Svana is nearly 2 months old now, I think. She “should” be dead. She had many things wrong with her. Her esophagus went nowhere. Fluid leaking into the cavity around her lungs caused them to collapse. Other issues led to her being on a machine to “replace” her heart as well as her lungs. She had no rectum.
When she was about 2 or 3 days old, some men from the church her grandfather pastors gathered around and prayed for her. That evening, she had a bowel movement. Her grandfather said, “I don’t care if I am a Christian and a pastor – the first doctor who suggests that the original diagnosis (no rectum) was a mistake gets my fist in his face.” The issue with her lungs was up and down. She had surgery to connect her esophagus where it belonged. She has had other surgeries; I don’t know the details of all of them.
But while she was on the breathing machine & heart machine, there came a point where the doctors said, “She’s used up all her reserve. She has nothing left to fight with.” Her grandfather said, “She may not have any reserve, but we have – in God.”
The next thing we knew, Svana started improving. The lung machine was removed and she was put on a ventilator. Soon that was removed, as well as the heart machine. Her parents were able to hold her for the first time. The last I heard, they were even able to dress her. Interesting, isn’t it, that she has been improving steadily ever since the doctors said she had no more reserve?
Her grandfather is the pastor of the Brookville, PA, Assemblies of God Church; her great-grandparents are retired Nazarene missionaries.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
The Thin Line
The last couple of weeks have been rather hectic – again. I’ve done a lot of lawn mowing, of which there is always a lot to do. And I’ve finally gone over 1000 miles in my car without the “check engine” light coming on. There was another little problem arose – whenever I went to pump gas, the pump would kick off ‘way too soon. Hopefully, that is fixed now; Wally found where one of the new hoses he installed was kinking a bit and causing the back pressure. I took the car in for inspection today, and he has to order parts – struts and ball joints. This is going to be an expensive proposition!
Last week was the exciting time, though. A very short time, but could have had very long term – possibly permanent – implications. We have a rather steep bank next to our driveway. At one point in that bank, there is a set of make-shift stone steps. I use those steps to go into the upper part of my yard, where my clothesline is. I was up there hanging clothes Monday morning, and my dog was wondering around. Then the people who were staying in the cabin next door took their dogs outside. They were restrained, but I was afraid my dog might run over there. Time to take her down to the porch and put her on the chain. I was hurrying a bit, although the dog was behaving herself so far.
I started down the steps. On the second step, the sole of my shoe “stuck,” causing me to lose my balance. There were stones from the partially tumbled-down stone wall near the bottom of the steps. One of them had a pointed corner aimed upright. Had I fallen immediately, I would probably have struck my head on that point, and it would likely have been the end. As it was, I caught my balance just enough to take one more step before I fell, and missed the rock – well, not completely, I wound up with a cut near my temple. I also scraped my left shin, and stoved my left ankle, wrist and shoulder.
I started calling for Mike. I wondered why I had to call so loud; he’d just been at his computer and in a place where he should be able to easily hear me. Then I remembered that he had gone into the bathroom just before I came out, and that’s upstairs, and about as far away in the house as you could get from where I was. I was close enough to the fallen rocks that I was able to shift around a bit and pull myself up getting hold of them. I went into the house, and started up the stairs just as Mike started down. He hadn’t heard a thing. He wound up having to put a bandaid on my temple. The way it was torn, he thought maybe I should have stitches, but it wasn’t deep, so I didn’t think so.
The line is very thin between life and death.
In spite all this, the next day I was still up to going to Clarion for groceries. Then on Wednesday I mowed. On Thursday I mowed. On Friday I mowed. Saturday it rained. On Monday, I did laundry – and mowed. Today I took the car into the shop, ran a few errands – and mowed.
I’m going back out in a few minutes and do a little more mowing.
Last week was the exciting time, though. A very short time, but could have had very long term – possibly permanent – implications. We have a rather steep bank next to our driveway. At one point in that bank, there is a set of make-shift stone steps. I use those steps to go into the upper part of my yard, where my clothesline is. I was up there hanging clothes Monday morning, and my dog was wondering around. Then the people who were staying in the cabin next door took their dogs outside. They were restrained, but I was afraid my dog might run over there. Time to take her down to the porch and put her on the chain. I was hurrying a bit, although the dog was behaving herself so far.
