June 2010
1 post
new site!
i am switching to a new site!!! check out some projects and blog space…
health + illness take 2!
May 2010
6 posts
just take it...
just take it
but i don’t want to
just take it. 2 months. give it a try. i’m writing you a prescription anyways.
zoloft:sertaline hydrochloride
selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor
(1S-cis)-4-(3,4-dichlorophenyl)-1,2,3,4-tetrahydro-N-methly-1-naphthalenamine hydrochloride)
C17H17NCl2-HCl
dibasic calcium phosphate dyhydrate, D & C Yellow #10 aluminum lake (in 25 mg...
universal truths?
i found this image in the newest issue of the New Yorker yesterday
who are these characters, and what are the universal themes to which they can’t connect? their bodies are “different” than the “normals” (Erving Goffman, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity), so how do their bodies allow or dis-allow them to connect to the themes they speak of?
It...
my steroid: a love story
one of my rheumatologists is hard to get a hold of. i never get to talk to him. i need more steroids and anti-malarials (methylprednisolone and hydroxychloroquine). he needed to call them in to the pharmacy. i needed to get them, so i could take them in the morning. my steroid. my morning engagement.
his office didn’t get it to me in time. i went the morning without it.
i...
today's breakfast
starting top left and working clockwise:
oatmeal with 1/2 an apple, 4 strawberries, and a handful of raisins
coffee with soy milk
water
leftover egg caserole
pile of pills - starting top left and working clockwise:
Xanax (alprazolam) 0.25mg
Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine) 200mg
Medrol (methylprednisolone) 2mg
Vitamin B Super Complex
Multi-Vitamin made with whole food
Aspirin 81mg
...
another piece for elizabeth
a poem 38 times for Elizabeth
photographic slide box, poem, paper
“Elizabeth Fleischmann-Ascheim died in 1905 from radiation burns. She was a pioneer in the field of X-ray technology. “American’s Joan of Arc.”
an MRI, some pills, an EEG
Yesterday, i had an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) of my brain: with and without IV contrast - meaning the first part of the MRI didn’t use a contrast and about halfway through, i was pulled out of the tube and injected with the contrast solution - the contrast being “gad” which can be a shortened name for many things - i don’t remember what mine was: gadodiamide - some...
April 2010
3 posts
a little bit of a hiatus
i realize that i haven’t been posting much, or at all. hold on folks, more is on the way…soon…i hope.
the idea of the blog stems from a personal place - my own experiences of times of health and illness - hence the title… so, right now, i have been going through a period of health issues. i’m supposed to slow down with everything that i am doing and am told to...
the Visible Woman
A slice of the Visible Woman. She was revealed in 1995 - the Visible Man was revealed in 1994. The Visible Man and Woman are part of the National Library of Medicine’s Visible Human Project. This project seeks to present the body much like an encyclopedia. The body is preserved, sliced, documented, and presented to the body as an educational tool.
In this image, we see the Visible...
Elizabeth Fleischmann-Ascheim
Visit this link and listen to the short audio track about Elizabeth Fleischmann-Ascheim - the first woman radiologist who we have all somehow forgotten.
seeing inside the body
the image to change photographic and medical histories - the first x-ray of Dr. Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen’s wife Anna Berthe’s hand.
I just finished reading Roentgen’s first paper on x-rays: “On a New Kind of Rays (Preliminary Communication)” written in December of 1895. It was strange reading his explanation of using the term x-ray in his 2nd footnote:
For...
March 2010
12 posts
a stigmatized excerpt
From Erving Goffman’s Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1963), 4-5. (Be mindful of the dated-ness of the text in regards to examples of some stigmatized individuals. However, this does not make the text any less useful for us. It even helps to explain the dated examples…)
“The term stigma and its synonyms conceal a...
some reflections on HR 3590
I watched the passage of the Heath Care Reform Bill on C-Span Sunday night. I was glad that it passed, but I had other things to think about that evening and couldn’t really “get into” it.
Now, I reflect on this bill, just signed by the President yesterday, that is to become law in a couple weeks. I ask myself: what does this bill and soon-to-be law really mean? What does...
HR 3590
219 Yeas
212 Nays
Just watched the passing of the Health Care Reform Bill on C-Span.
1 tag
some poetry
From Duino Elegies (1912-22) by Rainer Maria Rilke translated from the German by David Young (1978).
from the Seventh Elegy
There’s nowhere, my love
the world can exist
except within.
Our lives are used up
in transformations
and what’s outside us
always diminishing
vanishes.
...
Dems to watch-out for! →
I like this graph. The colors, the text, the names!
These are the democrats to be on the look-out for, supposedly. Do they hold all our health-fates?
a doctor's explanation i may or may not have heard
You know, stress isn’t good for you.
You should really try to eliminate that from your life.
Stress is bad.
It can make you sick.
Really fuck up your insides.
You know, your immmuuuunnnne system.
That’s where all the little warriors are.
Inside your blood.
They wait around.
Get ready.
Train a little bit.
And then
BAM
They go on the attack when called.
Someone deep...
a letter to Elizabeth Fleischmann
Elizabeth Fleischmann was an important figure in x-ray history. She was one of the few women involved in the history and had her own roentgenology clinic in San Francisco. Her clinic worked closely with the U.S. military forces during the Spanish-American war. Those injured in the Philippines were brought to San Francisco to her clinic.
She suffered from radiation burns on her hands and...
1 tag
a letter to Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen - discoverer...
Dear Mr. Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen,
If you only knew what your discovery would do to a wretch like me! What it would do for me!
There is no doubt that your discovery saved me. My pain that emanates from the inside in undetectable to eyes that the search the outside surface of my skin - skin that is visually impenetrable. Or so I thought!
