Animal update

I mentioned yesterday there been a few changes since my last postings. Of course I know I'm forgetting many because this MS is crushing I already poor memory. A big change in some ways is that we (my wife) added a dog to our home. Tom is calling to Alaska for three years and we try to talk him into leaving at Atlas with us but he said no over and over. We knew we would miss him so we have been looking for a dog to add. We are pretty picky and one day we had a surprising offer. One of my wife's sisters had a chocolate lab who passed away from complications of a tumor. The people they had gotten from 12 years ago called and said a lady who had purchased a chocolate lab pop but not able to give it enough time each day and her job was changing so she would have to go overseas. He had often left the dog with the original kennel people and their change in job led her to ask them to find a suitable word she could get more attention. He called my wife's sister knowing it just lost their precious chocolate lab. Her sister and husband told them it was too soon to think about replacing the dog he lost but she told them my wife and I were interested. Long story short we added a one-year-old female chocolate lab to our home. We had hoped for a little older dog that you have to take what comes your way because it's hard to find a good dog. She has a lot of pop in her and she is a handful for my wife. Her name is Jordan and she can be a sweetest dog in the world the little troublemaker.
She weighs about 30 pounds less than Atlas. They get along pretty good when she can play forever and he gets a little tired of her energy but she still wants to wrestle and he cannot stop. She is the center of attention now and doesn't like to share very well. She wants to be the only one with us on the bed. She wrestles with him to believe leaves find somewhere quiet to sleep. The cats are a mystery to her and she chases them and they tease her Because They Have doors cat doors into a bedroom and the basement. She's trying to learn how to approach the cats run away even if she approaches them quietly. One of our cats is the little cuddly on and the other explorers but never shows any affection and probably never will. It is kind of funny because the dogs play around all day and when my wife comes home Jordan never stops moving. He is definitely my wife's puppy. Most nights she sleeps with her head on my ankle which I really like. All of these animals are quite entertaining. Not sure our Jordan will be when Atlas leaves with Tom in early July. I hope to be able to post more in the future. Thank you for reading.

Blog resurrected

I may be able to resurrect my blog. I have had the radiation treatment for my trigeminal pain. I'm still on a medication that the doctor wants me to wean myself off of. It fell off with the pain and the radiation affects may take a few months. You know the medication is helping because I decreased the dose to fast and some of the pain is back. The pain is bad but I just tough it out hoping the radiation kicks in as soon. Anyway I'm able to talk, the swallowing, were before the radiation the pain was so bad I couldn't talk I had trouble eating, drinking, swallowing and talking. One of the side effects of that medication was that it messed up my vision. It gave me double vision and I had trouble focusing post or far. This made it impossible to see what I was dictating. Decreasing the dose gave me my vision back so I don't want to increase it again and so I live with the pain expecting that the radiation will work more and more. I posted some photos of me wearing my halo on Facebook. Other than the novocaine shots in my four head the procedure was painless.So for now I'm going to try my blog again. Not sure how long this will work for but I'm going to try.
I'm not sure where I left off but we've had a change or two since my last post. I wife was plagued with heart problems and was in hospital. They strained it out with medication and she is back to her determines self. I trust her but know that she would not let on that she was having problems. He is very determined to take care of me. We have found that insurance doesn't really fit my condition. It is set up so that you either get better for you.die. A chronic disease does not fit and we have always had issues with insurance. My condition would seem to require professional help all my wife is at work. There are two reasons why this is a problem. We would go broke rather quickly because the cost is out of the world. It would cost us at least $45,000 a year. We have found we are in between getting Medicaid help. To get on Medicaid he appears you have to be broke. This is a problem because I'm a small 401(k) that we would have to exhaust and all of our savings(not very much) before they would consider us. I don't know what we do in the middle where we are broke and waiting for Medicaid. Some applications take years so I don't know what we would do. My wife is determined to take care of me.. Our son Matt gives me lunch and check on me every day. I think we would be in trouble without him. Another issue with outside help is that we would give access to our home to a stranger. This would make my wife and myself. Uncomfortable. The other issue with outside help is that I like being here by myself. I don't mind company on occasion but having someone they are continually but drive me crazy. I like silence and I find most people can't tolerate silence very well. I've always had a problem with with my end of the conversation. It is exhausting trying to say the right thing. About 40 years ago I best friend and off to graduate school in Michigan. After that I just went fishing and more or less everything on my own. I usually took my fishing buddy, my Irish setter and I was fine with that. Growing up in a strange stepmother taught me to exist on my own that I prefer to spend most of my day was quiet and pets. So even if we could have professional help we would want to dictate what we want them to do and the professional wanted to everything their own way. We would have a clash from the get-go so I don't even want to consider professional help. My wife checked into it and they told her I was in a dangerous situation and if they came, I to get me up, they wouldn't be able to leave. Right there we have a problem. I feel safer being here but my phone for I can call helpers like my sister-in-law's and brother-in-law's, the neighbor who helps, my son for if need be 911. The rescue people are two minutes away. If I were in a home I would be the last priority if I was in bed because professional people take five people to do what my wife does every day getting me up. What I had my radiation it took five nurses to get me from my chair to the bed. So if I was in a care center and there was a fire they would get everyone else out before me. It's simple math. I feel safer here than I would in professional care.
So I prefer to keep things as they are as long as possible. My wife and I are hoping that we check out before I condition requires "professional" help. Call me stubborn you wouldn't be the first. I go to doctors and I argue with them because I am the customer and a lot of times they are just covering their butts. If I insist on a course then they are off the hook. I have found in the last 10 years with MS that I am responsible for my own health care. The medical field and insurance are not easy to work with.
There have been other changes to and I hope to talk about them later. This post got really long. Have mixed feelings about the medical field and insurance. Sad to say there are two kinds of care I have dealt with. Is either really really good or really really bad. There seems to be no in between. I wife and son trying to do things the way I want and I fear dealing with strangers.