Collecting diagnoses
I've spent most of the last decade getting sicker and sicker. I seem to get at least one new diagnosis a year, which I would have thought impossible before my body started falling apart. I suppose I thought disabled people had a disability. Maybe two? Three would be ridiculous. But here I am, well into double-digit diagnoses, and apparently I'm just collecting more.
This time, it's something to do with my ability to eat. I'm just not hungry anymore, so I simply don't eat until dinner, when the peer pressure of being surrounded by family convinces me to choke down a small plate. But it's a struggle that often results in me taking five modest bites, then turning my plate over to someone else.
I've got a diagnostic study scheduled for March. Until then, I'll just watch my metabolism crash, I suppose. I'll just spend every evening wondering if I'll be able to keep down even those five bites. I'll just stay perpetually exhausted and lethargic.
But it's more than the physical exhaustion that's getting to me; it's the emotional exhaustion of never being able to plateau. I'm done with always getting worse. I'm frustrated that I keep getting hit with new problems. I'm tired of this constant descent into a poorer quality of life.
All I want is to stay the same level of fucked.
I worry I'll reach a point when it won't even matter anymore. All anyone wants to do is throw pills at me, and I'm already on some that aren't meant to be taken together. Won't I reach the point where it's a choice between pill combos that will kill me and remaining sick as hell? They can't just medicate away everything that's wrong with me.
Then there's the other side of it, the little birdie that whispers in my ear, "Maybe it's the pills that are making you sick." That's when I go down spirals of wondering what would happen if I went off all my meds, psych included, and just tried to self-medicate with fresh air and yoga like people keep telling me. You know, because
...etc.
I've had so many strangers tell me I just need to go gluten-free. That I don't eat enough kale. Or that my only hope is prayer. Well Jesus Christ if going the doctor route is just seeing me with more and more problems, maybe I can't argue... Right?
Except, well, fuck that. So my flesh-prison is determined to rot a little faster than most, that is not reason to turn my back on science, to give up on the quality of life that medication has given me. No, how I'm living is not perfect, and I'm not even arguing against the possibility that a med here or there could be doing more harm than good. But I've lived off the medical grid, and it is pure, unadulterated hell. And I think about all the people who'd kill to have my insurance, and I wonder how I could flip them all off by turning my back on all the expertise and scientific aid available to me.
I'm just not willing to do it.
So I guess there are more diagnostics in my future. Probably more adjustments to my diet. Almost definitely more pills. And yeah, hopefully another diagnosis. Because while it's exhausting to think about all the shit that's wrong with me, you know what's more exhausting? Trying to pretend it'll all go away if I visualize enough rainbows.
This time, it's something to do with my ability to eat. I'm just not hungry anymore, so I simply don't eat until dinner, when the peer pressure of being surrounded by family convinces me to choke down a small plate. But it's a struggle that often results in me taking five modest bites, then turning my plate over to someone else.
I've got a diagnostic study scheduled for March. Until then, I'll just watch my metabolism crash, I suppose. I'll just spend every evening wondering if I'll be able to keep down even those five bites. I'll just stay perpetually exhausted and lethargic.
But it's more than the physical exhaustion that's getting to me; it's the emotional exhaustion of never being able to plateau. I'm done with always getting worse. I'm frustrated that I keep getting hit with new problems. I'm tired of this constant descent into a poorer quality of life.
All I want is to stay the same level of fucked.
I worry I'll reach a point when it won't even matter anymore. All anyone wants to do is throw pills at me, and I'm already on some that aren't meant to be taken together. Won't I reach the point where it's a choice between pill combos that will kill me and remaining sick as hell? They can't just medicate away everything that's wrong with me.
Then there's the other side of it, the little birdie that whispers in my ear, "Maybe it's the pills that are making you sick." That's when I go down spirals of wondering what would happen if I went off all my meds, psych included, and just tried to self-medicate with fresh air and yoga like people keep telling me. You know, because
...etc.
I've had so many strangers tell me I just need to go gluten-free. That I don't eat enough kale. Or that my only hope is prayer. Well Jesus Christ if going the doctor route is just seeing me with more and more problems, maybe I can't argue... Right?
Except, well, fuck that. So my flesh-prison is determined to rot a little faster than most, that is not reason to turn my back on science, to give up on the quality of life that medication has given me. No, how I'm living is not perfect, and I'm not even arguing against the possibility that a med here or there could be doing more harm than good. But I've lived off the medical grid, and it is pure, unadulterated hell. And I think about all the people who'd kill to have my insurance, and I wonder how I could flip them all off by turning my back on all the expertise and scientific aid available to me.
I'm just not willing to do it.
So I guess there are more diagnostics in my future. Probably more adjustments to my diet. Almost definitely more pills. And yeah, hopefully another diagnosis. Because while it's exhausting to think about all the shit that's wrong with me, you know what's more exhausting? Trying to pretend it'll all go away if I visualize enough rainbows.