Category: Health


It’s been a minute

Filed under: Health, Manhattan, New York, Personal not private
February 1, 2023

The first time someone said that to me, it was a bartender at a place I hadn’t been to in a few months. It seemed to me a cool way to say, “Haven’t seen you in a coon’s age thought you had died.”.


So, to everyone who may have thought I died, I didn’t. I just disappeared into a deep dark place. I am talking depression, aggravated by excessive alcohol consumption.


My father is an alcoholic, my brother is an alcoholic. I am an alcoholic. I was going to say, “I guess”, but there is no guessing. It is a fact. Today I went to work with the worst headache and feeling like I was going to puke. Yes, hungover.


My reason for writing this here is I know I should quit. So far, I haven’t been able to. Writing it down means, I must think about it. I must face the fact that the amount of alcohol I consume on a weekly basis will kill me. It’s not a maybe or an if. It’s a when.


When I first thought about writing this post, I had a lot more in my head. Now that I have started it, all the pretty words have deserted me. Now I am staring at this screen wondering if I should post it. Do I want the world to know? Oh that’s right, I have 5 maybe 6 people that read this.


Signing off. B

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The State on Pause and Remote Working

Filed under: Emotions, Health, Home, Important Stuff, New York, Personal not private, Technology, Work
April 13, 2020

March 16 was the first day of working remotely, NYS way of saying we are working from home. At first it was until March 30, it is now April 13 and I am still at home.

At first it was, Yay! No getting up early or having to get dressed! And it was fun. Then I started to think about all the things I wasn’t getting done. Not being able to pop by the brewery after work for a pint. The isolation is starting to wear on me.

And then started the petty annoyances, not being able to go anywhere, wanting to sew face masks and not having the supplies and nowhere to buy them. Ordering contacts and not getting them and it’s been a month. Ordering knitting supplies and having the store call me to say they can’t ship them.

Then things started to break, the home button on my iPhone, a knitting needle, and most heart rending of all, my laptop. Yes I am typing this on my iPad with an itty bitty keyboard. At least I have an iPad with a keyboard.

If any thing else breaks, I’m hiding under the bed until July.

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3 MTA workers hospitalized as noxious L train stench lingers

Filed under: Environment, Health, Manhattan, New York — 1 Comment
February 11, 2019

New York Daily News, February 7th, 2019

FULL TEXT:

L train riders and transit workers continued to be canaries in the MTA’s coal mine Wednesday.

Three MTA workers had to be hospitalized after hours spent inhaling the same sickening stench that caused a brief shutdown the day before.

The workers fell ill from the heavy fumes — and later on, Transport Workers Union Local 100 officials began distributing masks to station agents.

“They’re telling them the smell is still here. Some guys are saying, I’m starting to feel a little lightheaded,” a subway source said. “Another person is saying, ‘It’s making me nauseous.’”

State Department of Environmental Conservation officials Wednesday found water with “sheens” that seeped into the subway, giving off a smell an agency spokeswoman called “aged petroleum odors.” MTA officials believe it’s heating oil.

The gas smell seemed to hit riders the hardest between the Graham Ave. and Grand St. stops, lingering through to the Bedford Ave. station.

Despite the all-clear to start service back up Tuesday, riders and transit workers were still being affected by the stink overnight and through Wednesday.

“It’s scary,” said Joe Vincent, 55, a bartender from Williamsburg, Brooklyn. “Gas like this, you don’t know what it’s going to do to you.”

Gillian Lavictoire, 33, who was with her 5-year-old daughter at the Graham Ave. station, said it was an awful smell, though it’s dissipated over the previous couple of days.

“If it’s a health and safety matter, they should shut it down,” she said.

Ralph Russo, who lives across the street from the Graham Ave. station entrance, said he was unable to sleep in his street-facing bedroom. He thought the gasoline-like smell was unsafe.

“I had to lock the doors and sleep in the living room,” Russo, 77, said. “It was terrible. I couldn’t deal with the smell.”

One TWU station agent working at Graham Ave. bought his own mask after he began to feel ill on duty, a Local 100 source said.

A train conductor was also witnessed wearing a paper mask while on duty.

“It’s terrible,” he said.” I got a headache.”

~ B ~

Please be green, only print this e-mail if absolutely necessary

“You cannot play God then wash your hands of the things that you’ve created. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can’t hide from the things that you’ve done anymore.”

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#TimeToTalk

Filed under: Emotions, Family N Friends, Health, Important Stuff, Personal not private, Reblogging
February 7, 2019

This is something to talk about, not hide away or make people ashamed of. Be there for the ones you love.

Happily Ever After*

Hi. I’m Danni and I have Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. I’m presently  untreated, and unmedicated.

I’m pretty high-functioning, though, so most people don’t realize how hard I’m working to keep my eyes open because my depressed brain wants to sleep for 14 hours a day and my anxiety maybe lets me get 5. Or that I’m keeping my limbs tucked in tight partly to be polite and take up less space because I’m paranoid about my size, but mostly because even on a rush hour train I’m afraid an accidental touch from a stranger is going to trigger a bout with the screaming meemees.

