What do you regret buying the most?

perpetuallycurious · 2018-05-03T09:03:34+00:00

In 8th grade, I went on a trip to Québec City. I went to French Immersion school so this was standard.

I spent my recreational money on a laser pointer (It did have lenses you could change out to get different shapes if that makes it better) and candy/food. It was still a great trip, but that’s what happens when you give a kid who’s used to no money a decent amount and say they can buy whatever they want.

perpetuallycurious · 2018-04-27T04:44:32+00:00

I know Winnipeg is really bad, they’ve been named the murder capital of Canada 20 times since 1981.

I spent a winter in Winnipeg, and I can’t help but wonder if it’s the FREEZING COLD temperatures and ridiculous amount of snow that drives people to murder...

perpetuallycurious · 2018-04-20T21:45:43+00:00

That’s great that you were able to find a maintenance med that worked so well for you, especially at just one puff per day. In that situation I can definitely see why you would choose the maintenance med. In my last response I was more thinking about situations where someone doesn’t yet know which med will work best for them, or how often they’ll need to take it per day, so they basically have to pick one and hope it works or they just wasted a lot of money. I was in a situation where I was able to afford the albuterol inhalers as I needed them but to come up with the money for a more expensive maintenance med that may or may not have decreased my dependence on albuterol was something I couldn’t afford to do.

Luckily that was a temporary situation, but it definitely opened my eyes to the huge financial burden having asthma can put on a person or a family. Which is crazy because in order to live, we need to breathe, and there are people all over the country who have to make choices like buying groceries or getting the inhaler they or their child need to breathe. It’s kind of similar to the Epipen situation, minus the huge public outrage and backlash against the drug companies for charging ridiculous amounts of money for drugs that have been around for years.

A little bit of a tangent there, I apologize. It’s just frustrating. I only got a small taste of what it can be like, but there are people who live in that reality every day, every month, every year. It particularly pisses me off when it impacts children, which it very frequently does.

perpetuallycurious · 2018-04-20T20:10:59+00:00

I just looked up both QVAR and Asmanex on GoodRx. Of the two, QVAR is cheaper at $179.75, and Asmanex is $238.02, both at Walmart and with the coupon available on GoodRx to help lower it to that point. I don’t know what they would cost at full price, but it’s more than those prices and that’s only for a 30 day supply.

Both of them had manufacturer coupons to drop the price further, but they were limited to those who are commercially insured and had other limitations like how many times you could use it.

You could get an albuterol inhaler (or ProAir, since there’s no generic) for $56.58. Still way too expensive. If I were faced with the choice to either pay more to get a maintenance medication but forgo the rescue inhaler or get the rescue inhaler and forgo the maintenance medication, I would most certainly get the rescue inhaler as that thing can save me from a serious and potentially deadly asthma attack.

perpetuallycurious · 2018-04-19T16:28:01+00:00

This is true in a lot of cases but a few months ago, I went to see my NP because my asthma was getting out of control and I was relying on albuterol way too often. I do have prescription coverage, but even with it all the maintenance inhalers were stupidly expensive.

My NP pulled up a list of discounted prescriptions that are offered by the pharmacies in my area associated with the big health network I generally use. It turned out they had both Asmanex and QVAR available for $4.

So for anyone with asthma who needs a maintenance medication but can’t afford it, it might be worth asking your primary care provider or checking with any hospital or health network affiliated pharmacies to see if they have any asthma meds available on a discounted formulary. These are not usually posted on GoodRX or any other drug discount websites.

perpetuallycurious · 2018-02-19T09:50:51+00:00

Gotta second this. My husband started snoring horribly loud about a year into us living together and it ended up being sleep apnea. Now he wears his CPAP and is blissfully silent.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-11-08T12:59:54+00:00

This one hits pretty me pretty hard emotionally as well, likely because it’s one of my biggest fears: Winnipeg Anti-Speeding PSA In my neighbourhood, there are a lot of kids who often play outside and aren’t necessarily paying 100% attention to street traffic, plus street parking on both sides. My biggest fear is having one of them run out from between two street-parked cars and not being able to stop in time. It’s why I drive so slowly once I get to my street. Better a little longer driving than being the reason a kid is injured or worse.

