Viewing 1 - 9 out of 9 Blogs.

Well, as most everyone knows, after the last blog the tests were bad and the doc didn't think she had long to go, so off to Hospice she went. It took a couple of weeks but I came to terms with going to lose my sis. That lasted just over a month and she hit a plateau and quit deteriorating. So then she couldn't stay in Hospice. So had to go back to a nursing home. That's created all kinds of problems. Because she isn't in the nursing home for rehab, none of her insurances will pay for it. So we've had to file for state mecicaid. What a hassle.

Now she's awake a lot, getting dressed most days and will carry on a conversation like she used to. The mind isn't all there and sometimes it's what the hell is she talking about!! but I'll take it. I'm afraid it may just be a manic phase of her bi-polar but what ever it is, I hope it stays for a while. It's nice to have her back!!!

I am so tired, physically and mentally. And that's putting it mildly!!

Just when I think (that's what i get for doing my own thinking!!) things are going well and will slow down, WHAM! she does it again. First of all big sis was calling every other day wanting me to go out to her house, north of town, and get her one thing or another, and take it to the nursing home, south of town!! She's been running me ragged! I'm aging at an excelerated rate with all this!!

Then, Tues. when I was out there she said she had a couple of these water blisters on her feet and they had popped!! She had big socks on so I didn't try to look at them. Figured they'd take care of it. Then took her more stuff Thursday and she was getting a shower and when she came back to room I got to look at those feet!! It's not just feet, it's clear up to her knees and it's water seeping through her pores and causing these water blisters in the ankle and foot area. And she's swollen all over, hands, arms, feet, legs, stomach is like a huge bowl of jello!! She has put on 40 lbs. in 3 weeks!!!!

Well, needless to say, I didn't like the looks of it and talked to the doc out there. He'd upped her lasix to 80mg daily. But didn't seem to be working. So decided to call her cardiologist. He's the one who always seems to get her straighted out, if she'd just do what he says she might stay doing better! Anyway when I called and told him what was going on he wanted her in there Friday at noon. So here I go again. The only good thing is the nursing home transports her, there's no way I could have gotten her in my truck, she can't stand up! So I just met them there.

Well, he took one look at her and said you're going to the hospital and being admitted!! So the transport takes her there instead of back to the nursing home. Got her settled in there and got home about 4:30. Now, since insurance won't pay for two places, I have to go to the nursing home today and pack up all that stuff she's had me bringing her, and take a few things to her in the hospital. There goes my Saturday!!

Guess they're going to be running a bunch of tests. When she went to the hospital a few weeks ago, the squad took her to the hospital I hate. It's not the one she usually goes to and she didn't like it either. There's no records there and those docs didn't even send reports to her doc. The cardiologist had no idea what they had treated her for or what they had done for it. So it's like starting from scratch. he has to get the reports from them so he can know what's been going on!!

Anyway, enough of this. I'm going to quit thinking things are looking up and just start wondering what's next!!!

Well, here’s the latest on big sis. Wed., Nov. 21, was 2 weeks in the hospital. She’s still getting better, but was too well to stay there, so it’s off to a nursing home (NH) for rehab. There was no blockage in the intestines that the doc thought he saw on the MRI!! They did the scope thing and found nothing there. So that’s one less problem. As far as they can tell, it’s just the infection throughout her body!! That’s enough!

After sitting down and letting baby sis know what she would be in for to try to take care of big sis, she thought about it and had a change of heart. She’s 45, works full time. There is just no way she can take care of big sis at this point. So she told big sis that she could only come live with her if big sis got a whole lot better. She would have to stay out of the bed all day and live like a human!!! Which means regular showers, and regular meals to take care of the diabetes. She says eat what, I can’t eat much at one time. I said just a sandwich at lunch would do. I can’t eat a whole sandwich, so eat half, I can’t eat half, I eat about a quarter of one and I’m full! So I said ok, so you do what you can but eat regularly!!! She’s always got a come-back!! So where things go with that is anybody’s guess.

The last few days in the hospital she got her attitude back and has gotten rude a few times. I told her to take that energy and use it to get well instead of being nasty!!! She called Wed. morning wanting me to bring her a couple of things for the NH. Told her I’d come to the NH once she got there instead of having to pay $2 to park just to leave right away for the NH. ok. Then she called later and wanted me to bring her long coat in case it got cold. I asked why she needed it and she said for going in and out of the hosp. and NH. I said, they’re transporting you, you’ll be on a gurney, with blankets, why do you need it? She said I don’t know, guess I should just lay here and let everyone else do my thinking for me! Then she hung up on me!!! ARGH!!!! I think she thought I was taking her to the NH from the hosp.!! Like that was really going to happen!!

