I am going to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN next week and I'm told I could expect to be there up to 10 days. From my searching, it seems like there is very little to do in Rochester and I have a feeling I'll have plenty of down time, so I would love some suggestions of what I can do other than sit in my AirBnB with my notebook.

There are some issues which will restrict what I can do and that won't help-

The weather is not supposed to be great there next week, so outside things are probably not a possibility, and doing something like driving up to Minneapolis probably won't be realistic.

I'm not really an athletics/sports person and I do drink alcohol, but it's probably not a good idea for me to since I'll be getting medical tests, so those areas probably won't work either.

Finally, I'm going to the Mayo Clinic due to an undiagnosed disorder where I can't eat solid foods, so unfortunately, restaurants are also not doable.

Anything else I'm interested in. It looks like there's an art museum, but I'm guessing it isn't very big. It looks like there is a trolley to ride around on, but I'm guessing that doesn't exactly take a long time either. I also see that there's a Spam museum (as in the meat, not the email thing) in a town not too far away that I might visit- it's gotta be weird as hell.

But I can't find much else.

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[–] Zeppo@sh.itjust.works 6 points 8 months ago (2 children)

It's a fairly small Midwest town. Nothing too remarkable other than that Mayo happens to be there. I stayed there for two weeks but don't recall doing much other than the hospital tests, eating at the restaurant at the hotel, and wandering around the small downtown-like area. There's your usual assortment of restaurants, bars and breweries, plus some boutiques and clothing stores.

Mayo itself is like an art museum - they have a fantastic art glass collection and some historical artifacts. I think it's the Gonda building where on each floor, at the elevator landing, there's a spread of art glass. The pieces they have are made by some of the best known and most respected glass artists. I spent some time looking through all that.

There are a couple Mayo-themed tours, like the founder's house and the old fancy hospital building. The Spam museum is about 35 miles away, which is almost as far as St. Paul. There are some hiking trails. Personally I was pretty busy just doing hospital stuff from 8-4 every day, wasn't feeling super energetic, and was happy to eat and go to sleep.

[–] Zeppo@sh.itjust.works 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Side note, it sounds like you're going to do basically the same tests I did there - I had some sort of issue where swallowing food sort of worked but it seemed to stick in my esophagus, and I'd feel like hell and have to drink water, burp, regurgitate. That was familiar to me from Celiac disease (probably due to GERD inflammation) but it had gone away and come back. I thought maybe I had achalasia or at the least, an esophogeal stricture.

I had a choice of a Celiac specialist or a physical swallowing specialist. They did allergy tests, dermatology, additional Celiac testing, and the swallowing stuff. Overall I thought the doctors, facilities and organization were quite good. Make sure to go talk to the billing/finance people at the beginning.

Anyway, I had lost about 60 lbs in 4 months but regained it from eating blended foods and was doing better when I was there, which didn't help the testing - after barium swallows, radioactive sandwich and more, they determined no, I was just fine. I had temporarily sort of cured myself and so there wasn't much for them to observe. I had an irritating session with a psychologist where she grilled me for 45 minutes about "do you think the tests you had were accurate or do you still think there's something wrong with you?" I explained that sure, the tests were great, but I had been in pain every day for 4 months and lost 60 lbs so there must be some reason and apparently they hadn't done the right tests yet. She said I had "health anxiety" and I was so worried about gluten I had starved myself. Utter bollocks.

Anyway, I was right as it turned out I had adult onset type 1 diabetes and nobody ever tested me for that at all when I was there. On the last day the Celiac doctor told me "you could have type 1 diabetes... some people get that too" and then didn't order any tests or anything. Not sure why the presentation had been mainly digestive, but anyway, overall I sort of hate them now. Hopefully your experience goes better than mine did. It is a nice place.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

No, my symptoms are not like that at all. I went into great detail about it here: https://lemmy.world/post/12194311

It's entirely possible that my issue is, at least in part, psychosomatic, so maybe a psychiatrist will help? Who knows.

I also lost a ton of weight. I've gone from 260 at the beginning of last year to 180 now. I'm at my ideal BMI weight but I still look fat, which is fun.

[–] Zeppo@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, that is pretty different. I assumed it was similar from "can't eat solid food" but I never felt turned off from food, I'd just feel incredibly awful after eating so I stopped eating. Tried surviving on a bunch of different semi-liquid things before I found something that worked. I got medically underweight before gaining some back, and the weight loss was kind of a bonus after I felt better. People I knew told me "wow, you look great!" and I was like uh, thanks... funny how being dramatically unhealthy made people think I was more healthy.

Well, hopefully Mayo manages to find you some answers!

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

I hope so. Thanks!

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Oh nice to hear about Mayo, I'll see about taking a tour. I'm expecting to be in the hospital a bunch too, but I will be pretty anxious just sitting around and I know I'll want to get out.

Anyway, I hope they helped you and I hope they'll help me. Thanks!

[–] Zeppo@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I just wrote posted a diatribe about my experiences there too if you're interested. What they did would have been great if what they tested for was actually what was wrong with me at the time. Unfortunately they kind of let me choose my own tests, which was really nice, but it turns out I'm, you know, not a doctor and didn't ask for the right things, then they didn't really investigate other possibilities.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Ah, yeah, that kind of sucks. I hope that isn't what happens with me. That said, I gave them a pile of papers showing all the tests I already have which showed nothing, so maybe I will have less of that.

[–] Zeppo@sh.itjust.works 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Hopefully it's straightforward, and best wishes! Enjoy your radioactive sandwich!

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

Thanks!