Thread 10 - TalkLair: “The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles.”

[Kucinghitam]

Continuation of previous threads (thread 9).

Although the nights are gradually drawing in, the new lair of JTT escapees is all cosy and homey inside. The hearth is glowing, the walls covered in dubious artwork, books by non-approved authors line the shelves, rugs are down on the floors (and assorted pets curled up on them).

We just won’t mention the gnawed bones of our prey over there in the corner of the cave…

I'm going to look at the middle ground thread tomorrow it looks like it could be a laugh.

I haven't tried the cream yet but I will get back to you when I do. Probably tomorrow. I had some frittata to finish first. I also found an amazing soup in Waitrose today which comes in a plastic bottle and is full of vitamins. It's kale, spinach and turmeric. Now, it might not be amazing flavour-wise although I am a big fan of green soups but given that my diet is so limited at the moment and I can't swallow vitamins it will at least add some much needed nutritious value to my diet.

After typing that I realised that you can probably get liquid multivitamins and of course you can. I shall get some tomorrow!

P.s. I'm sorry I'm so me, me, me, oh my health, obsessed at the moment. Tomorrow I will find something interesting to say that isn't all about my fucking health!

@MouseMinge Hope you don't mind me posting. I haven't used the multivitamin one but I have used their separate Vit D, Vit B12 and Iron sprays and found them very helpful when I couldn't face tablets and was deficient. Superdrug and Boots also sell the brand. Hopefully you will start feeling better soon.

https://www.hollandandbarrett.com/shop/product/betteryou-multivit-oral-spray-60031510

I feel like a wuss compared to Mouse and Cyan's health woes, but yesterday I did something weird to my right knee.

Honestly don't know what, because it was a perfect ordinary workday with an ordinary amount of walking/standing/sitting. At some point I became aware that my kneecap felt like it wasn't "located" properly and the surrounding connective tissue felt uncomfortable; I tried bending my leg, straightening it, standing up, sitting down. Nothing helped.

Overnight the discomfort got worse and by lunchtime the tendons or ligaments or something are really sore whenever I bend that knee. I'm having to sit with my leg elevated straight out.

Fortunately today is a WFH day, because I'm not sure I could do lab work in this state!

Oh dear, Kuc! Sounds like when your elbow seems to fall out of place and you have to kind of hurl your arm outwards to get it to go back? This is something I’d trouble my GP with, if worse tomorrow. Dunno what it is, knees not my speciality. How are your lungs? That’s more my sphere.

I had sudden knee problems in January and found that using a knee support (?brace maybe) helped a lot - about 30 euro from the pharmacy and worth every cent. Knees are as bad as backs (poor Mach got crippled by a dodgy knee summer before last).

The thing I didn't realise at the time was that my knee was very swollen as well as very sore - I had to get the 'extra large' size and put it down to be far too fat, but within a few weeks it had shrunk by at least an inch.

It still might be an idea for you to ask for a referral to a physiotherapist.

I've been seeing a physiotherapist for a while about lower back pain, and she couldn't understand why I wasn't getting fully better - I think she thought I wasn't doing my exercises. Eventually over the summer, we cracked it. Then I started back at Pilates, after the summer break, and I had pain so bad it woke me up... I suspect Pilates may have been what triggered it in the first place, thinking about it.

My teacher is a physiotherapist herself and I've sent her details of what my physio said about what's wrong with me. I've been tonight and she was making me go gently on lots of exercises I'd been doing with gay abandon. Oops.

You're not a wuss, Kuc. Pain is pain and knee pain is horrible because it limits you so much. I hope it's better already but if it's still the same tomorrow off to the GP with you!

I went to the cinema this evening to see Past Lifes. It was okay but unfortunately, I didn't see the last twenty minutes because I fell asleep. I thought I was out of the habit of falling asleep at the cinema but alas no. To be fair to me I was tired and it was perhaps too gentle a film to keep me awake. Snoop told me what I missed and it was very little so that was okay.

That sounds horrid, kuc! Agree to get yourself to the gp if it doesn’t improve.

With the ‘located’ thing, I think I get something like this but without the pain. Mainly in the shower for some reason. It feels like my knee needs to ‘pop’, like the cap has moved about. Sometimes it does pop, which makes me shudder, but most of the time it doesn’t and I’m left with the weird feeling until it eventually goes away on its own.