I present as perfectly calm, put together, and slightly detached, even aloof sometimes.

Meanwhile the inside of my head looks a bit more like this with a soundtrack of Dani Filth-like shrieks overlaid:

20190119_105632 Storage, after approximately 21 hours of clean up (non-consecutive)

Last year was…

View original post 560 more words

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Today was a bad day

Filed under: Cleaning, Health, Home, Manhattan, Personal not private, WTF?
March 30, 2017

Before anyone jumps all over my shit, I know my definition of a bad day is nowhere near as bad as some people’s bad day. Some people have cancer, some people are abused, some people are homeless, have no healthcare, have no friends, voted for Trump and now realize he lied to them. OK that last group I have lost all sympathy for. If you are stupid enough to believe his lies, you deserve all the pain you get.

Whew. Today started good, no work, so no getting up early, in fact I didn’t get up to lunchtime. That’s when the shit hit the fan. It look like I had spilled coffee on my kitchen counter, but to the left of my sink and my coffee maker is to the right of my sink. Then I smelled the liquid and it smelled like vinegar, but I don’t have vinegar in my apartment because I am allergic to it. Then I thought, maybe I spilled beer, you know, maybe I poured a glass of beer, didn’t drink it and when I poured it out I missed the sink (could happen right?), so I started to clean it up, picking up the things on my counter and rinsing them and mopping up the spill, then I noticed it was all over the wall, and on the underside of my cabinets! What the actual FUCK happened here?

I had been boiling water to cook pasta for my lunch. I turned off the water, I cleared off my table, moved everything from my counters to the table and washed the counters and my wall. The liquid seemed to be coming from behind my kitchen cabinets. I looked above them and there were no stains so it wasn’t coming from the apartment above. That leaves only one explanation. Demons. My apartment is possessed by demons. I briefly considered calling my landlord, but decided against it.

Then I got diarrhea, while doing my laundry.

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Back to running

Filed under: Health
November 7, 2015

Last Friday (October 30) I started running again, it was a good idea badly executed. I decided to run at night on the path by the East River. Going through a dark spot I didn’t notice the path was broken up and down I went. On my face, ouch.

This was supposed to be my first run after my ankle healed. My ankle was feeling good and now my face, wrist, and knees were not. My Friday ended with a trip to the Emergency Room, where the doctor looked at my face, ignored my knees, ordered a tetanus shot and had the nurse give me some bacitracin. I was sent home, no cat scan, no x-rays, not even a bandaid for my open bleeding wounds. Just instructions to see my doctor in two day.

So I made an appointment with my Doctor, he checks me out and says “Don’t stop running.” What? With my knees hurting? “Give it a few days.”

Today I went out to run, a few more days than he suggested, in addition to my knees hurting my ankle decided it wanted to hurt also. At 2K I decided my doctor is insane. My knee told me it was quitting. “No” I said to my knee (actually to myself) we are running 4K. My knee whimpered and wobbled. I walked for a minute and decided if I couldn’t run, I would walk very fast. Except that cramps my shins so I had to run, my knee shut up and I went to the diner when I was done. I run this body, my friend says that and I was never sure what it meant. Until today.

My time was pretty good, which is good considering my run is next Sunday. I hope to do great, by great I mean finishing without puking, fainting, or dying.

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The struggle is real

Filed under: Health, Personal not private
October 24, 2015

Recently I wrote about my stomach problems. I’m here to give you an update. I finally went to the doctor and he diagnosed me with Gerd. Which I had already decided I had from googling the symptoms i was experiencing. I didn’t want to have it, but it was that or stomach cancer. He gave me some medicine and a list of foods to avoid. I took the medicine for a month and a half, then i starting having side effects. Now i am just trying to manage it with diet, avoiding acidic foods (tomatoes and citrus), coffee (very hard) and alcohol. I discovered i don’t have to avoid all alcohol and when i do eat or drink something i shouldn’t the flair ups are not severe because most of the time i’m being good but sometimes ….. I just have to have that cup of coffee.

Some of my symptoms are caused by allergies and intolerance. I discovered i’m lactose intolerant and allergic to eggs. In the midst of all this i decided to go back to being vegetarian further limiting my food choices. A friend asked me “Can you eat real food at all?” “No not really.” So its challenging, but i’m up to it. I feel so much better now. 

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Sliding backwards

Filed under: Family N Friends, Health
September 30, 2015

“On Sunday, November 15, I will follow in the footsteps of the New York Yankees as part of the seventh annual Damon Runyon 5K at Yankee Stadium – a unique fundraising run/walk that uses the Stadium as its course. I’ll get to explore the concourses and ramps, climb stairs between levels, and take my own victory laps around the warning track that circles the field. – See more at: LINK“

This is not a plea for money, however if you want to click on the link and donate I would appreciate it. Rather I posted this so readers would know why I am running. I don’t really like running, I do like how I feel afterwards and I like raising money for Cancer Research. It is a charity that is near and dear to my heart.

There is an app that tracks exercise and besides that I am listing them in a spreadsheet. This is how I know the last four runs I am getting slower. Each run slower than the one before. I’m still faster than when I started and not discouraged.

