All I wanted was a hearing aid...

So, let's go back a bit here.

As a kid, I got lots of ear infections. They hurt. A lot. But eventually, I got over them. They would still pop up every so often, but the tear-inducing pain wasn't an issue, and it'd just be a slightly clogged up feeling that would drain out as the cold or flu or whatever ran its course.

So, fast forward to some undefined time in the near past. Maybe a year ago, maybe two, I don't know exactly, and didn't take note of it at the time, but another of those winter colds came up, and again, my ear got infected- left ear this time. However, the eventual draining never really occured. It became just a part of my situation that my left ear was a little worse in hearing than my right.

Whether related to that, or just a function of diminished hearing from age, both wife and son soon started to get on me to get a hearing aid. It's been a few months, maybe even a year. Finally, with a little extra in our medical reimbursement account, I figured I'd go see how much one of these things cost. After all, there are only so many pairs of eyeglasses a guy can go through (the traditional way to spend down our medical account).

And so, went to a Health Partners audiologist, and had the hearing check. Yep- diminished hearing, especially in the high range. No shock there. And yep, this would explain the near-constant tinnitus going on as well. But he noted something he described as a "loss of conductivity", which was unusual, especially as it wasn't symmetric with the right ear. Before he would discuss any aids, he wanted me to see an ENT specialist, just in case there was a medical reason behind the conductivity loss. He gave me a list of ENT specialists, and while Health Partners was on the list, there was also a group right in Maplewood, near where I live. Since there wasn't any listed preference or proscription one way or another, I went with Midwest ENT Specialists.

Don't know why I'm listing the doctors, but I figured I'd put down what I remember.

As it happened, someone had cancelled an appointment that week, so I was able to get in just two days later to see the ENT guy. Convenient! When Dr.Cox came in, he said he'd seen the audiogram, and figured (without even looking) that it was simply a genetic predisposition, and nothing to be concerned about. Normally, he said, he wouldn't even go further, but an imbalance between the ears was unusual, particularly for a 45-year old.

He then looked in my ears and down my throat, and commented, "Just getting over a cold, eh?" Well- actually no. I'd been feeling just fine, and a cold was far from my mind. He noted that my adenoids were very inflamed- another thing that is unusual for someone my age (particularly odd to me since I had them taken out when I was a kid).

If I'd been 65 or older, he wouldn't have done anything, but just to rule out any oddness, he ordered an MRI for me. He recommended CDI- a company just up the street, and also conveniently located to my house. He prescribed a round of anti-biotics to take care of the adenoids, and gave me this sinus wash thing...

So, I took the anti-biotics, rinsed out my sinuses, and like two or three days later, started getting all sorts of snotty. Okay- so maybe there was a cold there, and the anti-biotics just kicked it out. I still felt fine- just more gloppy, which happens. Oh, and since he mentioned the adenoids, something I hadn't even noticed up to that point, I couldn't stop noticing them from then on.

The MRI was kinda cool. I can see why the claustrophobic (ie my dad) would have a hard time in there. I felt very much like sausage meat going into a casing. I found it relaxing, though I will say that the loud banging, clicking and buzzing noises are likely to rankle even the most tranquil soul. And even cooler- afterwards, I got a disc with the images and a viewer for it. So, I spent a lot of that Thursday taking a look at the meat sack of my head.

Did I make any sense of it? Heck no. I mean, I could see my eyes, my brain, the big things, but was there anything in there noteworthy? Not that I could see.

I joked with Julie that I kinda hoped it would "be something"- if only to justify how much I knew the MRI would cost. My medical history is otherwise so bland. Tonsils out as a kid. ACL surgery at 40. A "cyst-like lesion" on my chin. Nothing cool sounding. Which is good, of course, but makes for lousy conversation.

A week later, went back for the followup with the ENT. His entrance was a bit overdramatic, frankly. He sat down in the chair, and with a solemn face, just sighed. Not quite what I was expecting.

He told me that whatever it was that he didn't want to find in the MRI, he didn't find. Okay, so I'm seeing we're in a "good news-bad news" situation, and so now, what's the bad news doc?

Not just one things, but two. Oh joy!

1) There's something like an infection (he described it) in my left ear. Well, that would explain the sense I have of it still being filled. He's going to up my anti-biotics, and wants me to get a CT scan for a better look at it. Okay, cool- I get another ride in a big machine. Doesn't sound like a big deal. I can handle that.

2) He's no expert on MRI's, he says. In fact, he had to ask the radiologist on the phone to explain some of this... but apparently there's a growth near my pituitary gland, 4x7mm. He doesn't even have a recommendation for this, but instead says I should talk with Dr.Rethwill (my family doc) for his recommendation for a good neurosurgeon.


