Taking On the Establishment

Last fall, while playing in my weekly softball league, I did something really, outrageously stupid; I slid into third base. The result of my slide on a poorly-maintained field (the infield hadn't been dragged probably ever and was rock-hard), while wearing shorts, was a nasty gash on the side of my left shin. This thing measured about six inches from top to bottom and another three inches wide. For some reason, it took weeks to heal and eventually became infected. The pain in my leg was so great that I slept on the couch for over a month so I wouldn't disturb my wife each time I winced and gasped in pain.

Fast forward to November and I went to the ER with some abdominal pain. During the course of my evening in the hospital, they ran some blood work and the doctor came to me with a question. "Has anyone ever talked to you about diabetes?" He informed me that my glucose level was 220 that night. Later that week, I had more blood work done and went to see my doctor. The diagnosis was confirmed. At age 33, I was officially a Type-2 Diabetic. At least that explained why my leg was so slow to heal.

Upon getting the news, my wife and I dove into this thing head-first. We changed our diets, I was taking metformin and lisinopril (for high blood pressure), and the results were good. Both Valerie and I lost a good amount of weight (her more than I, but she's better at dieting than me). Eventually, however, the dieting stopped and the weight has slowly started to come back. I was once as heavy as 309 pounds, but got as low as 268 in January of this year. Now, I'm back to 280.

Last week, I had more blood work done, just to see how my sugar is doing. The results were encouraging, my A1C had dropped from 8.4 to 6.6 giving me an average glucose reading of 138; down from 196. This time, however, the doctor tells me my cholesterol is high. It never ends. So back to the doctor I go.

She wants me to start taking simvastatin (or Zocor) at 10mg per day. Seems reasonable enough I suppose. She explains that in "normal" people, my LDL of 129 would be in the accepted range and would require no medication, but in diabetics, they want that number below 70. She also tells me that my "good cholesterol" is 38 and we need to bring that up to at least 50. The statin, she says, should give me all the boost I need. Sounds good to me, I suppose, so I leave the office (BTW- my blood pressure was 117 over 70 - I rock) and drop the scrip off at the pharmacy and head back to work.

I spoke with my wife and told her what was going on. She immediately voices concern over taking a statin. She calls her grandmother, a nurse, and alerts me to a cocktail of supplements June was taking to lower her cholesterol. Now, June is in her eighties and is not diabetic, so I figure that her situation and mine aren't the same. Regardless, with the amount of worry Valerie had in her voice, I figured maybe I should do a little research here.

I spent the next couple of hours ignoring the latest Tigers trade rumor and instead surfing the web for information on diabetes and the use of niacin versus statins. No matter the source of the article, I found nothing good about statins at all. I decided that maybe my best bet would be to talk to the pharmacist.

When I approached the counter, the pharmacist was busy. I waited briefly, but eventually just figured I'd give some stuff a try. I had found no indication that niacin would cause any adverse effects in my body, so I'd just self-medicate. The pharmacist then did something I didn't expect; he came and found me to say he had seen me waiting and to ask if I had questions. I quickly explained my condition and my concerns over taking the statin. He relayed to me the adverse effects of statins and also told me my concerns were real. We talked about niacin, a supplement he was apparently well-versed in and he explained how I should start small and gradually increase my dosage. We agreed to avoid the "non-flushing" niacin because the hot flash that comes with it enables the user to determine when the ideal amount has been reached.

I left the pharmacy yesterday with a bottle of 250 mg niacin and a bottle of garlic. I did not pick up my prescription for simvastatin.

The more I've read on the subject of medications for my diabetes and my cholesterol, the less enthused I am about traditional medicines. From what I'm gathering so far, vitamins and supplements (or, ideally, healthy foods) hold all the same value as the drugs to, but without the risks. A small overdose of a prescription drug can kill you, but a significant overdose of vitamins causes only diarrhea and vomiting. To me, the idea that I might have a hot flash or two seemed a much happier outcome than the liver and muscle damage connected to statins.

So now I'm in an unusual position. I have always trusted my doctors to know what they are doing. After all, they have years of medical training and all I've done is read a handful of internet articles. I feel a bit dumb even exploring the idea of trying "alternative" medications for my condition. The drugs I've been on have worked so far. But my doctor now also wants to check my liver and kidney functions, and send me to an opthomologist for a dilated eye exam.

