We Were Here …
A Feature Length Documentary by David Weissman
“Of all the cinematic explorations of the AIDS crisis, not one is more heartbreaking and inspiring than WE WERE HERE… The humility, wisdom and cumulative sorrow expressed lend the film a glow of spirituality and infuse it with grace… ONE OF THE TOP TEN FILMS OF THE YEAR.” Stephen Holden, New York Times
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Earlier tonight as I was writing “We are not meant to be alone” hubby had put on this documentary that was airing here in Canada tonight. And so I sat through this film reliving the past 20 years of my life in stark detail.
Listening to the story tellers just breaks my heart, because I was there through the worst time of our lives. You just cannot imagine what it was like. Thinking about it is one thing, listening to someone narrate that time period is heart wrenching.
You know, the further I get from the past, the less I tend to think about it today. But every once in a while, and this rings especially true during Pride Months these documentaries play as reminders to those we lost.
I want so badly to tell you that YES, we are not meant to be alone and that we are all loveable no matter what devastation or situation we find ourselves in. And I think somewhere deep down, hubby’s message in watching this film was to say, yes I remember for you and you are not alone here in this life.
Things in my neck of the woods were as frightful as they were in San Francisco and in many big cities in the very beginning. When AIDS came to Ft. Lauderdale, we were all taken aback by the horror of just what AIDS was doing to our community.
Thank God – T H A N K G O D that what I saw did not happen to me. Because it was ugly. I have documented all these things in PAGES, but for the moment I am drawn to address this topic here and now because it weighs heavily on my heart and soul.
When I sero-converted I was so sick. I thought for sure that I was going to die at any moment. But my friends and keepers in the AIDS care circle had other plans for me.
The film speaks of finding a cure …
that there should be more than AZT…
Back in those days we were all taking AZT because there was nothing else to take. We even went the lengths to collect old drugs from people who had died, and those drugs were taken to drug farms and re-purposed for use for those who were still alive and fighting to stay alive.
God forbid you had to go to a hospital. They would break out the hazmat suits and moon goggles and scrubs. It was heartless the way that the medical community treated us, for a long time, until they got trained to be able to deal with us without all the fear that was running rampant through the cities.
There were no specialists, no real doctors at that point, it was hit and miss because there really was no social medical safety net to take care of all the sick. But there were enough people to begin with that took on the task of treating what they could with whatever they had on hand.
I know for myself. I took tons of pills to try and find something that worked. And in the beginning that was AZT. It made me sick, and we had little pocket timers that would go off every four hours to remind us to take our pills.
Eventually in Miami there was dedicated doctors who were in the loop of medical research that I got involved with and what these doctors did for me is nothing short of a miracle.
With Genotype and Phenotype testing, they figured out the strain and type of virus we were carrying, then from that they proceeded to attaining tables of drugs that we could take that had promising results in the lab. And as drug companies pushed out pills we took them.
We did not wait for test circles to form on others, we tested all those meds ourselves. So that every year we survived, we had data to share with the rest of the world as AIDS was a worldwide epidemic.
But medication was expensive especially if you could not afford your pills. There were no insurance plans designed for this – people were selling their life insurance policies and going on government disability to be able to afford treatment. I know it took me three attempts to finally get disability coverage in the U.S. I had to almost kill myself to get my social services person to sign off on my form.
Let me tell you what the government made us go through to get disability insurance. We had to be on deaths door step, sick unto death before they would finally clear you. I got so sick that on the day I finally got signed I walked into the office, not having bathed or shaven in a weeks time, hacking and coughing all over the place for someone to fear me enough to sign on the dotted line so that I could get assistance. It was heartless and cruel the things the government and the state did to those who were sick.
They made us little white boys go to places that white people don’t go to in broad daylight. Trekking from one side of the city to another taking bus after bus and train after train just to get social assistance. Needless to say that once a cast iron bitch always a cast iron bitch.
People were so afraid of the sick. God forbid you sat next to us on a bus, or a train. God forbid you had to deal with us directly.
- I watched families throw their sons out into the streets.
- I watched lovers toss their loved ones out into the streets as well.
- I witnessed land lords toss sick people from their homes.
- I witnessed employers fire and cut people off from insurance and livelihoods.
- I witnessed so called Christians get on their hellfire and brimstone horses and watched them burn us all down to the ground with hatred and fear mongering.
- My Own family turned against me when I got sick. They would rather condemn me rather than help me so fuck them …
It was Sick. Absolutely and Totally Sick !!!
And still today that hatred simmers in certain circles. And every year we go through these periods of time when we are raw with emotions that some fuck comes along and throws salt in the wound just because they feel righteous !!!
The One Good thing that did happen was it galvanized those who were left into care circles and care givers. AIDS separated the men from the boys and the girls from the women. You learned just how devoted your friends were to you and just how much they meant to you while they were still here.
And FUCK all you haters out there. Heartless Bastards…
So many of my friends died. All I have is a photo album of the last time I saw the Names Project Quilt show in Ft. Lauderdale or Miami I think it was. This blog is a testament and my memory for those years of my life when I thought that I too was going to die.
God in his infinite wisdom had other plans for me. There was a life to live. There were things I still needed to do, and people to meet and places to see. Today I have the best doctor in the world. He treated patient Zero, the French Flight Attendant back in the old days. I truly lucked out when I moved here to find him and get into his clinic.
It is sad that there is still no cure. But death is something of a second thought now. We are living longer. I had a doctor who told me that when I die that it won’t be AIDS that kills me. And that was a long time ago.
I’ve always said that if science ever gets to the point that time travel is possible, the time I would go back to is the period of time that I was first diagnosed, because it was the Best of Times and it was The Worst of Times. I knew then that I was loved and so cared for that I wanted for nothing. And I think that that is what saved me.
There wasn’t time to sit and wait to die. I was too busy being taught how to survive and in that time I did not sit in my shit and play with it. Time was of the essence and men nor horses were going to keep me from winning this fight.
Every day that I look in the mirror I thank God for Todd and Roy and all the others who took the time to teach me and to love me and to make sure that nothing took me down be that sickness or man.
Never Forget and Remember still that on your daily goings on, you never know who you are sitting next to on the bus or on the train, or walking down the sidewalk, you never know what battle someone else is engaged in.
It Gets Better. We are still alive. And our stories should never be forgotten.
We Were Here … I was there, and I am still here.
Imagine Just for a Moment …
If scientists can take T-cells from someone who is sick, be it from Cancer, AIDS or any other such disease and are able to genetically modify T-cells to turn them into super fighting cells that when reintroduced into the body find, attach, attack and eradicate tumors, infected cells, etc …The possibilities are endless.
If doctors can harvest T-cells from patients and make this work, we could see the really first scientific progress in medical history. A very long time ago I was sitting in a news conference and was told in no uncertain terms that medical science would never get its cure for AIDS before the sciences learned how to fight and eradicate Cancer first. It would have seemed then that people with AIDS were placed on the back burner so to speak.
I was looking at a medication poster at the clinic in my exam room and on that tablet it listed all the AIDS drugs that have been produced in the last 15 years. And I noticed as well that I think I have at least at one time or another taken every drug that came down the pike even before they started publishing these information posters.
Medical reports such as these give us hope that genetic modified solutions could be brought to bear to fight disease is promising. T-cells, I wonder if you could manipulate them like Stem Cells? I have to ask my doc the next time I see him. Which won’t be until December.
Imagine, just for a moment we are on the precipice of medical history…
Could it be???
We need to get the drug companies to fund more studies. Because this report that I posted earlier tonight aired on Canadian News this evening and the scientists who made this discovery got their funds from a charity, not the drug companies who wouldn’t fund this kind of research.
I hope that once these studies are published in their respective journals, that the medical and drug companies will take notice and get on board. It is time to get the pharmaceutical companies to start funding new studies and stop monopolizing the data and availability of drugs and medical studies.