WHAT?!? A neurosurgeon?? Wait a minute-- I just wanted a hearing aid so I don't have to keep saying "Pardon?", and now we're talking brain surgery!?

Alright, fine. And, of course, a follow-up appointment with Dr.Cox in two weeks, to review the CT scans.

CDI does this cool thing, where the results of the tests are posted online, after the radiologist has given the report to the ordering physician, naturally. So, I go back to that MRI to see what it say. Sure enough- there are two things noted. One is a "possible adenoma" on the pituitary. The radiologist talks about which images it's most evident on, but I'll be damned if I can tell anything, even having found out where the pituitary is.

So, drop a line to Rethwill, via HealthPartners online communication, and while he's out on Thursday, Friday morning he's put in orders for some lab tests. Googling up adenoma and that whole thing, I can tell he's checking into hormone levels to see if this adenoma is hormone-producing or not (I guess the treatments are different, depending on which it is). I call up the nurse, to see if I need to fast, or what, and am told that it doesn't matter when or how- that these are blood draws, and whenever I can get them done, is fine. So, just to speed things along, I get them done that Friday. I'm later told that I need to have one done at 8 am, which brings me to today- and the reason why there's yet another wrapping on my arm.

So far, all the other tests seem normal, and it looks like this is going to be a non-issue, though Rethwill is going to want me to meet with an endrocrinologist just for followup. Hey- endocrinologist is better than neurosurgeon, right?

But, that leaves the other concern, which Dr.Cox identified as an infection. Well, reading the MRI, I see the phrase "squamous cell carcinoma" as a possibility. Google is a dangerous thing in this instance--- and while this appears to be usually a skin cancer, looking the phrase up in combination with "mastoid" (where it is on me), can be a bit more disconcerting.

Now, yesterday I got the CT scan, a scan that looks more at the bone rather than soft tissue. And you know what? This time I can see it-- just where my left side skull is larger, more porous, less dense than the right side. It's clear. And going back to the MRI now, I can also see it there-- looks like a gloop where there shouldn't be one.

My "brain booger" is what I'm calling it for now, though what it is, and what will happen from here is yet to unfold. It's easy to let this stuff run away, and to a little extent, my imagination has been unfurling more than it should. This being Open Enrollment at the U, I'm starting to debate whether I should up my short-term and/or long-term disability insurance... or life-insurance for that matter (though at $250K, I think my life is adequate).

Like I keep saying, "It's nothing until it's something, and even then, it'll likely be nothing." But I kinda figured that at this point, I might start typing up something, in case it does become something. And if it winds up being nothing, then the worst that happens, is that I'll have put a lot of words into a blog that nobody actually reads anyway.

Sorry all...

Haven't been around much lately. Maggie and Robin know already, but by way of FYI for the rest of you (or maybe TMI, pick your acronym), my father passed away at the end of June. Been busy taking care of arrangements and stuff. My thanks to everyone who was a moral boost through the past couple of years- it's been a test at times. Now, on to the next test, I suppose.

This morning, he was in his home (in California). He couldn't find his ashtray- the one he had in his lap, the one he had JUST set a lit cigarette down in. It had to be somewhere, but it just wasn't around. Never mind that hospitals don't generally allow smoking.

"Can you believe how many people there are in this house?" he asked. House? Yes, he wasn't in a hospital, he was at his home, relaxing.

He's obsessing on Diane Green. Yesterday morning, he was insistent that I call and cancel his flight out to New Jersey. At lunch, he told Jason to cancel Diane's flight to Minnesota. In the afternoon, he told me two stories- one of how Diane and Carol both visited him in the hospital, and that Diane stayed for a day... then later, he told how Diane's flight to Minnesota was cancelled midway, somewhere over Altoona, PA, and how she was miffed, having to take a bus with 17 people all the way back to New Jersey. This morning, he told me how thankful he was that he had flown out to New Jersey, and spent the week there with Diane.

I'm torn. I don't think I should contact Diane, because that is long since in his past. But I'm not sure... maybe she'd want to know. I know that I've spent the past couple of days calling his brothers and sister- family most of whom haven't made any effort at making contact for the past year and a half (and probably longer than that).

He thinks he's in California, circa 1991 (or maybe 1983). And he doesn't want to move to that "damn cold hell" - Minnesota.

I stroked his hair, and asked softly, "Do you want the bad news yet?"

Noone reads this, but should anyone come across it, my dad is back... extremely frail, damaged, and maybe not whole... but no longer empty.

