River, pc: State of the Bear:

[mdlbear]

Fred Hutch takes a "whole person" kind of approach to patient care, which isn't something I've experienced before. My "care team" currently includes three oncologists, a social worker, a "patient navigator", an "integrative medicine" specialist, and (added only this week) an accupuncturist and a chaplain. I would never have thought of looking for help with "Spiritual Health -- they came looking for me based on some of my answers on the mental health section of one of their many questionaires, but from the brief conversation I had on Monday it sounds as though it will probably be better for me than most of the previous counseling I've had. It's a strange feeling, and a strange position for an atheistic Reformed Druid to be in, but there you have it.

Physically I seem to be doing better this week, as my shrinking prostate releases its grip on my urethra, and my current mix of laxatives deals with my arse. It's all still annoying -- I'm nowhere near being back to the way I was, say, a year ago, but I'll take whatever slight improvement I can get. And today I got a referral to a physiatrist specializing in pelvic floor rehab. (I only encountered the term "physiatrist" a few months ago, but apparently the term dates back to 1938. TIL!)

This is turning out to be a long, strange trip indeed.

Comments

[acelightning73]

After my original kidney incident, my son (who's a clinical psychatrist working with patients with mental illnesses and developmental deficits. Also he was an EMT when he was in college) told me about pelvic physical therapy, and I tried it. However, Medicare would only pay for it if I met certain requirements, and those included a session of activity that lasted close to an hour and a half. My heart condition made me weaker and decreased my endurance. I had to quit the pelvic therapy before it was really done, because I got too tired and weak to do the work during the sessions, and Medicare wouldn't pay them. I may go back eventually; it did do me a lot of good while I could still keep up.

[mdlbear]

Ugh! That sucks. At the moment I'm doing Kegel exercises on my own, mostly using Kegels for Men - REAL TIME Daily Kegels WORKOUT - YouTube and other videos by the same woman.

Watching/doing workout videos is another thing I never imagined myself doing.

[acelightning73]

I learned how to do kegels when I was pregnant, and it helped a lot with the exercises. One of the best things about the therapy is that they put myoelectric detectors on my pelvic muscles, and showed me a graph of how hard I was contracting them, and the graph allowed me to see what electrical activity I was producing, and that made me more aware of how to know what I was actually doing - the feedback was very useful in understanding how to make my body do what it was supposed to do. There were also leg exercises involving holding a large bouncy ball between my thighs and trying to squeeze it, just to strengthen the larger muscles. But I got to where I could shoot 200 microvolts out of my hoo-hah.

[kellan_the_tabby]

... I don't even LIKE having a hoo-hah & I wish I could shoot 200 microvolts out of it.

[acelightning73]

I reached a new higher number one day, and I was joking with my pelvic physical therapist about developing superpowers. And I am "The Woman Who Made Friends With Electricity". (This was therapy for incontinence, re-educating the pelvic muscles.)

Having a hoo-hah has advantages. That's why Heinlein said that "women are natural-born smugglers".