Hernias


Getting off the subject of that #$!%!! oxalis, I noticed Jerry Heverly
wrote:

> I've been away two days having my hernia repaired.

and Moira responded:

>I my experience most of the recovery from an operation is getting the 
>anasthetic out of one's system and this takes an astonishingly long time

I don't know what kind of hernia repair Jerry was getting -- though MOST
gardeners get the inguinal type, which are fairly "easy" (though soreness
is naturally going to be there).

As a note on surgical healing after having had 4 separate surgeries to repair
abdominal hernias (ventral) and 2 incisional hernias, and then last March
another "general anesthesia" surgery with the removal of thyroid cancer
(after 10 years + with Kaiser "in denial" ... I *knew* there was something
wrong -- Kaiser screwed up, saying that I just ate too much)... there is a LOT
anyone can do to heal faster (&/or not get hernias in the first place)...
Since I've had so many, due to medical mal-practice, I almost feel like I 
should write a book on the subject!!

For *planned* surgeries, be it carpal tunnel or whatever I've discovered 
that taking about 2000 mg of Vitamin C/day and 2 doses of Vitamin E each 
day for at least one week prior to surgery cuts down on the dealing time 
as well as adhesions. POST-OP: Add a good Vitamin B complex, PLUS drinking
at least 12 to 15 8-oz glasses of water each day. To speed up your healing
even faster, find (or hire) a Reiki practitioner to work on you each day
for a week, **&** if you are lucky enough to living in an area that has lots
of Dowsers who specialize in health issues, have your dowser work on you the
day before surgery, the day immediately after surgery, and maybe 2 days 
later.  I have a "reputation" for having serious complications following 
surgeries where a general anesthesia is required -- but my thyroid removal
last year went off w/out a hitch! ... A woman in my Reiki group worked on me
the night before, & the group worked on me during surgery (via long distance
techniques), and she worked on me again that afternoon after I was back in 
my room. My "health dowser" also worked on me before & after surgery (over 
the phone). I really set a record for rapid healing -- going home the following
afternoon (though I wanted to stay at least another 24 hrs, 'cause "The Inn
at Stanford", as they called the ward I was in, was so wonderful!!!). While I
am still losing hair, almost a year later, all other stress indicators were 
gone within about 2 weeks... except of course that trying to function without
a thyroid, before followup radiation is finished is not a very pretty sight --
I couldn't stay awake long enough to even cut flowers for my room!

IMPORTANT NOTE: There is a "group" of blood pressure medications called ACE
Inhibitors that has some major NASTY side effects *IF* you are allergic to it.
The bad news is that many, many, gardeners have allergies that make us cough
 -- often to the point of gagging & bringing up fluid. When this began happen-
to me, in 1988, I *assumed* that it was my allergies -- the wind was quite 
nasty & blowing cedar pollen & sycamore molds all over hell for a long time.
My cough became so severe that I actually tore two holes in my gut -- one of
them was 4 inches long when it was finally repaired 1-1/2 hrs later... It
was especially frustrating 'cause I would start coughing in the recovery room.
and always, I would get another "cough-induced" hernia in less than a year.
About 2 years after I started using this nasty ACE inhibitor called vasotex
it was noticed that I had developed an arythmia on my EKG (before my 2nd
drug-caused hernia repair). Six months after that, I developed a nasty "elec-
trical" problem called Paroxsysmal Ventricular Tachycardia (PSVT for short).
STILL no one suspected my medication as being the problem ... SINCE I WAS A 
GARDENER, IT WAS **ASS-UMED** THAT IT WAS MY ALLERGIES. It wasn't until this 
one incredibly stupid doctor put me on a Calcium Channel Blocker to keep my
heart from raising completely out of control, WITHOUT WARNING ME THAT 
	calcium chan. blockers + grapefruit (any form) = severe cardiac problems
What fun!! My family's response was: Gee Lyn, maybe you should give up 
gardening!!! ... No, I replied, I've decided to give up western medicine in 
the future. So I began seeing a Tibetan doctor who works with pulse diagnosis
& decided to declare war on Kaiser (didn't do any good, however)... Besides,
I only lost 7 years of my life in the process!!  I'm here to tell you about it
because when I keeled over at Costco after guzzling a Calistoga soda with 
Grapefruit in it, I decided to do it in the Book department. When the spinning
stopped (after some nice ladies gave me some benedryl that I carried with me),
I happened to look down & right there, next to Sunset's new Landscapping book
was a copy of another book called THE PEOPLES GUIDE TO DEADLY DRUG 
INTERACTIONS by Drs. Graedon & Graedon. I REALLY recommend that people with 
environmental allergies and/or blood pressure issues have a copy of this book;
it saved my life! The bottom line was that if I hadn't been plagued by 
allergies against grasses, molds, mildew, conifer pollens, etc., the MIGHT 
have been able to avoid 4 MAJOR surgical repairs! The cough that the ACE 
Inhibitors can cause is severe enough to rip your gut away from the gortex
mesh they install -- particularly if it was a Kaiser surgery, 'cause they don't
actually stitch in the mesh -- they staple it!

More than enough babble about things that will never affect MOST of you...but
it can affect you to the point of killing you.  I have even encountered 
nurses at Stanford, of all places, who were suffering from a drug allergy 
cough and didn't know it... So if ANY of you every have really severe coughing
fits during or after gardening, & you take some liquid benedryl and gargle 
with it & the cough still doesn't stop ... INSIST that your doctor check it 
out -- before it becomes a surgical issue.

G'night!

lyn


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
			Life's Lessons Part IV ...

"Have an adequate day." (author unknown)

If you can't learn to do it well, learn to enjoy doing it badly.

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

"The road to Enlightenment is long & hard, bring magazines & a snack."

"Every time I think I know where it's at, they move it." (author unknown)

People often find it easier to be a result of the past than a cause
of the future.

**The biggest difference between time and space is that you can't reuse
time.  -- Merrick Furst

**"We are here on earth to do good for others. What the others are here
for, I don't know."   --  W. H. Auden

Student to Buddah: Master will I be killed because of my anger?
Buddah: No my child; you will be killed *by* your anger...

"GARDENING:  The art of killing weeds and bugs to grow flowers and crops
for animals and birds to eat."

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us
with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
		-- Galileo Galilei

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"We did not weave the web of life.  We |        Lyn Dearborn 
are merely a strand in it.  Whatever   |  Master Gardener/Naturalist
we do to the web, we do to ourselves"  | Native Basketry Instruction
  --"Walk gently on Mother Earth" --   | dearborn@anchor.engr.sgi.com
		   Aaniin Anishinaabeg -- Mikinaak niin nindoodem
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