Friday, January 31, 2020

Trump Had Been Calling Me Every Other Day Last Week


Chateau Du Mer Beach House Bridge Decorated for a Garden Wedding
I bet you have received a call saying he is President Trump and asking for your support. Just last week I believed I received a call almost every other day, saying he is President Trump ( robot call) and ask for my support this coming election. Needless to say, I bang the telephone before the recorded message ends. Just an after thought I should have listened to the end of his message.

Anyway, according to the news this morning, it is more likely that by the end of today, the House of Senate will have him acquitted of the impeachment charges by the House Of Representative of Abuse of Power etc....

All these news irritates me and increased my blood pressure to high levels. To insure that this will not occur, I turned to FB account and look at my Memory Pages and some of my Favorite photos in my collection . Some of it I am sharing with you today.

Reflection Pond-Yosemite-Photo by Frank Cabunoc
Prayer Room-Chateau Du Mer, Amoingon, Boac, Marinduque
    
Garden Wedding Decor, Chateau Du Mer Beach House


Lighted Virgin Mary Statue, CDM Main House

CDM Hall Decorated for the Wedding Reception
Christmas Day at CDM, 2010
Enjoying the Back Terrace, at CDM with Miko- our pet dog
My Ground Orchids in Bloom, US- 2020
 Meanwhile enjoy this video of a Classical Trio:
https://youtu.be/CTXx_r6G1wE

List of Medications for Erectile Dysfunction

This is the last article on my series of list of medications for common ailments/diseases in the US.  I hope you found the series informative. 

 

Medications Used to Treat Erectile Dysfunction (ED)

Erectile dysfunction (ED) is the condition of not being able to get or keep an erection that’s firm enough for sexual intercourse. It’s often caused by an underlying health problem. The Urology Care Foundation estimates that this condition affects 30 million men in the United States. For some men, treatment with drugs may resolve their ED.

There are many types of drugs used to treat ED. Each drug works differently, but they all improve sexual activity by stimulating blood flow to the penis.

The most common ED drugs belong to a group known as phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE5) inhibitors. They block certain enzyme activity that leads to ED.

If you have certain health issues, it may not be safe for you to take ED drugs. For instance, if you have heart disease, your heart may not be healthy enough for sex.

Alprostadil (Caverject, Edex, MUSE) comes as an injectable solution and as a penile suppository. You’ll inject the solution directly into your penis 5 to 20 minutes before having sex. You can use it as needed up to three times per week. You should let at least 24 hours lapse between injections.

With MUSE (or Medicated Urethral System for Erections), the suppository should be administered 5 to 10 minutes before sex. It shouldn’t be used more than twice in a 24-hour period. The more common side effects of this drug include pain in the penis and testicles, as well as burning in the urethra.

Avanafil (Stendra) is an oral drug and a PDE5 inhibitor. You should take it about 15 minutes before having sex. Don’t take it more than once per day.

You shouldn’t use any PDE5 inhibitors if you’re also taking nitrates to treat heart disease. Examples of nitrates include isosorbide mononitrate (Monoket) and nitroglycerin (Nitrostat). Taking nitrates with avanafil can cause severely low blood pressure and even death. The more common side effects of this drug include:

Sildenafil (Viagra) is also a PDE5 inhibitor. Viagra is only available as an oral tablet. You should take it only once per day, about 30 minutes to an hour before sex. The more common side effects of this drug include:
  • headache
  • flushing
  • stuffy or runny nose
  • back pain
  • upset stomach
  • muscle aches
  • vision changes, such as blurry vision and changes in how certain colors look

Tadalafil (Cialis) is an oral drug that increases blood flow throughout your body. You take this PDE5 inhibitor about 30 minutes before sex, no more than once per day. It may work for up to 36 hours. The more common side effects of this drug include:
  • headache
  • flushing
  • stuffy or runny nose
  • back pain
  • upset stomach
  • pain in the limbs

Testosterone is the main sex hormone in the male body. It plays many roles in overall health. Testosterone levels naturally drop with age. This change can lead to ED and other issues, such as:
Doctors sometimes prescribe testosterone to treat ED. In fact, PDE5 inhibitors are most effective when used alongside testosterone therapy in men with a testosterone deficiency. However, the drug does come with risks. Testosterone can increase your chance of a heart attack or stroke. Because of these risks, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)Trusted Source says that only men who have low testosterone due to certain health issues should use testosterone.

