Posts by Brandon Newman95

Chris Taylor4 said:Don't go to just anyone, whether they are a psychiatrist or a psychologist. If you decide to see one, make sure they are specifically trained as psychotherapists.

Yeah, I get that. It could be a clinical psychologist who does psychotherapy, or a psychiatrist who specializes in it. Honestly? If I were in her shoes, I'd go with the psychologist-therapist route.

ruggedcyclist64 said:I’m starting this thread here because, frankly, I have nowhere else to turn.

The issue is my relationship with my mother—or rather, the total lack of one. I’m in my early twenties, still in college, and living at home. My mom takes care of us; she cooks, cleans, manages the house, and so on. Both she and my dad have provided me with everything financially, and for that, I am genuinely grateful.

The problem is that my relationship with her feels more like being roommates. There’s zero intimacy—we don't actually *know* each other. She doesn't know my friends, the struggles I face, or even my love life, simply because we never talk about those things. Our conversations are strictly functional: what’s for dinner, what needs to be picked up at Target, etc. She’s never even attempted to get to know me, build a bond, or ask how my life is going. I can't say if she’s ever even hugged me or told me she loves me.

When I went through puberty, she just handed me a box of pads—no explanation, no guidance. And don't even get me started on dating or sex; I had to learn everything from school textbooks and magazines.

I’ve always been more introverted, and during my teen years, I struggled with deep insecurities and low self-esteem, which made making friends difficult. Looking back, I think that was largely because I never heard a single encouraging word from her—never felt that sense of support.

Whenever I run into trouble, I don't turn to her—not that I even feel the need to, since we aren't built that way. There was a period when I started college and fell into a bit of a depressive slump; she didn't notice. Not even once.

It hits hard when I see my friends talking to their moms—how they can tell them anything, how their mothers are their biggest support systems. It’s painful. I never talk about it with anyone because, honestly, it’s embarrassing. We don't fight—which might be why our relationship isn't "toxic" like some others—but we aren't at war either. We're just... nothing.

We had one blowout argument where I finally laid it all out for her. She burst into tears and seemed completely blindsided by what I said, but even after that, nothing changed. The dynamic remained exactly the same.

I suspect this is just how she was raised—that her own mother was distant, so this "normalcy" makes sense to her. But to me, it’s nonsensical. Who wouldn't want a close bond with their child? How can someone be satisfied with such a hollow connection?

Even now, I find it hard to form deep connections with people, and I’m increasingly convinced it stems from my relationship with her. It weighs on me. At this point, I don't even have the desire to try and bridge the gap anymore; it feels like a lost cause. Instead, I find myself wishing I had been born to a different mother—someone I could actually talk to. I wonder if I would be a different person emotionally if I’d had that closeness.

I realize she’s provided for me financially, and I know there are people dealing with physical or psychological abuse, or constant fighting, so I feel somewhat guilty bringing this up as a "major" problem. I believe she loves me in her own way, but she never shows it. To me, that emotional component matters far more than any material thing a parent can provide.

Does anyone else have this kind of relationship with their mother? Does it bother you? Is there even any point in trying to fix it if she’s fundamentally uninterested?

What is your relationship with your mother like?

This story hits way too close to home. It’s giving me major Tild vibes... honestly, it feels like something I would’ve written myself back when I was twenty. If I were you, I’d definitely look into talking to someone. You don't have to jump straight to a psychiatrist or anything, but maybe just find a good psychologist to vent to.

Kimberly Morris said:Hey everyone!

So, look, I’m having massive issues with my stomach right now, and I urgently needed a gastroscopy. But—get this—I couldn't even get through the exam because I physically could not swallow the endoscope. Yeah, unbelievable. I mean, I literally gave birth with nothing but a heavy IV drip, no epidural, just raw grit. I deal with a ton of health stuff and I've endured plenty, but honestly, nothing has been as nightmareish as that gastroscopy attempt.

Anyway, now the doctor is telling me they have to put me under just to get the procedure done.

Given everything I'm juggling—migraines, insulin resistance, hypothyroidism, tachycardia, blood pressure swings, you name it—I am seriously freaking out about how my body is going to handle being sedated.

What kind of anesthesia do they actually use for this sort of thing?

Thanks in advance for any help.