And I don't know if this is a good thing or not.

Shells

The body that lays in the hospital bed is not my father. The tubes that pour life into that shell must be feeding and breathing someone else. That can't be him. I know my Dad. I feel my Dad. I see it in his smile, his eyes, his attitude, even in his gestures.

This unresponsive shell is empty- has nothing of the spark that is my father. This body doesn't fight back, it doesn't show the wry sarcastic bent. It is being watered and fertilized like a houseplant. My father would never allow himself to be treated like this. He would yell at the nurses simply because his feet were cold, and what sort of an institution would keep their rooms so cold. He'd blame Minnesota. He'd blame the black aides, who clearly have it out for him. If he were in California, he'd blame the Filipinos. Always someone else to blame, always something else to complain about.

Stick a pin in this shell, and a toe flinches slightly. That's not my dad.

Show me the MRI charts- maybe he's hiding somewhere in that digital data. Show me the EEG's- he likes to play up his sickness. He's got to be somewhere, but that shell in the bed doesn't have him. Give me the two pennies to put on those eyes... roll that corpse into the corner. Black humor when my father was contained in that shell. Now simply the best thing to do with that vacant body.

Want me to cry over that body? Anger, Bargaining, Depression... what were all those Kubler-Ross stages? None of them applicable, because that body isn't my dad. I've cried, to be sure, but not because of what I've seen. I cry because of what I don't see. My dad is gone, and it's only taking a while for that empty shell to realize. The priest asks if it's an emergency- do they need to perform the Last Rites within the hour? No, it's not, I answer. It can wait.

I don't tell him that it's already too late. My dad is already gone. They will only be anointing an empty shell.

What if John McCain can't actually BE President?

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.  Section I, Article II of the US Constitution

Despite his age, I think it's safe to say that John McCain was not alive at the time of the Constitution's adoption.  But is he a "natural born Citizen"?

Born August 29 (hey- another Virgo!), 1936 at Coco Solo Air Base, John Sidney McCain III was born in the Panama Canal Zone to US parents.  There's no doubt that he is a citizen, and has been since he was born.  But that "natural born" tag does not have a real clear definition, and since the only instance of the distinction in the ENTIRETY of US law is the qualification for President and Vice-President, it hasn't had many cases tested against it.

In 1790, the Congress passed "An act to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization", providing the process for residents to become citizens.  Included was this line:

"the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond sea, or outside the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens" 

This followed the English tradition (going back to 1350) of granting the same rights of inheritance to children of British subjects born overseas, then further in the early 18th century, of expressly declaring those children to be natural-born subjects of the crown. 

Five years later, this law was repealed, and a new act for naturalization passed.  The relevant clause now read:

the children of citizens of the United States, born out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States, shall be considered as citizens of the United States"

No longer are the children considered "natural born."  This could easily have been an oversight on the authors, but based on this phrasing, the Supreme Court ruled in Dred Scott that citizenship deriving from this clause was a form of "naturalization."  They didn't rule on the question of whether such a person would be eligible for the Presidency, since they were instead ruling on whether a slave was a person or property, but a citizen is either citizen "by birth" or "by law" (naturalized), and the implication, if read, would infer these children would not be "natural born citizens."

So, thanks to Dred Scott and, oh yeah, the Civil War, the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, overruling Dred Scott and giving a definitive answer:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

So, that's it:  Either you're born in the United States, or you're naturalized.

In case this point doesn't seem clear, United States vs. Wong Kim Ark, a case ruling on whether a child born on US soil to foreign nationals is a citizen, provides this telling comment in the dissent, saying that the ruling would have the effect that:

"...the children of foreigners, happening to be born to them while passing through the country, whether of royal parentage or not, or whether of the Mongolian, Malay or other race, were eligible to the presidency, while children of our citizens, born abroad, were not." Chief Justice Fuller, dissenting.

Note that because this was a dissent, it does not hold any value as a ruling itself, but at least suggests (strongly, I think) that citizenship granted by statute at birth is NOT the same as "natural born" citizenship.

So, is a US air base, in the Panama Canal Zone, part of the United States?

Legally, the Canal Zone was Panamanian territory under exclusively American control, but not actually incorporated into the United States itself.  So, no- the Canal Zone was not the United States.  Nor is a military base on foreign soil, United States- a point that the conservative basta... I mean... members of the Supreme Court seem quite clear to point out when they rule on Guantanamo. 

So, John McCain was not born in the United States.

He was automatically naturalized, by statute, at birth.

 

John McCain can not be President.

 

 

And no, I don't expect anyone to pay attention to this, either.