I sat up in bed and the machine came to me! Came to me...
1 tag
Lupus resources
I went to an Educational Coffee event put together by the Lupus Foundation’s Illinois Chapter yesterday. it was small. only myself, my partner, another young woman, another woman and her partner, and the woman who was giving the presentation. it was informal. she had many paper materials to give us. One of them was a list of different resources for those living with Lupus. I think many...
do politics ever catch up?
Article in the NY Times today: “Obama Calls for ‘Up or Down’ Vote on Health Care Bill.” The last quote in this article particularly struck me. Robert Gibbs, Obama’s press secretary, says that “the president has always subscribed to the notion that the politics will catch up.”
What does this mean, especially in this situation? That the notion of...
The BRAIN!
A few things about the brain. First of all, Brain Awareness Week is coming up! March 15-21st! The Dana Foundation (private philanthropic organization that supports brain research through grants and educates the public) claims to have the official site for Brain Awareness Week (BAW). There will be two events in Chicago:
1. Chicago Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting at Depaul on 3.25.2010
...
February 2010
23 posts
Differently-Abled Bodies →
Event that just happened last week as part of the series Bodies: Linked Events put on by the Center for Performance Studies at UCLA.
The event featured a panel discussion called “Choreographing Disability” with Petra Kuppers - on faculty at U of Michigan in Performance and Disability Studies - and Victoria Marks - on faculty at UCLA and teaches choreography in the World Arts and...
Obama's proposal →
Obama’s proposal outlined on White House’s website.
Obama's health bill plan largely follows senate... →
Obama revealed his healthcare legislation to bring awareness back to the issue and grapple with the divisive partisanship in Congress.
He proposes to extend coverage to 31 million Americans, costing $950 billion over a decade, though bringing down the deficit by $100 billion by reducing costs and fraudulent spending. His proposal, however, lacks a public option.
some politics for ya! petition at moveon.org →
“We’ve had enough of Democrats like Blanche Lincoln who listen to big corporations instead of their constituents. We urge you to challenge her in the primary and we’ll work hard to support you if you do.”
Obama to urge oversight of insurers' rate... →
article in the NY Times today. Today, Obama is proposing legislation that would give the government the ability to block insurance company rate increases. his legislation is somehow supposed to bridge the gap between the bills put forward by the House and the Senate.
This legislation is supposed to keep check on the rates that have run rampant in recent years - ex: 39% increase for CA’s...
DSM-5: The Future of Psychiatric Diagnosis →
Visit this site to track the revision developments of the DSM.
Revising book on disorders of the mind →
This is a NY Times article from Feb. 10th, so about 2 weeks ago.
The article talks about how the DSM - the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is being revised. Many definitions of disorders are changing - some may be subsumed by other disorders (ex: Asperger’s may become a part of autism spectrum disorder) and some may change entirely (ex: sex addiction becomes...
some texts
From Illness as Metaphor and AIDS and Its Metaphors by Susan Sontag:
Illness expands by means of two hypotheses. The first is that every form of social deviation can be considered an illness. Thus, if criminal behavior can be considered an illness, then criminals are not to be condemned or punished but to be understood…treated, cured. The second is that every illness can be considered...
International Museum of Surgical Science
I went to the Museum of Surgical Science today. I went particularly to see the shows that are part of the Anatomy in the Gallery series there. This series invites contemporary artists to show work that involves the body in some way. The artists there now, and unfortunately the shows close this friday, are Carol Chase Bjerke and Masako Onodera. There are many, many more fascinating things at...
Ariana Page Russell →
Found out about this artist today. She has an autoimmune disease just like me. Unlike mine though, her’s affects her skin and results in hypersensitivity because of excessive amounts of histamine that dilate her capillaries and cause welts.
She uses her own skin as a canvas, exploring what happens when her skin is subjected to different prods, touches, and pokes. She can create patterns...
Christa Donner at +medicine cabinet
Christa Donner’s installation, Non-Prescription, is now up at apartment gallery space +medicine cabinet which also houses the space secondBEDROOM.
You walk into the bathroom and the medicine cabinet above the sink is open. Instead of reflecting back to you your image, it shows you your insides. Your organs pop out at you. They complicate what you may know about your body’s biology...
Visual Cultures of Contagion, Hygiene, and...
Today, at the CAA (College Art Association) Conference in Chicago, there is a lecture/panel discussion about illness and the image: Visual Cultures of Contagion, Hygiene, and Convalescence, ca. 1870-1940. Speakers include:
Marni Kessler, University of KansasFriction and Contradiction in Edgar Degas’s “Le Pedicure” Fae Brauer, University of East London and University of New South...
1 tag
Niet Normaal + Difference on Display →
Niet Normaal is an exhibition curated by Ine Gevers going on in Amsterdam. Not Normal. It investigates what it is to be normal, what it is to be “not normal” - abnormal. Who decides what is normal? Who maintains this distinction? The show runs through March of this year. I wish I could go participate in this landmark show.
Issues of dis/ability are pertinent right now. What is...
methylprednisolone
humanizing a drug:
Methylprednisolone likes to drive fast.
He picked me up in his car the other day.
He didn’t stop at one stop sign or stop light.
I saw him yesterday from my seat on the #77 bus. I saw him through the front windshield.
He was in his car, driving.
He made a left hand turn too quickly and hit a woman crossing in the crosswalk. She skid across the road.
He stopped in...
introduction to health + illness
The purpose of this blog is to discuss and document issues surrounding the body, dis/ability, illness, health. It is meant to serve as an investigation into these issues, prying them apart, looking into them a little bit deeper, maybe even deeper than that. Medications will be discussed. Healthcare is a topic of great concern. Body criticism. Art. Activism. Anything and everything.