I'm more broken than you

[Haggis Killer]

This is the requested 'old farts' thread. Ok, I've started it.

So, let's see.

Three MRI's:
#1 - brain scan/migraines (answer: yes)
#2 - spine/bulging discs (answer: yes)
#3 - spine/bulging & deteriorating discs (answer: yes)

Surgeries:
Cheekbone, crushed by crazy soccer player. Wires still in.
Right hand. Two distinct cysts; bone and ganglion.

Breaks:
Ankle. Don't ask.
Various fingers & toes
Cheekbone. See above.

Outstanding issues:
Arthritis. Pick a joint.
Deteriorating disc; spine. V-shaped. Thank you, fencing.
Irregular heartbeat. Not problematic.
Four year old boy. He tortures me regularly.

Gone for now:
Back spasms for 16 years. Gone for now.
Bulging discs. Receeded or nerve path re-grown. Don't care which.

Ok, who's next?

[The Queen]

Current issues:
- Cholesterol, right around 300.
- Ongoing left hand/wrist -- depending on which doctor you talk to, it's either carpal tunnel, thoracic outlet, tendonitis or median neuritis.
- Teeth disintegrating: three more crowns needed, root canal probably not far behind.
- Migraines (seem to be mostly solved by wearing an NTI when I sleep. Ever so attractive, but whatever, it works.)

Fun tests:
#1 - cardio catheterization (wires and tubes threaded from your femoral artery into your heart. Oh, and you have to be awake for the whole thing. It's lots of fun, really. Answer: prolapsed mitral valve - prognosis, someday might need to have it replaced, in the meantime just live with it and take craploads of antibiotics before going to the dentist, just in case.)

#2 - two nerve conduction studies (dozens of electric shocks. Lots and lots of fun!)

Stitches:
27 in my nose. (Dog bite when I was 16. The good news is that telling the story to Kevin & Bean 20+ years later got me a Kevin & Bean flashlight!)

10 in my knee (outdoor theatre, slid on the gravel in the aisles during an amusing battle sequence.)

5 in my left shoulder (doctors removed what they thought was a chicken pox scar, then a cyst, then finally realized I healed keloid and left it alone. Except for the five staples of cortisone they pumped into it to flatten it and make it stop itching.)

[Drunk Monk]

I had nothing recent except bad allergies and some fussy joints, unless you count strep last year. My knees and shoulder have suffered from years of martial arts abuse, but nothing some neoprene, muscle relaxants and the occcasional tieda treatment hasn't handled.

When I was a child, I had a hernia. I also broke my ankles, my wrists and my thumb, mostly from falls, the thumb against another kid's head. I collapsed a lung in college, the night before I was to leave for JO's in fact. I had pnuemonia about a decade ago and was hospitalized after suffering from a week of high fever. I took a little brain damage for that which I only know about because I lost my ability to type after and had to retrain myself. Who knows what else was lost? That's the weird thing about brain damage. I had a rather bad reaction to some dit da jow once that made my testicles swell into itchy grapefruits. That was after contracting cellulitus in my left foot in China.

I have bad insomnia sometimes. Case and point - look at my posting time.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

It's called getting up and going to work. You'll notice we are both up at the same time. And I've been up for an hour. What a wuss.

[Drunk Monk]

I've been up since 2ish. I don't have to go to work for another 3 hours. For me, it's insomnia.

[Haggis Killer]

Ok, stitches. Lost count, but my favorite was this. My family was up in Idlewild visiting friends during a weekend. I fell and split my chin on a bench. The only "doctor" they could find was a dentist, who sewed up my chin in his dental chair. I was about 4.

Also, lost the end of my left middle finger when I was 2 and a half. In a door, trying to catch my brother the door slammer. Sewed back on, but didn't grow right.

Pneumonia. Had that. Didn't collapse a lung, though. And my testicles haven't swelled yet, even to the size of an apple. Grapefruit? Yeesh! Also have a hernia, but haven't had the surgery yet. Someday.

Migraines. Did I mention? Yesterday into today, in fact.

I'll think of more later.

[The Queen]

Just a thought. I used to get blinding migraines -- nausea, trying to see was like looking through broken glass, and I'd ground my back teeth down to nothing. The dentist built me something called an NTI device to wear on my front teeth when I sleep -- preventing me from clenching my jaw/grinding my teeth, and voila: so long as I keep away from strobe-type lighting and/or more than 14 hours straight on the computer, the headaches stay away. Only kind of headaches I get anymore are sinus headaches -- mild in comparison to the old migraines.

