THIS BLOG POST COULD SAVE LIVES!!!!! (please share)

Have you ever been in a situation where you could not speak for yourself? For someone with medical conditions, that is a very scary situation to be in. The emblems communicate medical, conditions, allergies, and/or other crucial medical information. To give you a little back story I was in and out of the hospital as a baby, I was born with Hydrocephalus (neurological condition), and Tetralogy of Fallot (heart defect). I had multiple surgeries due to both conditions. I also have allergies to medicines that were discovered during my hospital stays. To top all of that off, I had the main vein in my right arm re-routed to my heart, so you can't take a pulse or blood pressure in that arm. 

 So in 1997 when I was getting ready to go away to college, I thought it'd be a great idea to purchase a Medic Alert bracelet, so that if anything ever happened to me, my college friends/ acquaintances would not need to remember my specific medical conditions or the part about no blood pressure in my right arm. Fortunately, there was never a situation when I was in college where the info on the bracelet was needed. After college the next time I left home was when I moved in with my husband. By then I had still decided to wear the bracelet because I knew I wasn't going to be near someone with my medical information memorized 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

 The photos below are of my Medic Alert bracelet. (I covered up my personal info on the back) You can see part of the 1-800 number at the top. Underneath it has the most important medical info visible, and at the bottom is my member number.  Whenever a person is found at an accident scene or anywhere else where they are unable to communicate with anyone, the bracelet is how this info is communicated. You call the 1-800 number at the top, and give the operator the member number so that the operator can give you (the person who found the victim) any crucial medical info. the operator can also contact family and doctors of the victim. 

I lived my life for 16 years thinking that every single first respondent/ paramedic knew about these medical emblems. I discovered in 2013 that not every paramedic knows what they are for.  I was involved in a car accident. When the paramedics arrived on scene, I was mentally shaken up and even though I was conscious, I was still not speaking clearly. Neither of the paramedics looked for my bracelet, and when I pointed it out, they didn't seem to know what to do with it. They even tried to take my pulse in my right arm. (In paragraph one, I mentioned you can't do that on me.) 

I was able to point out the 1-800 number and the member number so that they could at least call that before my husband had arrived on the scene (I had called him after I dialed 911.) Things could have been a lot worse had I not have been able to speak for myself. 

 I believe that my story needs to be shared by everyone. There are thousands of people out there that wear different types of medical emblems for different medical reasons. Apparently the simple procedure to read the emblem and dial the 1-800 number on the back is not discussed in paramedic or nursing classes. 

Please share this blog to get this IMPORTANT LIFE SAVING INFORMATION out. I had not waited since 2013 to tell my story. I have emailed my local news stations multiple times over the past 2 years. They'd rather report about major ice cream brands that were finally put back on shelves and the design choices of a major coffee chain's holiday cups..... I highly doubt that those stories saved anyone's lives.

     

10 year "Engageaversary"

Jason and I were at my cousin Melissa's wedding in Virginia Beach. At the reception he 

caught the garter and I caught the bouquet. It was a sign... The next day October 13th our

 flight back to Texas, Jason kept asking me to stand up and move back a row. I didn't know it 

was so he could get down on his knee and propose. I didn't stand up because 9/11 had just

 happened the year before and I didn't want to freak anyone out by changing seats, so he

 had to think of another way.

So he borrowed my palm pilot and found the date 3/22/03. Then he typed "My wedding" 

and handed it back to me. Since it wasn't 2003 and (at that moment) I was not engaged, I 

thought he had someone else's palm pilot!!! While I was staring at it trying to figure out who's 

it was, he pulled my Grandmother's 50th wedding anniversary ring off my right hand and 

then put it on my left hand (We had discussed him using it before). Of course I said, "YES!!"

After we landed Mom picked us up and asked how the flight went. I kinda shook my left 

hand and said "This guy proposed to this girl <pause for reaction> and she said yes!!" Mom 

did not catch on at first. Then we walked over to baggage claim and Mom finally asked me 

what the ring was doing on my left hand. I just said, "Remember that couple on the plane 

that I told you about....."

I apologize for the weird layout.... Havent used this in a while......

Wow, It's Been a While...

Sorry for my lack in posts. I've been very busy lately helping out friends and working on my family tree. I have been working on every single branch of my and my husband's family tree. So far I have not found any proof to the rumor that my maternal grandfather's cousin was the tin man on the "Wizard of Oz", but on my paternal side, I did find out that one of my seventh great grandfather's was Hans Herr. He was the first Mennonite bishop in the new world. His house was built by his son Christian Herr in 1719 is the oldest Pennsylvania German settlement still in existence today. Their house is open to the public as a museum, and is located at 1849 Hans Herr Drive in Willow Street, Pennsylvania. I would really like to visit there one day.

In Portsmouth Ohio (where my parents are both from) on my maternal grandma's branches there is a street named after her family, which I believe my grandma's great granddad's was one of the first settlers in Portsmouth. I have also seen (or heard of) at least 2 or 3 car dealerships in Portsmouth run by very distant family cousins with other last-names. My paternal Granddad was Portsmouth's mayor back in the 1950's.

