All fixed "Teh lobotomy" consultant didn't believe me when I said, thanks but no thanks to the general anesthetic any more than she believed me when I told her I had not had surgery since the birth of my son. So she asked again, and again, and again if I was sure. Then she tried the carrot and stick approach, the carrot being that I wouldn't get the stick "it's going to hurt you know". Sure give me the options but let me weigh the pros and cons and make the final decision. Then she tried to ignore what I was saying and sent me the anesthetist anyway, for a chat. That's when she lost the battle for good, I know all the answers the anesthetists don't like. "I am allergic to paracetamol" tends to make them grumble and "no I have not been fasting, I had breakfast just before I came here" makes them roll their eyes. The numerous "you are so brave" from the nurses amused me greatly and I wanted to reply "no i'm not, I'm just too chicken for a general and 15 minutes of slight discomfort and a couple of minutes of actual pain seems like a better deal than a few days of total dozyness. Furthermore, if I'd been asleep I would have missed the opportunity to see my insides on a screen, in colour (how cool is that?). Before I left, the consultant asked was I allergic to anything, "yep, paracetamol and penicillin" and on hearing this she crossed out the script for paracetamol she had been in the process of writing (I find the number of times hospitals prescribed me the stuff when it's written in capitals on the file in front of them quite astonishing, previous culprits: John Radcliffe and West Middlesex). "Do you need any painkillers?", "not really", she sighs and rolls her eyes "I thought not". Once again, I look like the weird one for turning down something which is likely to cause me more pain than it will ease, surely it's a no brainer: mild bearable pain vs jaundice (paracetamol) or sore stomach (aspirin or ibuprofen ) or drowsiness and foggy brain (codeine - ask MFC how amusing it is to make me play Big Brain Academy on a mere 15mg of the stuff). I fear the days when I am no longer capable to assert my wishes in a medical setting. I hope when I can't speak for myself anymore somebody will be my advocate and ensures that my assessment of what treatment my body can cope with best is taken into account and my choices respected however nonsensical they may appear in the first place. |
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5.2.08 22:03 |
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Brains work in mysterious ways "do you have any homework?" "a bit" A little while later "are you still doing your homework? Do you need some help with it?" Then starts homework crisis of the day number one. The one that goes along the line of The Boy not really understanding the homework which has been set, not asking the teacher for an explanation he can understand, not writing it down because then there might be a chance I could help and not remembering the wording of it either. After establishing that there is no point wasting any more time on that piece we swiftly move on to the next piece of homework. I speculate it should be quick and easy since all it is is learning squares from 1 to 20. Piece of cake, after all he already knows his time tables to 12, 20 square is a doddle so it's a series of 7 pairs of numbers to learn by rote, not fun but it should take 10 minutes tops. Not so. Under guidance he reads the pairs out loud, and in his head, in increasing and decreasing order, writes them down a number of times, tries writing them without the card with regular "just go for a walk for 5 minutes", in between. No joy and loads of tears as the only 2 that appear to have sunk in are 15 and 19. Help comes in the shape of an IM conversation with Neil who provides mnemonics and tips and a quick method to work out squares of 2 digit numbers. The Boy then works out 13 to 18 using the method and agrees that he may not have time to do all of them in a test situation but that if he gets stuck on 1 of them it will be helpful he also agrees that knowing the last digit should be enough of a reminder. After nearly 2 hours he is ready to go to bed. In the morning he climbs in my bed to revise the dreaded squares for the test with a view of my quizzing him on the way to work. As we walk he doesn't feel too confident he will remember the numbers, I ask him if he is glad he has a trick to work out all of them up to 99 in the future. That way I said "if you needed to know 48 squared and you didn't have a calculator with you you could still work it out without too much effort". "Oh, I wouldn't need it for that Mummy, 48 square is easy, it's 2304" I had a bit of a "huh" moment as I checked my "tables de trigonométrie" and found he was indeed right. "How did you know?" The child then rolls his eyes at the obvious stupidity of his mother. "It's close to 50 so you only have to multiply by 100, divide by 2 then take away 96". Somebody please explain how working out 48X48 in your head is easy yet it is almost beyond him to learn 7 pairs of numbers in 2 hours? I don't get it. |
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10.2.08 17:41 |
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Just a thought Maybe those parents who were offering their kids on the "recycle" board of a forum a few weeks back were onto something. Do you think I could swap mine for the services of a cleaner? Failing that I guess I could always try and see how much he'd fetch if I sold him into slavery on e-bay. I doubt it's worth calling Social Services just yet but if things carry on as last night and this morning I might just get tempted. |
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12.2.08 08:52 |
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February - now with added crazy Latest encounter of the not particularly sane kind... the young lady who crossed right in front of me so that our cars collided. No harm done, just bent metal and plastic on both sides. So far annoying but no biggie right? In my world of high functioning crazy you breathe a sigh of relief nobody was hurt and you move from the middle of the intersection so you don't cause a traffic jam and just pull up somewhere safe and swap details. That's what happens in my world anyway. In hers you leave the intersection (so far so good), drive past the places where it would have been safe and sensible to park and drive off, yep, just like that. And when other drivers flash you and try to flag you down, you still don't stop, you carry on your way. Good: Some very nice witnesses let me have her registration number and their details so that the police and insurance can do their stuff. Not so good: Since nobody was hurt all the police are likely to do is write a letter to the registered keeper saying that it was naughty and they could face charges. The self righteous part of me feels that if she gets away with driving off when all there was was minor damage and it was just a case f swapping details and there were loads of witnesses about, I dread to think what her reaction would be to running over a pedestrian if there was nobody around. And lets face it I'm a bitter sort of a person. Good: The insurance have already tracked down who the registered keeper of the vehicle is and have confirmed they *are* insured (which makes the not stopping even more infuriating). Because they are insured there is an outside chance I might recover the excess in a few months time when the insurance companies and the lawyers have done their thang. Also good: The insurance company have appointed a garage and provisionally authorised the repairs. Not so good: I'll have to settle the excess as soon as the car is fixed and what with the extensive dentist work I had done on Saturday, before the bint decided not to check for oncoming traffic when she turned it's not really money I have spare. Good: The damage isn't so bad and the car will soon look as good as new. Not so good: I kinda need the car this week for trips to the tip and moving related errands and paperwork, formalities and car repairs are not really something I had factored in diary wise. 
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24.2.08 22:11 |
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