Where's Foamy Dog? Hurt chasing parked cars?

[Foamy Dog]

Hi Folks,

Some of you have been asking where I've been lately.

Well, not hurt chasing parked cars but I am very ill.

I've been fighting with a yet to be diagnosed movement disorder. The doctors have ruled out Parkinson's and Lou Gehrig's Disease but my symptoms are similar and have become severe making typing up rants pretty impossible.

I hope that they will find out what's going on soon and hope to be back to ranting with you ASAP. (Probably ranting about health care, insurance and the pharmaceutical industry!)

Until then, keep up the ranting; I'm so happy to have seen this board grow over the years!

--FD

[midcan5]

Hello Foamy, sorry to hear that, hope they can find it or treat it. While it sounds silly my wife loves "House" on Fox, she has me watching it sometimes. What is amazing is the complexity of the ailments and diagnoses. You wonder if it were real life would you have the opportunity to do all this testing and speculation? My wife has an inner ear problem that took years to diagnose and treat and finally one neurosurgeon correctly diagnosed and treated it. Comes back on occasion but she has been overall much much better. Good luck. midcan5

[Foamy Dog]

Thanks for the encouragement; yes, it has taken about three years so far and still no diagnosis. Meantime, I continue to tremor more and more severely and have to walk (hobble) with the aid of forearm crutches. I had to trade my spiked collar for them ;-) but after finding out how many movement disorders there are I understand why it's taking so long. Many can only be diagnosed by ruling out others and lots are misdiagnosed as Parkinson's.

The latest one that they are looking at (and I hope ruling out) is Shy Drager Syndrome (everyone knows my spelling is bad but I promise it has only one "g"). This is a Multiple System Atrophy that is, well, very nasty and incurable. So I don't want this one (as if I wanted any or had a choice in the matter.)

Anyway, I hope what ever it is can be cured so I can get my collar back!

--FD

[MO]

Get well soon, Foamy Dog! We're all pulling for you! With the elections coming up, we'll want to hear your wisdom.

[Patriot]

admin said:

Hi Folks,

Some of you have been asking where I've been lately.

Well, not hurt chasing parked cars but I am very ill.

I've been fighting with a yet to be diagnosed movement disorder. The doctors have ruled out Parkinson's and Lou Gehrig's Disease but my symptoms are similar and have become severe making typing up rants pretty impossible.

I hope that they will find out what's going on soon and hope to be back to ranting with you ASAP. (Probably ranting about health care, insurance and the pharmaceutical industry!)

Until then, keep up the ranting; I'm so happy to have seen this board grow over the years!

--FD

Hello Foamy Dog,

Just an idea, but perhaps you might want to investigate Tardive Dyskinesia... it's a movement disorder that can be caused by various medications --

[Foamy Dog]

Thanks for the advice, this is something they have looked at but no conclusion since I wasn't taking meds regularly before; however, I don't think they have ruled this out completely.

Hope they find something pretty soon; gettin' pretty weak.

Thanks again, and thanks to everyone for the support.
---FD

[Foamy Dog]

Hi all,

I'm not dead yet! I'm a tough old dog.

Still fighting!

The latest news is that they have found that don't have Shy Dragger Syndrome (thank God but I do have a neuromuscular disease. They suspect at the moment either a form of MS or Mitochondrial Degeneration.

At this point it has degenerated to the point that I am mostly wheelchair bound but still fighting to get around on forearm crutches when I can. I am now officially retired and thank goodness for the decent disability insurance that I signed up for many years ago when I began work.

My advice to everyone is to get all the insurance you can afford while you are well. Things like this come out of nowhere and I want you all to be safe.

The costs of medical treatment are out of control!
Sure I understand that it takes money to research and provide care but don't think that justifies what they charge us.

When the COPAY on one tiny pill is $50; something is wrong.

