Getting older isn't for sissies

[cornerofmadness]

In the last two days two different friends have lost their mothers. It just reminds me how few days I might have left with my own. We were talking about trailers today at work and the new ones are really good for 20 years and I said I wouldn't mind buying a new one because i'll be 67 in 20 years. Then that reality settled in on me like the proverbial ton of bricks...I'll nearly be 70 in 20 years time. OUCH. How? It seems like yesterday I wasn't even 30 yet. I wish my mid-life hadn't been so hard but what can you do.

The house has progressed. What I thought was cat hair on the second bedroom carpet is actually oil. Not sure how. I always take off my shoes. I've given up on making this house perfect. it will be what it will be.

Oh this will get you a laugh a coworker's husband teaches at another university (a much more prestigious one than here) and he asked the human biology students 'what cancer(s) they felt they were most likely to get and why.' One student after explaining why she felt she was at risk for breast cancer concluded her essay with 'this is why she goes to the gyn every year and gives herself monthly ORAL breast exams. We're still laughing.

Is anyone else watching Intruders? I'm not entirely sure I like it in spite of how well it is acted. I DO have serious trouble with the little girl being able to hitchhike everywhere (though I think she's doing a fantastic job with the other personality). Are there really that many people who'll give a 9-11 y.o. girl a ride and not call the cops? (or molest and kill her)

I got a book in the mail I swear i don't remember winning from Goodreads but okay, I'll take it.

I had to work thru lunch. My sugar went from 109 to 398 as a result When I say this new schedule is killing me, I mean it.

Send your name on a journey to Mars True story, in the 80s and early 90s NASA had this club you could belong to, you got a newsletter. I can't remember the name. Anyhow my name went up in a capsule then as well to Mars (or the Moon, one of them). Thanks to ES for this link and the next one

Cool dragon

declutter day 274 item tossed-Angelic Runes #1 why kept-Asked to review why tossed -Liked it but nothing came out for years

Comments

[ishte.livejournal.com]

I don't have much to say other than I know how it is to think of your parents morality. My dad as you know is already gone.  My mom just turned 84. Thankfully she's still in pretty good health.  She got a new hip a couple of years ago.  Now she needs the other one, but we have not nagged her about it enough to induce her to actually get it done. 

I'm not to freaked out that I'll be 68 in just over 20 years though. In our generation that's not really that old, though I know your health issues may be more of a challenge.  Who knows though.  By then they may have figured out how to fix what's going on with you. 

As my friends age, I'm very conscious of my fortune in having won the good health lottery so far.  My biggest problem is dental issues which I am now able to start fixing. I'm losing two teeth though.  an incorrectly made crown had destroyed the two teeth above it and they are beyond saving.  My insurance apparently also will not pay anything towards replacing it and I cannot afford to replace it myself.  Maybe after the first of the year.  No point in even getting the partial I'd that giant monster of a crown is just going to crush it as well. it'll never fit right with that thing in the as it is. Medicaid's website says crowns are covered when medically necessary.  The dentist says UHC won't pay.  I think I might try to take them to task on it actually since I have UHC through the Medicaid expansion. We'll see if I get anywhere with it.  I'd like to know how they decide what is medically necessary.  Isn't being able to chew properly important to my health?

[ozma914.livejournal.com]

Not a fun line of thinking ... And I'll be 72 in 20 years.

"Getting older isn't for sissies"

[0-mother-0.livejournal.com]

ain't that the truth... but, hard, gross, painful, humiliating and depressing as it may be - we're lucky to have it

the older I get, the more I realize that - and the more people my age, from my graduating class no less, that we bury the more it is driven home (we just buried another this week. barry handled the service)

yay clean house! (it doesn't have to be perfect)

and LOL to oral breast exams =D

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

This is true because the alternative is even more depressing. As far as I know only one from my graduating class is gone and that was a work accident (my medical school is a different story but that was a lot of ODs and suicides)

Yes, it needs to be perfect for OCD Mom and Brother.

