Shame.
Abandonment.
Depression.
Despair.
It is said that "shame is among the most unbearable of human feelings, regardless of our age or station in life."
Guilt reflects on what we do, but shame reflects on who we are. I think we first experience shame in the eyes of our primary attachment figure, such as a parent, and the unexpected disapproval, usually around the age of one or two, shatters our infantile illusion of power and importance. Without warning, we are ejected from paradise, and it can only be because we are bad. We feel bad; therefore, we are bad.
For too many little children, this experience is repeated over and over in the course of socialization, and it is so crushing that they never quite get over it and spend their lives feeling this "unbearable feeling of shame."
Recent research in neurobiology has shown that a child's developing brain is not yet ready to process the intense experience of shame and that the lack of an emotionally attuned parent at this crucial time can actually stunt, for life, the growth of the neural pathways for regulating such profoundly unpleasant emotions. What helps the infant's brain develop properly is for parents or caretakers to provide what the young brain is not yet able to, and that is the soothing or comforting of the very shame that has been inflicted.
"Shame on you!" "You should feel guilty." "You're bad." These messages are common, and, of course, they inflict sometimes life-long damage. If our parents, caretakers, siblings, authority figures, or significant others in our childhood lives wittingly or unwittingly give us these messages, society later does little or nothing to ameliorate them. It's baggage that stays with an individual to work out on her or his own, if ever.
Shame, along with abandonment for "being bad," is a recipe for psychological disaster. It doesn't take much imagination to see the linear relationship between these insalubrious mental states and depression/despair. For some, the only comfort lies in believing that "once you give up hope, everything is easy."
Is there healthiness (like truthiness) in shame and guilt? In some cases, the answer is yes. If one has done something wrong, the conscience (provided one has developed) is there to offer up guilt as a mechanism for changing behavior and "making things right." If one is truly a bad person at times, by normative standards, then shame is also useful. Sometimes we feel bad about who we are because we ARE bad. If that leads to corrective attitudes, an increase in empathy and compassion, and better and more sociable behavior, then shame is useful. But it should be "ad hoc" shame and "ad hoc" guilt. No one can live under the tremendous weight of free-floating or traumatically induced (by others) shame and guilt. Shame and guilt should have a strictly defined purpose. If they have no purpose and don't lead to a spiritual improvement in our lives, they should be abandoned as a psychological or emotional fugue unless we want to voluntarily embrace insanity, self-abandonment, dysfunctionality, depression, and despair.
The kind of shame and guilt I am describing as unhealthy, unproductive, and soul-wrecking is the shame and guilt heaped upon us by others' unfair judgments and pronoucements, where shame and guilt are gratuitously used to allow someone else to feel psychologically or emotionally superior or in control by degrading us. When we internalize that kind of shame and guilt, it goes on autopilot and self-reinforcement, and that leads to the inevitable dark night of the soul. There is no love and no redemption in that unjustified shame or guilt. It must be purged or we never discover who we truly are.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Class Reunion
In August 2010, the Belgrade High School (Minnesota) Class of 1960 will celebrate its 50th anniversary. I suppose that is an achievement of some sort. We started with 50 classmates, and very few of them have gone on to their alternative or heavenly reward. I wonder, though, how many have obtained their earthly reward.
Back in earlier days, class reunions were more about who made it and became "somebody" after high school graduation. These get-togethers had the distinct flavor of "my car is bigger than your car" (house, number of children, academic degrees, money in the bank, notoriety, etc.) and less about shared (common) experience in this chaotic world of wildly competing interests, psychic comfort, or spiritual awareness. Classmates who felt inferior to the faux-gold standard of achievement and didn't possess sufficient bragging rights often stayed away from these reunions.
