The Year of the Doctor

Taking care of health is important if you have Borderline Personality DisorderYar!  I promised thee a blog post!

Alright this is apparently the year where I celebrate having insurance again by being a responsible adult that takes care of her physical well-being.  Parts of this are easy, and other part not so much.  Also imbedded within these words will be an update as to my mental health and the meds I’m now taking.  So way to be relevant to the blog topic, self!  *pats self on back*

So, topics to cover:

  • Head
  • Shoulders
  • Knees
  • Toes
  • Eyes
  • Ears
  • Mouth
  • Nose
  • Lady Parts

Maybe not in the order, huh?

EYES: A major “yay!” and a slight “WTF MATE!” included!

So all 5 of my clan went to the eye doctor this week.  The husband, oldest and I have all worn glasses since we were each respectively 7 or 8 years old.  So for us it was just a yearly check in.  Nothing of note for Pat or Thomas, other than Thomas has my eyes in more than just color.  (Did you know that it’s been proven that the more you read, the more near-sighted you become?  Explains why I’m damn near blind.)

I, of course, need new glasses as well only… So apparently based off their previous records on me, my current prescription, and what the script in my current glasses read to be, the last place to examine eyes and get my lenses really messed up their readings *coughWALMARTcough*.  What’s the most fucked up about that is that the year I got those glasses was the only year I’ve ever had insurance through work and Wal-Mart was basically the only place that took that insurance and my mom still had to pay through the nose for me to get these glasses and apparently the royally messed up. That or my eyes magically got better by a lot and then tragically got a little worse than they had been the year or two prior.  So, really?  Every other year the government has paid for my glasses, which I no longer feel guilty about because I’ve gotten a better doctor and better glasses that I need to see because I’m going blind.  Anyway I’m back to one of my 2 old eye doctors (I flipped between them based on location and who could get me in without a 15 month wait) and they have always run consistent to one another.  So I know where I’m staying here on out.  Also?  She got me to 20/15 which she apparently can never accomplish in people with eye-sight as bad as mine and I can confirm has not happened in a really, really long time.  I’m so excited for those glasses to come in!  I’ll read all the things!  ALL OF THEM! *cough*

Lucas, who turns 7 today *sob* will be getting his first pair of glasses, and while we aren’t surprised he needs them, we are surprised just how bad his eyes are at his age.  When Thomas first got glasses he could take them off to play.  Not Luke.  I think this kid is about to see a whole new world!  Also; he won’t sit with his nose glued to the TV while watching anymore.

Sammy, who also sits nose to TV, has been confirmed to do so because she is 3.  The good doc did detect she isn’t exactly 20/20, but it’s a small degree of vision imperfection and usually not worth trying to convince a 3yo to take care of glasses over, unless there are other signs of trouble. (There aren’t.)  So while Sammy will indeed be wearing glasses in the future, she isn’t there yet.  Which is good.  It’s inevitable with the poor girl’s genetics, but I really am not up to that battle.

Lady Parts:

I’ll spare you details.  However, let me say that while I am two years out of sync on what should be a yearly appointment due to first no insurance, and then a chaotic uprising, I’m back on track here and scheduled for my yearly.  Also: When was your last well check here?  Guys, I know most/all of us are falling apart in so many ways, but this appointment is so important and can not be skipped.  These doctors look for some scary stuff.  Especially scary if left untreated.  So please, if you are behind, pick up the phone and schedule now.  No insurance?  Planned Parenthood takes care of so much of this as well, for I believe decent prices.  It varies by location; ask.

HEAD:

I’m doing mostly ok in the mental health department, but this is with the help of a dozen pills a day.  Since getting back in, I have been seeing my meds doctor regularly. Then, despite a few month blip where I had to cancel due to a funeral, and then not making it back in for a bit, I am back to seeing my therapist every couple of weeks.  I actually had a meds appointment today, which is why I owed you this blog post and didn’t write it on the spot, and we had a discussion on the current main symptom, which I’ll get to in a second.  First we’ll discuss the pill regiment up until today’s addition.

First, I’m on Cymbalta 60mg every morning.  It’s my go-to anti-depressant and I actually look forward to taking it when I start to fall apart.  Oh, it kills my sex drive and makes me fat, but it is also the best I’ve found at making me feel stable, without the robotic after taste.

