I am currently reading a book written by a palliative care physician. Many people confuse palliative care with hospice, which is not the case. I believe that the relatively new field of palliative care allows people with few treatment options the ability to live out their remaining time as comfortably as possible instead of having soul-draining treatments till the very end.
When we called in hospice they would only come if the patient was on painkillers only no medicine to treat the disease.
That's correct; hospice is for when there is no "curative intent". Palliative can include that treatment but is also focused on comfort and quality of life for the patient. Both are excellent programs.
When I worked with hospice, medications were given to make the patient comfortable and they expected no more than 6 months of life. I remember one lady who had throat cancer that she refused to have excised. She said she wanted to die "whole". She was allowed one cigarette and one vodka and coke per day, so she would fix her drink, or I would help her if she was unable, and then we would sit on the patio overlooking a lake and she would drink her drink and smoke her cigarette and we would watch the lake and those upon it. She eventually was choked to death on her tumor, but it was her choice to go as she did.
. I mentioned in the smoking thread that my father died of metastasized melanoma at 79 after a lifetime of unfiltered smoking. (He did not have lung cancer.) His oncologist gave permission for him to smoke in his hospital room during his last days. It was a private room and that was over 20 years ago, but I remember it well.
Today was my quarterly oncologist visit and my first time meeting my "new" doctor. He was OK but has some big shoes to fill; no one is going to measure up to my original oncologist. The good news is that I have been moved to a 6-month checkup schedule and no issues were noted today. He didn't have much to say about the muscle cramps I was having; I think doctors are confounded by my normal blood work. "Drink plenty of fluids and keep stretching." Our oldest daughter is in town for a couple of days and she's keeping us occupied. She and her husband are building a new home and it has been fun sharing her excitement over blueprints and specification minutiae. She and her dad went out for Mexican food tonight and then were stopping at Charlie's Ice House to play some pool. We used to have a pool table but we sold it several years ago because it was a huge dust collector, but the kids enjoyed it for a long time. Anyway, I had no interest in playing pool so I stayed home. I'm sure the green beer is flowing.
On Saturday, our youngest daughter and her family also arrived so we had a houseful of people for most of the weekend. It was a nice time; my oldest trimmed my hair for me. Both daughters were loving the Aerogardens so I let them each choose one to take home. (Happy to say that I am now down to three Aerogardens and one of them is empty.) One of them also took a gallon ceramic crock, lid, ceramic weights, and my book on fermenting. I love it when I can get rid of some "stuff." She is excited to try making pickles and sauerkraut. Our youngest grandson Alex (5) was in the backyard with his aunt and managed to fall into the pool while trying to get the floating crab-shaped water thermometer out of the water. It was quite cold on Saturday and the pool is like ice water, so the little fellow's teeth were chattering. I'm just glad someone was out there to pull him out of that cold water. It was really quiet here on Sunday afternoon when everyone left. My husband drove over to check on his mom, so it was just me and the hum of the washer and dryer cleaning sheets and towels. I miss the days of all the kids in the house, but I don't miss all the laundry.
Ah spring; time to drag out the power washer and spend a couple of hours trying to get it started. I can hear the birds chirping, the wind chimes tinkling, and the cuss words drifting across the lawn. Finally, the accursed machine roars to life and the concrete walkway around the house is getting un-algaed. I am wisely remaining indoors. We have hired a pro to power wash the house this year, but my husband is cleaning the driveway, sidewalks, pool deck, and patio. (No ladder required.) I don't want him up on a ladder to clean the 2nd story and the dormers on the roof. Those dormers are WAAAAAAAY up there. The guy who's doing that job is supposed to be here on Saturday, so we'll see if he actually shows up. I'll just stay in here with my coffee and banana bread.
I have mentioned before that I use "My Fitness Pal" to keep up with calories, etc. The app has a nice feature for importing online recipes that usually works very well. (This allows me to see the nutrition calculations for homemade stuff easily.) When I say it "usually" works well, here is what happened when I imported the recipe for the BJC Banana Bread. The first ingredient is "butter and sugar for greasing pan." Note that it was converted to Duck Wings and Greasing Ham. Hmmmm. Am I wrong to suspect this nutrition info???
It's ridiculous to count everything down the nearest single calorie anyway. (251? .Where'd they get the 1?) Just round calories, on basic items, UP to the nearest 10. Takes care of little stuff like that. Always gives you an over-estimate of what you really ate. I'd rather have that, than an under-estimate, then wonder why you didn't lose as much weight as expected. That's also why I do it on paper. Much easier and faster.
I hear ya. The reason I use the recipe importer is that I can easily find the calories in homemade recipes without calculating each ingredient and then dividing by number of servings. Unfortunately the "import" function added duck wings to my banana bread. I might have to try this variation at some point.
Not much going on around here, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The better half went over to the RV to check it out and "de-winterize." He called to say that the ground fault plug that was running the battery charger had tripped so the batteries are all low. He added water to them and turned the charger back on. Then he removed the insulation stuff from the water connections and turned the water on. He said the water pump seemed to run for a long time so he figured it was filling the water heater. Walked outside to see a waterfall coming out of one of the storage compartments. Thankfully, after looking around to see that it wasn't a broken pipe, he discovered a valve for the ice maker was not working and water was pouring out of there. The shut off valve to the ice maker was also not working so he just turned off the water and is looking online for a replacement valve. It's always something. (But we are thrilled it wasn't a broken pipe under the floor!) We have decided that we are going to replace that valve and have the brakes checked, then drop it off at PPI Motorhome Sales, a consignment seller. They are fairly high volume sellers and I'm going to tell them I'll take bottom dollar for that pain-in-the-butt RV. I will be thrilled to unload that albatross. About a week ago I bought some magnetic things to go on the garage door. I saw these advertised and then found them on Amazon; they are fake "hinges" and windows that simply stick onto the door with magnets. I kind of like the look so we'll see how long these last... All of that is fake... the hinges, the handles, and the windows. Cost about $50 so no big investment. My little garden is doing pretty well. I have a bunch of radishes that are just about ready to harvest. One of the tomato plants has some marble-sized tomatoes and all the cucumber plants have started climbing the trellis. Looks like we're going to get some rain today so that should help the lawn.