Interstitial Cystitis. Fuck incurable shit. Fuck it up the ass.
Nightmares. Fuck nightmares. Actually got to bed at decent hour for a change, so naturally my brain was like, "Nope!" And plotted to traumatize me, one stupid hour at a time.
I'm in my twenties ffs. This should not be a thing that exhausts me, but totally was. Apparently my own brain is mighty disturbing.
grumbles
When you're in your thirties, you start getting something much, much worse: Work Dreams.
I'm a fraidy cat and after watching paranormal activity had nightmares for weeks, but nothing's worse than putting in a hectic 8 hour day and then hearing your goddamned alarm clock going off and finding out it was all a dream and you get to do it all over, immediately. What a rip off!
@thebird These are the worst.
@SG
Omg, I hate work dreams. Those are a whole different kind of nightmare.
@Ganymede said:
@Shebakoby said:
I'm not saying American health care is perfect, or anything close. Far from it. I have relatives in the states, so I have heard a few horror stories on the other side of the border. But neither am I saying that Canada's sucks (or sucks worse). The US system has pros and cons, and same with the Canadian system. But we shouldn't pretend that there are no flaws, or that the flaws are insignificant, in the Canadian system.
So, then, we concur on this point.
Canada's problem with access in remote (or rural) areas is a huge problem. That's not what is raised down here in the United States as an issue, though. Americans are paranoid for all the wrong reasons, which is why I feel it is important to point out that those fears are insubstantial.
It's a little different down here because there are large populations where access isn't the issue; cost is. And yet, there are still access issues in places like Nevada, Wyoming, and Montana.
So, if I were to trade the American private system with Canada's public system, I'd take the latter because the American private system still suffers from the same problems as Canada's.
(Edit: My brother is a Canadian physician who has worked in Vancouver and now Ottawa. He gives me updates from his end, along with my schoolmates that are also in the medical profession.)
There's maybe only one thing that the US system, as flawed as it is, has over the Canadian system. Money available for R&D. One of my relatives who lived in the United States (now deceased) used to work for a company called Sea-Med. That company developed something that my relative referred to as a "roto-rooter" for blood vessels and it was superior to balloon angioplasty in removing fatty artery blockages. It drilled right through it, leaving the artery wall undamaged because it was designed to not damage the artery. We saw a video about this device back in the early 1990s.
Canada still doesn't have this technology.
The biggest problem I have is the resistance to change in the system, changes that would improve the system. My community, about 15 years ago, had a HUGE kerfuffle over a CT scanner. A private citizen donated 60,000 dollars to the local hospital. They said the money should be used to buy a CT scanner. The government at the time (NDP) refused to allow the purchase, because OMG PRIVATE MONEY (even though it was a charitable donation) will ruin the system or some sort of invalid slippery slope argument like that.
Two separate MLAs fought each over the issue, each wanting credit for bringing a CT scanner in before they would consider voting to approve one, and both ended up quitting politics forever (one before the other, though). The Hospital did eventually get a CT scanner (though via the provincial government, not the money donated to the hospital).
Some fear that any 'taint' of "private money" (rather than from tax dollars), including charitable donations (which is CRAZY to oppose), in the health system will ruin it forever, but we could have had a CT scanner way sooner than we did if they weren't so ideologically rigid and stubborn.
I'm spooning a Barrett .50 cal.! I could kill a building.
@Silver said:
@Shebakoby said:
The moral of the story is people fall through the cracks in both systems. Way more in the other one because of the whole money thing (not to mention a MUCH larger population), but still. Improvements could be made to prevent this.
There is an element of political rah-rah in the US (I'm sure it exists everywhere really) that begins its day by making assumptions about what you mean when you say anything disagreeing with them. They also think that the Real News that they listen to is superior to the Fake News other people hear, or even sometimes to the Real Life you live. Sometimes that particular fight happens with the battle cry "anecdotes are not evidence!" or "show me notarized documents" or some variant thereof.
Don't worry about it too much.
is no biggie. Some people make far too many assumptions, and they need to learn that what they're seeing isn't necesarily confirming their confirmation bias.