She must be limber to do that or have it confused with the new prostate exam

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

no definitely not a fun line of thinking...yeah that's the same age as my parents now

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I'm glad your mom is doing well. I do worry about my health not so much that I might die younger. I'm okay with that. It's the quality of life issues that bother me.

Our generation is okay, your daughter's too. It's the one after her that is predicted to NOT outlive their parents. Scary thought.

Ugh to that tooth. I'm sorry but to me, two destroyed painful teeth IS medically necessary. I finally learned why my crown is so painful in spite of almost all the nerves to it being severed. My body thinks the metal base is a foreign invader (well it's not wrong) and keeps attacking it

[ishte.livejournal.com]

Yah, I'm allergic to a lot of metals. Thankfully, I don't have problems with the metal base on either of my crowns. Just one is made wrong. I'm allergic to amalgam though, and often have to go around and around with dentists and insurance companies about whether they will allow composite fillings. There are still dentists out there who think composite is inferior and don't want to use it for chewing surfaces. I have several very large ones in the back. Until this week, I had never lost a composite filling. The one I lost was a teeny tiny one they put in the corner or one incisor. Honestly I think it was too small. I don't think they gave it enough room to adhere to the tooth. Some of my composite fillings are so good back there, that I've had dentists tell me that they can barely tell where they are. Some are more than 25 years old, and there is no decay around them. (another reason I have heard from time to time for why some dentists or insurance carriers don't want them. They claim the tooth decays around and under them more easily. I had two amalgam fillings done at the same time. Besides the constant blisters in my mouth afterwards, those two teeth ached constantly and intensely. I had to have the fillings dug out. By then the nerves were damaged, and I had to have root canals in both. One of those is my good crown. The other one (the second bicuspid right next to it) never got a crown, so I'm really surprised that it's held up and not crumbled. It's discolored around where that amalgam filling was though.

I don't understand at all, how having too teeth smashed to bits because of a bad crown would not be considered medically necessary either. (Want to write me a note? LOL) For that matter just having a bad crown that isn't made correctly. Either I have the crown removed so that it doesn't destroy the partial when I get it and just have the nub that's left there (and hope that doesn't break to pieces, which I understand it will, and pretty quickly), or I pay another $600 out of pocket (which I don't have) to have it made correctly. Blah... /bitching

My daughter went to her dentist today. She already had an appointment because she wants them to address her 'triangle tooth'... a tooth that didn't come in where it was supposed to, but instead came in through the roof of her mouth behind two other molars so that the three molars on that side form a triangle. After she made the appointment, she got an abscess, and had to go urgent care and then to the emergency dentist. But she kept the appointment anyway and they did a lot of cleaning including a deep root cleaning. They her they normally give patients novocain for that procedure but that HER insurance wouldn't cover the cost, so that she would just have to bear with it. Ugh! But her teeth are real clean now. Also, they told her that they felt qualified to extract the triangle tooth, which the emergency dentist wouldn't do, they wanted her to see a specialist. So at least that's under way.

MY dentist's office scheduled me to come in on the 13th, and then called me to tell me that they'd have to reschedule because the office wouldn't be open that day. DUH? You didn't know it was Columbus day two weeks before? Don't people normally mark off in their appointment books the days the office is closed? So now I have to wait another two weeks. I have to have two weeks notice to ask for a day off, or to be scheduled off at a specific time. *shaking head*. //bitching

LOL, you just can't get me started.

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[ishte.livejournal.com]

EE... My best friend from high school died a couple of years ago. She was a year younger than me. She had health issues for quite some time though. Nervous issues, and also other things. Her father died young too. I don't know what she died of. Nobody contacted me. I found her obituary online last year when I did a search to see if maybe she might be online somewhere finally. I suspect she probably had cancer. She was afraid of it because of her father, so every time they told her a pap came back "abnormal" she'd be on the phone with me terrified that this time they'd tell her it was something serious.

