I have an irrational fear of dentists and bugs. Seeing either makes me feel like I'm legitimately having a heart attack.
Man, good thing you never joined the military. You'll spend your first three days going through medical test after medical test. I got my wisdom teeth pulled with general anesthesia and whatever the fuck they gave me wore off pretty quickly that I needed three injections of it. Good times
Just an FYI, if it's Prilosec or Nexium (essentially the same drug, omeprazole is the generic name for one of them) or Prevacid (generic lansoprazole), don't take them for an extended period of time. If you keep having heartburn issues, switch to something like Tagamet (generic cimetidine) or Zantac (generic ranitidine), as long-term doses of Prilosec, etc. can cause kidney failure.
Spoke too soon. At urgent care from blood coming out. Of the ass. Times like this, I wish I had friends.
If I could, I'd be there for you. I'm poking around the various folks I know on Facebook to see if anybody might be local to you.
Diverticulitis? That can cause bleeding in your colon. It also might explain the fevers and the blood pressure problems.
Bleeding out of the rectum is normally a broken vein. That is actually not that unusual for a person approaching middle age. Getting older is so much fun, huh?
That is called the sunshine discount. I. E. so many people want to live here for tge weather that the wages get bid down. Companies love it and workers hate it but it is the reality in many fields.
@Anna, you are a vet so go sign up for the VA in La Jolla. It should be free for your minus a $5 copay for prescriptions. I believe you mentioned you had medicaid, if so, the VA works with that and your out of pocket costs for all medical care will be free. I recently burned my arm on the job and am going through the workers comp process to get compensation but rather than use my employer's health care I just went to the VA because it is better care for free.
If it's fresh red nosebleed type blood, it's probably a hemorrhoid, or a fissure. The kind of blood in your stool you have to be scared of is when you poop black.
Yep, the doc said it felt like something was there. He said I should probably look into getting a camera up there, cuz I've had bright blood before, but nothing that could pass for frigging blood outta the other end.
Yes, you qualify for free for the first five years after discharge, if you have at least a 10% VA disability rating then you get it free for life no matter how much you earn (with at least a 10% VA rating no copays and everything is free), and even if you don't get any disability rating you still get insurance for life if you meet income qualifications which are pretty damn generous. It is well worth checking out. Are you a title 10 vet? Did your ship ever get forward deployed? Just being any where in the Gulf automatically makes you a combat vet and eligible for expanded benefits. Bring your DD214 member 4 copy, your driver's license, and social security card, and let them say no rather than just assuming you don't qualify. Also bring anything else like medical records or a certificate of honorable discharge, or any awards you got (because some medals qualify you for expanded benefits).
Unless you took Pepto-Bismol, in which case your poop is going to be really black regardless. If it's really fresh it's just a broken vein at the bottom end. That'll take a week or so to heal up.
Like Dinner said, the VA is available even if you only served one enlistment contract. My son just got out recently, and also thought that you could only get VA benefits if you retired, but to his surprise he only pays a small co-payment. And being in the VA system automatically ensures that you won't get "fined" come tax time for not having medical insurance.
So, do I just call my local branch to get set up? It's right about time for me to renew my insurance anyway.
I don't know know how my son got signed up. His next door neighbor (also a young vet) told him how to do it. But I will call him and find out and get back with you about it.
Okay I just called him. He just called his local branch of "Warrior Project" which I guess is set up to get recently discharged vets into the VA program. You might have to google this because it could be different region-by-region. But he said just explain your situation and they can get you started. The exams are free, there is a co-payment for medications. Once in the system you get paperwork for your taxes that serves as having health insurance (he has no actual insurance - just the VA). Hope that helps - pretty much everything Dinner explained. You really can't beat it, but appointment times might be a bit of a wait. BTW most VA hospitals do not have emergency care or trauma centers if that's an issue - but other than that they have pretty much everything else.
The La Jolla VA Medical Center (next to UCSD) does drop ins while the Mission Valley VA only does appointments. La Jolla VA opens at 6am for registrations, just go in the main entrance, walk up to the help desk, and make a right. You will see a huge sign that says new veteran enrollment. That is where you want to go. Bring the three things I listed above and they will even fill put the paperwork for you.
Oldfella, the VA La Jolla has emergency care and is a full functioning hospital. Once she is enrolled she can also go to tge Balboa Naval Medical Hospital on Park Blvd as well as the Marine Corp Hospital in Oceanside. If memory serves tgere are a half dozen VA clinics in the county but those dp not have emergency care. In a real emergency you can go to any hospital and the VA will cover it.
It took me ten years to bother to sign up for the VA and I wish I did it years earlier because it would have saved me thousands. Not to mention there are a shit ton of benefits above and beyond free medical care for life. Don't forget to also sign up for CalVets with the state because not only would you get 50% off on all UC, CSU, and junior colleges in the state but your kids can eventually attend those places for free as well. Think about that, you could have as many or as few children as you like and all of them can go to college for free up to doctorate level if they want. Yeah, that is worth signing up for.
Well the VA covering emergency care is something my son doesn't know about - I need to tell him about that rather than have him try to "suck it up" if he's injured because he doesn't have the money for a trauma center visit. Yes I never went to the VA for many years because I thought "disability" meant legs blown off or severe brain injuries, not just partially fucked up like me.
"Partially fucked up" is pretty much everyone that didn't get booted out the service during P-days for drugs. Techman thought the same shit about not taking away from vets with real injuries in the weeks leading up to his hear attack and we know how that turned out.