@Shebakoby said:
@Ganymede said:
@Shebakoby said:
I'm not saying American health care is perfect, or anything close. Far from it. I have relatives in the states, so I have heard a few horror stories on the other side of the border. But neither am I saying that Canada's sucks (or sucks worse). The US system has pros and cons, and same with the Canadian system. But we shouldn't pretend that there are no flaws, or that the flaws are insignificant, in the Canadian system.
So, then, we concur on this point.
Canada's problem with access in remote (or rural) areas is a huge problem. That's not what is raised down here in the United States as an issue, though. Americans are paranoid for all the wrong reasons, which is why I feel it is important to point out that those fears are insubstantial.
It's a little different down here because there are large populations where access isn't the issue; cost is. And yet, there are still access issues in places like Nevada, Wyoming, and Montana.
So, if I were to trade the American private system with Canada's public system, I'd take the latter because the American private system still suffers from the same problems as Canada's.
(Edit: My brother is a Canadian physician who has worked in Vancouver and now Ottawa. He gives me updates from his end, along with my schoolmates that are also in the medical profession.)
There's maybe only one thing that the US system, as flawed as it is, has over the Canadian system. Money available for R&D. One of my relatives who lived in the United States (now deceased) used to work for a company called Sea-Med. That company developed something that my relative referred to as a "roto-rooter" for blood vessels and it was superior to balloon angioplasty in removing fatty artery blockages. It drilled right through it, leaving the artery wall undamaged because it was designed to not damage the artery. We saw a video about this device back in the early 1990s.
Canada still doesn't have this technology.
The biggest problem I have is the resistance to change in the system, changes that would improve the system. My community, about 15 years ago, had a HUGE kerfuffle over a CT scanner. A private citizen donated 60,000 dollars to the local hospital. They said the money should be used to buy a CT scanner. The government at the time (NDP) refused to allow the purchase, because OMG PRIVATE MONEY (even though it was a charitable donation) will ruin the system or some sort of invalid slippery slope argument like that.
Two separate MLAs fought each over the issue, each wanting credit for bringing a CT scanner in before they would consider voting to approve one, and both ended up quitting politics forever (one before the other, though). The Hospital did eventually get a CT scanner (though via the provincial government, not the money donated to the hospital).
Some fear that any 'taint' of "private money" (rather than from tax dollars), including charitable donations (which is CRAZY to oppose), in the health system will ruin it forever, but we could have had a CT scanner way sooner than we did if they weren't so ideologically rigid and stubborn.
I can't find any references to Sea-Med or to this alternative to balloon angioplasty you mentioned. I also couldn't find anything like the second story and didn't expect to, but I did run across an article for 2004 about an Alberta woman receiving a provincial-wide award for charitable activities that included raising funds for " the acquisition of a CT scanner for the Hinton Hospital."
I will admit to conformational bias. My bias is, frankly, that much of the time you're just talking shit.
@thebird said:
@SG
Omg, I hate work dreams. Those are a whole different kind of nightmare.
TBH my work dreams ARE nightmares.
But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?
-Mark Twain
Nightmare or dream, it is terrible:
I am ay my desk working. Someone pops by, and talks about the current build of software. They are concerned about an area of functionality. I check the records, and nope, it tested just fine. They leave.
I have a waggish sense of humor.
@Silver said:
TBH my work dreams ARE nightmares.
My point exactly, haha. Work is nightmare enough. Which makes the nightmares that much more frustrating. Nightmare during the day, then think "Hey, maybe at least have a cool dream before I do this shit all over again!" But nope. More nightmare.
I'm not sure what I'd prefer, tbh. Creepy zombie witch-lady thing nightmare (it was more terrifying at 3am, don't judge...), or work nightmare. It's a real toss up.
Nothing beats the 'I have to pee' dream, though. Come on, people.
It does not matter what is happening in that dream, you will have to stop to use the facilities every few minutes until it wakes you up. Outrunning a deadly apocalyptic storm? "I swear it will JUST take a second just bundle up and you probably won't freeze to death in the blizzard winds!" Space ship crashing? "But the life pod doesn't have a bathroom it's right around the corner I swear I will be right back!" Terminator chasing you? "I know, I'll hide in this convenient restroom!"
I hate that dream so fucking much, even if it always seems to wake me up snickering at its inherent absurdity.
Oh fucking well.
