Category: Sweden

how much do you know about your colon?

I had a colonoscopy in December*. It’s a standard cancer screening procedure in the United States once you’ve turned 50. They didn’t find any cancer, but both the doctor and the paperwork I was given (the paperwork included fresh pictures of my insides; one showing my intact appendix) stated that I have a “grossly redundant colon”.

In plain language that means that my colon is several times the length of a normal person’s. It’s a nuisance for a doc trying to navigate a tiny camera, but it’s not dangerous, and has no symptoms.

A grossly redundant colon is a hereditary condition, though.

So at one point I asked my parents about it, to learn which one of them had given me my extra-long intestines. My parents are both in their 80s, and have lived their whole lives in Sweden, a country with national health care and some of the best research hospitals in the world.

Neither of my parents knew anything about the length of their colons, because neither of them had ever had a colonoscopy.

According to an article in the New York Times today Americans pay more for medical procedures than people in any other well developed country. In the case of colonoscopies, American medical centers bill insurance companies $7-8000 for a screening procedure that would cost $650 in another country, if it’s even performed. Only in the US are colonoscopies the go-to screening test for colon cancer, because there aren’t, actually, any data to support that colonoscopies are better than less expensive screening methods. Another example: A nasal spray that costs $108 in the United States will run you $21 in Spain.

“The United States spends about 18 percent of its gross domestic product on health care, nearly twice as much as most other developed countries.”, the NYT article states. Winners? Health care providers, manufacturers, drug companies, all working together to drive up costs. Losers? Whoever pays the insurance premiums.

* Also known as the day when Dan wasn’t white enough to drive me home.

why 1980s theme parties are offensive to me

An old friend of mine got his band back together, almost 30 years after they broke up, and played two nights. Part of the reason was, as I understand it, to show their now-grown kids what dad can do. (If you lived in Göteborg in the early 1980s you might want to press play.) The last time they played together was in the summer of 1985, and everyone was very young.

My friend was sweet enough to send me the link for the youtube version of their show. As I listened (because, let’s be honest, you don’t really see much) I realized that those songs were sitting somewhere in my brain. They’d been there all along.

I’ve never been fascinated by time travel, but all of a sudden it felt as if the 1980s was a place. A place I could travel to on a plane. And if I did travel there, I’d find the streets and the bars and the stores and the people still there, intact. The people who are dead now, and the people who are older now, and the buildings that were torn down. Still there. A strange feeling.

first rule: don’t think you are somebody

There is a Swedish proverb that I had never heard until, maybe, last year: “Those who wish to sing, always find a song.” When I see it quoted, it’s always considered inspirational, and uplifting. Not only have I never heard it, but it also doesn’t ring very Swedish to me.

The Law Of Jante (based on observations by Danish writer Aksel Sandemose in the early 1900s, now used to describe a state of mind in Sweden and the other Scandinavian countries) suppresses individual achievement. Generally, to stand out in a crowd is not considered a good thing.

I wonder of this proverb may have had a negative tone originally, meaning “those who want to stand out always find a way”. Somehow that feels more Swedish to me.

me? my name is ‘ladda’

Dan and I went to the movies today, and one of the previews was for the History Channel’s series ‘Vikings’. As I was watching it I realized there wasn’t one Scandinavian actor to be seen, or heard. Which gave me the same chuckle as the English language version of the Girl With The Dragon Tattoo: English speaking actors playing Scandinavian characters that don’t know how to pronounce their own names. In The Girl, etc. Daniel Craig knocks on a door and says “Hi, I’m Mikael Blomquist”, butchering both his first and last name beyond recognition. It’s too funny, and too unnecessary.