Latest news with #Occam'sRazor
Chicago Tribune
5 days ago
- Politics
- Chicago Tribune
Asking Eric: My husband has fallen into a funk
Dear Eric: I have a good friend with whom I get together maybe twice a month or so. We disagree politically, sometimes passionately, but always end our conversation by telling each other that we are still friends and still love and respect each other. A few months ago, her daughter got engaged, and when my friend shared this news, she said that, of course, I would be invited. Whenever we met up, I would always ask about the wedding plans, and we would talk at great length about this. Recently we met for lunch with a third friend, and the subject of the wedding shower came up. Friend One handed Friend Three the shower invitation right in front of me, with no explanation to me. This seemed deliberately designed to be hurtful, and indeed I am hurt and confused. I can now assume I'm not invited to the wedding either. Do I say anything to Friend One? Should I assume that she's angry about my political views? Should I just ignore the whole situation and pretend I don't care? Or should I cut my losses and just withdraw from the friendship? – Uninvited Dear Uninvited: Unless something else happened between you and your friend, either around politics or the wedding, I'm inclined to take the Occam's Razor approach here. Is it possible that your invite got lost in the mail and she assumed that you already had it when she gave the shower invite to your other friend? Perhaps you've already thought of this, but it just seems overly involved and cruel for her to talk to you about the wedding for months, then go out to lunch with you and use that moment to humiliate you by inviting the friend. Especially since she hasn't given you any indication, from what I can see, that you've been taken off the invite list. Is it possible that the fractious nature of your political disagreements weighs heavily on you, even though you do make up with each other when you get into it? To assume that she's being vindictive about your opinions suggests that perhaps you don't actually think everything goes back to love and respect at the end of each debate. So, ask her. 'Are we OK? I haven't gotten an invite to the shower, and it would hurt to not be there and celebrate your daughter. But I want to check in with you to make sure I haven't misread anything or missed a cue.' Dear Eric: My husband who used to be active and social, has fallen into a funk. This has been going on for some time. He just sits all day and watches TV or is on his computer. I believe him to also be an alcoholic. He will pour a drink in the morning and drink all day. And for no reason his attitude changes – yelling for no reason and calling me names. I retired a year and a half ago and since then have become a housewife who pretty much does everything. He won't seek help. I have talked with a counselor to keep myself 'sane.' Any advice would be helpful. – Tired of Being Taken Advantage Of Dear Tired: It's good that you're talking to a counselor. Your husband's struggle with alcohol and his mood can bring you down, too. It's likely that it's already happening. Work with your counselor and/or a trusted friend or loved one on a plan to put some distance between what's happening with your husband and yourself. This doesn't have to be divorce or separation, if that's not something you're willing to consider right now. But for your peace of mind, your quality of life and your safety, it will help you to be out of the orbit of his booze-influenced behavior. You shouldn't have to do everything around the house if you don't want to. And it's unacceptable for him to yell at you or call you names. This is emotional abuse. One of the reasons it's important to put together a plan is so that you can be protected from this abuse and any escalation of his behavior. Also, please look into groups like Al-Anon or SMART Family Recovery, which can help you navigate this living arrangement and the hard feelings you're managing. Once you have a plan in place, tell him that this situation is not acceptable to you, a number of things need to change, and that if he won't seek help, you can't keep going as you have. It may help to have a friend or loved one with you for this conversation. You're in a dangerous situation and your husband has already refused to address the root issue. So, you have to do what you can to protect yourself and to help him to help himself.