Now that we're all nearly 70 years of age, I wonder how the "group ethic" will have changed (if it has changed). Instead of going on and on about children, grandchildren, careers, and illnesses, I wonder if we will instead converse about whether what we've done in our individual lives has given us meaning, fulfillment, comfort, or wisdom and, if not, how we could find those things in the years we have left in this plane of existence. That would be a conversation worth having. If it's just another iteration of who's who and who looks "good," I think I'll skip this reunion too.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Master of My Fate
Psychologists generally agree there are 412 (but who's counting?) emotions. Of these hundreds of emotions, there are 8 major "negative" emotions and 8 major "positive" emotions. All of this is debatable, of course, but the 8 major negative emotions are fear, anger, shame, blame, regret, resentment, apathy, and grief. The 8 major positive emotions are joy/love, interest, enthusiasm, empathy, curiosity, boredom, laughter, and action. Most people don't think of boredom, laughter, and action as emotions, but when one considers that e-motion is energy in motion, then boredom, laughter, and action are definitely on the list. It is also theorized that a thought precedes an emotion.
Statistics show that the average human being has between 50,000 and 75,000 thoughts a day and that 80% of these are "negative" thoughts. By the time we are 40 years old, we have created and experienced about 730,000,000 thoughts. If 80% of those are negative, that means our minds are "programmed" with and have experienced, in a real sense, about three-quarters of a billion negative thoughts by age 40 (people over 40 can do the math). If we say 5 affirmations (positive thoughts such as "I am beautiful, unique, and loved") a day, which most of us probably don't do, the bottom line is still at least 49,995 negative thoughts a day. Furthermore, most of these negative thoughts have to do with the past or the future. They are not usually about the present moment in which we live, which is the only moment we are guaranteed to have.
Recent studies have shown that suppressing negative emotions (denying or blunting what one feels internally) is not helpful for learning, adapting, interpersonal interactions, or a sense of happiness. Emotional suppression has more to do with feeling an emotion than with expressing an emotion. Many emotions, especially negative ones, while felt internally, are better left unexpressed, but nonexpression is not synonymous with suppression. On the other hand, similar research shows that faking positive emotions does have a salubrious effect on learning, adaptation, interpersonal interactions, and one's own subjective estimation of happiness. "Fake it 'til you make it" is not just an off-the-wall humorous comment on how to"be" in this life. There is a well-known experiment that can lend proof to the assertion. It is about smiling. It has repeatedly been shown that the act of smiling will improve a person's mood even if the person does not feel like smiling. At the very least, smiling frequently will cause other people to wonder what the smiler is up to or knows. The secretiveness of the "knowing smile" can elevate some people's moods all by itself. Faking positive emotion works.
Faking it may, indeed, work with a whole range of positive emotions, but it doesn't work with knowledge deficits. Affirmations and positive thinking don't eliminate knowledge deficits. Mastery does. Mastery is not achieved by magic or magical thinking (e.g., if we ignore our problems, they will go away). Realizing that our errors or mistakes hurt ourselves and others, self-mastery is the real challenge in our lives. Achieving important goals takes time and hard work.
Randy Gage, an author who writes motivational materials, says that "mastery comes from confidence, confidence comes from experience, experience comes from practice, practice comes from commitment, and commitment comes from vision." Success is reading this list backward and working effectively and tirelessly from the vision to the mastery.
There are four levels to the process of self-mastery. The first level is recognizing incompetencies or deficits in oneself. When a person does not recognize or acknowledge a knowledge deficit, that person does not care about improving his/her knowledge or skills. The second level is becoming aware that other people have desirable competencies or knowledge and that these are achievable. That is the first step toward learning. The third level is learning the basics and putting those into practice. Most people fall into this category because they limit their own knowledge and practice their skills selectively. This does not, however, constitute mastery. The fourth level is to assimilate more and more knowledge and skills and to practice using them effectively. Continual expansion of the fourth level leads to self-confidence, and that leads to self-mastery.