I started down the steps. On the second step, the sole of my shoe “stuck,” causing me to lose my balance. There were stones from the partially tumbled-down stone wall near the bottom of the steps. One of them had a pointed corner aimed upright. Had I fallen immediately, I would probably have struck my head on that point, and it would likely have been the end. As it was, I caught my balance just enough to take one more step before I fell, and missed the rock – well, not completely, I wound up with a cut near my temple. I also scraped my left shin, and stoved my left ankle, wrist and shoulder.
I started calling for Mike. I wondered why I had to call so loud; he’d just been at his computer and in a place where he should be able to easily hear me. Then I remembered that he had gone into the bathroom just before I came out, and that’s upstairs, and about as far away in the house as you could get from where I was. I was close enough to the fallen rocks that I was able to shift around a bit and pull myself up getting hold of them. I went into the house, and started up the stairs just as Mike started down. He hadn’t heard a thing. He wound up having to put a bandaid on my temple. The way it was torn, he thought maybe I should have stitches, but it wasn’t deep, so I didn’t think so.
The line is very thin between life and death.
In spite all this, the next day I was still up to going to Clarion for groceries. Then on Wednesday I mowed. On Thursday I mowed. On Friday I mowed. Saturday it rained. On Monday, I did laundry – and mowed. Today I took the car into the shop, ran a few errands – and mowed.
I’m going back out in a few minutes and do a little more mowing.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Welcome to the Rat Race!
Things have been rather hectic the last week or so. It actually dates back to my last doctor’s appointment in early May. Nothing I did gave me relief from the pain in my back that I get whenever I spend more than 5 or 10 minutes doing a task that requires standing or walking. He prescribed a very strong pain medication, and faxed the perscription to my perscription company.
It was that same week that my hot water heater went out – well, it started leaking. It was still working, but a leaking hot water heater is not to be tolerated. A neighbor, who does most of my plumbing work, got a new hot water heater and installed it. This was on Thursday. He lit the pilot light, and fired up the heater. It lit up for a few seconds, then went out. After trying for some time to make it work, he found out that it was a factory fault – in a sealed compartment. GE was to call me and make an appointement – they would come out with a new hot water heater and install it. When they finally called me, they said they didn’t have a rep in the area, so I should have my plumber do the work, and they would reimburse him. Well, he doesn’t do much plumbing work any more (I’m one of his few plumbing customers), and he runs a tourist trap, where he and his wife were running a seminar that weekend, so it was out of the question for him to get back to me until Monday. So no hot water before Monday. Ray came Monday morning and took out the tank, to get the replacement. He had to go to Oil City, and cut a lot of red tape, and did double duty by doing some personal shopping while there. By evening I had hot water again.
But to continue with the story about the medications – Monday morning, my perscription came in the mail. It was one of those “take one or two tablets every 6 hours as needed for pain.” Well, in the doctor’s office, he said take two, etc. So I took two. This was about 11:00 am. Around noon I ate lunch. Shortly after, I started feeling weak and a little dizzy. Then my stomach started acting up. I grabbed the sheet that came with the medication, and read the side effects. It included all of the above. I called the doctor. He said, “Cut the medication to 1 tablet, and take every 4 hours.” Just shortly after that, I experienced another of the side-effects – vomiting. Loss of appetite was another. As I told several people, I not only lost my appetite, I lost my lunch. I slept all afternoon. After Ray came back & reinstalled the hot water heater, I went back to bed, and slept out most of the evening.
I ended up just taking the medication twice a day. Oddly enough, it still affected my appetite, to the point that I lost about 12 pounds in 6 weeks. I’ll take that side-effect any day of the week. Unfortunately, it seems to have worn off, and I’m gaining a little back.
OK, now fast forward to a week ago Monday. I did my laundry as usual, and was able to hang the clothes out. However, I was having just a little more pain than usual in my hips.
On Tuesday, our “hen party” was scheduled. That’s a bunch of us ladies who went to high school together. That was also my grocery day. I went to Brookville early, cashed a couple of checks, then went to the BiLo to get my vitamin D perscription filled. There was still a little time before the dinner, so I went up to my sister’s in Roseville and shot the breeze with her for a while. Then over to the Country Club for lunch. I was sure I couldn’t eat the whole meal that I ordered, because of the effects of the medication. I didn’t eat all of it (I’m usually a clean-plate person) but most of it, with no apparent ill affects. Then, by the time I got out of there, my stomach was started to get a little queasy. I drove over to Clarion to the Walmart for my regular grocery shopping. On the whole trip, my stomach was in pain. I started pushing the cart around, and in a very short time, the pain dissipated. The weather outside was rather warm, but they had the air conditioning going in the Walmart. So, now, I am pushing my cart around the nice, cool Walmart – and sweating like crazy!