My old Boss's brother is fighting Acute Myeloid Leukemia right now. He's several years younger than me and they just lost their father to cancer last year. His treatment has been by design apparently to reduce his immune system to 0 with chemo, then let it build back up a little, send him home for a week. Then back to the James for another round of chemo. They're telling him that it's likely he'll need a marrow transplant. I hope one of his family is a match.

We really need to find a way to kill cancer that doesn't also kill the patient.

[ishte.livejournal.com]

Can they replace your crown it with an all porcelain or all resin crown? I don't know where your crown is, and while I know that all porcelain or all resin is commonly used on front teeth, I don't know if they're considered strong enough for back teeth or not. I think porcelain is, since most crowns are porcelain bonded to the metal base. I would guess you could get an all porcelain one. Hope?

I guess that I'm lucky in that I'm not allergic to steel. Go figure. Allergic to amalgam, allergic to gold (though I can wear a 14k gold ring, I can't wear gold earrings. I'm guessing the skin is more sensitive in my lobes?) allergic to silver to a lesser degree (again I can wear silver rings, but not silver in my ears or mouth.) I'm also allergic to some acrylic. My body is weird. LOL

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[0-mother-0.livejournal.com]

the majority of ours have been heart disease and cancer, but we've had some accidents and ODs. one of my best friends from HS was one of the ODs (at 40 yrs old)... the recent one was apparently an old case of AIDS. he lived for over 20 years on good meds, but pneumonia finally got him

you need one of those signs, "love me, love my mess" ;) but hopefully your mom will see all the hard work you've done and say "it looks so nice!". (tell her I said so)

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[0-mother-0.livejournal.com]

I'm so sorry about your friend. I know how hard that is. Fortunately, the BFF I lost from high school and I had drifted apart in our late 20s as she got deeper into drug use (we had both used recreationally, but she fell in love with the stuff). She OD'd at 40. My husband handled the service (sometimes it feels like he's the only mortician in town...). It was bracing and hard and pretty surreal, even after all the years, so I can imagine how hard your loss was. That your friend was so afraid makes it worse, I think. Fear and pain are the worst of all things.

and best wishes to old bosses' brother
with a resounding YES to ending cancer, for good. it's such a strange disease - mutiny, really. where are those cancer eating nanites? isn't this "the future"?

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I think the natural causes ones are a bit more depressing.

I'm not holding my breath on that one

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

it's a molar and no that wasn't offered to me but I have an appt coming up. I can ask.

I'm allergic to gold as well and usually I've no problems with steel. It seems to be the mere presence my body is pissed about

Re: "Getting older isn't for sissies"

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

that's too bad about your friend and your old boss

yeah the problem is you're talking about trying to kill a cell that while fundamentally different from the other cells is still a human cell. It's very hard to come up wiht something that isn't toxic to literally everything

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

Okay you're right, not knowing it's Columbus day 2 weeks before is kinda dumb.

i feel really sorry for your daughter. that's terrible. Frankly as a dentist I would have just comped her the novacaine (unless that's against the law because it could be. There were things I couldn't do to help patients with crazy insurance)

[ishte.livejournal.com]

Hard to say.  Bodies are weird things.  I hope they can do something about it.  It may be something in that particular alloy that is irritating your tooth.  I'm glad to know that her regular dentist feels able to deal with the triangle tooth though without having to go to an oral surgeon.  They have an orthodontist on staff. They'll get her fixed up and she's anxious to get the work done and just be on regular maintenance.  I'm feeling the same way about my teeth.  Now that I can, I'm anxious to get it all fixed. Just having my front teeth fixed has made me feel much less self conscious.  I know that the chipped tooth to most people probably just looked like a small gap, but to me it was very unsightly.

[ishte.livejournal.com]

I'm with  0_MOTHER_0 on this.  Where are those cancer killing nanites? We need them.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

we certainly need them. they're working on it

[ishte.livejournal.com]

That's a good thing.  It's definitely needed.