Statistics show that the average human being has between 50,000 and 75,000 thoughts a day and that 80% of these are "negative" thoughts. By the time we are 40 years old, we have created and experienced about 730,000,000 thoughts. If 80% of those are negative, that means our minds are "programmed" with and have experienced, in a real sense, about three-quarters of a billion negative thoughts by age 40 (people over 40 can do the math). If we say 5 affirmations (positive thoughts such as "I am beautiful, unique, and loved") a day, which most of us probably don't do, the bottom line is still at least 49,995 negative thoughts a day. Furthermore, most of these negative thoughts have to do with the past or the future. They are not usually about the present moment in which we live, which is the only moment we are guaranteed to have.
Recent studies have shown that suppressing negative emotions (denying or blunting what one feels internally) is not helpful for learning, adapting, interpersonal interactions, or a sense of happiness. Emotional suppression has more to do with feeling an emotion than with expressing an emotion. Many emotions, especially negative ones, while felt internally, are better left unexpressed, but nonexpression is not synonymous with suppression. On the other hand, similar research shows that faking positive emotions does have a salubrious effect on learning, adaptation, interpersonal interactions, and one's own subjective estimation of happiness. "Fake it 'til you make it" is not just an off-the-wall humorous comment on how to"be" in this life. There is a well-known experiment that can lend proof to the assertion. It is about smiling. It has repeatedly been shown that the act of smiling will improve a person's mood even if the person does not feel like smiling. At the very least, smiling frequently will cause other people to wonder what the smiler is up to or knows. The secretiveness of the "knowing smile" can elevate some people's moods all by itself. Faking positive emotion works.
Faking it may, indeed, work with a whole range of positive emotions, but it doesn't work with knowledge deficits. Affirmations and positive thinking don't eliminate knowledge deficits. Mastery does. Mastery is not achieved by magic or magical thinking (e.g., if we ignore our problems, they will go away). Realizing that our errors or mistakes hurt ourselves and others, self-mastery is the real challenge in our lives. Achieving important goals takes time and hard work.
Randy Gage, an author who writes motivational materials, says that "mastery comes from confidence, confidence comes from experience, experience comes from practice, practice comes from commitment, and commitment comes from vision." Success is reading this list backward and working effectively and tirelessly from the vision to the mastery.
There are four levels to the process of self-mastery. The first level is recognizing incompetencies or deficits in oneself. When a person does not recognize or acknowledge a knowledge deficit, that person does not care about improving his/her knowledge or skills. The second level is becoming aware that other people have desirable competencies or knowledge and that these are achievable. That is the first step toward learning. The third level is learning the basics and putting those into practice. Most people fall into this category because they limit their own knowledge and practice their skills selectively. This does not, however, constitute mastery. The fourth level is to assimilate more and more knowledge and skills and to practice using them effectively. Continual expansion of the fourth level leads to self-confidence, and that leads to self-mastery.
The test of self-mastery is to "reality check" knowledge and skills by exhibiting them to other practitioners with more experience in order to receive feedback on demonstrated competencies. Assimilating feedback and using it constructively will promote and enhance self-mastery.
The gold standard to measure the achievement of self-mastery is to ask the question, "Do I feel knowledgeable, skilled, and confident enough to teach this (whatever it is) effectively to someone else?"
There is an old Chinese proverb that says, "A moving hinge does not rust, and running water does not stagnate." When it comes to knowledge and skills and self-mastery, we have to keep moving or we will perish. More is better.
The gold standard to measure the achievement of self-mastery is to ask the question, "Do I feel knowledgeable, skilled, and confident enough to teach this (whatever it is) effectively to someone else?"
There is an old Chinese proverb that says, "A moving hinge does not rust, and running water does not stagnate." When it comes to knowledge and skills and self-mastery, we have to keep moving or we will perish. More is better.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Unconsciousness
After Mother Nature saw to it that my surgery was cancelled on February 8, 2010, by virtue of dumping 4 feet of snow in our region, I was re-posted for Monday, March 1, 2010. Surely we would not have a repeat snow emergency as late as March 1st (we almost did).