Remarkable method wipes out leukemia in 2 patients, improves a third
By Stephanie Nano, The Associated Press | The Canadian Press
NEW YORK, N.Y. – Scientists are reporting the first clear success with a new approach for treating leukemia — turning the patients’ own blood cells into assassins that hunt and destroy their cancer cells.
They’ve only done it in three patients so far, but the results were striking: Two appear cancer-free up to a year after treatment, and the third patient is improved but still has some cancer. Scientists are already preparing to try the same gene therapy technique for other kinds of cancer.
“It worked great. We were surprised it worked as well as it did,” said Dr. Carl June, a gene therapy expert at the University of Pennsylvania. “We’re just a year out now. We need to find out how long these remissions last.”
He led the study, published Wednesday by two journals, New England Journal of Medicine and Science Translational Medicine.
It involved three men with very advanced cases of chronic lymphocytic leukemia, or CLL. The only hope for a cure now is bone marrow or stem cell transplants, which don’t always work and carry a high risk of death.
Scientists have been working for years to find ways to boost the immune system’s ability to fight cancer. Earlier attempts at genetically modifying bloodstream soldiers called T-cells have had limited success; the modified cells didn’t reproduce well and quickly disappeared.
June and his colleagues made changes to the technique, using a novel carrier to deliver the new genes into the T-cells and a signalling mechanism telling the cells to kill and multiply.
That resulted in armies of “serial killer” cells that targeted cancer cells, destroyed them, and went on to kill new cancer as it emerged. It was known that T-cells attack viruses that way, but this is the first time it’s been done against cancer, June said.
For the experiment, blood was taken from each patient and T-cells removed. After they were altered in a lab, millions of the cells were returned to the patient in three infusions.
The researchers described the experience of one 64-year-old patient in detail. There was no change for two weeks, but then he became ill with chills, nausea and fever. He and the other two patients were hit with a condition that occurs when a large number of cancer cells die at the same time — a sign that the gene therapy is working.
“It was like the worse flu of their life,” June said. “But after that, it’s over. They’re well.”
The main complication seems to be that this technique also destroys some other infection-fighting blood cells; so far the patients have been getting monthly treatments for that.
Penn researchers want to test the gene therapy technique in leukemia-related cancers, as well as pancreatic and ovarian cancer, he said. Other institutions are looking at prostate and brain cancer.
Dr. Walter J. Urba of the Providence Cancer Center in Portland, Oregon, called the findings “pretty remarkable” but added a note of caution because of the size of the study.
“It’s still just three patients. Three’s better than one, but it’s not 100,” said Urba, one of the authors of an editorial on the research that appears in the New England Journal.
What happens long-term is key, he said: “What’s it like a year from now, two years from now, for these patients.”
But Dr. Kanti Rai, a blood cancer expert at New York’s Long Island Jewish Medical Center, could hardly contain his enthusiasm, saying he usually is more reserved in his comments on such reports.
“It’s an amazing, amazing kind of achievement,” said Rai, who had no role in the research.
None of the three patients wanted to be identified, but one wrote about his illness, and his statement was provided by the university. The man, himself a scientist, called himself “very lucky,” although he wrote that he didn’t feel that way when he was first diagnosed 15 years ago at age 50.
He was successfully treated over the years with chemotherapy until standard drugs no longer worked.
Now, almost a year since he entered the study, “I’m healthy and still in remission. I know this may not be a permanent condition, but I decided to declare victory and assume that I had won.”
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Online:
New England Journal: http://www.nejm.org
Science journal: http://stm.sciencemag.org
Survey Says ???
Well today was my day to see the doctor at the clinic. I was early and they took me right away which was good. On the downside they threw a newbie med student at me to do my triage and checkup and medical history. I really hate these medical interns who pick me apart like a dissection project. She took forever to write my refills and had to call the pharmacy twice to make sure that my file was the same as it was at the pharmacy. **note** my meds haven’t changed in years. All she had to do was look in the file-book and see what was there.
UGH !!! Med students…a little Meredith and a lota Christine …
Here are the numbers:
04 October 2010 -viral load 39 copies (undetectable) cd4% 42 cd4 ABS 1470
01 March 2011 – viral load not reported cd4% 44 cd4 ABS 1232
19 July 2011 – viral load 39 copies (undetectable) cd4% 44 cd4 ABS 1364
There is a new test to check the age of the virus which tells doctors how old the virus is in the system as one ages over time. The number is called CD28 (94). Which my doctor says is a very good number.
There is research in the pike to eradicate the virus from the body, to finally try to attack latent virus that scientists say lie dormant in a body for long periods of time and these cells lie inactive until at some point they are activated and become active hiv virus cells.
In the next year if researchers are successful, there might be a new type of medication coming to test clinics that will aid in this new treatment protocol. Since we are a research hospital at the Montreal General, any tests will be open to the patients at the clinic.We talked about the Berlin patient who was cured of HIV by way of a transfusion. Research is being made on that front to treat other patients with HIV. My doctor is on top of all the latest research.
My diabetes numbers were good. My HbA1c number is 5.5
Doc says I need to loose more weight to better my diabetes stats in the long run so as to avoid going on insulin dependency.
There was a question about my B12 levels and other hormones because I am in my mid forties now, they need to check at the next lab drop in the fall. When I lived in Miami regular B12 injections and Vitamin C infusions were run of the mill procedures that we would get every week. I don’t know why they don’t do that here. It seemed that Hiv management there was a bit more comprehensive.
Doctors here don’t follow old methods, in opt for total drug treatment and not much side study practices. We don’t get the “extras” we used to get in the states.
That’s all for today. More to come, stay tuned …
Wednesday words …
It is brisk out today and a little windy for my liking, but oh well, what can you do right? Today brought a trip to the clinic to get my latest numbers.
I am reading “Afterlife” by Paul Monette, yes I decided to continue my foray into the past and reminisce a bit longer. Drugs were hard to come by and the T-cell count was akin to a college board test. They say if your T-cells drop below 200 then you should worry. I find it difficult reading these books seeing men fighting for life with T-cells in the 200-300 range, getting sick and eventually dying. It is all very frightening.
So here are the numbers for those of you following at home.
30 Jun 09 CD4 1638 Cd4 % 42
29 Sep 09 CD4 1312 Cd4% 41
17 Feb 10 Cd4 1462 Cd4% 43
06 Jul 10 Cd4 1419 Cd4% 43
04 Oct 10 Cd4 1470 Cd4% 42
1 Mar 11 Cd4 1232 CD4% 44
My Cd4% is the highest it has ever been as far back as November of 1993. My Cd4 levels vary from test to test. But still in the thousands. The fluke in the table is the 1638 one off test in June of 09. That’s the highest number on the table in my medical history, looking at the page as I am typing this.
What am I taking these days:
Isentress – 400 mg. Twice a day (1 pill)
Prezista – 600 mg. Twice a day (1 pill)
Intelence – 200 mg. Twice a day (2 pills)
Norvir – 100 mg. Twice a day (1 pill)
They seem to be working…
All the other numbers are nominal. My lipid panel is good, and all my other function tests came back normal. The lab didn’t process my testosterone panel this time, so we will get that number on the next draw come July. That is the new topic of conversation in the HIV circle I run in. ED, testosterone and the like.
As always my doc says that I need to loose some weight. Hopefully with the weather getting better I can get outside more often.
So that’s that.
More to come, stay tuned …
Change …
Courtesy: Flickr
Things are not looking up. People are starting to worry about their lives, their lively hoods, their safety. Fear is beginning to permeate life.
It is hard to watch the news right now. I’ve been following the disaster unfolding in Japan. What the people in Japan are going through, I would not wish on anyone.
On late night radio, we are starting to hear the first tones of concern and fear. A number of people – many people – are wondering what comes next. The name Lindsey Williams in being beckoned once again. People want to hear what he has to say now, and what to expect.
This is what people are beginning to fear. Fallout reaching the shores of the U.S. and further abroad. I listened last night to men talking about what’s coming and it is becoming clear that fear is in the air.
