Blogging from the coffee shop again, since the home internet situation is still not fixed. According to one of the phone technicians, my signal is not strong enough, so they are sending someone out to check on it tomorrow night.
Whatever, it has actually been kind of nice. I read some Douglas Adams, then a trashy old Ludlum paperback, and now am on Chris Mooney’s new book. I’m also caught up on Entourage and Hung, and working through back episodes of Rescue Me.
Hopefully this blog will be back to normal tomorrow night.
A Mom Anon
Not to harsh anyone’s buzz or anything,but if ya’all could keep a good thought for my husband,I’d really appreciate it.
He had a heart attack this morning and I almost lost him. He’s only 42,but he hasn’t been managing his diabetes,blood pressure or cholesterol. I found out in the ER he hasn’t taken his meds since MARCH(why? Because he felt better,I don’t know whether to cry or strangle him).
He’s in a coronary care unit right now,hopefully he’ll be in a regular room tommorrow and then he can come home in a couple days. I’m scared he’s going to loose his job,and even more scared that our health insurance isn’t going to cover all this.
I’ve been up since 4am and I’m not even sure if I can sleep,even though I know I have to.
schrodinger's cat
Mom Anon, my thoughts are with you. I hope your husband starts feeling better soon. Keep us updated about his situation
and good luck.
Svensker
@A Mom Anon:
Wow.
Prayers and good thoughts to you and your hub.
Will this make him take his medicine more seriously?
Big hugs. Let us know if we can do anything.
General Winfield Stuck
@A Mom Anon:
I am really sorry to hear that Mom Anon. That is awfully young to have a HA. But it has to be good news that he’s in ICU and has survived. Maybe being so young helped him survive and now he will manage the risk factors. And try and not worry yourself so much about the future. I know that’s hard to do in such a situation, just take it day at a time and be glad he’s alive. Things will work out:) you’ll see.
smiley
Heartfelt sympathy to you, A Mom Anon. I’m sure this event will convince him that he needs to take his meds (is it the injections?) .
Delia
@A Mom Anon:
That’s really a rough place you’re in right now. I’ll send out prayers and good thoughts as well, for you and him and your whole family.
Rey
@ A Mom Anon
another Wow. You will definitely be in my prayers. Went through this same thing with my 72 yo mom back in March. She had not been taking her meds since Sept. Try not to be too angry with him, hopefully this will be a wake up call. (((((hugs)))))
Violet
Mom Anon, sending comforting thoughts your way. Take care of the immediate stuff and don’t worry too much about the long term things. Just make sure you alert the insurance company so they can’t pull that “you didn’t notify us within 24 hours” nonsense down the road.
Sending healing thoughts your direction. And don’t forget to take a few moments for yourself. You’re important too.
Hugs.
geg6
A Mom Anon: My gawd, thank FSM he’s pulled through the worst. Hopefully, he’s now learned the importance of the meds. I sure hope all works out well and I’ll be sending good thoughts your way. And John? Should you check this, Rescue Me is SEARING this season. Might be the most brilliant season ever of a pretty consistently excellent series. Denis Leary, whatever you may think of him, is fearless, especially this season. I’ve been in awe. He does completely fucked up better than almost anybody.
2th&nayle
@A Mom Anon: Geez Louise! I just thought I was havin’ a bad day! Thank goodness y’all were close to a hospital! Scary stuff! Sendin’ all my good energies to you both. Take care!
burnspbesq
Prayers are with you, Mom.
I shouldn’t be lecturing anybody – I am not on the shortlist for the award for World’s Most Compliant Diabetic (too much naughty food and too little exercise, both of which are facilitated by my career choice), but let me share one little tidbit.
If your hubby’s regimen includes insulin, and he’s got a bottle and syringes, and he’s not doing it because it’s too much of a pain in the ass or he’s needle shy, PENS ARE THE ANSWER!!!!!
Sorry for shouting.
Dustin
Bloody hell, and here I was going to tell John to skip Mooney’s book because it’s sniveling trash…
Hope everything’s going well with your husband Anon, young heart troubles are never easy.
JK
Does anyone know of any job openings for an online researcher or fact checker in the New York City area?
Beeb
Warm healing thoughts going out to both of you, Mom Anon.
General Winfield Stuck
@JK:
Internet tradition deplores fact checking.
AhabTRuler
hmmm…hmmm…nope, got nothing!
Chris Zerhusen
I hope your husband makes a full recovery Mom Anon. Fortunately our medical care has gotten pretty good at managing heart problems. My Grandfather lived for 30 years after his first heart attack (of four). May your husband have even longer.