My uberfriend and personal nurse, Ruth, flew here from Salt Lake City on the previous Saturday, and we spent Sunday shopping at Whole Foods for the vittles necessary to keep us in the gustatory style to which we have become accustomed for the past 45 years.
On Monday, I drove us to Good Samaritan Hospital on Loch Raven Boulevard in Baltimore. We had to park in a remote lot since all the good parking spaces were already in use by the early-morning shift. I was told to report to the admissions office by 10 a.m. There, the usual paperwork was done swiftly, and we were escorted into the surgical holding area of the hospital, where clothing was removed (Ruth got to keep her clothing), machines were hooked up, IV was started, and vital signs were taken every 5 seconds. Owing to numerous mis- or un-identification leading to the mistaken sawing off of limbs and the erroneous removal of organs, hospitals have finally learned (and it's now the law) to make double-damn sure that the patient is the right patient and the proposed surgery is being done on the right body part. I was asked no less than 10 times to state my name, spell my name, recite my birthdate, and narrate my procedure. By the time I actually went to surgery (where I was asked the above questions twice more), I was fairly confident they knew who I was and what I was there for.
My surgeon and I had previously discussed that this was an operative procedure that could be done using local anesthetic and intravenous sedation, which would allow me to be conscious during the operation. As it turned out and which was quite a shock to my sensibilities, the anesthesiologist in league with the surgeon decided it would be much better if I were placed in a prone (face-down) position instead of a lateral position, and that requires maintenance of an airway and a general anesthetic. I had a momentary fright as I contemplated "going under. " It wasn't what I expected. When that announcement was made by the anesthesiologist in the surgical holding area, I looked at Ruth and said, "Should we do this?" She gave me a quizzical glance for a nanosecond, and then I decided that if I ever had the chance of being pain-free, losing consciousness would have to be part of the process. I said, "OK." Off we went.
Ruth was escorted to the surgical waiting room, and I was rolled on a gurney into the operating room. There I was met by a bunch of masked but friendly OR personnel, including the anesthesiologist. He said, "I am going to give you some Versed now." I asked him if I had to count backward from 100, as is usually the case when a patient undergoes induction. He said, "I don't think that will be necessary." That was the last I knew.
I can't swear to it because I have no conscious memory of it, but apparently the OR personnel managed to get all 292 pounds of me, unconscious, on the operating table, face-down, without dropping me or damaging me in any discernible way. The next thing I was aware of was waking up in the recovery room, trying to talk, pulling the oxygen mask off my face, and saying, "I've been cut." I looked at the clock in the recovery room, and it was 6:20 p.m. My surgery had been delayed because of a heavy OR schedule, and I didn't get into the OR until after 3 p.m. My throat was sore, and my vocal cords were quite irritated from the endotracheal tube that was in there to maintain my airway during surgery. That's the part of a general anesthetic I like the least. It takes a few hours to get your normal voice back, and it takes me that long to stop coughing from the throat irritation. The incision itself is a nothingburger compared to the throat and voice inconvenience. I wanted ice chips, and they were forthcoming immediately.
It wasn't too many minutes later that some kind soul went to the surgical waiting room to fetch Ruth, and she was allowed to stay with me in the recovery room for the two hours they kept me there. My vital signs were excellent at each check. The nurse in charge of me in the recovery room was Julie, and she had a great sense of humor and gave me very good care.
At 8:45 p.m., I was finally taken up to my private room on the orthopedic surgical ward. The first thing I did was get off the gurney under my own steam and go to the bathroom. There is only so much a bladder can hold. Then I got into my bed, and the rituals began. I was hooked up to a PCA pump (patient-controlled analgesia; in my case, IV Dilaudid) and an IV of normal saline. Venodynes were placed on my lower legs (to prevent blood clots while sedentary). I was carefully instructed by the floor nurse how to activate the PCA pump, but I told her I didn't need it and wouldn't use it. She was doubtful about that, but I never did take even one hit off the Dilaudid. I am not a fan of narcotics. I would rather suffer some pain than feel the fuzzy-headed effects of narcotics. Later, the nurse wanted to give me oral OxyContin, but I refused that too. I told her I would take some Motrin if I needed pain relief. They were all surprised, including the surgeon when he learned the next morning that I hadn't had any pain killers after surgery.
