CJ the Curmudgeon

[cjsmith]

I'm beginning to lose patience with a certain category of people. Oh, I'm not proactively rude, but I no longer accept some pronouncements unquestioned.

"I can't swallow pills," someone said to me once. Well, I carefully didn't say, you better not live to be much older. (NB: This person had no dramatic anatomical weirdness. She could swallow food and drink.) Seriously, who lives to middle age without learning to cope with swallowing pills? Heck, who gets to COLLEGE age and hasn't learned to cope with that one? I felt like she was bragging that she was still five years old inside, and a spoiled five at that.

I remember a recent comment in a friend's journal about not dealing well with needles. I can relate. I used to faint -- no kidding here, FAINT -- at the sight of needles in use. I now inject myself daily. I don't LIKE it, don't get me wrong, but I DO it. There are certain special-snowflake attributes that I simply no longer have the luxury of keeping.

"Restrictive diets don't work for me," said a coworker of mine at lunch today, referring to what I don't eat on the Lyme/antibiotic/yeast-control diet. And this time, I spoke up.

"They don't?" I said. Like you're so special, I didn't say, that if you got this disease you would somehow be above managing it. "What if you knew that eating ice cream would make you pretty sick?" I asked instead. "What if you knew it would land you in the hospital, what then? Where's the line?"

He readily rephrased, saying he has no strong motivation to lose weight; I agreed that I could totally understand that, and we rambled off on side topics.

I think I'm beginning to see that in some cases, "special snowflake" translates to "I've been very lucky in certain ways and I take it for granted." I don't have nearly as much patience with that as I once had.

Bad me, for having little patience? Maybe, but y'know, I'm not at all sure of that.

Comments

[aelfie.livejournal.com]

I remember a recent comment in a friend's journal about not dealing well with needles

That was probably me.

Yep. I don't do needles. Why? A very traumatic experience as a young child. I still have nightmares. Do I do shots? Yep. Too damn many in my opinion. But I do, at least the needed and necessary ones. I just have my anxiety attack, turn my head and cuss out the person who's giving it to me (I warn them first). I'm a lot better than I was as a child when it took 3 adults to hold me down to get a necessary shot. So why haven't I gotten the latest recommended shot? 'Cause the pain hasn't gotten to the point of where I'm willing to overcome my anxiety. It may get there, and if it does, I'll grit my teeth, cuss out the doctor (like I did when he fixed my ingrown toenail), and get the shot. But in the mean time I'll take my advil, and ice it down, and wait. I may get lucky.

Re: Pill Swallowing.

I know LOTS of adults who cannot swallow pills. Their gag response is too strong. My FIL being one of them. His solution? Chew 'em up. Bleh. My Grandfather was another. All of his pills had to be crushed first. And he took about 30 pills a day to stay alive. This isn't something that is uncommon.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I hear ya. O'course, you (and your grandfather) got the job done, too, in stark contrast to some folk. Perhaps they can't swallow pills whole, but they can take medication in pill form; you don't do needles happily, but will if you absolutely must. We all have tradeoffs -- in some cases (like yours) far more painful than in other cases -- and the fact that you get shots shows that your life hasn't been all roses and song, allowing you to avoid something you strongly dislike.

There are times I wish my life had been all roses and song, I totally admit. :-/ Other times I think having to face some of these things has made me stronger.

[aelfie.livejournal.com]

Having to get allergy shots for 10+ years got me over a lot of it. I still get squicked at getting shots in unusual places. (Like my feet)

Joe was not in the room when they stuck the epidural in my back. Its a good thing, that's when he would have gotten the "YOU DID THIS TO ME!" cliche delivery room scream.

[psi-star-psi.livejournal.com]

As soon as you agreed to get the epidural, Ron and I left for dinner.

A looong dinner.

I think we even called ahead to be sure it had taken effect before we returned. My lower lip was not to be in the same room with you until it kicked in.

[aelfie.livejournal.com]

That's because you are a smart man

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

You didn't want your lower lip pulled over the top of your head? Imagine!