arrangement of flowers and he took our children out on Tuesday night to buy a gift - which is a silver chain with three square diamonds.  Most of my co-workers were more impressed than I.  While I appreciate it and will wear it with pride, jewelry is my husband's fall back gift.  Whenever he has not put any thought into the occasion and waits until the last minute, he forgets the dozen or so items I had said would be nice and runs straight for the jewelry store.  See, now I sound bitchy.  Onward, then.  We did go to one of my favorite restaurants for dinner.

2.  I had my initial evaluation on my shoulder last night.  The physical therapist that did it was very kind and personable.  She asked me a lot of questions and really seemed to listen.  After the questions, she asked me to stand and then apologized for what had to happen next.  She had me do several range of motion tests, measuring each time.  It was excrutiatingly painful!  Then she did some strength tests, which didn't bother me as much, but I did point out that the strength tests should have done first because my shoulder was in so much pain from the range of motion tests.  Anyway, she was very good and said that it shouldn't take too many sessions before they would know if physical therapy would work because it wasn't strength I needed to work on - just pain free movement.  She put a patch on my shoulder that will deliver medication directly into the joint.  It seems to be helping as I am not in as much pain today.  We'll see.  I have to go back tonight.

3.  On a related note, the insurance committee has agreed to look into my claim.  Because we are privately insured, the district has the ability to approve otherwise uncovered items.  I wrote a letter expressing how it made more sense to pay for limited therapy now than to wait until they had to pay for surgery and more extensive therapy later.  Fortunately for me, another teacher in our elementary building just had shoulder surgery this summer and could accurately give a cost on her surgery and therapy.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  Another bit of good news on this front is that the therapist isn't going to charge me anything until I hear from my insurance company.  If they don't end up covering it, she said they will set up a payment plan for me.

4.  Plans for Christmas have begun - because we will be traveling!  I am quite excited about this prospect.  We will be traveling to Huntsville, Alabama to spend a week with my aunt and uncle and several cousins and their families.  I enjoy traveling and I like spending time with my extended family.  Hopefully everything works out!

I think that's all.    Oops, time for English class!

This entry was posted on Friday, September 21st, 2007 at 2:00 am and is filed under Medical. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.