I think the not knowing and the “they don’t need to know the severity of things” discussion has begun. Will we get the truth from the governments involved in this disaster? Many questions and concerns are being raised.
The crazies are out saying all kinds of things. The word “Armageddon” has been raised by some. And from last nights discussion, it is not what if, but when. People are reading the signs, and the question is, who do you believe? What do you believe? And what are you going to do to insure the safety of your family and friends?
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The weather is getting warmer. Hopefully the great thaw has begun. Maybe if we are lucky, the last vestiges of Winter are passing away. The snows are melting and soon, we will see grass in open spaces.
The sun shone today and it was a good day all around. I am on reading week so I have the week off. But my two profs have left us enough work to keep us busy all week in preparation for mid terms next week, and I have another oral presentation to present in two weeks time.
I got set up done early tonight and spent the better part of an hour working on my mid term at the hall. The prof gave us a page of questions, terms and theories to look up in the text and from the slides from class. I got a good portion of the questions done today.
We had good numbers at both meetings. We talked about change. That’s about the only constant in life, change…
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Things are changing, things beyond our control. People in Japan are facing what seem like insurmountable odds to find the dead and missing, to clean up the mess and try, once again, to rebuild their lives from such utter devastation.
The world weeps with them. And the world is paying attention to every update that passes over the airwaves. We hope for the best, and we hope that there is transparent information exchange.
People are afraid, there are no two ways about it. People are seeking answers to questions that, in my estimation, cannot be answered simply. Some believe that the signs are written on the wall. I don’t subscribe to this line of thinking.
We must have hope. The world is not coming to an end. Some say the rapture is coming soon, May 21st to be exact. But the bible tells us that we won’t know what the appointed day is, and when it is coming. But there are those who are set in a belief that Jesus is gonna come, and soon.
We shall see who is right.
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It is going to come down to a choice, wait for it …
Who has the real truth? Who are the true believers? Are the end of days on their way? And if there is a God, do you believe he is warning us of dire things to come? The fundies have their panties in a wad and something is gonna have to give sooner or later.
Pay attention to the signs and omens. Change is afoot. It may not come like we want it, or how we need it. But I believe that if we are steadfast and hopeful we will prevail. I am in the life and living crowd.
All we have is today. We are powerless over tomorrow.
We pray for those souls who have died, we pray for those who are left. We pray for the world in this time of calamity. And we hope that things get better, and not worse. We don’t need another disaster.
We need a miracle. A few of them at that.
I’m not giving up just yet to sit here and wait for Jesus to come get me. I’ve lived this long, and I am sure as hell not ready to die either. And I know that many of you out there don’t want to die either.
So we will see what Jesus has up his sleeve in the coming weeks.
Thunder Snow …
I was up with the little birdies this morning to make my appointment at the clinic. As I was getting ready to leave it started snowing. When I got out of the building, it was REALLY snowing … By the time I got to St. Matthieu it was like a BLIZZARD with blowing snow and it was coming down in buckets. And at one point I heard thunder over head … Thunder Snow …
Now you think that if this continues for a long time, there is going to be a lot of snow on the ground. By the time I got to the bus, I was covered in snow it was falling like pea sized pellets.
The bus was packed. We got up the hill, I don’t know how that bus got up the hill but it did. It was still snowing when I entered the building. Thankfully all the elevators were working today.
The clinic was packed, all the chairs were taken, I was looking through the windows while I was waiting to see the doc. They say if you don’t like the weather in Montreal, wait 30 minutes and it will change.
The skies opened up and the clouds blew away and the sun was shining. The snow had come and gone.
I got in and out in less than an hour. Doc says I am doing well, he upped my glyburide and sent me off with an appointment in six months.
I didn’t get to see my favorite nurse today. I did not see her in the office while I was there.
The downhill bus was approaching the stop when I rounded the stairs out of the building, and I made it, just barely. I stopped by pharmaprix to fill my scripts and came home.
Now it is nap time, since I have a few hours until class tonight.
Post a Day #31 … Tech
Courtesy: Shredder
What’s one piece of technology you can’t live without?
The one piece of technology that I can’t live without would most definitely be my computer. It is my point of contact with the rest of the world. Everything I do, is done on my computer from news and email, to schoolwork and Facebook.
The computer is on from the moment we wake up in the morning until late at night before we go to bed.
The other item that is important nowadays is my cell phone. However I don’t use mine as much as hubby uses his, everything is synced on hubby’s phone. He does everything on that item.
You’d think with a cell phone I would be all up in twitter, but I am not. Neither is hubby.
The computer is our one stop shop for everything electronic. We watch news, and our news shows, television and movies, and music and the like. All of my electronic shopping is done on the computer, all the banking, and Ebay.
I spend an inordinate amount of time every day reading my blog list, watching You Tube videos and I play on my Facebook. I mean really, we live for this technology because it connects us to other people around the world.
If I think about what it was like in the 80′s growing up, how simple things were. I had a stereo and a record player, a car and friends. Who’da thunk it that we would be immersed in this world of technology just 30 years hence.
And the kids of today have everything at their fingertips. With cell phones, and twitter to Tumblr and I pods and I phones. I watch the young people at school and all they do walking here and there and in class is play on their phones. It is like a third appendage.
That’s all I have for this topic.
More to come, stay tuned …
Post a Day #17 – Does everything happen for a reason?
Courtesy: Famoose
Do you believe everything happens for a reason? Why or why not?
Do I believe that everything happens for a reason?
Who created the universe? And where did we come from? They say that we have been created from stardust. That all the things that make up the body came from the universe. And everything evolves, as it does.
Do we make things happen? Or are things just moving forwards as the universe decrees in its wisest vision.
For every action there is an opposite and equal reaction.
Every body remains in a state of rest or uniform motion unless it is acted upon by an external unbalanced force.
Can we control the outcome of any/every situation? Or are we powerless over people, places and things?
I like to think that I am familiar with fate, and that I believe in fate. Whatever happens happens. Whether it be good or bad. I can take action and try to control every outcome, or I can let go and allow whatever to happen.
Life moves forwards, we grow up, we grow older and our lives change. There are aspects of life that we cannot control. Not yet at lease. Things are in motion all the time. And everything may happen for a reason?
I am powerless over people, places and things. Therefore I cede control to the universe or the power greater than myself.
People are going to do what they do. In any case. Certain things have been set in motion and the outcomes are unknown at this time. But whatever happens, the outcome of certain events are dictated by the primary action that took place at an earlier time.
I think that’s how it works. I believe in fate. I believe in destiny. Everything happens for a reason, not sure. If we act, the universe responds. It may not be what we wanted, but it may be what we needed.
If someone says something, and someone takes action because someone said something or did something to spur that action forwards, they are responsible for their actions. And so is the one who posed the idea.
Isn’t that what people are talking about today. A picture went up online. An idea spoken by a political person. That photograph was seen by millions of people, now we wonder if that action/photograph online was responsible for heinous crimes against humanity in the last week. Or is the person who acted heinously personally responsible for his actions? I think the politician is responsible for her actions and what she says to the general public. Just like the man who took action – he is responsible for what he did …
(If everything happens for a reason, to what do we attribute these goings on?) Fate, or everything happens for a reason?
Can we attribute every action and outcome to the idea that everything happens for a reason?
Do natural disasters fall under the category that everything happens for a reason? Or does this idea only apply to human interaction? Does everything that happens on the human level happen for a reason, and natural disasters occur on a different level?
If everything happens for a reason, then there is no responsibility for the outcome. How do you explain the killing of innocents – if everything happens for a reason? Can you justify things like this happening to “everything happens for a reason?”
We are responsible for our words, our actions and responses to whatever is going on around us.
I am responsible… Whatever I give to the universe, the universe is going to respond one way or another. If I act, something happens. If I say something lets say “here” I am responsible for those words.
But if you act, you are responsible for your actions.