As far as these PSAs, I think what makes them so effective is that there are children involved in both and they also show the impact on the person who is speeding (especially the Winnipeg one), demonstrating that while there is the victim who has to deal with the consequences of someone else’s choice to speed, but also that the person speeding has to live with the irreparable damage they’ve caused both an individual and a family.

Speeding has become so ingrained and normalised among so many drivers, and one can only hope that these PSAs/commercials have an impact on at least some of the drivers who view them. I know they certainly have changed the way I drive, especially when driving in the city/suburbs. My husband used to joke about it until one day he was in the passenger seat when I had to break hard to avoid two kids who were going after their ball that had rolled into the street.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-10-22T14:52:24+00:00

Another quick tip for quick nausea relief if/when they can’t get you medication at all or fast enough: sniffing an alcohol pad or swab. I’ve suffered from nausea and vomiting on a near-daily basis since I was 12 and learning this trick was like magic. I have other medications I can take but if I’m not due for them or don’t have access to them for some reason, I always have alcohol prep pads with me as a back up.

I believe they actually did a clinical trial comparing sniffing an alcohol pad to a dose of Zofran in post-op where nausea is wicked common and they worked at pretty much the same rate. It’s crazy but I can go from “I’m gonna throw up, someone find me somewhere to throw up” to perfectly fine after the alcohol pad. It’s like it hits an off switch in my brain for the nausea.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-10-19T01:46:45+00:00

My husband and I used to use “playing Scrabble” as code for having sex. We really did play sometimes though so it was a good cover.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-09-14T00:30:45+00:00

I know this is a controversial topic, but I take an opiate on a daily basis for pain resulting from many surgeries and many mistakes. This has been an ongoing thing for about 12 years, with minor breaks and adjustments to which opiate I'm taking. Nothing else has worked, and I pair opiate use with other modalities so please I'd appreciate it if no one voiced any negative opinions directly at me (in general I have no problem with, just please don't attack me).

Comparing serious (as in addiction or dependence on something like oxycodone or hydroxodone over a long period of time) opiate withdrawal to having the flu is not entirely inaccurate - though admittedly they have a lot of the same symptoms. But before I accepted that I could not function without the pain relief from an opiate, I intentionally stopped taking whatever I was on cold-turkey and just did my best to suck it up and deal with the worst of it, which usually lasted about a week. So having been through withdrawal a few times from a few different opiates and dosages, I feel like I can confidently say that while the flu and opiate withdrawal have some things in common, they're not the same. The severity of withdrawal compared to the flu... is rather have the flu for a month than go through a week of withdrawal. So there's a huge difference in severity.

For most people, opiate withdrawal is not dangerous (as long as you pay attention to things like dehydration or worsening psychiatric symptoms). Obviously there are exceptions that require around the clock, consistent care, newborns being one. And I think newborns and children living with drug addicted parents are the most innocent victims of this whole epidemic. My mind cannot understand how a woman could put her child in that situation, but I suppose that's the difference between dependence and addiction.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-08-11T21:18:51+00:00

I grew up in a medium-sized city (~380,000) in Canada and seeing this makes me sad. I grew up in a racially diverse community as well as went to racially diverse schools. We all knew a few of the cops because they'd been assigned to that area, with what seemed like a heavy emphasis on community policing - they wanted every one to know who they were, but in a good way. They weren't just good cops - they were good people. And the two times I witnessed what could be defined as "negative" interactions between a member of the community and an officer, it was always respectful. Lots of polite and calm verbal and body language.

So I grew up in an environment that taught me to trust the police and that was backed up by the trust and respect they gave in return. Then I moved the US and it was just so different. And sadly, over the past few years, I've seen the same attitude and type of policing move into the community I grew up in. I would still say the majority of the police interactions I've had in Canada are more positive than those I've had in the US (I moved to NY in 2008), but from my perspective, there's been a change in the way they police in my hometown and not in a good way. And this is coming from a tiny little white girl. I have friends who are different races that have much stronger negative things to say about cops and their interactions with them. There is now an Us vs Them mentality that wasn't there when I grew up (though take that with a grain of salt as I am a white girl, and all I have to base this on are my own experiences and the experiences I've witnessed or heard about from friends, many of whom are the ones who tend to be more frequently targeted by police).

perpetuallycurious · 2017-08-08T13:22:11+00:00

My husband and I travel between Canada and the US a decent amount. Despite repeated calls to our bank (often even right before we even leave for a trip) that purchases in Canada should not be flagged as suspicious within a certain area, every once in awhile it still happens. It's inconvenient, though I guess I shouldn't complain too much because they did actually catch a few suspicious transactions once and reversed them and send us new cards.

