I'm Getting Old and Feeling It This Morning!

Since I am hitting the half century mark this fall, I thought I better get myself checked out medically to some degree, just to see if I'm good to go to triple digits or not.

The first stop was to see my new doctor.  My last doctor retired a few years back, and being the slight procrastinator that I am, I didn't get around to getting a new one, that and the fact that we moved into a new community.

So I finally had an opportunity to meet the new doc over the March break -- quite a pleasant fellow with a South African accent.  He sent me to get my blood-work done at a local lab.  After fasting 12 hours, I walked into the lab at 8:15 -- wall to wall people.  Now I understood why the receptionist had said to get there early.  I took a number and the last available seat.  Actually considering the number of people, the line did move quite quickly.  Waiting rooms are a funny phenomenon though, the atmosphere is so dependent upon the personalities present.  There was one loud old lad there, who had to talk to everyone, and seemed to think he knew everyone.  As soon as he left, a hush fell over the room .....a very awkward hush.  Noboby dared to speak!  Talk about dead air.  Finally someone came in who knew another person, and they carried on a quiet conversation, while twenty or so of the rest of us examined our feet and politely pretended we were not eavesdropping.

Maybe a slight exaggeration, but you get the idea!

Anyway, they took my blood and did an EKG on me.   Monday at school I get a phone call from my beloved, telling me to stop at the doctor's office on my way home. The nurse wants to see me and put me on experimental medication for high cholestrol.  My immediate reaction is that I've one foot on a banana peel, and that the bells are a tolling.

When I arrived, the receptionist handed me a sheet and a package of pills and was about to send me on my way.   Huh, ...what, .....wait a minute here, I think I need to talk to someone.  She told me to sit and she'd summon the first available nurse, which she eventually did.

So the truth is, my cholestrol is slightly elevated ( I eat too many of the Mrs' homemade cookies), not enough to have set off the alarm bells.  Methinks the telephone call and the impending tone of urgency, may well have shaved a half year or better off my life expectancy.  The drug they gave me, I was told, had the possible side effect of muscle pain.

Yesterday morning I awoke and could hardly roll out of bed.  In the night I had obviously lost a round with some heavyweight champion in my sleep.  I can't see the bruises, but the small of my back (I know with my girth its hard to locate exactly where that might be) certainly sustained some sort of meteoric hit.

I took an Advil, and a second cholestrol pill and hobbled off to school.  Made it through the day and did a long soak in the hot tub when I got home.  I spent a somewhat restless night -- do you know how often we turn in our sleep? 

I'm to stay on the pills for a few days to determine if they are the cause.  Of course I have had this bug since February 11th, and it may be that it has just migrated from my sinuses and lungs to a new hiding spot -- I'm not ruling that one out either.

So I'm hobbling off again this morning, fortified with Advil, and an extra one for lunch.  I'll not be doing the Charleston any time soon -- of course if I think about that, I hadn't planned that activity anyway.

And that is about all I have to say for today.

Musings and meanderings from the Musical Gardener.