I believe in responsible actions. If I am of sober mind, and I say something I am responsible for what I say. Just like you are responsible for what you say and for what you do. If you choose to act in an irresponsible way, then your circumstances will happen in return, just the same.
What comes around goes around … The universe is listening …
Everything happens for a reason … Not So Sure …
Ups, Downs, The year that was 2010…
Courtesy: Fysnoopy
I have been pondering this post for a number of days. Thinking about what I want to write about as it happens, live and in color. Firstly, this blog…has seen better days. It has been reincarnated twice and is still going, because I am stubborn.
So many blogs have ceased to be in the last five years. Some have changed their focus and I still have a good read list that I go through every day. The blogsphere has lost some really great talent, because I guess the chic of blogging had weaned for many writers that I used to read. But writing is therapeutic …
I have had my issues with people in the recent past, which is why this blog was moved, renamed, reincarnated and re-domained. You can never escape lewd and sick people on the internet. Because once you commit it to the internet, it is there to stay. I survived the last attack and kept the blog intact.
I have kept the focus on this blog as it always was. My topics have stayed true to heart, writing about life, love, troubles and miracles in recovery. My numbers are not what they were, but the internet changes so quickly with the times, that it is hard to keep readers when you post everyday goings on. I’m not political, although I have political opinions. I have stayed away from religious topics because I’ve heard all the arguments, and been attacked by the religious right and left. I have been attacked by those who question the very real facet of my life which is recovery.
My life begins and ends with recovery. Because without it I am nothing. If I wasn’t sober right now, I would be in a sad state. When I got sober this last time, I meant it. Nothing in life happens but by chance. There are no coincidences. And miracles do happen when you aren’t looking for them. That’s what makes recovery so beautiful.
The latticework of my life is meetings and sobriety. I have kept a select few of people in my inner circle that I can go to for advice at any time of day or night. I have my sponsor and fellows in the program that I call my friends. Over the last year I have seen a major upheaval in sobriety in that long time friends were stricken with diseases that took away their lives, literally. I still keep in touch with these people, yet they are mere shells of who they once were.
That’s what happens when you allow sobriety to get relegated to the back burner. People loose their focus and their lives unravel, and I have been powerless to this day, to stop it or change the outcomes.
Some major things happened in my life over the last year. Some good, some bad. I failed at the greatest work of my life, that being graduate school. I knew going in the I was the outsider from the first day of classes. People who were my friends, no longer felt it necessary to keep my confidences and be “friends.” Once I crossed that line into graduate studies everything changed, and I saw it happen before my very eyes. But I went with it, playing the part, trying to look good under pressure, to seem confident. but it was all a ruse.
I knew sooner or later that I would face the gauntlet and it happened second semester. I was tired of the game. I could not produce work that was deemed acceptable as a graduate student, however hard I tried, getting extensions and working my ass off, in the end I failed to make the marks. And there was no love lost at the end. I was ready to go as they were readily prepared to boot me from the graduate program. It was one of the great failures in my recovery. But through it all I remained sober.
After that there was nowhere to go but up. I thought about quitting my education because once you leave the system, there is no more money, and money is the one thing we need to keep flowing until hubby makes his mark on the world, that story for another time.
I was sitting in the financial aide office and my friend said to me that I should go down to Dawson and arrange for classes there, because I had never attended Cgep, that that was free money. That very day I went down, applied and within days, I was a Dawson student, in continuing education. It was a step down, but otherwise it was a good move for me. Easy work, not a lot of pressure to perform like a grad student. Thanks the gods.
For the last year, I have been keeping my cards close to my chest. I have been living in the moment for so long, that it has become second nature.
Practicing the tools of sobriety, some people would say, is too difficult. But faced with no other choice, it’s what you have to do to stay sane and in control. I have succeeded in my first semester in Cegep. It was an easier run than I had expected.
What else did I do in the last year? I haven’t gone back through the umpteen pages of posts that I have written over the last year, they are too numerous and would take me in forever to go through. So this is just going to be a highlight and lowlight post for years end.
The greatest joy this year has been to be able to share in my hubby’s journey on into his furthering graduate studies. He is the finest of educational models. Even with his help, I could not do what he does with one arm tied behind his back. His mind is as sharp as a tack. His skills are outstanding, his abilities are limitless. He took on the new work with zeal and enthusiasm. Along with his classes, he got a TA position in his department and that made all the difference. He met new friends and he has a social life that is rewarding.
Let us talk about marriage. 2010 has been a year of rewards. Married life is a joy. Just being in the same room together is enough. We don’t need trappings or riches. We live a very frugal lifestyle. We have lived in the same apartment since the day we met in 2002. We celebrated six years of marriage this past November. A simple card with three words was all I needed on our anniversary. And that is what I got, and that was enough.
For the first time in our relationship, we have more money in the bank than we used to have because of his dual student/employment role in graduate studies. The promises about financial insecurities will leave you, took long enough to come around for us. We still have bills and they still take up most of our money every month because bills go up, they don’t go down. And I would not give up the view we have from home for any other property in the city, save a view from the mountainside up above us on the mountain.
Cgep does not pay what university pays in student financial aide. And when I left graduate studies we took a huge hit, until hubby got established. But we have some financial success today, a goal that we have sought after for years, and we could never really find the mark, in the last year it came to us. So that was a good point to talk about.
It’s really not a good thing for me to sit before a blank canvas this late at night, because my mind tends to wander around topics I don’t like to ponder during the day. Hence the photo above.
Let’s talk about medicine. I survived another year. And that is something we don’t like to talk about lest we jinx the good run I have had medically over the last year. I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and have been on medication ever since. We had to shift a few habits and get rid of some that were necessary to end. My HIV numbers have remained over the 1000 mark for more than a year. With T-cells over the 1000 mark, my doctor is pleased with my progress. That’s why at my last doctor check in he gave me a 4 month break until the next lab draw. Dr. George, my diabetes doctor is pleased with my sugar numbers and I won’t see him till March of next year.
I have been sober now 9 years and a few days. Last Thursday was my anniversary, and the people who were there from the beginning are still in my life today. I got to talk to all of them, scattered all over the world as they are today, they all called me to congratulate me on my achievement.
The holidays are upon us. I hate them, and I love them just the same. I hate them because I am constantly reminded of what I don’t have. And really am I missing it really? No. The topic of family is something we don’t discuss ever. I have had to accept that I will never get back what I lost in decisions I made early on in my life. And my move to Canada was the final nail in my proverbial casket. I would never be forgiven and the curse that exists is one of silence. A punishment that my parents do to those who cross them. They shut off the switch and turn you into darkness, never to see the light of day.
Although today I wonder what they say to friend about my real absence from their lives? I wonder what kind of stories they tell about me. With the dawn of Facebook, I had a tantalizing brush with my brother for a short amount of time. Here I though I would get to make an amends and have contact after so many years, but that never materialized. It was a stab at my heart to be sure.
With marriage I get family. I don’t see them, but at Christmas we supply them with presents like good family does. Hubby goes home for a few days to exchange gifts and visit, and I stay at home where my mouth won’t get me into trouble. There are confidences that we have in our marriage, that no one knows about. There are things that we trust to each other that remain foreign to my inlaws.
Nobody knows what we know and what we have been through over the last seven years. Our relationship has only grown over the last few years. We have been together going on nine years and we have been married for a little more than six years now. Hubby has stood beside me and he encourages me when I need it and he is there at the end of the day to lie next to at night.
I have done a lot of thinking about the past. I miss my friends. I miss the life I had when it was all flying by the seat of my pants. I was 26 when I was diagnosed with AIDS. I am going to be 44 years old next summer. 16 years have passed since that fateful day – July 8th 1994.
I am moving towards an invisible line. Long term survivors of AIDS from the 80′s and 90′s are being studied now by doctors and writers, because we are charting new territory, living beyond the initial life markers. Many of us have survived and I really don’t know what to expect as I march towards 45 and blessedly hopeful of 50.