I haven't yet spoken to my doctor about not taking the statin and I don't think I will. I have blood work scheduled for October to check on my progress and until then I'll be doing things on my own to try to get my issues in check. The more I read about diabetes, the better I am understanding how to control my sugar levels through diet and supplements.

Today, I found a handful of articles that gave me some ideas on what to try. I also discovered an online community of diabetics that seems very friendly and helpful. This is a condition which scared the crap out of me at first, but now is doing the same again the more I read. Sometimes the effects can take years, even decades, but the damage to the internal organs, as well as the extremities and the eyes, is real and if left unchecked it can be deadly.

This is a scary place for me to be. I'm making a potentially deadly decision to go away from my doctor's advice and to try to sort things out on my own. What I really need to find, I think, is someone knowledgeable in the use of vitamins and supplements as alternatives to prescription drugs. Of course, I doubt my insurance will cover that visit. If I'm right, however, I can stop taking my meds (eventually) and start to live a healthy, long, life. I'm still only 33, there is a lot to do before I die.

From Young Boy to Young Man

Sebastian turned five years old last week. It is alarming to me how much maturing he has done over the past few months. I can't put an exact date on it or even recall a specific situation where I first noticed it, but he's definitely growing up lately.

When Valerie and I got married, Sebastian was not yet two years old. He still wore diapers and still insisted on a bottle at bedtime. He didn't use a bottle during the day, but he wouldn't think of retiring for the evening without a bottle of warm milk in tow. He was good kid I think, but in all reality it's difficult for me to know for sure. Prior to my moving into Valerie's house and gaining an instant family featuring two very young children, I had no experience, no prolonged exposure to children that small.

I can recall quite clearly how apprehensive I was around them, and maybe part of me still is a bit. It didn't help matters that I was so green to the experience nor that Sebastian seemed to regard me as a rival for his mother's attention. I know it seems silly that I would think he could do that at such a young age, but he and I have butted heads a lot over the past three-and-a-half years. I don't blame him by any means, I certainly should have been much more patient, but I frankly didn't know how to be; I hadn't yet been softened enough to the reality of having a family.

I had heard about "terrible twos" and the demonic-like behavior of children of that age. Sebastian made all those nightmares come true, it seemed. Looking back, I can't remember any specific incidents, only a general sense that if there was a way to ruin a trip to the store or to cause me to lose my temper, Sebastian would find it. More than that, it seemed he took pleasure in finding it. More than once he would do something i had specifically forbade him from doing, all the while watching me with a smile on his face, waiting for the inevitable reaction. Why he did this, I have no idea. I understand wanting attention, but he was clearly seeking the wrong kind.

Sadly for me, the terrible-ness didn't end when he turned three, or even four. Since I have known him, Sebastian has sought the spotlight, but always doing so by displaying poor behavior. Don't get me wrong, he wasn't an evil child by any stretch; he has always been very kind-hearted to his family and displays an inordinate amount of clinginess to anyone of the female gender. He claims to have a "billion" girlfriends, most of which are in their early to mid-20s.

Throughout our time together, I have tried my best to explain where I feel he's going wrong and until recently I may as well have been speaking Chinese. It didn't seem like it mattered how many times I explained it, or how loud I would eventually yell, he didn't seem to get it; or he chose not to. Either way.

Lately though, I've seen a change in him. He and I are much more able to interact in peace. He seems to trust me more and be less afraid of me. I am not in any way blaming him for his "fear" before this. My temper is legendary and Sebastian always knew what buttons to push. I know this makes me sound like a bully, but this didn't seem like an ordinary child. The little boy just knew how to get people angry and he reveled in getting a reaction.

Something happened that has changed his demeanor. I don't know what it is, but if I could bottle it I would make a fortune. Sebastian still clings to his mother and any other female, but he also now is allowing others to see him interact with the world without demanding the attention he did before. It's almost as if he feels more comfortable with himself, or with his life. I don't know if that's true, but it's what I hope is true. He seems at peace with the world around him lately, or as much at peace as a five-year-old can be, I guess.