While I’m tempted to blame this on a variety of factors, blisters on my toes, sore legs, twisted ankle and/or worsening asthma, part of me realizes this is probably just the ups and downs of running and human physiology.

Today I did not want to run. I made a compromise, that I would only run 2 miles. My time was terrible, a friend who I admire as a runner commented on my Facebook post that a “bad run is better than no run”. Support strengthens my resolve.

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Have you read “SPEAK”?

Filed under: Emotions, Health, Important Stuff, The World
April 18, 2015

“Speak” is a young adult novel by Laurie Halse Anderson, it is not a new book, it was first published in 1999. And this is not a review of the book, that will be on my other blog. In fact, this post has a spoiler in it so if you haven’t read the book and are planning to, you might want to not read this post. This is a chance for me to get on my soapbox about my favorite topic to get on my soapbox about, violence against women.

Melinda Sordino’s freshman year is off to a horrible start. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, and now her friends — and even strangers — all hate her. Months pass and things aren’t getting better. She’s a pariah. The lowest of the low. Avoided by everyone. But eventually, she’ll reveal what happened at the party. And when she finally speaks the truth, everything will change.

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know what happened at the party. In fact I knew before I read a review of the book with a spoiler that told me what happened that Melinda had been the victim of some sort of sexual assault, either rape or attempted rape, probably by a popular boy. What I didn’t understand when I was reading the book was why no one knew what happened, they all knew she called the police but not why. I was expecting that she was a pariah because she had claimed she was raped at the party but no one believed her, but no one knew why she called the police. The reason (here’s the spoiler) was because when the police got there, she ran away and didn’t talk to them. Of course then, you might ask, if she didn’t talk to the police then how did everybody know she called the police? I don’t remember that being explained. It’s really the only thing in the book that doesn’t make sense. It did not detract from the impact the book has had on its reading audience.

This book has an interview with the author in the back. I didn’t really read it, just kind of skimmed through it, one question and answer caught my attention:

Have any readers ever asked questions that shocked you?

I have gotten one question repeatedly from young men. These are guys who liked the book, but they are honestly confused. They ask me why Melinda was so upset about being raped.

She admits she was horrified, as she kept getting the question over and over she realized that many young men are not being taught the impact that sexual assault has on a women. I would go a step further and say a lot of young men don’t truly understand what rape actually entails. “Lots of Men Don’t Think Rape is Rape“. I keep reading on social media that we need to talk to our girls and boys about rape, tell girls how to protect themselves and boy to not rape. Parents need to do more. They need to educate their children, boys and girls, about what exactly rape is and why it is wrong. Boys can’t understand the emotional impact of rape unless someone explains it to them. Realize I am speaking in generalities here, I know there are some very aware young men.

Rape is a crime of violence and woman can feel it. Even when their life wasn’t threatened women report being afraid they would be killed. Some men don’t realize they are a threat to women simply because they are bigger and stronger than the woman. Also the way the ‘definition of rape’ has changed and the fact that many men are starting a ‘mens movement’, just makes me more afraid.

O.K. that’s all I can think of right now. Getting off my soapbox.

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Making progress

Filed under: Family N Friends, Health, Personal not private
February 4, 2015

Since I eliminated some foods: soda, processed meat, coffee and cutting back on others I have noticed some changes. For one thing, I really miss coffee. And my stomach is getting better. I am starting to pinpoint some foods that should definitely be avoided and some that I probably should eat more of. Also I need to eat more regularly and eat real meals instead of just snacking. I should eat less sugar also.

All this is an attempt to avoid going to a Gastroenterologist since I did that when I thought I had an ulcer. Meaning I know what tests they are going to want to do and I am not ready for that.

In the interest of healing myself, I googled probiotics and found some sites with lists of foods high in probiotics. There is a good slide show at Livestrong.com. Briefly the list is:

  • Green peas – raw
  • Dark chocolate
  • Natto – Japanese breakfast food
  • Kefir
  • Miso
  • Kombucha tea
  • Umeboshi plums -eaten by Samurai
  • Yogurt
  • Sauerkraut – unpasturized
  • Pickles – made with fermentation
  • Cheese
  • Tempeh
  • Kimchi

Looking over this list, there are some foods I recognize, some I don’t and some I never eat. I knew about yogurt and kefir, in fact I have been having a half cup of kefir in the morning and evening. I didn’t know about green peas although eating carrots and celery seemed to help. I knew dark chocolate had some good things for you. The fact that miso contains probiotics explains why I can eat the miso ramen. 6 foods are Asian, apparently the Asian way of fermenting foods either produces probiotics or doesn’t kill them. I never eat pickles, sauerkraut and never tried Kimchi because of the vinegar allergy, also I don’t like sauerkraut. Now I can claim that my allergies are killing me.

Progress is being made. I am writing down everything I eat so when I do have an ‘attack’, which is still happening I can look at what I’ve been eating and make adjustments. If nothing else, I know what to do to get relief. The pain doesn’t go away as quickly as it I had a pill to take, but it does go away.

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