Update Timeline

I know it's been forever since I've been here. There are days I can't even remember to take meds, much less write a blog post. Much to update ya'll on, so here it is in Bullet-time:

• May - Shady had emergency gallbladder surgery. She was in the hospital about 36 hours altogether, and recovered for almost a month and a half. This meant that I went from being the patient to to being the caregiver with absolutely no warning. Our diet went from mostly homemade to whatever I could take from the freezer and put in the microwave. The house looked like a bomb went off inside it. The whole experience definitely re-emphasized exactly how much Shady does around here, as if I could ever forget. I'd be living in a cardboard box under a freeway somewhere if not for her, most likely having cut off my legs at the hip joints long ago.

         On the plus side of this, she now feels tons better, and is no longer sensitive to wheat. Apparently,
          the gallbladder had been so bad for so long that it simply couldn't process wheat anymore. Her
         doctors say it's rare that surgery fixes a wheat sensitivity, but not so rare that they were truly surprised.
         With all the weight she's lost this last year (60 some pounds last I knew), she said she probably put
          a few back on when she realized she could eat pizza again. Ha!

• I haven't driven since July. The muscle spasms have gotten so bad, and so unpredictable, that I'm a danger behind the wheel. I occasionally will even get spasms in one of my eyes, and it's just not worth it to me to cause a wreck just so I can drive myself around. We don't have a running, licensed car at the moment anyway.

• My brother is moving in here to help with money issues. It'll also help get him away from family he fights with, so it's win-win. It's happening very slowly, but it's happening.

      In current health-related news, I went to the doctor a month or so ago. I have tremors occasionally that my body interprets as earthquakes. As in, I have to find liquid to look at so I can convince my brain that the liquid isn't shaking, so it can't be an earthquake. It's a low level quake all over my body, almost like when you get so cold that you physically start to shake. I believed it to be muscle spasms. Normally, these tremors only happen once in a while, but about a month ago, it began to happen constantly, and that's when I went made the appointment to see Dr P.

As I was describing it to him, he sounded like he had heard that description before, but he said it's not muscle spasms. To him, it sounds like adrenalin being pumped into my body - my fight or flight response is constantly in overdrive, and body has no way to burn off that energy, so it shakes. He suggested I see Dr G and see what she thought.

The appointment with Dr G was just the other day. She disagrees. She thinks it's a reaction to one of my medications. Never mind that I was getting these tremors long before I started any of these pills. She also decided that since I've never gone to the ER after a panic attack, I must have not ever really had one. Maybe I'm just too close to the appointment still, but that pissed me off. I need to call and make an appointment to see a therapist, I need a second opinion. Dr G upped my anti-anxiety dosage and that was it.

I've seen Dr P again since then. He said that if he's right, then the increased medication should help. If she's right, my body will help us figure out what's going on. So frustrating. 



Recently, I've also been having strange symptoms. I fall asleep at the drop of a hat, for what seems like hours. I have vivid dreams, mostly of whatever I was doing when I fell asleep. Then I wake up with a jerk and find I was asleep for a second or less. Or that it's been a few seconds, but that I heard everything that happened while I was asleep. Sometimes I wake up to find that it's been an hour or so and that Shady has tried everything short of dumping cold water on me to get me to wake the heck up. It doesn't seem to matter whether or not I got enough sleep the night before, or how long ago I woke up, or what I'm doing at the time. I've fallen asleep on the couch, on the toilet, and in the middle of a sentence.

The only thing I know of that even remotely fits those symptoms is narcolepsy. Which is scary in it's own right, and it's own reason for me not to drive anymore. However, I am scared out of my mind to go to Dr P with this. I'm afraid that he's going to think I'm a hypochondriac or a drug seeker. Or that I'm one of those nuts that takes every little thing wrong with them and internet researches it to death until they have a panic attack. 

Ok, I'm done for today. Time for Torchwood and sleep.