Boston Globe
5 days ago
- General
- Boston Globe
Friend fears losing wedding invitation over politics
Recently we met for lunch with a third friend, and the subject of the wedding shower came up. Friend One handed Friend Three the shower invitation right in front of me, with no explanation to me. This seemed deliberately designed to be hurtful, and indeed I am hurt and confused. I can now assume I'm not invited to the wedding either. Get Love Letters: The Newsletter A weekly dispatch with all the best relationship content and commentary – plus exclusive content for fans of Love Letters, Dinner With Cupid, weddings, therapy talk, and more. Enter Email Sign Up Do I say anything to Friend One? Should I assume that she's angry about my political views? Should I just ignore the whole situation and pretend I don't care? Or should I cut my losses and just withdraw from the friendship? Advertisement UNINVITED A. Unless something else happened between you and your friend, either around politics or the wedding, I'm inclined to take the Occam's Razor approach here. Is it possible that your invite got lost in the mail and she assumed that you already had it when she gave the shower invite to your other friend? Perhaps you've already thought of this, but it just seems overly involved and cruel for her to talk to you about the wedding for months, then go out to lunch with you and use that moment to humiliate you by inviting the friend. Especially since she hasn't given you any indication, from what I can see, that you've been taken off the invite list. Advertisement Is it possible that the fractious nature of your political disagreements weighs heavily on you, even though you do make up with each other when you get into it? To assume that she's being vindictive about your opinions suggests that perhaps you don't actually think everything goes back to love and respect at the end of each debate. So, ask her: 'Are we OK? I haven't gotten an invite to the shower, and it would hurt to not be there and celebrate your daughter. But I want to check in with you to make sure I haven't misread anything or missed a cue.' Q. My husband, who used to be active and social, has fallen into a funk. This has been going on for some time. He just sits all day and watches TV or is on his computer. I believe him to also be an alcoholic. He will pour a drink in the morning and drink all day. And for no reason his attitude changes — yelling for no reason and calling me names. I retired a year and a half ago and since then have become a housewife who pretty much does everything. He won't seek help. I have talked with a counselor to keep myself 'sane.' Any advice would be helpful. TIRED OF BEING TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF A. It's good that you're talking to a counselor. Your husband's struggle with alcohol and his mood can bring you down, too. It's likely that it's already happening. Advertisement Work with your counselor and/or a trusted friend or loved one on a plan to put some distance between what's happening with your husband and yourself. This doesn't have to be divorce or separation, if that's not something you're willing to consider right now. But for your peace of mind, your quality of life and your safety, it will help you to be out of the orbit of his booze-influenced behavior. You shouldn't have to do everything around the house if you don't want to. And it's unacceptable for him to yell at you or call you names. This is emotional abuse. One of the reasons it's important to put together a plan is so that you can be protected from this abuse and any escalation of his behavior. Also, please look into groups like Al-Anon or SMART Family Recovery, which can help you navigate this living arrangement and the hard feelings you're managing. Once you have a plan in place, tell him that this situation is not acceptable to you, a number of things need to change, and that if he won't seek help, you can't keep going as you have. It may help to have a friend or loved one with you for this conversation. You're in a dangerous situation and your husband has already refused to address the root issue. So, you have to do what you can to protect yourself and to help him to help himself. R. Eric Thomas can be reached at .
The National
03-06-2025
- General
- The National
Nigel Farage's Scottish conspiracy theories fit Reform UK's agenda
The shadowy fingers of this conspiracy first pulled the strings in Aberdeen on Monday, at an event which saw Farage take issue with Scotland's media – and The Herald in particular. They had, the Reform UK leader insisted, been 'involved' with the anti-racism protesters outside his press conference. Farage claimed that Reform UK had only told Scotland's press of the location, so protesters must have found it out through 'one of you'. He doubled-down on this on Tuesday, simultaneously expanding the conspiracy to claim that The Herald colluded with protesters with the 'deliberate intention of trying to provoke violence'. This garbled interpretation of events is transparently intended to whip up hysteria against the media – but it ignores several key facts. READ MORE: Nigel Farage hides from public and press in shambolic by-election campaign visit Firstly, campaign groups such as Stand Up To Racism, which organised the anti-Farage Aberdeen protest, use well-known methods to gather information. Hoping for a leak from the media isn't