I've started recording my PMS symptoms in a regular place so that I can track what's happening. I have the impression that every few months, either my PMS, my period, or both, are miserable and I'm not sure why or if that's actually so, aside from vague references in my personal journaling before last month when it was really bad.
Last month I spent two or three days in a very low mood, unable to get the motivation to do anything I was supposed to do, including school work. I managed to do the short assignments due for my language class, and that was about it. Then, the first two days of menstruating were absolutely miserable, and far worse than what I normally experience. Normally, I have one day of heavy bleeding with cramping, etc., but can manage with just one dose of a medicine like Pamprin. Last month, I had two days of heavy bleeding and ended up holding my stomach every time I stood up, walked, or sat down because all of these activities jarred my internal organs and made me feel awful. Pamprin didn't really help, either. It was a few days later that I started to think about birth control to get this under control again. I suspect stress is throwing hormones off, but who knows if it will level out on its own?
This month, on the other hand, the most noticeable symptom I've had is increased appetite, both before and during menses. I'm a little confused, but I like this a lot better than ending up sobbing for half an hour after an Israeli film screening I had to go to for class. (It didn't help that I had no warning for how ... upsetting this film would be ahead of time. Need to talk to the prof about that at some point, actually.) That wasn't fun, and if I hadn't been PMSing it might not have happened.
So I'd like to try birth control. I went on it freshman year when my mother suggested it in case I became sexually active in college, but nothing happened at all that year, and eventually I gave up taking it because I didn't think I needed it. It seemed fine and a helpful regulator, if nothing else. Of course, there's also the consideration that I have a boyfriend these days and may end up becoming sexually active soon. But really, the horrible mood during PMS is what makes me want to take birth control again. Because I have a hard enough time keeping my mental health on a good track without hormones playing into it, too.
Showing posts with label medicines. Show all posts
Showing posts with label medicines. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Current medicines
At some point, not too many years ago, the only medicine I took every day was Claritin, for allergies. Oh boy, has that changed.
I present to you, my daily meds:
[Image description: Six pills, in three groups of two, and two bottles, one small, the other larger.]
These medicines include: an antihistamine (since my allergies never went away) and omeprazole, an antacid, in the morning, to be taken well before food; piroxicam, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug or NSAID, and Flintstones multivitamins to be taken with food, usually at lunch but sometimes earlier; an eyedrop bottle, which I use maybe once a week; a nasal spray, which I use right before bed; and amitriptylene, which I try to take around 10pm because it makes waking up difficult.
Random details: 1) The nasal spray comes from a different supplier than my last bottle of this particular prescription, and this stuff fucking burns. I stand there for about a minute after using it just holding my nose while the sensation fades. 2) If you are ever tempted to buy the CVS version of the Flintstones complete, don't. It tastes like chalk and is nasty. I bought two bottles when they had a sale, because those two were cheaper than ONE of the Flintstones. I doubt I'll ever finish them. I ended up buying Flintstones after all; those ones I actually look forward to eating because they're yummy (made for kids, you know). 3) Amitriptylene is extremely soporific. The longer I stay awake after taking it, the harder it is to wake up in the morning because I haven't had a full night's sleep. That is, the effect is exaggerated with the addition of the medicine. Also? I wouldn't recommend trying to walk if you've taken a dose and are already extremely tired and are up late. I was not at my most graceful last night. At least I didn't walk into anything? I was definitely weaving and having to rebalance a lot.
Moving on, on any given day I might add tylenol/acetaminophen (but never advil/ibuprofen as it's another NSAID and can't be taken in conjunction with piroxicam/feldene) if I have a headache or if bodily pains aren't quite under control.
However, I also caught a cold recently. It started with a sore throat last Friday afternoon, and by Monday the sore throat was gone but was replaced with general stuffiness and the beginnings of a cough. As a result, I've been taking these as well:
[Image description: A box of Mucinex, three cough drops, and 5 little sample packets.]