@MouseMinge I’d like to see Past Lives but I’ll wait until it makes it to MUBI (and they give me yet another free trial!). From the trailer it does look quite sleepy. I love East Asian cinema.

I nearly went to see Past Lives a couple of weeks ago, but couldn't quite rouse myself for the trip to Manchester. I see it's still on, though, also Ken Loach's latest happy tale. Tomorrow would be a good day if I got my shit together.

My knee is slightly less painful today. On this trajectory, I'm hopeful it'll be OK-ish by tomorrow, when I have to do a bit of lab time.

Today I had to pick DDs up from school, take them to their orthodontist introductory appointment, feed them lunch and drop them back at school. Fairly trivial, except when you factor in that I therefore had to also pick up and drop off the car club car (and our nearest ones were already booked up so a fair amount of walking time esp with my dodgy knee). The orthodontist explained the number of appointments DDs would need within the next few weeks/months/years to get their braces fitted - immediate reaction from DDs was "How many? Hell no!" and DH is broadly of that opinion too. DDs don't want to miss so much of school when they're in their GCSE years, and DH also pointed out the amount of hassle it would be for us.

TBH I was also leaning against braces for DDs but am not sure if IBU. I had braces in my teens for wonky teeth, but I could get to and from all my appointments without parental input. Also, I actually had wonky teeth.

By contrast DDs have entirely decent-looking teeth, but our regular dentist was concerned that they were developing somewhat of an overbite and referred them to orthodontics - they've been on the waiting list for almost 3 years and I'd almost forgotten about the referral until the clinic contacted us! I honestly don't think it's much of an overbite at all. But I'm worried it's sort of neglectful to not do the braces, plus if we don't do it now, then when?

@Kucinghitam - my daughter is 42 and recently did the Invisalign thing. She had braces for a couple of years as a teenager but over time the teeth had gone wonky again. They now seem fine again, so it's not something that can only be done on your teens.

My lovely dentist was probably about 30 years old when I met her, with a mouthful of crooked crowded teeth. I asked her which dentist she went to, and she admitted she hadn’t been since her student days, and had only become a dentist because of her sheer terror of them.

Anyway, don’t know if it was because of our talk (I’m a dentistphobe as well), but next time I saw her she had a mouthful of wires and now, 20+ years on, has gorgeous straight teeth, a credit to her profession!

Would your daughters be dealt with on the NHS? MiniPSB's overbite was bad enough that he could be – we were told that it could get painful for him if it wasn't treated.

In the end, we paid to have him treated privately, because he wouldn't otherwise get retainers (stupid decision by NHS). If your DD could get free treatment on the NHS, I'd grab it because it is very expensive in my experience to go privately.

I had braces quite late in my teenage years, and in those days you didn't then have retainers, so they went back to where they were and I wish I had straight teeth. Though not enough to cough up to have them done now.

Yes, it's NHS (as they were referred by our NHS dentist) and there will be retainers after the braces. That's sort of what I meant by "if not now, when?" because this opportunity isn't going to keep being available.

I have straight teeth but a deep bite, so my top front teeth entirely cover my bottom teeth when they meet. It isn’t noticeable to look at from the outside. I was offered braces for this as a teenager but circumstances meant I couldn’t have them. I have SO many problems with my jaw as a result, full-on TMD and currently under a specialist. I’ve even considered jaw surgery in hope of relieving some of the pain. I’m not sure if the braces would’ve helped but I wish I’d had them. It might be worth asking about the risk of TMJ issues if left untreated before ruling it out.

Goodness @CyanCrystalViolet that sounds very alarming! Our dentist had sort of vaguely mentioned "potential jaw pain" when she first referred for braces, but I didn't look further into it.

I'll add this to the family discussion later.

My teeth are also like that, CyanCrystalViolet, though thankfully I don't have any issues with pain. What causes the pain, do you know?

My teeth are weird - it seems to run through the female line as there are a number of aunts or cousins who've had 'too many teeth'. Can't remember the exact number but I had at least 10 double teeth removed between the ages of seven and 13 as they just kept popping out. Then wore braces for a few years to straighten out what was left. Miraculously, they look quite normal.

