Thanks a lot, hormones!

April 5, 2015

It’s easy to forget how much of an effect hormones have on our physical, mental, cognitive, and emotional health until they get all fucked up.

Now, before I continue, let me say that, yes, I will be talking about my period. Oh heavens! Some of you have already IMG_20140312_153843closed the browser screen. Others are squirming uncomfortably. Tough. This is what I talk about on this site: health issues. And that includes periods. Have questions? Read this post from last year.

As I’ve mentioned before, I have PCOS. That’s polycystic ovary syndrome. It’s not uncommon, but it affects different people in different ways, so we have to be careful not to generalize when it comes to PCOS. For me, it means I’ve never in my life had a “regular” period. I won’t bother to describe the horror that was my so-called menstrual cycle when I was a teenager. Let’s skip ahead to last year.

After many years on a few different birth control pills and other hormones, I suddenly stopped getting my period. I’d had some off months before, but this time was different. My doctor had me go off the pills to see if I’d get a period naturally. I didn’t. So he ordered an ultrasound. Now don’t get me wrong, I was thrilled to not be getting a period. It was one less thing to deal with from a body that gave me enough to deal with. And I wasn’t looking to get pregnant, so that wasn’t an issue. But there were 2 likely reasons for the lack of a period, and we needed to know which it was. Birth control pills can lean to a thinned endometrial lining, and that can mean no blood. Or maybe I wasn’t ovulating, so that’s why there was no blood. Maybe it was both. Unfortunately, the ultrasound showed that my endometrial lining was building up. It wasn’t at dangerous levels yet, but it was getting close. That’s not good.

So my doctor put me back on a birth control pill. And it’s not been good. First came the brain fog. Then the moodiness, ravenous appetite, and increased pain. Then the fatigue. I eventually realized I’d become hypothyroid again. Estrogen can bind thyroid receptors (thank goodness I’d done my own research!) My doctor ran blood tests, and while I waited for the results I went on the placebo week (many birth control pills have this: you take the pill for three weeks, then nothing or a placebo for a week.) I got my period (yay!) and felt SO. MUCH. BETTER! All those new symptoms were gone!

The blood tests came back and my doctor increased my thyroid med when I started the next birth control cycle. The symptoms all improved, but didn’t go away completely. The fatigue is still bad. I became nauseated frequently. I had occasional disturbing thoughts. The other day I was just going about my business, thinking about how lousy I felt, and suddenly thought that it might be best to die. Then I wouldn’t have to deal with the health stuff. Hmm, that’s not good. I wasn’t feeling depressed or suicidal. The thought only lasted a moment. But it was a moment too long. I’m usually a happy person, but I’d been in a bitchy mood for the past week. I’m not liking me these days.

Yesterday I’d had it. I was sick of the nausea. I worked too hard to fix my diet to be dealing with this bullshit now! And the fatigue was too much. I worked too hard to fix that, too. And don’t get me started on my mood. I just couldn’t stand it anymore.

So today I made a change. Sure, I probably should have checked with my doctors. But I didn’t. I know what I’m doing is safe in the short term. We’ll worry about the long term at my next appointment in a few weeks. So what did I do? I went off the birth control pills and I went back to my old dose of thyroid med – exactly what I was doing before this whole mess. I’m only 1 week into the cycle. I don’t know if I’ll get my period, but I do think I’ll be feeling better in another day or two, and that’s the important part.

I will need to do something to make sure I get my period at least a few times a year. There are other options. This was the option that we thought would have the fewest side effects. Back to the drawing board! Maybe I need a different estrogen pill. Maybe I need progesterone instead. Maybe I need both (which is what I had before last year.) Maybe I needed to raise my thyroid med more. That’s very possible, and I probably should have done it today, but I just felt too lousy.

Very likely, I will need to try this whole thing again in a few weeks. And I will go through this same misery when I do. But for now, I’m hoping my hormones will calm down a bit and allow me at least a few days of feeling my usual level of lousy, instead of this new level!

6 Comments | Decisions, Expectations, Fatigue, Frustration, Healthcare, Isolation, Limitations, Medication, Pain, Rants, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Always rethinking goals

March 27, 2015

I had a plan. Then I got sick.

But then, you know what they say about the best laid plans.