It can be local, or they can give you short-term general anesthesia. My guess is they’ll go with the short-term general stuff. Honestly, I've gone into procedures accepting way more risk than this, and I've dealt with much heavier issues than what you're facing. You'll likely just get something to calm you down. Everyone is terrified of anesthesia, it's totally normal. They'll put you under and you won't feel a thing. Then you'll just wake up, get an IV, and stay for observation.

swiftheron7 said:I finally got my referral for an abdominal ultrasound, and according to the Medicare waiting list, Massachusetts General Hospital is taking orders for February 2019—meaning a 4-day wait.

But then I get an email from them scheduling me for February 2020. Like, what year is it?
Who the hell is running this show? The list supposedly updates every single day.

And check out this ridiculous response I got from Mass Gen:
Dear Patient,

The Social Security Administration has authorized abdominal ultrasound diagnostic testing at the primary care level. Therefore, besides specialist services, if the necessary equipment is available, this can also be performed at a family medicine clinic.
Consequently, we suggest that based on your primary care physician’s red referral or internal referral, you seek the prescribed healthcare services at any other medical facility capable of providing the requested care that maintains a contract with the Social Security Administration.

At our facility, this scan is reserved exclusively for oncology patients and children.

I am completely lost now. It's my first time trying to use this online booking thing and I already feel like I'm being totally screwed over by some hidden camera.😵

Give them a call. It's actually possible the wait is that long (so many doctors have left the practice lately, especially over at Mass Gen).

bluegardener4;73518659 said:... if anyone has any advice ...

Went into the clinic because of this cough that's been bugging me for about a month. Weirdly enough, as soon as I lie down, the coughing just stops. 🙂 I'm in my early thirties.

Everything came back within the normal range except for:

EOSINOPHIL GRANULOCYTES 9.8% (ref up to 7)
Glucose is sitting right on the bottom edge of the limit
Cholesterol 5.7 (ref. 4.7)

My primary care doctor thinks the cough might be allergic since my lungs sounded totally fine when he listened. I've already gone through two rounds of antibiotics.

I'm taking Dassault for allergies (started a few days before the blood work), and before that, I was on Panthus and Folcodin.
Thanks

What's the deal with the CRP, GERB, and heart stuff?

Nicole James said:You really ought to check in with a cardiologist first—though, generally speaking, it is highly recommended.

I wasn't even thinking about doing anything without checking with a cardiologist first,, but we could just have a general discussion here. Are you still in the hospital?

So, what’s the deal with giving the flu vaccine to heart patients?

Look, I really hate dropping names like this without a doctor’s permission, but honestly, regarding Vinogradski, Dr. Carzavec (he's a hematologist) was great back in the day. My iron levels were absolutely trashed—I think they were down to like 2.5... One of the hematology specialists over at Vinogradski is Dr. Hrvojka Bosnjak—she seems pretty young. If you want to go private, check out Bates Clinic. Obviously, in NYC.

Hannah Edwards12 said:I find myself at a complete loss regarding how to proceed.
Recently, my partner opened up to me, suggesting that he might be dealing with some sort of psychological issue.
He claims he can "hear voices" that are constantly talking about him.
It is difficult for me to take this at face value, frankly, because he is the type of individual who avoids any semblance of hard work and tends to dodge his responsibilities even when he's currently employed. To make matters more complicated, he has a colleague at his job who struggles with depression and is frequently out on medical leave.
He attempted to discuss this with his parents, but they don't seem to take him seriously at all; they argue that ever since he was a child, he has had an overactive imagination and a tendency to "embellish" the truth.
The reality is... life is never dull with him, as I seem to discover something new about this man every single day; he was quite the charmer when we first met, but he has been caught in lies far too many times.
There have also been instances of bizarre behavior and an intense, irrational paranoia regarding other men, which occasionally leaves me wondering if there is an underlying clinical condition at play.
Now, he is insisting on seeking professional treatment, but we are all deeply concerned that if he is simply manufacturing these symptoms, he will end up being handed a diagnosis and a heavy regimen of medication just because he insists he has schizophrenia—given that his grandmother suffered from the same thing. In my more cynical moments, I suspect he is inventing this illness merely to avoid having to work.
Does anyone have any advice?

If his grandmother had it, there's definitely a genetic predisposition involved.

