Bull-headed to the Extreme

I am a bull-headed woman. I know, because my Daddy always said so. My daddy was always right. (You can hear me finally admitting that, can’t you Daddy?)

Over a period of time I’d had episodes of mild chest discomfort. I had also had episodes of palpations. When the palpations occurred I wasn’t too worried; I’ve had them as far back as I can remember. The chest discomfort, well, that was starting to get my attention. It was new.

It would happen for a few minutes and go away. I’d think to myself, “Self, you really need to see the doctor and find out what this is.” But, I’d get busy and not make the call.

Until last week when both hit at the same time. Not severe, mind you, but scary. I drove myself to the ER. (Don’t do this, by the way, its dangerous.) I should have called 911, but I’m independent stubborn bull-headed.

After being hooked up to an EKG machine and having an EKG run I was hooked up to monitors and left to my own thoughts for what seemed like an eternity. At long last the doctor came in and said there some “abnormalities in the EKG, but not enough to say I had or was having a heart attack. Of course, by the time he showed up the palpations and chest discomfort had ceased. 

He suggested wanted to admit me to the hospital. He wanted to run periodic blood tests through the night to be assured that I wasn’t having a heart attack. If they weren’t conclusive, he wanted to continue on with an even longer list of tests. I listened. Panic set in.

I hate hospitals. I hate being in them. I hate them so badly that I find it hard to stay long when I have a loved one admitted. It does not matter which hospital it is either. They scare me to death. I dread them.

I was polite when I explained to the kind doctor that, no, I wouldn’t do that. He was polite and sincere as he explained to me why I should do as he suggested. I said no. After he left the room, I proceeded to pull off all of the EKG stickers. Then I pulled off the leads to the monitor. (Those things put up quite a fuss when you do that, just as an FYI.)  When the nurse came back, I was dressed and only needed him to get that pesky IV thing out of my arm. Luckily there was no IV line attached. Otherwise getting my shirt on would have been impossible. No, I’d have pulled it out myself at that point. (I’ve seen them removed from my husband enough times to know how its done.)

I was discharged after signing a release for the hospital saying I had left against their medical advice.

Since then I have seen my doctor and had blood work, x-rays, and more EKG’s done. Everything is negative. Nothing has jumped out warning of my immanent demise. I’m being treated for stress and anxiety for now, but will be getting more cardiac workups done. I want to know for sure that its just stress and anxiety.

My doctor gave me strict orders: If it happens again and is severe, I am to call 911. I am to stay at the hospital, and be sure I’m OK before leaving. . . when I’m told to leave. sigh. . . I know she’s right.

If I had that day to live over, I would stay and let them do their multitude of tests. Why?  Well, because then I would already know for sure if I have a heart problem. I would have it all out of the way.

I panicked. And I’m bull-headed.

That time I was lucky my bull-headedness didn’t send me straight across the Veil.

Caregiving Issues – BPD

My husband suffers from many health problems, one of which is Borderline Personality Disorder(BPD).  http://psychcentral.com/lib/2007/symptoms-of-borderline-personality-disorder/ He was officially diagnosed in 1999, nine years into our relationship. Once I did some research and understood the disorder, which in his case is accompanied by chronic depression, it made dealing with him easier.

In BPD the person suffering with the disorder sees others as either all good or all bad. This viewpoint can change within the blink of an eye in my husband’s case. This weekend I have been all bad. I don’t care enough, I don’t do enough, I am not attentive enough, the list could go on forever. Even though I know the reason for this barrage of criticism, it still takes it’s toll.

He is worse in the evenings, and today I have to go to work early, which means I will be home in the evening, again. The third day in a row. Oh, joy!

I needed to vent, and since he does not “do” computers, I vented here, on my blog.

– WalksAlone

AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA

I wanted to share this open letter that was written to The New York Times, but never published. It sums up my feelings to a tee. ~ WalksAlone

 

YES, this open letter was written by a FORMER Vice President of Proctor & Gamble, one of the companies that caved in to the hateful boycott of Glenn Beck by the extreme left:

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Claim: Lou Pritchett penned an “open letter” to President Obama.

CORRECTLY ATTRIBUTED

Example: [Collected via e-mail, May 2009]

AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me.

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know nothing about you.

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for your expensive Ivy League education and your upscale lifestyle and housing with no visible signs of support.

You scare me because you did not spend the formative years of youth growing up in America and culturally you are not an American.

You scare me because you have never run a company or met a payroll.

You scare me because you have never had military experience, thus don’t understand it at its core..

You scare me because you lack humility and ‘class’, always blaming others.

You scare me because for over half your life you have aligned yourself with radical extremists who hate America and you refuse to publicly denounce these radicals who wish to see America fail.

You scare me because you are a cheerleader for the ‘blame America’ crowd and deliver this message abroad.

You scare me because you want to change America to a European style country where the government sector dominates instead of the private sector.

You scare me because you want to replace our health care system with a government controlled one.

You scare me because you prefer ‘wind mills’ to responsibly capitalizing on our own vast oil, coal and shale reserves.

You scare me because you want to kill the American capitalist goose that lays the golden egg which provides the highest standard of living in the world.

You scare me because you have begun to use ‘extortion’ tactics against certain banks and corporations.

You scare me because your own political party shrinks from challenging you on your wild and irresponsible spending proposals.

You scare me because you will not openly listen to or even consider opposing points of view from intelligent people.

