Hi there,

I jsut need some feedback from anyone who has a depressed parent. My mother is addicted to cigarettes. SHe lives and breathes them. She also doesn’t ahve the $ to support her habit. She keeps calling me and today..resorted to "begging" for a pack of cigarettes. She called me crying stating that my sister had come over there to give her catfood for her cats and they had an arguement. My mother called ME up crying, i thought she tried to hurt herself or something, and then as I talked to her.. she calmed down considerably and I stated that I couldn’t buy her cigarettes. She immediatley said http://www.healtheffect.net/ubb/tongue.giflease’ and I replied" why don’t you get the patch. SHe was upsetting me sonsiderably
My mother has this pattern of manipulating people to do for her. This behaviour has made all 3 of us kids to really not want to have much to do with her.
What makes it hard is that now, she;s had a mini stroke and some arthritis and really deosn’t ahve any money for herself.
I’m the oldest and she has relied upon me because I’m the one who’s helping ehr with food on my own limited income. I have a 14 yr old and I need to take care of him 1st.
I’m tired of helping her. I’m in therapy for myself and I tell you, these phonecalls upset me greatly.
Is anyone else out there experiencing this.
ps: she’s tried the suicide thing many times over crap like this.

I was just wondering if what my son seems to have developed over the last couple of weeks is common and normal or not. He has always been a great eater, up untill a few weeks ago. When I give him what I know he likes he will eat maybe 1 or 2 bites then begin throwing everything everywhere from his highchair. This happens with every meal and snack given at any point of the day. He will ask for a bite of something when he sees us eating, but when the fork or whatever goes near his mouth he’ll scream no and run. He’s also begun hitting alot, even though he is disciplined for doing that it so far seems to not be doing a bit of good. He most of the time is doing it just to get some sort of reaction out of us it seems. He also did recently become a big brother about 2 weeks ago, and I’m sure he is feeling somewhat left out even though he isn’t at all. But at the same time he began acting this way a few weeks befor the baby was even born. Anyone else gone through somthing like this? any pointers would be great. Thanks alot.

I have a Graco activity center that DS loves. It bounces a bit, but I don’t think it is as bouncy as a jumperoo or door jumper, but I am not sure. It has springs in it, but seems better suited for just sitting in and playing.

Do any of you have both of these items? I am thinking about purchasing a jumperoo or door jumper but am not sure if there is a big difference from the activity center. Thanks!

hey my name is leanna and im only 16. Recently, exactly 6 weeks ago i got very ill. i couldn’ stand up i couldn’t eat nothing. all i did was sleep. so i got blood work done for mono and it came out negative. then i appeared to be getting a serious amount of kanker sores in my mouth, i had atleast 5 or 6 at a time that made me in serious pain. so i called the doctor, he reported to me that i had mono. the blood work was wrong and all my symptoms led him to the fact that i had mono. now also remember when i first got blood work done my white blood cell count was "dangerously low" which nobody had taken into consideration. two weeks after having mono i had very bad strep throat. i had to take steroids to stop the swelling, i couldnt breath because i was so swollen in the neck area. the strep throat had left in exactly a week in a half. now i am still in the process of getting over mono but i had to get a blood test recently and my white blood cell count is still very low. should i be worried? should i look into it more and what might be the cause of the white blood cells being so low? if someone could help me that would be great.

If you are a reader of the posts you will notice that I posted about my finally going to court after six+ years. I didn’t have a great outcome because it gave me not even a years wage to work with. They will take care of any medical but I do not feel grateful for this at all. I am on my second week of the descision and I am so depressed because the input from others is not helping. I want to cover myself up and die. I have even had comments saying I now could work. I am physically disabled (spinal injuries) with chronic pain and now I can work yeh sure.
I need some sort of reasurrance. My mind is going wild and all I can think of is finishing up. Could someone tell me what happened to them after they settled? I do not think everyone would have prospered. I just wanted enough to invest so at least I could have enough to live on if I retire. —- I don’t even know what to call this.. I could write a book, any takers for helping write a book. This year alone could fill it.

About 5 years ago I broke my ankle a standard fracture bit of ligament damage. After I had the cast off I have now constant pain in my hip knee and foot on the left side. Been to physios, excersise physologists, doctors, several cortizone injections massage excersises etc etc. 5 years later still no relief yet the pain is getting worse. I had a blood test a few months ago which showed up inflammation so now I am being referred to a rhemotologist and am not sure what he will be able to find. The physio says I have bursitis in my hip and knee as well. I’m about at my wits end and no one has actually identified a cause for all this pain. Can anyone help me? I’ve had several xrays which have not shown anything structually wrong in my knee or foot.

