See how helpful Val is to Hick? In fact, I even took a day-to-day duty away from him. Almost. You may recall that I'm pretty sure he's trying to kill me. Every attempt is different. Sunday night, I almost took that chore away.
Hick had already gone to bed. It was around 9:00, and I was sitting at the kitchen table with HIPPIE, skimming the innernets, and having a snack. That snack was a little bowl of COMBOS, the Pizza Flavor Pretzel version. They're little hollow pretzel tubes, filled with not-quite-cheese in a powdery form. I prefer the versions that have a hollow cracker rather than the pretzels, but they are hard to find, and the pizza flavor is okay.
Anyhoo... when I eat this snack, I bite them in half. Not because they're too big, but because if you leave them regular size, they need more chewing, and get soggy faster. So I bite them in half to eat them. Here is a re-creation, to show what my snack looks like:
I was near the last of my treat when I felt a sharp pain in my gums. The area behind my two front teeth. Huh! That smarted. But I thought nothing of it. Just a shard of pretzel. The pain went away quickly. Then I noticed that my mouth and lips felt really dry. I just had my metal water bottle there, having finished my Shasta Zero Sugar Cola, to which I add a fresh squeezed lemon, earlier in the evening. I took a sip of water, and then used half a select-a-size paper towel to blot my lips.
BLOOD!!!!
That paper towel looked like I had applied a whole tube of lipstick before blotting. I blotted again and again, with the same result. It was like the never-ending lipstick, only my lipstick was BLOOD! I went to the bathroom mirror, and saw that indeed, my lips were covered, and my tongue was coated with blood! That's not good!
Back to the kitchen, where I used a red SOLO cup for cold water to rinse my mouth. The spit came out bloody. Over and over! AND two raggedy hunks of gum-skin slipped down the drain! Again, there was no pain. Just a waterfall of blood that would not stop. In fact, as I sat at the table again, I could feel dripping from my gum to my bottom lip.
All I could do was let it flow. It's not like you can put a bandaid on a cut behind your two front teeth. Holding a folded paper towel there with pressure did nothing. I had to keep swallowing, and blotting. It went on for two hours! You know any little wound on your face or scalp bleeds a lot. Same with the gums, I suppose. I take an aspirin a day, so I know my blood flows more, and more easily, than most people. But I was starting to get worried.
Good thing I'm no longer on that demon drug Xarelto! I literally could have exsanguinated! And poor Hick. Not only would he have been without my cheerful companionship, but he might have been blamed! The house would have looked like a crime scene! And that luminol stuff would have made the places I cleaned up glow with the evidence. Two drains would show that somebody had tried to wash off blood!
I should probably stop watching those how-to-murder-your-wife shows. And stop eating COMBOS, the pretzel version.
Or stop biting them in half and break them instead. Buy a different snack.
ReplyDeleteThere's no way to break them in half, unless you crush them to smithereens. The biting is not what sliced the flesh from my gums. It was a shard from a half I was chewing, that I had taken from the bowl. I guess I will have to switch back to my Gardetto's snack mix.
DeleteCurious to know your experience with Xarelto - clearly not good judging from your comment! It has been recommended for an older family member and we have concerns (aside from the sky-high price).
ReplyDeleteI was prescribed Xarelto after multiple bilateral pulmonary embolisms. It made every joint in my body hurt. Elbows, fingers, ankles, wrists, hips, knees. I would cry with the pain, trying to sleep at night. The doctor said it was the standard of care, and that I should be on it for a year. That the joint pain was not listed as a side effect. I went to a specialist, and argued for aspirin therapy after researching it online. He let me off the Xarelto after six months.
DeleteMy main concern with Xarelto, aside from the pain, was that if you have a bleed, it can't be reversed with a shot of Vitamin K or some other agent. You have to wait for it to "wear off," while not taking further doses. I don't remember it clearly now, but I think that could take several days.
I'm sure Xarelto helps a lot of people, and it was good in the beginning for dissolving my clots, but it was not the drug for me. It's been more than 10 years, so they might have new ways to counteract those effects by now.
Thanks very much for the information! It's great to hear that you figured out an alternative that worked as a long term solution. We are still working through a number of issues to find an appropriate blood thinner for this family member. I'll definitely add your input to my research notes as Xareto was high on the list due to the convenience of only needing one pill per day. This family member is 98, and keeping track of multiple pills can be challenging.
ReplyDeleteI can understand your concern. Best of luck in finding the right medication.
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