Tag: Houston

Specialist Update

I went to the specialist’s appt. on Tuesday.
They admitted me to the hospital to get as many tests ran as possible I was released on Friday.

We did a 3D echo of the heart which was the coolest thing I have ever seen. Then a transesophageal echo is also known as a TEE, then a CT of the heart, lungs, and abdomen with contrast and without.

I have a leg doppler later this month and my cardio will discuss if I need a right-left heart cath.


It’s not an emergency that I do the surgery next week but, for my symptoms to go away I have to do surgery. My worst symptoms are dizziness and shortness of breath. Next up would be how worn out I get because of tiredness.


I am not a candidate for a valvoplasty there is too much regurgitation on the valve. I have to have a mitral valve replaced it can not even be repaired.


The surgeon I met with thinks my procedure can be done using robotics and thru the right side of the ribs. This would be a lot less invasive surgery than open heart surgery. He suggests the mechanical valve and coumadin for the rest of my life. With my age, this is the best option.
I already take Coumadin/ Warfarin so that is no change you just have to monitor it closely.


In the hospital, they put me on a Heparin IV drip because my blood was too thick they said a few weeks before surgery I will need to give myself shots in the stomach 2 x a day for a blood thinner. I am not at a therapeutic level at this time. My level is like 1.8 and for surgery, it needs to be between 3.5 and 4.5.


I really like this team of Drs and I love the less invasive surgery which would also mean less recoup time.

I am ready to get back to doing things I love like walking, photography, and playing with the dogs I feel like I have had to take a step back from everything I love. Our house in Livingston is about to be built and I want to be able to enjoy this time in my life.


Right now we are just chilling out about this and will make a decision sometime soon about when we think the best time might be.

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I love auctions

There are quite a few auctions in our area.

Some places are monthly, a few are semi-weekly. There are just enough for me to stay

interested in watching them.

I never bid at the beginning of an auction I try and wait until the last few hours but honestly the last hour is better.

This week there was an auction that had several pretty quilts. I love quilts and my goal was to win one of them but I actually won both. I was able to get one for $36.00 and one for $27.00. Honestly, I never thought I would get them that cheap. The first thing I do with bought quilts whether they are new or used is washing them in my front load washer adding Lysol Laundry Sanitizer then hanging them up to dry. The front-load washers avoid damaging the quilts.

At this same auction, I was watching some National Geographic hardback coffee table books. Our grandson who is 10 years old reads at a High Schoo Level and is always needing to be challenged. These books were all on the earth, solar system, galaxy, and more. I won the 9 books for $22.00 and the biggest of these books I would think would be $150.00 or more to purchase it is huge. These books were all brand new and I do not think you could buy any of them for under $50.00.

Sometimes auctions have stuff you need and other times it is stuff you want. Either way, I enjoy the excitement of trying to win something.

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Home Ownership

When you own a home you have to take responsibility for that home.

With such things as new roofs, flooring, facial boards, new doors, windows etc.

Sometimes you get hit with foundation issues in our particular area this is quite common and your slab will shift.

This happen to ours and the issues is between the add on and the old part of the house. When the new slab finally settled into the black gumbo dirt it made our house unlevel. We have a 3ft slab all the way around most people have a two foot slab. We paid extra for this when we built the original house and when we added on we had to do the same thing.

We should have put piers in between the seams of the new and the old but no one told us this and we had no idea about doing this.

We have our first estimate for our slab the piers will go through the seam area from front to back and all the way around the add on. This will take 34 piers and they have to tunnel from the front to the back along the seam line. Our house is 1″ off in some places 1 1/2 in others and 2″ in others but it is only off on the add on side this in itself is a blessing.

The cost is $15,890.00 needless to say we will get a minimum of 3 estimates before we do this I know price can vary quite a bit from these companies.

Since our oldest son Joshua is in the house building and flipping business he has some connections we are going to talk to about the slab and he will be doing our remodeling projects.

There is always one thing that holds up everything else.

Life is GOOD!