I've tried to instill confidence in him whenever I can. Sebastian used to wear his jeans unbuttoned because he "couldn't" figure out how to fasten them. If it wasn't a snap, he couldn't do it. Of course, he could do it, but it wasn't easy, so he didn't try and just walked around open to the world instead of attempting to fasten the button. This isn't the only example of how he used to wait for others to help him, but it's the one I point to when I show him how to do things he says are too hard. Once I sat down and showed him how to button his pants, the excuse didn't fly anymore. When he would say he couldn't do it, I would remind him that he has done it and he can do it again if he tries. He tried and he did it. I made sure to tell him he did great.

We are now at a point where he can accomplish most any task asked of him (within reason of course; he's five). Grandma brought him a new bike for his birthday and this one has no training wheels. It's a little big for him yet, but Aunt Steph (one of his girlfriends) and Uncle Braden have been helping him to learn to ride. We discovered that because of the size of his new bike, he was having trouble getting started, so I took the training wheels off his old, smaller bike and he did pretty well last night. He falls sometimes (he hasn't figured out how to stop except to just fall over) and one of the falls yesterday drew some blood on his ankle. That was all he needed to want to give up.

But just like the buttoning of his pants, I know he can do it if he keeps trying. More than that, if I tell him he can do it in that way, he thinks he can as well. I am very proud of all the growing he has done of late. I'd like to think I had something to do with it, but I don't think I can take much credit. It takes a village to raise a child and Sebastian has a wonderful support system of family around him everyday.

It can't be easy to have your life thrown into chaos the way his and Lillian's were when their parents divorced at such a young age. The transitions they have made, along with my own, haven't always been smooth. It might have taken Sebastian a bit longer to adapt, to accept, than we would have liked, but I couldn't be prouder of him. I hope someday we will have the same father-son relationship that any "traditional" father and son would have. I think we are well on our way.

Friends and Strangers

"Facebook is for friends that have become strangers, Twitter is for strangers that should be your friends." -Unknown

I am not an overly social guy. That's probably an understatement, actually. The truth is that most of the time, I'd much rather be hibernating in my home than spending time with people outside of my family. Throughout high school and college I had many friends, but only a select few that I ever made an effort to hang out with. Over time even those friendships have evaporated, either due to distance or in one case because the guy slept with my girlfriend. What ever happened to Bro's before Ho's?

Anyhow, the inspiration for today's post here is yet another facebook friend request from yet another douchebag I went to highschool with. I graduated 15 years ago and in the time since I probably have spoken with (either in person or online) approximately three percent of my class. In the past five years, that numbers is probably half as high. I don't mind catching up with old friends though, quite the opposite actually, but the issue I have is with the people on facebook who think we should be "friends" despite the fact that we haven't seen nor spoken to each other is a decade and a half AND when we weren't ever friends in the first place, even when we shared a school.

If I didn't give a shit about you in high school (and I assume you didn't give a shit about me either), why in the world would I care to share my profile with you today?

Maybe it's the sheer prestige of having 350+ "friends" that makes them feel better about their own lives, I don't know. Maybe they've found God and want to give me their testimony. Maybe they've hit the lottery and want someone to give the money to. I don't know their motivation for contacting me out of the 15-year blue and I don't care to find out. I don't need a high friend count to justify my existence, nor do I want one.

I use facebook because my wife uses facebook (religiously, but not spiritually) and I want to see all the pictures she posts of the kids, and also to keep aware of when she bashes me to her friends as she did this weekend. (That's okay Baby, I ain't mad at you.) I do not use it to keep up with guys and girls that I once had a biology class with in tenth grade. I didn't care what you were doing then and I don't care what you're doing now, so please stop asking for my acceptance.

I am facebook friends with several people I went to high school and college with and I do interact with some of them from time to time. It's not that's I'm against keeping in touch with friends or former friends, but the key element is that we had to have been friends at some point if you expect me to have any interest in you or your life.

So to the randoms that appear in my online world on occasion, looking to boost their friend count, I have only the following to say: I have far too much going on in my own life to waste time giving a shit about yours.

Politics Suck

My office at the car dealership where I spend my days (can't really call it work so much) sits right next to a customer lounge where the Bob Evans crowd gathers to wait on their repairs to be made and watch Fox New Channel. So, because of my proximity to the television (and their refusal to turn up their hearing aids), I'm subjected to endless circular arguments over whatever topics the talking heads deem appropriate that day.