By the time I headed for home, all my symptoms were pretty well gone. But I still had some pain in my hips.
Now we’re to Wednesday morning. I turned on my computer, and did some other things while waiting for it to boot up. I came back to a blue screen with a few messages on it, the most significant being “No Boot Device.” I restarted it several times, with no luck. I went to setup, and it appeared that one of the disk devices didn’t exist. I called Dell. After the tech had me try several things, it was concluded that the system didn’t recognize my hard drive. It could be either a cable, or the drive itself. The computer was still in warranty (and in-home warranty, at that!), so Dell made arrangements to have a tech come out and do whatever needed to be done. That took a while to get all straightened out since I’m out in the boonies, and I didn’t get the problem fixed until late Friday. Unfortunately, it was the disk, not the cable – and I lost everything, except what I had backed up, which was precious little. I lost absolutely all my documents. I had pictures backed up to September 2007; most of the pictures I lost were scanned in (so I still have the originals) or, if digital, the ones that were any good were posted on the internet and I can retrieve them from there. I still have some software I have to download.
One thing I lost – I had an ancient piece of software with which to record recipes. I had copied everything from an old diskette, and downloaded some software to convert them to a usable format. I’m pretty sure I have since thrown away all my old diskettes. I was usually able to read them, but I couldn’t reformat them, because of their age. Some of the recipes I still have somewhere from another source. Some I never tried – they were that type of “I’d like to try that some day.”
Now, while all the rest of this is going on, the pain in my hips is getting worse, and I can barely hobble around. I had ordered some plastic clogs from a mailorder house to wear outside in the mornings, because the grass is always quite wet. They arrived in the mail this past Monday. They don’t fit quite right. They are a little large in the back, but they put pressure on my big toes. What was amazing was that as I walked around in them, the pain in my hips eased. I suspect it something to do with the composition of the soles – thick, spongy plastic. They didn’t completely eliminate the pain, though. The next day, I was thinking, now the doc said that I could still use my OC pain medication (naproxen sodium) in addition to the prescription meds. I decided that I’d try taking one of them in the middle of the day, and maybe it would help a little. I have done so for the last three days, and it has virtually eliminated the hip pain. Now, if I could only get rid of the back pain . . .
Now, for the “monthly features” – first of all, the Magnaclam calendar:
Magnacalendar Images - July
And birthdays:
July 15 – my great-niece Qavah
July 21 – my daughter Karen
July 25 - my brother-in-law Phil
July 30 – my granddaughter Annie
Just fixed that last entry - Annie is definitely not my daughter!
Hey, family, I lost my birthdays list when my computer crashed, so I’d appreciate any of you helping me out with getting them back. I have at least the month & day for all those that I have posted here throughout the past year, but if possible, I’d like to have the year, too. I’d like to have a comprehensive list of all the birthdates in our family, and there are some whose birthdays I have never had – or at least, never had recorded.
It was that same week that my hot water heater went out – well, it started leaking. It was still working, but a leaking hot water heater is not to be tolerated. A neighbor, who does most of my plumbing work, got a new hot water heater and installed it. This was on Thursday. He lit the pilot light, and fired up the heater. It lit up for a few seconds, then went out. After trying for some time to make it work, he found out that it was a factory fault – in a sealed compartment. GE was to call me and make an appointement – they would come out with a new hot water heater and install it. When they finally called me, they said they didn’t have a rep in the area, so I should have my plumber do the work, and they would reimburse him. Well, he doesn’t do much plumbing work any more (I’m one of his few plumbing customers), and he runs a tourist trap, where he and his wife were running a seminar that weekend, so it was out of the question for him to get back to me until Monday. So no hot water before Monday. Ray came Monday morning and took out the tank, to get the replacement. He had to go to Oil City, and cut a lot of red tape, and did double duty by doing some personal shopping while there. By evening I had hot water again.
But to continue with the story about the medications – Monday morning, my perscription came in the mail. It was one of those “take one or two tablets every 6 hours as needed for pain.” Well, in the doctor’s office, he said take two, etc. So I took two. This was about 11:00 am. Around noon I ate lunch. Shortly after, I started feeling weak and a little dizzy. Then my stomach started acting up. I grabbed the sheet that came with the medication, and read the side effects. It included all of the above. I called the doctor. He said, “Cut the medication to 1 tablet, and take every 4 hours.” Just shortly after that, I experienced another of the side-effects – vomiting. Loss of appetite was another. As I told several people, I not only lost my appetite, I lost my lunch. I slept all afternoon. After Ray came back & reinstalled the hot water heater, I went back to bed, and slept out most of the evening.
