cassakane

Last month our 2004 Ford Taurus was having some problems. My husband had the codes read and was told is was the catalytic converter. Husband did not immediately have it repaired and we kept driving it. We finally got it repaired and it turned out to be a coil (ignition?) instead of the catalytic converter. Before we got it repaired it started making a noise like metal grinding a scraping on metal. It is a "long" sound, like the metal parts are scraping against each other for a couple of seconds.

I have only been driving the car short distances - taking my son to and from school, mostly. At these short distances (maybe two miles round trip) the sound is quieter and intermittent. A couple of times I drove the car more than a couple of miles and the sound gets very loud and constant. Today when this happened, I turned the a/c off and the sound got quieter, but did not go away.

Does anyone know what this might be? I am supposed to take my son to a specialists appointment first thing in the morning. The appointment is 30 minutes away. I am guessing that I should not go...I know I should not go, but we ve had to mess with his medication to prepare for the appointment, and I don t want to have to go through that again.

So, what might the problem be and can I drive the car?

My daughter is suffering from morning sickness. She experienced an extremely bad bout of vomiting and tore a flap of skin. The flap of skin starts at the back of her tongue (that is where it is still connected) and runs down into her throat.

I advised her to gargle salt water to clean the area and she will call her doctor first thing in the morning. I cannot find any info about this online. Does anyone have any advice?

My mother got a fistula made in her arm two weeks ago. (This is something common for dialysis patients.) Last week we went to an appointment with her primary care doctor and he was obviously shocked by the condition that her arm is in. As he described it her wound is not put together properly - one side of the incision is higher than the other creating a ledge. I think this is probably the reason it is not healing well. The wound is also running *a lot* of clear liquid. Her primary doctor thought that this is lymphatic fluid and that the surgeon accidentally cut into her lymphatic system. The doctor also said that the incision is much bigger than he has ever seen. Her doctor immediately contacted the surgeon's office and they asked my mother to come in immediately. We drove over an hour to get to his office and he barely glanced at my mother's arm, quickly declared it was "fine" and left the room.

Today at dialysis my mother showed her arm to the people working there who said they had never seen anything like it and called the surgeon's office. The surgeon's office said that a nurse practitioner will call back on Wednesday (two days from now). I do not like this answer at all. It doesn't seem possible that someone who can't even see the wound will be able to help.

Should my mother try to contact a different surgeon? Would a new surgeon accept her as a patient or would she be considered "off limits" because the surgery was done by someone else?

Don't tell me to sue.

I'm asking this again to try to get the right info so I can get a good answer. My car was leaking and steaming. My husband replaced the water pump but the car was still leaking. The problem was the timing cover and he did not feel like he could fix it. I am currently staying with my mother to take care of her. She talked me into letting a family friend fix the car. After the guy had the car my mother told me a story about how he had fixed a car for her, messed up the timing belt and ruined the car. So, obviously I was upset because the problem with my car involves the timing.

My husband was visiting this weekend and he took the car for a test drive. He says that the car is idling rough and lacks power to accelerate. He says that he can feel the engine vibrating when he pushes on the gas pedal.

So, since my car was okay before this happened, I am assuming that either something else was damaged because my car overheated or the guy who worked on it did something wrong. What might be wrong with my car and would it be safe for me to drive the car 3 hours home when the time comes. My husband feels more comfortable having our regular mechanic fix the car since we don't know anything about the mechanics in this area.

My mother talked me into letting a family friend fix my 2004 ford taurus. My husband test drove it and says that the timing belt is messed up - he says that at high speed it feels like only 2 cylinders are firing. It feels like when you push on the gas pedal the car is not responding.

I am currently staying with my mother to take care of her while her boyfriend recovers from surgery. My home is three hours away from here. Would it be safe to drive my car home when the time comes so that our regular mechanic can fix my car?

I checked my blood sugar on Christmas Eve with my mother's machine - it was 425. This is the worst time of year to get in to see a doctor so I am trying to control my blood sugar with my food choices (low carb, low glycemix index). I couldn't get a testing machine until last night because I have to stay at work for days and I am not allowed to leave. I had eaten 2 vegetarian sausages(6 carbs) for breakfast, no lunch and hummus and pretzels (20 carbs) and carrots for dinner. My sugar was 325 after the dinner. Obviously my plan was not working.