God how I miss the Casey Anthony trial. At least that was interesting.

I'll be quite honest, I have no idea on what issue the President is supposed to be speaking this morning. I can't say as I actually give a damn, either. It's not that I don't support President Obama, I do actually, especially when compared to the ridiculousness of the Bush era, but what I have figured out about Washington and what takes place there is that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have any interest in doing what's right for the country. The only agenda that either side seems to have is being right and preventing the other side from doing what they want to do.

This cannot be healthy for the country.

We have a system that at its base is the best in the world, or so they would have you believe. But the problem is that because the two major sides cannot agree on what to order for breakfast, let alone how to attack the deficit or create job, or anything else even mildly important, nothing can get done.

The system is designed to prevent a dictatorship. It's supposed to ensure that one crazy lunatic won't take power and thrust our country into disaster. That's the checks and balances system at its core. But it's not the American people that these congressmen and women are representing anymore; they represent only themselves and their party. Their interest is not in getting the best guidelines and regulations for the nation, but only to yell the loudest, get noticed, and get re-elected.

The Obama administration was set-up to fail, but it's not unique to this presidency. The next president will face the same issues and so will the next and the next. With a system in place that has grown out of control, where the decision makers have chosen to spend their time preventing others from putting to work their plans without offering substantial alternatives, the country is stuck in neutral. And because each side is wasting time and energy trying to prevent the other side from being right, we as a country, are left in the middle, stuck with no action at all from the people we voted for; people that were put into office to take action.

I have very little patience for people who do nothing, who refuse to make decisions and who refuse to risk being wrong. Those people are the ones occupying our most influential posts in Washington these days. Worse than that, really, there are a healthy number of elected officials who make it their work to actually prevent any action from taking place.

The country is in a better place than it was a few years ago, at least from where I sit, but with such little progress coming from our elected leaders, we cannot move quickly enough toward complete recovery. In all honesty, I would be much happier if the powers that be would simply take an action, any action, and be willing to live with the consequences. Do it right or do it wrong, but do something. At least with a singular decision maker, the country would have a direction, right or wrong.

There is nothing worse than idly playing your fiddle while your empire is burning.

Tragedy in Texas

I wasn't entirely sure on what site to post this piece. It's a story that occurs at a baseball game, so I could have published it at MCB, but the greater significance has absolutely nothing to do with baseball.

Last night in Arlington, Texas, a 39-year-old firefighter was in attendance at the Rangers-A's game. He brought his young son to the park with him. In the second inning, Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton corralled a foul ball and tossed it up over the scoreboard (which is 14-feet high) to the fan who was sitting in the first row of the seats. The fan reached for the ball, caught it, and tumbled over the railing, landing on the concrete behind the scoreboard, some 20-feet below his seats. He was awake and conscious as he was taken away on a stretcher, asking paramedics to "Please check on my son. My son was up there all by himself." The man died a short while later at the hospital.

I heard about the incident this morning on my drive to work. This is the second death from a fall at a ballpark this year and the third time that a Rangers fan has fallen over the railings at their home ballpark since it opened in 1994. While accidents like this do happen from time to time, this one hit me especially hard. What must that little boy be going through today. He is a young boy who went to a ballgame with his dad. They were 150 miles from home, just he and his father. What greater evening can a child have? In a flash, his dream evening turned nightmare as he watched his father, in all likelihood his idol, fall some 20 feet to his ultimate death. But this is a nightmare from which this boy won't wake up. His father is gone forever.

The minutes following the fall must have been torture for the boy. Hamilton said today that he could hear the boy calling for his father just after the man fell from the seats. If that doesn't just rip your heart out... The hours that followed were surely worse as he was (in all likelihood) transported to the hospital to be with his dad, surrounded by strangers only - no one to comfort the child. Remember, these two people were 150 miles from family and friends, so by the time anyone was contacted and would have shown up to pick up the boy, he would have been alone in this horrifying situation for several hours. It just breaks your heart.

As a father, I do things to make sure I'm around for my kids. There will be no riding of motorcycles for me, no sky diving, no swimming in shark-infested waters. But I wouldn't have thought twice about doing the same thing this father did in Texas. Accidents like this can happen to anyone at any time and while it's a sad thing, it's probably not avoidable. I can only hope that if I ever meet my demise in such a way, that my children aren't forever burdened with having to witness it. And that they aren't left alone for hours to deal with what happened all by themselves.