Your doctor will watch you closely if they give you testosterone. They’ll test the levels of testosterone in your body before and during your treatment with this drug. If your testosterone levels are too high, your doctor will stop your treatment or lower your dosage. Side effects of testosterone may include:
Testosterone for ED comes in many forms. The table below lists the forms of testosterone and their brand-name versions. Some forms may also be available as generic drugs.

Testosterone form
Brand names
Transdermal creamFirst Testosterone Cream 2%
Transdermal gelAndroGel, Fortesta, Testim, and Vogelxo
Transdermal patchAndroderm
Transdermal solutionNone (only available as generic)
Topical gelAndroGel and Natesto
Nasal gelNatesto
Oral capsule Testred
Oral tabletAndroid 25
Mucoadhesive film that dissolves under your gumsStriant
Pellet implantTestopel
Solution for intramuscular injectionDepo-Testosterone and Aveed

Vardenafil (Levitra, Staxyn) is an oral drug and a PDE5 inhibitor. You take it as needed 60 minutes before sex. You can take this drug up to once per day as recommended by your doctor. The more common side effects of this drug include:
  • headache
  • flushing
  • stuffy or runny nose
  • back pain
  • upset stomach
  • dizziness

There are many vitamins and supplements on the market that claim to help ED. Some promise better sexual function as well as increased energy and vitality. However, these supplements usually don’t work. They may also be unsafe.
Some supplements that are marketed as “natural” may even contain drugs. ED supplements can still interact with other medications you’re taking. They may also cause side effects. Talk to your doctor before using any vitamins or supplements for ED.

Not everyone with ED needs to take medications. If you think you have ED, see your primary care doctor. They’ll give you a physical exam and request certain lab tests, as well as a complete medical and psychosocial history.
They may also refer you to a mental health professional, who can help you manage performance anxiety or relationship issues related to your ED.

ED caused by underlying conditions

Your ED may be caused by untreated diabetes, high blood pressure, or another issue. Treating that condition first may improve your ED symptoms.

ED caused by medications

ED may also be caused by other medications you’re taking. These may include drugs used to treat:
Your doctor can review the drugs you’re currently taking. They may make some changes that can improve your ED.

ED caused by lifestyle choices

Sometimes lifestyle choices can contribute to ED. Adopting healthy habits may help improve your symptoms. Try avoiding smoking, maintaining a healthy weight, getting regular exercise, and keeping your alcohol intake in check.

Source: https://www.healthline.com/health/erectile-dysfunction/medication-list#work-with-your-doctor

Meanwhile, enjoy this photo from the Internet
Peter Peppers 

Also enjoy this video,
https://youtu.be/7KqlAMqkxt0 

Wednesday, January 29, 2020

Oh, What a Beautiful Morning!

I woke up this morning greeted by sunlight shining in our living room picture window. Its the middle of winter, but the sun was shining brightly and the temperature was 46 degrees F outside.  It is a day when one has to feel happy and alive. Here are four photos I took at various angles showing the houses across our street!


The above photos reminds me of the hymn, This is the Day the Lord has made, Let us rejoice and be glad! Meanwhile, enjoy the hymn below:

https://youtu.be/IRLxugEtqx8

Also, enjoy my discovery of a Moriones souvenir from Marinduque
 

Monday, January 27, 2020

New and Old House Decorations for 2020



Enjoying Our Electric Fire Log this Season
With Christmas Decoration gone, our house lacks color and vibrancy. So, I added a few touches to our old decor, so the house looks fresh and new.

Here are some of the photos of our 2020 house decor including air plants-( Birthday and Christmas gifts from Ditas and Carenna) and succulents (from Alix Katague).

