It’s Just a Flesh Wound

My views on illness and injuries are practically from the middle ages. I generally do not go to the doctor. I don’t believe in personally being sick (because it’s all mental, so mind over matter, right?). I’m very much part of the “walk it off” group.

However in other ways, I verge on acting like a hypochondriac. I actually do have some general knowledge of the body and the various systems that make it up. We had this totally awesome computer “game” when I was little where you had Adam and Eve and you could pick something like lymph nodes or the cardiovascular system and they had fun little videos explaining how it worked. I took all the bio courses offered in high school, and way back in the day had quite a few toy medical kits. I also had my dad’s old travel medical bag. All of a sudden my dolls and teddy bears were suffering horrible injuries and subject to all kinds of emergency surgeries. My mother was quite distraught when she realized a real scalpel had been hidden at the bottom of Dad’s bag. Oops.

This just means that I like to use my slight knowledge to diagnose myself. Now I know lots of people do this through internet research. I like to just make random guesses and then come up with what I feel are appropriate treatments (face hurts? Probably sinuses. Must drink tea and take baths. Excessive vomiting? Have some sort of mint stuff and make sure to keep fluids down. Headache? Drink something with a bit of caffeine). Thus why I am convinced I’m dyslexic, and also suspect I have some sort of clotting/circulation issues.

Back in college this drove my roommates insane as I was obsessed with attempting to staple a wound closed. They sometimes use staples instead of stitches for bad cuts in the ER. I mean sure, they have their own medical staples, but I felt like the idea could be applied with normal staples. When I worked at The Meadows we once stapled ourselves. The boys were trying to out man each other which led to Nate stapling his arm. Being of the if-you-can-do-it-I-can-do-it mind frame we then stapled me, and one of the other guys. Not a big deal. However the staple couldn’t really fully imbed in the skin, which made me curious to see if it would work better elsewhere and with an actual injury. Which is why whenever somebody in college had any sort of cut, I ran around imploring them to let me staple it.

I can’t say I’ve ever had any serious injuries where it would matter that I tend to ignore real medical treatment. The one time I broke my wrist we did actually go to a doctor (I was only 12, and rather hysterical for a whole lot of other reasons than just breaking my wrist). Otherwise I’ve made it through things like food poisoning, chemical burns, broken toes, and some sort of ankle injury.

Now that one might have actually not been that bad at first. It’s hard to say. We were heading to the Pennsylvania Renaissance Faire. I was wearing very thin shoes, and stepped on a rock which then caused me to twist my ankle in some direction I don’t think it wanted to go. I breathed for a minute while I determined whether or not it was broken. Since I was driving, and it was my left ankle, I told everyone we could continue on. I figured it was a long drive and it could rest. Once we got there I ignored it. All was fine and dandy until we were back home at the end of the day and I decided to actually take a look at the stupid thing. I pretty much had half a baseball sticking out of my ankle. It took a month of ice and wrapping it until it seemed back to normal.

The Toe, several days after breaking.

When I broke my toes, I was yet again running around on them all day and laughing here and there while announcing “I think I broke my toes, guys.” I’m not sure anyone really believed me until we were getting mani-pedis and I declined as my entire pinky toe, part of my foot, and the next toe over were the most interesting shade of purple. But really, they’re toes. I taped them up later and wore flip flops for a month.

I just don’t find most external injuries that big of a deal. Generally you know what caused them, and you can see and fix them.

Illnesses should really be a whole other story. What I hate about illness though is it’s generally not as visible. You’re just going off what someone says they feel. Are they overreacting? Are they underplaying symptoms?? Who knows. I’m probably one of the worst offenders. I don’t mention anything that I don’t think is relevant. I only go to the doctor once I feel it’s necessary, which is how I managed to be sick for over a month in college with who knows what. A virus? Mono? A blood clot? No one’s really sure.

While when I talk to others I tend to push the “walk it off” philosophy, on the other hand I am very likely to tell them to go to the doctor whenever they have weird symptoms. You never really know what’s going on in your body. There’s so much they can fix now, as long as you catch it early. It’s much better to swallow your pride and talk to the doctor over ignoring something until it’s past being treatable.

Yeah this makes me a bit of a hypocrite, but I can live with that. To be fair, while I don’t actually go in to the doctor I do talk to doctors, which is practically the same thing as a regular consultation.

As you may or may not know, November, besides being NaNoWriMo (which I’m still not doing. One of these years it’ll happen by god), is also Movember. Men across the world are growing some very fun mustaches to earn awareness for men’s health issues. Since some men have a tendency to ignore preventive health measures (they treat it like asking for directions…) I think this is brilliant. While we can’t all grow amazing mustaches, we can all do our part to support them. If you have a spare dollar or two you can head over here to my friend Marc’s page and donate. Make sure to vote for the Hulk Hogan. The Cop scares me.

Keep in mind that all the things you can be doing at any point to promote your own health. Be somewhat active. Eat healthy-ish. Wear a seat belt. Everyone has their own version of being healthy (for instance, I only eat a half pound of bacon at one sitting rather than a full pound) but it’s important to just keep these ideas in mind. You don’t want to end up dying at The Heart Attack Grill (fascinating place I found in Vegas).

