As I hinted in my last blog entry, my great-grandmother is responsible for my general attitude about the medical profession. My great-grandmother was a nurse, and to be frank thought doctors were a bunch of idiots (not the word I want to use). All her life she relied on natural and herbal remedies, never took anything stronger than aspirin oh, and some shots of whiskey, and lived to be 98 years old. She died on August 31, 1970 and I was fifteen years old at the time, so I still remember her quite well. She was a feisty woman, who told it like it was and didn’t mince words, or language for that fact. My grandmother and mother always said my personality reminded them of her, so that will give you an idea of “where I’m at”.
Now I’m not saying I don’t have health problems, I do, the most defeating at times is my arthritic type joint pain in general, and now of course, as I mentioned previously, my carpal tunnel and wrist injury…and like my great-grandmother I refuse to take anything stronger than aspirin (I skip shots of whiskey as I just plain don’t care for it). I rarely go to the doctor, save for when I have a bout of bronchitis, and will agree to take antibiotics for it, but nothing else, and I’m even picky about them. Once, my doctor prescribed an antibiotic, one I never had before and not a penicillin type either which doesn’t effect me too badly with side effects. Well, I did get the prescription filled but before I took it, I read up on it via the myriad of prescription drug websites. It was Cipro (ciprofloxacin hydrochloride) and clearly stated right off the bat was a severe warning…DO NOT TAKE if one has joint pain and there was an increased risk of tendinitis and tendon rupture. I further read that a lot of class action suits were against this medication as many people who took it, became virtual wheelchair bound people. Lovely. Did I want to take it? No way! I managed to get the prescription changed to Augmentin, an antibiotic I’ve had before.
Then there was the time my doctor recommended Celebrex….another winner in my eyes, since once again, a severe warning was listed as it could trigger blood clots, strokes and heart attacks. Did I take it? Again, no way. In my opinion if one were to read the general possible side effects of most medications, people would never take anything. The worse was an incident years and years ago, with another doctor, one I actually liked a lot. I was having one of my bouts of bronchitis and he prescribed not only an antibiotic, but an asthma type medication…both were medications I had used before but separately never combined. Well this was long before I had a computer, so couldn’t look them up to see about interactions. So I took the prescriptions to my pharmacist, handed them over and he nearly fainted. He said if I had taken that combo, well lets put it this way, I wouldn’t be writing this…yes, it was a lethal combo of medications. Thank God, my pharmacist caught it though!
The question I often think to myself about medications in general is this. Why don’t the doctors look up medications and ALL their effects? If I were a doctor, each and every time I would prescribe something, I’d take a look on the computer for side effects, drug interactions, food interactions and so forth–I would want my patient to understand all the risks involved in taking anything, not to scare the person, but just to be informed. But alas, doctors don’t do this, do they? Nope.
There’s one story my mother and grandmother often told me about my great-grandmother. This was before I was even “around”, so before I was born. Say my great-grandmother was recommended to be hospitalized for some condition. The nurse would come into the room to give her medications, watch as she take the pills, drink water and “swallow” the pills. Not five seconds would pass after the nurse left that my great-grandmother would take the pills out of her mouth and throw them on the floor and under the bed–in other words, she never took any. Oh, and I know that trick myself…how one can make it look like they are taking pills, drink water and seemingly swallow the pills, but of course, with the trick, one isn’t actually swallowing them…Guess I DO think a lot like my great-grandmother!
It’s a shame though while my great-grandmother was alive, that neither my grandmother, mother, or even I paid much attention to her natural and herbal remedies and what she used for a variety of ailments and wrote them down. The only one I remember is that famous mustard plaster one that can be used to break up congestion in the chest when having a cold or flu, or to use as a natural heat rub. I’ve come up with a few of my own remedies for things using herbs. For instance, years ago, I was plagued with regular bouts of gastritis that made me feel as if I had every football, soccer and basketball team pounding through my gastrointestinal system. NOTHING worked. Not Gas-X, not Maalox, nothing. Then, since I do have a very good herb book which lists every herb and their medicinal uses, I read up on fennel seed, yes fennel seed which tastes like licorice. I would boil up some water, place a teaball filled with the fennel seeds let it brew and drink it and would even eat some of the seeds themselves, and yikes did it ever work! Talk about breaking wind like a machine gun! 
Thankfully I haven’t had gastritis in decades now, perhaps also due to I’m eating better and not eating many fatty, fried foods.
Well I’ll end it here for now and plan to write more about my attitudes about the medical profession and my great-grandmother in my next entry.
©2009~Melanie Neer aka pyewacket
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