The health center has a lot of free samples they give out, usually in the form of a "cold care pack" unless asked for something specific. This includes medi-phenyl aka phenylephrine, tylenol, and cough drops. I've been using everything but the Tylenol. I've also been coughing enough that I wanted to get something specifically for a cough. This afternoon I called the health center to ask for cough medicine, and after a bit of back and forth involving the nurse and the nurse practitioner looking up drug interactions, they determined that the best thing would be Mucinex. Apparently there's a "class D" (don't ask; I don't know) warning against taking anything DM with amitriptylene--something about the drugs being too similar. As a result, they told me not to take Robitussin DM, which is what I would normally take for a cough. They also offered to refill an inhaler they gave me last year when I got sick, but my lungs don't feel "tight" this time as they did last time, so I declined. (The tightness was "something like bronchitis; apparently the bronchial tubes weren't expanding enough to allow me to breathe. That was fun when I went in a hot, glass building for a meeting...ended up wheezing in the hallway and having my class dean and half a dozen other people very concerned about me.)
At any rate, those are the medicines I'm on at the moment. My apologies for the lack of prettiness on the shots; it's way too late to have natural light and the only lights I have in my room create shadows of various kinds, which was making the whole thing look kinda bad to me.
I'm up to six pills a day (+ another 10 or so until this cold is over). I wonder how many more I'll have to add before the year is out?
Edited to add a 3) to the random thoughts list.
I present to you, my daily meds:
[Image description: Six pills, in three groups of two, and two bottles, one small, the other larger.]
 |
| Daily Meds--6 pills, two bottles |
Random details: 1) The nasal spray comes from a different supplier than my last bottle of this particular prescription, and this stuff fucking burns. I stand there for about a minute after using it just holding my nose while the sensation fades. 2) If you are ever tempted to buy the CVS version of the Flintstones complete, don't. It tastes like chalk and is nasty. I bought two bottles when they had a sale, because those two were cheaper than ONE of the Flintstones. I doubt I'll ever finish them. I ended up buying Flintstones after all; those ones I actually look forward to eating because they're yummy (made for kids, you know). 3) Amitriptylene is extremely soporific. The longer I stay awake after taking it, the harder it is to wake up in the morning because I haven't had a full night's sleep. That is, the effect is exaggerated with the addition of the medicine. Also? I wouldn't recommend trying to walk if you've taken a dose and are already extremely tired and are up late. I was not at my most graceful last night. At least I didn't walk into anything? I was definitely weaving and having to rebalance a lot.
Moving on, on any given day I might add tylenol/acetaminophen (but never advil/ibuprofen as it's another NSAID and can't be taken in conjunction with piroxicam/feldene) if I have a headache or if bodily pains aren't quite under control.
However, I also caught a cold recently. It started with a sore throat last Friday afternoon, and by Monday the sore throat was gone but was replaced with general stuffiness and the beginnings of a cough. As a result, I've been taking these as well:
[Image description: A box of Mucinex, three cough drops, and 5 little sample packets.]
 |
| Cold Meds--cough drops, tylenol, decongestants, mucinex |
At any rate, those are the medicines I'm on at the moment. My apologies for the lack of prettiness on the shots; it's way too late to have natural light and the only lights I have in my room create shadows of various kinds, which was making the whole thing look kinda bad to me.
I'm up to six pills a day (+ another 10 or so until this cold is over). I wonder how many more I'll have to add before the year is out?
Edited to add a 3) to the random thoughts list.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Power completely restored!
So. That thing that happened. I've already posted about the blackout. This past weekend, the university put my building on partial generator power so that emergency systems, heat, and some lights came back online. I believe many of my residents and the Light house residents upstairs chose to come back at that point. I didn't. I didn't want to sleep where I didn't have power enough to see anything after ~5:30pm. I also went to Massachusetts, as mentioned in my last blog post, and my anxiety levels dropped some. My friends are awesome, and they have two adorable kitties, and they also gave me use of the spare bedroom/craft room, which meant I wasn't sleeping in the same room as someone else. I unfortunately couldn't let the cats in without supervision due to issues with one of them possibly spraying, and the possibility of either of them digging claws into the air mattress. Still, I spent a lot of time hugging cats and convincing them to purr.