That’s why there are books being written about men with AIDS who are reaching that milestone in their lives. The surge of life that has been afforded us because of medical technology has been a blessing. I would never have reached this point had I stayed in the U.S.
I am living a dream. That’s all I can say. The last nine years has been a gift. I have achieved so much and lived a life, that if you told me this back then, I would have laughed you out of the room. Who knew I’d survive this long? One day at a time…
What do we expect in this next decade of life? I don’t know. But there are some who are going to offer us their best shot at predicting what comes next. That book, by the way, is on its way from Amazon as we speak.
Keeping it simple as I did in the beginning, I return to the past. i was diagnosed in July of 1994. And my rationale behind survival was based on six month increments. I learned to trust my doctors over time and in sobriety back then I was reasonably sure that if I lived to see Christmas, I could basically accept that I would make it to my next birthday. I never forget that rationale, keeping it simple.
If you do it, by the numbers, I have nothing to worry about medically. I have healed my body and my soul. And the grant I received from being taken was that I would live. And so I have. I have accepted the fact that my pear shaped body is what it is. And I have the tell tale signs of protease paunch, from protease inhibitors that I took so many years ago. Really, I am not as vain a man as some that I know who are my age and living with AIDS. I mean really, beyond a bottle of Miss Clairol, I haven’t done anything drastic to my body to enhance or to recapture something from my youth. What you see is what you get. Some of my friends have had major surgeries, gotten massive tattoos, had ass enhancements, and facial reconstruction injections. Save that none of that really bad shit happened to me when I was younger living with the disease. I escaped with a tummy. I didn’t get strapped with body dismorphia.
The last thing I want to talk about it mortality. It has been on my mind as of late. Maybe because I have fixated on the past for a good amount of time in the last year. By the numbers, I should not worry about dying. But death is ever present. I was once told by a doctor that it wouldn’t be HIV that killed me, that it would be something else. What that something else is still a mystery.
I think about dying. I dream about dying. Every day is a gift when you live with long term illness, that once was a silent a merciless killer. A leopard cannot change its spots no matter now medical science changes the terms of the game. The animal remains the same. It is we who cheat death by living, many of us have lived beyond any doctors predictions. Death, can’t be far away, when you consider how many people died from this over the last twenty years.
I lived a good life, to this point. Well beyond my dreams of success. I got the chance to do things that many of my friends did not. And I am grateful for every day that I lived. I don’t have any regrets. They would be a waste of time.
There are things still on my to do list. And hopefully in the next calendar year I may get to experience some of them. My so called “bucket list.”
I want to thank all of you who have remained with me here, reading and sharing in the journey. I try to help others, because in order to keep it you have to give it away, and i do that here freely and without complaint.
Here is to 2011. May it be joyous and life changing. Let us all pray.
So it’s 2:30 in the morning and I am tired of typing. So that is it for my end of year review. Thanks for reading, and may God bless you and keep you. Blessings on your heads.
World Aids Day …
This is supposed to get your attention. And it is supposed to call you to action. The celebrities want you to fork over cash on Wednesday for charities raising the flag over AIDS in Africa and worldwide.
It is a world shame that drug companies have not done enough to bring life giving medications to many places in the world that need them.It is a shame that in the year 2010, people are still dying from AIDS, when we know so much and the first world has so much to be thankful for when it comes to AIDS research and drug availability.
But we have failed the 3rd world. Millions of people in Africa suffer because of greed and drug monopolies. Drug companies have not done what they should do to bring affordable medication to millions of people who need them. We have the means and the money to do this. And yet governments around the world do nothing or very little.
Even in the first world – Here in North America, drug companies have failed many who live with HIV not making drugs more available to us. Ryan White funds need to be approved – ADAP programs need to be funded. More money must go the states for care of people with HIV. Drug companies must bring down costs for life saving medications. And we must bring to the market any and all generic forms of drugs to the market.
In the U.S. is costs $1000.00 of dollars a month to medicate someone with HIV. Here in Canada it is much cheaper for us to get medications each month. But so many go without and WHY?
What is it going to take to get these life saving drugs to people that cannot afford them? Celebrities who talk about going off social media to bring your attention to this matter are missing the mark. All these rich celebrities need to dump some of their own wealth into the charities they are asking you to donate to. If the top 2% of the worlds wealthiest people dumped something into the pot of wealth we could bring these much needed drugs to parts of the world that still don’t have them.
AIDS is a global crisis still today. If we don’t do something now, millions more will die unmentionable deaths because we did nothing. The saving of lives trumps many of today’s drama and gossip.
We Remember all those who have gone before us. I remember all the friends who have died over the last two decades. Life goes on for many of us, because of dedicated doctors and clinic workers. I am alive because of wonder drugs available to me.
16 years and counting … Remember my friends, remember your friends. Remember those of us who are still here living with HIV.
Take time today to remember us, remember them.
AIDS virus avoids drugs by hiding in bone marrow; finding could point way to better treatment
By Randolph E. Schmid, The Associated Press
WASHINGTON – The virus that causes AIDS can hide in the bone marrow, avoiding drugs and later awakening to cause illness, according to new research that could point the way toward better treatments for the disease.
Finding that hide-out is a first step, but years of research lie ahead.
Dr. Kathleen Collins of the University of Michigan and her colleagues report in this week’s edition of the journal Nature Medicine that the HIV virus can infect long-lived bone marrow cells that eventually convert into blood cells.
The virus is dormant in the bone marrow cells, she said, but when those progenitor cells develop into blood cells, it can be reactivated and cause renewed infection. The virus kills the new blood cells and then moves on to infect other cells, said.
“If we’re ever going to be able to find a way to get rid of the cells, the first step is to understand” where a latent infection can continue, Collins said.
In recent years, drugs have reduced AIDS deaths sharply, but patients need to keep taking the medicines for life or the infection comes back, she said. That’s an indication that while the drugs battle the active virus, some of the disease remains hidden away to flare up once the therapy is stopped.
One hide-out was found earlier in blood cells called macrophages. Another pool was discovered in memory T-cells, and research began on attacking those.
But those couldn’t account for all the HIV virus still circulating, Collins said, showing there were more locations to check out and leading her to study the blood cell progenitors.
Finding these sources of infection is important because eliminating them would allow AIDS patients to stop taking drugs after their infection was over. That’s critical in countries where the treatment is hard to afford and deliver.
“I don’t know how many people realize that although the drugs have reduced mortality we still have a long way to go,” Collins said in a telephone interview. “That is mainly because we can’t stop the drugs, people have to take it for a lifetime.”
The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health, Burroughs Wellcome Foundation, University of Michigan, Rackham Predoctoral Fellowship, National Science Foundation and a Bernard Maas Fellowship.
Symphony of Science Videos…
Symphony of Science – ‘We Are All Connected’ (ft. Sagan, Feynman, deGrasse Tyson & Bill Nye)
Carl Sagan – ‘A Glorious Dawn’ ft Stephen Hawking (Cosmos Remixed)
H1N1 Vaccine: I got mine. Get yours.
Lifted from: CheckUp – Jason’s Blog…
UPDATE: Montreal.
The H1N1 website was updated I guess over the last 48 hours and they upped the classification of persons who should get the vaccine, as the numbers at the clinics were low over the weekend here in Montreal.Since I am immunocompromised (HIV +) and I am also diabetic, I was pushed further up the line today on the website.
So I got ready and walked up to Alexis Nihon Plaza and got in line. I did not wait more than ten minutes at most to get all the way through to vaccination. They have a triage area outside screening people, and I did see them turn elderly people away – a woman who was in her sixties and was diabetic was turned away. They are pretty strict when it comes to the most important.
After getting through triage, they checked me into the system with my medicare card and I had to fill out a short form – they had people there to assist you if you needed it, and then they signed off on our forms, then it was to the vaccine stop. I got the vaccine with the adjuvant included.