You scare me because you falsely believe that you are both omnipotent and omniscient.

You scare me because the media gives you a free pass on everything you do.

You scare me because you demonize and want to silence the Limbaughs, Hannitys, O’Relllys and Becks who offer opposing, conservative points of view.

You scare me because you prefer controlling over governing.

Finally, you scare me because if you serve a second term I will probably not feel safe in writing a similar letter in 8 years.

Lou Pritchett

Origins: Lou Pritchett is a former vice president of Procter & Gamble whose career at that company spanned 36 years before his retirement in 1989, and he is the author of the 1995 business book, Stop Paddling & Start Rocking the Boat.

Mr. Pritchett confirmed to [snopes.com] that he was indeed the author of the much-circulated “open letter” quoted above:

“I did write the ‘you scare me’ letter. I sent it to the NY Times but they never acknowledged or published it. However, it hit the internet and according to the ‘experts’ has had over 500,000 hits.”

Pondering Our Future

I have so many things I need to be doing this morning. Instead, I find myself glued to the computer, following link after link to information about what is in the health care bill as it exists in congress at this moment.

The more I read, the more fearful I become. Not only about lack of medical care as I grow too old to be “useful”, but at the fact that hidden in this bill are provisions that will strip away our privacy, our freedoms, and that will effect every aspect of what it has meant to be an American.

In my opinion, this proposed legislation is not so much about health care as it is taking over every aspect of our lives and extinguishing all the qualities of the United States that have made her the greatest nation in the world for over 200 years.

Our founding fathers are surely rolling over in their graves. Our ancestors who fought and died to keep us free are surely joining them. I’m surprised the earth herself has not begun to quake from all the activity six feet under our soil.

Have we become so lazy and complacent that we would rather the government “take care” of us to the point that it dictates every portion of our lives? Are we willingly marching in lock-step into “1984”?

Wake up America! It may be too late to stop the government take over of our lives, but at least be aware of what is happening!

A Rant

I dropped out of school in the ninth grade. I had four children that I struggled to raise, sometimes in conditions that would be more at home in a third world country instead of the United States. I read and studied on my own all my life and at 30 got my GED and at 40 gained admission to college with better test scores than high school graduates of that year.

I grabbed my bootstraps and pulled myself up from welfare and poverty to home ownership and a decent life. My children are productive members of society with honest jobs and are making it own their own, supporting their families without assistance from the State.

My children and I know that nobody will do it for you, you have to take responsibility and help yourself. We lived it and we know it is true.

At least it was true in the America I grew up in. Nowadays, it seems people are conditioned to expect someone to do everything for them.  I think it starts when children are small and parents aren’t allowed to discipline and teachers are “friends” instead of authority figures. In the role of Mama AND Daddy in my household, I was both comforter and disciplinarian. I put the “fear of God and Mama” into my children early. It doesn’t seem to have hurt them too much.

The United States that had the opportunity out there for me is crumbling away. It is on the way to becoming something I do not recognise. A place where individualism and the desire to succeed are punished instead of rewarded. A place where your life from birth to when you are considered to no longer be a productive citizen is going to be determined by the government.

I am horrified at the path our leaders are taking us down. I am angry that the opportunity I had and the will to take it are being stripped away. I am afraid for my children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren for they will not live in the same great nation I grew up in, struggled in and that let me succeed beyond my wildest dreams.

God and Goddess Bless America and be with Her, for She is in dire need of your help.

A Plan In Action

I saw an attorney today and after looking over my paperwork, he assured me that I was correct. He also assured me that it could and would be taken care of. It will be about two weeks until we can really move forward, but, I was told to stop worrying, stop losing sleep, and to stop being stressed, that it was going to be okay.

It still hasn’t completely sunk in yet, but I’m getting there on the calm down thing. Thanks to all for bearing with these last few crazy posts.

A Plan

After spending the best part of yesterday pulling out bankers boxes from the basement and going through reams of saved papers, I found most of what I was looking for.

I learned that my gut feeling is correct, there is something amiss in a contract I’m under. Armed with this information, I know I have to call a lawyer and let someone other than me handle it from here on out. I’ll be setting that appointment up tomorrow.

Now for the hard part. I have to tell my brain to let it go, stop obsessing, stop the anxiety and depression, stop worrying. I’m finding that almost impossible to do, and yet, I must.

One day next week I will turn the mundane, physical evidence over to a contract lawyer. Today I have to turn the mental, spiritual part of my anguish at being cheated over to the Goddess and God.

Late Night Blogging. . .Again

I am a morning person by nature. However, for the last ten years I have worked “second” shift, those hours from mid-afternoon until around midnight and thus am often up and about while others sleep. Right now I have some personal worries which I won’t discuss here. Enough to say they are distracting me during most of my waking hours and especially while I’m at work.

While I know deep down inside that all will work out, I still have my tendency to obsess over things and worry over things until my brain speeds along at thousands of miles per hour going over and over the same internal conversation. These are the times I fear for my sanity (if I ever had any). 

An old friend of mine used to call this “the paralysis of analysis.” He had it right, for when my brain kicks into anxiety mode and tries to analyse every detail of what might happen and when, I may as well be paralysed.

So tonight as ready myself for a few hours sleep, I’m asking the Goddess, God and Creator to aid me in putting my restless mind to rest and let me decide on a plan of action and then act on it without this constant droning of circling thoughts.

May all my readers be blessed in all that they undertake to do. Bright Blessings to all.