I ended up just taking the medication twice a day. Oddly enough, it still affected my appetite, to the point that I lost about 12 pounds in 6 weeks. I’ll take that side-effect any day of the week. Unfortunately, it seems to have worn off, and I’m gaining a little back.
OK, now fast forward to a week ago Monday. I did my laundry as usual, and was able to hang the clothes out. However, I was having just a little more pain than usual in my hips.
On Tuesday, our “hen party” was scheduled. That’s a bunch of us ladies who went to high school together. That was also my grocery day. I went to Brookville early, cashed a couple of checks, then went to the BiLo to get my vitamin D perscription filled. There was still a little time before the dinner, so I went up to my sister’s in Roseville and shot the breeze with her for a while. Then over to the Country Club for lunch. I was sure I couldn’t eat the whole meal that I ordered, because of the effects of the medication. I didn’t eat all of it (I’m usually a clean-plate person) but most of it, with no apparent ill affects. Then, by the time I got out of there, my stomach was started to get a little queasy. I drove over to Clarion to the Walmart for my regular grocery shopping. On the whole trip, my stomach was in pain. I started pushing the cart around, and in a very short time, the pain dissipated. The weather outside was rather warm, but they had the air conditioning going in the Walmart. So, now, I am pushing my cart around the nice, cool Walmart – and sweating like crazy!
By the time I headed for home, all my symptoms were pretty well gone. But I still had some pain in my hips.
Now we’re to Wednesday morning. I turned on my computer, and did some other things while waiting for it to boot up. I came back to a blue screen with a few messages on it, the most significant being “No Boot Device.” I restarted it several times, with no luck. I went to setup, and it appeared that one of the disk devices didn’t exist. I called Dell. After the tech had me try several things, it was concluded that the system didn’t recognize my hard drive. It could be either a cable, or the drive itself. The computer was still in warranty (and in-home warranty, at that!), so Dell made arrangements to have a tech come out and do whatever needed to be done. That took a while to get all straightened out since I’m out in the boonies, and I didn’t get the problem fixed until late Friday. Unfortunately, it was the disk, not the cable – and I lost everything, except what I had backed up, which was precious little. I lost absolutely all my documents. I had pictures backed up to September 2007; most of the pictures I lost were scanned in (so I still have the originals) or, if digital, the ones that were any good were posted on the internet and I can retrieve them from there. I still have some software I have to download.
One thing I lost – I had an ancient piece of software with which to record recipes. I had copied everything from an old diskette, and downloaded some software to convert them to a usable format. I’m pretty sure I have since thrown away all my old diskettes. I was usually able to read them, but I couldn’t reformat them, because of their age. Some of the recipes I still have somewhere from another source. Some I never tried – they were that type of “I’d like to try that some day.”
Now, while all the rest of this is going on, the pain in my hips is getting worse, and I can barely hobble around. I had ordered some plastic clogs from a mailorder house to wear outside in the mornings, because the grass is always quite wet. They arrived in the mail this past Monday. They don’t fit quite right. They are a little large in the back, but they put pressure on my big toes. What was amazing was that as I walked around in them, the pain in my hips eased. I suspect it something to do with the composition of the soles – thick, spongy plastic. They didn’t completely eliminate the pain, though. The next day, I was thinking, now the doc said that I could still use my OC pain medication (naproxen sodium) in addition to the prescription meds. I decided that I’d try taking one of them in the middle of the day, and maybe it would help a little. I have done so for the last three days, and it has virtually eliminated the hip pain. Now, if I could only get rid of the back pain . . .
Now, for the “monthly features” – first of all, the Magnaclam calendar:
Magnacalendar Images - July
And birthdays:
July 15 – my great-niece Qavah
July 21 – my daughter Karen
July 25 - my brother-in-law Phil
July 30 – my granddaughter Annie
Just fixed that last entry - Annie is definitely not my daughter!
Hey, family, I lost my birthdays list when my computer crashed, so I’d appreciate any of you helping me out with getting them back. I have at least the month & day for all those that I have posted here throughout the past year, but if possible, I’d like to have the year, too. I’d like to have a comprehensive list of all the birthdates in our family, and there are some whose birthdays I have never had – or at least, never had recorded.
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