June Chit Chat

[Sunshine]

Nuthatch, such a wonderful write up of tula and watching the photos. ty

Laz, i hate doctor induced problems...that stinks...

[Cherie]

Nuthatch,
How lovely! Thanks for sharing.

As far as the horse, I believe that one of Peg's profile pics was a photo of her on a horse. That may be what folks are thinking of. I don't think it was a .gif but a .jpg

Slammed trying to catch up over the next three days. Have to edit and submit over a hundred slides for a NMSS program I am doing in RI on the 15th doing both the Clinician Research presentation and the Wellness presentation. Also have to write another article for the MSFocus online Magazine this week, apply for my continuing education credits from the conference, pay bills, etc. At the moment it feels on the edge of overwhelming. Doesn't help that I only got about 4 hours of sleep last night. The three hour time change twice within a week is messing with me.

[Jeanie Z]

:) Just checking in. See the surgeon this afternoon. Nice post about Tula. Had an email from Tammy R. and she is surprised this board is still active. Maybe she will come on again. Jeanie :)

[agate]

Agate, would you please PM me an address so I can send a card.

nuthatch, I hope to do this a bit later today. I'm in a rush just now--a (routine) doctor's appointment to get to this AM.

Virginia, I think you're remembering right about Rita Slater. It was a nightmare.

Agate, if I remember correctly I believe Rita had a bad site reaction to Copaxone and got necrosis of the skin. The Nurse kept telling her to put hot water on the site and she did and it got worse and worse. I believe a friend of hers came on after that and said that Rita had done everything the nurse had told her to do and the nurse told her to keep giving the shots and I think she did that. I might be a little wrong on this, but it is kind of the way I remember it.

Jeanie, I'm sure everyone would be glad to see Tammy back here. She was known as Jingle for a while, I think?

[Howie]

I went to the store for all the nonfood items. Then went to CVS and got my refills, and I'm done for the day. It's really nice today, but it starts warming up from here on. Everyone have a great day!

[Sunshine]

It is not a UTI— good news. Sorta. That means my worsening of legs are not due to an infection.

Will see GYN, as feels like a yeast due to two courses of antibiotics, that didnt respond to OTC inserts.
That will be Friday since late afternoon appts are ahardship. I have a friend taking me first thing Friday morning.
At least no more anxiety about UTI.
Started the nightly Macrodantin and Ellura. The urodynamic test is in 3 weeks. Such a long wait....

[Virginia]

Nuthatch, here I was getting concerned about you, while you were just playing and having such a great time. Glad to hear that you had visitors and that you enjoyed them so much. Such a great story about the pictures. Any recent pictures of Tula that you might want to share?

I foolishly stayed up until a little after 1:30AM last night and felt very bad today. The weather here was great, but as Howie stated it is due to get hot again. Actually, it is the humidity that has helped so much.

I went to get hair cut and colored this afternoon. While leaning my head back at the shampoo bowl I had one of my dizzy spells. I had to tell the lady who does my hair that I needed to sit still for a minute when she let me up. It was first I had experienced in several days and I had hoped that this had stopped, but no such luck. I stopped and got something for supper and came home and had a ginger ale.

I have this site on my iPhone, but cannot post I don't think. I am not sure because the text is so small for this site that I can't tell and I haven't learned how to get around this site on the iPhone. I am going quite a few places on the phone, but obviously there is a lot I need to learn to maximize my use of it. I am not too motivated because my computer and very large monitor are so close here at home and my home phone has always been preferable to me over my cell phone. I will learn as I go along to do more on the phone. I do enjoy listening to the podcast and reading some news.

[stillstANNding]

Virginia, I use my phone to read and post here at BT.

Sorry you still have the dizzy spells. Did you ever look into the inner ear thing with an ENT?

Sunshine, that is da** long. Too long.

Cherie, I’d bet the house that you will meet all of your deadlines.

I was up early as my cat Lily finds it necessary to sleep on my head. I just couldn’t shake her.

ANN

[nuthatch]

Sorry Virginia, I don't mean to make anyone worry! When Tula comes for a visit, I am in constant demand, much to my delight. We are both a couple of nuts and enjoy each others antics immensely. My daughter enjoys the break and gets to have conversations with her dad without the interruptions of a toddler. She also enjoys watching her daughter interact with her Nana and Grandpa since we live so far apart.

Sorry to hear you're still dealing with dizziness. Have you spoken to you doctor about the possibility of BPPV being the cause? Trying not to nag, but don't want you to suffer with dizziness unnecessarily if it's something that is simple to fix. Here is another article that explains BPPV clearly.
Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

I have a smart phone but never utilize half of what it can do. I think it's way, way smarter than I am! The camera, text, and the speaker phone are the invaluable functions for me. I recently found out, thanks to my son, that I can talk and also see him in a phone call. I now get to see my grandson, Everett and he can see me too! Since I will never get to see their home in person, Ean has given me a tour of their home with his phone. Everett shows me his toys, his back yard, even his little dog! We give each other phone kisses. It's great!

Thinking of Jeanie, Cat, Rose and of course, Peg's family. Prayers for healing.

Hang in there Sunshine.

Ann, is the eating thing improving? I sure couldn't sleep with a cat on my head! One of mine sleeps against my left side every night. The other cat sleeps next to DH after she walks across him just as he is drifting off! Drives him crazy. Cats . . . they have a mind of their own!

