A “Shocking” Afternoon

Just after Christmas, I began to get numbness in my hands. After taking steroids and muscle relaxers, I was back at the primary doc because they were still numb. I saw a pain and muscle specialist after that who sent me to get an EMG to see if they could figure out what was going on.

I had my EMG done yesterday. I had it on my calendar and in my phone as 11:15am. When I got the the address, the building was empty. I was only like 15 minutes early, so I figured I had better call. There had been plenty of snow, so maybe they closed for the day?

(ring – click) Dr. So and So’s office

Yeah, I’m Keith and I have an appointment today …

(Interrupting) Yes, at the Waterford office

Right. I’m here now and the building is clocked up.

You’re appointment is at 1:15pm, correct?

(Feeling stupid as I look at the order where I scribbled the information – and “1:15pm”) Uh, yeah, I see that I must have written the wrong time down.

We don’t get to that office on Thursdays until 12:45.

Well, I guess I will go grab lunch then…

See you at 1:15! (Click)

On the bright side, it was one of the quickest tests I’ve ever had done. It was also one of the weirdest.

They put these electrodes on your hand, measure some spots, and then start shooting things to make your fingers move. It was bizarre. He didn’t say much about the results or what he was seeing, but asked if anyone ever told me to wear braces. I told him know, and asked if I needed to. He said, “We’ll know after the test is read”

At one point he simply said, “Hmmmm.” I was like, “Is that a good ‘Hmmmm” or a bad ‘Hmmmm?” He said, again, we’d find out when the results were in.

When he pulled off all the wires and such, he said the doc would have the results in the next couple days. So hopefully, I will know what the heck is going on soon.

Post Surgery Update

I apologize for not posting a dedicated blog to an update on my son. Many blogger friends have reached out and asked how he is doing after surgery a week or so ago.

We are blessed that he didn’t need to be in surgery very long. They had booked the operating room for 4 hours, due to the “possibility” of other surgeries, but he did not need them. This was good news mostly, but there are now other questions. From my wife’s social media post:

Surgery went amazing. You would never know this kid had anything done. He bounced back fairly fast and is eating and drinking like a champ now. But surgery left a TON of questions and opened up new concerns. Andrew has severe sleep apnea as well as a speech delay, which we have always blamed on the laryngeal cleft and his Laryngomalacia. Both of which are still there, but surgery revealed they are not the cause of the obstruction like we were thinking. We have an appointment at the end of September with neurology to start looking at different things.

Some of the stuff we are witnessing is really leaving us scratching our heads. In speaking to the neurologist, some speech delay or speech regression could be neurological in nature. There is also some concern about muscle tone loss in some areas. We’re working with PT on that.

He’s been a toe-walker for a very long time and that can cause future problems. So this week, he received his braces. Both feet go in them and he needs oversized shoes so the braces fit in them. He wears them off and on for a couple hours and as the days progress, he’ll eventually be wearing them all day. This will help him stop toe walking and with those lower calf muscles.

He continues to have non stop energy and leaves mom and dad exhausted at the end of each day. He has come up with creative ways to climb up to counter tops, turn on and off lights, and destroy anything in his path. He is our little firecracker!

We will continue with his speech therapy and physical therapy and hopefully he’ll keep making progress. We are praying that the neurologist will provide further answers.

Thanks for keeping him in your thoughts and for sending positive messages our way.

2 Hours and No New Toothbrush?!

I am not a fan of the dentist. I really hate going. Every time I go, I feel like I am dropping a ton of cash – even with insurance!

The last time I went to the dentist was three years ago. I am not proud of this. The last time I went, I blogged about it here:

Dr. Yank, D.D.S.

If I am being honest, if it wasn’t for the fact that Ella and Andrew had appointments on the same day, it would have been longer. While we were there with the kids, Sam said, “You are over due for a cleaning. You should make an appointment while we are here.” So I did.

I had my appointment this week. The funny thing is that they never did clean my teeth!

First, they came in and updated all my medical history and medications. Then they came in and did the standard X-Rays. You know, where they make you bite that thing and point the machine at your cheek. After that, they told me they wanted to do a 3-D scan of my teeth.

They took this wand-like thing and spent some time running it over my teeth. You end up getting a picture that looks something like this:

Of course, those teeth look a lot better than mine.

They can look at just the top teeth or the bottom teeth. They can twist it and turn it around on the screen and see behind them and everything. It was pretty cool.

Then they took me out in the hallway and had me sit in a chair. They strapped my head to this thing and took what they called a panoramic X-Ray. The machine spins around in front of you and you have to hold still while it does its thing. It was weird.

The final result is something like this:

When the dentist finally came in to talk to me, I had been there an hour and a half. My teeth have never been straight. My two front teeth overlap and when I played trumpet in high school, I always played off to the side because of it.

He told me that my teeth look good “especially since it has been three years.” He suggested that my mouth would be healthier if I did something about the crooked and crowded teeth. Perhaps some of those Invisalign braces. I told him I would entertain the idea, but I know that it will cost me a pretty penny.

My teeth need a “deep cleaning” because of some bone loss. So I have to go not once, but twice! 90 minute visits! They will do one side on my first visit and the other on my next visit. While I am there for one of the visits, they will remove an old filling and put in a new one. I will need to be numbed up for both cleanings. URGH!!!

$$$$$ $$$$$ $$$$$

I guess after three years, they needed to recoup some of the money they hadn’t gotten from me!

Thankfully, my first of the two cleanings isn’t until February …

Why not close this blog with another great dentist joke?

Martin and his wife walk into a dentist’s office. He says to the dentist, “Doc, I’m in one heck of a hurry I have three buddies sitting out in my car waiting for us to play golf, so forget about the anesthetic, I don’t have time for the gums to get numb. I just want you to pull the tooth, and be done with it! Today is Friday and we have a 10:00 AM tee time at the best golf course in town and it’s 9:15 already… “.

The dentist thought to himself, “My goodness, this is surely a very brave man asking to have a tooth pulled without using anything to kill the pain.”

So the dentist asks him, “Which tooth is it sir?”

Martin turned to his wife and said, “Open your mouth and show him dear…….”

“Start Saving”

Sam made dentist appointments for both kids this week. When she called, she asked about what age they will start seeing babies. To her (and my) surprise, they will see them as soon as they start getting teeth.

Ella had her appointment a couple days ago. Sam took her and she was fairly well behaved. Naturally, there were some times when she fussed a bit. I guess she wouldn’t let them count her teeth, but they were able to get fluoride on them.

Andrew had his appointment today. He’s only got 8 teeth, so his appointment went fairly quickly. But the doc had some news for us …

I may or may not have blogged about Andrew’s tongue and lip ties in the past. He was struggling with taking bottles and they clipped them in the office to help. At any rate, his lip tie grew back – right between the two front teeth. Because of this, he will probably need braces in the near future.

Sam was dumbfounded. She literally brought him in to have them clean and put fluoride on his teeth and they are already talking about braces!!?? Yep.

They basically looked at Sam and told her, “At least you have lots of time to start saving for braces!”

Gee, thanks!