I have been very lucky so far. My parents are both still around and I haven't suffered tragedy anywhere near what others have. I cannot imagine how devastating it must be to bury a child and I hope I never have to find out. But I also cannot imagine what this little boy in Texas is going through and what he'll continue to have to deal with. His life changed forever last night. It's just not fair.

Ignorance is Bliss

I was reading a piece by Gregg Doyle on CBS Sports today. Doyle, if you're unfamiliar, is a bit of a shock-jock when it comes to sportswriting, but his pieces are generally entertaining even if his reasoning seems crude. Today he was tackling the subject of Blue Jays slugger Jose Bautista and the ever-present steroid rumors. That's not the point of this piece, though, I have another blog for that.

Doyle wrote something in his piece today that really hit home for me personally. And it speaks to the on-going battle within my own head.

"If we're naive, so be it. If we're stupid, hey, that's OK. Sometimes it's healthier to be stupid and naive than to be cynical and smart. Cynical and smart people, their hearts corroded by all that negativity, tend to die early. Stupid and naive folks? Assuming they stay out of traffic, they do OK."

I exemplify everything that Doyle outlined above. I have spent my entire life being the very definition of cynical, being consumed by negativity. The glass has never been half full for me. This is a realization I came to long ago and for many years not only did I accept it, but I found it a source of pride.

I wouldn't be the one who got fooled when everyone else did. I would be the smartest guy in the room, and voice my opinion no matter whose feelings might get hurt. In short, I actually prided myself on being a jerk.

I recent years (since I got married), I have taken strides to change my outlook. To a small degree I feel it's working, but it isn't easy changing 30+ years of ingrained negativity. Far too often, I still refuse to sugar-coat my feelings to people who aren't within my close circle of family. Notice I didn't mention friends there. That's because I really don't have friends. I mean, my wife is my best friend, but she's also the only real friend I have. At least the only real friend I have that I have actually met in person. I have people I know online thanks to the blog and twitter and there are some of those that I do consider friends, but it's not like we can go play a round of golf together.

My point is really that while I used to have friends, it's either been too much effort to keep in touch over the years, or (more likely) my general unpleasantness made those friends decide that they were better off without me. I'm not upset by it, I haven't made much an effort with them either, I'm simply stating my theory is all.

Getting back to what Doyle talked about with the "stupid and naive" people. He's got a great point. When you go through life giving a damn about every little thing, making sure you control every variable, you never have any fun because you simply don't allow yourself to.

There is a saying in my house that sounds funny but probably was never meant as a joke; "Dad doesn't like fun." I do my best to limit the opportunities of the kids to hurt themselves. If I see a situation that they are putting themselves at risk of falling or getting hurt, I put a stop to it. I don't allow them that "fun" because I'm worried. And it's not just that I worry about their safety, it's also that I worry that if they get hurt, they'll cry and then if they're really hurt I'll have to take them to the doctor or the hospital and that would put a serious halt on my evening plans. See how selfish that is? Like I said, I'm kind of a jerk sometimes.

But I do think I'm getting a bit better. I think. My wife would probably disagree though. (side note: the other day I shocked the hell out of her when I suggested we take the kids to the community pool. She was thinking of wanting to go as well, but assumed I wouldn't want to so she didn't bring it up. Hahaha)

It's not just at home where I over analyze the next move, either. In all sorts of situations at work or wherever, I see a situation and immediately think five moves ahead, always envisioning the worst possible scenario. Believe me, if you do that enough, nothing seems like it would be fun. The risk is always greater than the reward.

But the reality is (and here's the part where I really struggle) that worst-case scenario almost never actually happens. Ninety-nine times out of one hundred, the kids don't fall, they don't get hurt. The magic marker almost always comes off their bodies, or the wall. The spilled juice is easily wiped up from the table or the floor. When I see these situations in my head, however, the outcome is always much worse than it ever actually is.

Like I said, it's not really about the family life and raising the kids for me; this is a battle within my own head no matter the time of day or where I am. I am working to allow myself to be "stupid and naive" more often. Because it's a helluva lot more fun than always being "cynical and smart."