There was an area outside the vaccine stop where nurses were monitoring people for side effects, so you aren’t alone during the process. They were very efficient and the line moved rather quickly. By the time I got out of the clinic there was a huge line – the lunch hour crowd I guess…
Get Yourself Vaccinated !!!
There’s no question about it; H1N1 is sweeping through Quebec, and has been for a few weeks now. You’ve probably already heard that Quebec government has released the vaccine, and is dispensing it across the province. I would strongly encourage you to consider getting yourself vaccinated.
Most of my readers are young, and mostly healthy. As such, the need to protect yourself from flu is not pressing. If you contracted H1N1 today, it would likely only mean missing a few days of school or work. So why get vaccinated? Because the flu pandemic is spread by droplet contact from person-to-person. Vaccinate yourself so that you’re not just another person in the long line of transmission. Because that line ends with people who are more susceptible, and who are going to die from it. Vaccinate yourself on behalf of Quebec’s elderly, the immunosuppressed patient who uses the pay-phone after you, the pregnant woman next to you on the bus, and the cancer patient. Getting the H1N1 vaccine is the socially responsible thing to do.
Find an Quebec vaccination clinic near you at THIS WEBSITE Vaccination schedules will vary by region, and in most regions where there are limited supplies of the vaccine, you will be prioritized according to your risk.
First to be vaccinated are those in danger themselves, and second those who have susceptible close contacts (e.g. health care workers). If neither of those are you, be prepared to wait a bit for your vaccine. Keep checking back, however, because eventually there should be enough for everyone.
There have been rumours and anxiety going around about the safety of the vaccine. As always, be discerning about where you get your information. Those organizations most-equipped to assess the quality of the H1N1 vaccine have pronounced it safe, and effective. In general, vaccines are the safest medications around.
That being said, the vaccine is likely to give you a sore muscle at the injection site, and perhaps a headache, fever, and flu-like symptoms for a day or two. This is not the flu, but rather your body’s immune system responding. Take Tylenol for your symptoms, and you shouldn’t be held back. Ultimately, a day or two of headache, and a sore shoulder are far better than having the flu itself, which can last more than a week!
Do it for your grandparents, for your nieces and nephews, and for the many Quebecers depending on you to do your part. Get your flu vaccine.
Thanks Jason …
Brrrr…Cold …
Right now in Montreal it is a nippy 7c outside. For you who don’t do metric that would be 45f. It is cold, wet, and dark outside. The rains have gone for the evening I think, and the trees have shed a fair amount of leaves to the ground since yesterday.
We got a lot accomplished today. When money comes the house bustles with activity. We did some food shopping this morning, paid some bills, spent over $100.00 at the pharmacy for pills for the month, thank God we have insurance through school that covers 80% of our our purchases.
I broke out my winter coat from the closet last night because I needed to take it to the mender around the corner. He does all my big time mending that I cannot do myself. So instead of paying over $100.00 for a new jacket, he is going to replace the zipper on my coat at the cost of $40.00. Not bad.
Like I said it is dipping into single digits here at night. Last night for the first time this season I actually turned on the HEAT in the bedroom. Today hubby was fiddling with the living room heater. The rule of thumb here is that when we reach the point of a weeks worth of (below 10c) temperatures that I shut the windows for the last time and we put the plastic on the windows. Because up here on the 17th floor, when the winter winds blow, they blow right through the window panes. Hence the need for extra strength plastic covering.
I have successfully navigated another week of classes. I only have class on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Along with class reading I have a shitload of books to read for my Gnosticism class, that class alone may kill me because of the amount of reading I have to do for this term.
I started a new drug for my Type 2 Diabetes, Januvia (100 mg) once a day.
JANUVIA is a once-daily pill that, along with diet and exercise, helps lower blood sugar levels in adults with type 2 diabetes. JANUVIA is a type of prescription medicine called a DPP-4 inhibitor (blocker). DPP-4 blockers enhance the body’s own ability to control blood sugar levels.
Because JANUVIA stops working before your blood sugar gets too low, it is not likely to lower your blood sugar to a potentially dangerous level (hypoglycemia). When your blood sugar levels are at a healthy balance, JANUVIA doesn’t have an effect. When JANUVIA is used with a sulfonylurea, low blood sugar (hypoglycemia) can occur. To avoid this risk, your doctor may prescribe lower doses of the sulfonylurea.
Sulfonylurea:
Sulfonylureas are oral medications that help lower blood sugar in patients with type 2 diabetes. Medications in this class include:
- Glucotrol and Glucotrol XL (glipizide)
- Diabeta, Glynase, PresTab, Micronase (glyburide)
- Amaryl (glimepiride)
- Chlorpropamide
- Tolbutamide
- Tolazamide
I take Diabeta before my meals. I will have to keep my eye on that.
Oh well, I guess I should eat something before I fall over. I cheated and ate two Tim Horton’s doughnuts and drank a double double during class tonight. I was a little sick to my stomach getting ready for class, which was strange. I never get the heaves like I did this afternoon.
Talk to you soon.
More to come, stay tuned…
H1 N1 Vaccine (Information Updated) 22 October
***Edit***
The Quebec Provincial Vaccination program begins on Monday October 26, 2009. Check your local provincial website for vaccine locations or go to the Health Canada website or your local state health information site. The Online location maps go live tomorrow October 23rd, 2009.
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They have been talking a lot about H1N1 and the vaccine that they say Canada will have by Mid-October. I’ve never had to get a flu shot ever. And I am considering all the warnings that we are getting here. They say that the vaccine will have an attached Booster besides the H1N1 vaccine.
Being immunocompromised makes these decisions very important. One never wants to introduce serum to the system in any case, and I have avoided it so far. I wonder what you are thinking on this topic???
To vaccinate or To NOT vaccinate…
EDIT – UPDATE 3 Sept. 09
Canada’s swine flu vaccine coming in October
CALGARY (CBC) – Canada will have swine flu vaccine available in October, Canada’s chief public health officer said Thursday.
“In early October, we’ll start having vaccine, we’ll actually have it in vials and safety tested by the company,” Dr. David Butler-Jones said in an interview with CBC Newsworld.
Federal public health officials are waiting for the results of clinical trials to be confident before moving forward to immunize people.
The Public Health Agency of Canada has said that a vaccine against the H1N1 would be ready by mid-November.
On Wednesday, Liberal health critics charged that Canada is lagging behind the U.S. in getting the vaccine early enough for people at high risk.
An editorial in the Canadian Medical Association Journal last week also accused the federal government of delaying rollout of the H1N1 vaccine because of time-consuming regulations for an adjuvant in the vaccine that boost immune response and increase production.
“We feel that we will be certain of that by mid-November, but it could happen sooner, and that’s always been the case,” Butler-Jones said.
“We will have vaccine in place. And so if we do see a more serious outbreak or if we see the flu come heavily earlier than we expect then we can potentially move that date up. So we’re in line with every other country in the world.”
In Ontario, the chief medical officer of health, Dr. Arlene King, said Thursday that seasonal flu vaccine campaigns will likely start in late September and early October, followed by the pandemic flu clinics when that vaccine becomes available.
“In terms of what we’ll see in the fall, I don’t have a crystal ball and no one else does. And we need to be prepared for potentially less than normal flu activity, about the same or possibly somewhat worse,” King told a news conference.
“And so what we’re planning for is a somewhat worse or busier than usual flu season based on what we’ve seen in the Southern Hemisphere,” where flu season is winding down.
Federal, provincial and territorial officials are deciding on who should be first in line for pandemic vaccine when limited amounts first become available.
So far, the priority groups include pregnant women, health-care workers, people living in northern and remote communities and people under age 65 with chronic health conditions, King said.
Like other Canadian and international public health officials, King recommended basic measures to curb the spread of flu such as staying home when sick, covering coughs and sneezes, and frequent handwashing.
Elsewhere on Thursday, Dr. Thomas Friedman, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the U.S. anticipates H1N1 vaccines will be available in mid-October.
