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Sunday, September 20, 2009

Discipline, GIVE IT BACK

I'm going to apologize for ranting now because I'm not going to want to at the end. I figured this is where a post like this should go so that's why it's here.

I'll start this off by saying I myself do not have a child but my girlfriend who I live with does have a daughter, and in turn I help to raise her because that's what responsibility is all about, right? Correct....

First I want to ask, what the hell ever happened to being able to discipline my child? Just recently saw on the news a lady who spanked her kid in a store because the kid was misbehaving, it wasn't a brutal spanking, just a slap on the ass and a "KNOCK IT OFF!" Now this lady had to go to court for CHILD ABUSE, that's right I said it, CHILD ABUSE for spanking her kids ass and telling him to knock it off. I don't know what caused the spanking or the yelling but that doesn't sound like abuse.
My girlfriend and her daughter were cleaning her room (daughters room) and my girlfriend tossed a flat piece of cardboard to the other side of the room, like a Frisbee, who wouldn't do that? Well the cardboard went off to the right a little too far and hit her kids forehead. Ouch poor kid, mommy kissed it appologized and the child laughed it off and said it was alright, it was a mistake. Well at school the little scrape on the forehead was noticed and later on in the day here comes good ol' Child Protective Services (go protect some fucking children you ass-holes!) because the school got in our business and felt like a tiny scrape on the forehead of a child was abuse. I could understand if it happened all the time, but this was once all that school year that she has had a tiny minute almost microscopic scrape.

Second, my girlfriends daughter is in second grade, in AIS (can't remember what that stands for but it's extra help for a learning disability). We're not sure if she has a hard time reading and writing or if she just makes it really really really really really really really difficult for us. For homework it's simple picture of an item we'll say it's FLAG, they show you a picture of a flag, give you the letters FL_G and they have to fill in the blank. Simple enough, she spends about 45 minutes on about 10 of those questions. Then there is 10 sentences they have to write each week in a composition notebook. Simple enough, do two a day right? Well 1 sentence and 30 minutes later we (my girlfriend and I) want to pull our hair out, sentences like "My mom found a desk and painted it for me" takes 20 minutes. So I came up with an idea of having her write things that she wants on a piece of paper and show us before she can get it, like "Mom can I please have a drink" write it out, show us, and you receive, we're not denying the child of it just making her attempt thinking and writing. Since kids are needy I figured this was a great way to get her to practice her spelling and writing. Great idea I thought, yes I was proud of it. Teachers looked down upon it, it's abusive and it's not helping anything. WELL WHEN SHE'S HAVING TROUBLE PUTTING THOUGHTS INTO WORDS IT HELPS!!!!!!! Yup abusive coming up with new ways of teaching a child, yes arrest me for abusing this poor child. OASDYGTPRFQ8YERWQJKEYIF that's how it mas me feel.

Apparently when CPS was here they informed us that having a 7 year old clean her own room, CHILD ABUSE.
Spanking, CHILD ABUSE
Yelling at a kid, CHILD ABUSE
Use of any sarcasm just for joking around, CHILD ABUSE
Making them do work other than school work, CHILD ABUSE. Example: Picking things up in the backyard, sticks from the tree, child's toys, dog poop (which I would pick up not her). All these things are frowned upon.

YEAH well not listening to parents when they suggest extra help for a child at school sounds like PARENTAL ABUSE


When I was a kid, I remember getting spanked, slapped, put in time out in the corner, grounded, grabbed by the arm and dragged, yelling, all types of things and I turned out great.

They are taking away the right to raise children which seems to be the problem with children these days. You ever notice kids (under 10) saying "Fuck you" or calling you an ass-hole? I've heard this numerous times from children with good parents and with bad parents. Something about taking away discipline seems to be taking away from good parenting. A child needs a slap in the ass and to be yelled at now and then. They need to be told no and to shut up at times. Life's not that easy so why make it seem that easy to them as they grow up, it's only going to lead to failure, which is not anything this country or any country needs. It seems to be the goal in today's society, have a kid, give them anything they want.... it's almost like you have a kid and THEY tell you how it is, you can't put your foot down and do what's right.