What causes the pain, do you know?

I think it's that my lower jaw is going up higher than it would if my bite were correct, putting more strain on it. I get massive masseter muscles as a result which I've been getting botox on the NHS for. The difference in my face after a treatment is insane. They build up again after a few months and then my lower jaw starts wandering upwards again, becoming tight and painful. I wake up several times a night with my jaw locked together. If I press against my masseters it feels like I've been punched in the face, like a big bruise. I can't eat anything that requires much chewing or I start getting spasms. It's rubbish. I haven't met the specialist consultant I'm now under yet, but we had an initial chat on the phone and he promised he was going to help me. Just waiting for an appointment to find out how.

That sounds horrible, you poor thing! I hope you get treated for it soon. My jaw aches thinking about it.

I'd never heard of masseters before and just looked at mine. They're a tad bigger than they might be but nothing to look at. The one thing that does bug me is that I clench and grind my teeth in my sleep but that's another issue.

Sounds deeply unpleasant, @CyanCrystalViolet . Sympathies.

Hive mind, can I vent a bit? And maybe look for any words of wisdom that might help?

As you all know I live in the US. My older DS, 45, lives in the UK, as does my DD. DS is autistic (wasn't diagnosed until age 33 so had none of the kind of help autistic children get at school now) but more functional than many, though he has the classic black and white rigid thinking. He gets a small PIP each month but he is (currently) in work as a gardener. When he's not doing that, he gets work on building sites through an agency.

He has a partner now - they moved in together a few months ago. She is 11 years older than him, but they seem to care for each other (and my best friend has that kind of age gap with her husband so I don't see that as a problem). However, they have now been given an eviction notice for their flat, because DS brought a dog in there, strictly against the landlord's rules. According to his partner, there has been some pooing and peeing in the flat too. He took on the dog, who is quite old - 15, a labrador/Staffy mix, from a friend who got a younger dog who was bullying the old dog. DS is a great dog lover. Friend also cancelled a debt DS owed him.

DS is heavily in debt. I have bailed him out many, many times and I am limited in what I can do to bail him out further, currently having a great many unavoidable expenses of my own. He also drinks heavily. He may be an alcoholic, though he claims to drink the way his friends drink (which may in itself be a problem). I had a phone call from his partner this morning about her distress about how he behaves towards her when he's been drinking. I just talked to him (not telling him I'd talked to her) and wangled the conversation around to that, and he is in complete denial about it.

So there are two or three issues, not unconnected. They need to move, and they need to move somewhere where they can keep the dog. They have no spare money, though things have been easier since partner moved in and they can share expenses. She is getting to breaking point with the drinking, which he is in denial about.

Is there anything I can do at all to help this situation to become any better? If she leaves him, she can go into a house share, but DS isn't going to last long in a house share. My aim has always been to keep him in a stable situation so he doesn't end up on the streets. I'd really like him to go to AA, but he won't go.

I'm torn about making any financial help from me dependent on him going to AA because I have no way of finding out if he actually goes or not, and I'm not convinced that going under that sort of pressure will help him.

Basically I feel like a complete failure as a parent at the moment and I'm very worried about him.

Gosh, that does sound hard. The lack of options doesn't at all reflect on you as a parent, though - there isn't the support there should be for people in that sort of situation, and what help there is relies on them wanting to engage with it.

The only thing I can think of to suggest is Shelter - there have been recent rule changes on both evictions and pets, so there's a possibility the eviction might be challengable. Although if the dog has already caused damage I suspect that's a slim hope.

You are not a failure as a parent, @Britinme . It's impossible to take on all of your adult child's problems and if he can't acknowledge his own problems it's impossible to help him fix them. I really don't know what you can do but I do know that my mother ended up stopping helping my addict brother because the more she helped the less responsibility he took for his own actions. I can't imagine the worry and stress this is causing you and I'm not suggesting you do the same as my mother but please know, that you're not a failure. You're a loving, caring mother who has gone above and beyond. I don't have any advice I just want you to know that this is not on you.

@CyanCrystalViolet your jaw problem sounds really bloody awful. I do hope that your new consultant can help and thank god for botox!