Air Plants and Succulents in our Living Room
One of My Orchids are in Bloom_Living Room Picture Window

Piano Decor of Marble Eggs from Romblon
Naked Lady with Snake Gold Crown for Accent
Corner Wood Sculpture to Accent the Fire Place 
Wood Horse Carving with Accent
Our Kitchen Window Simple Decor
Computer Room Window
Computer Room Albums and Grand Kids Photo
Master Bath and Chinese New Year Decor
Master Bath Photo and Me
Mini Lamp highlights one of Macrine's doll collection

Philippine Ant Eater Displayed in the Glass Case

Rattlesnake Ash Tray with her  Four marble Eggs


Collection of Coffee Books and Honor Plaques

Small Christmas Tree for the Whole year Display( no lights)



Meanwhile enjoy Kulas(Becoming Filipino) trip to the underground river cave in Marinduque(not Palawan)

 https://www.facebook.com/becomingfilipino/videos/2649484685278959/

Saturday, January 25, 2020

House Cleaning for the Chinese New Year

Today is the start of the Chinese Lunar New Year. It is the year of the Rat. It is time to clean-up your mess-for example house cleaning.

One of my New Year Resolution is to clean the house of paper junks, old bills and other junk accumulation for the last five years in all the rooms of the house. As of today, with the help of David III we accomplished this task except for the guest bedroom. Here are some of the photos before and after clean-up. We filled 2 garbage bins in the process. I am very tired but happy and felt accomplished.  The next clean-up will be in January 2021 if I am still around in this Planet Earth.


Living Room after Clean-Up

Family Room after Clean-up

Family Room Before Clean-Up
Guest Room Before Clean-Up
Guest Room After Clean-Up


Guest Room after Partial Clean-Up


Kitchen Window after Clean-Up

Computer Room Before Clean-Up
Computer Room After Clean-Up

Meanwhile enjoy two photos of my pineapple, still alive and ready to be harvested before the big Freeze!


Thursday, January 23, 2020

Book Review-Being Mortal-An Update


A few years ago, my beloved sister in law (Charro) sent me a surprise gift, a book, Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. Charro is from Palo Alto, CA and is a nurse oncologist. She worked at Stanford University Hospital doing cancer research for a number of years. She just retired recently.

I read the cover page of the book and it sounds very interesting being a senior citizen. However, when I opened the first chapter, the font of the book is small, I could hardly read it. So I did an Internet search and here's an excerpt from the review of SHERI FINK dated NOV. 6, 2014, published in the New York Times. I recommend this book to all senior citizens of the world. Thanks again for your gift, Charro.

"It began with a tingle in the surgeon’s fingers and a pain in his neck. A couple of years later, he learned he had a tumor inside his spinal cord. That was when the difficult choices began. Should he have it removed right away in a risky operation, as his doctor recommended? Or should he take time to consider this question: At what point would the expanding tumor cause debility bad enough to justify the risk of greater debility or even death in trying to fight it?

The surgeon in the story is the father of Atul Gawande, who is also a surgeon as well as a writer for The New Yorker. His new book, “Being Mortal,” is a personal meditation on how we can better live with age-related frailty, serious illness and approaching death.

Medical professionals are the ones who are largely in control of how we spend our “waning days,” he writes, yet they are focused on disease, not on living. “Medicine has been slow to confront the very ­changes that it has been responsible for — or to apply the knowledge we have about how to make old age better.” The experts quoted here argue that doctors should not only treat disease but also concern themselves with people’s functional abilities, and that most medical trainees should learn about geriatrics.

In the first part of the book, Gawande explores different models of senior living — from multigenerational households to newfangled nursing homes. In the latter part, which is shorter, he shifts somewhat abruptly to end-of-life medicine, promoting hospice as a model of care. The two sections are anchored by two of Gawan­de’s most memorable New Yorker essays, which make up two of the book’s eight chapters — “Things Fall Apart” and “Letting Go.” Around them are rich stories from his own family.

“Being Mortal” is a valuable contribution to the growing literature on aging, death and dying. It contains unsparing descriptions of bodily aging and the way it often takes us by surprise. Gawande is a gifted storyteller, and there are some stirring, even tear-inducing passages here. The writing can be evocative. In a home for the aged in a New Delhi slum, mattresses are “pushed up against one another like a large sheet of postage stamps.”

