Catching up??

It is Christmas Eve and I haven’t posted since Thanksgiving though I have ha a lot of stuff that I wanted to post, i have just not had the energy.  When I was in Columbia for Thanks giving, I bought gasoline for less than three dollars a gallon for the first time in years.  I felt like I should send up a flare or something.

I came home and made a real effort to do some work in the yard, but my back wouldn’t tolerate it.  I have since had some relief, not a lot but some.

Janet has been in pain from the repairs made when she broke her leg three Christmases ago.  She has worked really hard to avoid repeating drugs but she has taken Tylenol 3, Vicodin, Tramosol, Tylonol and Tramolso together, etc. etc. and has toyed seriously (against the advise of her Cardiologist) with having new surgery to remove all the metal that was surgically put in place to repair her femur (you may recall it was broken  in three places.)

Our son Stuart is a fencing coach and he came home awhile ago and told us that one of his fencers is an acupuncturist.  He suggested that we consider it.  We thought about it for several weeks,k but after one really terrible week with almost no sleep because of the pain, she called and made an appointment (the acupuncture office is in Savanneh.)

She got approval from two of our three doctors before going, we went, and after grilling the poor acupuncturist about his training, his license his certifications, etc. she finally went in for treatment (which took over an hour.)  We left, came home and she said she thought she had some improvement, but she was convinced when she went to bed that night and slept the whole night without pain. (and without any kind of pain medication.

When we were in the office, the man had interviewed about possible treatment but I told him  that most of my problem was my neuropathy which acturally removes pain (and all feeling in my lower legs and may hands and my back in which I have no disks between my last three lumbar verterbrae and my shoulders where I have no remaining rotator cuffs.  None of those seemed to me to be in his purview.

When we went to our Cardiologist Janet hesitantly told him about the acupuncture (expecting a negative reaction) and his reply was “Oh I have acupuncture once a month because the disks in my lumbar region are gone, and I want to avoid surgery.  He was very pleased that he pain was gone.  Guess who decided to try it.\?

Last week we went to Savannah  where she was treated and I was treated.   l didn’t have the almost miraculous result that she had, but I have been able to do things this week that I haven’t been able to do for months.  I still have pain in my back when I get up in the morning, but after rocking in a rocking chair for twenty minutes or so, I can get up and move almost normally, without humping over, and constantly groaning.  My neuropathy is even improved.  I am still waiting for some improvement in my shoulders, but I can go though my daily therapy without profanity.

Will let you know how things come out.  We have another treatment scheduled for next Thursday.

Post Thanksgiving

Well, We went to our daughter’s for Thanksgiving, I  prepared the Turkey and it was good.  I was a little disgusted with the stuffing.  I got it over spiced a bit, but overall it was  pretty good.  We had a couple of missionaries over to eat with us, so we had a good place to put the leftover turkey.  They took home a bunch for turkey sandwiches, though we still had enough to share with Beth-Anee and Stuart, and we had gravy forever (still have a bunch) 

Stuart took his dog and went home in the morning while Janet and Beth-Anee and I  went to some Black Friday sales.  We didn’t spend a lot of money and we got a few things that we really needed so all in all it worked out.

WE came home on Saturday after a good visit.  WE have avoided a lot of potential for over eating, but found that for the aging, the turkey soup was a bit better in general than the rest of the stuff.  (Stuart has done a pretty good job taking care of the rest of the leftovers)  I had visions of freezing the soup  any finding it new homes, but we are enjoying it ourselves.

WE have been trying to get the Christmas decorations up on the exterior (and the interior) of the house, but Janet and I are both having walking problems (her legs, my back) so it is coming very slowly, but so far we have had a wonderful holiday, and hope yours is doing as well.  I sit at the computer with all kinds of things in mind to write, both for the blog and on facebook, but I end up reading email and facebook and not posting in either place.  I really hate it when, my excuse for lack of  mobility  doesn’t hold up for writing

I watched the tree lighting ceremony in New York. and it did my heart good to hear and see Tony Bennett and Neil Diamond performing.  Their voices are not what they used to be, but they were both great.  The younger singers, in general, reinforced my inner feeling that the glissando which was not written into the music by the composer should be outlawed.  It is still embarrassing to thing that back when they used to ask me to sing the STAR SPANGLED BANNER at the beginning of the GSU baseball games, I used to insert a glissando  into the line of “The land of the free-eeee and the home of the brave” line.  Maybe that’s why, after a couple of years, they quit asking me.