With the help of some of my cousins and one of my uncles, I have been able to put faces to several names on my tree. More recently with help from a tweet to ancestry.com and the "Barefoot Genealogist", I was able to locate marriage records for a set of my paternal great grandparents and one of their sets of parents.

Time to get back to my research!!!

Are you Siri-ous??

     So I finally decided to jump on the bandwagon and become an iPhone user. I really needed a new phone because my Droid was having what I called "phone seizures". I am not sure if a button was getting stuck or if it was trying to do an update or what. The phone would start cycling through different screens and contacts and would not quit until the battery was removed. Also, on the droid, it wasn't staying charged as long as it used to. The final funny thing that my droid did was when my family was sitting at the dining room table for our Thanksgiving meal and I think it was my Mom or Dad who asked, "Who wants to say grace?" Right on cue I got a text or email and my phone said, "Droid."


        As an early Christmas gift this year I got the iPhone 4S. So far , my favorite feature is "Siri" the talking assistant. Just yesterday I told Siri "I love you." and it replied "I hope you don't say that to other phones!" Then I asked her if she would marry me and she said no because she didn't know who I was. Apparently I needed to identify myself in my contact list on my phone. Tonight I asked her if she could change a diaper after one of my Facebook friends said she wished that Siri could. I asked my Siri and her reply was "I don't know what you mean by 'Can you change a diaper for me.' " Just now my friend Jennifer had told her's "You are the wind beneath my wings" and Siri said "I am?" then Jennifer said yes and then Siri said "I thought so!" 


       Siri is also good with reminding me to do things, which is perfect for me and my short term memory. I can tell her what I need to remember and when she should remind me. Her reminders always arrive on time. She is my equivalent of Jem's  Synergy. Synergy was a holographic computer system that created realistic holograms of virtually anything using special star-shaped earrings, Synergy transformed Jerrica into the glamorous pop singer, Jem when she would say, "Showtime Synergy!"  Just now I tried "Showtime Siri" and all she told me were movie times for the nearest theaters..

So I guess one day we will be going from this:

To this:

       

Like I chose to have 2 major surgeries back to back.....

Well it looks like our last apartment complex didn't appreciate our cleaning before we moved out. The only reason we lived in that particular apartment in our old complex is because 2 years ago I had a heart valve replaced and then my shunt replaced. I also had the Chiari Malformation which for a while had messed up my coordination on  stairs. The nice landlord that we had at the time let us move from the upstairs apartment we lived in to one on the ground level.
       I guess our first mistake was not having to go through all the formalities of renting a new apartment. We payed a $200 deposit for the ground level apartment and got $000 back when we moved out. There was a new landlord when we moved out. She was the one that didn't know how to change a light bulb and lost 2 months or more of our rent payments. I would have written this blog entry sooner, but I was giving that complex the benefit of the doubt and thought they'd actually get a check to us.
       Again, because the move was so sudden back then we did not go through all the formalities of signing a brand new lease, nor did we have any paperwork in our possession. Jason wasn't really surprised that we never got our money back. ..... 

Why don't you just send Ronnie the bill?

Well folks, do you recall in my last entry how the phone company told me that in 2 weeks our name should be on the caller ID? GUESS WHAT? It still hasn't changed. We are still hearing from people we call that our name shows up as "Ronnie Murphy". Did he agree to pay our bill? They also advertise a "whole house" DVR. We are supposed to be able to start watching in one room and be able to start where we left off in another room. That didn't work for us either. We ended up messing with some wires that the installer put in and finally got rid of an error called "ocap" I think they left an "R" out. (o-crap).
       Next, I was at a friend's house the other night trying to connect wirelessly to their internet, and it wouldn't connect. I never had that problem with our last ISP.  Shouldn't we be exempt from paying the bill or at least get a discount? Speaking of bills, lately we've been getting mail for other past residents. At least we can recycle paper. Does your city charge you to recycle? We recently discovered ours does. We thought it'd be the other way around. Can we forward the bill to Ronnie?

Unlucky Technology...

     So we finally get settled into our new place and then we'd like to get our TV, phone, and internet hooked up. We only have a couple options here and I'm beginning to wonder why we stuck with the one that we did. First they kept "losing" our order for new service. Then instead of putting our appointment back on the original date, they kept moving it back!! (Like it was our fault and not their's that the appointment had disappeared.) I'm sure they've never had to go 3 weeks without cable, phone, or internet.
      Once we get it hooked up finally, there were several "hidden charges" in the bill and the technician had brought us the wrong modem. Again apparently it "must have been our fault" that all this happened because we had to argue with the customer service rep to get it fixed. So finally I use modern technology and social media to contact/ complain. I tweeted our final issue about the caller ID showing a different name and was told every 48 hours for the past 6 days that the name had been changed to mine and it would take 24-48 hours to correct it. The tech always initialed what he said, so tonight I knew I was talking to the same guy who changed the time that the caller ID would take to change up to 2 weeks!!! Why tell me 48 hours before? So I'm not really sure if it will now be 2 weeks from today that it will be fixed (yeah right). So if "Ronnie Murphy" calls you.... answer.... it will be me or Jason.
            So that was one technology problem that I'm having. The other is my cell phone. The apps are starting to crash before they're opened and I've restarted my phone several times. I guess I'll have to do a hard reset.... GRRRR!!!! WHY!!!!