Drugs! Greed! Sex (ok, not sex...)

I had my biannual visit with Dr. Rao, my neurologist, yesterday, and I came away from the appointment feeling both good and a bit sad. I actually saw a new PA, Jan, while there, which makes four different PAs I have worked with since my injury, along with Dr. Rao, for my neurology needs. The first, Kay, was (and remains) my little Russian hero. Kseniya Bogotova – sounds Slavic, no? She was wonderful, and a huge part of my recovery. Alas, I have not seen her in over two years since she left the practice. She was cute, caring, and helped me in my recovery a great deal. I am sad she is not part of my continued recovery, but the profession works that way, I guess. Jan was very nice, listened to what I had to say, and agreed with my assessment of where I was in the recovery process – which is to say still fairly screwed up. Not in the “I can’t function” way, but I am still dealing with issues from the injury.

The sad part of the visit is I am going to be starting back on two of the medications I was on up until this summer, and then quit (with the agreement and cooperation of my doctors – NEVER cease a medication regimen without your doctors’ input!) because I wanted to see if I could thrive without taking all the rather heavy meds I was on. I had a secondary reason, as well, as I had started to work on my pilot’s license again this year, and could not pass a FAA medical while taking some of the meds I was on. Well, the piloting will have to wait longer, as I will be resuming the sleep medication and the ADD drug I was taking, due to the fact that I am rapidly beginning to see the same sleep symptomology and hypersomnolence I was experiencing before, along with some mental ‘fogginess’ during the daytime.

I am quite bummed, as I was determined to NOT have to take these drugs over the long term, and especially not for the rest of my life, as Dr. Rao had indicated might be the case. Oh, well. We’ll try again and maybe at some point in the future I will give coming off the drugs another shot.

The good in all this is that I will once again be taking these drugs. A bit contradictory, I know, but this will provide additional evidence to the attorneys involved in my case that there ARE long-term costs associated with my continuing care, and they all need to get off their butts and settle the case I have against the bank’s insurer – AIG. Now, there is a LOT I could say about AIG, and the people in that company I have had to deal with, but I will hold my tongue. Needless to say, when I first heard AIG was asking for a government bailout because they can’t run their damn business, I was the first on the phone to my congressional representatives to scream “NO F’ING WAY!” That ploy was as effective as a fart in a hurricane, I guess, since the government has bailed them out twice now to the tune of $120 billion, which they have misspent horribly. I hope someone goes to jail.

I know this goes against what you may remember of my “Corporate America RULES” philosophy, but my MBA didn’t brainwash me, it only taught me to think more critically than ever. Being critical of business, especially financial services companies, is not that hard these days, is it? I am significantly distressed at where things sit today in our economy, and in that sector particularly, but that is a topic for a different post. I will say this: My personal situation, that of my former employees and my investors, all of whom have or will lose everything they put into my company with me, is joined in lockstep with the corruption and greed that has put us where we are today. WE made our own bed, though - don’t think it is just the fault of CEOs everywhere - you and I played our parts, too. So, I am angry! At them, yes, but at myself, too. No, I didn’t pull a Thain and ask for $10 million right after I finished the job someone else had started and ran my company into the ground, but I bought into it just like he, and everyone else, did. I remember thinking in 1989 that Gordon Gecko was right – “Greed, for lack of a better word, is GOOD!” Turns out that the morality play that movie was SUPPOSED to be in Oliver Stone’s original intent has actually come to pass. It only took 20 years for it to come to fruition.

Until next time…