Sixty days...

After some rather extraordinary (and relentless) searching by the CVS pharmacist, he now has the last five bottles of the erythromycin solution from CVS stock nationwide.  He is no longer able to place any further orders.  So, along with the bottle I picked up today, I have 60 days left of the (sort of) economical version of the erythromycin.

I feel like have I have been on a roller coaster with hope and disappointment (and more hope and more disappointment) trying to address the gastroparesis.  Having something that works and then losing it was hard.  Finding an alternative format of the drug then realizing how cost prohibitive it is was brutal.  Deciding to at least plow through retirement for a year, to have some relief was extraordinarily confusing, laced with the fact that I just don't think I am worth the monthly expense.  Then, to find out that CVS had some more bottles so as to delay the costly switch ... up and down and up and down and up and down.

The number of bottles available has also gone up and down.  But, over the past 10 days, since I last fetched my prescription, the pharmacist has been able to get the last of the bottles on his shelf.  He ordered the last four one at a time, working around the limits placed on the ordering system.  That's really more than I need to remember. I just want to remember that he tried so hard, once he got a look at the price of the pills!

So, sixty days.
Sixty days until the math simply won't add up.
Sixty days until I ... well, guilt and confusion will be my companions.

There is this one ... thing.  Everything I have read about Erythromycin and the treatment of gastroparesis notes that it eventually loses its effectiveness.  Now, most of what I read mentioned about six months.  I am on month ten (or thereabouts).  Thankfully, it is still working.  Maybe ... maybe the money won't be an issue because it will stop working for me.  I will say that the pills seemed to do a slightly better job.  If it were not for the money, I would look forward to being able to take them.

$386.  After I pay for all my medications each month, that is how much left I will have for every other expense in my life.  I really dislike math.  I do.  My math stinks ... until the Celebrex generic comes out.  I'm crossing my fingers on that one.  The truly frightening part is that I will not know the exact cost until I start taking the medication.  In pricing it, the cost was first $280, then $320, then $436.  Who knows what it will be in sixty days.  I am trying to avoid that kind of thinking completely, firmly affixing in my mind that the cost will rise no higher.

But the scariest math of all is forecasting.  I did all that financial shenanigans last fall through January because Medicare, drug coverage, car insurance, and house insurance all went up.  The odds are that all those will be going up again next year.  What then?  There's no more maneuvering left in my life.

Have I mentioned that I found a healthier alternative dog food for Amos that is ~$22 less over a two month period (I will be buying a larger quantity each time)?  Or how about the fact that my Taco Bell order has suddenly gone from $2.79 to $3.20?  Oh, how I wish that I could have a day where I don't find myself crunching numbers about something.  Where I stop looking at everything in my life with dollar signs.  While never wealthy, I spent the majority of my adult life not having to worry about money.  Twice I was unemployed.  I realize now than I could have been far more frugal then. In any case, ever since those two periods, I stopped carrying debt save for a mortgage.  Now, I have no debt.  At least not until I start taking those pills, draining the last of my retirement.  SIGH.

Sometimes I feel ancient, not because of my body but because of my mind.  The things I think about, both pondering and fretting, have changed dramatically over the past few years ... especially over the past few months.  Needs and wants.  As I said before, that is the heart of budgeting.  And confusing wants with needs is at the heart of many budgeting mistakes.  I still think about that budgeting approach I wrote about in April: the 50/20/30 rule.  The fact that it takes so many things folk consider needs, such as cable, and puts them in the wants section (lifestyle) is such a positive.  For example, my neighbor, who lives on a tiny salary, visits flea markets and thrift shops and such with her son all the time.  She will talk about how they never spend more than $15 each, but they every weekend.  go twice on a weekend.  That is $30 a week, $1,440 a year on stuff they do not really need.  So, that is their lifestyle spending.  She mentioned that she has cable, because they can afford it.  But she also noted that they have little medical expenses.

I spend ~12% on lifestyle, primarily phone, Internet, streaming, and symphony.  That is less than the budget balance of 30%, but yet I sometimes still feel as if that is still too much.  The financial advisor's stance is that you have to have some enjoyment in your budget.  She thinks I don't have enough.  The surgeon certainly didn't, which is why I chose the symphony, but how do you think about wants without guilt when your needs are so great??