“We’re going to be trying to reach out to children in large number, and parents, to get kids vaccinated because we know that so many kids can get the flu, and the vaccine is likely to be quite effective,” Friedman told a news conference.
“My kids will get the flu vaccine when it becomes available, and I would recommend that all school children get vaccinated.”
Children will likely need two doses of the H1N1 vaccine in the U.S., which lacks an adjuvant, unlike the Canadian vaccine. So far, three swine flu vaccine manufacturers worldwide have reported that a single dose seems to offer enough protection against the virus based on the early results of human trials.
The CDC also recommended H1N1 vaccination for all people with underlying conditions such as asthma, diabetes, lung disease, heart disease, neuromuscular conditions and neurological conditions that increase their risk, as well as pregnant women.
HIV Genome Decoded
Found on: JOE MY GOD …
Researchers at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill report that they have successfully decoded the entire HIV genome, a breakthrough that may lead to new antiviral therapy.
“We are beginning to understand tricks the genome uses to help the virus escape detection by the human host,” said Kevin Weeks, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the study’s main architect. Like the viruses that cause influenza and hepatitis C, HIV carries its genetic information in single-strand RNA rather than the double strand DNA found in all living organisms and certain viruses. This make is more difficult to decode because, unlike DNA, RNA is able to fold itself into intricate, three-dimensional patterns. Earlier studies have succeeded in modeling small regions of the HIV genome, which consists of two strands each containing nearly 10,000 nucleotides, the basic molecular building blocks of both DNA and RNA. Using a new technique, Weeks and colleagues produced images which, while lower in resolution, spanned a much larger area. The study, published in the British journal Nature, should help scientists discover ways in which the RNA genome determines the lifecycle of the HIV virus.
Other researchers applaud the achievement, saying this “aerial view” of the virus will allow scientists to understand its workings at the atomic level.
Recordbreaking News !!!
I own the record at the clinic for the highest cd4 count to date. My numbers from the last four lab works:
- 03 July 08 – 1326
- 29 Oct 08 – 1365
- 19 May 09 – 1312
- 30 Jun 09 – 1638
My CD4 % is 42
My CD3 % is 84 – CD3 ABS 3276
My CD8 % is 41 – CD8 ABS 1599
My cholesterol is down and my triglycerides are down as well. It seems that the Crestor is doing the job, and to add to this I lost 10 pounds in the last two months. YAY !!! My glucose is in Nominal range and everything seems to be ok. My doc was very pleased at my progress.
This is a wonderful way to mark my 15th anniversary living with HIV.
Medical Update
I hit a new high today and I a told by my doctor that my T-cells number has broken the clinic record and I am now famous. I’ve been on Lipitor for 3 weeks and my triglycerides are down and my cholesterol is down almost a whole point. Which is great news. The numbers are as follows:
CD4 – 1365 A New Record. I am healthier than a negative human being.
CD3 – 83
CD4% – 39%
So now we are on commercial stock for medication since Quebec is now covering all my medications and I am off study stock pills. YAY !!!
Stay tuned. More later…
Anonymity …
I had an unusual experience this morning and it has been bothering me all night long. I went to the hospital clinic and dropped my labs and took a seat in the exam room assigned to me. The nurse came in and took my vitals and to start my triage as usual.
She left the room and there was a knock on the door and a 4th year intern young lady walked in an introduced herself. With her was a woman. A woman I knew. From the Rooms. The first words out of my mouth were, and I didn’t think about it at that moment, I said to her “I Know You!” The intern looked at me quizzically and I said “yeah I know her from the rooms.” I had blown her anonymity. They did my workup and asked me some questions about my diet and my fasting routine. Then they left.
I was waiting for my doctor to come in and the Woman came back in and said to me “nobody knows that I am in the rooms. Let’s keep this between us!” The longer I sat there the more uneasy I felt. Because she returned again and started asking questions about the pills I was taking in my regimen and she was accusing me of not understanding what fasting meant. I was like What that Fuck!!! She was wearing a lab coat and all, but what did I know – that she was a medical doctor or something of that sort.
I felt like my privacy had been breached. My anonymity was also broken when she acknowledged me from the rooms. Now I don’t usually have problems with doctors and interns looking at my file. BUT I was terribly bothered that someone who comes to my meeting has now had intimate access to my medical files.
And that is not sitting well with me right now.
It is almost accusatory the way I am feeling. I don’t want another “Drunk” having access to the particulars of my life because she is in the rooms. I’ve known this woman for some time. And I’ve heard her talk and share. I just don’t know how I feel, well I do know how I feel about today…
I don’t want this woman having access to my file or my doctor… simple as that. I don’t know in what capacity she was working today with a 4th year intern – but she did ask me some pointed questions about some of my pills in that kind of AA “Why are you taking these specific pills???” way…
There has always been proponents who think that pills are a threat to sobriety. I’ve had the pill argument with more than one AA member in my many years. I just don’t feel right knowing that another member now knows the particulars of my life that were once private. I don’t like it at all…
Am I being ignorant and stupid or petty???
I’ve never faced this kind of dilemma in my sobriety before. Actually knowing someone directly who has had access to my medical life, who is a member of the rooms. It’s just as bad that I pointed the finger first and called her out. I feel like my medical life has been invaded by her. I don’t trust anonymity when my worlds come this close together. Now I am going to have to take this to bed with me, UGH !!!
What do I do now???
I know let it go… I don’t know what I’d say to her when she comes to my meeting the next time. You know, I don’t think you’d like certain people peeking in on parts of your life that are sacred and private, but I am an alcoholic and I think like one – AND SO DOES SHE !!! I know there are other alcoholics that work at the General, but they do not work in the Clinic nor do they have access to that kind of information. My information!!!
I am really feeling this little intrusion in a big way right now…
Dubai aims to top its own world's tallest tower
By ADAM SCHRECK, AP Business Writer
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – With its world’s tallest building nearing completion, Dubai said Sunday it is embarking on an even more ambitious skyscraper: one that will soar more than 10 American football fields.
That’s about two-thirds of a mile or the height of more than three of New York’s Chrysler Buildings stacked end-to-end.
Babel had nothing on this place.
“This is unbelievably groundbreaking design,” Chief Executive Chris O’Donnell said during a briefing at the company’s sales center, not far from the proposed site. “This still takes my breath away.”
The tower, which will take more than a decade to complete, will be the centerpiece of a sprawling development state-owned builder Nakheel plans to create in the rapidly growing “New Dubai” section of the city. Foundation work has already begun, O’Donnell said.
The area is located between two of the city’s artificial palm-shaped islands, which Nakheel also built. The project will include a manmade inland harbor and 40 additional towers up to 90 floors high.
About 150 elevators will carry employees and workers to the Nakheel Tower’s more than 200 floors, the company said. The building will be composed of four separate towers joined at various levels and centered on an open atrium.
“It does show a lot of confidence in this environment” of worldwide credit problems and a souring global economy, said Marios Maratheftis, Standard Chartered Bank’s Dubai-based regional head of research.
As part of government-run conglomerate Dubai World, Nakheel has played a major role in creating modern-day Dubai, a city that has blossomed from a tiny Persian Gulf fishing and pearling village into a major business and tourism hub in a matter of decades.
Besides the growing archipelago of man-made islands for which it is best known, Nakheel is responsible for a number of the city’s malls, hotels and hundreds of apartment buildings.
The company said the new project is inspired by Islamic design and draws inspiration from sites such as the Alhambra in Spain and the harbor of Alexandria in Egypt.
“This is nothing like it in Dubai,” said Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, Nakheel’s chairman.
Perhaps not quite. But Dubai is already home to the world’s tallest building, even if it remains unfinished.
That skyscraper, the Burj Dubai, or Dubai Tower in Arabic, is being built by Nakheel’s chief competitor, Emaar Properties.
Emaar has kept the final height of the silvery steel-and-glass tower a closely guarded secret, saying only that it stood at a “new record height” of 2,257 feet at the start of last month. It’s due to be finished next September.
