Still miss you buddy

Don't screw around with taxes. When the issue with my daughter became critical in late March of 2011, I had taxes in the pipe and almost ready to hand in. The issues of her care quickly ballooned into a horrific crisis, so we filed and extension. Same in 2012 when she was transferred to another hospital. Same in 2013 when DSS took over and brought her back in state. Note that we filed extensions each year. I thought I was covered. WRONG!

Income Tax extensions are only good for 6 months from the date of filing.

The end of 2013, I got the business and personal taxes done in one feld swoop.... 3 years of accounting in a little less than 5 weeks. Everything was filed by the middle of January of this year, and we got the return receipts about a week after mailing. In the course of the last 7 days, I got a letter from the IRS for each of the filing years, stating: "We charged a penalty on Your S Corporation Tax Return", and citing Internal Revenue Code Section 6699 (a) (1). The penalty is $195 per share holder per month for up to 12 months. Note that this is regardless of the profitability of the business, whether you filed monthly or quarterly estimated income returns or whether at the end of the year the stockholder or the company was showing any taxable income. A stunning penalty of $4680 per year for 3 years for a grand total of..... $14,040. Graciously, the IRS allows you 4 weeks to get the money to them!

The accountant tells me that you can send the IRS a letter requesting an abatement of the penalties. He says their firm has had a good record of success, especially when the stockholders are on the same joint return and there was no taxable income for any of the years. Supposedly, the IRS isn't trying to bankrupt good, law abiding citizens. The penalty is generally used to "encourage" small corporations to file on time, and is part of the "Pile On" that happens when you late file and owed income tax but didn't pay in estimated income through the year. So I guess it could be worse?

Safe to say that most people don't have that kind of money hanging around. We don't especially given the circumstances of my medical condition and the issues associated with our daughter. I was already prepared to sell off some "stuff" to cover the support and accounting bills of around $13k. I don't know how to get though this one though if the abatement process doesn't work for us. I should have known better, at least known to look into the extension part of it. I inherited some money in the mid 80's and in my depression and loss decided to not put it on the 1040. Two years later they told me to pay not only the tax but interest and penalty that ended up being 2/3 of what I inherited.

Lesson learned? Don't mess around when it comes to filing income taxes.

Swank Diet Update / Fish Heads, fish heads, rolley polley fish heads....:

Back in October, the blog went though a "reboot", and my posting about the Swank Diet for MS patients. I'm at the 6 month mark, so it is appropriate that there are some pretty significant results to report:

In my January well visit, the following was noted:

• The nurse said "Wow" at my weight loss. My honest weight when I started the diet in earnest on October 22nd was about 225 pounds. At the physical I tipped in at 203 and I'm currently at around 195.
• My blood pressure was mid-range normal where before it was either marginal or low range of high.
• The blood work values were "fabulous" to use the words of my PCP. My cholesterol was high before but normal now. By the time we were done with the consultation part, he was more a fan of the diet that I am!
• The weight loss, lower cholesterol and blood pressure was all effortless and result of getting rid of most of the saturated fats in my diet.
• My stamina has improved. Although I'm still having the problem coming "on line" in the morning and having problems with fatigue and slurred speech (sometimes) in the afternoon, the problems are not as severe or long lasting. Last summer I was losing all ability to work in the afternoon 3 or 4 days each week and had 1 day a week that I was debilitated and unable to work at all. In the last month, I've had 3 days I couldn't work but we think there was a problem with the Avonex injection. My afternoon chronic fatigue is down to a couple of days a week and I'm most always able to either recover after a rest or get more work done in the evening
• With my fatigue lessening, I don't know what to do about the recommended "rest" periods that Swank and others recommend. Right now there are a majority of days I feel like I can push through the fatigue and force myself to a reasonable level of productivity. Unfortunately, I'm afraid to do this right now. The fatigue is cumulative (only so many spoons) and I'm afraid I'll end up losing full days of productivity. So at this point I'll either take my hour nap or do light writing work on a light notebook. I don't know if I've been milking the nap thing all along. It's too easy for me to fall down the reading or internet hole during the nap and not getting true rest when I need it. I'll keep struggling to find a balance.
• I still suffer from "fuzzy brain", "balogna back", the feeling of being in a compression chamber, ringing ears and vertigo but I can correlate it to major changes in the weather. As I write this the temperature is in the process of dropping 45 degrees through the afternoon and I can feel the symptoms coming on. The diet doesn't seem to be helping this directly but for the severity of the symptoms and their frequency decreasing. Same symptoms but only a couple of days each week and not 3-4.
• There may be a correlation between pain and white sugar intake. After a couple of weeks on the diet, you become aware that there aren't any constraints put on the amount of sweets you can eat as long as they are fat free. Technically, the diet can even be interpreted as setting patients up to become diabetics. I've been trying to watch my sugar intake but with varied success because I've always bolused sugar for depression / comfort / energy. In December I had i under control but slowly lost control. About a week ago when I was in the middle of a two day debilitation, I remembered that I'd consumed exactly double the amount of sugar I allowed myself. So I'm currently trying to replace the majority of white sugar in my diet with other things like Splenda and Steevia. This will be a battle, but will give you more to read when I have the results.

In general, I'd recommend using the Swank Diet if you have MS. I have a appointment with my neurologist next week and I'm sure he'll give it no credit other than for the benefits of healthier eating. My wife says she thinks its helping. I do too. I'm not fond of eating fish heads all the time but it seems to work. After 6 months, I no longer crave beef, although my wife made a pork loin a couple of weeks ago and I almost broke the diet to have some. I'm looking forward to being able to have beef and pork in small amounts when the year is up but I mostly don't crave or think about it day to day.

I hope this is helpful for someone out there wondering about results or researching the Swank Diet for the first time. It's worth a try. In my case it's helping but hasn't healed me (yet) but I'm happy with the results.