Saw some names come in. Sorry I don't have a new splash for ya.

I get the next set of injections tomorrow.

More in a minute ...

Good luck with the shots. Hope the rest of the plan is helping as well. There's a couple of packages coming your way.
Kent

Thanks Kent,

You know ... it's no secret, I've mentioned it here. That sweetner substitute in the Crystal Lite was killin' me. I've had far less headaches since cutting it out.

I've mentioned that I've suffered from absolute killer headaches for many months. If you don't have them, be grateful. I've never been plagued with them before, but then I've never had any of the mess of stuff that turned up. And, you simply do not know what you don't know ... until you come across the answer. I learned I had an issue deep in my sinus, that was the result of a problem during a previous operation. Took awhile to find it. Had it surgically corrected. It didn't take. Had to do it again. Long miserible story. BUT ... evidently that was ONLY one of the issues causing the horrible headaches.

Another was my effort to slim down a bit. So, I traded in my beloved sweet brewed tea, for Crystal Lite's Ruby Red Grapefruit drink. Aspertaime sweetner. I've lost about 30 lbs thru various alterations to what I eat, and mainly just eating less and not eating anything I enjoyed before. But ... the headaches continued. They weren't all the same. But they all lasted on and on and on.

Toss that on top of my normal pain management, it's been a bear. So; when I'm sitting here ... with my head exploding ... and don't know why ... and I get a mail reminding me that it's Spring, and someone is wondering how their gun is going; I try to keep working. And, I have. But, it's stopped me alot of times when I simply could not concentrate thru the pain.

Well, thru just trying to noodle thru things, Kelly and I started researching a bit. Hesitant to start yet another trail of Drs. and tests. Well, we came across the Aspertame issue. It really, really causes some severe problems for some. And, I can tell you, I'm one. But ... you tell me ... when you are trying to do the noble thing ... make the society happy ... loose some weight you slob ... and one of the things is cutting out the sugar, who just automatically knows it's going to nearly kill you with headaches.

Last thing I found ... deteriorated furnace chimney piping. Hidden areas I was unaware of. I'd repaired areas I knew about. Was getting to replacing the whole system of piping. Did so during that big roof, wall repair job months ago. But, piping raw furnace exhaust (as in BIG holes), into your work space ... not good.

Now ... now that we know all these things; some are very simple. Sure ... how about we just mark that date on the calendar and replace all that piping every couple of years. Get some new batteries in that Carbon Monozide Alarm that you DID put into the shop a few years back ... and that NEVER beeped once in it's life. Sure ... you are supposed to check those things ya know. Do some extensive research into every food and drink item you ingest, and check each one for your personal tolerance. Good idea. While you're at it, get a CAT scan and MRI of every body part and system, just to make sure you don't have some hidden damage done years ago during a previous operation. Right ... I'm being absurd.

Thing is, how can you possibly know everything you don't know. It's a retorical question. That's what goes thru my mind when I sit and answer my e-mails every day. Can you see the guy getting a mail if I'd go thru the above 100% true information? "Yeah ... well there my septium was fused to the turbinate structure of my right sinus. The darned aspertaime in my ruby red grapefruit drink was mixing with the toxic atmosphere in my shop, and the three of them nearly exploded my head. Of course, that doesn't account for the tension headaches. Let me tell you about THAT!!" hahah.

OK. Thus ends the workday.

Gary

Gary, I'd put my money on the CO poisoning before the aspartame. Headache, fatigue, memory problems, body aches and perhaps IRRITABILITY (couldn't help myself)...in a chronic exposure condition you would be affected without Kelly having any problems. Good news, get rid of the source and you're cured.

Had an interesting case in my residency. Seems in the starting days of "Just in time" inventory, a patient who worked as a surgical tech was having her carpal tunnel release for the second time and noticed everyone else in the OR was as well. Most of them were still having problems after the surgery and she was concerned something else was happening. They found the common thread was the disposable surgical gowns which were sterilized with ethylene oxide had not been allowed to out gas before shipping. Normally this occurred by sitting on the shelf before going to the hospitals. Not so with just in time inventory. This caused the cuffs on the gowns to expose the wrists of the workers to hazardous levels of gas which caused nerve damage which mimicked carpal tunnel syndrome.

Ahh unintended consequences.

Kent

I just came in. Making a tool, in order to finish a bolt, in order to but it's barrel and bolt into the bluing next. Should just be a few days now. And then I can assemble some stuff.

I was thinking, last night ... yeah ... shouldn't ... but I was thinking; if you mentioned a particular athelete, what would you like to see most on his website? And, I thought of things like ... "breaking the tape while setting a new world record!" "winning a gold at the Olympics." Stuff like that. The rest is practice sessions, plane flights, hotel rooms, and all the stuff that makes the couple of interesting moments ... interesting.

I do wish there were more of those winning moments. We've got some coming here. There's been one heck of a lot of sessions leading up to it. I often sit here, with a cup of coffee getting cold ... and I wonder what I might share that you'd enjoy. However; I know that there's really not much you want to see except a new gun ... your new gun especially.

It's Spring. That helps the evening work shift. It's not dark for five hours of the evening shift.

Anyway. I know it's Spring. I'm very glad. Injections tomorrow again. Second set, of the three sets of doubles. That helps too. I just can't show you all the steps along the way. Hopefully, we'll soon have some guns.

Gary

Kent,

Humorous follow-up ...