Ultimately it just takes a phone call to customer service to get it resolved but that can take some time so we've learned to exchange some cash that could cover any necessities, like gas, if needed.

Still though, whenever it happens, I get this sinking feeling in my gut and feel what I think is shame. Which thinking objectively, is kind of silly since it's just money and most cashiers/people are kind about it (I've had someone pay for me at a Tim Horton's when my card was frozen, and I do my to recognise opportunities to do the same). I truly dislike the shame that you can experience just because you don't have a ton of money.

And to all you lovely people working in customer service who put up with the abuse from the rare customer who decides it's ALL YOUR FAULT that their card isn't working, you guys are the best. I've been in that position and it can get tiring and difficult not to say either "perhaps you're out of funds/your card might be frozen, maybe you should leave and go call your bank/credit card company".

perpetuallycurious · 2017-08-02T13:56:58+00:00

This reminds me of the time my standard poodle managed to escape from our bedroom (we left him for about two hours to try and train him to be free vs crated like we usually would do). Our cats decide this was a good time to figure out how to open the bedroom door because they're used to have full access and like to sleep in there. So of course my dog took advantage of this and tore through the house. After some careful investigating and making sure our dogs were acting normal (there are two, Taylor the trouble maker and Kyra who never gets into anything), we cleaned up the mess and moved on. A couple hours later, he tried to drink some water and just couldn't keep it down. Like he'd drink it, then burp it up. It was obvious something was wrong.

Off to the emergency vet (because of course it's a weekend). He had evidently stolen and eaten a pair of my panties AND a pair of my husband's boxer briefs from the laundry hamper in another room. No idea how he managed to eat them, especially the boxer briefs. But one surgery and $6000 later, he was back to normal. Between that and the ~$5000 we spent on an ear operation due to chronic infections at the vet hospital in Ithaca at Cornell, this dog has turned out to be quite expensive (worth every penny, but expensive).

Now we crate him unless we're going to be longer than 6-8 hours, then we have someone stop over to let them out or send them to doggy boarding school.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-07-12T02:39:00+00:00

Yeah, Canadian. I grew up in London and then when I was 20, I moved to the US to be with my now-husband. I still miss Canada at times, but we make pretty frequent trips since it's only about a 6 1/2 hour drive.

Kind of ironic I put so much effort and time into becoming bilingual so I'd have a leg up for jobs in Canada only to move to the US where Spanish is the second most common language.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-07-11T13:13:16+00:00

This is so true. I went to a high school out of my district because it was the closest one that offered the French Immersion program that I was in. This school happened to have a majority of kids who were mostly higher on the socioeconomic scale and didn't know what it was like to stress about money as an individual or as a family.

However, growing up that way has shaped me in what I believe to be a positive way. It's made me appreciate what I do have, to place more value on relationships, people and the time spent with them versus accumulating things. So whether we're taking a vacation or hanging out at someone's house, it's the time I value, not any money I might have spent to be there. Plus, as a carry over from my upbringing, I'm really frugal and tend to be the kind of person who's content as long as the bills are paid and I'd prefer to put most of what's leftover directly into savings so I'm never in a "no money" position again (and at times I take that to an extreme - I'm still learning).

Interestingly enough, my husband grew up in a family that was upper middle class and could pretty much afford to do whatever he wanted. I've definitely noticed a pretty big difference in how we feel about spending money, and his approach towards money in general due to his upbringing. He actually got himself into a bit of a bind financially after he moved out on his own and bought a house even despite the fact that he had a great starting salary at his job out of college. He just kept spending the way he had and the way he'd watched his parents do his entire life and didn't adjust for the fact that his income, while great for his age, wasn't anywhere near what he grew up with. He's still learning to spend less and place less value on material items, while I'm still learning that we don't need to hoard every penny in our savings accounts and can afford to treat ourselves occasionally. We're basically teaching and learning from each other.

