We are so excited! As soon as I saw her picture, I knew she was the one. It was love at first sight. I could not stop thinking about her, and as things unfolded with the litters at Sky Blue Aussies, she was available. We have our eye on another pup who is only 3 days old as of today, so I will fill you in as soon as we know everything is certain with our second puppy. Velcro will have a sister, and most likely she will be coming home a month after Velcro.
Running is minimal but more consistent. I'll talk about that below, after I get the shitstorm off my chest.
Recent Random Thoughts
I haven't been writing on my blog much, it's been hard with all the distractions, between puppy brain and it being Pinktober, the month where cancer and pink become intertwined and there are a lot of things going on. I spoke 3 times in one week, and I have more coming up before the month is through.
I had somewhat of an "aha" moment yesterday when I was thinking about my struggles with getting my program off the ground. It's a challenge to get people to want to do something. Everyone I talk to about it, including healthcare providers, sees the obvious and intense need for this type of education for patients and their caregivers. But there are a lot of barriers to people being able to use it in the way it is intended. I've been barking up the wrong tree trying to get it through the traditional healthcare channels.
One thing I am doing, that should help, is writing a book, which will not only have the program in it, but will also discuss why everyone needs to be in on this. Healthcare is so screwed up and it's only getting worse. Absolutely unsustainable. Yet cancer is about to overtake heart disease as the number one killer of Americans, and our healthcare costs are rising at an insane rate, and our health outcomes and general public health are getting worse. We have more obesity and diabetes, more lifestyle-related illness, and our administrative costs of running the healthcare system are exceeding our ability to put our resources into patient care and education.
Healthcare Heretic Again
I am being the healthcare heretic again, and working to make nurse groups aware of a documentary film project. Health 3.0 is a concept that goes beyond this transactional model, we call it 2.0, of healthcare where physicians or providers don't have relationships with patients, instead they are more of a factory, cranking patients through appointments in 15 minute intervals. Check this out for an example.
This short video is being mild about it. What I wish I had time to say is that all of these cancer centers and freestanding emergency rooms popping up everywhere are only being built because the current system incentivizes it. The hospitals get paid more. They can get reimbursed at a higher rate for emergency room visits and can charge a facility fee for setting foot in a cancer center, rather than an independent oncology practice. This disincentivizes patients from visiting their oncologists for follow-up visits. The hospitals can charge up to $400 for a facility fee alone (not including the doctor's bill) just for having an appointment in a room at the cancer center.
Had I realized just how slimy this whole process was, I would never have supported the local facility as I did half a decade ago. The Big Heist is right. It is a heist, to the tune of 20% of our GDP. Not acceptable. But people need to wake up and get off their obesified butts!
Remember how when we were talking about the need for the Affordable Care Act just a decade ago, lamenting the overuse of emergency rooms because people didn't have insurance for primary care and preventive medicine? Well, now we have high deductible plans again, with rates rising, driving people out of the market, but hospital executives can clean up on higher reimbursements and facility fees. And we're not doing a better job for patients. Dumb and dumber.
Here we are again. The vicious cycle of healthcare, now has consumed independent physician practices, has doctors all working as part of the giant healthcare factory, working at the whim of their employers, being told what to do by insurance companies, and nurses are understaffed and miserable again, physician suicide rates are rising, and nurses are leaving the profession because of burnout and injuries from overwork. There's no nursing shortage, just a shortage of nurses willing to put up with the abuse.
And the people who wrote the ACA: lobbyists for the pharmaceutical industry, hospital executives, and insurance companies, have ensured they will rake in big bucks while starving the masses.
General Random Thoughts about Running
I've been running about 4 days a week on the average. About 6 or 7 miles each time.
I know!!!
It feels good to run when I feel like it and I feel refreshed afterward. My friend Emma is training for her first ultra, so doing long runs with her has gotten me out on the trails. I'm so enjoying this.
I miss my hair color. I now have a streak of reddish brown in the front of my scalp. It's a deep brown with a reddish tint, but it's my natural color. People pay a lot of money to get their hair tinted to that color. Now I have just a streak of it to contrast with my grayish white. What are you gonna do?
I refuse to dye my hair. I am getting too many thumbs up when I run, and I need that for the motivation. Plus it keeps the creepos quiet. Nobody catcalls their grandma. Much preferred this way.
Oh, and one more thing- one day I was actually able to reach my mouth with the toes on my left foot. I haven't been able to do it again, must have been a good flexibility day. I'll keep working on it until I can do it consistently. Then I will post pictures.
photo credit: Donna Rohde, Sky Blue Aussies