If Life Gives You Melons

My absolute favorite t-shirt (thanks Kevin!!)

I am convinced I am dyslexic. Because I also happen to be a Taurus, you can’t talk me out of thinking I’m dyslexic, but it annoys me when people (my father) doubt my dyslexia. It’s not like I wanted to be dyslexic. I certainly didn’t choose to be this way. And it’s hardly my fault that just because I have autocorrect and happen to be a super awesome speed reader that my dyslexia is not immediately apparent.

 Most people would assume if you read well, you’re not dyslexic. The thing with my reading, is that I speed read. The thing with speed reading, is that you don’t actually read the full word. You really just take in the beginning and end of the word. The thing with just reading the beginning and end of the word, is that generally it doesn’t matter if you are reordering the middle letters the wrong way (so if you’re reading it as cheif instead of chief it doesn’t matter). The really nice thing about speed reading, is that you are filling in the word based on context. Which is why when I read a word wrong it becomes pretty obvious.

For example, today I was reading an email that had a word that I thought was “entangled.” However once I finished the sentence (they were very entangled and responsive) I realized it sounded pretty weird. They were responsive to being entangled? Is this some kind of Fifty Shades of Grey thing? So I looked at the word again, studied it a moment or two, and realized it was “engaged.” Here right above “engaged” it said “attend,” so I did my usual letter shifting… and ended up with “entangled.”

This kind of thing happens all the time, and I just ignore it. I actually never thought of it as a problem, I assumed it’s normal. I mean doesn’t everyone have that problem of words and letters constantly moving around?

Apparently not.

Really, I first suspected my dyslexia back in school. I HATED math with a passion. I found it almost impossible to memorize all the stupid formulas, and I was always frustrated because no matter how much time I spent looking over quizzes or tests, inevitably there would be a least one question I missed because at some point my 203 turned into a 230. I’d get some credit, because my work was right. I understood the process. Just those stupid numbers kept getting switched.

You’d really think this would have flagged me for my teachers to mention dyslexia, but to be fair it wasn’t every single problem. It was more like 1 or 2 questions every other quiz/test/homework. I guess they thought I was just sloppy. Or couldn’t read my own handwriting, which is a fair possibility considering how crappy my handwriting is.

Nonetheless, since no one ever mentioned anything I assumed it was all in my head, and carried on.

It wasn’t until I was working with my current company that I really became convinced I was dyslexic. I was frequently making calls, and I hate calling people because half the time I end up dialing the wrong number. I was complaining a bit to a coworker, and he mentioned some similar issues, and then said the magic words “I’m dyslexic.” Which got me thinking. If he was dyslexic, couldn’t I be too?

That weekend I happened to be back home with my parents, and during some down time, I decided to look up some common symptoms for dyslexia. I found this questionnaire of 20 common dyslexic symptoms. It then gave some general results (such as most people have no more than 4 “yes” responses) and also said if you have more than 9 “yes” responses it’s a strong indicator of dyslexia. Guess what? I had ***14***!!!

I raced around my house telling my father (who didn’t believe me), my mother (who just kind of listened and nodded), and my grandmother (who was visiting). Now wouldn’t you know it, as soon as I tell my grandmother about the results, she casually said, “Well you know, Jerry was dyslexic.”

Jerry being my grandfather. Dyslexia being genetic. This clearly being something I should have known.

I suspect my father doubts my dyslexia because of how eager I was to accept it. But why not? Do you realize, being dyslexic would explain so many of what I thought were just random quirks? Things I always thought made me stupid (like my severe issues with left/right, and my inability to tell time unless I have a digital watch) are actually common symptoms of dyslexia.

I’ll conclude this post with a list of common dyslexia symptoms THAT I HAVE, because it’s pretty good proof in my court. Not because of how long the list is, just the sheer randomness of things I’ve always been teased about (like how I pronounce words, or the way I hold my pencil) which are apparently somehow linked with dyslexia. Also, I just like lists (as does my friend Erin).

1.     Spells phonetically and inconsistently.

2.     Confusion over left and right.

3.     Seems to "Zone out" or daydream often; gets lost easily or loses track of time.

4.     Leaves sentences incomplete; stutters under stress; mispronounces long words, or transposes phrases, words, and syllables when speaking.

5.     Shows dependence on finger counting, tricks, and gimmicks.

6.     Can do arithmetic, but fails word problems.

7.     Hears things not said or apparent to others; easily distracted by sounds.

8.     Feeling or seeing non-existent movement while reading or writing.

9.     May lack depth perception and peripheral vision.

10. Clumsy, uncoordinated, poor at ball or team sports.

11. Handwriting varies or is illegible.

12. Trouble with writing or copying; pencil grip may be unusual.

13. Prone to motion-sickness.

14. Has difficulty telling time.

15. Can be an extra deep or light sleeper.

16. Strong sense of justice; emotionally sensitive; strives for perfection.

17. Poor memory for sequences.