Bird Feeder Watch Again

Yesterday morning, I saw:

1) Cardinal: female and male
2) Housefinch: female and male
3) Titmouse (don't know how to tell the genders apart)
4) Nuthatch (don't know how to tell the genders apart)
5) Chickadee (don't know how to tell the genders apart)
6) American Gold Finch: female and male
7) Red Bellied Woodpecker (don't know how to tell the genders apart)
8) Junco: male

Prevention Is The Cure

The cost of medical treatments is in the news these days, thanks to the article published by Time Magazine. One aspect of this that people never talk about is how much cheaper it is to prevent disease than to treat it. In the case of cancer, it may be that prevention is the cure. I am reading The Emperor of All Maladies by Siddhartha Mukherjee right now, which is a biography of cancer and cancer treatment. The author drives home the point that the prevalence of cancer, despite the many methods of treatment and many scientific investigations into cancer treatment, is increasing. Why is this the case? Because we do nothing to prevent cancer. One of the reasons that it was so difficult to identify cigarette smoking as a cause of cancer for so many decades is because it was endemic. It is difficult to identify something as omnipresent as the very air one breathes as a source of disease. Some people still do not believe.

If you are motivated to protect yourself from death by cancer, the best place to begin is prevention. If you don't develop cancer or give your body the tools (vitamins and nutrients) necessary to fight cancer before it takes over, you will not die of cancer. Next most important is early detection. If you catch cancer in stage I or II, it is easier to fight off (yes, with the help of drugs and surgery and so forth) than stage IV. Oh, and also cheaper.

How does one prevent cancer? Our old friends diet and exercise are top of the list. Also don't expose yourself to carcinogens like cigarette smoke, asbestos, radon, x-rays, sun light, all those things you already know are bad. How does one detect cancer early? Be aware of your body: perform self exams as recommended by your doctor. Take advantage of tests you are lucky enough to have provided for you by your medical system.

Sick Winter of 2013

Like my hat?

This winter is our sickest yet. Captain Adorable is still sick. He has been very helpful and sweet, doing his chores without complaint yesterday. His hives are getting better, but he still has a cough and a snotty nose. He's been sick since January! That's 3 weeks! Captain Obvious was sick and is still hacking up phlegm on his business trip! And yes, I am sick!

I've had a fever since Friday, and it has climbed as high as 102.2. When I woke up with 101 yesterday morning I decided to go to the doctor. The doctor's office required that anyone with flu-like symptoms don a mask to prevent others in the waiting room from getting sick. I knew I did not have the flu, but asked for and received a mask anyhow (because I am a rule follower). There were only 2 other people in the waiting room and I sat far away from them. I was a bit shocked when one of them requested a mask for herself right after I sat down--she said wanted one because I might have the flu so she wanted to wear a mask also. Sigh.

I was tested for the flu and strep and have neither. However, the persistence of my fever (still have it, now, on Tuesday) led the doctor to conclude that it is a bacterial infection. She prescribed antibiotics. I think they are helping. I do not feel as bad as yesterday...but still icky. The doctor cautioned me to rest and drink tea with lots of lemon and honey for my sore throat. :)

Blah. Bring on SPRING!

Vocabulary

Captain Adorable is picking up new words (no, not bad words) left and right. Or maybe I am just starting to notice his use of new words more and more...anyhow, whatever the case may be, I have recently heard him use "unnecessary," "advantage," and "instinct," all correctly in normal conversation.

So, I am sick now (probably not the flu, but feel miserable nonetheless: fever peaked at 102). Captain Obvious is out of town for work and so I am a single parent for a week (or until Oma arrives, yay! on Wednesday). Yesterday I watched entirely too much tv with my little Captain. I know, terrible parenting, but I was miserable and my throat was too sore to read aloud. We were lucky to find a National Geographic marathon of shows about the honey badger (wow those animals are amazing!). We learned all about the honey badger's parenting style (including hearing a cub harass its mother with constant begging for food), diet (they eat anything and everything), hunting techniques, et cetera. We learned that they can survive a puff adder bite (which would kill a lion, a much bigger animal). We saw them kill and eat several cobras. Actually, the honey badger doesn't "eat," it DEVOURS. It is amazing to watch the animal chase down a cobra (even chase the snake up a tree!) kill it, then eagerly bite off its head and destroy the fangs before eating it from neck to tail as if it were a delicacy.

Later, when eating gelato after dinner, Captain Adorable said "I'm going to beg for another bowl like a honey badger begs for a snake."

I thought this was cool because it showed he definitely learned about honey badger behavior! And was able to talk about and apply that knowledge to his own life as a particularly apt metaphor. ;).

CT Scan Clear

CT scan was clear. Things look good. It has been a year since the last procedure (RFA on Jan 11, 2012). Get to graduate to more time between scans. Oncologist will check with his attending and his supervisor, then let me know if we are going to just to go 4 month intervals or maybe even 6 month intervals. Will update when I know. :)

Back To School and CT Scan Tomorrow

Captain Adorable is finally well enough to go back to school. There was no school on Monday or today, which was probably good since he had a chance to rest. He was coughing pretty badly (so much so that he made himself vomit up his dinner two nights in a row) at night. But last night he slept all night long and today he was doing well. Went to the doctor for a well-child visit and he is in perfect condition--growing and developing well.

I have another CT scan tomorrow. I'll update this blog with the results of course.

The Flu, Skiing, Skiing Sick

On Wednesday, January 16, Captain Adorable slept late. Very late: 9:00am! This is an extremely unusual occurrence; so much so that I do not set an alarm on school days because he wakes up everyone an hour or so before we actually have to get out of bed. We were an hour late to school!  When I picked him up from school--actually, from Science Club, which meets for one hour after school, he was eager to get out of there and seemed tired.