Because the PCA pump was hooked up to my IV, the nurses had to come every 2 hours throughout the night to check my vital signs. This is the protocol when a patient has access to a PCA pump, regardless of whether or not the PCA is used. Ruth stayed overnight with me, trying to get a little sleep in the recliner chair in my room. Every time we would doze off, they would come in and turn on the bright overhead lights (interrogation-style lights) and wake us up. One thing that's hard to come by in a hospital is uninterrupted sleep. You have to go home for that.
At 6 a.m., another surgical resident came to make rounds on me. That also woke us up, of course. He didn't contribute much to the process except to look at my incision and to test my motor and sensory parameters. Both were fine. Mercifully, my surgeon rounded early and was there by 8:30 a.m. I was sitting up in bed, and he came into the room and said, "Look at you!" I don't know what he was expecting, but he was surprised to learn that I hadn't had any IV or oral pain medication at all. I told him that I was ready to rock and roll, and he very happily discharged me to home right then and there. In a few minutes, the nurse came in and discontinued my IV, pulled the line out of my arm, and I dressed in my street clothes, Ruth brought the car around, and we were home (with a sigh of relief) by 10 a.m. on Tuesday, March 2, exactly 24 hours after I presented for admission. Nothing could have been better. They gave us a week's worth of surgical dressings so Ruth could change the dressings every day.
And now the food: I had to fast for 16 hours before surgery. On the day of surgery, I was put on a clear-liquid diet after the operation was over. That's the norm. In the recovery room after surgery, I had diet ginger ale and cranberry juice (juice drink, full of sugar and hardly a cranberry). This elevated my blood sugar to 153, so the protocol kicked in where a patient has to get insulin if the blood sugar is over 150. I am glad my floor nurse decided to belay that, and I never got the insulin. A few hours later, my blood sugar was back to 101. On the morning after surgery, I was advanced to a liquid diet, so they brought me chicken broth, Jell-O, Lipton tea, and apple juice. Since I'm a vegetarian, I wasn't going to drink the chicken broth or eat the Jell-O. I don't do caffeine, so the Lipton tea was a nonstarter. I knew the apple juice would elevate my blood sugar, so I didn't drink that either, fearing that would start another discussion about giving me insulin. Sigh. My day nurse decided I should eat something, however, so she advanced my diet to soft. Right before we left the hospital, the dietitian brought me sauted apple slices, apple juice, and two white-flour fake-blueberry muffins. Ruth and I just looked at each other and decided we would eat when we got home. It's a wonder that hospitals still think this stuff passes for nutrition, but short of bringing your own food, which they wouldn't let you eat anyway, they will never 'get it.' Proper nutrition is mandatory for proper healing, but dietitians don't seem to understand that connection.
When we got home on Tuesday morning, we had organic eggs and toasted Ezekiel bread (organic, sprouted, whole-grain bread bought at Whole Foods---good stuff) and real brewed decaf coffee. It was the best meal of my life.
