A Lesson on Statins

I've been a bit under the weather recently so bear with me. I learned a valuable lesson this week. Statin drugs have a lot of side effects. By now everyone knows someone who gets joint pain from statins. Despite the marketing, it is a common side effect, not a rare one. I had that, and switched to another, and got the pains again, and switched to another, and got them again. And now I am on yet another. No joint pain, this time, but my stomach went to Hell, which caught be by suprize.

 I only mention this, not to whine, but to point out that this is a serious side effect. I suffered for a few weeks now and didn't really know why. I was waiting for the joint pain...and didn't even think about a statin causing such stomach problems. I refused to look up the side effects, because that always "works on your mind" and you end up with most of them. When I finally did, and saw the many patients who reported stomach pain and all sorts of other stomach trouble, a bell went off.

 Long story short, I quit taking the statin, and I am amazed at how quickly I got better. I feel like me again. I am exercising, and eating pierogis, and not clutching my stomach all the time, thinking I was destined for gall bladder surgery. Even drank a half a beer.


 I know I'll have to fess up to the doc and tell him I am not taking these statins anymore. And I'm sure there will be a conversation about cholesterol again. But quality of life is important, too. People suffer on these drugs. Why can I rattle off names of several relatives who have had to quit taking them, or just take two pills a week? The side effects are bad, and they are common.

The Sunday Morning Muse, July 15, 2012

"Be polite to all, but intimate with few." Thomas Jefferson


Good advice from a very smart man with big ideas and wild hair.Today I am musing about how Jefferson would have handled Twitter and Facebook. I suspect he would be quite perplexed at first. Why would anyone put out half baked thoughts and serve up their private life for public scrutiny? Isn't that what newspapers do?

After all, this is a man who worked on heavy things like the Declaration of Independence.


 He would probably warm to Facebook in some way. Accumulate a lot of "friends" but, on his Close Friends list....now that is where the real thought provoking ideas would go. Assuming he can figure out the privacy settings....which can confound  Mensa members, I'd say he would really love it.


Twitter is another story all together. I'd say Jefferson wouldn't tweet. That's just me basing it on nothing other than lack of gravitas. I think he'd want more than 146 characters to get his points across.  And he wouldn't tweet short sighted, unpondered thoughts. He was a letter writer after all. Loved to put quill to paper.

Free Advice

"I'm getting rid of a cold," that's the response you should give when someone inquires. It's all about mindset. (man to woman in a restaurant)

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I loved the simplicity of this when I heard it. Why not give it a try? It can't hurt. Gives the impression you have power over the cold instead of it controlling you. Haven't you heard people who just give up? You know the type. "I am soooo sick," they say as they hack and snort, "I've always had these sinus infections this time of year and it'll probably last 3 weeks....and THAT's if I'm lucky... You'll see.. by Friday it will be in my chest... and I'll need antibiotics....and... one year I had pneumonia..."