Monday, my boss emailed all residents of my house to tell us that CL&P power was restored to all campus buildings, including ours. He didn't, however, check to make sure we were back to full power. We weren't. The extension part of the building had no electricity, although it did have heat. The main building had everything, I think. Facilities and Physical Plant were in the house on Monday and Tuesday doing something with breakers, and replacing (?) the boiler. By Tuesday afternoon, we had power back, and my temporary roommate and I moved back into the house as fast as possible.
I took a mental health day on Tuesday because I was still stressed about not having my own room back. This morning, I woke up in my room and alone. There was more relief associated with both of those things than I would have believed had I not just spent 10 or 11 days not having one or both. I feel so much happier today, just because of those simple things.
Yesterday I *also* went to see my therapist, when I asked for an urgent care session (I made the appointment before I moved back to my room, although the appointment was after). I talked through just how upset I've been for the past week, and he assured me both that it's completely normal that all the changes in my routine would cause this level of upset, and that my self-advocacy was excellent and really wasn't asking for favors so much as leveling the playing field since most of my peers had power back well before I did. That was the basic thing we talked about anyway. I'm not going to go into more detail on that.
Two other things came up during the session: the doctor who prescribed amitriptylene had called my therapist to discuss how I'm doing on the 10mg dose and whether I would like to raise it. After a short discussion, I decided that yes, I would like that, so last night I took 20 mg. Today? I walked to all my classes, even the one that went after my voice lesson, which normally makes it difficult to go anywhere. I was in mild pain by the end of the day, but it wasn't impeding my ability to do things, which was awesome. I just hope that I don't keep having to up the dosage of the medicine, but even so, it was such an amazing relief not to have to deal with the extra pain.
I said two things. The other was that the class dean had called him to ask about the email I had cc'd her on informing my professors that I would be taking a mental health day and not coming to class. She was on my side, apparently, but unsure why I needed the mental health day. Dr. A told her, without going into specifics, that just not having my room available was an incredible strain, etc. Apparently, a lot of students have been stressed out in different ways by the power outage.
Now that I'm back in my room, I've noticed a number of stress responses have gone away or lessened: my face is no longer extremely oily and extra-pimply; all-around pain has lessened (although a large part of that *is* the medicine); and I'm much happier.
I think, at this point, I may just be able to handle the rest of the semester. So long as nothing else happens. *knock on wood* All the same, I think it would be good idea to start meditating again. It did wonders Monday night when I was upset, and lately it takes a lot to calm me down.
So yeah, in general: huge improvement today as far as physical and mental health go, and I hope to continue with that.
Monday, my boss emailed all residents of my house to tell us that CL&P power was restored to all campus buildings, including ours. He didn't, however, check to make sure we were back to full power. We weren't. The extension part of the building had no electricity, although it did have heat. The main building had everything, I think. Facilities and Physical Plant were in the house on Monday and Tuesday doing something with breakers, and replacing (?) the boiler. By Tuesday afternoon, we had power back, and my temporary roommate and I moved back into the house as fast as possible.
I took a mental health day on Tuesday because I was still stressed about not having my own room back. This morning, I woke up in my room and alone. There was more relief associated with both of those things than I would have believed had I not just spent 10 or 11 days not having one or both. I feel so much happier today, just because of those simple things.
Yesterday I *also* went to see my therapist, when I asked for an urgent care session (I made the appointment before I moved back to my room, although the appointment was after). I talked through just how upset I've been for the past week, and he assured me both that it's completely normal that all the changes in my routine would cause this level of upset, and that my self-advocacy was excellent and really wasn't asking for favors so much as leveling the playing field since most of my peers had power back well before I did. That was the basic thing we talked about anyway. I'm not going to go into more detail on that.
Two other things came up during the session: the doctor who prescribed amitriptylene had called my therapist to discuss how I'm doing on the 10mg dose and whether I would like to raise it. After a short discussion, I decided that yes, I would like that, so last night I took 20 mg. Today? I walked to all my classes, even the one that went after my voice lesson, which normally makes it difficult to go anywhere. I was in mild pain by the end of the day, but it wasn't impeding my ability to do things, which was awesome. I just hope that I don't keep having to up the dosage of the medicine, but even so, it was such an amazing relief not to have to deal with the extra pain.