The rest of the week was uneventful. Everything healed up wonderfully. The incision remained clean, dry, and intact. I was walking around the house without a cane. We went to see Alice in Wonderland in 3D. It was marvelous. Ruth did all the driving since I was told not to drive until my skin clips were removed (26 of them in an incision about 8 inches long). Of course, I cheated and drove 3 days before my followup appointment with the surgeon. Nothing bad happened. I drove Ruth to the airport on Thursday morning, March 11, and I drove myself to the doctor appointment on Friday, the next morning. The skin clips were removed, and I was told I could now drive. I smiled. I was asked to come back for a final followup appointment on April 6. No bending, twisting, or lifting in the meantime. I think they mean I should not be throwing 100-pound alfalfa bales around the barn, which is what I did when I was a kid on the farm and which probably contributed to the lumbar spinal stenosis and herniated disks from which I sought some relief with this very operation. Instead of having spinal fusion and laminectomy, I opted for a titanium device called X-STOP. You can watch a video to learn more about X-STOP. It is now covered by Medicare, for which I am grateful. Instead of recuperating for 6 months after spinal fusion, X-STOP recovery is about 6 weeks (or less). It's a great invention. I only hope it works long-term.
That's all for now. I've got to go sling some hay bales and get ready for a dance at Spring Hill.
Click on the hot link below for more information about X-STOP.
http://www.spine-health.com/video/x-stop-interactive-video
My uberfriend and personal nurse, Ruth, flew here from Salt Lake City on the previous Saturday, and we spent Sunday shopping at Whole Foods for the vittles necessary to keep us in the gustatory style to which we have become accustomed for the past 45 years.
On Monday, I drove us to Good Samaritan Hospital on Loch Raven Boulevard in Baltimore. We had to park in a remote lot since all the good parking spaces were already in use by the early-morning shift. I was told to report to the admissions office by 10 a.m. There, the usual paperwork was done swiftly, and we were escorted into the surgical holding area of the hospital, where clothing was removed (Ruth got to keep her clothing), machines were hooked up, IV was started, and vital signs were taken every 5 seconds. Owing to numerous mis- or un-identification leading to the mistaken sawing off of limbs and the erroneous removal of organs, hospitals have finally learned (and it's now the law) to make double-damn sure that the patient is the right patient and the proposed surgery is being done on the right body part. I was asked no less than 10 times to state my name, spell my name, recite my birthdate, and narrate my procedure. By the time I actually went to surgery (where I was asked the above questions twice more), I was fairly confident they knew who I was and what I was there for.
My surgeon and I had previously discussed that this was an operative procedure that could be done using local anesthetic and intravenous sedation, which would allow me to be conscious during the operation. As it turned out and which was quite a shock to my sensibilities, the anesthesiologist in league with the surgeon decided it would be much better if I were placed in a prone (face-down) position instead of a lateral position, and that requires maintenance of an airway and a general anesthetic. I had a momentary fright as I contemplated "going under. " It wasn't what I expected. When that announcement was made by the anesthesiologist in the surgical holding area, I looked at Ruth and said, "Should we do this?" She gave me a quizzical glance for a nanosecond, and then I decided that if I ever had the chance of being pain-free, losing consciousness would have to be part of the process. I said, "OK." Off we went.
Ruth was escorted to the surgical waiting room, and I was rolled on a gurney into the operating room. There I was met by a bunch of masked but friendly OR personnel, including the anesthesiologist. He said, "I am going to give you some Versed now." I asked him if I had to count backward from 100, as is usually the case when a patient undergoes induction. He said, "I don't think that will be necessary." That was the last I knew.
I can't swear to it because I have no conscious memory of it, but apparently the OR personnel managed to get all 292 pounds of me, unconscious, on the operating table, face-down, without dropping me or damaging me in any discernible way. The next thing I was aware of was waking up in the recovery room, trying to talk, pulling the oxygen mask off my face, and saying, "I've been cut." I looked at the clock in the recovery room, and it was 6:20 p.m. My surgery had been delayed because of a heavy OR schedule, and I didn't get into the OR until after 3 p.m. My throat was sore, and my vocal cords were quite irritated from the endotracheal tube that was in there to maintain my airway during surgery. That's the part of a general anesthetic I like the least. It takes a few hours to get your normal voice back, and it takes me that long to stop coughing from the throat irritation. The incision itself is a nothingburger compared to the throat and voice inconvenience. I wanted ice chips, and they were forthcoming immediately.