@surreality said:
I hate that dream so fucking much, even if it always seems to wake me up snickering at its inherent absurdity.
Snickering until you realize you actually do have to pee so bad that the apocalypse will have to wait, and nearly wet yourself in your feeble attempts to stumble, in blind half-asleep-ness, to the bathroom.
@thebird said:
@surreality said:
I hate that dream so fucking much, even if it always seems to wake me up snickering at its inherent absurdity.
Snickering until you realize you actually do have to pee so bad that the apocalypse will have to wait, and nearly wet yourself in your feeble attempts to stumble, in blind half-asleep-ness, to the bathroom.
...yup. The perils of coffee before bed, indeed. That dream is inevitable. 
Oh fucking well.
For some reason I often have a dream where I am unavoidably looking down at the floor all the time. Like it's hard to look anybody in the eye or look up, and then I find out my neck is all twisted and weird and I wake up hurting.
And then I have this dream where I die but linger and everybody's like "Hey what's up. I thought you were dead." "Yeah me too. I dunno. Fuck it."
Today's Hate: Why is there no cam copy of Magic Mike XXL for us agoraphobes?? 
My nightmares either go full below-the-belt awful, or turn into unintentional comedy on me.
The most memorable involved rushing around the house inexplicably with a pile of paperwork I was oh-so-very-insistent on completing despite the Jason-style slasher brutally murdering people in nearly every room. I'd run, and resume the paperwork the moment I was out of immediate danger, on repeat for what seemed like hours. Finally, after running like a madwoman to the front door, said slasher materializes on the other side of the front door (like they do), at which point I shake the paperwork and yell, "Do you mind? I'm trying to do my taxes!" At which point he lowered his machete, his shoulders slumped, and he trudged sadly down the path and walked away in a full sulk.
Thankfully, it's the ones that go funny on me that I remember more often than the rest, which just leave that quaky state of shivery awful lingering for the remainder of the day with some associated phobia usually sticking around for the rest of the week. 
Hypnagogia and sleep paralysis suck. I've had them both periodically since I was around four years old.
My nightmares are always similar. I dream that I'm in my house, alone, and it is dark. I walk over to switch on a light--the switch doesn't work. I try several others--they don't work. I realize that the darkness is intentional and threatening, and that I cannot do anything about it. Back when I had a television, this would generally be joined by the television (which cannot be turned off) playing something full of static that shows talking figures at desks talking about how something is going to happen to me. At its worst, the dream ends with me lying in bed, paralyzed as if crushed under a heavy weight and unable to breathe.
I have trained myself to recognize that when light switches don't work and I'm seeing the world in this twilight, distorted state, then it's "another one of those damn dreams." That used to immediately increase how threatening things felt, but now it makes it bearable instead.
I can't find any references to Sea-Med or to this alternative to balloon angioplasty you mentioned.
Really? Because it took me two googles and a couple of click-throughs worth of effort to find out that the company was called 'SeaMED' and got acquired by and folded into Plexus Corp, and the device was called the Rotoblator Rotational Angioplasty System, whose patent was sold to and is now held by the Boston Scientific Corporation.
From other articles it looks as if it's not strictly an alternative in the sense that a lot of doctors aren't trained in its use anywhere but in the US, and even in the US the balloon method is still pretty common because the rotational system requires a lot of training, and the original method 'works well enough'.
I will admit to conformational bias. My bias is, frankly, that much of the time you're just talking shit.
Maybe you're bad at google? That or you just didn't try very hard because you just wanted an excuse to justify your knee jerk attack on somebody who dared to criticize the Canadian health care system.
I also couldn't find anything like the second story and didn't expect to
Funny how when you go into things with expectations, they're so easy to meet. Unfortunately, I've only got so much time or patience for fact checking assholes today, so you're on your own for that one.
@Silver said:
TBH my work dreams ARE nightmares.
My point exactly, haha. Work is nightmare enough. Which makes the nightmares that much more frustrating. Nightmare during the day, then think "Hey, maybe at least have a cool dream before I do this shit all over again!" But nope. More nightmare.
I'm not sure what I'd prefer, tbh. Creepy zombie witch-lady thing nightmare (it was more terrifying at 3am, don't judge...), or work nightmare. It's a real toss up.
