Swallowing Arsenic

Since traditional western medicine has failed to relieve my heart troubles, I go to see a doctor who specializes in homeopathic / alternative medicine. I refuse to have my ear candled or wear a magic crystal but since I don't really have much to lose at this point, I try to keep an open mind.

They ask 45-minutes worth of questions ranging from early childhood to what types of food do I crave and do I keep my belongings in order. God, I cannot even imagine my primary care physician asking me how satisfied I am with my sock drawer.

Oh, they also feel-up my ankles. Everyone wants to feel my ankles. I now have nightmares about people feeling my ankles so that if they ever do swell I will no doubt combust in a second.

In any event, by the time I am through they take six tubes of blood and this (due to my Metoprolol-pressurized blood) takes another thirty minutes.

We make all sorts of deals along the way. If I pay $129 then the $1000 food-sensitivity test will be covered even if my insurance denies it. If I pay $59 then the $250 test will be covered if my insurance denies it. I will have to pay $142 for the third test regardless. Likewise, please pay $8 to dissolve four pills of arsenicum album under my tongue twice daily.

Otherwise, we will have to wait for test results to determine if I am within reason of a reversal of symptoms. There is not much I can say about that. My decline has plateaued but I cannot wait until the next down to take action. The Metoprolol may help my heart but is eating away what little personality and psyche I have left.

Foundation : Gone.

daughter:
i can hear myself;
i'm somewhere in
there..

mother:
nobody's
home...nobody's
home....

s'en allait tout simplement
routier pauvre et chantant
en tous chemins, en tous lieux
il ne parle que du bon dieu
il ne parle que du bon dieu*


There was a hole in the floor and my foot went right through it. I had not noticed that for some time now the foundation of the house I live in is missing. There are wooden frames, some wire mesh, but no foundation and most certainly nothing reliable to stand upon. I suspect the disappearance began around the time of my divorce and the thievery has continued in the form of my health decline and crawls on knocking out any others in it's path.

Now, I see cracks around the floorboard, cracks in the cement patio, a leak above the non-working fireplace. Cracks ... as if the rest of the house will fall as well.

*http://www.poe.org

Coughing A Sigh Of Relief

Asthma - mostly of the exercise-induced variety. That seems to be what I have. No congestive heart failure appears to be on the horizon. After three months of worrying how I will be able to take care of myself in the event that I drown slowly in my own bodily fluids, I am glad to have asthma.

After today's pulmonary stress functioning test, I collapsed into a fit of coughing and wheezing resulting in another breathing treatment. My little heart had tugged along well despite the undertow of increased Metoprolol and was not deemed as culprit of my bronchospasms.

Today, and maybe tomorrow too ... maybe even the next day ... , I won't complain about the problems I endured in the medical system these past three months. I will probably get to it soon enough. But, for today, I'm going to bed in hopes of a good sleep. My face looks kind of like this -- :D

I Want The Sunshine

"Sunshine, won't you be my mother
Sunshine, come and help me sing
My heart is darker than these oceans
My heart is broken underneath"

It's been almost two months since the bicycle exercise that sent me into that familiar fit of coughing accompanied by a metallic taste of blood. Supposedly, it is probably just exercise-induced asthma but now the coughing finds new ways to appear. I've been waiting two months for the test that would allegedly allow me to be treated properly.

No one notices me lying on the ER bed that has been triaged into the pale hallway. The air-conditioner is cranking out freezing air and this instigates another fit of coughing. When the heart monitor begins to sound it's alarm again, I notice my blood pressure of 150/100 and heart rate of 136.

I was just supposed to get another EKG and then go home. I can't do this anymore. For the past three years, I've had declining health with no explanations. Panic ensues followed by hyperventilation as they give me a shot of Ativan and begin a breathing treatment. After three tries, they finally get my arterial blood gas and I again get the "look" I don't like. Apparently, patients with asthma do not have 110% oxygen in their blood -- especially after an asthma attack. I want to know what is happening to my body. It hasn't even quite hit middle age yet.

Batteries Not Included

"All I want to know is a God-damned thing
Not what's in the medicine.
All I want to do is I want to BREATHE
But batteries not included"

Lying in bed at night, I hold my index finger on my radial artery to make sure that my heart is still beating. Sometimes, my blood pressure gets so low at night, I worry that my heart will stop beating in my sleep and that no one will find me for days. Unless it is a work day, no one would notice. Even if it is a work day, then who would my employer phone? The cats would be stuck with my corpse for who knows how long. These are my thoughts in the night as I fear that their pills that are suppose to keep my tachycardic heart safe from out-of-control rising blood pressure will -- instead -- stop it completely. I've tried to tell them that my heart does not always race. Instead, sometimes stalls ... but they give me the look I fear, check my ankles, and have no advice.

9/11: Always Honor, Never Forget

Green Day + NRDC: The Clean Energy Revolution

An Obama Witch-Hunt For Fascism

Tired of hearing the continual assaults on President Barack Obama, I've concluded that many Americans are on a witch hunt for fascism. I’m not trying to be pro- or anti- Obama, but everything is being taken out of context. A health care proposal has been turned into a death panel. A speech to encourage children to stay in school is being touted as 'communist' and 'brainwashing'. What is the real problem here?

Red alert is the color of panic
Elevated to the point of static
Beating into the hearts of the fanatics
And the neighborhood's a loaded gun
Idle thought leads to full-throttle screaming
And the welfare is asphyxiating
Mass confusion is all the new rage
And it's creating a feeding ground
For the bottom feeders of hysteria