It wasn't too many minutes later that some kind soul went to the surgical waiting room to fetch Ruth, and she was allowed to stay with me in the recovery room for the two hours they kept me there. My vital signs were excellent at each check. The nurse in charge of me in the recovery room was Julie, and she had a great sense of humor and gave me very good care.
At 8:45 p.m., I was finally taken up to my private room on the orthopedic surgical ward. The first thing I did was get off the gurney under my own steam and go to the bathroom. There is only so much a bladder can hold. Then I got into my bed, and the rituals began. I was hooked up to a PCA pump (patient-controlled analgesia; in my case, IV Dilaudid) and an IV of normal saline. Venodynes were placed on my lower legs (to prevent blood clots while sedentary). I was carefully instructed by the floor nurse how to activate the PCA pump, but I told her I didn't need it and wouldn't use it. She was doubtful about that, but I never did take even one hit off the Dilaudid. I am not a fan of narcotics. I would rather suffer some pain than feel the fuzzy-headed effects of narcotics. Later, the nurse wanted to give me oral OxyContin, but I refused that too. I told her I would take some Motrin if I needed pain relief. They were all surprised, including the surgeon when he learned the next morning that I hadn't had any pain killers after surgery.
Because the PCA pump was hooked up to my IV, the nurses had to come every 2 hours throughout the night to check my vital signs. This is the protocol when a patient has access to a PCA pump, regardless of whether or not the PCA is used. Ruth stayed overnight with me, trying to get a little sleep in the recliner chair in my room. Every time we would doze off, they would come in and turn on the bright overhead lights (interrogation-style lights) and wake us up. One thing that's hard to come by in a hospital is uninterrupted sleep. You have to go home for that.
At 6 a.m., another surgical resident came to make rounds on me. That also woke us up, of course. He didn't contribute much to the process except to look at my incision and to test my motor and sensory parameters. Both were fine. Mercifully, my surgeon rounded early and was there by 8:30 a.m. I was sitting up in bed, and he came into the room and said, "Look at you!" I don't know what he was expecting, but he was surprised to learn that I hadn't had any IV or oral pain medication at all. I told him that I was ready to rock and roll, and he very happily discharged me to home right then and there. In a few minutes, the nurse came in and discontinued my IV, pulled the line out of my arm, and I dressed in my street clothes, Ruth brought the car around, and we were home (with a sigh of relief) by 10 a.m. on Tuesday, March 2, exactly 24 hours after I presented for admission. Nothing could have been better. They gave us a week's worth of surgical dressings so Ruth could change the dressings every day.
And now the food: I had to fast for 16 hours before surgery. On the day of surgery, I was put on a clear-liquid diet after the operation was over. That's the norm. In the recovery room after surgery, I had diet ginger ale and cranberry juice (juice drink, full of sugar and hardly a cranberry). This elevated my blood sugar to 153, so the protocol kicked in where a patient has to get insulin if the blood sugar is over 150. I am glad my floor nurse decided to belay that, and I never got the insulin. A few hours later, my blood sugar was back to 101. On the morning after surgery, I was advanced to a liquid diet, so they brought me chicken broth, Jell-O, Lipton tea, and apple juice. Since I'm a vegetarian, I wasn't going to drink the chicken broth or eat the Jell-O. I don't do caffeine, so the Lipton tea was a nonstarter. I knew the apple juice would elevate my blood sugar, so I didn't drink that either, fearing that would start another discussion about giving me insulin. Sigh. My day nurse decided I should eat something, however, so she advanced my diet to soft. Right before we left the hospital, the dietitian brought me sauted apple slices, apple juice, and two white-flour fake-blueberry muffins. Ruth and I just looked at each other and decided we would eat when we got home. It's a wonder that hospitals still think this stuff passes for nutrition, but short of bringing your own food, which they wouldn't let you eat anyway, they will never 'get it.' Proper nutrition is mandatory for proper healing, but dietitians don't seem to understand that connection.