This morning I was talking with a friend. Sometimes I do some budget consulting. I don’t have the energy to do much of 3-27-2015 4-01-42 PMit, but I love it, and do it when I can. I always begin with discussing the person’s/couple’s goals. These goals can be anything: buying a house, buying a smart phone, getting a dog, having children, traveling the world, starting a business, retiring young…. there are endless possibilities.

Today I happened to be working with a friend, so it was more casual than when I get paid by strangers to consult for them. After we’d gone through her goals, her spending, her debt, her income, and her savings, we talked some more about goals. And she asked me about mine.

Most people assume my goal is to get healthy, but it’s actually not. I know I’ll never be completely healthy, and I also know I want more than that.

We all had plans that were different when we were healthier. Some got derailed because of health, some got derailed for other reasons, and some were achieved. After my friend left, I thought again about my goals. I think the most unusual thing about them is how often I think about them and change them. Most people, I would guess, hardly ever step back to look at the bigger picture. They assume they’ll do the things society tells them to do, like get a job, get married, buy a house, and have children, probably in that order. But they don’t think beyond that. I know I didn’t. In fact, that’s about what my life plan looked like.

Just before I got sick, I started thinking about leaving my 9-5 job and starting my own business. I didn’t know what that would be. I thought I might try to earn a living off of blogging (spoiler alert: this blog is 4 years old and earns nothing, so that won’t be how I earn my fortune.) I considered some other options. I dated and looked for Mr. or Ms. Right. And mostly I put one foot in front of the other.

Since I’ve been out of work, I am constantly thinking about the present and the future, about what I want and how to achieve it. I change it constantly, as my health and moods change. I’ve come up with several potential ways to work for myself from home part time. I know that I want a dog. I want to improve my health as much as possible while not being obsessed with it. I want a dog. I would love to find a life partner, but I’m also currently content with being single. I want to live someplace quiet and peaceful, preferably near the water. I want to exercise regularly, including physical therapy. I want to be financially stable. I want to spend less time home alone and more time with people I love. And did I mention that I want a dog?

Most people don’t think about their goals often, if at all. Having a chronic illness doesn’t necessarily change that. For some people, it might make them think about their goals less. I happen to go the opposite way. I need something to reach for. I need a happy place to aim for. It gives me a reason to try. Let’s face it, living with chronic illness is work! Reaching for my goals gives me a bit of incentive not to give up on that work.

What about you? Do you spend a lot of time thinking about your goals? Do you avoid them? Do you change your goals over time? What’s one thing on your list?

4 Comments | Decisions, Expectations, Job, Milestones, Raves, Relationships: Family & Friends & Dating & Sex, Unpredictable | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Why I must be my own medical detective, and you should be yours

March 17, 2015

I just solved a huge mystery. My doctors agreed that it makes total sense. But they didn’t think of it. I did.

It’s not easy to research a health condition. It can feel impossible when you don’t have a diagnosis. I went to the library when my symptoms started, but I didn’t find anything. That was in the pre-household-internet dark ages of the early 1990s. When I got online a few years later, I tried again, but I didn’t find anything. Years later the internet had more information it on so I tried again, and again, no luck. It was looking up symptoms. I didn’t have a diagnosis yet.

11 years after my symptoms started I had a diagnosis, but it wasn’t very helpful. Then I got more diagnoses. And more. And more. Still, I couldn’t piece together the puzzle. I was overwhelmed. I gave up.

One day in the library I was reading a novel and I suddenly had the urge to get rid of (or at least ease) my daily nausea. I found some books, and my journey began.

I was fortunate in many ways. The brain fog was bad, but I was still able to read. It was slow and torturous, but I did it.  I was educated enough to make sense of some difficult matter. I had just enough diagnoses to follow the right breadcrumbs. I had a fantastic library at my fingertips. I found the right books when I was in the right mindset. I was lucky. But I also worked damn hard. It took many, many months to get through those books. And it was worth every minute.

I’ve noticed lately that I have a lot more free time now that I’m not always studying those books and reading websites and following Facebook groups. It’s not that I’m cured, but I learned enough to get stable, and I was ready to take a break before tackling the next thing. I’ll do it at some point, but now I’m resting.

A couple weeks ago I was having bad brain fog. (I still am.) It came on suddenly and I didn’t know why. Maybe it was the estrogen I’d recently started again for my PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome)? I could imagine why that would make a difference, but that was the only change in my medications. Or maybe it was the change in seasons? I always have trouble when the seasons change, especially in the spring. I checked with my naturopath. She agreed estrogen itself wouldn’t have this effect, but maybe the fillers would. Or it could be the change in seasons. But that didn’t feel right. I know how that feels, and the symptoms, their degree, and the style of onset just didn’t feel like it came from the start of spring.

