Hormones suck and insurance companies suck more

January 25, 2013

I want to cry.  I am not sad or upset, but I want to cry.   That’s the beauty of having a prescribed hormone yanked away.

When I wrote this post a week ago, I figured the med would be approved eventually, so I’d just have one unpleasant month.  PrescriptionAs it turns out, the insurance company denied it completely.  I’ll need to appeal.  Or try another med.  Never mind that I’ve been on this one for EIGHT YEARS!  Never mind that my DOCTOR prescribed it because he felt it was the best option for me.  Nope, the insurance is deciding this one.

Memory is a funny thing, especially when you have cognitive and memory problems.  I know I’ve been off the med for brief times before, and I remember that it made me emotional, but I didn’t remember it being this particular level of hell.  For the last 24 hours, I’ve been a wreck at times and I’ve felt fine at times.  When I feel fine, I figure the other stuff was a fluke.  Then I’m a wreck again and I know that I need to find another solution.  I can’t just wait to see if my body normalizes over time.  (We tried that once.  It didn’t.)

I’ve been really anxious.  And I’ve been obsessing.  Last week, before the hormone change kicked in, I sent a text to the guy I’m sleeping with.  He didn’t answer right away.  I thought about him occasionally, had some nice sex fantasies, and assumed he was busy and would get back to me later.  Then I moved on and did other things.  Yesterday the hormone stuff started, and it was much earlier than I expected.  I sent him an email yesterday and he didn’t respond right away.  I started wondering if he didn’t like me anymore (even though we sent flirty messages earlier in the day and made a date for next week.)  Then I started thinking he was intentionally ignoring me.  He’s avoiding me.  He’s going to ditch me and that’s why he’s not answering.  He’s sick of dealing with me.

Ok, I know how ridiculous that sounds.  Even while I thought it, I knew it was ridiculous.  And yet, I couldn’t stop thinking it.  And I kept thinking about it.  Even when I tried to do other things, I kept thinking about it.  Every time I had an email or a text message, I wondered if it was him.  That’s not normal.  That’s not me.  I don’t usually obsess like this.  And I’m pretty sure that next week I won’t be obsessing and anxious and weepy.  But right now I am.  Right now I’m crying because I got a call about scheduling an appeal hearing for state medicaid, and I couldn’t thinking clearly enough to make an important decision (because of this mess with the medication,) and I started crying.  Again, that’s not me.

There are a lot of good reasons to stop taking a prescription.  I can think of many.  And they all involve choices being made by the patient and the doctor based on what’s best for the health of the patient.  None of them involve money or insurance companies, and yet that’s how my decision is being made right now.  This is just plain wrong.  I’d like to call the insurance company and tell them that, but when I called before, I started crying.  The irony.

So I’m legitimately angry, pissed off, furious.  That’s my normal response, and I’ll happily embrace it.  As for the rest, I’m hoping it goes away soon, so I can go back to feeling like myself.  I miss me.

4 Comments | Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Isolation, Limitations, Medication, Rants, Relationships: Family & Friends & Dating & Sex, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Fun in the sun or sleeplessness and pain?

January 14, 2013

While Australia is battling wildfires and California is dealing with frost, here in New England we’re dealing with our own weather oddity: warmth.  Last week it was in the 30s.  Later this week it should be in the 30s.  Yesterday and today were in the 50s.  And it was sunny.  Go figure.

Aside from all of the concern over climate change, I have another worry: my body doesn’t like severe climate changes.  It especially does not like sudden temperature increases.  And it really doesn’t like more than one day of said increases.

I woke up feeling very hot.  I always sleep better in a cool room, and since it was so warm, I’d gone to sleep with both windows Boston sunshine
wide open and a fan on, but I was still hot.  I looked at the clock: 4:44am.  Yeah, it really said that.  I was not amused.  I got up to turn up the fan and check that the radiator wasn’t running.  While I was up, I got water.  Then back to bed.  No sleep.  I tried reading for a while.  Lights off.  No sleep.  At 5:37 I finally had a good idea.  Just a couple days ago I was cleaning up my living room and feeling frustrated that there was no good place for the box fan that was in a corner of the room.  I stumbled to the living room, noticing the pain in my foot.  Huh, that wasn’t there when I got water, was it?  I haven’t felt that specific type of pain for a while, probably close to a year.  I got the fan, set it in the far window, and went back to bed.  No sleep.  After a while, I switched the fan to the closer window.  Somewhere around 6:15 I finally fell asleep.