one of them. Secondly, it can't possibly have only been the media who knew about the location of the Aberdeen press conference. For starters, the venue had to be aware – and Reform had clearly informed a raft of supporters such as the Tory defector Duncan Massey, whose office obviously knew. Then there's the police, who had officers on site. If Reform didn't tell them where to be, who did? I am not aping Farage here and pointing fingers for an imagined leak, but simply highlighting that his so-called evidence for this anti-media conspiracy theory is full of holes. Reform went on to undermine their own shaky claims after protesters also turned out to demonstrate against Farage in Hamilton. Protesters turned out against Nigel Farage in Hamilton on Monday (Image: Jane Barlow/PA) This one saw Farage cower and hide rather than face activists, leaving members of the press waiting in a car park for an event Reform had organised and then surreptitiously cancelled. Speaking to Politico, Farage's allies in Reform UK claimed he had only dodged a 'large-scale protest' which they claimed had been organised by the SNP. So Reform UK's version of events is that the media conspired to see protests meet him in Aberdeen, and the SNP then arranged for protests to greet him in Hamilton. This is perhaps a time to deploy Occam's Razor, which says the simplest explanation is likely the correct one. Is it more likely that the Scottish media, anti-racism campaign groups, and SNP all conspired together to organise protests against Farage wherever he visited in Scotland? Or is it that the Scottish public organically decide to protest against racist populism without the need for some grand puppet-master pulling the strings? READ MORE: Steph Paton: Ash Regan's gaffe has revealed the sorry state of politicians In the world of Reform UK, the establishment stitch-up is the better option, so it is the one they will promote, regardless of the facts. Far-right conspiracies are, after all, well in Farage's wheelhouse. Just look at how Farage's party have campaigned in the Hamilton by-election, using race-baiting adverts and false quotes to try and convince people that Labour MSP Anas Sarwar is more loyal to Pakistan than to Scotland. And it didn't stop there. On Monday, Farage falsely claimed that Sarwar had said: "We are the South Asian community, we are going to take over the country, and take over the world." Let's call that what it is: racially-charged rhetoric calculated to stoke division and distrust. Is it any wonder that a grand conspiracy isn't needed to organise protests against that?
Medscape
15-05-2025
- Health
- Medscape
Hey, Hospitalists, Those Hoofbeats Sometimes May Be a Zebra
Kelly Chellis could have dismissed the random swollen knee on her then-6-year-old, Trys. At that age, children get injured all the time, and Trys could have tripped, twisted it on the playground, or done one of many other things and simply forgotten to mention it. While Trys's swollen knee at first seemed to fall under the category of typical childhood bumps and bruises, the journey that followed is an important example of the need for hospitalists to stay curious and keep an open mind in patient diagnosis. 'The week of Trys's sixth birthday, they woke up one morning with their right knee swollen to the size of a softball,' Chellis recalled. 'We kept saying, 'Does it hurt?' but Trys really wanted to just go on to school.' Kelly Chellis Chellis' instincts, fine-tuned where Trys was concerned, given that the child had survived a congenital heart defect, gave her pause, though. She took Trys to their regular pediatrician, where x-rays were taken. Although the films showed nothing irregular, the pediatrician had them proceed to Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. 'We were put on the infectious disease floor because they thought that there was an infection in the kneecap, and they were just (administering) IV [intravenous] antibiotics,' Chellis recalled, saying that all of the tests that the epidemiologists ran came back normal. Protocols on the floor restricted their movements in case Trys had something communicable. As Chellis kept them occupied inside their room, a break in the case emerged from a strangely timed art project. 'Out of the blue, [Trys] wanted to draw a hand turkey. In March, that's kind of odd — to want to draw a turkey,' Chellis said. 'But I'm like, great, I'll trace your hand. Then when Trys laid their hand down on the table, their fingers would not actually lay flat.' Chellis immediately drew the care team's attention to Trys's hand, which led to the hospital's rheumatology team joining the case. Shortly thereafter, Trys was diagnosed with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). Chellis was stunned, but they finally had an answer. Don't Let the Obvious Block the Possible Occam's Razor, often attributed to 14th-century friar William of Ockham, said that if you have two competing ideas to explain the same phenomenon, you should prefer the simpler one. A frequently used, more colloquial explanation of the principle is 'When you hear hoofbeats, look for horses, not zebras.' While Occam's razor is helpful in many situations, it has a caveat: Zebras still exist, especially in the medical field. Trying to find the balance between relying on medical training, which is based on pattern recognition and hard data, and the potential for a variety of diseases, like JIA in Trys's case, to manifest on the diagnostic spectrum can be difficult, especially for doctors just entering the field. Rebecca Carter, MD 'In any diagnosis, I try to consider the two extremes: One, what is most likely, and two, what would be most dangerous to miss,' said Rebecca Carter, MD, associate professor of pediatrics and division head of General Pediatrics at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore. 