There was nothing to do but wait and see. I hate that. But I had no choice, so I waited. Then the other day I looked in the mirror and noticed one eyebrow was thinning near the end. That was odd. It’s a classic hypothyroid symptom, but my thyroid has been stable! I have Hashimoto’s Disease, so antibodies are attacking my thyroid. In theory that means that I’ll need to adjust my medications over time, but my immune system has been calmer lately. And besides, wouldn’t the onset of brain fog be more gradual? It didn’t seem right.

Then a few hours later it hit me: the estrogen! I’d read in my research that estrogen affects the thyroid hormone delivery system. I’d paid attention because at the time I was taking estrogen for my PCOS. I went off of it later. If the estrogen I started a few weeks ago was binding those thyroid hormones, then it could have made my current thyroid dose partially ineffective and caused me to become hypothyroid again! This explains other symptoms, too, like my slight depression, moodiness, and increased appetite.

I emailed my naturopath. She agreed. I emailed my thyroid doc. He agreed. I’m getting blood work done tomorrow. There’s no doubt in my mind that I’m right, but the blood work will confirm it and then the doctor can write me a new, higher prescription.

No doctor was going to catch this. That was clear. I was going to continue to get worse and worse and maybe, just maybe, someone would have eventually realized it was my thyroid. But how sick would I have gotten? Instead, we caught it early – I’ve only been on the estrogen for 3 weeks. With any luck, by next week the brain fog will have lifted and I’ll feel stable again!

Being a detective isn’t easy, but it’s necessary. No one cares about my health more than me. No one will fight harder for my health than I will. And no one can understand my body better than me. Someone else would look at my history and say that this was the same thing I deal with every March. Only I could know that it wasn’t because it just didn’t feel like it.

Think about what you know about your body and your health that no one else can know. Then, when you feel up to it, consider doing a little reading. And please come back here and let me know how it goes!

Do you do your own research? Have you felt it was worthwhile? Please share your experiences, good, bad, or otherwise, in the comments!

2 Comments | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Limitations, Medication, Raves, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

I miss having the security of a steady liveable income

March 10, 2015

Sometimes I forget what it was like to have a steady liveable income. My new “normal” has become so ingrained, it’s easy to think that’s how it always was. Then I’ll wish I could buy a new sweater, for example, and I’ll remember there was a time when I really could buy a new sweater any time I wanted to.

This is one of those things that can be hard to understand until you live it. Politicians talk about cutting social security disability payments because they see the huge amount the program costs overall. They don’t consider what it’s like for an individual to have to actually live on the average payment of less than $1200 per month. (Full disclosure: my payments are above average. Of course, the cost of living in my city is also above average. I haven’t done the math to figure out if the ratios are the same or not.)

Of course, it’s all relative. There are people who aren’t on SSDI who only earn that much. There are people who earn $150,000 per year and are in debt. The former has their own set of issues that need addressing on a federal and state level. The latter has options, though. I miss having options.

Once upon a time I earned around the average national income of $50,000. Even in one of the most expensive cities in the country, I had no problem living on that salary. I just avoided spending money on certain things. I saved money every month. So while I couldn’t shop endlessly or at high-end stores, I could definitely afford to replace worn out clothes. That was my “normal” for many years.

It’s been a cold winter and that’s fine by me! The cold is much better for my body than the heat, so I’m happy about it. But unfortunately, my wardrobe is not. I have many t-shirts, but not many sweaters. The ones I have are old and out of style. Some are falling apart. They are pilling and developing holes. But I keep wearing them because I don’t have a lot of options. Sure, I have some savings, but SSDI only covers about half of my expenses each month and I need my savings for that other half. I can’t go throwing it around on clothes that I don’t really have to have.

It’s not the clothes that I miss, it’s the ease of of those purchases. It’s knowing that any money I spent would come back into my bank account and then some. It’s knowing there was always more where that came from. It was knowing that I had years, decades, to keep earning and saving.

And that security is what’s really been taken away.

Despite what certain politicians think, I would rather be working if it meant getting that security back. But the truth is, that’s just not an option for me right now.

6 Comments | Expectations, Frustration, Job, Limitations, Politics, Rants, Unpredictable | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »