Yeah, there’s basically a “valve” muscle in the esophagus called the upper esophageal sphincter (either a part of the cricopharynx, vice versa, or they’re the same… Not sure). It stays closed for the most part, but opens for swallowing and burping. Swallowing is generally fine, but burping not so much. You may have seen the term R-CPD in the thread, that stands for Retrograde (outward direction) Cricopharyngeal Dysfunction. There’s a similar condition called achalasia, which is also treated with Botox, but that also has swallowing issues unlike R-CPD.

Anyway, the Botox helps that muscle relax. The body metabolizes it after several months, but in that time you have “training wheels” that help develop muscle memory to burp. About 80% of people are “one and done” with that one shot. I personally had a second and don’t really have “tasteable” burps, but I do have small ones that seem to help.

It’s funny, because before I suspected that issue in my daughter we saw a pediatric ENT (the type of doctor who performs the procedure). Knowing it’s an obscure thing many doctors have a hard time grasping, I told him about it figuring it may plant a seed for some parent in the future. His response? “That’s funny, I don’t burp either. What you said makes sense though.” I would have loved to go back to him, but unfortunately he moved across the country in the meantime. Ended up going to another doctor in the practice who is amazing though!

The main ones you see almost universally are

• excessive flatulence (it’s gotta come out somewhere),
• bloating comparable with pregnancy (usually equivalent to what you’d see after several months in, but occasionally people look full term!)
• Weird gurgling noises in the throat

There are also things like hiccups, hypersalivation, constipation, and things like that that are common but not guaranteed.

My daughter has been pretty underweight for a while. I realized she’s had massive farts, and a bit of a big belly given the rest of her relatively small size. She was super hard to burp as an infant (that varies a lot in adults with the condition) and it pretty much stopped after a while. Basically the bloat kills the appetite.

Pretty much. It affects people differently, but one guy talked to manually any doctor who would listen. Dr. Bastian in Chicagoland has a YouTube channel about laryngology (basically all throat stuff) and that guy who had so many issues with not being able to burp contacted Dr. Bastian about it. He told him to get some Botox on the muscle of the throat that releases gas, and the guy ended up flying to Chicago to have it done. Dr. Bastian is pretty legendary in that community now. He also has a very impressive background even before that.

I actually went to that practice for my first injection and was originally booked to see Dr. Bastian. He fell sick the week I was there, but another doctor in the practice was able to do it instead since I came from out of town. Honestly everyone there is great!

But also, I saw similar symptoms in my toddler daughter, who was very underweight (getting better!). It was hard, because it can be difficult enough to find someone willing to do it for an adult, but a young child? Nobody wants to take that risk. Most specialists I talked to thought it made sense, but it really wasn’t their area (fair) or they’d get skeptical. The ENT we saw about it was HORRIBLE and basically chased us out because it was a zebra. Eventually I booked a telehealth visit with Dr. Bastian just to see if I was projecting my own experiences on her, and he was the kindest man. Sent a letter with his opinion for me to show other providers, and I think it really helped show I wasn’t insane.

Daughter eventually had it done by a pediatric ENT doctor who has done it before. She did great for several days but snapped back after an endoscopy about a week later. We’re trying again in about a month and a half!

Sorry to ramble, but this has been such a big thing for me personally!

I would strongly suggest getting the treatment if you can! It’s a super simple procedure.

I was a part of the noburp community on the old site. In the last decade it’s been used to cure that. The body metabolizes it after about 6 months, but having that assistance often helps build the muscle memory and people can usually burp after that. I personally had it done twice and can still do small burps at last, and my daughter (toddler, born very prematurely) had it done at the beginning of the year. Her physical medicine doctor mentioned it as a possibility, and when I told him about the burping thing he basically equated Botox in the medical community with Windex in My Big Fat Greek Wedding

The US $100 bill was introduced in 1914 and would have been worth over $3,300 in today’s dollars. Even if that’s only about half what $10k SGD is worth, that’s still a hell of a long time to hold that ceiling

France shares its longest land border with Brazil

Honestly, people love to shit on the PT Cruiser but at least it tried to be a little different - arguably in a cool retro way!