'While much of what we do in medicine, and certainly most of what I do in general pediatrics, comes down to the notion that common things are common, our most significant impact, and the true foundation of our training, comes down to not missing the rare or less common presentations.' While there are many such diseases that affect all ages, JIA is a textbook example of a diagnostic outlier in many ways: First, as profiled in Trys's case, the symptoms of JIA — a group of disorders in which the immune system mistakenly targets the body's own joints and tissues, triggering widespread inflammation — can overlap with more common conditions like sports injuries or infections. Many other early symptoms compiled by the Arthritis Foundation , like morning stiffness and mild fever, are nonspecific, and symptoms come and go and can be anywhere from mild to excruciatingly painful and disabling during attacks. All of these factors make JIA diagnostically elusive, even though it is the most common form of arthritis in young people, affecting about 300,000 children in the United States, according to statistics from the Arthritis Foundation. As a result, the American College of Rheumatology reported that some children wait months, even years, for a diagnosis. 'JIA is a challenge to diagnose, particularly because most kids just compensate for any joint issues they could possibly have by limping or just making up for it in any way that helps them keep going,' said Aixa Toledo-Garcia, RhMSUS, and managing partner at The Center for Rheumatology in Albany, New York. Toledo-Garcia is not affiliated with Trys's case but said the pattern of their diagnosis is very common. 'It's usually the parent that notices the limp or the swollen joint. Practical Care and Uncommon Diagnoses: Maintaining a Balance Carter said that longtime pattern recognition experience in a clinical setting is what alerts doctors to medical outliers like JIA. 'As physicians, we have to see hundreds or even thousands of cases of the same common illness in order to detect when something feels off or different about the patient in front of us,' she said. 'All those hours of medical school and residency give us this perspective, to help us to fully trust our gut when there is something uncommon about how a child presents, and to know when to dive a bit deeper to explore alternative diagnoses to make sure we get it right.' 'Yet' is a great addition to carrying out the process of diagnosis, added Dympna Weil, MD, a board-certified obstetrician/gynecologist and master coach at Prescribing Possibility in Upstate New York. 'By this, I mean, we must use those skills we learn and continue to hone with time. We need to let go of any ego we have and embrace the fact that we don't and cannot possibly know everything,' Weil said. 'Sometimes, patients' bodies don't read the textbooks. They may present differently than the books would tell us they 'should.' So admitting we aren't sure exactly what is going on yet can go a long way in keeping our minds open to other diagnostic possibilities.' If the patient doesn't improve after being given the standard treatment for the diagnosis reached, Weil said clinicians should stay open to the possibility that perhaps the initial diagnosis was incorrect. 'We may need to go back to the history and listen again to the patient's presentation or reassess their physical exam to better inform us. It is critical to confidently know what you know, but equally, to know what you don't know and to not be afraid to ask for a consult or pursue a different path.' Trys's diagnosis of JIA, while shocking, brought clarity. It shifted the family's focus toward proactive care, which included immunosuppressive medications to reduce inflammation and slow disease progression. Since then, both Chellis and her child have become advocates for JIA and participants in the fight for better healthcare policies both statewide and nationally. Partially as a result of their experience, Trys is now studying for their Medical College Admission Tests, and their medical career will clearly be informed by how their diagnosis and subsequent treatment played out. Standing Out in the Herd Medical training emphasizes pattern recognition and probability for a reason: You don't have time to agonize over each and every one of the thousands of possibilities that the rash on the patient in bed 5 might indicate. However, there are times that the most meaningful diagnoses come from the smallest observations, the details that might otherwise seem inconsequential. More than anything else, the fact that a child's random idea to draw a hand turkey in the middle of March ended up being a critically important key to diagnosis highlights the fact that curiosity is an essential tool in medicine, right alongside the stethoscope. You may even have to fight a few people on this, but sometimes, when you hear hoofbeats, they don't belong to a horse. Sometimes, they really do belong to a zebra.
