Joy to the World

Today was the best day I have had in something like 10 years. Really. I am feeling so good on these meds. I am taking 28 pills/day plus a powdered laxative mixed into liquids right now and I don't see a lot of chance that will be decreasing anytime soon. Some of those are vitamins and minerals and I actually need to add another to the list of those; I want to try natural cholesterol treatment first. Oh, and I'll have 2 additional anxiety pills as I transition back to work. I am literally taking a months' worth of pills every single night (and day). So by the end of next week I will more than likely be taking 32 pills/day, plus the powder. Some of this is because of taking oddball doses; I need to be on 40 mg of imipramine, for example, and it only comes in 10, 25, and 50s, so I have to take 4 10 mg pills.

It's even more amazing that this is what works for me when you know that I refused meds for a long time. I was so opposed to meds that I didn't even take tylenol for headaches unless I was dying. Finally my senior year I became depressed enough to agree. Unfortunately things between me and the antidepressants were unfriendly from the start. Even when I started bipolar meds and knew I was going to require several meds I fought against adding more. When lithium tremors made me shake constantly I refused to try Inderal to stop it until it was so bad the doctor practically forced me to try it. Now I probably need to revisit Inderal but it makes me tired so I'm just not using glass dishes and hoping for the best.

The trick is that after trying for years we may have finally gotten to the intricate mix that helps me. I imagine that over the next months I'm going to learn to monitor my seroquel dose. I don't have a ton of leeway with that as I am at 650 and my doctor won't let me go higher than 800 in conjunction with the high dose depakote, but as long as a lot of increase isn't needed over time (the most common way I've failed meds) this may let me start talking about that "stable" word I asked to not talk about. It's weird because I'm suddenly realizing I'm going to have to re-learn my disorder. If I truly am going to stay this good and my cycling is going to occur in this newer and slower pattern I am going to have to figure out what the new way feels like.

Since increasing my thyroid med I have literally felt better every day. My energy is coming back. My hair looks healthier. Today my mother noted I looked healthy for the first time in months. I may talk to both of my doctors about trying thryoid as my next line of defense now that we've seen a major improvement that is pretty clearly due to it and high dose thyroid meds can help sometimes.

I just can't believe what it feels like to not be falling apart. My major symptom now is just low energy, and I think that's going to improve. I'm restarting very low dose Provigil tomorrow to see if I can tolerate it. Fingers crossed and knocking on wood simultaneously....

Today was just great in that I felt good and good things happened. Over the past month I've been more and more aware of an increased tolerance for crowds and noise. I can even listen to music (certain types) and I literally turned my car radio off to music 3 1/2 years ago. I'm not choosing music now, but it isn't chasing me out like it used to. I can even sit in the main waiting room at the counseling center, where music is used as white noise.

I can't talk about the biggest good thing yet. It's 99% likely, not completely. Keeping this secret is going to KILL me for the next 6 weeks. It's making me a little bit bubbly I'm so excited. I'm barely able to not tell everyone what I got them for Christmas, much less keep this MAJOR thing secret. I got my mom a really neat sea glass pendant and chain and it has killed me to not have given it to her.

The smaller good thing is that I called into my disablity insurer's phone service center and another huge check for 4 weeks and 1 day was mailed to me yesterday. So now I'll just have to worry about fighting one more time after I go back to work to get paid for the final 4 weeks. What a process.