She got to the NH and I tried to get her settled in. It was put this here, put that there, take this with you, fix this, fix that!!! Then the lady next to her was trying to get something off her tray table and big sis says, oh, she’ll get it for you!! I haven’t done enough for her, she’s farming me out!! Then, I’m trying to get her situated for her dinner tray, and she can’t even lift her head to get the pillow under it! and she thought I was going to bring her to the NH? She can’t stand up, can’t lift her legs, can barely grasp anything with her hands! So here comes the dinner try and it has a grilled cheese sandwich. She can’t even cut it in two! I sat there and watched her and couldn’t believe it! But I didn’t help her. She’s got to start somewhere doing things!! So she finally picked it up and tore it in half! And the person who could only eat a quarter of a sandwich laid there and ate a whole grilled cheese, a deviled egg, 2 bowls of tomato soup, a dish of pears and a little bowl of pea salad!!! Now, in all fairness, I think that last couple of weeks at home, that infection was building through her system and that may have had something to do with it cause she wasn’t eating much at once then. But she’s been eating for a week now in the hospital, so she’s got to know she can eat better. She starts that stuff for sympathy!!

In the hospital there was a lady next to her whose husband was there most of the time taking care of her. Baby sis was telling me about big sis was telling her about this on the phone and big sis told her she wished she had someone to take care of her like that! So I asked baby sis, did she also tell you they were celebrating their 61st wedding anniversary? Do you know how old that lady is? Baby sis said well, under those circumstances she must be around 80!! I said yeah, and big sis is gonna be 60 Friday!! and she wants to lay in bed and have someone take care of her???? OMG!!! Looks like we’re in this for the long haul, folks! Don’t think she’s gonna be out of there any time soon! So that’s where we are now!! More fun ahead!!!

Well folks, here we are again. There’s so much to say, I almost don’t know where to begin. Guess I’ll just go back to the beginning of Sept. when I took my little perch fishing trip. Big sis had been in the hospital for a couple of days prior to me going and it all started a little before that. Big sis had been in one of her funks and just laid around the bed. She can’t get in the shower herself, and she just sort of gave up trying to wash up. Whenever I said something she’d get mad and wouldn’t speak to me. She wasn’t getting up to let the dogs out and there were messes all over the house. I’m embarrassed to even tell this now, but got to get it all off my chest. She was feeding herself, but she’d cook something, eat a little and leave it sit on the stove to come back and eat more tomorrow!

In the hospital they cleaned her all up, and discovered the reason for the dizzy spells and falling. That had been her excuse for living like she was. When she got out my daughter and the one granddaughter Bridget, went to stay with her. I told them to keep on her about hygiene, sugar readings, eating right and taking her meds. I go out every two weeks to fill her med organizer, but you’ve got to stay on her to take them. The girls got busy and cleaned house like you wouldn’t believe. They couldn’t stand to stay there in the filth. They were making sure the dogs went out and even cleaned out the fridge!

Well, over a period of time she started complaining about them. She didn’t like them nagging her about washing up, taking meds, taking sugar readings and the rest of it. She griped enough til they finally said they weren’t staying where they weren’t wanted and packed up and left. Her and I got in a little argument and I told her she was ungrateful. But I still took her to doc appts., grocery and whatever else she needed. But I thought maybe she’d be ok since they found out why she was getting dizzy and falling. It’s orthostatic hypotension. Her blood pressure bottoms out when she stands up. So they put her on meds to fix it. So everything’s ok! Yeah, right!

All she did was lay in the bed all the time and I started getting disgusted with her. Here we go right back to all the same old bad habits. And it all just kept going down hill. Last Thursday she called and said she fell and did I want to come out or did I want her to call the squad. I told her to call the squad cause I couldn’t get her up! So tried to call all that evening to make sure she was ok and no answer. Well, just thought she was laying in the bed not answering the phone. She does that a lot. So tried a few times Friday. I had doc and hair appt. and was going to go to her house to check when I got done. Stopped at my house and there’s a message on the phone that she’s in the hospital.