I said two things. The other was that the class dean had called him to ask about the email I had cc'd her on informing my professors that I would be taking a mental health day and not coming to class. She was on my side, apparently, but unsure why I needed the mental health day. Dr. A told her, without going into specifics, that just not having my room available was an incredible strain, etc. Apparently, a lot of students have been stressed out in different ways by the power outage.
Now that I'm back in my room, I've noticed a number of stress responses have gone away or lessened: my face is no longer extremely oily and extra-pimply; all-around pain has lessened (although a large part of that *is* the medicine); and I'm much happier.
I think, at this point, I may just be able to handle the rest of the semester. So long as nothing else happens. *knock on wood* All the same, I think it would be good idea to start meditating again. It did wonders Monday night when I was upset, and lately it takes a lot to calm me down.
So yeah, in general: huge improvement today as far as physical and mental health go, and I hope to continue with that.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Adjustments
I took the amitriptylene at 10pm last night, and set my alarm for 8:15 (didn't go to bed until after midnight). The first couple of times my alarm went off, I felt like I was moving through cotton to get out of bed and hit snooze. It took 25 minutes or so (it's a cell phone alarm that goes off every five minutes), but I finally stopped feeling like that after the third or fourth iteration. I even managed to get up in time to take a shower and such before leaving for class.
And also my mouth felt disgusting. Needed water, I guess.
I have to be at a physical therapy appointment at 8:15am tomorrow. This is going to be interesting.
On the bright side, I feel much less pain than I did half a week ago.
And also my mouth felt disgusting. Needed water, I guess.
I have to be at a physical therapy appointment at 8:15am tomorrow. This is going to be interesting.
On the bright side, I feel much less pain than I did half a week ago.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
New medicine
I started a new medicine Friday night: amitriptylene 10mg. The doctor said within a couple of weeks it should start to control the pain. For now, I'm taking it right before I go to sleep, which seems to not be the best decision when I go to bed at 1am because I'm up talking to a friend in a different time zone, or watching Buffy until 2am because one of my housemates hosts social gatherings on Friday nights and I can hear it loud and clear. I've had a really hard time getting up the past two mornings. Now, granted, I messed up my sleeping pattern a bit last week, and slept really badly Thursday night (and took a nap Friday afternoon). However, my usual pattern is waking up between 8 and 9 whether or not I have class or it's a weekend, so it's unusual for me to reset my clock to 10am and still not be able to get up.
I think I'll start taking the meds between 10 and 11pm and see how that goes. It's not like I function well enough to do homework by that point, anyways. (I'm very much a morning and day person. At night, my concentration ability drops rapidly.) I want my mornings back.
I think I'll start taking the meds between 10 and 11pm and see how that goes. It's not like I function well enough to do homework by that point, anyways. (I'm very much a morning and day person. At night, my concentration ability drops rapidly.) I want my mornings back.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Some good news
Well, it seems that my theory about my Hebrew textbook causing problems has some merit. I did not have the class Tuesday, and I felt fine. I did not have the class today, and made it to all my classes (didn't feel fine because I started feeling ill halfway through my last class, but the only pain problem is my knee).
I'm going to make photocopies of the next couple of chapters and carry those to class tomorrow. It *should* make things better than they have been.
I'm also going to continue taking Tylenol all day instead of after I start hurting, since that was the other factor today, and it seems to have helped.
I also talked to my boss today about what he needs from me in order for me to stay on track. He suggested that I do some program planning now, and set five dates, and then I'll have some preliminary work done. I think I'm going to do that this weekend.
I'm going to make photocopies of the next couple of chapters and carry those to class tomorrow. It *should* make things better than they have been.
I'm also going to continue taking Tylenol all day instead of after I start hurting, since that was the other factor today, and it seems to have helped.