Today, I did some reading and tried triscuits (because they are whole wheat), eggs, cheese and almonds. My sugar was 165 after eating this. (135 when I woke up) So, the triscuits were not I good idea.

I am a vegetarian, so meat is not an option. Does this mean that I have to eat only eggs, cheese and nuts until I see a doctor? Do I need to try to keep my sugar around 100 or is there an acceptable range because I don't have medication - like under 200?

I did discover that a medication I am taking - hydrochlorothiazide - raises blood sugar levels. So, maybe my sugar will be easier to maintain when this is out of my system.

Thanks for your advice :)

We are currently renovating a 105 year old house. The basement obviously has problems with leaking and there were also burst pipes in the basement...so, the basement was very damp. We have fixed the pipes and are going to install french drains to alleviate this problem.

The kitchen is right above the basement. When we pulled up the linoleum we discovered that there was plywood under the linoleum - it must be sitting on top of the original wood floor. The plywood itself was damp. It must have absorbed a lot of moisture from the basement and then never been able to dry out because of the linoleum. It is drying now that it is exposed to the air. If you bounce on the floor it shakes things in the room more than normal.

We haven't pulled up the plywood yet. What I want to do is tile the floor with ceramic tile. Can the plywood dry and be okay? Do we have to replace the plywood? Is it likely that we will have to replace the wood floor that is under the plywood? Are ceramic tiles out of the question since the floor has a bounce? Will sistering the floor joists fix this?

I just bought a fixer-upper. I started tearing off the wallpaper in a bedroom and noticed that the walls beneath have a few small holes (maybe the size of a quarter) and are crumbly. There is one spot where the wall is weak. I don't know what the walls are made of. I would assume plaster, but that just doesn't seem right. The material is maybe 1/2 inch thick and a brown color. It looks like an ancestor of drywall...but there is no white stuff on the inside. The house was built in 1908.

No comments about buying a fixer-upper when I obviously have very little knowledge - this house was *insanely* cheap because of the current market in my area. ;)

The house was built in 1925. It has a furnace in the basement. The ductwork only goes to the rooms on the ground floor. There are passthrough vents that allow heat to rise to the rooms in the second story.

Is it possible to replace the furnace with a heat pump without having to redo the ductwork? Or do heat pumps need special ductwork? The furnace needs replaced and it seems like a good idea to get a heat pump since there is no AC in the house. Obviously the passthrough vents won't work so great when it comes to AC...but we can always use window AC units upstairs when necessary.

My husband and I are planning on building our own home - as in my husband is going to do the majority of the work. We are trying to get the cost down as much as possible. We have not yet contacted local contractors, but the quote that I found is that having a basement built costs $25-35 per sq foot. From what I have been told, the basement is the cheapest level of the house to have built...but does that make it cheaper than building a first floor on a slab foundation ourselves rather than having a walkout basement first floor built?

My husband's company has offered him an opportunity to work in India. They just suggested it today, so I am not sure of all the details. I am trying to learn what I can about living in India, so that I will be able to make a good decision about whether we should move our family there. We have three children, ages 14 yrs, 12 yrs and 5 weeks.Will it be possible for my children to attend Indian public schools? I do not want to pay tens of thousands of dollars a year for them to attend a special school for foreigners. I do not want to spend that kind of money, and I would want my children to experience the real India.

An answer to this question and any advice about relocating a family to India from the United States would be great :).

My old dryer stopped working...well, it stopped *heating*. Also, the timer would never go off...the timer would tick down, but never buzz off - so the dryer could just run cold for hours. My husband tried to fix it. He replaced the heating element (although it was called something else) and some other part that reminds me of "cut-off switch". He tested other parts of the dryer and everything seemed to be working well. After talking with an uncle, he decided that it was probably the timer and that it would be best to buy another dryer.

We got the other dryer last night, but ended up with the wrong sort of three-prong plug. So, my husband brought another plug home at lunch and hooked up the new dryer. I just went to check on the first load of clothes. The dryer is not getting hot and the timer is not moving.

How can this same problem possibly happening to two different dryers? One of them brand new? What could possibly be causing this?

I've had some pain with my pregnancy for the last couple of weeks...since week 23. I am pretty sure that it is just ligament pain, but my mother is freaking out. The pain is often on the sides of my bump - where the ligaments are - but can be across the top or bottom of my bump. I am okay as long as I am sitting down or standing still. If I am walking I am in pain. If I walk a lot, the pain really increases. I had two good days last week with very little pain, and then washed a bunch of dishes. That set the pain off again. If I do too much and then sit for awhile, I have to walk hunched over for a bit because the pain is so bad that I can't stand up straight.

Does this sound familiar to anyone? I have a doctor's appointment on Thursday, but my mother is trying to insist that I go to the ER - ridiculous.

I'm going to try to keep this as simple as possible. Years ago a doctor told me that I was hypoglycemic. Although she never performed any tests, as far as my personal experience went this seemed like a good diagnosis.

Several weeks ago I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes and started checking my blood sugar levels. Last week my glucometer fell out of my bag into my car and was in the car overnight in freezing temperatures. When I found it the next morning it didn't work. My mother had told me that cold would kill it, then later denied this and said that I only had to wait for it to warm up. This was two days later (I'd been at work for 50 hours straight with no chance of buying a new one.) and so the machine was warmed up and seemed to be working fine. All week my sugars have been low. Not *very* low, just lower than what I would expect them to be after the few weeks of experience that I have had. For example, last night I had a small baked potato, beans and rice for dinner...I knew these were not the best choices, so I didn't eat a lot...but two hours later my sugar was 85. I really feel like it should have been more than that.

Today, I was unable to check my sugar after breakfast because I was on the road. So, when I got home I had a snack of crackers and cheese and checked two hours later. The first reading I got was 44. This did not seem possible, if it was that low I should at least feel very sick or something. (I did feel a little unwell.) So, I immediately tested twice more to see what readings the machine would give me. The first was 68 and the second was 75. I know that I was very careful to dry the alcohol on the first (44) test, but I was stressed for the next two tests and can't be sure that I did dry the alcohol on those ones.

I then used the control solution to test my machine. The machine tested fine...but it seems to me like range of 103-138 is enormous. Can that really be an accurate test? I called the hotline and spoke to a representative. She had me test the machine again and it came out within the accepted control test range. She said that with readings under 100, a difference of 20 or less is acceptable in readings. She said that I only had a difference of 18 in my readings. Well, I didn't think about it until later, but the difference between 68 and 44 is 24, not 18. I don't understand where she got the 18 at all. So, she may have made a mistake.

I was feeling a little unwell at the time of these tests and eating some toast helped me to feel better. I then had pizza for dinner. I ate enough pizza that my sugar should have been between 100 and 120, but when I checked it was 83. I was also feeling very sick, but I was not thinking that it was because my sugar was low. I really don't think I should feel that sick at 83....anyway, I hate some pretzels and feel much better. I really debated about whether to eat anything at all, I didn't know whether to trust my machine.

Is it possible that my body is suddenly having trouble keeping my sugar up? Maybe it is going high really fast and then my body is flooded with insulin, bringing it down really fast so that when I test two hours later it is low? Do I trust my machine and make choices about eating based on the test results? I am so afraid that the machine is reading low and my sugar is really high and I am hurting my baby. And I can't call my doctor's office until Monday!

Thanks for reading all of this and for any advice you have to offer.

I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes a few weeks ago. I'm doing my best to control my blood sugar by eating right, but sometimes it just seems very random. Yesterday I had a bagel with cheese and french fries for lunch. It wasn't a lot of french fries. I was eating the lunch provided at work, so there were no nutrition labels on the food. So, I couldn't count the carbs.

When I checked my sugar two hours later it was 196. This is the highest it has ever been...and I really feel like it shouldn't have been this high based on what I ate. But I understand that I could have misjudged the impact of the food that I ate. However, the thing that I am really confused about is that two hours later, when I checked my blood sugar to see if it would be okay for me to eat something for dinner, my sugar was 75. I'm not taking medicine or anything....is it weird for my sugar to jump that high and then go so low so quickly? Or am I just inexperienced and this is totally normal?

I know this probably sounds crazy. It seems very obvious to me: your baby (obviously not a very young baby) or toddler is doing something wrong...so you tell them no. However, I see so many questions on YA from mothers whose small children are behaving very badly...and it is like saying "no" and providing a consequence if the behavior continues never even enters their mind.

Years ago one of my cousins was probably approaching 1 y.o. and we were at a family christmas eve party. The cousin kept sticking her hand in the cheese tray. I told her to stop and took her hand away...but her older sister was like, "she's a baby" and let her keep doing it.

I have raised my stepchildren since the youngest was 4 y.o. I believe strongly in establishing rules and consequences. If my baby/toddler is behaving in an unacceptable manner, I have every intention of telling him "no". Am I crazy to think that this is even possible? Or are many parents just allowing their children to run free because they are afraid to say no?

And before anyone tries to tell me to distract a small child who is doing something wrong...I understand behavior modification very well and know that this is the wrong approach.

I would like my teenage daughter to adopt a fashion style rather than just wearing the same jeans and t-shirts that the other girls wear. The benefit for her is that I will be more interested in buying her clothes if she adopts some sort of style. She is willing to do this...but we need some information regarding different styles.

Right now all that I can think of is gothic (which she did when she was 12), gothic lolita and harajuku which she probably will not be interested in... there must be a lot more styles that she can choose from.

I would love to have some suggestions. Thank you :).

I'll try to make this quick and limit the tmi ;). A few weeks ago I thought I had a miscarriage. The midwife said that it would have been between 5 and 6 weeks.

Reasons I thought I was pregnant:

1.I'm trying to get pregnant

2. I took two tests and both were positive - one 4 days after my missed period, and one 6 days after.

3. Tender/painful breasts starting a couple days before my missed period and increasing in pain until miscarriage.

4. Weird, heavy, uncomfortable feeling in my abdomen until miscarriage.

5. A few bouts of slight nausea...nowhere near actually throwing up

6. Very tired, needing a nap everyday.

7. Peeing all the time

When I had what I assume is a miscarriage, there was a little bleeding and then a couple hours of horrible pain. For the next two days I did not bleed much. It was a Saturday and Sunday, so I couldn't see my doctor. I passed a little blood, but mostly little pieces of stuff...it looked like someone popped a thick black balloon.

I went to my doctor on Monday morning and she felt around on my stomach and sent me to get bloodwork and an ultrasound. By the time I got to the ultrasound I was bleeding a lot. My assumption is that the doctor feeling about got things moving that were stuck. There was a lot of blood and also some matter in the toilet. I never passed more than a couple of blood clots. I did pass a weird dull brown blob a day or so after I passed a lot of blood.

The problem is my hcg levels were basically zero. So that would mean that I was never pregnant at all. I don't understand how I could have all these symptoms and get two positives tests. One of the tests was a First Response, I forget the other one. They were both made to detect pregnancy early. Although I got the positive lines...the lines were pretty light. On the second test, I thought the line wasn't going to show up...but it did right at the end of the three minutes.

Is it possible that I was pregnant, but that my body wasn't making enough hcg? Does this sound like a miscarriage...or just a late/bad period? I'm going to see a fertility specialist next week....If my problem is that I don't produce enough hcg, that can be treated....right?

Thanks for your help :)

(Advice from people with experience rather than just opinion is really appreciated.)

My daughter wants this song, but doesn't know the tittle or the artist. She says the lyrics include:

run fast for your father, for your sister and your brother

the dark days are over

I've tried some lyric searches, but no luck. She might have the lyrics wrong....

Thanks for your help :)

I had a trans-vaginal sonogram on Monday due to a five week miscarriage. It is understandable that the procedure hurt. However, should I still be in pain today (Friday)? I am getting better every day, but it still hurts if I put any pressure on my abdomen.

I am wondering because the tech was young and didn't seem to want to do the sonogram. She explained what would happen and asked if that was okay with me, in such a way that I knew she wanted me to say "no". Even after I said yes, she asked again...wanting me to say no. After working on me for about 20 minutes, the tech went and got an older tech to assist her. The older tech worked on me for about 10-15 minutes, and she was much gentler. However, the younger tech may have already completed most of the "painful" parts like digging for my ovaries. From what I could gather by listening to them, the younger tech called the older tech in to help her figure out if something that was showing up was an artifact of the sonogram or not.

While I was pretty sure that I had miscarried, my doctor sent me to get the sonogram because she thought there was a chance that I had not lost my baby. It seems very odd to me that the procedure was so painful. If I had still been pregnant and the baby was in danger of a spontaneous abortion - it would seem like this procedure would have almost guaranteed a miscarriage.

I am not going to call the hospital and complain or anything. After taking it easy all week and still experiencing discomfort and pain, I just want to know if this is the typical result of the procedure