What happened was, the squad came out and got her up (and after everything we have discovered they’ve been out about a half dozen times in the last couple months, she wasn’t telling us about it), then a few hours later Thurs., she fell again and called the squad a secont time. This time they took her to the hospital cause they said they couldn’t keep coming out and docs needed to find out what was going on. Well, I go up there Friday when I find out and of course find out she’s been in since Thurs. afternoon. There she lays with a neck so filthy it’s black again, and yes, I’ve seen it getting worse but whenever I say something she just gets mad and won’t talk to me. She smokes too, and her fingers are so stained from nicotine she looks like a little old man who never put a cigarette down. She doesn’t smoke that much, she just never washes her hands!

Saturday afternoon they put her into ICU. She is in extremely serious condition. Her body is full of infection and they don’t know where it’s coming from!! Duh!! Dog urine? Laying in her own filth? the food she eats? is it any wonder? But, she’s also got some kind of blockage in her intestines. That was discovered with an MRI. So they did a lot more tests today and we should know something tomorrow.

We’ve all talked back and forth and come to the conclusion that she can no longer live by herself. Her son is taking steps to sell the house, one of the sis’s in Indy volunteers in a dog rescue and she fosters dogs, so she’s going to take the dogs to foster til she can find them a home. How long big sis will be in the hospital is up in the air right now. But he looks 80 years old instead of just about to turn 60! But she will almost positively have to go into a nursing home whenever they get her well, and we'll have a fight about that.

The baby sis, she's 45, is wanting her to come to Indy so she can take care of big sis. Mel works a full time job and drives and hour each way back and forth to work. She just doesn't realize what work it would be to take care of an invalid. And being gone minimum 10 hrs. a day is not helping big sis!! She needs monitored closer than that!

I haven’t said much about her the last few months because I’ve been partly disgusted with her and partly ashamed and embarrassed of her. And then I feel guilty for feeling that way. It’s the bi-polar I know. This psychiatrist she sees gives her the meds she takes and that’s about it. He doesn’t make sure they’re helping. He can’t be, she’s only in there 10 minutes for an appointment!! I try to do more, but I can’t keep that big house clean like it needs to be. Plus, I’ve got my own life and I’m going to be out there living it come hell or high water!! And she just really doesn’t care. She hasn’t for the last couple of years. She just talks about being with her husband, who died 6 years ago.

So that’s where we are right now. Not sure exactly what is wrong with the intestine and the infection is playing hell with her body. She’s diabetic and her sugar in there was at 20!! For those who don’t know, normal is 90 ��" 120. They’re having to pump her full of sugar! She has 3 large bags of stuff hanging on there going in her, plus 3 little bags! She’s really bad. Don’t know where it will go from here, but if I’m not on much for a while, you know why!

Well, now we get to the heart of all these blogs, it’s partly so my friends can get to know me a little better, but partly to vent my frustrations. For several years now, I’ve tried to do whatever I could for my sis. I love her. But am getting to the point that I wonder sometimes how much longer I can do this!

I can’t count the times I have sat at the hospital with her, day in and day out, and tried to help in whatever way I can. When her bi-polar kicks in, she then turns around and takes her anger, or whatever it is, out on me. That's the bi-polar and how they do, and I understand that, but it doesn't make it any less painful sometimes. When she was really sick, I would take care of everything then get accused of trying to take over her life! I don’t want her life! It's a mess! It’s bad enough I have to cope with it, I sure don’t want to live it!!

I have taken her to emergency, one son lives too far away, actually only 30 miles, and the other one can’t stand being in the hospital for any reason (all the times she was in he rarely even came to see her) so anyway, I’ve taken her probably 6 to 8 times in the last couple of years. And I sit there with her (when she broke her leg it was from 10 am til about 11 pm) and talk to the docs and take care of whatever needs done. She and I are both diabetics, and while sitting there for hours there are times I have to eat. That means walking all the way to the other side of the hosp. and I don’t walk very well for long distances.

Then, I take her to every doc appointment she has. There’s been on average one a week since the fire in 2005. I fill her pill organizers, she has 2 that hold a week’s worth each, otherwise she wouldn’t take her pills. I call and make appointments, deal with insurance claims that she doesn’t have the patience with, and call whatever company she’s having problems with. Last one was the phone co., big confusion over her phone plans. Got that straightened out finally.

Her health has deteriorated drastically the past year, and even though she’s only 1 year older than me, she looks 20! I’m tempted to post a pic I took of her last week. Was taking some of her dogs for her and she’s in one. Was at Wal-Mart about a month ago and she has to ride the scooter in the store cause she can’t walk that far. Girl at the checkout asked if she was my mother. C said the girl only thought that because she was in the scooter. No it wasn’t, she almost looks old enough to be my mother!!!