This am, when I was being taken into the O.R. for the epidural injections ... I was talking to the nurse. I had started telling her about having changed off of sugar drinks to Aspartame sweetened Crystal Lite ... and she said, "Oh, my husband can't drink that stuff ... the Aspartame gives him horrible migrane headaches!" I said, "Really .... ya don't know what ya don't know ... do you?"

And, what do you mean ... "Irritability??" .....

Fixed the furnace issue when I did the roof work. Couple of months ago now. Headaches continued afterwards, though I'm sure that was a serious factor for a good while before that. You remember how I showed up for the last Cajun Cup? (With my head in a carry-on bag cause it hurt so bad?) I never have just ONE issue at a time. You know that. My tire will go flat because: 1). there's a nail in the tire. 2). the valve will also be leaking. AND ... 3). the sidewall will be seperating and leaking too. In that way, the fun goes on longer ... and everyone involved in the fix will look at me like ... "why don't you just make it simple Dude?"



Gary

Hello Gary,

I'm glad that you recognized that the aspertame isn't helping you out any, many people go forever before they realize that one particular food is causing them problems. Yeah, I know that the FDA says the stuff is safe...but....myself, I avoid the artificial sweetners whenever possible.

I switched to just plain old unsweetened ice tea from drinking Dr. Pepper all the time. I still have a can or two from time to time, but learning to enjoy unsweetened drinks was the only way to arrest my perpetual weight gain tendency. It's funny how sweet a can of soda seems these days, it's like the pure, distilled concentration of sugar to me now when it was just "the same 'ol same 'ol" when I was drinking it every day. It's pretty amazing how many extra calories you can take in just drinking two or three cans of soda a day.

So anyway (to make an already long story not that much longer), I started getting the occasional weird "wiggle" feeling in my chest from time to time. Nothing you can really point to, just a weird "did that really happen?" feeling. I go to the doc and tell her about it, and she says right away "How much caffeine area you drinking". Oh...about as much as is in two to three quarts of brewed tea a day...turns out that that's a pretty fair amount. It was giving me occational pre-ventricular contractions, or PVCs (that's the fancy word for "heard palpitations"). The good news is that it's easy to fix, just cut out the caffeine. The bad news is that you have to cut out the caffeine. The first couple of days were pretty dire, major headaches, a feeling of just being "out of it" all the time. The good news is that I can get my flavor of tea in decaf, and that you can gradually add it back in until it gives you problems again, then back off a fair bit.

So, if you had to cut back on the caffeine in a major way, some of those headaches were probably caffeine withdrawl. You get to depend on the stuff, and your body punishes you for going cold-turkey.

Hi Gary,

Justed stopped by for a bit and wanted to say "Hello". Hope your injections went well. Maybe this will be a better summer for you, with some of the answers to problems you've gotten lately.

Scott

Guess I'm lucky when it comes to artificial sweetners and some preservitives, no headaches but my lips will swell up like a balloon. I know exactly what is causing it quick.

That sure sounds lucky to me

hahaha.

Yeah ... I'll bet he looks just like one of those "pouty" runnway super models when that happens. hahaha.,

Gary

Yea and I have the disposition of one too!!!

Griffin I know it sounds odd that I would call that lucky, but my older sister went threw all kinds of grief was even diagnosed as having MS before she figured out those diet Mountain Dews she was drinking were causing it all.

Wow! That's a story Joe. Good for her.

So; you think I don't really have "Southwest Galloping Bat Wing Dandruff"? It's a miracle!! It's really just the ink on the letters of my laptop's keys?



Gary

You never know gary, you never know.... Actually my sister was told by a certain doctor that her symptoms were leading him to belive that she may have MS. She quite by accident discovered that her problems were linked to the artificial sweetner in the Mt. Dews when a friend told her that she was allergic to it. Since my sister had always fought allergy problems throughout her life she stopped with the diet softdrinks. You have to understand that for her it was a softdrink when she woke up, one before she went to bed and no telling how many in between. in a matter of days the symptons that had been getting progressively worse, including losing her sight in one eye, started to reverse and eventually disappeared all together.

I remember reading one time somewhere about a fellow that was having all kinds of health issues, doctors had treated him for everything without curing anything. Finally in desperation he went to an allergist who had him list all his symtoms, Then he had him write down everything he did for two weeks, telling him to write down everything. After returning with the list the doc saw that the fellow was reading the newspaper for several hours a day. When he asked him about it the guy estimated 3-5 hours everyday. He was reading it at breakfast, taking it to work to read at lunch and working the crosswords at night. The doctor made a follow up appointment for two weeks and told him not to touch a newspaper. The fellow was some upset as his routine of reading the paper and doing the crossword puzzle had been his lifesyle for several years. After two weeks he returned to see the doc and reported he was cured, turned out he had become allergic to the ink used to print the papers. His constant handling of the paper allowed the ink to be absorbed through his fingertips until his body developed an allergic reation.

Really interesting Joe. Thanks for the stories. Always good to know. You never know when a freind or family member will develop some crazy problem, and you just might have a clue of something to look into.

One of my Specialists recently, told me that his patients are often more up to date on their particular symptoms and ailments than he can be. They research things that they know to be happening to them, and follow the leads to possible causes. The Dr., would have to have a total knowledge in all possible subjects to be informed on anything that could come up. And then, it just might be that they've not run across something like aspertame in a grapefruit drink, causing an airgunsmith to have migrane headaches for four months!

BTW ... the frequency of my headaches is down 80%. I think the rest are tension headaches, etc.



Gary