California Ninja

I've had right much pain in my right hand mostly when I play pickleball and it usually goes away in a day or so, but sometimes it is extremely painful. And it is always a little bit painful. So I made an appointment with the hand doctor long time ago and it finally came up today. Turns out he's a pickleball player too so he understands. My thought was that I just had arthritis and there wasn't much I could do about it. But he is tracked down to what he thinks it might be more likely which is the ulnar nerve in my elbow. So he gave me a shot. If the shot works then we've identified what the issue is and if not we've also identified what the issue is. So my right hand and my right arm from my oboe down is almost useless. I'm dictating this on my phone because I tried to type it in my right end. Fingers just do not operate correctly.

The doctor was a great one and we had good conversation and among other things he said oh you have a little bit of arthritis. But turns out I don't have all that much. Interesting.

Other things going on. I got it in email from Jennifer Alex's, new wife and she asked if we wanted to have the two granddaughters, Lillian and Laurana(AKA Juliette) to come out to Texas to visit us in April. So they're going to come out and we got a few things in order to make that happen. Dana has what will be their bedroom completely full of Dana stuff as in in the floor is completely covered and there is no way to walk into the room. So she has a ton of work to do before we can get a bed to go in there. And then we need to find a suitable bed. They're only going to be here for 3 days I guess four nights so it's not a huge commitment but it should be really fun.

Laurana is going to college next year. Not sure where she's going. We've actually never had too much of a relationship with him because neither of us talk on the phone. Either Dana or I don't much on the phone and it's pretty hard to establish any kind of relationship by texting. So this is a real opportunity to create a relationship with both of them. And it's very nice of Jennifer to think of doing that. But there's lots of things to think about. We do not normally do things like that. We are so sedentary and set in our ways but it should be interesting and it is after all only 3 days.

Other than that, things are fairly quiet here. Beaux is entirely well and Toby is nearly well. They have both been sick for nearly 2 months now. Coughing and sneezing and trying to clear their post nasal drip out. It's actually been fairly dramatic but I think they are both nearly over all of it and back to just being normal dogs. It's very nice. Beaux is just as perky as he could be. It's hilarious. And we have a great time going on walks. He loves his walks.

Dana is doing fairly well and I have not yet killed her cardiologist. There is still potential for that. He still thinks he should be running the world and it would be easy if it was just me, but of course Dana wants to let him do more than I think he should be doing so if I get overly involved, I'm really being too controlling. The whole thing is just very difficult. He wants to run all kinds of tests and put her on drugs and I think less is better. But I can't direct it. I have to form a coalition and that does not appear to be happening very well so I just have to stand by and pick up the pieces later on. That part is more than a little frustrating, but at least at the moment she's doing well.

Beaux appreciates life as much as any being I know.

I saw an article not long ago, one I wish I'd saved, that said in order to really lose weight requires you to become a different person who might end up having different friends and doing different things. The reverse being true. Same actions,same habits, same friends means you stay the same person.

That seems kind of radical but does make some sense. One of the things that semaglutide is touted for is to lessen all the cravings. Cut down addictions from drugs to gambling to eating.

I recently took a survey asking me about those things and I was not too helpful. I've lost all my addictions, the ones they asked about anyway. I don't gamble, don't smoke, don't much drink, don't do drugs. I'm a fairly boring person and was not all that exciting when I did smoke and drink and do drugs. That last might be a different point.

I'm down to 194.6 pounds as of this morning. That's 35 pounds that I'll likely never see again. The first 20 was on Noom, the most recent 15 from Semaglutide.

Last night I was eating dinner and realized I just wasn't hungry so I stopped. I'd not eaten all that much yesterday but I wasn't looking for more. Dinner was OK. I just reached down into myself and didn't find any desire to eat.

That's the way of semaglutide. I watch out to be sure I get enough protein and fiber and then just eat when I want to eat and not when I don't. Sometimes I'll track it in Cronometer but as long as I'm continuing to lose weight I don't feel like I need to bother doing that.

The whole thing will be even more interesting when I get to whatever weight I decide is where I should stop. "Normal" for my 5'9" height is 168. I would look like a scarecrow, like an Okie on the way to California. I can hardly imagine.