I get back from my fishing weekend, all relaxed and feeling great, and find out something came up and the doc appt. her son was supposed to take her to for me he couldn’t, so she didn’t go to it. So here we go again. Got back on the 6th, feeling great, and had a whole week of that before it started again. Went out to the house Sat. 12th to fill pills and everything ok. Called her on Sun. and she wouldn’t answer the phone. She never does, but if I holler on the answering machine she’ll usually pick up. Not on Sunday.

Youngest sis called from Indy and asked if she was ok cause she wouldn’t answer phone! I had doc appt. on Monday and stopped by after (she lives about 15 miles from me so it’s not like it’s right on the way). She’s in one of her moods, and just doesn’t want to talk to anyone. I told her I’m not anyone and it’s bad enough I worry about her all the time, she makes me worry 10 x’s as much by not answering phone.

Her youngest son lives with her, but when he’s at work I can’t get her. Called yesterday and he was home so made him put her on phone. She was cold and distant and could tell she didn’t really want to talk. So just made sure she was ok. My calmed, relaxed nerves after my trip are going crazy again worrying about her. Have to go out this afternoon and get on the phone and raise Cain with the insurance co. again. She can’t deal with that stuff, gets too confused too easily. Her husband worked at Chrysler for 30 yrs. and has great retirement health insurance, but have to fight with them over claims every time we turn around.

So this is my life day in and day out. Taking care of and worrying about big sis. All this has been to explain to my friends on here why last month I deleted everything on my page and didn’t get on for a couple of weeks. Left a long letter on my page saying I felt like a number on here and was not really communicating and being friends by just sending graphics all the time. I have friends in the building, but most of them are a lot older than me and have enough troubles of their own. I can’t talk to them the way you would a close friend. My daughter has enough going on in her life with 2 teenage daughters, and I sure can’t talk to my sis, she’s the root of everything. So I felt pretty alone at the time and wanted someone to talk to and felt I wasn’t getting that on here.

Thanks to my friends, especially Dorothy, Rita, Tony and Steve and to some people that at the time weren’t friends but are now, especially Linda and who left messages of encouragement (and sort of slapped me upside the head with words), I got over that feeling quickly. I now realize yes, I do have friends on here, and yes if I need it they will listen. I hope I can do the same for them if they need it.

Just writing these blogs has helped me by giving me a place to vent. And I’ve gotten lovely comments from some of you about them. I know I will continue this and I think just writing the blogs helps me deal with it all a little better. I know I feel better now than I did 30 minutes ago. Just getting it all out helps. Til next time, I love you all.

OK. Some of you are anxious to know what came next. Well, part of the reason C. looked so bad sitting in that chair was because she was in shock, but she also had to know that none of her animals got out. The look on her face is one I’ll never forget.

She was out of the house for about 5 mos., had burns across her shoulders, from one side to the other, except where tank top straps would have been and down the back of her arms halfway to the elbow. Had to have a nurse come and change bandage for just over a week, then went back in hosp. to have skin grafts. She’d shoot me for telling this, but they took skin off her butt cheek for the grafts, and now she has these big discolored patches on her rump. Things were going ok with all of that, then Dec. 5, 2005, one month and 3 days after the fire, she had a heart attack. At the time I said, can anything else happen?

She got out of hosp. 1 week after heart attack. Insurance put her in an apartment, really nice one, until the house was done. Went up to the house while fire inspectors were going over stuff. Fire had started in front bedroom that is used as an office/computer room. While fighting fire they had thrown everything out the front window of the bedroom. We (fire inspector, her oldest son, and me) were sifting through all that burned material and came across a small jewelry box that was just scorched a little and crushed in spots. Opened it up and it was a brand new pair of Diamonique earring from QVC. They were untouched. Couldn’t believe it. All office documents, insurance (house, car, life, medical) papers all gone, everything you would normally keep in an office file.

Some important papers made it because they were in a lock box. But most everything in that room was ashes. Inspectors recreated the room and could tell where fire started. Boiled down to either a paper shredder or air cleaner that were plugged into a surge protector. They thought one of those had shorted out starting the fire. They take all that stuff back to a lab and x-ray it and can tell what started the fire. Turned out it was the surge protector. (Make sure you pay xtra for a good one and don’t buy cheap ones).