WereBear
Oh Mom Anon, I’m so sorry. That’s an awful lot to deal with at once. Two things come to mind.
Get someone by your side. We all care here, but there’s just no substitute for a hand to hang onto and a shoulder to cry on.
If it were me, I’d call my Congressperson and both Senators, saying how worried you are about this insurance situation. Ask for a staffer’s name. Write them a letter and get one back. May not help, but when it comes to worrying about insurance it can’t hurt to be able to say you have paperwork. It can make them think about going after easier prey, maybe.
JK
Here’s some stories to bring people down because I haven’t been feeling good these past few years, regarding my job situation, and misery likes company.
Too Hot for Fox News
thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-07-29/too-hot-for-fox-news/?cid=hp:beastoriginalsC6
Queen of the Birthers
thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-07-30/queen-of-the-birthers/?cid=hp:beastoriginalsR2
pika
@A Mom Anon: I am sending you thoughts of strength and peace.
Mona
Geez Mom Anon, I was about to (elsewhere) write something sniveling and self-pitying. You brought me back to reality and I am sending loving thoughts your way.
JK
@A Mom Anon: Good Luck to you and your husband.
Litlebritdifrnt
A mom anon – DH recently had a scare wrt to his heart and I can understand where you are. My thoughts are with you.
John wrt the signal strength being weak or some such thing. When I got road runner in addition to my cable the idiot technician who came in to fix it up screwed up and instead of giving us a dedicated line split the cable which basically gave us a “half strength” to both cable and internet. It took them (competent technicians) forever to figure it out. Once they got that figured out it happened again several months later, they of course checked all the usual problems to no avail until BINGO, turned out somehow that some dude had managed to break into the cable box across the street and was hooked up to our (and other neighbor’s) cable illegally and was syphoning off our signal strength. Once they got that figured out we were good, it was a pain in the neck until they figured out what was going on though.
A Mom Anon
Thank all of you so much, seriously. For those of you that asked,he has Type 2 Diabetes,which should have been managed with oral meds twice a day. But nooo,he had to be 5 yrs old about it. Sigh. Once he’s doing better,I’m kicking his ass. And just to make it a super deluxe special happy fun ball kind of day,it’s our 16th wedding anniversary. He’s SO lucky I love him. I’ve cried like 80 times today,and I STILL can’t wind down enough to rest. If something happens to him I won’t be right for a long time. Neither will our son.
I didn’t mean to steal the OT thread,lol. This is really a pretty good group of folks here,and I’m kinda new,so I hope I didn’t fuck up. This is the first time I’ve actually sat down since 4 am and I figured a good thought or two added to the mix couldn’t hurt. Thank you all,really.
Steeplejack
@A Mom Anon:
You will be in my prayers and thoughts. Sending healing energy your way.
General Winfield Stuck
@A Mom Anon:
Not a chance. The fighting spirit is always best. Especially in dealing with us ornery menfolk who think we’re invincible, but really aren’t/
JenJen
@A Mom Anon: All of my best thoughts for you and hubby! Thank you for keeping us updated. I never seem to know what to say in these situations, but I’m thinking of you and please, please hang in there.
Demo Woman
@A Mom Anon: Since you are in Price’s district, you can’t be to far away from me. If I can be of any help, please just let me know and I’ll post my email
SiubhanDuinne
@ Mom Anon
Let me add my words of concern and good thoughts to the rest of the posters’. Mom, I don’t know where you live but if you’re within 50 miles of metro Atlanta let me know, seriously, if I can do anything at all to help make your life a little easier right now.
I had a heart attack 17 years ago, and then 8 years ago I had quadruple bypass surgery (no attack that time but I prolly would have had one within days or hours). I didn’t have the diabetes complication but I know the rest of it all too well. The upside: your husband is young, he has you, and when he comes out of this he’s likely going to be the best-behaved compliant person you’ve ever seen.
Thinking about both of you, and I mean it, let me know if you’re anywhere within geographic reach.
trollhattan
Heartfelt best wishes to you and your husband, Mom Anon. Here’s hoping for a good outcome.
SiubhanDuinne
@ Mom Anon addendum
Forgot you live in GA-06. That’s not far from me. The offer stands.
ninerdave
One of the best Sadly, No! posts in a long time.
dougie
Rescue me is phenomenally good television. Entourage is, well, the opposite of that. Blech.
Brachiator
@A Mom Anon:
I hope everything goes well for you and your husband.
Jon H
I just moved into a new apartment building with a kinda neat feature. There’s an “internet cafe” on the first floor, with 3 PCs hooked up to the net for surfing, a printer, and free wifi. Plus some cafe tables and some coffee machines of some sort I haven’t looked at.