When we got home on Tuesday morning, we had organic eggs and toasted Ezekiel bread (organic, sprouted, whole-grain bread bought at Whole Foods---good stuff) and real brewed decaf coffee. It was the best meal of my life.
The rest of the week was uneventful. Everything healed up wonderfully. The incision remained clean, dry, and intact. I was walking around the house without a cane. We went to see Alice in Wonderland in 3D. It was marvelous. Ruth did all the driving since I was told not to drive until my skin clips were removed (26 of them in an incision about 8 inches long). Of course, I cheated and drove 3 days before my followup appointment with the surgeon. Nothing bad happened. I drove Ruth to the airport on Thursday morning, March 11, and I drove myself to the doctor appointment on Friday, the next morning. The skin clips were removed, and I was told I could now drive. I smiled. I was asked to come back for a final followup appointment on April 6. No bending, twisting, or lifting in the meantime. I think they mean I should not be throwing 100-pound alfalfa bales around the barn, which is what I did when I was a kid on the farm and which probably contributed to the lumbar spinal stenosis and herniated disks from which I sought some relief with this very operation. Instead of having spinal fusion and laminectomy, I opted for a titanium device called X-STOP. You can watch a video to learn more about X-STOP. It is now covered by Medicare, for which I am grateful. Instead of recuperating for 6 months after spinal fusion, X-STOP recovery is about 6 weeks (or less). It's a great invention. I only hope it works long-term.
That's all for now. I've got to go sling some hay bales and get ready for a dance at Spring Hill.
Click on the hot link below for more information about X-STOP.
http://www.spine-health.com/video/x-stop-interactive-video
Minton plates
http://www.thepotteries.org/potters/minton.htmClick on the hot link above for a more complete history of Minton plates.
In the 18th century, many of the English potters had a hard time trying to find high-quality materials to make porcelain plates. It was not until the 1740s that they began to use calcined animal bone ash to help give the antique dinnerware both strength and translucency, using various experimental formulas. After much debate and failed experiments, the potters concluded that the best bones to use were those from an ox. The only problem was that until 1796, bone china was illegal. There had been problems brewing between the trading that was done with the people in the Far East, and because of this they found that they were running low on the porcelain that was used to make English antique plates, and they desperately sought a solution to the problem.
A potter from Staffordshire by the name of Joseph Poulson was one of the first to produce new china pottery after the patent for the bone China was disapproved by Parliament. By 1796, he struck up a partnership with Thomas Minton who owned and operated an earthenware pottery factory.
Though they each owned their own businesses, they worked together to create dinnerware for the English people. Poulson made the pottery while Minton, a trained engraver, decorated each piece. Minton had a mind for business, which he learned from his brother, Arthur, and was able to make it successful.
Together both Paulson and Minton created antique plates that were considered to be elegant when compared to most pieces of its day. There are no marked plates and other dinnerware from Minton’s very early works. However, a few of the dessert plates have survived and are recognized by their blue-and-white earthenware pattern for which Minton is known.
Minton used various patterns and techniques, making his pieces diverse and unique. The majority of the early patterns were decorated with an overglaze of polychrome enamels that covered the entire piece. He used skilled artists to paint landscapes and other scenes with exquisite details.
Besides using landscapes, Minton also created some pieces with floral patterns. Some had only one flower while others had groups of them. Other of these types of pieces were designed with exotic birds next to plants that were rich in color and beauty. On the bottom were Chinese decorations and pseudo-Chinese characters.
Each Minton antique teapot, plate, and dish came in various patterns as well as shapes. Some were basic while others had a very unique shape that defined it and matched the period it was made in. Today, Minton plates are still exquisite and can cost anywhere between $200 to $12,000.
For more information on Willow ware, another Minton plate style, click on the hot link below (Wikipedia):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willow_pattern
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)