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Covid Vaccination

I received my first Covid vaccination March 6 and my second March 27. I had the Pfizer injections.

These injections are timed out 3 weeks apart.

I have had no serious side effects from either injection. I was prepared because I have allergic reactions to a lot of medications mostly antibiotics.

There is a small red spot on my arm that started out the size of a dime the first day then a nickel then a quarter now day 2 it’s about the size of a half of dollar from the second injection. It is slightly raised like a mosquito bite and felt a little bruised for about 24 hrs. This is not bad at all it is slightly itchy I can tell it’s an allergic reaction but I knew this would happen with me so I was prepared.

I had to travel about 16 miles to get my shot at a large clinic but since there were people there coming from Katy I felt like 16 miles was nothing. This clinic has been doing 900 vaccinations every weekend.

Texas reopened our state against my better judgment but noone asked me my opinion.

While we were driving for my 2nd vaccine on Saturday I could not help but notice all the crowded restaurants honestly are people that desperate to eat out at a crowded place with everyone not wearing masks?

Everyone, please get their vaccinations and do not be scared of them. We have to get rid of Covid so our lives can return to normal and we need everyone’s cooperation to do this.

Be smart wear your mask wash your hands often and get your vaccines. Let us all do our part to end COVID.

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Watching airplanes

One of Crickets favorite things to do is watch the airplanes fly over our house.

We are about 16 miles from one of Houston’s major airports William P. Hobby.

They change the flight patterns a few different ways every so often the planes fly low over the house. I mean low enough to read what plane it is.

Cricket watches the planes in the sky like she is amazed. I visualize her saying “Da Plane Da Plane” like on the show Love Boat many years ago.

It brings me joy watching our dogs reactions to different things. Life is good!

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Flying Low

We saw this airplane near Bush Airport on Friday the landing gear was already coming down.

We live near the other major airport and the planes have been few and far in between.

I happen to get a picture of this one as it was crossing the freeway using my canon 400 mm lens.

It is great to see some airplanes flying again there is hope this pandemic might end soon.

UnitedAirPlane1

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Have a safe and happy July 4th.

I know we are all very tired of this COVID 19 pandemic stuff.

Texas opened back up way to soon we all knew this at the time but some of us still stayed home while many went out to eat or to the bars.

If people had stayed home we would not be getting this 2nd phase as bad as we are. This week Pearland, Manvel, Alvin, and Houston all have put in face mask orders so if you are in these towns in public you must wear a facemask.

Thank goodness they closed the beaches because everyone loves the beach and people would be migrating there this weekend.

We have been blessed and have not been sick. We have only been around our daughter, son in law, and grandkids, and my mother n law. We are avoiding most people.

My husband and I have been isolating as much as possible since the end of March.

All of our groceries are picked up on curbside, I get a few Amazon deliveries a week and a chewy and a Walmart or 2 every month. If by chance we had to go into a store we wear a face mask and use hand sanitizer and the wipes.

I spray the house with Clorox disinfecting spray every few days.

All the groceries are wiped down before being put up all the bags are tossed in the garbage.

We have only picked up food 4 times in 98 days and I am so tired of my own cooking. That is why I have been making new stuff lots and lots of new stuff. I even made a cornbread zucchini dish that was amazing.

I am tired of staying home but I know this is what is best for everyone.

I feel like we have done as much as we possibly can do for the last 98 days I just wish everyone would listen and do the same.

We still have plenty of disposable masks, some mask my mother n law made me and lots and lots of hand sanitizer and antibacterial soap from my auction wins.

Now only if I could find rubbing alcohol.

If you must celebrate do it with ONLY your household do not bring anyone else into your house be smart about this.

At this point, everyone who has been in contact with 10 people is sharing germs with those who have not been in contact with others. This is how the virus spreads.

If you have been around other people at work or at the stores do not risk being around the elderly or those with compromised immune systems.

We have shared over 500 cucumbers but we have been very smart about this. We place them in clear bags( I also won at auction) on the tailgate to my truck people text me when they are on their way to pick up their cucumbers. This has allowed us to share with our community but not interact with the public.

