HOLEY MOLEY...

...This has been a weird weekend. With the way I slept, the weekend turned out to amount to like four mini-days. Don't think I'll try that again. None of those "days" were long enough to accomplish much of anything. It's been ridiculously warm in the way of outside temperatures so Poopy had been blasting the AC and it feels like I've been holed up in a bunker or something. This is my weekend to get caught up on household chores so that next weekend I can take a guilt-free trip East to visit the JuJu Clan. Looking forward to that in the worst way. I hate that those grandkids are growing up so fast and I'm missing it. And with JuJu pregnant and due in November with Grandchild #3, I'm all the more aware of how fast time is slipping by. It's downright sinful that we spend all winter waiting for summer and when it finally comes, it goes by in a blur.

What's new here? Not much. Poopy is not feeling great. This is always a rough time of year for him, especially when it's hot and humid. I'm not sure if I've ever posted about his health problem. Maybe I'll do that today.

Have you ever heard of Meniere's Disease? Poopy's hit him (and when I say HIT, I mean that it came out of nowhere and knocked him on the ass) three months after we were married in 2000.

Here's how the damn thing works...

In a normal person, the fluid in the inner ear drains continuously. There's all little intricate processes that go on in there that affect your hearing, balance, sinus activity, etc. In a Meniere's patient, the drainage isn't working properly. The fluid in there builds up causing pressure in the endolymphatic sac and affects your hearing, balance, sinus activity, etc. Lots of things increase or decrease that pressure. Things like barometric pressure rising and falling, humidity, salt intake, caffeine consumption, heights, motion, pretty much, you name it. So... What the patient ends up with is constant spells of dizziness, motion sickness, balance issues, pressure and pain in the ears, ear infections, sinus problems, hearing loss (mostly gradual), headaches, changes in appetite, nausea, etc. Those are the everyday symptoms. Once in awhile a Meniere's attack, which usually comes out of nowhere, will manifest itself by causing extreme everything up there plus a possibility of a blackout, profuse sweating, extreme nausea, intestinal issues, and the balance thing pretty much crashes. There is no cure. No one knows exactly what causes the disease. It's been recognized since the 1700's. It's managed (and I use that term loosely) with meds like anti-motion-sickness drugs and histamine injections, etc, etc. It can go into remission.

Poopy has had surgeries whereby a part of the bone that surrounds the fluid sac is removed, thereby relieving some pressure. It's a temporary fix. He's had it done twice with minimal relief. Any surgery of that type runs a high risk of infection and is risky.

At one point an option was to surgically cut the balance nerve on one side with the desired outcome to be that the nerve on the opposite side would become stronger and take over. But in Poopy's case, the Meniere's has spread to the other side making that option no longer possible. To cut either nerve at this point with leave him with no balance whatsoever.

One experimental treatment at this point is to inject antibiotics directly into the endolymphatic sac. Again there is the high risk of infection. The "fix" is temporary and the injections cost $3,500 (last year's price) and are not covered by insurance.

So that's pretty much my husband's disease in a nutshell. Sucks to be him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~