LET ME RAISE MY CHILD, NOT YOU, DON'T TELL ME HOW TO RAISE A CHILD. STAY OUT OF MY BUSINESS.
I can understand if the abuse is visible and consistent, or if the child acts in the way an abused child acts. My girlfriends kid does NOT act like an abused child, she's happy, laughing, smiling, and friendly, that just screams abused child apparently, maybe then they would have the need to look into it, but one fucking scrape should not warrant the need to have CPS come to my home uninvited and go through my home like they're the police asking questions that have nothing to do with anything at all.

Lets look back 40 years ago, not much insanity, couple of murderers hear and there and some robberies and such, a couple serial killers and so on. Now look at the way things are today. I can't turn on my TV without hearing about some KID killing someone or some KID doing some out of control shit. I'm not one to put blame on tv and video games for this stuff because I grew up watching violent tv/movies and video games and like I said I'm fine, haven't killed anyone. I had the so called "abuse" when I was a kid, that kind of makes me stop and think for a second before doing something that's possibly life threatening to other people or harmful to other people. Yes we can call that common sense, but where did I get that from? From being DISCIPLINED yes that's right, discipline is a good thing, don't take it away, errr GIVE IT BACK I should say.

I want to just ramble for hours and hours and probably stop making sense soon if I don't stop now.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Attacked by Shingles

Well it all started shortly after noon on Thursday (8/10/09). I had gotten a weird pain in my side, since I was at work I figured I had just pulled a muscle or twisted funny in some way, which happens from time to time at work. So I continued on with my Thursday just like any other day, working and hoping 4:30 would come quicker so I could just get out. Well the day ended I went home and did the usual, check the internet, eat some food, watch some tv, go to sleep and prepare for the next day at work. It was a different week than usual, we usually work 4 10 hour days and have Fridays off, but because of the holiday (Labor Day) we worked 4 8 hour days and had to work Friday. So I wake up Friday morning didn't feel much of the pain but it was still slightly there. As the day went on more though the pain started to feel a little weirder, when I say weird I mean it was a feeling I have never felt with a pain before. Thursday it was feeling like a bruise so I had checked my side and back (which is where the focus of the pain was), Friday though only about 2 hours into the day it felt like a little more than a bruise but still mostly bruise like. About 2:30 in the day the pain started tingling like an itch but the itch felt like more of an inside under the skin kind of itch, not something on the surface. I had mentioned this stuff to people at work at the only things I got were "Maybe it's kidney stones" or "Could it be your pancreas?" along with other ideas like a pulled muscle, etc. So work on Friday comes to an end and I notice it hurts to lean back in a chair with my back against it and just felt really foreign to me. Continue on with my Friday after work like usual, home, check internet, eat food, watch tv, hang around the house, play video games, played guitar learned "Down By The River" by Neil Young. Check the painful spot on my side and back and no sign of a bruise but the itch and pain were still there underneath. Then I went to bed later on in the night.

I must also add for the record, I watched a show Friday night on Animal Planet called Monsters Inside Me. This guy had gotten a strage feeling in the back of his head, a sharp pain. After a few days he was waking up with blood on his pillow. But before all that he was just attributing it towards a reaccurance of Shingles, which he had when he was younger or a few years before. Turns out that after a couple weeks and going to the doctor they found maggots under his scalp by the Botfly. Which obviously got removed from his scalp. Good episode.

After watching that I go to bed and then here comes good ol' Saturday, I wake up around 10:30-11am and the pain is there. I didn't think much of it so I went on with my day, played guitar and little bit of video games, grabbed a bite to eat. Then I decided it's time to jump in the shower, right before getting in the shower I noticed in one of the mirrors I had a small red/pink lump on my side, very tiny, about half the size of a dime. Near the end of my shower I'm rinsing off and notice a rash towards the front of my side, looked like a bunch of little red dots which I thought looked like heat rash, but I knew it wasn't especially because of that blister like thing I saw only a few inches away from it on my side. At that point I start thinking "Well I finally have insurance and I don't use it often, lets take a trip to the hospital and get into Fast Track". Well I get there, tell them "I have a pain in my side and a small rash starting to form, this is day 3 of the pain, day 1 of the rash" so they take my blood pressure, take my temperature, ask me all types of fun questions like they usually do at a doctors office, then tell me to wait in the waiting room.