And contrary to the belief in the Parent house, Dad does like fun. At least when he allows himself to.

Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice

I was talking with my wife last night after the kids went to bed. Those are the moments, so few of them, that we get a chance to be alone and connect as human beings. We were talking about the kids, of course, and I'm not sure how the subject came to it, but also about this blog of mine; this place and its purpose.

As I said before, I'm generally closed off to the world as far as my thoughts and feelings go. But this site will provide not only an outlet for my inner demons, but also a place where my thoughts can live on forever. I have written over 800 articles about my beloved Tigers and for as long as the internet survives, those pieces will be available to whomever Googles my name. What I haven't done enough of is allowing my children to really know their dad and if something were to happen to me, I fear they never would really know me and who I was and what (besides the Tigers) I cared about.

I want this site to be a place where they can find out about me and how I feel about them, just in case.

I saw a little girl with her dad today, getting candy from a machine in front of my desk. The girl was maybe eight years old. As I type this, the pair has made a return trip for a second helping from the machine. I so want to be that dad, the one who gives his daughter everything she wants. Instead I'm the dad who says "we'll eat dinner soon" or "you have candy at home" or some other kill-joy statement.

I don't know why I can't bring myself to let them live like they should, to let them enjoy every moment to the fullest. I can't bring myself to enjoy those moments, either. I can try to look at it and come up with an answer, but in reality it doesn't matter why I can't do those things, it only matters that I don't do them. Reasons and excuses don't make my little girls smile.

Lillian may be the smartest six year old in history. I swear she could start fourth grade tomorrow and she'd find a way to keep up. From the day that I met her, she was always 15 years older than she is. If it wasn't illegal to do so, I'd maybe even leave her at home to watch the three other kids. I think she could handle it, I really do.

She's always there to pick up my slack. Leyton loves to have books read to him, but sometimes after the second or third book, I'm ready to move on before he is. Lillian will pipe up with "I'll read it to him" and she does it to perfection. It's easy to forget that she only just turned six. It's easy to forget that as a six year old, she is only a small child and will be selfish at times and will pout and over dramatize seemingly tiny situations. (aside: that little girl from above is back for round three. There is no way I would allow that, nor do I think her dad should.)

Lillian and Sebastian are my step-children. This is in title only. Their "real" dad is a truck driver who gets very little time off and that which he does have he devotes to hanging out with his friends and looking for answers to his problems in the bottom of the bottle. Maybe those answers are in the next one, Joe, you just keep on looking. I know you will. Those two kids treat him like a God when he does pity them enough to see them. Part of that is that they love him, sure, but part is that he acts more like that fun uncle that shows up to take you to the water park every now and then. And don't blame his work schedule for all of his absence, he only started driving truck about a year and a half ago. Before that he was unemployed and still wouldn't show up to see the kids. He says he's trying, but he also says he won't alter his lifestyle just because he has kids. I've wasted enough space here on him. The point is that those kids deserve better than he gives. They deserve better than I give most of the time, too.

I'm a very lucky man in that I married the best woman in the world and joined a family with kids who accepted me right away. I have never once heard "you're not my dad!" from either of those two. I suspect I will once they reach the know-it-all stage of teenagers. I can't tell you how exactly I will react to that when it does happen, but I can guess that anger with a heavy dose of hurt feelings will come with it.

I pick on Lillian a lot, maybe more than I should given her age. It's all in good fun and I hope she gets that (I think she does), but nevertheless, I should probably watch that a bit. When I married Valerie, Lillian was not quite three years old and had already lived a lifetime. I worry that she's not active enough and that her appetite is too large. I don't want her to grow up being made fun of for her weight. She's not fat now, but she a bit heavier than she maybe could be if we encouraged her to be more active and spend less time in front of a television. I grew up fat (still am), I know what that can do to your self worth.

Lillian is my helper on days when Valerie works and I'm at home with the kids, but she's also a beautiful, smart, funny little girl. She just recently lost her fifth tooth and she hoards her money from those teeth and from birthdays. I swear you can't get her to spend it to buy herself a toy or whatever she wants. I hope that I'll be able to give her the childhood she should have and I hope I do well enough with her that one day she'll ask me to give her away at her wedding. Whether she does or not, I know that day will break my heart.