How tired is Just Me?

[If you happen to encounter weirdness in formatting or a link saying the blog is down there is some work being done to my template in the next few days.  It will be back and hopefully better.]


Just me is soooooooo tired that she cancelled counseling, and relatively at the last minute too.  I never do that.  I'm very aware of the financial assistance I am given, and so I try to never cancel when I know it means Dr.Mind might have had a chance to see someone else and actually earn money that hour.  But today I did.  I worked and when I realized I had no energy whatsoever and that getting home at bedtime would be impossible I cancelled.


I did go have supper at my mom's and saw my sister and niece for a bit.  That was good but I shouldn't have because it made me more tired.  And I'm working Saturday and Sunday to make up for my days off because I'll not even have enough PTO acquired when I have surgery to cover one week off, much less the 2 that I need to take.  My short term disability doesn't kick in fast enough to help, so I'm just going to be unpaid for 6 days.  Which is not my idea of fun.  Thankfully I do have the help that is July being the 3 paycheck month, which is a very good thing as I should be able to squirrel much of that away and I'll defer my huge student loan for a month.  It is so much that a little more added to the payment won't matter.  My niece remains adorable.  The other day I sang her a song that is really a shortened version of a much nicer song my sister sings to her.  It's about a frog and involves sticking your tongue out a bunch of times.  This also is the baby sign for frog.  So as soon as she saw me she grinned and stuck her tongue out.  Apparently rather than Aunt Jen I am the frog lady.  She's  awesome though; I mean how smart is remembering that so clearly?  She's also cracking me up because she's standing without support, except she likes to hold something to pretend she has support.  At one point she was supporting herself with my medic alert necklace.  Now that's stable.....But she has a point, why fall before you can walk if you don't have to, if all kinds of adults are there to hang onto however pointlessly?  I love that little girl so very much. I wish I could see her more.  Someday when I  can sell this house and move to where I work I'll only be 45-60 minutes from her.  By then she'll be old enough to spend weekends with Aunt Frog.  I  can't wait.


I'm praying for a good resolution to some scheduling issues.  There have been issues with this for a long time and I started being much more assertive last week.  There were more today, things that frustrate me because I'm not supposed to schedule myself to keep things more central and somehow I was scheduled to go hours away from one place to another.  I really, really hope someone listens.  I didn't do a full load today and am still exhausted; I suspect I'm going to be tired for a while now, maybe even until my surgery. I think between blood loss, hormones going crazy, pain, and asthma I don't have much chance for a while.  So hopefully I am wrong, but it's something I'll have to see to believe and am trying to adjust to the idea that I'm just not going to feel great until surgery in 7.5 weeks and then of course it will take a few days before I recover.  As I understand it I'm going to be under anesthesia for an hour or even a few more if there is anything to remove, like endometriosis or my ovary or both, and the dr. warned me that I'll not feel great for several days afterward and that is without the part where I'll have been off of my MAOI and probably will miss a dose of lithium as well, which isn't a big deal but when one med is off everything matters more.  (If I'm not allowed fluids and take lithium I tend to become a little confused and toxic sx  appear, like clumsiness, difficulty finding words, etc.  That is ok in a way because my mom will be driving, but it's not good when i need to make informed decisions at the hospital and it makes me look drunk which is not idea when going into surgery; they tend to like people sober.  If I take it and get IV fluids early in the morning I'll be fine but I can't go very long without liquid.  This is something Dr. Brain gets to figure out.)


I seem to be getting sleepy so I'm going to see where that leads.  6 or 7 hours of sleep sound pretty wonderful right now....

Trauma and Compassion

[If you happen to encounter weirdness in formatting or a link saying the blog is down there is some work being done to my template in the next few days.  It will be back and hopefully better.]

