(no subject)
OY! as my nephew Michael seems to be indicating in the user pic. Well, after all, it WAS the day of his bris :)
Here is my story about this weekend at OVFF:
As many of you know, I've had peripheral neuropathy in my feet since 2001. Although it is a disease usually associated with people who have diabetes, my father and I, who are not diabetics, both have it. It may be a genetic thing, it may be a side effect of medications we take. Regardless, it's a major pain in the ass and prevents us from doing a lot of things we used to enjoy doing. It's been getting more and more painful for me to walk distances as time has gone on. I started needing to use a scooter rental when we go to amusement parks several years back (maybe 4), and I've been considering buying a scooter for myself for well over a year now.
I tried to get insurance to cover the cost, but I was told by the two doctors I consulted that one has to be basically bedridden in order for one to qualify for insurance to do so. One doctor wrote to me "Since you are fully ambulatory, a scooter is medically unnecessary at this time". "Fully ambulatory". Hmm. Yes. I can walk. It hurts to walk. The more I walk, the more it hurts. Some days are better than others, but I have been using a scooter to get around in my grocery store for around a year as well. It makes me truly angry that pain doesn't seem to be a consideration for insurance companies in this instance. Lots of people have pain in walking - diabetics, people with MS and FM, and the pain can be intermittent. It seems I have a limited number of footfalls a day, or time spent just standing, and beyond that limit, it is too painful for me to continue to stand or to walk for the remainder of any given day.
I walked the two blocks home once from my doctor's office, and it took me a ridiculously long time to do that. Mostly I do not think about the neuropathy on a daily basis - I just deal with it and don't focus on it because life is too short and my life is too busy and happy to dwell on such things. Many people have things a LOT worse than I do and function just fine. However, that day I was in a lot of pain, two blocks was a LOT further than I'd walked at a time in a very long time, and the fact that I used to walk daily over the Brooklyn Bridge and back on my lunch hour from the Brooklyn Criminal Court just flashed in my mind, and I gave in to self-pity and just cried because I simply CANNOT do that anymore. I hurt so much at Necronomicon that on Friday night I went right to our room after the dealer's room closed and told Gerry "I don't even want to get out of bed to go to the bathroom. I have to keep my feet up on this bed. I am NOT going to any more cons without having my own scooter. That's it."
I had been hoping that my pain specialist would help me to feel better enough that I would be able to walk with only numbness, which he said many of his patients with neuropathy were able to do after using a combination of hydrocodone and neurontin. I'd been on both meds for months, and after Necronomicon I finally decided "Screw it, I'm going to just buy a scooter myself". So I did some research online, and a few weeks ago I bought myself a Go-Go Elite Scooter. It was just a bit over $1,000, which I thought was not too bad. It's lovely, I can pick it up by myself (it's heavy, but I'm strong - I think the heaviest piece is around 40 or so pounds), and a few days before OVFF I took it out for a test drive with Gerry. We went over to his parents' house, probably less than a half mile away from our apartment. Ah, mobility!!! MAN, I have missed that. So I planned to bring the scooter with me to OVFF, and I was looking forward to that a great deal. There are very long hallways between the sleeping rooms, con-suite, restaurant, and function space. Very long for someone to walk in pain, at least.
Gerry was extremely doubtful that we would be able to get all of our stuff into Jeanneane's truck. I was certain we would. I have been packing up vehicles when I'm working with Nancy Lebovitz since 1999, and I am rather good at it. Good spatial relations must run in my genes, or something. So I got up early in the a.m. on Friday October 26, told everyone else to pretty much leave me alone, and I consolidated J9's 3 large boxes into smaller, mostly mushable and more easily packable bags, got all my button business, her t-shirt business, my scooter, and all of our luggage packed into the truck with enough room for all of us to sit without TOO much discomfort. I was MIGHTY pleased with myself.
On the way, about 1 1/2 hours out on our 8 hour trip, we were talking about the scooter, when I suddenly realized I had forgotten to take the key. Which is required to make the scooter operable. Sigh. I had even LOOKED at the key (which was hanging on our key rack near the front door) and said to myself "I need to remember to bring that" but didn't put it in my bag or pocket or onto my key-chain at the time. I MUST get it unerringly into my brain that when I think of something I need to do, I need to DO IT RIGHT THEN, or at least make a note of it somewhere that I need to look frequently, or else I am more than likely to forget to do it.
Thankfully, the neurontin and hydrocodone I'm taking for pain under the care of my pain-management doctor were pretty effective for the most part, and I only had -some- trouble in getting around the con. I tried to mostly stay put, which wasn't hard since I was in the Dealer's Room for the majority of Friday and Saturday. I mostly had to lean on Gerry only at night on the way to our room. But damn, I wish to heck I'd remembered to bring it. Next time for sure!