Well, there's a topic for you to rant about. ;D

Keep up the good fight everyone and keep ranting productively; I'll try to leave messages a bit more often but typing is quite difficult so bear with me.

In the meantime; I do drop by and read fairly often and I want to thank you all for visiting RantWeb and sharing your thoughts in The Rant Forum. I remain delighted at how much it has grown!

A very special thanks to MO; I can't tell you how much I appreciate you!!!!
--FD

[MO]

So glad to hear from you!

Hopefully, they'll get an exact diagnosis soon, so they'll know how best to treat it.

Yes, the cost of medical care is outrageous! I have some theories about why, and I'm not at all convinced it would get any better with more government interference.

Get well soon, so you can play on line!

You know, they have software that you talk into, and it does the typing!

[midcan5]

Foamy Dog, good to hear from you, I agree medicine prices are out of control, any service that controls costs tends towards the going price and when it comes to health you pay what you can. For many that is not possible. Of course now energy is doing the same. Markets have good and bad qualities. A friend of ours who has a similar problem with arthritis and they are now treating her with hormones as most other treatments have not helped... Good luck.

[midcan5]

Foamy, Hope all is well.

[Foamy Dog]

Hi all,

I just wanted to drop in and let you all know that I am still alive and barking.

The verdict is finally in on my illness and though they previously thought it was ruled out, this has been diagnosed as a motor neuron disease, most likely ALS (aka Lou Gehrig's Disease).

Though it has been awhile since I last posted; I still drop in from time to time and am pleased to see that you all are continuing the good fight. RantWeb.com has been taken down as I am no longer able to maintain it but this forum, the most important aspect of Rant Web will live on.

A huge thank you to everyone for making the forum such a success and by success, I mean a place of productive discussion. RW has never generated money as that was not and has never been its purpose. The Rant Forum will remain here for you, and it will remain free as long as our gracious host, Proboards offers the service.

A very special thank you, once again to MO! Without you, this would not be possible and the board would have fallen into ruin long ago. Thank you, a thousand times.

Of course I can't end a post without giving you something to rant about ;D so here are my latest thoughts:

1) The government is way too big and involved way too much in our day to day lives. If we want to keep true freedom, we need minimal government. I am now an Independent but I agree with the Libertarian philosophy on this one.

2) One of the country's biggest problems, if not the biggest, is political parties. George Washington warned us against having them at all and I'm with George on this. So much could be accomplished if all the pettiness of disagreeing just because of party lines were put aside. So many times I have seen politicians actually agree on a matter but somehow manage to argue about it just because they were of different parties.

This has to stop; it is counter productive and ridiculous to have something for the greater good of the country remain un-addressed because of such pettiness.

3) The country needs to move more toward the center and individual freedoms. There are issues being discussed in the government that have no place there. Just because we may not like something doesn't always mean that the government needs to be involved. It is not the government's place to police things that we may find offensive. It is our place as adults to try to act as just that and respect one another as well as our differences. The government isn't there to enforce happiness (it will never make everyone happy) but it was supposed to be there to enforce freedom...it is going in the wrong direction.

Perhaps the answer is to look from the center for compromise that won't make either side any more happy or unhappy than the other. The government needs to get out of our lives on many levels and out of 'micromanagement.' I feel that we need to agree to disagree and find solutions that are 'just acceptable' to the majority and enjoy our diversity. I think it obvious that certain issues just can't be agreed upon and that many of these are the very ones that should be placed back in the hands of the people where there is no law that says one way or the other, just people taking responsibility for their own actions once again.

So where does the government NOT belong? I hope to see a lot of discussion about this. I think that so many things need to be put back into the hands of the individual.

We the People simply need to take more responsibility.

So there you go; some things to rant about.
Long live the Rant Web Pack; make Foamy proud!

[MO]

Glad to hear from you FD!

Hope that the docs can manage your illness so that you can continue to post. I've had some issues recently, but hope to be able to post more in the weeks leading up to this mid term election. Will post more later (after work).