This and that......

I have surgery scheduled tomorrow morning to repair the (re)fracture of my right wrist.  Details in the posts below on the saga of my right arm.  Needless to say, I am frustrated and beyond upset (I can only imagine how my stress level is affecting my hormone balance right now-----I had hormonal blood work done Friday, but I'm having hot flashes indicative of low progesterone.)   I wanted to post today, since I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be doing much at the computer this week!

First up, from The Age.com, an  article about the progress on a genetic blood test that will predict the age that a woman will reach menopause.  This could be immensely useful not only for women trying to plan families, but also for women who wish to start (bioidentical) hormone therapy before they reach menopause. Often a woman can predict their menopause transition based on when their mother experienced menopause, but if the mother has had a partial/complete hysterectomy, is dead, or is not the daughter's birth mother, or several other factors, daughters are left to guess at when they will go through the menopausal transition.

I'm so stressed out right now I want to eat everything in sight, and much of it isn't healthy.  I'm craving Brach's malted milk Easter eggs (and Brach's is the only acceptable brand.....I'm picky).  I know that music can calm me down or wind me up, and right now Pharrell William's song "Happy" is one of my favourites. Check out this article from Huff Post Healthy Living about using your iPod to help manage your emotions.  During my "downtime" this week, I need to hop on iTunes and listen to the songs on the sample list.

As I have detailed before, I take estriol cream for vaginal dryness.  The medical term is atrophic vaginitis, and here is a list of symptoms from The Mayo Clinic.  I got a new prescription for the cream a couple months ago, and when Greenfield Pharmacy sent me the cream, they neglected to send the adapter for the jar, which is necessary to get the cream from the jar into the vaginal applicator.........and Greenfield forgot to send the applicators too!  I called and very sweetly and politely asked for the supplies needed to administer the estriol.  Got them in the mail a week later.  I called Greenfield Pharmacy to refill the prescription a couple weeks ago, and it never occurred to me to ask them include the jar adapter (mine has a tear in it from putting it on and off the jar every time I use it) and some syringes.  The bottle arrives Tuesday, and......you guessed it.....no supplies.  I called the pharmacy, explained the situation.  First person either had no idea what I was talking about or didn't want to be bothered, so she switches me to another person.  I explain the whole issue again and the tech says "well, we'll see what can be done."  I was furious, and I called them back five minutes later and told them not to bother, I would get the supplies elsewhere.  The compounding pharmacies tout their superior, personalized service, but it has been my experience that they are no better than the big box pharmacies, and in most cases, are worse.

I have a couple more articles to share with you, but this post has taken me forever to type, and I need to go ice my arm again (story of my life this week.)  Enjoy this first full week of April.......I hope that it's spring wherever you are!