6:30 I sit in the waiting room, watch some interview with Darrell Strawberry (I think) on ESPN. He jabbered on about random crap, Twinkies being one of his favorite snacks or something, boredom made me watch it. That and no remote in a waiting room.
7 Yankee's vs. Orioles game starts, so I'm watching that thinking of how pissed off my brother is due to the fact that in the first couple innings the Oriole's were up 6 to 1. Contemplated calling him to brag (I'm an Orioles fan) but I never did.
8 Finally they call me to see the doctor, or so I thought. So I went into this room with a bed and a curtain blocking me from the main hallway. They gave me a robe and two towels or blankets and told me to put on the robe. I put on the robe not knowing exactly how to do it, so it's on loosely falling off my shoulders, and I'm sitting there for about 15 minutes like that
8:15 Nurse comes in, introduces himself, has me tell him my name and birthdate to make sure I'm not some imposter (atleast that's what I'm guessing) then he asked some more basic simple questions. I show him the rash and at about the same time we both said "Looks like shingles". Yes I went there prediagnosing myself with Shingles, because of the great internet of information we can diagnose ourselves. But I went not for the reassurance but for the medication if needed. He told me he'd go get the doctor and have him take a look at it.
8:30 or 8:45 somewhere around there, a lady nurse comes in and asks if I mind moving to a different section so the room could be used for a patient more in need of it. I said no problem. Went to the next area which was just a curtain seperating me from the guy next to me. Mentally handicapped guy with a horrible cough and couldn't speak. Slightly annoying but hey, you can't pick the people you're stuck next to in a hospital (as far as I know), and it could have been worse I suppose.
9 the doctor comes in looks at me asks me some questions about why I'm there, I tell him. He looks at my side, front, back and tells me it is Shingles. I told him I had come to that conclusion before coming. As he's telling me this he's kind of looking at me like I have two heads. Says it's rare to happen to people my age (26) and it's from chickenpox which lays dormant in your nerve endings and never really goes away. Nice to know that. Shingles usually appears on people with a weak immune system (always comforting to hear) so he's going to do some blood tests. Tells me I don't need the robe on and I can put my shirt on, so of course I do this immediately.
9:10 the blood is being taken by another nurse and they left an IV in, guessing just incase they need more blood for some reason, so I don't ask questions, just deal with it in my arm.
9:30 another nurse comes in with a robe and two towels in her hand and tells me to put it on. I tell her as nicely as I can (being the wise ass I am) and I just said "The doctor came in and told me to put my regular shirt on so I'm not putting on another robe. Sorry, doctors orders." So she left.
9:55 doctor comes in "Well the blood work came back fine" still looking at me like I'm some freak with multiple heads and snot pouring out of my ears or someting "Since you don't seem to be in too much pain, you can just take Ibuprofen. He wrote me a perscription for Famciclovir (Famvir) and off I was. Medi-script in hand and one Famvir that they supplied to get me started that night since I couldn't fill the perscription at 10 at night.

Today Tuesday (8/15/09) there seems to be more rash and still some pain. But I'm going to keep up on the meds because it says to. I have a list of doctors excepting new patients and I will get into one of them ASAP, to hopefully avoid Fast Track again (such a bad name for something so slow).

That's my story of shingles so far, not really happy about it but hey, nothing I can do. Apparently if you have had chicken pox I can't give you shingles. If you haven't had chicken pox I can give you chicken pox but not shingles. Pretty interesting how it works. Shingles doesn't pass through coughing or sneezing, but through contact with the actual blisters themselves for, I believe, the first 7 days or so.

Anyways that's it so far, hopefully everything gets better soon.