When we were on our Sonic road trip, my neighbor's son talked about how badly he wanted a tablet, such as an iPad.  I brought up how much he spends each week on games and such that he finds at the flea markets and noted that if he forewent those things, he could save up for a tablet.  Now, being autistic, there is a lot he struggles to understand, his mental age being nowhere near his physical age.  But in this case his position was that he thought he should be able to have everything he wanted.  Afterwards, his mother talked about how she's taught him to think that way because she's given him most of what he's wanted all his life because of his autism, because of his struggles. She's begun to realize that she's skewed his understanding of fiscal reality trying to compensate for something that is no one's fault.

I currently know three parents whose children have deliberately accessed credit card information to make secretive purchases.  Children, not teens.  The children do not think that they are stealing, but rather taking what they should be given.  It's their right to have the things they want.  The difference between wants and needs is a foreign concept to them.

I was helping someone with budgeting a while ago and tried to point out the difference in wants and needs in the items that were being listed as expenses.  I failed, because that concept was, again, foreign.  When I was growing up, we had to work for the things we wanted.  We were a chore-heavy household with no expectation of payment for chores.  An allowance was a privilege, not a right.  And earning your own way was an obligation, a duty.  Now, I realize just how precious a gift that parenting stance was.

A dear friend of mine talks about her desire to conquer the world.  I hope she does because it would most certainly be better off.  Anyway, one of my favorite children's poetry books is If I Were In Charge of the World, by Judith Viorst.  The title poem is as follows:


If I were in charge of the world
I'd cancel oatmeal,
Monday mornings,
Allergy shots, and also Sara Steinberg.

If I were in charge of the world
There'd be brighter nights lights,
Healthier hamsters, and
Basketball baskets forty eight inches lower.

If I were in charge of the world
You wouldn't have lonely.
You wouldn't have clean.
You wouldn't have bedtimes.
Or "Don't punch your sister."
You wouldn't even have sisters.

If I were in charge of the world
A chocolate sundae with whipped cream and nuts would be a vegetable
All 007 movies would be G,
And a person who sometimes forgot to brush,
And sometimes forgot to flush,
Would still be allowed to be
In charge of the world.


Student, old and young, used to laugh when I read this one.  It still makes me chuckle, even though I've read it aloud so many times I've practically got it memorized.  Or ... I used to have it memorized.

If I were in charge of the world, seeing what I do now, financial literacy and volunteering would be core subjects starting in first grade.  Reading and writing would be plentiful and praised and given vaunted places in the annals of achievement.  Grammar would still be taught.  Science would begin in kindergarten via gardening.  History would be taught in the lower grades by interacting with seniors.  And homework would not be a factor until middle school.  In other words, reading, writing, critical thinking, and helping others would be highly prized.

If I were in charge of the world, protecting the child rather than the intact family would be most important in cases of abuse.  Repeat abuse would result in harsh, stiff, and punitive consequences.  And talking about abuse would be normal and accepted and carry no stigma.  

The same with folk who drive whilst under the influence.  A driver's license is a privilege not a right.

If I were in charge of the world, common sense and civility would return to our society, as would hand written thank you notes. 

If I were in charge of the world ... well ... I'm not, am I?

I cannot really do anything about the things that bother me out there in the world or even here in my own small patch of it.  I can, however, address the sad state of my weeping cherry tree.  I just took a break from writing and did so.

Headlamp gardening is still rather enjoyable to me, except that lopping off branches hurt my blossom-loving heart.

Necessary pain.

The right side is still a little ... out there ... but if I made the cut for the most offending branch, I would then unbalance the tree too far in the opposite direction.  I thought I would live with this for a while and see if, perhaps, my weeping cherry would start growing more from the top (like a fountain) instead of those funky branches reaching out from the sides.

The other advantage to headlamp gardening is that I could better ignore the browning of my beloved grass.  GREEN grass all summer is a want not a need.  

I am not going to water.
I am not going to water.
I am not going to water.

Baby Bunny watched me work.  Amos didn't see him and so Baby Bunny didn't have to run for his life.  Amos didn't see Baby Bunny, because, whilst I worked, my fluffy white dog was busy "watering" all four wheels of my Highlander.  SIGH.

I wish Amos could learn to distinguish between needs and wants with his "watering" activities.