The house had to be gutted, mostly because of smoke damage, so new drywall, kitchen cabinets, light fixtures, (furnace & water heater in small closet across from bedroom) so those were new too. New windows, doors, everything you can picture in a room. Got settled in there and she started having these dizzy spells. Here we go again. She would go out to the kitchen to get something and just drop. Broke an ankle, then last Aug. broke her leg in a spiral break that had to have major orthopedic surgery. Was assigned this cardiologist in the hosp. at that time, and he started seeing her in his office afterward. She’d had high blood pressure for years and was on 2 meds. for it. First time in his office he saw that and took her off them immediately. Changed her lasix to water pill less harsh on kidneys (because she's diabetic). Blood pressures went from 70 over 40 back to normal & dizzy spells stopped. Her family doc had been seeing those low blood pressures for 2 years and did nothing. I was so upset about that.

Then in late Dec. 2006 she went to family doc & said she was having trouble breathing. Now, this is a 59 yr. old woman with history of heart disease. Doc said pneumonia was going around so gave her an antibiotic and said that will kill anything, and gave her an inhaler. That was it. C. called & told me and I asked if she (doc) made her (C) get a chest x-ray. No. I said why not, there’s one right down the hall in the medical bldg. the doc is in, no. I couldn’t believe it. Told C. that an x-ray would show if it’s pneumonia or not. Oh well. So 3 days later, on new year’s eve. I’m sitting in emergency with her because she still can’t breathe. First thing they did was take x-ray. Her lungs were half full of fluid. She was heading for congestive heart failure! We had a few bouts with that.

Now for the overall stuff. From the time she got back in the house until she broke her leg in Aug. she rarely left her bed. Partly because bi-polar was kicking in, but partly because she was scared to get up because of falling from the dizzy spells. Wasn’t taking meds right because she couldn’t sit up long enough to fill pill organizer and couldn’t sit there and go through 13 or 14 bottles. Finally, when she broke her ankle in Aug. I said that’s enough. You have to get out and see someone about this. I don’t mind helping you with whatever you need but if you’re not going to try to help yourself I’m wasting my time. The whole time I’m out there trying to help take care of her, taking her to what few docs she’d go to, and going and sitting with her in emergency every time she went.

Well, this has gotten overly long this time, so I’ll cut off here for now.

To continue from last time, I had just mentioned my big sis. Born on the same day, one year apart, but as opposite as they come. Carolyn was always a bookworm, and I was one of the biggest tomboys around. She’s sort of quiet and I’m in your face. She was the good girl and I was the hellion! I can remember all through school, there were times I’d have the same teacher(s) she’d had the year before. First walk in their class and it was “oh, I had your sister last year and she was such a pleasure, I just know you’ll be just like her.” Boy did they get fooled! But she acted just like the typical big sis growing up. Always looking out for me and trying to keep me out of trouble.

It’s been difficult since she was diagnosed bi-polar, but she had a husband who understood. I researched the subject so I understood. Five years ago her husband was diagnosed with colon cancer. He’d been having problems for a couple of years and wouldn’t go to the docs. By the time they got to him, it was bad. He got through it but his health was extremely weakened. After chemo, radiation, surgery, more chemo, more radiation, they said they thought they had it all. By then he was extremely debilitated. Four months later he was gone from congestive heart failure. He had worked at Chrysler for 30 yrs. and left her pretty comfortable.

C. lived about 25 miles north of Dayton at the time, and said she wasn’t making any hasty decisions. Well, after a year she decided she wanted to move closer to Dayton, primarily because all her docs were down here and the hospital she used is here. Plus, she got tired of that drive back and forth for the year her husband was ill. So she sold her house and bought one down here. Her husband was allergic to dogs and we’d had them growing up so the first thing she did was rescue 4 dogs. Then we drove to Cleveland to rescue parrots, twice. Her license plate is “Zoo Cru”. Everything was going good, then in Dec. 2005 she had a house fire.

She was just dozing off about midnight (she leaves the tv on when she sleeps) when the power went out. She got up to check it and the smoke alarms went off. She went down the hall and saw the smoke coming out of the computer room (door was closed because one of the birds was in there and she didn’t quite trust dogs). She opened the door! Flames shot out and the entire house filled w/smoke fast. She ran and got the fire extinguisher (she doesn’t remember this, but it was found on the living room floor). She must have tried to put it out and wound up getting burned.