Nicholas Davis4 said:I have to agree with Brandon Newman95; what they're saying is spot on.
Everything is anonymous... they won't ever know it was you.
Exactly!
Here is what happened: there was this one piece of equipment at the hospital—the only one of its kind in the entire US—that is absolutely critical for diagnosing conditions where patients can slip away very quickly. It sat broken for eight months. The staff actually vented to me about it... basically, the board of directors or whoever pulls the strings above the department heads... I can't recall the exact hierarchy... but that top-level administration responsible for approving repairs just kept saying no.
So, I decided to take action and sent a very polite letter to the Department of Health and Human Services. I didn't go in attacking the hospital; instead, I focused on how shameful it was that such vital equipment wasn't being fixed. I kept it diplomatic... I even made sure to praise the specific staff members who operate the machine.

Fast forward a couple of months, I head back there for a follow-up, and suddenly their supervisor snaps at me! She acts like I personally betrayed them, claiming they were always so kind to me... meanwhile, I'm standing there feeling completely lost. What on earth? It turns out... since I had sent that email to the Department, they had sent an inspector down. The inspectors went hard on them, and somehow, they knew exactly what I wrote. Who told them it was me? And who lied about the contents of my message?

Luckily, I had a great relationship with the frontline staff, so I was able to show them my actual email to prove I hadn't said anything bad about them.
But clearly, someone higher up—presumably within the Department—leaked my confidential information.
Can you imagine if I had actually filed a formal complaint against them?!
Would I have to look for political asylum just to stay safe?!

Then someone says, "Oh, feel free to complain." Right. As if.
There's just not enough support. Privacy regulations are ignored, and people in power protect each other more than two thieves guarding a shared stash of gold.

Brandon Newman95 is right.

And yes, I still have those medical records.
I am willing to post them.
But then again... where would I even go to find asylum?

I second this entire post. Asylum, hmmm... I wouldn't even know where to start.

stormyraven10 said:So, did you actually get a court order handed down making that happen?

Look, we were all seeing the same doctor, plain and simple. In the dental field specifically, I ended up putting myself in a really awkward spot, and I was the one who had to fix it. It literally happened—they tracked my info down through my IP address and via this forum. It’s not pretty. So, to anyone out there thinking this forum is anonymous or that privacy laws and data protection stuff actually mean something here... yeah, I'm not buying that crap. Everyone knows everyone else. They read each other's posts, they cooperate, they're all in on it, so nothing ever sticks. And personally, unfortunately, I've been dealing with a lot of doctors lately, and for certain inquiries, it's just a small circle where everyone knows each other and nobody's going to snitch on their own. There was no official ruling; it was just handled verbally.

stormyraven10 said:Maybe don't speak on things you aren't quite sure about?
According to the law, defamation happens when someone spreads a false factual claim to others that hurts someone's reputation, knowing full well it isn't true.

I think it would be way more helpful if people were just more upfront about whether they liked or disliked certain doctors—it’d really help future patients out!

Don't go talking nonsense. I wrote something against a doctor here a long time ago, and wouldn't you know it? Someone found out, and the fallout was massive for all of us. Personally, I even had to move my medical files around just to deal with it. So, spare me the fairy tales. They all look out for each other; it's all an inside job. Unfortunately, because of some health issues, I have to visit them pretty often. It's like they say, "birds of a feather flock together," so why don't you try posting something negative about one of them and see what happens? I ended up having to apologize publicly on this forum just to deal with the mess.

stormyraven10 said:It would be awesome if you could also drop the name of the doctor from the Trauma department 🙂—you know, just so we all know which ones to steer clear of!

And honestly, it’d be great to know who they could actually sue for defamation. Even though there are medical reports and everything. It's like they say, "birds of a feather flock together." They all just look out for each other.

Rebecca Rivera3, the real question here is what’s actually worse. I mean, let’s be honest, we’d all kill to just be healthy for once. For years, everyone’s been stuck on some kind of medication for something or other. Before 2009, I didn't touch a single pill—maybe some vitamins here and there, but that was it. It was the same thing until recently, where everything turned out to be a physical issue rather than some psychological thing.

silentdriver23 said:Right after my surgery, the surgeon was nowhere to be found, just barking orders at the nurses over the phone. And the nurses? They won't give you straight answers because they don't actually know anything—they just guess. One of them finally told me they used two units of blood because of my blood pressure. This is my sixth surgery, and only my second one under general anesthesia—the others were just nerve blocks or regional—and I have never bled this much or needed two units before. Honestly, seeing all that blood and those huge clots on the clothes in my bag... it didn't look right. It looked like way too much. Since there was an incision in my neck, part of me wonders if they nicked an artery or something, which might explain why they're being so secretive. But what really gets to me is that I have another surgery coming up in six months at a different hospital, also under general anesthesia.