Well, I just had some fresh raw veggies dipped in red wine vinegar dressing. Can't get used to eating burgundy colored carrots! Makes me think of Laz!
Funny, pasta makes me think of Howie and that yummy potato soup always brings Virginia to mind! Of course, chocolate is an Ann thing!
Welcome back to Hoots! Stick around!
Hi to anyone else I missed mentioning too.
Here's a pic of my girl.

[Lazarus]

I had the first round of rituxan in this June course yesterday. I was full of energy last night but my neuro always reminded me that the immediate energy was probably coming from the pre med of steroids I get before the rituxan. Whatever, I even thought about cleaning the house so I must be feeling better!

The farming season is starting off slowly here in western Massachusetts. But, the fields are almost all planted.... some crops are big enough so that when I look down the rows I can see straight lines of crops that have emerged from the ground. I love that look...before the weeds have emerged to threaten the crop. The battle goes on....

[agate]

Linda, an energy boost is always good!

nuthatch, did you intend to post a photo? Maybe others are seeing it but it's not there for me.

Had a routine doctor's appointment yesterday. I was concerned because the lab test results recently showed a low potassium level, again. However, we came to an agreement about that, and I'm going back in 3 months for a recheck. She is fortunately turning out to be the kind of doctor who doesn't have the attitude that it's "my way or the highway." She's open to my input.

We discussed whether the vitamin D level should be any higher. The previous doctor wanted it at 80 but the recent test showed it had slipped to 69 from 71. She looked this up and we decided not to change anything about the vitamin D. I'll go on taking 5,000 IU a day. I received congratulations on the BP (112/60) and the HbA1C (5.3). It's always nice to come away from a doctor's appointment without bad news. Like a reprieve. And she treats me with respect, which I really appreciate.

[Sunshine]

I see that Ellura has been endorsed last month by the American Urological Association as a prophylactic.
Comforting. I had started it yesterday.

Keep that doctor Agate.

Did the brain MRI today and I didn’t spasm. The tech frowned that the neuro did not order with contrast and aske me why and told me why she thought I should. He specifically said to me No Contrast. I didn’t argue with him since my veins are heavily used and compromised by IVIG. And I have plenty of gadolinium in my body already from past scans.

[Cherie]

Seems we have two June Chit-Chats going. Howie started this one at 12:02 am on June 1st and Lazarus started the other a little over 4 hours later.

As to no contrast on MRI: In relatively stable MS or older adults with MS (over 60) who may have slightly slowed or compromised renal function due to age, it is recommended NOT to use contrast routinely any more. It is to be used mainly for diagnostic purposes and in younger adults. While they used to believe gadolinium cleared in about an hour, they are now finding traces of it in tissue (especially kidney) a month or more after exposure. My Dr and the two "second opinions" I have seen in the last 5 years have all ordered MRIs with NO CONTRAST.

[Virginia]

Cherie, could this be due in any way to the stronger MRI machines. I am not saying they are bad, but once when I asked the Radiologist about the T3 (and let me point out this has been many years ago) he said that he would trust his wife in the machine I was using which was not a T3. He stated that he would put her in a T3 only if it was medically necessary. He also stated that for MS purposes that the older machines were fine. Maybe all this has changed since then.

Nuthatch, you said you were posting a picture of Tula, but no picture showed up. If I had a cute curly headed little girl I would show her off at every opportunity. I have found Face Time on my phone, but I will not be using it. I have heard people say that it can make you look pretty bad. Of course a little grandson could never look bad.

I may very well have BPPV. That was a good article on it. I am very lazy when it comes to going to any Doctor anymore. It is so hard to get in to see the good ones around here and I end up being so frustrated. I go if I think I just have to. Otherwise, I sit back and admire people like Ann, Sunshine and Agate who are so diligent about taking good care of their health. I think I do that, pretty much, other than going to the Doctor and keeping regular hours.

Speaking of regular hours I was still paying this morning into the afternoon for overdoing on Sunday. When walking is better due to low humidity it is hard not to do it, and then I stayed up late writing some notes, one to Farmer Joe, and I think that is what finished me off. Then of course I had to get up yesterday and go get haircut.

Ann, you need to cut me some slack. I am older than you are. Besides I just got my phone last week. I thought I was doing pretty good to pull up this site and log myself in. I can't set the text on it and it is very tiny. I did read Agate's latest post and hit the thanks button, and also Sunshine's. I can't go back and forth between threads. I have to go out and then go back in and pull up a different thread. I was able to get FB put on, but have not yet been able to log in. My fault because I can't remember my password. There are a host of other things I have done maybe once or twice and then can't find my way back to them. I need to read the tutorial that I saved off U-tube. I read part of it, but since I did it before I had received the phone obviously it didn't make much sense to me.

Linda, thanks for being our farm update person. We miss that and it helps that we have you.

Agate, my D3 was in the 70s close to 80 years ago. The kind of D3 I was taking was discontinued and since starting another organic kind several years ago it has not gotten out of the 50s. Sounds like you have a good Doctor. I am so glad you do. I miss the Neuro I had for almost 20 years.

Got to go fix dinner. Having Sunshine's chicken, pesto, tomato and cheese dish again. Easy to fix and good, so I eat it pretty often.

[Cherie]

Virginia.
In a session at the Consortium meeting, they were saying that the 1.5 Tesla machines that we have used from the beginning are NOT ok any longer to diagnose or track active disease and that many people can go years with an unclear diagnosis which could have been arrived at in a 3 tesla machine. 7 Tesla machines are now available in many of the major Comprehensive MS Treatment Centers throughout the Country and can even more clearly track disease progress.