She had a gown on cut like a tank top and the burns were only where the skin showed. But as she then headed out the back door, she thought the gown was on fire and pulled it over her head and went out the back door naked. Good thing her neighbor’s bedroom is at the back corner of the house where she was and she started yelling. He called fire dept. and she brought sis a blanket. Luckily her neighbor had her one son’s phone #, and called him. He then called me immediately.

Now, you’ve got to understand, I’m a journalist/writer. But I was so mad at our one local station. Neighbors sat C. on a resin lawn chair in front of their house until the ambulance got there. This station took a lot of footage of her sitting there. Black face from the smoke, in shock, hair singed. And they kept showing that footage for 2 days! I can close my eyes and still see that. I doubt that image will ever go away. I start crying just thinking about it. It was on the news in our Community Room the next day as I was going back to the hosp. and a group of residents watching and I said that’s C, and they looked at me surprised and said they thought it was a black lady.

Guess that’s enough for this time. Don’t want to bore you guys!

Continuing from last time. In 2000, I moved into the apt. building I live in now. There are a lot of elderly, mostly over 70, and those of us who move in, in our 50’s are handicapped. Problem is, most of those are mentally handicapped. Since Ohio did away with State Mental hospitals, they have mainstreamed those people into regular society. I don’t have a problem with that, except for the ones that get violent, but you really can’t form a friendship with most of them either.

Because of my age, and the fact that I still get around, I made friendships with a lot of the elderly and took them to doc appts., grocery, drug store, etc. I moved in, in May, and was elected Resident Council President that Nov. Thought I could really help. The council owns its’ own snack machine, Coke lets us use 2 soda machines at no cost as long as we buy from the local distributor, and we run a kitchen where some of our ladies cook. We serve lunch 5 days a week, for $3. It may be the only decent meal some our elderly get since they can’t cook anymore. This is not an assisted living situation.

Some of these people seldom see their families, if they even have any. Those are the ones I try to help the most. One lady, my darling Miss Doris, is 86, and had to have cataract surgery. She had to have drops in her eyes several times a day for several days before and after. Her daughter wouldn’t come and do any of it, so I was running down to her apt. and taking care of it for her. One day I went down to do the drops, and there sat her daughter. You’d think she’d have insisted on doing it. No, she sat there and watched me. I don’t understand that attitude toward your mother! But there's a lot of that attitude in here.

The council uses the profits we make to provide fully catered dinners at Thanksgiving and Christmas. We have door prizes, good food and try to meet new people in the building. It takes a lot of work to put these together though. Over the years, I started to get disgusted though, because everyone would come to me to complain about whatever problems were going on in the bldg., but when I’d go to management and mgt. would ask people about the problem, they would tell mgt. oh, it’s ok. They just don’t want to stand up for themselves or their rights, even if they have me to initiate the complaint.

So, I refused to run for office again and haven’t even had anything to do with the council since the beginning of 2006. I don’t take as many of them on errands anymore because I can’t lift wheelchairs in my truck these days. My back doesn’t like any lifting. And you really can’t have conversations with them. They have enough of their own problems. I just try to brighten their days a little in any way I can.

I have 3 sisters. The 2 younger ones live in Indy. One in Indianapolis and one in Lebanon, just outside of Indy, but both work in Carmel (just north of Indy). The older sis is one year older than me to the day. Yes, born on the same day one year apart. We’ve always been each others’ best friend since we’re Army brats and moved a lot growing up. In her early 20’s she was diagnosed with diabetes. In our 30’s she started having problems and was diagnosed bipolar. She’s handled it pretty well over the years until the last few. A lot of problems have arisen and I’m the only one here. I’ll go into more later. This is enough for now.

Thought I would use this venue to tell my friends about me. It helps to understand someone if you get to know them a little, and I feel like my friends here are the only ones I have my own age. I really need those friendships.

I have been dealing with severe osteoarthritis since I was in my teens. I worked from 17 until I had to go on disability in 1995. I was only 47. Had both total knee replacements at 40. Shots in all kinds of joints (still have that) ankle. shoulder, thumb!! That's a fun one!

Had left ankle fusion in '99. Can't move it at all. Left shoulder rotator cuff, twice. Right shoulder is starting. My right hip is halfway to a replacement according to my orthopedist. My back is shot! Can only walk about a block.

I tolerate the pain most of the time because I can't stand being doped up! Would rather hurt and be able to get out and do things than to be like a zombie who can't leave the house! And I do keep going!

I'm going to keep adding to this on a regular basis. But it's late, and I'm gonna read for a while to put myself to sleep.