After my scary heavy period and feeling absolutely horrible I called to see my gynecologist yesterday.  They said she was booked and the only option was a man, was I ok with a man?  I told them I'd be ok but that I couldn't  have a pelvic done by a man.   So I  got there and was horrified when they told me I had to have a pelvic with the male dr.   I said no but he came in to talk, most of which involved trying to convince me that I should go to see a psychologist and get over my fear, and that all the tx plans in place aren't going to help anyway.  I think he was building up to telling me I need a hysterectomy.  Thankfully that's when the other dr. stopped him.  After a lot of discussion the very, very kind nurse got upset with the receptionist for doing that and tracked down my doctor who told her I should have been put on her schedule to begin with.  So I spent 30 minutes wearing a sheet and  being thankful for her.

She was so nice, never mad a fuss about my swollen red eyes, had a new plan to hopefully solve this all, and has carefully be sending everything to Dr. Brain for approval.  We discussed the narrow options when I can't have the standard treatments for cysts and that trying anything while I'm already knocked out makes more sense than repeating the process in a few months.  So, when I have my surgery I'll have general anesthesia.  Dr. Removal Guru will get the growth out and take biopsies if needed.  Dr. Gets It will do a quick test that gives her a look into my bladder for why I have blood my urine.  One of them will put in a mirena IUD which should slow or stop my periods over time.  This is contingent on Dr.Brain as we've always agreed no hormones period, but at this point I'd rather go through removing it than to not try and it's not easy to get int there in  my case unless I'm under.  I'll then have laparascopy with focus on the painful ovary, removal of same if warranted and assessment for endometriosis or any other cause of pain and extra blood loss.

All that is good.  The male doctor, he just was not getting it.  He was all fake supportiveness but I know the difference and this wasn't it.  He also was trying steer me away from the recommendations of 2 people who have actually opened my chart and that isn't right.   But I was so blessed that Dr. Gets It did comTe see me because I was otherwise going to have to go pay an ER copay when I could have had Dr. Body's partner, or even Dr. Body, do an exam.

So I had a rough day.  But it's over now and I am so, so happy about that.

This is getting old

I wound up at home again today, dealing with quite a bit of pain thanks to my ovarian cyst.  The whole set of messed up things inside has now conspired to make my cycle completely unpredictable and at least before I had some clue that I would have the pain about this time and this time each month.  Now that seems to have changed, which kind of makes it harder.  Only a few more months to go. For now I just hope tomorrow feels a little better since I'm working no matter what.   I have to.  Plus it isn't like it takes care of the pain to stay home; I just wind up sleeping through it, can take vicodin if forced to, and can be in the position that is most comfortable.  However it still is going to hurt for a few days and I'm going to be exhausted.  I'm so tired of being tired.

Whiny post, sorry.  Out of strength.  Just completely, totally out.

Ewwww

There have been a couple of ways that the place I work for has been peripherally in the news lately.  I went looking for the articles this weekend and got a very, very unhappy surprise instead.

There's this one man who works for my company who I frankly find a little creepy.  He used to touch me too much (aka at all), he is very socially awkward, and he annoys me in other small ways.  Nothing huge, just not my favorite person to be with which is so are with my coworkers that it seems bigger than it is.

So what pops up nearly immediately but his online personal ad?  With descriptions like what a good kisser he is. EWWWWWWW.  I cannot tell you how gross that idea is.

And this is undeniably about the meanest blog ever but I'm never going to be able to look at this guy again.

Stress

Today I found out my niece won't be afraid of me this time because she can point to "where's Aunt Jen?" in a picture.  Awesome. I feel so, so big.