I also talked to my boss today about what he needs from me in order for me to stay on track. He suggested that I do some program planning now, and set five dates, and then I'll have some preliminary work done. I think I'm going to do that this weekend.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Out for the count
Yesterday was a better day in terms of pain levels than I've had in a while. I think it was a result of my physical therapist putting me on electrical stimulation and a heating pad for twenty minutes. For the rest of the day I managed pretty well, aside from some ongoing emotional problems resulting mostly from being in pain all the time and not getting things accomplished (see my last post). It wasn't until after dinner that I was noticing enough discomfort to take the medical van or the Ride.* I didn't. I walked home. I even managed to get a solid night's sleep without being awoken or kept awake due to pain or discomfort.
*The medical van is available in the daytime for students with disabilities or injuries like a broken leg who have permission from the health center. The Ride is a nighttime shuttle service available to all students.
Today I started getting mild pain as I did my morning routine, and then went to my Hebrew class. I think that was what started the problems. I have a heavy textbook for Hebrew, which we work from in class, which means I have to carry it with me. The class is a ~7 minute walk from my house. From the class to lunch is probably 3 minutes. Then 5-6 minutes back to my dorm. I was somewhat okay sitting through class. Lunch was terrible and I finished as fast as I could. Went back to my dorm, started crying.
Pain is extremely difficult for me to deal with. I hate it, I fear it, I can't think around it. I ended up not going to my voice lesson in favor of meeting with one of the doctors at the health center about pain management. I start a low dose of amitriptylene tomorrow. In the meantime, the doc said to take Tylenol regularly for a while to see if it will get me over the hump because that sometimes works better than taking it occasionally. I asked for and received a couple of handfuls of single-dose packets of acetaminophen (my Tylenol bottle is probably going to run out soon...).
I also emailed a couple professors, the Dean for Students with Disabilities and my Class Dean to work out how to hopefully set me on a better track. I'm going to set up a weekly meeting with one of the deans (I haven't quite decided which, but I'm thinking probably my Class Dean) in order to strategize and deal with new things as they come up. I expressed the need to have someone working with me because I can't self-advocate easily when I'm already having trouble keeping up with things, and cry every time I explain things to a new person, to boot.
I'll be doing something about my textbook, although I haven't decided what yet. I've had suggestions to photocopy, get a rolling bag, cut the binding from the textbook and just bring in the pages I need from that, or share with a classmate. I don't think I'll be cutting the binding. I'm horrified by the suggestions, and honestly am not sure how to do such a thing without having to do a lot of hard work. Most likely I'll end up photocopying, even though it's wasteful and will make me run out of ink pretty fast (or coins, if I decide to use the library copy machine).
These are some of the things I'm doing to deal with the pain, but I hate that I have to work so much harder than my friends to do simple things, I hate that I keep spending my weekends doing bedrest, because even though I don't party, I still usually do something on weekends, even if it's just go visit a friend somewhere else (often it's board games).
Right now I'm laying in my bed with my laptop on top of the covers and wishing that I could make my wrist pain go away, too. I'm sleepy partly from crying earlier and partly because I took vicodin to get some relief. I think I'm pretty coherent and able to think, which is not my past experience with it (I once took vicodin and then tried to tutor someone; I would not recommend this). I suspect that the fact that I can still feel what's going on with my knee has something to do with why I'm more clear-headed; the pain is bad enough that the dose I have isn't quite as strong as I need, so it's not affecting my cognitive function. Though I'm not a medical official, so I don't know if that's actually something that happens.
My physical therapist says that this kind of pain shouldn't result from Sjogren's syndrome. Maybe she's right. Maybe my unofficial diagnosis isn't correct. I certainly don't have that many problems with things like dry mouth, which is a common symptom (I have plenty of saliva, etc, although dry eyes are slightly more of a problem). However, I reject the notion that this is my fault from doing something wrong; as far as I can tell, I haven't done anything different except that I'm not in a dance class this semester, and the summer ended so I've started school again. Granted, I'd love agency and to be able to pinpoint something I could change to make this all go away, but...I have a hard time right now with being told X thing you're not doing is wrong and there's no excuse for not doing it. I feel like I'm failing on so many levels and it's hard to combat that feeling. Being told that by two different people within two days (even if they didn't mean it that way), especially two authority figures, is just making things worse.
