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Guys,
For the 2nd time in about a month I had to make an emergency trip for medical help. This one was about 2:00 this morning. I had pains in my middle/upper chest that wouldn’t go away. It wasn’t near the heart or my left arm so I pretty much knew it wasn’t heart attack related.I got to the ER down at Memorial Hospital in Jasper about 2:30 this morning. X-rays, IV, fluids, EKG, a GI Cocktail, BP, blood drawn, etc, etc. The ER doc said it appears to him I have a really bad case of acid reflux since everything went okay. They gave me lots of fluids and four prescriptions. The pain in my upper chest still has not completely subsided but it’s a lot better.
I did have enough sense to make sure that Whitey Herdog had plenty of food and water before I left for the ER at 2:00 in the morning..:)
r/Esteemed Rat
Dang Rats, glad you’re okay. I’m guessing the Doc might have told you cut back on those fancy cigars for a while. At any rate, happy to hear you’re feeling better and hope you continue to do so.
Yeah, that is scary rat. If its acid reflux you might have to scale back the did dins. It could be irritation from smoking also. Best wishes to you.
Tough morning, glad you are past it, now try actin’ yer age! Lol, I hate it when I hear that too 😀. It usually means scaling back on what you enjoy.
Glad you’re all good! Knowing Rat, he’ll be turning somersaults by high noon tomorrow. I certainly wasn’t going to say anything here, but Rat’s post gives me inspiration to share a very recent medical issue of my own…..and I apologize to Rat, as I in no way am attempting to one-up his post. A bit over a month ago while driving, I felt some unusual pressure in my kidney area. Then a couple days later when I arrived home from work, I felt awful. About 9pm I started having to urinate about every 15 minutes…..and this part is gross….it was a deep red bloody urine with all of these solid flaky things coming out as well. I drove right over to the ER, where they ended up doing a CT exam. They said the results would be ready within an hour, but ended up taking over 3 hours. It was 3 hours of misery, as all sorts of terrible diseases were swirling around in my head. The doctor finally came in and said that all looked good except for some thickening in my bladder, which the doctor explained was probably due to my infection. What a relief! I gladly swallowed their antibiotics and happily returned home. The next day I received a call from the hospital saying that another radiologist reviewed my CT results and was concerned about the location of the bladder thickening. My appointment with the urologist was a week later. I was slightly troubled, but mostly figured that the thickening was due to my infection. I had to take the antibiotics for an entire week, but felt great the very next day after my trip to the ER. Then at my initial trip to the urologist, my doctor said that due to the positioning of the bladder thickening, he needed to look inside the bladder and thus my misery and torment ensued. I forgot what they called the thing, but they inserted this microscope with camera thing into your peni s and they let you see what’s going on in there with your doctor. And what a mess it was…..you could see the large tumors with these red veins running through them. The urologist said that it did not look good, as it appeared that the tumor had invaded the muscle and quite possibly the wall, as he explained. I asked him to be honest with me and if he thought it was cancerous. He said yes. Then I asked him if he had ever seen a tumor of this nature that ended up being benign and he replied “not yet”. He then said a biopsy would have to be scheduled. I just took off without scheduling it. They called me as I was driving home to schedule the biopsy. One would think that the biopsy would be done quickly, but the soonest I could have it done was 2 weeks down the road. I also had another appointment in a few days to see if I was fit for surgery…..EKG etc. That turned out fine and I was told the name of the doctor(not my urologist) that would be most likely taking out my bladder……now things were terribly setting in about how severe my cancer was. The next 2 weeks were pretty rough. The days weren’t too bad, but I would wake up every morning during those 2 weeks right around 4am and could not get back to sleep…..I’d just toss and turn and contemplate matters. Early on, I got over the fear of myself dying, but agonized over what would become of my daughter and granddaughter, whom live with me. I never shed one tear during this time, but certainly would have if my 8 year old granddaughter had known what was happening and started crying…..so of course she was not told. Then came the biopsy. Both the doctor and anesthesiologist spoke to me at different times prior to the procedure. The doctor told me that he felt pretty strong that the tumor may have spread and that there was a good possibility that my bladder would soon have to be removed. Then I said that I hoped to have at least one good year left. I then also said to feel free to experiment on me with anything that may possibly help others down the road….which he laughed at….but I was serious. We chatted for a good 15 minutes and I felt very comfortable with this young doctor. The procedure was to be relatively quick and I could most likely go home a couple hours after the biopsy. What really was disturbing to me was this poor gentleman down the way from me whom was loudly crying for about 5 minutes…..he unfortunately must have received some really bad news. Shortly later I was wheeled on a gurney into this super bright operating room…..this was the first time I had ever went under anesthesia. I remember telling the surgical team(doctor wasn’t there yet though) that they should all check out the William Hurt movie from about 35 years ago named “The Doctor”….great movie by the way. And the next thing you know, I had awoken. A bit later my doctor arrived and said that things looked better than he expected and that he “took everything “. I asked if he still thought it was cancerous and he replied “probably, but we’ll await the pathology results”, which wouldn’t be in for about 5 days. So I felt better about things, even though I knew I had cancer, but now I was thinking that I had a chance to be around awhile if it had not spread too much. I had this darn large catheter bag I had to tote around with me for several days where it would fill up with bloody urine and then I’d have to dump it out in a toilet every few hours….sorry for the gross stuff gang.
