Let's Kick This Around

I've been a bit distracted by all of the Crazy in my world, so I haven't been keeping you up to speed on my other stuff. My Less Crazy. Or just Ordinary Stuff. Or even mildly interesting or even Somewhat Off The Wall Ideas that I sometimes get. Those are kind of fun.

I did determine from talking to my PCP that I am going to have to go back to my neurologist at the Headache Center. When I first saw him over two years ago, I thought he is *awesome.* That was back before I had good insurance and we couldn't actually do anything to implement any of his great ideas. Then, I actually got good insurance and he no longer thought they were good ideas. In fact, he said he no longer recalled even saying them. Uggghhh. I was hoping to change doctors when my SSD came through, but it turns out that there is nowhere to go. They are the PRIMO outpatient care facility for people with migraines, which is what I need. And when I say PRIMO, I mean ONLY. At least in this area.

So, I am trying to figure out how to make him think this is his idea all over again. Because it was. And can be again. I just really pissed him off a couple of times in the last couple of years with self diagnosis. Doctors don't like that crap. However, when you have a migraine for ten years, you kinda know it's a migraine. And when you have side effects to a medication and it's the only new thing, you kinda know it's that medication. They just don't like it if they prescribed it. I would think they would be used to being WRONG at some point. Guess not. So, I am working on this one. Planning and all.

Meanwhile, back when I was in group therapy for chronic pain they talked a lot about slowing down your breathing to help with the pain. So, I do that sometimes. Ironically, until you slow it down, and start breathing deeply, you don't realize what shallow, fast breaths you are taking. The other thing my therapist mentioned in our second session is not thinking about the pain at all. Imagining yourself somewhere else. Somewhere pleasant.

So, I was in the Think Tank yesterday thinking about the above stuff when I also started thinking about the TV show Fringe. I watch it on DVD, so I haven't watched this entire season... yet. Anyway, they do a lot with Fringe Science. Ta Da. That was a big reveal. It is actually one of the coolest shows on TV. Anyway, I started thinking about what if there was a way to facilitate this process of making a person focus on that pleasant place. Sometimes I get stuck because I get "hung up" on a detail. If I am in my childhood bedroom I can't remember where something is and it frustrates me. And then I can't maintain the "illusion." Or if I am at the beach I can almost smell the salt in the air, but not quite. I can't quite push past the pain in my head. But, what if Fringe Science hooked up an electrode of some kind into the memory area of my brain and stimulated it? And I could see/remember everything clearly, so clearly that it was truly like I was there. And then they were able to just barely tap the pleasure center of the brain during that memory the entire time I was under. Like the wisp of a brushstroke. For most migraine sufferers, if you could keep them under twenty minutes the blood vessels that constricted in the neck that caused the migraine would have had time to decompress. When they came out of it, the migraine would be gone.

Stress is the root of so many other health issues, I can't help but wonder what this sort of therapy would accomplish for heart patients, etc.

I just finished the last book of The Hunger Games trilogy, Mockingjay. By and large, I don't remember YA books being so good when I was that age. As always, I hate coming to the end of a series. Makes me a bit sad. Like saying good-bye to old friends.

And you say to me, "The characters were onions all the way through. Real or not real?"

Without hesitation, I reply, "Real."

Thank you Suzanne Collins for keeping it real.


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