David
A Near Death Experience
Nov 10, 2019
I knew something wasnt right as I was heading to work Monday afternoon, severe stomach pain and nausea was creeping in. As I had eaten a meatball sub just a few hours earlier, I thought it was just a touch of food poisoning. That food poisoning kept me up all that night vomiting, and extreme shivering when I tried to get to sleep.
I called in sick the next day spending most of the day sleeping. As I was starting to feel better, I thought nothing more of the situation, thinking it was behind me. Boy was I wrong.
Wednesday rolled around and I still had some stomach pain, but thought I could make it through my work day. I made it till about 5:30 (I work second shift, 2:45pm to 11:15pm) then had to notify my supervisor that something was wrong, as the abdominal pain was getting more severe and becoming more stabbing. He got me to our local hospital a little before six oclock.
After running a few tests, blood work, urine sample that the nurses aid described as being the color of bourbon, and a CT scan, I was informed of what I already suspected but wasnt saying to my sister who had met me at the hospital, I had appendicitis. The ER staff immediately contacted a surgeon and scheduled surgery that night. They got me to the operating room a little before ten that night.
When I came too it was 11:45pm and aside from a small amount of pain near one of the incisions, (the procedure was done laparoscopic using three small incisions) I wasnt feeling to bad, a regained full consciousness pretty quickly. That was when my sister informed me that my appendix was in worse condition than originally thought, and that I was looking at a week in hospital to recover. Oh joy. I had my sister call my employer to let him know what was going on, he understood and told me to take the time I needed. The next morning the anesthesiologist came by to check on me and told me that my appendix should have come out a month ago.
The next two days in hospital, they had me on what they call the clears diet, consisting of gelatin, black coffee, broth, apple juice, and popsicles. Basically just short of a starvation diet. By Saturday morning they put me on solid foods to see if I could keep them down, which I did, and they sent me home that day. So the predicted week long hospital stay turned out to be only three days; although I still needed to make a follow up appointment with the surgeon before getting a return to work date.
I contacted the surgeons office the following Monday, and made an appointment for that Friday. At they time they removed the staples from my incisions and informed me that I could return to work next Thursday, as I was required to abstain from heavy lifting for two weeks from the date of surgery. During the time I was at home recovering I made a go fund me page to try and recover some of my lost pay, and maybe any costs that my insurance doesn't cover. I went back to work with no complications.
My appendix was so far gone that I pretty much got to the hospital just in time. I am posting this blog to help others avoid some of what I went through. The surgeon originally told me that if he got the entire appendix out with the laparoscopic procedure, which was 99% of the time, I could have gone home the next day. The prolonged stay was because of the severity of the appendix. Google the symptoms of appendicitis, learn what they are, and if you are experiencing any of them get it checked out ASAP. Its better to be safe, get the symptoms checked, and have it be nothing, than assume its nothing and die from a ruptured appendix.
Until next time, be sate and be well my friends.
Go fund me link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/sa9f9-emergency-surgery?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet
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The Old Ways
Sep 2, 2019
to offer my works on a variety of products; I have even created a collection of products around a graphic I designed based on the subject of this blog. I understand that the various items that my works may be printed on are mass produced, and that is fine. Mass production is acceptable for most mundane everyday items such as electronics, phone cases, travel mugs, and such. What I don’t like to see in mass production are things like furniture, home décor (in some cases) and clothing.
During my lifetime I’ve had the opportunities to learn from a master woodworker, two master cobblers, and a master tailor, all of whom drove into my head an attention for details and a focus on quality over quantity. This could be why I’m a bit jaded today when it comes to mass produced items; mass productions seems to focus on quantity more than quality. Also it bothers me to see consumers buying more mass produced items than custom crafted products.
Well, it looks like I got off on a bit of a tangent there. I don’t want you to think that mass production is the only aspect I had in mind when I conceptualized this blog post, as I do have another post in mind delving deeper into my thoughts on that subject.
My thoughts on the old ways of doing things versus modern ways apply to most if not all categories of life. The old ways of cooking for example, I still prefer to cook on the stove or in the oven rather than a microwave, and I often use cast iron skillets when cooking, hell I even still use a stove top coffee maker, (the best coffee I’ve ever had). Shopping is another example, while I do buy many of my common everyday items (household items, bathroom supplies, etc,) online from Wal-Mart for many other things I would rather go shop at the locally owned stores in town, or at antique shows, or craft shows and bazaars.
Tying in with cooking, I touched on natural healing and prevention as opposed to modern medicine earlier in this post; eating hole, natural, unprocessed foods as much as possible. I’m not gonna go too deep into this here, because as I said before that is a subject for another post. Also, I’m not trying to promote one diet choice over another, I don’t care if you’re vegan, carnivore, or something in-between, modern versus traditional methods of food choice and peroration can still apply,
Remember, the title of this post says that sometimes the old ways are still the best ways! I will admit that there have been some advances that make things better or easier in our lives. Some advances in medicine, surgical advances have certainly made surgery better than it was in times past. However it may still be better to live a healthi
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Climate change?
Aug 31, 2019
for more merch with this graphic.
David G Duke - Mother Earth
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DGD Media: Play to Win
Jun 2, 2010
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