Sadly I didn't get to share that or the other happy stuff with Dr. Mind like I wanted. I also had some heavy stuff to start.  Instead a work issue that I found out about at 6:45 right before I went in made me so mad that we had a pointless (not really, just not what I wanted) session talking about that and other things frustrating me and making me angry.  Then, just because it wasn't all bad enough and I was leaving feeling mad because work consumed time I wanted for something far different I managed to hit my glass of water rather than picking it up, throwing 32 ozs. plus of water around Dr. Mind's office.  So we spent a good 10 minutes crawling around the floor cleaning up.  For the 2nd time in a couple months as I spilled sprite all over the place another day.  So then I  left fighting tears and with him trying to tell me it was no big deal except it was because it was a last straw.  Then I got home and responding to the work issues maturely took another hour so I'm now trying to get to sleep so at 4 AM I'm wide awake to write notes.  And if they are late I'm going to tell them it is because I spent a couple hours crying due to this ongoing frustrating situation plus trying to deal wtih it and I just didn't make it.  Still goes as a negative on my tracking but whatever.

Tomorrow at least I know I'll be done relatively early since I have a PM meeting that is to be done by 5 or earlier, so I can be sure of being home by 6:30.  That lets me get lots of rest for Saturday, which is haircut and trip to see my niece.  I want to see her once more while she's a baby, not a toddler and since walking is close and she turns one in less than a month it's time.  I bought her some clothes today that were size  24 months and 2T for fall and winter.  She's getting so big.  And so, so, so cute.

And now I need to get to sleep.hopefully sleep comes.  Last night I wound up awake until valium worked about 1:30  AM.   Not good.

Answer

Please, please note that this is not intended in any way to embarrass or upset anyone.  This is just my policy and since it came up I'm going to share.

MissBee posted recently about her new blog and would I read/promote it.  The answer is, no.  I will read it.  However, 2 years ago I got hurt very badly on the internet.  A woman posted a blog about her decision to carry to birth a baby who was diagnosed with fatal developmental issues.  She wrote a lovely blog.  She went from 0 to a zillion readers in no time.  And then the baby didn't come and didn't come.  It was born with few signs of the illnesses she had described.  And then things crumbled on the blog as people realized the miracle baby was a doll.  Nobody knows how much this woman earned from her little scam.  It was later found she was posting on any blog remotely related to dying babies or that was popular with Christian women and using false names to seek readers.  She had ads and people making donations and it was a wonderful scam.  She got away with it too, just to make it worse.  It hurt.  A lot.  So I don't trust blogs on face value anymore.

I am not accusing MissBee of anything and while I will read your blog when I have time this weekend I have not yet.  However, to earn my support I need several things:  1)  I need to know you.  Telling me you've read my posts but not referencing them in any way does not show me you have any idea what I've written.  I don't expect you to read 1500 posts, but show me you are reading and not just commenting on every blog that might get you traffic.  2)  You need to hang around here and participate for a while.  Again, I need to know you.  3)  You need to have an established blog.  I'm not telling people who come here because what I say somehow helps them to somewhere that I don't know just like I'm not going to recommend a dr. I don't know.

Again, this has nothing to do with this individual, and while i've probably offended you 20 ways MissBee I hope do stick around and see what's going on here, get to know me, and then I'll be happy to endorse you if I feel it's appropriate.  This just has to do with the ethics I use with blogging and Michal please comment and help explain the pain of the whole April Rose thing.  We made mistakes but the thing about mistakes is you learn to not pass them on.

Jen

Asthma versus MAOI

Today was a little scary.  My asthma flared badly, I used my medication liberally, the nurse at the allergist's office clearly didn't know  what I was talking about referencing "is that safe with my MAOI?" so instead gave me "shut the psych patient up" answer.  I didn't do what she said since she was clearly guessing, so it never occurred to me that use of meds hours later would cause my blood pressure to go up.  Therefore I had a headache for many hours before I checked my blood pressure and it was pretty high for me.  It's better now and doctors have been contacted, but clearly finding a balance between blood pressure and asthma is going to be a struggle.  I can't even just take a blood pressure med as my blood pressure runs low normally.

Not so relaxing.  I think I am finally sleepy though.

Continuing education-not

I have  the lowest caseload I've ever had right now so I spent part of the afternoon on continuing education stuff.  I had several behavioral health courses to take and decided to get them over with, knowing they were likely to have parts that annoyed me.  They did.