I had my next appointment with him in 2 weeks to have 2 stents removed…..I guess probably from my bladder into my kidneys…..I never asked exactly where. My pathology results came in a few days later via email on something called “My Charts”…. but I couldn’t get the darn thing to open up. I was feeling a bit better about things, but didn’t want to dampen my mood by reading about my cancer results, so I figured I would just have my urologist tell me when I went in to have my stents removed. I figured my urine would clear up during this time, but they still had pink tint to it and sometimes it would get much redder, which was kind of frightening. Last Friday was my appointment to get my stents removed and my pathology results revealed. The nurse or attendant whom was there for my initial urology appointment, prepped me for stent removal by the urologist. I commented to her that I hope I have a couple years left but she didn’t comment. The doctor came in about 20 minutes later and said after he removed the stents, he was done with me……I didn’t have cancer. When the doctor left after the removal, the nurse or attendant said that after my earlier comment, she wanted to tell me that I didn’t have cancer, but she couldn’t at that particular time. Needless, to say that after a month of misery, it was a very nice ride home.Brutal…I’m in reasonably good health, but Mrs. 1TD’s been battling stage four breast cancer for about a year and was placed into the ER and then a hospital bed for 28 straight days and nights back in Oct. as a result of a severe reaction to a potent chemo drug infusion that had her white blood cell count down so low that it nearly killed her more than once. She’s a lot stronger and braver than I am. In any case, I suppose the lesson is to take good care of yourself so you don’t have to depend on the health care industry to keep you alive and spare you from suffering.
Howdy Gashouse. A tardy welcome to the old farts’ wing of Brian’s rangers and everything you ever wanted to know about the St. Louis Cardinals, and no small amount of stuff you could do without. Like me, you suffered through that long dry stretch of the 1950s (despite having some terrific players) which ate up all of our youths until that glorious 1964. Had to wait until I was in the army to see a Cardinal pennant and World Series. Enjoy.
If you have to give up something Rat, let it be the stogies. Eating plenty of catfish ought to be good for you. Perhaps you should increase frequency to it to twice a week.
Pugs: Quite a medical adventure you had. I recently started to have some severe pain in my guts. Went to the doctor. She just shrugged and said I probably had the flu. That night I was in an ambulance en route for the hospital where they promptly sliced out my gall bladder. All better now. Ah the joys of modern medicine! May our birds bring us joy and good health in the second half.
To Rat, Pugs, and CIF: Take care of yourselves gents. Moderation is the key.
As a friend of mine likes to say, “getting older is not for sissies”. I concur.
I can certainly empathize. I had over 60 office visits in 2021-2022. Masks were still required. I suffer from profound hearing loss so I read lips. Communication was impossible. I still work full-time. I was ready to just say no more and let the chips fall. Fortunately it’s all been resolved and life has returned to normalcy. So all my Cardinal friends i pray for your full recoveries.
My apologies for the hideously long and graphic medical post last night. I do not shoulder all of the blame, as the tall glass of Wild Turkey sitting next to me must bear some culpability. Walking around for month thinking that I was most likely dying of disease was not fun and gave me new perspective of those whom are. It truly is somewhat of a living hell that they are experiencing. Back to baseball.
Pugs?
If Donald Trump would have known about all of your experiences he would have had you up on the stage at the Republican Convention instead of Hulk Hogan!“Whatcha gonna do when the Pugs crawls all over you?!”
SS Masyn Winn R
DH A. Burleson L
C W. Contreras R
1B P. Goldschmidt R
LF B. Donovan L
3B N. Arenado R
RF L. Nootbaar L
2B Nolan Gorman L
CF M. Siani LWow gang, that is something. Rats and Pugs, glad you two are doing better and we will be seeing your posts.
Somewhat ironic, the lovely Lady Bike has had increasing acid reflux of late and has an endoscopy scheduled for July 30. She knows she needs to be better on some things. For example, she is a coffee aficionado and always starts her day with two or three cups of coffee. I have told her for years that I can’t do that – I have to eat something first otherwise the coffee goes right to my head and makes me feel weird, plus it gets my gut all acidy. I have cereal and milk with coffee in the morning, after an hour of working out (on weekdays – I take weekends off). A few bites of cereal first then the coffee – and lots of water before any of that.
I guess while we are at it, I am a cancer survivor. Diagnosed with colon cancer in 2007. During the surgery they took 18 lymph nodes for testing and all were clean. Needless to say I have had a lot of colonoscopies and tests over the years, and in 2017 the oncologist said I was 100% cured. They say if no signs show up within 10 years they call you good. Still do the scopes every three years just to make sure, but to anyone 50 and over, don’t put off your preventative health care.
Taking a gander at Friday’s out-of-town scoreboard:
The DBacks lead the Cubs in the last of the 3rd at Wrigley. 3-0 is your score.
Scoreboard Update:
The DBacks now lead the Cubs 5-0 in the 5th at Wrigley Field. And they currently have two on and two out..
All-Star closer Ryan Helsley, DH Matt Carpenter, bench coach Daniel Descalso and coach Willie McGee are having travel issues getting to Atlanta. Their availability to the #STLCards for tonight is … up in the air.
— John Denton (@JohnDenton555) July 19, 2024
#STLCards OF/SS Tommy Edman was shut down from rehab activities over the All-Star break because of lingering pain in the ankle he sprained recently, manager Ol Marmol said. He received a pain-killing injection in the ankle. The club hopes he can play a rehab game on Tuesday.
— John Denton (@JohnDenton555) July 19, 2024
Current conditions at Truist Park near Atlanta are wet and sloppy. This heavy storm could delay the #STLCards and #Braves. First pitch is scheduled for 7:35 PM ET/6:35 PM CT. pic.twitter.com/IWukdm19Rp
— John Denton (@JohnDenton555) July 19, 2024
On a good note…..taking a gander at Friday’s afternoon out-of-town scoreboard:
The DBacks get a win over the Cubs at Wrigley. 5-2 Arizona your happy final.
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