I’m going to try using it instead of having the IV hose internet feed in my apartment. It’ll be hard giving up constant BBC streams.
@AMA: Best wishes for you and your husband. May the insurance gnomes smile upon you.
Comrade Darkness
@A Mom Anon: I’m pretty sure you can’t steal an open thread. So no worries on that.
Hope your hubby pulls through well. Our medical system is geared for this part of disease, the gotcha moments, less so, unfortunately, on the prevention part. You really have to do your own homework and lobbying on that. But you will hopefully have a more willing guy to deal with now.
steve s
Random question for the foodies (though chemistry geeks would be better). Is there any truth to the common notion that you should never refrigerate opened cans of food? Or is this one of those things that ‘everyone knows’ but isn’t actually true, like it’s cheaper to leave flourescent lights on than to have to restart them?
Something Fabulous
finally unlurking for this!
A Mom, just wanted to add my positive thoughts and to send you a (hopefully!) reassuring anecdote: when my cousin was 40, he also had the kind of attack we thought he couldn’t recover from, and like others have noted, became the MOST compliant person, lost 45 pounds and has become, 5 years later, a distance runner! We are all so proud of him, and his children have him for all the big milestones coming up. So keep the faith, of whatever kind!
JK: have you tried mediabistro.com? They usually seem to have lots of NYC-based listings.
Third Eye Open
Just saw the recon pics from The Pasty Crackers of America get-together in Hot-Lanta this weekend. Looks pretty…uhm, genteel
mai naem
@A Mom Anon:
Once your hubby’s back home and gone through the initial doctors’ appts and issues etc. have him take a diabetic education class, even if he’s taken one already. They’re usually free and he might pay more attention this time around. I know a few people who’ve attended them and it’s changed their attitude towards diabetes quite a bit.
whatsleft
Best wishes to your husband for a full and speedy recovery, Mom Anon. And you – get some rest!!!
Fraud Guy
I’ve been having the same problem with Comcast.
First, the signal is too weak.
Then, the signal is too strong.
Then, it is just right…until the cycle starts again.
At least they don’t cut off cable during the interim.
Ron
Another round of birtherism coming up. Orly Taitz claims to have obtained a Kenyan birth certificate for Obama. It’s pretty awesome though. 1)It’s filed 3 years after his birth. 2)It’s filed as part of the “Republic of Kenya” in the year between Kenyan Independence and when they actually became a republic. Of course the same people who are convinced the HI birth certificate is fake will believe this one is obviously genuine.
freelancer
Chris Mooney’s new book sucks. All it seems to do is blame scientists and not science journalists for poor communication. It posits that the New Atheist movement is offensive to the faithy demo of the country, most in particular the Christian Evangelicals. His solution in the book, specifically referring to PZ Myers, is that Myers STFU in the face of Christian complaints. He names the Crackergate episode in detail, however neglecting what brought about the circumstances of crackergate. That a college student had received many, many death threats for taking a eucharist from a catholic ceremony. He was accused of “kidnapping” Jesus. That is offensive.
scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/07/the_great_desecration.php
Myers entire post regarding Crackergate was that each of us is not required to hold sacred the things that other people personally hold to be sacred. Mooney misrepresented that, and his book accomplishes nothing in addressing the difficulties of popularizing science. It mainly blames those who are already science-minded.
Rosali
@A Mom Anon: My best wishes for you and your husband. Although we may seem tangential, we actually are a BJ-connected family and many of us here keep tabs on how the regulars are doing. I sincerely hope all goes well with your husband.
asiangrrlMN
@A Mom Anon: I am so sorry to read about your hubby, A Mom Anon (and on your anniversary, no less!). I am glad that you caught it in time, and I am sending a white light to surround both of you in this difficult time. I’m also hoping that your hubby will be a little less stubborn about taking his meds after this scare. If there is anything we can do, please let us know.
@JK: It’s rough when you’re in a job you hate or when you’re looking for a job, especially during these times. I don’t have any advice for you, unfortunately. Good luck with your situation. I hope it improves.
robertdsc
Best wishes to you and your husband in this difficult time, Mom.
steve s
“we actually are a BJ-connected family”
I’m just not going to say anything here.
Anne Laurie
A Mom Anon, my prayers are with you & your family. Geez, our (official) sixteenth anniversary was yesterday, and now I really NEED to go hug my own Spousal Unit, except he’s on the other side of the country…
JK, can’t offer you anything but sympathy — I’m hoping that Obama’s proposed Electronic Medical Records program will need a great many tech-savvy new hires, which is one more reason to pray that the Congresscritters get off their highly-insured arses.
Steve S: Good idea.