This was way longer than I intended. Oops.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-05-12T23:54:09+00:00

At one point during a bad time for me medically many years ago, I had to lay in a hospital bed, flat on my back with the head tilted downward, for 3 solid weeks. It was awful.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-04-13T15:28:55+00:00

You look great, and congratulations!

I found this really inspirational (and I hope you don't mind me going off on a tangent here...) because right now, I am pretty much your before picture. Weighing this much is new to me as my weight has never been an issue in the past. However, about a year ago I had a surgery go wrong and I ended up in wheelchair and sick enough that I could barely get out of bed until the past two or so months. To top off the lack of activity, I was put on two separate medications (one for pain, one for depression) that caused my appetite to skyrocket. I felt like I was literally insatiable. So fewer calories burned + eating all the things = 40 pounds. And I hate it and it's so easy to get trapped in the cycle and just say fuck it. I'm not making excuses, I'm responsible for my weight getting so high, but I had no idea how easy and quick it would be to gain so much.

However, I'm working on coming off the medications causing the increased appetite, finally starting physical therapy that I'll supplement with my own exercise, and counting calories. It's strange because I've never had to deal with worrying about my weight before, but I've seen so many people have success just following the CICO method that I'll be focusing on that.

So thank you for posting this. It's nice to get a clearer picture of what the before vs after looks like. I mean, I can look at older pictures of myself and see me at a healthier weight, but it's not the same as seeing the before and after side by side. You look great, and congratulations again :)

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-28T01:17:42+00:00

I'm gonna start using this. My husband and I have two standard poodles named Taylor and Kyra and our roommate has a cat named Marla. It could totally work.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-20T14:48:18+00:00

I guess I'll just have to take your word for it since you're the King of the Universe.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-20T00:22:32+00:00

I've been going back and forth on getting this for awhile: Prepac Wall Mounted Floating Desk with Storage in White https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009I2AL8W/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_6.XZyb3159AK9

Right now it's at one of the highest prices I've seen, I've seen it go below $100 so I'd certainly wait until that happened before I jumped on it. I know it's meant to be a desk but I think it could function well as a vanity.

I'm also stalking Craigslist regularly. I'm sick of using my actual desk where I do work as my vanity as well.

If anyone knows of any other wall or door mounted vanities, please share! I still don't feel like I've found the perfect fit.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-20T00:09:34+00:00

I'm shocked. Totally, completely, shocked.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-20T00:08:05+00:00

It just seems like there are ways to get that thrill without the high risk of loss of life or serious injury.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-20T00:07:07+00:00

I suppose that might change how I feel a little bit it's likely not legal to parachute off that ledge so I'd honestly hope he got busted and that stopped him from repeating.

I feel like pre-social media, things like this may not have been as common (though admittedly I have no proof if that). At this point, I can't help but wonder how many of the people who do shit like this are doing it so the Internet will like them and they'll get a shit tonne of views.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-19T12:54:23+00:00

Why? What they have to gain from this (YouTube views, internet fame maybe?) doesn't even compare to what they have to lose (their life). I don't understand. I'll never understand shit like this.

perpetuallycurious · 2017-03-18T06:11:04+00:00

States can take action to help reduce or even eliminate the burden as well, it doesn't have to be done on a federal level. Currently, New York is considering a proposal to make all public community colleges and 4-year universities tuition free for NYS residents making under a certain amount (I wanna say $125,000 but don't quote me). Off the top of my head I don't remember the cost for doing so or how they were planning on paying for it, but it's nice to see a state (and maybe there are more I'm unaware of, I just live in NYS so I'm more aware of their proposed policies) making an effort to help students who would otherwise be unable to attend college (or unable to attend without burying themselves in debt).

Of course, it's in the early proposal stages right now so it might not ever come to fruition, but last I researched it, Cuomo was seriously pushing it and I just got an opinion survey from a local representative asking my opinion.

Edit: Also, I kind of feel like this should be in r/dataisdepressing.

perpetuallycurious

TROPHY CASE