At home I felt his forehead and immediately went for the thermometer. 101 (Fahrenheit)! Took him to the doctor the next day, and the temp was gone, so we were offered a flu test but it didn't seem likely and I did not get one. Home again. And the temp went up and the boy was still and quiet and not eating and snot was flowing like crazy. He couldn't breathe out of his nose, willingly used saline spray to get some relief, and used up tissues like nobody's business. Despite running a humidifier and a diffuser with eucalyptus essential oil in his bedroom (as I always do when he is stopped up with snot), I had to put him in the shower at 11:00pm. He woke up because of difficulty breathing from so much snot and then couldn't get to sleep again till after the shower.

The next night, Captain Obvious was home again, yay! I, who never give over-the-counter medications, agreed to give Captain Adorable a decongestant for the night. He needed so much to be able to sleep and rest. It may have helped a little. At about 5:00 that morning I noticed lots of yellow discharge from his eyes. I called the doctor and she diagnosed him as having a mild case of the flu after all, and he had developed viral conjunctivitis. We got prescription eyedrops, another layer of unpleasantness for my already unhappy and sick guy. But he was on the mend. He did have the FluMist, by the way, so the doctor postulated that he was partially protected and that's why his flu was as (relatively) mild as it was.

Sure enough, by Sunday the fever was gone and on Monday he woke up without a temp! We decided to risk it and go on our scheduled ski trip after all, especially since we knew we'd spend Monday travelling, so it was another day of sitting still (aka resting). He was very disappointed that we did not go skiing as soon as we got there, like we did last year. On Tuesday he and Captain Obvious were snotty and coughing. It seemed that they had both caught the cold that was going around on the plane  Capt. Obvious rode home from his most recent business trip. We decided to leave, even called the front desk to tell them we would be checking out that day and would come back later to use up the other 2 nights we had paid for.

Captain Adorable was devastated by this news; he cried and cried, locked himself in the bathroom, and cried some more. (Do you know how pitiful it is when a child already overwhelmed with snot cries desperately?)  Captain Obvious and I looked at our calendars to find out when we could come back. The only time to return would be in late February...and the view from our slope-side window was perfect. The slopes were so snowy and inviting! The weather was quite cold (it was 4 Fahrenheit our first day there), with natural snow was falling and the resort making snow like crazy...so, yes, I decided that we should stay after all. One of those decisions that was good and bad. We had a wonderful time, but Captain Adorable was sick. He coughed and snotted and coughed and snotted some more. We gave him OTC cough medicine at night to help him sleep and ibuprofen after breakfast to allow him keep up with his desire to ski ski ski all day long. He made leaps and bounds in his skiing ability and could ski blues (intermediates) by the second day. He begged Captain Obvious to take him down a black diamond. They tried one (which was more like a blue, according to my dear husband) and he did fine. He was having the time of his life! We had to buy him new mittens because the super great (ha!) gloves I bought at home were crap and a face cover because the cold wind on his face was chilling. His body was warm and toasty, though, with his technical wear base layer (wool is wonderful), excellent ski pants, and down coat to protect him from the cold.

At the top of the tubing runs. Yes, it is that far down.

After skiing, we went snow tubing on the second night and it was So Much Fun! Laughing and bumping down the tube runs together and separately, running for the magic carpet back up to the top, videoing our trips down...not quite as wonderful as skiing but awesome. And requires no skill at all! I hope we get to do that again. We also went bowling (first time for both Captains), roller skating (on inline skates), and the Captains played minigolf.

The skiing was great. I took my first lesson ever and discovered that skiing is easier than I thought. The last day we were there we woke up to 4 inches of powder. It was amazing. Oh so amazing! I encountered a very happy ski patrol guy outside the lodge at the top of the mountain who remarked that the powder was like Utah powder, no, like Jackson Hole powder! The snow was so good he needed a cigarette! I laughed and said well I didn't want a cigarette but it was fantastic and I loved it. Then he told me this joke: "You can tell a true skier by asking, 'Would you rather have great powder or great sex?' A true skier will always say powder because you can have great sex anytime but you never know when you'll get great powder."

Fear is still a big factor for me. I have learned how to handle myself much better on the slopes and can ski some blues, but those with precipice-like approaches are still too much for me! A cold hard fear grips me tighter and tighter and I cannot escape. I had to walk down one trail (sobbing). After that, I was unable to get back to my confident happy feelings. My belly had stopped aching but then I discovered I could no longer move the tail of my right ski and fear's grip tightened once again. I soaked my goggles with tears and somehow got down the green the Captains had wanted to share with me. The next run was my last of the day (have to get back to the lodge somehow) but I could barely make it down the familiar green slope I had confidently skied several times already that morning, not to mention the day before. (To make matters worse, I discovered that I could have gotten to that green trail on the other side of the mountain by walking a bit, which is no fun in skis, but way more doable for me than encountering the precipice that the top of that blue run...and the fear and the sorrow and the anger...).

I took Captain Adorable to the doctor the morning after we got home. She said that it was a classic case of secondary infection--a bacterial infection that you get right after overcoming a viral infection. His nose was inflamed (swollen inside), full of mucus, and both of his ears were infected (one quite a lot). I lamented not bringing him in sooner and she said not to worry. She prescribed antibiotics. He's had 3 doses now and he's running around the house, obviously feeling better and better.

I suppose I should have gone home and taken him to the doctor...but I think it was worth it to stay and ski and have the adventure we had. And so does Captain Adorable.