It was a miserable hour and a half.  My mind wasn’t racing.  There was nothing mental or emotional to keep me awake.  I just wasn’t responding well to the temperature.  I noticed pain during that time.  A lot of pain.  But that wasn’t keeping me awake either.  I was too tired.  I’m just glad I was able to sleep eventually, and that I didn’t have to get up early.  It wasn’t as much sleep as I usually get, but it was enough to get through the day.

Too bad the first thing I noticed when I got out of bed this morning (at the more appropriate time of 10:30am) was the pain in my foot.  Then later I noticed the pain in my wrist.  And other areas weren’t feeling too good either.  And I was HOT.  I opened all of the windows in my apartment and that helped.  I wore a t-shirt (in January!)  I wore my cooling neck band and that helped more.  But it wasn’t until the temperature began to drop this afternoon that I started to feel better.

Things are continuing to improve, but I’m still dealing with a lot of extra pain.  I’m at Mother Nature’s mercy, and so far, it’s costing me.

So while everyone else is loving this weather, getting outside without heavy coats, throwing balls and frisbees, taking long walks, and getting some sun, I’m counting down the hours until the cooler weather returns, with the glorious 30-something degree days and even colder nights.  For someone who dislikes winter, I’m really anxious for it to return!

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Posted by chronicrants

Daring to dream

January 8, 2013

I’ve come up with yet another career plan.  I’ve made so many plans in the last few years.  This one seems as plausible as any… if I go back to work someday.  As my health got worse in recent years, it seemed more and more important to have alternative plans because I knew I couldn’t keep working the way I was.  Then when my health got really bad, I felt too lousy to bother trying to figure out a plan.  And now I’m back to planning.

Dreaming

The specific plans don’t matter.  They generally involve consulting in different fields where I have knowledge, part time work in areas that would provide benefits, and jobs in fields that I always found interesting but that won’t take too much extra training.  And they all have something in common: they require me to be in better health before I can attempt any of them.

My naturopath told me yesterday that she thinks it’s a good sign that I’m so antsy to prepare for the future.  I know she’s right.  I’ve been thinking the same thing lately.  When I felt so horrible that reading a chapter in a book was a chore, of course I wasn’t thinking about returning to work.  But now that I’m feeling somewhat better, I’m anxious to feel completely better so I can do more!  It’s a strange in between zone, where my brain is jumping ahead and my body isn’t ready to follow.

Of course, this isn’t just about jobs, but I think that jobs are the easiest thing to focus on.  My friendships are awesome, so there’s no need to work on those.  My family is great, except for the sibling I don’t get along with, so there’s nothing to work on there.  I want a relationship, but that means dating, and more than that, it means being open to being vulnerable.  While my health is stopping me from dating, it’s my past experiences that’s stopping me from being vulnerable.  I’ve been hurt so many times, and I’m not ready to go through that again.  Now that I’m having sex again, I don’t mind waiting to date.  I really want to be able to do more in a day, like get a haircut and see friends and do laundry all in the same day.  I dream about that a bit, but the idea of “more” is so nebulous, and so hard to imagine, that I don’t dwell on it much.  I worked at a job as recently as late 2011, but doing “more” without feeling horrible was a long time ago and it’s harder to remember.  So I think about jobs, careers, possibilities.

And obviously there’s the money part.  I don’t know where I’ll be living in a few months, and it all depends on the insurance appeal decision.  I haven’t been buying new clothes, even new winter socks without holes, because of the money.  I fantasize about being able to buy new slippers without worrying about the money.  So earning an income would be fantastic.

