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Here I am, stuck in bed, watching night after night of dismal health news. I don’t usually get upset when the weekly “new cancer culprit” story breaks, but over the last couple of days scientists have uncovered some unexpected sources of ill health. First there was the news that working at night increases a person’s cancer risk because the body doesn’t make enough melatonin when it sleeps during daylight hours. Yesterday, we learned that doctors are inappropriately using CT scans, a habit that is increasing cancer rates (I had a CT scan two months ago. Didn’t think twice about it). And today we have a study from the University of Michigan that claims that exposure to violent media increases a person’s risk of aggressive behavior at close to the same rate that smoking cigarettes would lead them get lung cancer. (Can I just say that I have been arguing that violent media promotes aggressive behavior for 20 years. It’s common sense people. Humans are imitative creatures. I also find it interesting that the concept of violence in /violence out is only credible when framed as a medical problem). In the last year we have seen studies showing that long commutes cause high blood pressure, increased heart rates, back and neck pain, short-term memory loss, chronic frustration, and illness. Once you arrive at your job, after that long commute, your body is in for even more abuse. According to the Mayo Clinic, sitting on the job all day is harmful to our health. For a society so attached to the notion that we are improving our quality of life through technological advancements, it seems like culturally we are heading toward barbarism. We are building lifestyles that damage our minds and our bodies. Wine appears to be nature’s cancer fighter, but our decade seems to be unwittingly raising our wine glasses in a toast to the grim reaper.

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World’s shortest blog post. I had surgery today and I survived. They removed bone from my leg and put it in my head. Now I am walking with a cane, actually not, cuz I don’t have it yet. Pain killers are good. And my lovely friend Vicky brought me lentil soup and Jessica carted me around all day. The end.

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Photo courtesy the Nebraska State Historical Society

In the interest of honesty I have decided to disclose, to the world, something kind of crappy that is going on with me. Why? Because I have been dealing with this “something” for two years and it is more or less always a part of my daily life. This problem is costing me beaucoup de money (which causes me ongoing anxiety — let’s just say I could have bought a 2007 Corvette with the dough I am paying) and it has affected my appearance and my overall health. No, I don’t have cancer. No, I am not dying. Two years ago I found out that I have an aggressive and rare form of periodontal disease that was destroying the bones of my teeth, jaw, and sinus cavity. Although strangely it wasn’t causing me any pain. The problem was that if the bone continued to deteriorate at the rate it was going, I would lose all my teeth within five years and I would not be able to replace them. Fixing this situation was going to take a long time because I would need to heal for months between each surgery. My dentists tell me that eventually they will put me back together, but right now, to use a house repair analogy, I feel like a room that just had the carpet ripped up, the wallpaper stripped, and a wall knocked down, and now the workman are telling me that they need another year to put in a new wall, mount wood paneling, and refinish the floors.

The silver lining for all this is that I am becoming a little less vain and a little more sensitive toward people who have ongoing health problems; I am more willing to let other people help me, especially my mother; and while money worries do paralyze me at times, I can feel that I am shifting into hope, hope that everything will be all right no matter what; and hope that I will make the sacrifices that I need to make in order to pay for all this. Oh, and in August I noticed that I had lost 16 pounds without even trying! What was that I said about vanity…?

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