The stories give a dignified voice to older people in the process of losing their independence. We see the world from their perspective, not just those of their physicians and worried family members.

One of his most provocative arguments is that hard-won health and safety reporting requirements for elder care facilities might satisfy family members, but ignore what really matters to the residents in question. Despite the popularity of the term assisted living, “we have no good metrics for a place’s success in assisting people to live,” Gawande argues. A life of safety isn’t the life most people really want for themselves.

Gawande searches for models of care that promote frail people’s ability to live a meaningful life, by imbuing them with cause or promoting their ability “to keep shaping the story of their life in the world.” The reader may wonder if everyone in these innovative senior communities is as satisfied as the individuals Gawande profiles. Given that there is little data to back up the anecdotes, it’s hard to know if there are real solutions here. There is also relatively little exploration of the options for people with dementia.

In the last part of the book, Gawande argues against the treatment-at-all-costs model that once prevailed in medicine. “People with serious illness have priorities besides simply prolonging their lives,” he writes. “If your problem is fixable, we know just what to do. But if it’s not? The fact that we have had no adequate answers to this question is troubling and has caused callousness, inhumanity and extraordinary suffering.”

Gawande is swayed by the paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould’s essay “The Median Isn’t the Message.” After receiving a cancer diagnosis with a median survival of only eight months, Gould observed that some patients survived well beyond the eight month median. He became one of them, living some 20 years after experimental treatment, and dying from an unrelated cancer.

Gawande uses his father’s powerful story to explore the concept of shared ­decision-making in medicine — the idea that the ideal modern doctor should be neither paternalistic nor informative but rather interpretive, helping patients determine their priorities and achieve them. He shares lessons he learned from a palliative care doctor who advises him to “ask, tell, ask” during a difficult discussion about a patient’s prognosis: Ask what patients want to hear, tell them and then ask what they understand.

Gawande identifies no perfect solutions to the problems inherent in bodily decline. He is just asking us to commit ourselves to creating better options and making choices with the goal of a purposeful life in mind ".

About the Author: Atul Gawande has been a staff writer for The New Yorker since 1998. He is the author of three best-selling books: “Complications,” a finalist for the National Book Award; “Better,” selected by Amazon.com as one of the ten best books of 2007; and “The Checklist Manifesto.” His latest book is “Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End.” He has won the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science, a MacArthur fellowship, and two National Magazine Awards. He is also a surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, in Boston, and a professor in the department of health policy and management at Harvard School of Public Health and in the department of surgery at Harvard Medical School. He is the executive director of Ariadne Labs, a joint center for health-systems innovation, and the chairman of Lifebox, a nonprofit organization making surgery safer globally.

Meanwhile, enjoy this photo of my orchid in bloom inside the House! 



Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Frustrated with the Impeachment Process-Clean-Up your Closet

Not Happy with the Impeachment Process? Do Something Constructive by Cleaning your Closet/House

I started cleaning my closet today and found out I have 20 belts.

I have done constructive work today-getting rid of my residual anger and frustration from the impeachment trial by cleaning my closet. 

I have decided to donate 250 ties from my 300 ties collection that I started in 1964. Parting it was just like losing part of my life. My son and wife had been urging me to give it away to Good Will or Salvation Army for the last couple of years, since I had not used a tie since my retirement from FDA in 2002. The collection is just occupying needed space in my closet. So today, I unwillingly donated 250 ties, but I kept 50 most colorful ties in my closet.


One of the 50 remaining ties has a painting of nude woman, several others have art and embroidered flower designs, and another has the face of Marilyn Monroe. Looking at them reminded me of my professional career from 1964 to 2002. Nostalgic memories, Indeed!
Eight of the remaining 50 ties in my collection

Samples of 1970 ties that I donated to Goodwill

For more information on men's ties from the 1920 to 1970 read:

http://vintagedancer.com/vintage/mens-tie-history-1920s-to-1970s/

Meanwhile, enjoy these photos after my clean-up of the whole house

Living Room after Clean-Up

Family Room After Clean-Up



Kitchen Window After Clean-Up
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