We are now beginning to hit our stride in Texas where the air conditioner is not constantly running.

Since I am finally on medication to address heart problems, depending on exactly when I take it I may be running hot or cold depending on what the weather is. (And it’s always extremely annoying. Always.)

But there is no in-between.

But there is never any in-between.

It’s been three months since I was supposed to get a referral processed for cardiology, but since my primary care physician’s front desk is only staffed with three people that… isn’t happening. Or it hasn’t been happening, I guess I should say. All I can do is politely call to ask about it, to inquire about the status of it and maybe bump it to the top of the list. I also have to call for refills on my heart medication since my doctor never puts any on them. I think it has more to do with him being scatterbrained than it would be him wanting me to call his office every month to ask for refills on a medication that you’re not really supposed to stop cold turkey. (And, worst of all, getting a new PCP would mess up all of the specialist referrals I have.)

I put in a refill request for the medication that my primary care physician put me on late last week, it’s… this week now, I have none of it left and am resuming being symptomatic. In spite of that, I’ve still managed to hear a whole lot of nothing back from my doctor’s office. I’ll be contacting them over this next week unless things necessitate sooner care than that again. I would have thought that, at the very least, a refill or two would have been put on this medication… but no. No, it wasn’t. I was given a thirty-day supply of a medication that made me cough uncontrollably and to the point of vocal dysfunction for the first half of that, and by the time it actually began to help, I had none left and my doctor hadn’t responded to the refill request.

This song and dance is going to be fun (and what I mean by that is not fun) if I have to keep repeating it.

Now that I am finally no longer coughing due to the medication that I was supposedly placed on for this (which doesn’t mean that it was successful, as I shouldn’t have been placed on it to begin with given my health history), I have edema in my leg that has gotten progressively worse and begun to creep further and further up said leg. Even though I’ve had transient periods of edema in the past, none of them have been quite like this — I’m not able to wear any of the pairs of shoes that I own because of this, excepting the pair of CLOAK Slipps that I’ve owned for… ever now, forever now, and getting that on my foot has been a fight.

I’m going to be calling my primary care physician (doctor? physician?) in a few days, hoping that I’m finally able to get through to them because… that’s always been fun, and I’m going to ask about the status of the cardiology referral that was supposed to be sent out. I’m also going to ask for a refill on the medication that I was put on if they don’t want to change it before I see that doctor, and see what needs to be done about my leg. I can almost not bend it at the ankle, and it’s getting to the point where bending it at the knee — or even sitting on that leg, which I do some of the time — has gotten increasingly more awkward. I know that, given my family and health history, the edema is most likely to be caused by… wait for it, the heart problems that have been inheritable on that side of the family. I just want to be able to stand, walk, and use this leg without concern, and this is getting more and more annoying (with the leg less usable) as time goes on.