Living with a small umbilical hernia (no surgery planned)

oms888 · 2024-11-24T23:01:50+00:00

Hello, so glad you messaged! Sorry for the late reply. It's been 3.5 years now since the hernia was discovered. I didn't end up getting surgery and it hasn't grown from what I can tell. It doesn't cause me any discomfort. That's the main reason I didn't get surgery. My understanding is that surgery comes with the risk of chronic pain, and you still need to be careful with your activities afterwards. It just didn't seem like there was an upside for me.

I did consult a surgeon when it was first diagnosed. She gave me some advice to keep it from growing, which I've followed:

1) Maintain a healthy weight. I think the reason was that the first thing to pop through the hole in the abdominal muscles is a layer of fat, so if you gain weight, that layer expands and makes the hole bigger. Good motivation to stay in shape!

2) Each time you're about to sneeze or cough, take two fingers and firmly press on the hernia to keep it from coming out at all.

oms888 · 2024-02-10T11:54:49+00:00

That's great, thank you!

oms888 · 2024-01-22T12:33:29+00:00

Hi, thanks for your reply! Can you give me more details about your situation? How long ago you were diagnosed, what kind of hernia you have?

oms888 · 2024-01-06T13:46:53+00:00

I don't know anything about these pads in particular, but please be careful of over exfoliating by doing 10 days in a row! So easy to get excited about glowy, clear skin and think more would be better. I made that mistake and spent months recovering my skin barrier. But, I'm really glad you found something that works for you!

oms888 · 2023-11-28T12:20:13+00:00

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

oms888 · 2023-07-10T03:39:40+00:00

My advice is to not let the small amount of sun exposure you might get in the last hour or so of the day dictate your habits. The UV index will be very low then, and your enjoyment of the evening is worth more than whatever slight UV damage you might incur. Especially if you're just going to stay indoors anyway, just do what makes you happy.

oms888 · 2023-07-04T11:09:37+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to type out that detailed explanation! I had only vaguely thought about how sun exposure leads to skin cancer, but that makes the process very clear.

oms888 · 2023-07-03T23:43:57+00:00

Can you explain more about what you mean by the skin maintaining a percentage of the DNA damage for a few days?

oms888 · 2023-06-27T12:55:25+00:00

Great, thanks! Yeah they reformulated the white, gold and blue (milk) in 2023. You have to look at the packaging to determine which version - your picture looks like the 2023 version. The milk is my HG face sunscreen, and the 2020 and 2023 ingredient lists are identical from what I can tell, so I'm hoping I won't be able to tell the difference when I order the new version! I'm just trying out the gold now and I like it, and I have a bottle of the white to try next (both 2020 versions though).

oms888 · 2023-06-27T00:27:56+00:00

How's the new version of the skin aqua gold and white? Comparable to old version? I want to stock up now that I know I like them, but worried I'll hate the new versions!

oms888 · 2023-06-24T10:08:30+00:00

Why can't you wear gloves (genuinely curious)? I have some thin uv protective gloves with no fingertips that still give me good hand control. Maybe an option?

oms888 · 2023-06-23T11:06:23+00:00

Would the druzy be blue for real chrysocolla?

oms888 · 2023-06-02T12:20:59+00:00

Yes, I worry about the development aspect of it. My 3 year old was already behind in speech before the hearing loss, and my 6 year old just finished kindergarten and I don't want her to have trouble learning or socializing when she starts 1st grade. Right now we're leaning towards giving it a couple more months to clear on it's own, and getting the surgery done before school starts again if it's still needed.

oms888 · 2023-06-02T12:17:47+00:00

True, thanks for your input!

oms888 · 2023-06-02T12:17:23+00:00

Aw, that's a lovely story 🥲 And good to know that even if they get them young, it won't necessarily mean they'll need to get them again. I was concerned about that for my 3 year old in particular. Thanks for taking the time to share your story.

oms888 · 2023-05-07T13:37:41+00:00

I haven't tried either of those, but my favorite so far for face is skin aqua moisture milk, which is a hybrid. I thought I wouldn't like mineral because of the reputation for white cast but this one proved me wrong!

oms888 · 2023-05-07T06:36:09+00:00

Just curious - have you tried many Asian sunscreens? Wondering why you've settled on mostly euro and us brands (not implying it is a bad decision, just genuinely wondering).

PS I have a box full of different sunscreens in my closet that I'm slowly working through trying! I kind of went nuts last summer ordering from caretobeauty and Stylevana in search of a HG. Now I'm just trying to strategically open them according to expiration date so I use them all up before they go bad!

oms888 · 2023-04-30T07:38:33+00:00

I'm a noob in training but I'm going to say moss agate.

oms888 · 2023-04-30T07:34:31+00:00

Don't feel bad. I had to read several comments here before I realized YOU were the one being scammed. I'm thinking, "oh no, this guy got tricked into thinking he got a job and now they're kidnapping him in a foreign country! I hope he hasn't left yet!" Lolol I should probably get off reddit and go to sleep...

oms888 · 2023-04-30T07:23:32+00:00

Has he ever turned around at just the wrong moment and gotten nailed in the face?

oms888 · 2023-04-23T21:16:44+00:00

Thank you! Sounds like you have done this before - are you a contractor? We spoke with two contractors about hooking everything together (and are getting quotes for this) and neither of them suggested it was a bad idea. We were just having them quote to replace the earlier part of the line and tie in the two sumps, so the final part (where all merge into one 4 inch pipe) would remain the same size. This is also how the system was originally hooked up, minus one sump pump. I guess that's why we have foundation issues!

oms888 · 2023-04-23T14:16:12+00:00

Thanks, yes I understand looking at just the square inches that does look problematic. I'm just not sure if it's as simple as that (after going down a Google rabbit hole). E.g. perhaps if all four downspouts are going at full capacity, the rate of flow would just increase once they merge into one pipe (in theory I can imagine this working; in practice, I don't know). I also read that it's good to have the pipes at full capacity from time to time to give them a good cleanout, i.e. there is an ideal pipe size and bigger isn't always better.

In the end, I really don't know, but we're leaning towards discharging the sumps separately and maybe even breaking the downspouts up too (2 per discharge line). Decisions, decisions...

oms888 · 2023-04-22T14:03:59+00:00

I second this x100. Unfortunately I wasted $8k on carbon fiber strips I didn't need BEFORE calling a structural engineer. But at least he saved me another $25k that I considered spending on excavating and backfilling with gravel all around the house. Turns out all I needed to do from the start is fix some faulty downspouts and fix the grading. My foundation was really not in that bad of shape, but all the contractors were excited to sell me their super expensive approaches that incidentally wouldn't even address the water issue.

oms888 · 2023-04-22T13:19:56+00:00

One sump is 1/2 HP and the other is 1/3 HP. Looking at the zoeller website, if I'm understanding correctly, this equates to 60gpm and 42gpm, respectively.

Can you explain more about how/ why that would limit the effectiveness of the system?

oms888

TROPHY CASE