[Drunk Monk]

I've actually only had stitches once. It was when I had my collapsed lung. I had walked all across San Jose to pick up some epees, drove home, and went into shock. I was living with my parents and they got me to an ER right quick. After waiting for hours, the doc runs in, sticks my flank with a hypo of morphine and I swear, I swear the muther didn't get the damn needle out before cutting me open. He jams a tube into my chest which causes me to go into coughing convulsions and throws a rough suture to tie it in. He's out the door in five minutes. I spent the whole fucking night like that, hooked up to this percolating device that drained the air. It was noisy, not that I could sleep anyway with this tube sticking out of my side. The next morning, the doc runs in, yanks the tube out and pulls the suture shut like a drawstring bag so my scar was this messy pucker for years. Out the door in another five minutes. I saw him again - for five minutes - he had cancelled my first stitch-removal appointment and rescheduled for a week later. By then, the suture was buried deep in my drawstring pucker scar, so he reaches in with some plier-like tool and yanks a big old piece out. It felt like someone struck a match up my side. If I ever see that doctor again, he owes me fifteen minutes of me kicking his ass. Unfortunately I have no memory of what he looked like. The pain and meds blotted it out. Plus I think he wore a mask. Like a Freddy Kruger mask or something...

[cranefly]

Okay, I think you've all got me beat to bloody hell.
Still, I'd like to play. But can I include a photo? A really really delightfully charming photo?
--cranefly

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Excellent.

[Drunk Monk]

You think your photos can beat my grapefruit testicle story? No DOOMer beats my testicles...

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Not a very extensive list:

Three metatarsal fractures, 2 right-hand, 1 left-hand (HK remebers, maybe, since I was fencing him at the time) all from punches.

Three knee dislocations (all left knee) torn meniscus (both knees, but only surgery on the right knee to fix that) partial ACL tear (left-knee, big honking bionic brace for those rare occasions that I fence). Knees will now spontaneously dislocate if I am sitting oddly and relax them.

Osgood Slaughter's Disease. Look it up. The calcium deposits make it difficult to kneel, but they saved my knee when it went through a dashboard during a car accident. Could be useful in MMA.

Stitches, 11, bottom of left foot, finding a forgotten tent-peg left in the ground.

torn tendons in right foot from unplanned dismount from motorcycle (MUNI gets credit for the assist).

Disc bulge, L-5 (let me hear all of you L-5 people out there!). Periodic visits to the ER when pain gets too bad to sit, stand, sleep, or walk. First blow-out kept me in bed for two weeks and had my right foot dangling uselessly for a while. Could still sit in a guard position, though, and give lessons.

Irregular heart beat; switching to decaf seems to have taken care of most of that. The Doc wanted to give me drugs that would require another set of drugs to alleviate the side-effects. De-caf is a small price to pay.

Various tendenitis/joint issues. Price of getting old. Had one of those tests the Queen mentioned, where they get some torturer with an MD to stick you with needles and run current through them.

Migranes. Not nearly as many as when I was in my teens and twenties. Now it takes prolonged severe stress or two many meals with "smoked" ingredients (if you are ever in Kentucky, they put that "smoked" shit in everything)(and they can't make whisky; they make "girl-whisky": like a single-malt with a few table-spoons of sugar added; made to be added to Coke and drunk by Frat boys and regulars on "Cops"). My favorite is the "swirly fog" followed by the pain that makes you want to tear your eyes out. The nausea didn't start until later in life.

Taking Lipitor now.

Thar ya go! A longer list than I thought.

[Haggis Killer]

El Five, El Five, El Five!!!

L5 totally rocks!

And, yes, I do remember "The Punch" as I like to call it. A pure example of my psi-powers. I have the ability to drive The Yeti to a point of complete and utter frustration. I think it was the beat-disengage. Might've been a disengage-riposte.

Ah, me. We were so young back then. Still, I'd already been 3 or 4 years into the back spasms by then with a long road ahead.

[cranefly]

I've been reading The Artist's Complete Guide to Facial Expression by Gary Faigin. It is an amazing text, deftly-written and well-illustrated, and there's nothing else out there like it. Highly recommended, especially if you want to get past drawing faces with blank expressions (check any art website for lots of examples).

Anyway, while reading this thread, I realized my face had been seized by an unrelenting cringe. Good god, people! I can only say I am so lucky. Still, I will play soon, and include a photo -- though I'm looking two other photos as well.

I checked the Facial Expression book to pin down what muscles I was using for my cringe. I expected to find a cringe muscle. Nope. It seems to involve all the muscles of the face, with emphasis on three of them: the levator labii superioris (the sneering muscle), orbicularis oculi (the squinting muscle) & the corrugator (the frowning muscle).

I'm going away now. For a while. My face needs a rest.

--cranefly

[cranefly]

As for DM's alluded-to grapefruit testicles, I await the photos with bated breath.