If everyone does their part we can get through this but it has to be all of us doing this together.

Happy July 4th – Stay Safe and wear your face mask.

 

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Navigating Health Insurance

Has anyone been through the nightmare of having to find insurance on your own and you are not eligible for medicare yet?

My husband is retiring in 7 weeks and I have to find my insurance. His will be easy enough but I am younger than he is.

The first time I checked on this early last year I made the MISTAKE of giving the online form my phone number. I kid you not by the time I pushed enter my phone started ringing and I was getting 40 – 50 calls a day.

Now all those calls are blocked one by one I got rid of them.

I have a friend who suggested Humana insurance. Does anyone else have any suggestions?

What I would like is low monthly payments low deductable and prescription care coverage.

Please no Salespeople!

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Dr. Appointments, Testing and Results

I have spent the last few weeks at Dr. Appointments, testing and getting my results on follow up visits.

I have had 3 EKGs, 1 regular stress test, 1 nuclear stress test, 1 echocardiogram and I wore a Holter monitor for 24 hours. The only results that are not back yet are the Holter Monitor.

I have mitral valve stenosis this was discovered about 12 – 14 years ago. Almost every year without fail I have gotten my yearly echo that is until I got breast cancer and then I had other priorities to take care of. No one should ever put off their yearly heart testing that was not very smart of me but I have no one to blame but myself.

Mitral valve stenosis is caused by Rheumatic Fever but I never had that as a child or an adult. This was verified with my parents. Think of stenosis as a hose that is being stepped on and blood can not flow through the valve properly there is leakage spewing and backflow.

My mitral valve is what they call Moderate/ Severe, there is moderate regurgitation or leakage, as well as my Left Atrium,  is now enlarged. There is an estimated right ventricle systolic pressure of 45 – 50 mmHg. I am sure this will be verified by a heart catheter in the very near future.

The symptoms that this causes me are cough, chest pain, and soreness like a bruised feeling as well as dizziness and fatigue.

The Cardiologist says right now we have to get my pulse rate down to around 50 it runs 74- 80. To do this we have decreased my thyroid medication, changed BP meds to a channel blocker 2 x a day. He even added Lasix even though I am not retaining fluid he thinks there is fluid we are not seeing. All these things will ease up the pressures around the heart and hopefully help some of my symptoms.

On top of all this, I have lung issues emphysema and asthma so my lungs are not in the best shape.

In order for me to have Mitral Valve Replacement surgery the heart and the lungs have to be in the best shape, we can get them with medication. With getting an artificial valve replacement I will have to be on 2 blood thinners for the rest of my life.

I have a pulmonologist appointment this Friday and we will see if there is anything else we can do for my lungs to get them ready for this surgery.

Hopefully, by January this surgery can happen. It is open heart surgery which means more recoup time for me. The thought of cracked ribs scares me to death as well as being put on a heart-lung machine but I am trying to stay calm and not overreact.

I am sharing my story with you all in the hopes I can help someone else. I want others to learn through my experiences and I will do my best to keep everyone updated as new things happen.

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CT Lung Scan Results

I have 4 lung nodules from 4mm – 8mm in size they are considered small at this point.

The first lung scan showed 3 nodules the second one showed 2 and it said one was resolved and this one showed 4 but listed two as new ones.

I have always loved reading anything about medical stuff and sometimes that just ends up scaring me more. Especially when I read the descriptions of the nodules.

There is no way to know what they are until they can be biopsied. Lung nodules are not necessarily cancer.
Lung nodules have to be 1cm before they can be biopsied due to the dangers associated with them.

The pulmonologist reminded me that lung cancer stage 1 is very curable that is why we are doing these CT Lung scans this was my 3rd one in 1 1/2 years.

He changed my morning inhaler to a stronger version and now its morning and evenings this is because I have been experiencing some more shortness of breath.

I felt pretty good about this appointment he is so good to answer my list of questions and explain things to me and he never rushes you which is a big plus.

He is ordering some more testing and wants to see me again in the month.

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