Rainy Day Wanderings
I knew today would be long; I was not disappointed in that supposition.
I forgot to mention that I accidentally showed up early to yesterday's appointment. I thought it was at 1100, but it was at 1300. My mistake, and at least I was early instead of too late. It was today's appointment that was at 1100, which I was thankfully reminded of through a phone call, and a good thing too, because I thought it was Thursday. I miss my memory more than I mind the pain. My beautiful, faultless memory, that never got dates wrong and that could flawlessly spout long strings of numbers with ease. Pain comes fourth, behind fatigue, nausea, and brainpower, in the tragedies of my chronic illness.
I am also still not recovered from Saturday, still not recovered from doing something as harmless as having dinner with a friend and sitting on a barstool and drinking colas all night with more friends. Sitting, mind you, and watching other people interact and dance and drink and carry on.
So this morning I went to the allergist and they tested me for a whole slew of food allergies. I didn't test positive for a single one. But, before you go jumping to conclusions or Ahas! and pronounce me a veritable hypochondriac, I also barely showed any reaction to the 100% pure histamine control dot. It made the tiniest red discoloration and didn't welt up at all. And that's literally what allergies ARE; the doctor thinks that maybe one of my medications may have muted the skin test results, so she decided to send me to the lab for a blood draw of the same test. Which is unfortunately not as accurate, but might show something that the skin test did not. The lab is in a separate building, not much further than the subway station, but in the opposite direction, so I decided to walk.
Have I mentioned the lack of mental faculties, and that even before I got sick I always was rather sadly lacking in navigational skills? I can get lost fighting my way out of a wet paper sack; it comes with the visual processing problems. Everything looks the same!
So, my brilliant plan to walk to the lab rather than back to the metro, of course, ended with me getting lost, or at least turned around for a bit, and having to backtrack while the sky occasionally spit water on me, until I finally sorted my surroundings out and, using landmarks and street signs, logicked my way to the lab building. At least that went quickly.
Rather than meander home, I hunkered down in a Starbucks and finished the easy one of the four homework assignments for the week. Then, still over an hour early, I went to check in to my therapy appointment.
Not much got done there either. We talked about my treatment plan, which is up for review soon but which hasn't changed and I haven't seem to have made any progress in either. And she told me she understood if I wanted to take a break, which I might, considering I feel like we've plateaued and even she isn't sure what kind of therapy might be best for me, and/or whether she is qualified in that kind of therapy, once we figure out what type I should have. Mostly I just complain about how frustrated I am with everything. I go to my pain doctor and have them tell me they don't know what is the best course of treatment for my pain, they do nothing, and tell me to come back in a month or two. At least my shrink tries various drugs and things (whether or not they work is another story), but half the time I don't think this new one listens and I really, really miss the old one. He keeps giving me stuff for anxiety, as if I'm having some kind of panic attack or something, but I'm not anxious I am ANGRY. I'm not wringing my hands and going "what am I going to do" I am SHAKING MY FISTS AND GOING WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU PEOPLE DOING? It's a distinction he has yet to grasp. I go to the rheumatologist who says my condition isn't bad enough to merit the drugs that prevent it from getting worse, and she wants to avoid the nasty side effects of the drugs. Um..... I'm still not sure if I agree or disagree with her. I still love my GI doctor, even though one does get tired of having cameras shoved down one's throat and up one's bum. My primary care provider seems to think that so long as I keep going to therapy, everything should just be hunky-dory, never mind the fact that she refuses to do anything about pain or fatigue or any other symptom. Screw quality of life, why should that be important; it's all in your head, right? We have fundamental differences of opinion. I'm like, hey, if you can't make me better, at least you can make me comfortable so I can go on with my life. I want to be alert and not in pain. I seriously could use either some ritalin or provigil or something along those lines, then maybe I wouldn't be so tired and could concentrate when I try to study, maybe then I could THINK a little easier when I want to. I've never been on either (okay, I tried ritalin way back in high school, and all I remember was feeling pleasantly stoned), but they are supposed to help concentration and mine couldn't get any WORSE, that's for sure. And a couple percocets for when the tramadol isn't working isn't going to kill me either. I was getting them from the emergency room from time to time, I hardly ever need them except every now and again but it's nice to have them on hand for when you do need them without having to sit in an uncomfortable chair in the emergency room for like four hours at a stretch. And if we really want to push the envelope of controlled substances, how about some temazepam for when I wake up in the night, which is possibly the only time I will admit to feeling anything like the anxiety this shrink seems to think I suffer from. Sometimes I wake up at night with a weird adrenaline spike and have no idea why. It's not from a nightmare, I just wake up, as if something has jumped at me and gone 'BOO!' in my sleep. Maybe I have sleep apnea and that's when I stop breathing, although I don't snore so that seems odd. But everyone now and again that happens and it takes me awhile to settle back to sleep, and often I don't sleep well afterward. Temazepam was the only sleepy med that has every consistently worked for me without leaving me feeling super hungover the next day.
So, two appointments and lost and wandering in the rain, plus still in recovery already from Saturday. Obviously I'm stupid-tired. Just as obviously I am awake, by which one could surmise (and you would be correct) I am ingesting massive quantities of caffeine. Right now it's Earl Grey tea, but I had a good bit of both coffee and tea at Starbucks also. Oh, and just to put the cherry on my day, even though my therapist sweetly saw me early when she saw that I was waiting patiently (and there super-early), someone was ill on the metro train ahead of me on the way home, so we got stuck on the train while they single-tracked. Ended up taking an extra thirty minutes plus to get home. Of course.
Left the house at 0945, got back in at the dot of 1800. I'm dead on my feet.