I do have knock kneees and flat feet which I know definitely doesn’t help but surely can’t be the cause of all this pain can it? I have no pain on the right hand side at all.

Hoping someone has a few answers here because I am stressing out. I haven’t had a period in two months. I am not on birthcontrol. I went to my gyn and he put me on provera which I started at the beginning of the month. I should have started my period already but haven’t. I called him back and was told to go in Friday to have a scan of my endometrium done. Has anyone had this done? Is it just like an ultrasound. Also has anyone ever been on provera and it didn’t start their period like it was supposed to? They already did an ultrasound to check for cysts and that came up clear. Any suggestions on what could be causing me to not have a period. I haven’t had any pain or anything, just no period.

Desiree’

I had a LP done almost 2 years ago and something went wrong. No one can say or admit what could have happened. I was being tested for MS but have been dx’ed with Lupus for years and had some brain lesions.

I have had to go on SSDI and I cannot drive, work or talk sensibly since. I forget words, stutter a lot, tremors in my hands and a loss of balance.

I was fine the day of, working as a corporate administrator, and basically incapacitated ever since. I have trouble sometimes even writing a check, I forget what to do. I did have to have two blood patches for the terrible headache.

Before I ever left the hospital I was unable to turn my neck at all and still don’t know if this was normal. There is no recourse via malpractice as no lawyer wanted to go up against the big name hospital and told me I would have to have another dr prove what they did wrong.

Any ideas anyone???? Anyone else heard of this??

Last week I tried those blood pressure machines at the drug store. The first time I used it my bp was 123/77 then a few days after it was 117/73. I am taking two medications for high blood pressure. The last month when I went to the doctor to get it checked it was 140/96 and he was thinking about adding a third medication. I was just wondering how fine those machines are? I will always go by my doctors readings but I don’t want to take more medication if I don’t have to. I see my doctor this coming week to get it checked again and I will tell him about the reading any way. Thanks

I have posted this is a couple of other threads, but I wanted to start a thread under the name policosanol so that others might see it. I’d be interested to hear if others have had the same positive benefits as I have.

I take 20MG/day. Raised my HDL from a very low 31 to a still low but much better 41. Over the last 8 years, which included at least 16 lipid profiles, my HDL never went above 31. After 8 weeks of taking 20MG/day of policosanol the two most recent lipid profiles both indicated 41. Also lowered my LDL by 25%.

Very safe. Many, many clicial trials. No known side effects. Made from Sugar cane. Nothing works for everyone, but it is worth serious cosnideration for anyone looking to lower cholesterol without using statins or other prescription drugs.

Policosanol is a mixture of fatty alcohols derived from the wax of sugar cane. These active substances work to lower cholesterol levels by several mechanisms. It inhibits cholesterol manufacturer but does so prior to HMG-CoA reductase. In addition policosanol also exerts exceptional effects on LDL-cholesterol metabolism. Specifically, policosanol increases LDL receptor processing. It exerts this effect by increasing the binding of LDL to its receptor, improving the transport of LDL into the liver cell, and significantly enhancing the breakdown of LDL cholesterol. In addition to lowering LDL, policosanol has also been shown to increase HDL, protect against free radical damage to LDL-cholesterol, and inhibit excessive platelet aggregation.

The clinical studies have included short and long-term, randomized, placebo-controlled and comparative studies versus statins (lovastatin, pravastatin and simvastatin), fibrates (bezafibrate and gemfibrozil), acipimox, and probucol involving nearly 3,000 subjects. In these studies, policosanol in dosages ranging from 5 to 20 mg/day, has demonstrated significant improvements in LDL-C, total cholesterol, HDL-C, and the ratios of total cholesterol to HDL-C and LDL-C to HDL-C. Policosanol produces cholesterol-lowering effects within the first 6-8 weeks of use. At a daily dosage of 10 mg of policosanol at night, LDL cholesterol levels typically drop by 20 to 25% within the first six months of therapy. At a dosage of 20 mg, LDL levels typically drop by 25-30%. HDL cholesterol levels typically increase by 15 to 25% after only two months of use. The combined LDL reduction and HDL increase can produce dramatic improvements in the LDL to HDL ratio.

Go to the following site, sponsored by the US National Library of Medicine. [url="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?CMD=search&DB=PubMed"]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?CMD=search&DB=PubMed[/url]
Type in policosanol then press GO.

You will find a significant amount of peer reviewed studies on the effect of policosanol on cholesterol.