What I need is to get back on track and not struggle every day to keep up with my studies. What I want is to not be in pain.
I can only take things one little bit at a time, but at least that gets something done when I have a very limited number of spoons to work with.
*The medical van is available in the daytime for students with disabilities or injuries like a broken leg who have permission from the health center. The Ride is a nighttime shuttle service available to all students.
Today I started getting mild pain as I did my morning routine, and then went to my Hebrew class. I think that was what started the problems. I have a heavy textbook for Hebrew, which we work from in class, which means I have to carry it with me. The class is a ~7 minute walk from my house. From the class to lunch is probably 3 minutes. Then 5-6 minutes back to my dorm. I was somewhat okay sitting through class. Lunch was terrible and I finished as fast as I could. Went back to my dorm, started crying.
Pain is extremely difficult for me to deal with. I hate it, I fear it, I can't think around it. I ended up not going to my voice lesson in favor of meeting with one of the doctors at the health center about pain management. I start a low dose of amitriptylene tomorrow. In the meantime, the doc said to take Tylenol regularly for a while to see if it will get me over the hump because that sometimes works better than taking it occasionally. I asked for and received a couple of handfuls of single-dose packets of acetaminophen (my Tylenol bottle is probably going to run out soon...).
I also emailed a couple professors, the Dean for Students with Disabilities and my Class Dean to work out how to hopefully set me on a better track. I'm going to set up a weekly meeting with one of the deans (I haven't quite decided which, but I'm thinking probably my Class Dean) in order to strategize and deal with new things as they come up. I expressed the need to have someone working with me because I can't self-advocate easily when I'm already having trouble keeping up with things, and cry every time I explain things to a new person, to boot.
I'll be doing something about my textbook, although I haven't decided what yet. I've had suggestions to photocopy, get a rolling bag, cut the binding from the textbook and just bring in the pages I need from that, or share with a classmate. I don't think I'll be cutting the binding. I'm horrified by the suggestions, and honestly am not sure how to do such a thing without having to do a lot of hard work. Most likely I'll end up photocopying, even though it's wasteful and will make me run out of ink pretty fast (or coins, if I decide to use the library copy machine).
These are some of the things I'm doing to deal with the pain, but I hate that I have to work so much harder than my friends to do simple things, I hate that I keep spending my weekends doing bedrest, because even though I don't party, I still usually do something on weekends, even if it's just go visit a friend somewhere else (often it's board games).
Right now I'm laying in my bed with my laptop on top of the covers and wishing that I could make my wrist pain go away, too. I'm sleepy partly from crying earlier and partly because I took vicodin to get some relief. I think I'm pretty coherent and able to think, which is not my past experience with it (I once took vicodin and then tried to tutor someone; I would not recommend this). I suspect that the fact that I can still feel what's going on with my knee has something to do with why I'm more clear-headed; the pain is bad enough that the dose I have isn't quite as strong as I need, so it's not affecting my cognitive function. Though I'm not a medical official, so I don't know if that's actually something that happens.
My physical therapist says that this kind of pain shouldn't result from Sjogren's syndrome. Maybe she's right. Maybe my unofficial diagnosis isn't correct. I certainly don't have that many problems with things like dry mouth, which is a common symptom (I have plenty of saliva, etc, although dry eyes are slightly more of a problem). However, I reject the notion that this is my fault from doing something wrong; as far as I can tell, I haven't done anything different except that I'm not in a dance class this semester, and the summer ended so I've started school again. Granted, I'd love agency and to be able to pinpoint something I could change to make this all go away, but...I have a hard time right now with being told X thing you're not doing is wrong and there's no excuse for not doing it. I feel like I'm failing on so many levels and it's hard to combat that feeling. Being told that by two different people within two days (even if they didn't mean it that way), especially two authority figures, is just making things worse.
What I need is to get back on track and not struggle every day to keep up with my studies. What I want is to not be in pain.
I can only take things one little bit at a time, but at least that gets something done when I have a very limited number of spoons to work with.
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