Steph and Jilli, you KNOW ITA re:

Makes perfect sense to me. And what I don't get is -- why is Remeron okay in his eyes, but not Ambien? Remeron is a sedating drug, and it's an antidepressant (which I don't want), and it causes weight gain (which he doesn't want to see happen). Ambien? Just helps me sleep.

And I'm no dummy when it comes to drugs. I get that it can cause dependence, but if it's helping a legitimate medical condition, and the patient is okay with possible dependence, then who the fuck cares? That's like doctors who won't prescribe adequate pain meds for patients with chronic pain because they "don't want the patients to become addicted." Well, fuck that. It's chronic goddamn pain. Key word "chronic." It's not going away. So if it's not going away, then why not help your patient to have a decent quality of life with adequately managed pain?

I've made that decision -- without a 20 mgs of Ambien, I can't fall asleep unless I am up for 24-30 hours. I always run out before the end of the month, and I have found that if I take 15 mgs of Xanax an hours before I try to sleep -- usually at about 1, then I can fall asleep within 2 hours.

My doc seems ok so far about Rxing for me, but I have two more refills left on the Ambien and none on the Xanax.

I am not addicted to them -- I am addicted to fucking being able to fall asleep within 1 hour of going to bed, instead of 5-6 hours (or not at all.) I take my citalopram and estradiol like a good girl in the morning; am I addicted to HRT and AD's, too? GIMME THE EFFING SLEEP MEDS. So I can, ya know, sleep.

Sorry. Trigger.

smaonster, you know how happy I am for you, and I feel kinda proud sister-ish of you right now!!! You did it!!

Tons of nothing~ma for Kato.

TCG has been driving his one hour commute home for two hours and I'm not sure he's much closer to home than he was when he started.

Bartleby has a growing (pun intended,sadly) array of these fatty tumors. We get them tested, they come back as lipomas.

It is squishy, and when we feel it, he doesn't indicate pain or even discomfort, and he's getting on towards 10, so it may well just be a lipoma.

There's a non-profit arts organization in my neighborhood that provides all kinds of arts/crafts events at no cost for kids and their parents -- it's geared primarily towards low-income families, but no one is turned away if they're middle-class. They do all kinds of projects and stuff, like painting and mixed-media shit, but also video projects and photo journals. It's pretty cool.

As a fund-raiser, they're putting together a dog calendar, and anyone can submit a picture of their dog with a short description the pooch, and then a "panel of judges" (I assume the kids) will pick 45 dogs to have their pictures in the calendar.

OBVIOUSLY we entered Kato, and this is the picture we submitted: [link] He NEVER does that head-tilt. EVER. I think he knew I was taking the picture for the contest, so he played up his cuteness. Sly pooch.

he played up his cuteness

He sees the opportunity to chase his dreams as a calendar model! Don't mock his dreams, man!

He's not cute--he's gorgeous!

I think you should submit this one.

[link]

Brenda, oh my god, I forgot to post the picture Ginger made of that one: [link] It is my new favorite photo ever. EVER.

OMG. Ther are no words for how awesome that is.

Haaaa, that is amazing.

That one is frame-worthy!