Just my two cents as a non-expert, but nurses aren't even allowed to give out certain info. If you’ve got another surgery lined up in six months, I’d be demanding answers. Every single detail matters when you're going back under general anesthesia. I'd definitely push to find out if I actually received a transfusion.

silentdriver23 said:I remember them waking me up—it was just this light tapping on my face—and then they immediately wrapped me in a thermal blanket and whisked me off to a room where they got me dressed and cleaned up the blood.

Look, I’ve had my fair share of procedures. I've done pre-op stuff under local anesthesia, and once I had a short session under general anesthesia. For that last one, I woke up in a recovery room, but for the pre-op thing, yeah, they wrapped me in a blanket and handled everything in the room. Just my two cents as a layman: if someone needs a transfusion, the hospital definitely should know about it. And honestly, if people are willing to share, which hospital we're talking about could be mentioned in a private message.

silentdriver23 said:Thanks for the reply. And yeah, obviously I signed the consent form for a transfusion, but I’d still really like to know if they actually gave me one. When I asked people at the hospital, nobody wanted to give me straight answers—they just kept saying they could regulate my blood pressure with two saline bags, which feels like some kind of brush-off. It's been ten days and I'm still pale and feeling totally weak, so seeing how much blood was used, I just wanted to know if they're required to list a transfusion on the discharge papers. Mine just says everything went fine.

If you ask me, they are absolutely obligated to tell you or write it down. I don't see any reason why they wouldn't, unless they're hiding behind that new stupid privacy law. As for the saline thing, or the IV route, I guess that's just their way of managing your blood pressure. Personally, I think they should have noted it, and if you're still looking pale and feeling wiped out, maybe you should talk to your doctor about iron supplements or just trying to get your levels up naturally. Honestly, though, you're going to feel weak after any surgery. One thing I don't get, though—did they wake you up in the recovery room or did you just come to on your own?

silentdriver23 said:Can I ask a question? So, I had a C5-C6 microdiscectomy at the NEA and they put in an implant. Everything went fine, but some things are just... weird. They woke me up in the OR and I was covered in needle marks everywhere. My left arm and leg were completely numb, and my right leg was all bruised up, plus my shoulder was blue. They had me wrapped in one of those thermal warming blankets they use, and they actually took off the bottom half of the clothes I was wearing when they put me under. My stuff was shoved in a bag filled with blood—it looked terrible. What I really want to know is, if I received a transfusion, are they required to list that on the discharge papers? Because mine just say everything was "okay." Also, why would I have two bruises and be wrapped in a heat blanket? Thanks.

From what I understand, before any surgery, you have to sign off saying you won't refuse a blood transfusion. In my own experience, one of my discharge summaries specifically listed the blood type used and the reaction, but in two other discharge papers, there wasn't a single word about it. Maybe, since it was my first time being put under anesthesia, they handled things differently? As for the bruising and the blankets, I honestly don't know.

Olivia Bishop8 said:Thanks to everyone who weighed in on my post. Seems like we’re all on the same page—if the doctor nails down the right therapy, things might actually look up. He did mention he’s pretty happy with how things are progressing so far. Yeah, some anxiety came up. The kid is basically terrified of everything! I just hope things turn out okay for my little one, and for all of you dealing with this nightmare of a disease too.

Seriously, try combining a psychiatrist with medication and maybe some help from a psychologist.

Jose Ward4 said:Do you have a link to those specific posts? Sorry for bugging you, I just can't seem to track down where you wrote that. Honestly, I think your brother might have a congenital issue too. My brother had a hole in his heart that they didn't even catch until he hit 45. He didn't have any symptoms before that; he was actually quite athletic. It wasn't until he started feeling wiped out in his mid-forties that they found it. Long story short, his lungs and heart just gave out. Two years ago, he actually had to undergo a transplant for both lungs plus a cardiac repair. He's on anti-rejection meds now, but he's doing well. Everything is working normally. I don't want to scare you, I just wanted you to know there are others out there dealing with this, just like my brother. Hang in there. Things have to get better. They have to—for all of us. Oh, by the way, he had his surgery done in Vienna.

Bottom line: stay healthy, watch your heart.