They had one part that made me nearly laugh aloud.  The general statement was that bipolar sometimes manifests in mixed states, explained what they are and why they are dangerous as well as I've seen this done, and then stated that people in mixed episodes generally need to be hospitalized and have limited potential for benefitting from treatment while mixed.  I actually had to stop myself from going to show someone to laugh at this.  I have been in a mixed episode for most of the last 10 years or longer and the only time I've been hospitalized it was for one of the rare times I was "only" depressed.  And I have benefitted greatly from treatment while mixed; I think one of the criteria used by my doctors for pushing hospitalization not benefitting in therapy while feeling horrible.  Granted it was not quite the type of therapy our agency provides and I will admit that at times it becomes necessary for treatment to be more supportive than anything else (have I been showering? paying bills?  getting sleep?  taking meds and using PRNs to make myself sleep even when I don't want to). How am I coping with _____?  Therapy is basic usually while mixed, but not always; it was during a long mixed episode that I learned to trust Dr. Mind sort of, to cry without panicking and forcing it to stop, and how to communicate to him how I felt.  I learned to use guided relaxation while mixed despite failing at this many times before that.  And I work mixed a lot.  So I think they need to check their facts.  I'm sure it has to do with there aren't a ton of people who have the severe, long, combined with rapid cycling mixed episodes that I  do, and so I've learned to live with them more than someone who has one every few years which is more what the course was describing.

The other part where I wound up laughing was when I scrolled into the medication section.  One glance and I thought  "lithium" and sure enough it was.  The funniest part is there are 3 forms of lithium: capsules that are regular release which I took for many years until I'd thrown up so much lithium that even smelling the capsules made me gag; Lithobid/generics thereof which is time release; and Eskalith/generics thereof which is also time release but slightly different, I think it si not as gradual or controlled as lithobid.  I've been on all of them and for whatever reason when I changed to Eskalith to get the dosage that it is available in only in eskalith, thus saving me from cutting pills when I wasn't well it turned out that I tolerate Eskalith better than either of the others.  I think that's mostly association; I think I was using the capsules when I got toxic, and was  on lithobid during the months of fighting to get a dose I could tolerate  once we knew I had to be on lithium to manage even  at a tiny dose, and then eskalith started as an attempt to get a more precise dose and has worked out to be the best way for me to take it.

Regardless this all made me think about if I was given a bowl of psychotropics I could probably identify a majority because of being on so many.

Falling asleep, better go.

Pure, unadulterated cuteness

My mom is at my sister's babysitting today.  I called to tell her something and she put my niece on the phone.  My niece who heard my voice and grinned and then when I kept talking started clapping her hands.  Enough sweetness to kill.....

Something happy

I know I've been a bit gripey on here lately.  Chalk it up to this:  Brenda the cyst typically hurts for a few days around ovulation, then backs off until the day before my period and hurts badly then.  That's what I assumed, with every reason to support my assumption, was happening Friday.  Except that I don't think Brenda even did what she usually does as the pain has been much less than usual.  So either my cycle is totally messed up and I have another 2 weeks and then more Brenda pain, or I have serious PMS.  Given the 8 lb. weight gain in the last week or so I know I'm hoping for pms.  There's just no pattern to this.  Which is the reason the surgery looks so good......

But I'm going to see my sister and niece Saturday.   I told my sister I want to take them out to lunch.  She said great, and while we're out  WILL YOU WATCH THE  BABY so she can get her hair cut.  I'm not just a beach sitter with lots of back-up.  I'm really, truly Aunt Jen, allowed to make decisions and everything.  I truly never dreamed she'd trust me with the baby and instead I'm one of the limited few who is allowed--limited as in a friend of my sister's who has a degree and years of experience in infant development, grandmothers, probably an uncle who lives with them although I'm not sure, and me.  

So excited........