I’m not dead yet!

Canadian bacon comes from the back (as in, near the back bone) of the pig. Ham comes from the other back (as in, the butt)… Which isn’t to be confused with the pork butt (also called pork shoulder) from the front, typically used for pulled pork.

Hey Arnold! It’s a little older but wonderful to watch and subtley shows some serious issues (one character’s mom is pretty obviously an alcoholic, even if you never see her actually drinking, but it’s not too blatant for naive minds)

Also, Pepper Ann is criminally underrated. It never gets particularly serious or anything, but it’s a good coming of age show with a pretty relatable female main character. One thing that’s stuck out for me is that pretty much anyone would think she’s a pretty cool girl they’d want to be friends with, but she feels hella awkward around most people. Good way to bring up that you may feel a bit awkward, but sometimes you need to fake a little confidence and others may take it better than you’d think

That’s a good point that they exist, but a better way to quantify their prevalence is probably by population served. Even if the majority of fire departments are like that (if…) they would be in the most rural areas with little population. I would think most people live in areas densely populated enough to have an always-staffed fire station.

I feel like if we know about this, they would too. Or at least a supervisor.

Kinda sorta. I’m firmly in the millennial generation, so there aren’t as many computers older than me. But I can tell you about my dad bringing home a brand new 486 (25MHz) and temporarily setting it up for the first time on the kitchen table, before it was officially set up downstairs.

In high school I got a handful of leftover computers to play with. Some early Pentiums, a really weird 486 tablet (still have that in my crawlspace!), and stuff like that. Great to learn hardware on, do some homework in my room, listen to Winamp, etc.

Then college came and I had less time and space. Then I bought a home a couple years later (when they were all on sale!) and had a kid. Most of my time and money goes to those things.

But! I hate where technology is going now. I remember things being fun and innovative, rather than yet another thing weirdly integrated with an app on your phone (likely with a subscription 🙄 ). So I’ve spent some time restoring antique radios, and put together some fun projects I’ve found that use a 3D printer and Raspberry Pi, including a working mini computer that runs a Dosbox instance with my favorite games from that 486.

Tl;dr not that young by Lemmy standards, but I get it!

I think CNBC’s ticker is for stock prices, whereas Fox and CNN are for news headlines (although Fox will do several pieces for the same story, essentially putting a miniature article in a ticker)

MSNBC hasn’t had a ticker in years, if ever (I’m sure they did at one point but I had watched it for a while and noticed its absence)

That’s the same initials of mine! I did a PEI bed sheet though, and so far I’ve stuck with Cura (but you’re tempting me!)

Is it the greatest? Of course not. Does it take care of a lot of issue I had with my previous Ender 3 V2? Definitely.

even though I read this huge wall of text, I’m not closer to understanding what this plugin actually does

Sounds like every piece of corporate literature produced in at least the last decade

I work with a different kind of legacy system. It was retrofitted to work with SOAP, OOP, and some other modern stuff, but none of the old farts bothered to learn it. When I inherited a SOAP service that system used, I had to learn a lot about it to get what I needed.

And honestly? It’s been a lot of fun. It’s a unique kind of challenge, I’ve practically gained celebrity status at work, and even if it’s nothing I’ll be doing long-term it shows how I can pick up weird systems and work with others to make some miracles happen.

Kinda sorta. Cousins mean you share grandparents. Second cousins share great-grandparents. Third cousins share great-great-grandparents.

The the “removed” refers to generations. My first cousin’s kid is my first cousin, once removed. His kid (my cousin’s grandparent) will be my first cousin, twice removed. So 16x removed would be 14x great-grandparent/child.

In other words, Benedict Cumberbatch’s 14x great-grandparent shared a great-great-grandparent with… Was it a king we were talking about? I already forgot OP.