Here is my story about this weekend at OVFF:
As many of you know, I've had peripheral neuropathy in my feet since 2001. Although it is a disease usually associated with people who have diabetes, my father and I, who are not diabetics, both have it. It may be a genetic thing, it may be a side effect of medications we take. Regardless, it's a major pain in the ass and prevents us from doing a lot of things we used to enjoy doing. It's been getting more and more painful for me to walk distances as time has gone on. I started needing to use a scooter rental when we go to amusement parks several years back (maybe 4), and I've been considering buying a scooter for myself for well over a year now.
I tried to get insurance to cover the cost, but I was told by the two doctors I consulted that one has to be basically bedridden in order for one to qualify for insurance to do so. One doctor wrote to me "Since you are fully ambulatory, a scooter is medically unnecessary at this time". "Fully ambulatory". Hmm. Yes. I can walk. It hurts to walk. The more I walk, the more it hurts. Some days are better than others, but I have been using a scooter to get around in my grocery store for around a year as well. It makes me truly angry that pain doesn't seem to be a consideration for insurance companies in this instance. Lots of people have pain in walking - diabetics, people with MS and FM, and the pain can be intermittent. It seems I have a limited number of footfalls a day, or time spent just standing, and beyond that limit, it is too painful for me to continue to stand or to walk for the remainder of any given day.
I walked the two blocks home once from my doctor's office, and it took me a ridiculously long time to do that. Mostly I do not think about the neuropathy on a daily basis - I just deal with it and don't focus on it because life is too short and my life is too busy and happy to dwell on such things. Many people have things a LOT worse than I do and function just fine. However, that day I was in a lot of pain, two blocks was a LOT further than I'd walked at a time in a very long time, and the fact that I used to walk daily over the Brooklyn Bridge and back on my lunch hour from the Brooklyn Criminal Court just flashed in my mind, and I gave in to self-pity and just cried because I simply CANNOT do that anymore. I hurt so much at Necronomicon that on Friday night I went right to our room after the dealer's room closed and told Gerry "I don't even want to get out of bed to go to the bathroom. I have to keep my feet up on this bed. I am NOT going to any more cons without having my own scooter. That's it."
I had been hoping that my pain specialist would help me to feel better enough that I would be able to walk with only numbness, which he said many of his patients with neuropathy were able to do after using a combination of hydrocodone and neurontin. I'd been on both meds for months, and after Necronomicon I finally decided "Screw it, I'm going to just buy a scooter myself". So I did some research online, and a few weeks ago I bought myself a Go-Go Elite Scooter. It was just a bit over $1,000, which I thought was not too bad. It's lovely, I can pick it up by myself (it's heavy, but I'm strong - I think the heaviest piece is around 40 or so pounds), and a few days before OVFF I took it out for a test drive with Gerry. We went over to his parents' house, probably less than a half mile away from our apartment. Ah, mobility!!! MAN, I have missed that. So I planned to bring the scooter with me to OVFF, and I was looking forward to that a great deal. There are very long hallways between the sleeping rooms, con-suite, restaurant, and function space. Very long for someone to walk in pain, at least.
Gerry was extremely doubtful that we would be able to get all of our stuff into Jeanneane's truck. I was certain we would. I have been packing up vehicles when I'm working with Nancy Lebovitz since 1999, and I am rather good at it. Good spatial relations must run in my genes, or something. So I got up early in the a.m. on Friday October 26, told everyone else to pretty much leave me alone, and I consolidated J9's 3 large boxes into smaller, mostly mushable and more easily packable bags, got all my button business, her t-shirt business, my scooter, and all of our luggage packed into the truck with enough room for all of us to sit without TOO much discomfort. I was MIGHTY pleased with myself.
On the way, about 1 1/2 hours out on our 8 hour trip, we were talking about the scooter, when I suddenly realized I had forgotten to take the key. Which is required to make the scooter operable. Sigh. I had even LOOKED at the key (which was hanging on our key rack near the front door) and said to myself "I need to remember to bring that" but didn't put it in my bag or pocket or onto my key-chain at the time. I MUST get it unerringly into my brain that when I think of something I need to do, I need to DO IT RIGHT THEN, or at least make a note of it somewhere that I need to look frequently, or else I am more than likely to forget to do it.
Thankfully, the neurontin and hydrocodone I'm taking for pain under the care of my pain-management doctor were pretty effective for the most part, and I only had -some- trouble in getting around the con. I tried to mostly stay put, which wasn't hard since I was in the Dealer's Room for the majority of Friday and Saturday. I mostly had to lean on Gerry only at night on the way to our room. But damn, I wish to heck I'd remembered to bring it. Next time for sure!