The cognitive aspect is important too.  I miss using my brain.  Of course, I’m still having cognitive problems…. it took me a long time to think of the word “cognitive” as I was starting this paragraph, actually.  But if I can work, then I can use my brain more and give it exercise, and if I’m working then it means that I’m able to use my brain, and how fantastic would that be?

I know that returning to work, to the “normal” world, to the world where I don’t dread the question “what do you do?” is pretty far off.  It could be months, it could be years.  It may never happen.  But right now I’m dreaming.  I’m making plans.  Because if it does happen, I want to be ready.

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Why dating isn’t happening while I’m ill

December 23, 2012

I noticed her as she walked into the room.  She wasn’t “my type” yet I found her very attractive.  I smiled at her and she smiled back.  This was the point where I would normally get shy and look away and hope that maybe she’d come talk to me.  But I’m trying to get out of my shell more, and flirt, and that’s easier to do because I’m not dating anyway.  Not dating = less pressure.  So I got up, crossed the room, almost lost my nerve, got my nerve back, and introduced myself.  And she flirted with me!

We found a quiet spot and chatted for a while.  Then we went our separate ways, and found each other later in the party.  We agreed to get together one day soon.  I wondered if I could manage to see her, but I was so attracted to her, and I hadn’t had a date in 8 months, and I hadn’t had sex in 9 months.  Something had to happen to change that.  I’ve been lonely at times and I’ve been horny at times, and often I’ve been both at once.  I figured it was worth it to try just one date.  After all, I really liked her.  But then I did something stupid.

She asked, “What are you doing tomorrow?”  Before my brain could stop it, my mouth said, “Nothing.”  My brain instantly pointed out, “Of course you’re not doing anything, you idiot, because you’re exhausted and even coming to this party was a ton of effort, and you promised yourself a day to rest.  You can’t go out with her tomorrow!”  I went home thinking that maybe I could make it work, but by morning I knew it was hopeless – I felt like crap.  I texted her that I felt lousy, but didn’t elaborate, and we made plans for later in the week.  I just hope I don’t have to cancel again.  If I cancel twice in one week, I know I’ll have to give up on her, because she’ll have given up on me.  But it would be nice if it worked out and I could have just one date with her.

By an odd coincidence, I also got a text earlier yesterday from an ex.  He was thinking of me and wanted to say hi.  I filled him in on the basics (not working, not dating, etc., because of worsening health.)  He said we should get together when I’m feeling better.  I quickly explained that I’m feeling just fine for sex.  It’s dating I can’t handle.  Once I’d assured him that my health was ok for sex, we made a date for one day this week.

That’s why this whole thing is so odd.  I can have sex with someone I already know, because I don’t have to worry about explaining the health stuff.  He already knows all about it.  It’s worse than the last time we saw each other, but it’s generally the same.  He understands and accepts it.  If I have to cancel, he’ll be ok with that.  If I have a problem while we’re together, he’ll support and comfort me.  But with someone new, I want to give a good impression.  Even if I tell her a bit about what’s going on (and I’ll probably have to,) I still don’t want her to think that it’s worse than it is, or even that it’s as bad as it is.  I want to act like I’m ok so I don’t scare her off.  And I’m just in no condition to act like I’m ok, even though a date should be physically easier than sex.

So many people don’t understand why I feel that I can’t date while I’m so ill, but it all comes down to that last part: I don’t feel up to acting like I’m ok.  It’s just not worth the effort.  Because even if I can manage to do it once, chances are, I won’t be able to do it a second time, and before the third date they’ll have to know everything.

With any luck, I’ll figure out a way to share enough of my problems with the lady from last night without scaring her off.  And in the meantime, sex with my ex may not be the smartest move ever, but a good tumble is not only great exercise, but it should also help relieve stress.  Chances are, I’ll feel better afterwards.  Now I just have to make sure I’m well enough this week, and that it happens again after this week too!  And I really, really hope that I can have a good date with that woman.  Please cross your fingers (figuratively – most of us can’t do that literally anyway) for me.

2 Comments | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Isolation, Limitations, Pain, Rants, Relationships: Family & Friends & Dating & Sex, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

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