The Insanity of the United States Postal Service

Quote: Face

Today, I broke. I cried three times on the route. I can't even remember the last time I cried. .

It's December. My wife got a job as
a manager of a PacMail after her mall
closed. It was the day after Tgiving when
she started. She cried every day. She
never sat down for 10 hours. She had
to stay for hours after closing to get
caught up. It was that way till Xmas
Eve.

It gets worse Face, be aware of that. The
middle of the month you'll collapse. It's
the orig thankless job.

Quote: Face

I have no idea why it burns, or why just grazing the skin would hurt,

This is my opinion.

That burning is discs bulging or pinching on nerves. I believe pain comes from inflammation. I like Motrins, or Ibuprofin for anti inflammatories, and I have taken plenty of the scrip ones as well, they all have the same basic ingredient AFAICT? I seem to be allergic to them and can only go three days before my skin starts coming off, whoopee. You can take 2400mg. per day of Motrin. Hell with those commercials that say you can take two of these or twenty of those, give me the twenty.

You know the drill. Do you have access to or can you imagine some kind of inversion table, to get the vertebraes stretched out a bit?

If heat helps, these are a godsend: http://www.thermacare.com/ , there are different shapes and sizes. They last 12 hours, and feel wonderful, and of course heating pads at home with plug ins.

Does ice help? I like flex ice, that is refreezeable, big zip loc bags, whatever roll of duct tape you need to keep it where it hurts. You got to get the inflammation down. I have an ice belt, I think we were here before.

Slow down, move with precision. Even if you aren't in their union, you have representation. Labor laws, something must apply to you? You know,,,YOU KNOW, this can explode on you, dammit kid. If you screw up, then who will we have to live vicariously through?

This thing is bigger than all of us, and is ancient. Breathe. Honk your horn when you arrive so home owners look out and see the mail truck, announce it is there. Everybody is gun friggin happy now. Survive this.

I recommend epidural steroids. I had a real massage yesterday, I want more. Ice, heat, Ice heat, don't tweak anything else. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

Focus, breathe, be the ball. Take care of yourself because there is absolutely no one else that can. Honestly, this can get a lot worse.

Get some morphine if you have to, pain is not your friend. You will end up seeing the pro's by choice or due to incapacitation, while you are still on your feet, you have a little choice. Think about getting yourself some disability insurance as well. It is the difference between being able to live with dignity, and moving under a bridge when this finally goes down on you.

Remember, Humpty Dumpty was pushed, : )

Ibuprofin gel caps work best, they hit
your system right away. Take 3 or 4
every 4 hours.

Sorry to hear all this. Hang in there, Face.

I use Aleve. Works.

Quote: Face

Bottle of pills, whiskey down
Melt into the floor.
Does it hurt? Are you sore?
Quoth the raven, "nevermore".

I thought I had it rough with all three side hustles colliding in 1.5 days, up 25 hours, 2 hours sleep to work about 5 more, then hopefully a nap before I have to drive again. Tomorrow is filling out forms. Today is easy but I cannot disclose. Sleep dep my biggest issue. Nowhere near what you are having.

Do hang in there, don't be crazy. We are all rooting for and hoping you make it past this patch.

Quote: rxwine

All anger and crazy thoughts are actually normal under some conditions.

And I hope this is considered. I'm not suicidal or homicidal, despite the fact that I may state that I am exactly both lol. But that was a bad day, and I just needed to vent =p

Quote: Evenbob

It gets worse Face, be aware of that. The
middle of the month you'll collapse. It's
the orig thankless job.

So I've been told. I actually had one normal day. Just smack in the middle for no reason, low mail, regular parcel load. I thought it was a reprieve, perhaps the post holiday pile up had been gone through and now we'd just have a slight uptick because of the date. Then cyber Monday hit. They actually broke out the 2 ton to tote our parcels closer to our routes (we're out of Hamburg but deliver Lakeview), but I had so much I couldn't process it in time and missed the boat. 8p came and went and I was still out on the road =/

Quote: petroglyph

This is my opinion.

That burning is discs bulging or pinching on nerves. I believe pain comes from inflammation. I like Motrins, or Ibuprofin for anti inflammatories, and I have taken plenty of the scrip ones as well, they all have the same basic ingredient AFAICT? I seem to be allergic to them and can only go three days before my skin starts coming off, whoopee. You can take 2400mg. per day of Motrin. Hell with those commercials that say you can take two of these or twenty of those, give me the twenty.

You know the drill. Do you have access to or can you imagine some kind of inversion table, to get the vertebraes stretched out a bit?

If heat helps, these are a godsend: http://www.thermacare.com/ , there are different shapes and sizes. They last 12 hours, and feel wonderful, and of course heating pads at home with plug ins.

Does ice help? I like flex ice, that is refreezeable, big zip loc bags, whatever roll of duct tape you need to keep it where it hurts. You got to get the inflammation down. I have an ice belt, I think we were here before.

Slow down, move with precision. Even if you aren't in their union, you have representation. Labor laws, something must apply to you? You know,,,YOU KNOW, this can explode on you, dammit kid. If you screw up, then who will we have to live vicariously through?

This thing is bigger than all of us, and is ancient. Breathe. Honk your horn when you arrive so home owners look out and see the mail truck, announce it is there. Everybody is gun friggin happy now. Survive this.

I recommend epidural steroids. I had a real massage yesterday, I want more. Ice, heat, Ice heat, don't tweak anything else. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

Focus, breathe, be the ball. Take care of yourself because there is absolutely no one else that can. Honestly, this can get a lot worse.

Get some morphine if you have to, pain is not your friend. You will end up seeing the pro's by choice or due to incapacitation, while you are still on your feet, you have a little choice. Think about getting yourself some disability insurance as well. It is the difference between being able to live with dignity, and moving under a bridge when this finally goes down on you.

Remember, Humpty Dumpty was pushed, : )

I've never had success with "normal" remedies. I am sure you're right on the money with the inflammation, but ice/ibu/aceto never seems to work for me. I dunno, maybe my expectations are too high =p I suppose I should count myself lucky because I can find relief through little more than positioning. Even as bad as this day was pain wise, once I am home and can sit/lie the way I want, the pain all but disappears (relatively). I just need something that'll let me go when I need to go.

Morphine is all but out, unless I want to go the dirty route and I don't want to do that. Skin popping is not conducive to fatherhood. Or living. Really, all I need is a script of my little 5mg vikes and I can keep trucking on maximum one per day. That's really all I need. I don't need to be "pain free"; short of a litre of morphine, I couldn't achieve pain free anyways. I just need to dull the knife in my back. But I don't have insurance, or the money to cover the several hundred dollar out of pocket cost for visit and meds. I often take leftovers from friends and fam who've had surgery / dental work, since it saves me a copay and cuts out the middle man. I suppose I'll have to go looking.

Having gotten through that day, I kind of hit the reset. Yesterday was sort of worse, at least as far as work goes. Our start time has been bumped up to help us get our routes done in time, but despite the early in, my home time did not follow suit. And once I was done with my route, I was sent right back out on a piecemeal parcel run. I got home with just enough time to pack a bag and feed half of my fish, then right back out the door to ref a college level double header. Left for work at 0600, got home from work at 0045. Every stitch of my self is blown out, tight, and sore, but my back does not hurt. Today is a great day =)

It's a cold and sunny Sunday and my boy will be here any minute. We're gonna go bowling and then decorate the house / erect the tree. I just hope he doesn't ask me to go fishing XD

Thanks for lending me ears to cry into ;)

You're definitely making me feel guilty for the way I plan to do much of my shopping in the next few.

Quote: odiousgambit

You're definitely making me feel guilty for the way I plan to do much of my shopping in the next few.

You usually have an option (USPS Ground/FedEx/UPS). Pick USPS. Not having a job is worse than having one you struggle in. Just know I am damning your soul to hell and cussing you right out every second of every day XD

Kidding, of course. I refuse to shop at the store, too. As long as you don't have a secure mailbox, we're cool. If you do have a secure mailbox, please keep it to yourself and discretely replace it before commenting further. Not only will I wish you hell, but I'll actively conspire to put you there ;)

Face, do most of the stops on your route have individual mail boxes? Where I live in Las Vegas almost everyone has a communal box. On my cul-de-sac there is five houses and one mail stop with eight individually locked boxes. I would assume the driver would prefer the community boxes. For some reason I was assigned box seven even though there are only five houses.

Would you please use your extensive connections and influence with the postal service to have my box number changed to three?

Thanks for your help.