The final height of Nakheel’s proposed tower is likewise a secret, as is the price tag. The company would only say it will be more than a kilometer (3,281 feet) tall.
O’Donnell said he was confident that Nakheel could pay for the project despite the financial troubles roiling the world’s economy.
He also brushed aside concerns by some analysts that Dubai’s property market is becoming overheated and due for a potentially sharp correction.
“In Dubai, demand outstrips supply,” he said. “There might be a slowdown, but there definitely won’t be a crash.”
Space shuttle moved to launch pad as rescue ship
Space shuttle Endeavour stands ready after arriving at pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Friday, Sept. 19, 2008. Just a short distance away on pad 39A, technicians continue to prepare space shuttle Atlantis for its scheduled Oct. 10 launch on mission STS-125 to service the Hubble Space Telescope.
(AP Photo/John Raoux)
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – In an unprecedented step, a space shuttle was moved to the launch pad Friday for a trip NASA hopes it will never make — a rescue mission. The shuttle Endeavour is on standby in case the seven astronauts who go up on Atlantis next month need a safer ride home.
Atlantis and its crew are headed into space for one last repair job on the 18-year-old Hubble Space Telescope. It’s a venture that was canceled when first proposed a few years ago because it was considered too dangerous.
The risk is this: If Atlantis suffers serious damage during launch or in flight, the astronauts will not be at the international space station, where they could take refuge for weeks while awaiting a ride home. They would be stranded on their spacecraft at the Hubble, where NASA estimates they could stay alive for 25 days. Air would be the first to go.
Endeavour and four more astronauts would need to blast off on a rescue flight as soon as NASA determined Atlantis was too damaged to fly home.
On Friday, Endeavour was parked at its launch pad just a mile from where Atlantis is tentatively set to lift off on Oct. 10.
It is the first time since 2001 — when flights were more closely spaced — that both of NASA’s shuttle pads have been occupied. And it will probably be the last.
The Atlantis astronauts say there’s a slim chance any rescue will be needed, and they say they would fly to Hubble even if there were no such backup plan.
Scott Altman, Atlantis’ commander, said it may seem like overkill, but having a rescue ship on the pad is the right thing to do.
“It’s kind of a belt-and-suspenders approach. But if you need the belt after your suspenders fail, you would be glad you had it,” said Altman, a retired Navy captain and former fighter pilot.
On top of the usual launch and landing dangers, the Atlantis crew faces an estimated 1-in-185 chance that a piece of space junk or a micrometeoroid will cause catastrophic damage to their ship. Those are greater odds than for a typical shuttle flight because of Hubble’s extremely high and debris-littered orbit.
Before reaching Hubble and again after leaving it, the Atlantis astronauts will inspect their spacecraft for signs of damage, just as crews always do while in orbit.
Ever since space shuttles resumed flying following the 2003 Columbia tragedy that killed seven astronauts, NASA has had a rescue plan in case of irreparable damage. But all those missions have been to the space station, where astronauts could camp out for two months.
The Hubble mission offers no such safe haven. That’s why the Hubble repair mission was canceled in 2004; NASA’s boss at the time deemed it too dangerous.
A new NASA regime reversed that decision, once space shuttles were flying safely again and repair methods became available to orbiting astronauts. The caveat was that another shuttle be on the launch pad, all prepped and ready to fly — something never before attempted.
NASA took similar steps in 1973 during its first space station program, Skylab. But a rescue was never needed.
Once Atlantis is aloft, “if it even begins to smell” like a rescue might be needed, final preparations for Endeavour will begin, said launch director Mike Leinbach. He said Endeavour could lift off within six days.
The rescue craft would fly to Atlantis and use a 50-foot robot arm to grab the damaged shuttle. The Atlantis astronauts would put on spacesuits and float, a few at a time, to Endeavour over the course of three spacewalks. Endeavour would return home with all 11 astronauts.
The toughest call, officials say, would be deciding that Atlantis indeed had serious enough damage that a rescue should be tried.
“This will be an emotional thing,” Leinbach said.
Such a rescue would put four more astronauts at risk and would mean the end of Atlantis, and undoubtedly the space shuttle program, which is set to be phased out in 2010. Atlantis would be sent into the Pacific once its astronauts were aboard Endeavour.
It would rank right up there with the drama of Apollo 13, said Ed Mango, Atlantis’ launch director. For Leinbach, who would head up the rescue launch, it would be the most important thing NASA has ever done, period.
Altman realizes that if pressed into service, Endeavour might not get off in time. Storms or a last-second engine shutdown could keep it grounded.
“There’s no guarantee it would get there,” Altman said in an interview with The Associated Press. “On the other hand, you look at how many things would have to go wrong to make it not possible to pull off. …
“There’s a scenario out there that doesn’t have a happy ending, and I think we all have to come to grips with that before launch.”
Medical Update 8-06-08
It has been a day today. And I did not get upset, although I did have a minor anxiety attack when I checked my mail this morning and found out that the government had screwed up my financial aide for the fall semester, they had taken away over $4,000.00 in bursary money, which I had to get back. I had a doctors appointment, but before I could get to that I had to take care of the money.
The university figured out why the govt screwed up my file and supposedly, they fixed it and I should have a new calculation tomorrow. Let Us Pray !!! Never trust the government for anything…
So I got to the doctors a half an hour late and I got in and got out in less than 45 minutes this time. My doctor is concerned about my lipids, and my triglycerides, they are way too high. So I bought some salmon oil at the pharmacy, and I am told this natural supplement should help, along with more diet and exercise. I need to loose about 10 pounds. which would be really nice, but i can’t seem to get rid of my protease paunch.
Here are the numbers: They are higher than they’ve ever been before.
Viral Load: 49 copies pm/ml
Cd4%: 39
Cd4 Abs: 1326
Ratio: 0.91
Cd3%: 83
Cd3 Abs: 2822
Cd8%: 43
Cd8 Abs: 1462
Remote Alaska volcano erupts, spewing rock and ash
The Okmok Caldera…
By RACHEL D’ORO, Associated Press Writer
ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A volcano erupted Saturday with little warning on a remote island in Alaska, sending residents of a nearby ranch fleeing from falling ash and volcanic rock.
The Okmok Caldera erupted late Saturday morning, just hours after seismologists at the Alaska Volcano Center began detecting a series of small tremors.
The explosion flung an ash cloud at least 50,000 feet high, said geophysicist Steve McNutt.
Ten people, including three children, were at Fort Glenn, a private cattle ranch six miles south of the volcano on Umnak Island, located in the western Aleutians about 860 miles southwest of Anchorage.
They were later picked up by the fishing boat Tara Gaila, which responded to a Coast Guard request for emergency assistance. The Tara Gaila was taking them to Dutch Harbor, (Home of The Deadliest Catch) the Coast Guard said late Saturday night.
The ranch residents had managed to call military police on Kodiak Island on a satellite phone before losing their connection, according to the Coast Guard.
At the same time it issued the general request for assistance from boats in the area, the Coast Guard diverted the cutters Jarvis and Melon to head toward the scene from their patrols in the Bering Sea.
A rescue helicopter from the Melon responded but had to land in Dutch Harbor after flying through some volcanic ash, causing some damage to the aircraft, the Coast Guard said.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Lee Goldsmith said those at the ranch reported rock and ash falling around them.
Okmok is 60 miles west of the busy fishing port of Dutch Harbor on Unalaska Island. Ash was reported falling in the region, McNutt said.
Two planned flights from Unalaska were canceled in response to the eruption, said Jerry Lucas, a spokesman for PenAir, the primary airliner serving the area.
The 3,500-foot volcano last erupted in 1997, according to McNutt. The volcano has shown signs of increased activity during the last few months, he said.
Previous eruptions have typically produced lava flows, but the volcano center could not immediately determine if that had occurred in Saturday’s explosion, McNutt said.