I was shooting for 180. My current BMI is 28.6. "Normal" is 24.9 or less. 180 would put me at 26.

No one who knows me thinks I'm much more than normal overweight or thinks I should lose another 25 pounds.

So, we'll see. I am moving better on the Pickleball court. It will be interesting if there is a difference in my knees and the rest of my joints. Maybe would be worth it after all.

Meanwhile, I'm not really hungry right now but I do need water.

Sometimes (probably more frequently than I'd like to think) I need someone to point out the obvious. After listing another of Dana's medical incidents last week, anais_pf replied that she used a journal to track her husband's medical journey. It was like being slapped on the head for me.

When I had my own company I went to lots of networking meetings. Of course I did a crappy job networking with people but I did keep track of them all and what happened and what I was thinking with a nice faux leather bound journal. I had it with me all the time and it is so much easier to keep notes by hand and transfer the ones worth keeping to online.

A couple of days ago I bought a new journal. There are a lot of 'medical' journals with tabs and places to enter blood pressure and such. But I bought a blank page one and a set of nice mechanical pencils (what is now days known in my head as a lifetime supply) for less than $20. Yesterday I went through my wife's medical info online and extracted time lines and problems and procedures and organized them in the book. I feel like I've got a lot better control now. We're on our way shortly to get her a shot for a nerve issue she has. I'm her driver so I'll be there and if questions come up I won't be fumbling for my phone and Google Drive but will have the book. The information in it will only get better over time, more efficient, more thorough. And with AI I'll likely be able to easily import the written entries to online if I need to do so. I feel more in control.

Things will keep happening and I'll only become increasingly in charge of her medical outcomes. Such a simple idea will help and, should it become necessary, will help anyone else involved.

The back third of the book will have my own info. Not nearly as much or as complicated but still, there are dates I no longer care enough about remembering but still get asked about.

We had a video conference with Dana's primary doc, who is actually a PA. She is a wonderful person and we always have good convercations. Over time her advice gets more and more on point as she spends time with Dana's physical issues.

The way doctoring is supposed to be.

I ran out my thoughts on putting Dana on Plavix and she agreed. We're not going to do that. There is no supporting documentation. The cardio just added the prescription without putting anything in writing about why but only telling Dana verbally that she'd been having TIAs (contradicting neurologists from the stroke centered hospital we went to) and she needed to be on a blood thinner. He had interacted with her for about 10 minutes and made the decision based mostly on what she told him. And he veered way out of his cardiologist lane.

This is the way too much doctering is now.

The last thing Dana needs (or, I suspect, many of us need) is more drugs. Especially one that promotes bleeding throughout the body.

I'm increasingly a better consumer of medicine because I have to be. And I will give a lot of credit to AI which I thought from the start would be a great tool for medicine. It collects data from all over and explains in language that I can understand and is willing to drill down infinitely into minutia.

A great example. Dana is scheduled to have a follow up MRI to check her aneurysm. I suspect that it has healed but we obviously need a review and the thing is kind of scaring her, for good reason.

BUT she also has low iron. We both do but hers is worse and really effects her. She needs to get an infusion of iron to pump it up in her blood. But, and here's where AI came into play, it turns out that the drug they use for infusion (ferumoxytol) screws up MRIs so if she were to do an infusion now she would have to put off the MRI for three months. I tracked that down while on the call with the PA and we figured out a different path right then that allowed her to take a different supplement until her MRI and then get the infusion. So nice to wrap it up at once.

Documentation of all of this has become a bit of a chore. Someone needs to invent a good app to track senior health issues.

And, long as we're talking about health, we took Toby to the vet. The docs are kind of rotated, you never know who you're going to get there. But we got one of the elder statesmen (who we will now ask for in the future) and he assured us that what we saw as Toby not being able to breathe and in great distress was pretty much him just clearing his post nasal drip. We got a different antibiotic and some other Prednisone kind of stuff to calm things down some and were on our way without another $500 charge. And I think the drugs have already helped Toby and the discussion about how he's really not that bad has helped Dana.

And I'm still well. Fortunately.