I take 300mg of Trileptal every AM and 600 in the PM.  It is the mood stabilizer that has always been good to me.  Again, no robotic after taste.  As an added bonus, it doesn’t want to kill me like Lamictal does. (Can you imagine death by rash?)

New for me is my twice a day 1mg of Ativan.  This is a fairly low dose (higher than the 1mg part implies) that doesn’t take away all my stress and anxiety, but it takes away the physical tics it brings.  A higher dose that kills the anxiety does things to me (man).  But as my anxiety tends to make my skin crawl and other just not fun things, I’m on a high enough of a dose to prevent that crap.  As an added bonus: for the first time in about 7 years, not only do I have hair but it’s past my shoulders now!

So today I went in with the intent on talking about my rage.  Sure enough, when the other symptoms are under control, I become a raging beast.  I’m not psychical or violent, but I’m loud and can use hurtful words.  I think we all know first hand that words can hurt just as much, if not more, than violence and actions.  So after brief discussion, per my request I start back on Geodon tomorrow.  Oh, antipsychotics aren’t a joy to be on, but I’ve been on/off them enough to know the pros and cons of either side of that decision and I’m looking forward to feeling more like Dr Jekyll, and less like Mr Hyde again.  (More Banner, less HULK?)  Even if it does mean I’m going to eat every carb in sight and pack on another 20 pounds.

KNEES?:

Speaking of packing on another 20 pounds, I’m currently the heaviest I’ve ever been and I don’t like it!  It’s like over the past 3 months I have just packed it on!  Well, with the Holidays behind me, I’m fixing that, dammit.  I wouldn’t say I’ve given up pop, but I’ve cut way down and am working on drinking a lot more water.  I’m eating less pasta and more rice.  I’m doing my best to be more physically active, but I’m writing this a week after buying my first cane (knees!), so there is that.  Nevertheless I don’t need the cane everyday, so on my good days I’m going to go out and walk/run the neighborhood like I swore to when we first moved in (and then life fell to shit around me).  I won’t ever be society’s idea of skinny, but that’s ok.  I just want to be happy with my body within my own ideals of attractive, and I’m not.  I also want to fit all my clothes again, and I don’t.

MOUTH:

Ugh.  I can’t even… It took us something like 8 years to find a dentist that both took our insurance and was someone we were willing to go back to.  I tell you, there are a lot of bad dentists in the world.  It’s even worse than regular General Practitioners.  We finally fund one just to have him close down his business in the past year (had to go back home due his mom’s failing health).  I don’t even care that he was in the opposite side of town.  I would have made the drive.  Now I’m back to square one and we are all well over-due for a visit.  I seriously… Why is this so hard?  I mean, I can tell horror stories.  I really liked the dentist that we finally found too.

NOSE:

Speaking of general practitioners… I need one of these even more than I need a dentist but I’m seriously dragging heels about this.  Frankly, most just don’t know how to help me or are scared of me.  How my Borderline Personality Disorder scares a way a doctor that won’t even be treating it as I have a great mental health team, is beyond me.  I literally could scream.  Dear Doctor, if you want to be frightened away by a condition, at least let it be the fact you aren’t competent in treating fibromyalgia.  Oh, about that.  Mind you, I’ve only had one doctor ever even realize I suffer from fibro, so that is annoying in itself.  But now that it’s finally on record, I’m opening with that.  However, the reason I’m not going back to that doctor, besides the fact he’s terrified of my mental health that he isn’t treating, is that he was constantly wanting to treat the fibro with meds I was already on for the mental health or meds I had been on for it.  First off, and yes this does give you some leeway to be scared of the BPD monster, you can’t just throw a mental health pill at a mental health patient, without considering the repercussions.  Also, if I was on a pill for years for my mental health and it never ever helped my fibro, why would it suddenly magically make my fibro better now?  Ok, I’ll humor you.  Oh look, I’m suddenly suicidal because misuse of antidepressants can do that, ironically.  Alright, fine.  Maybe his fear of my mental health WAS valid.  But only because he was a moron.  And he isn’t even the doctor that I walked out on, or the one who put me on blood pressure meds to treat the wrong kind of headache, and then claimed he was 150% sure that the meds weren’t what caused me to gain 20 pounds suddenly over a 2 month span despite me doing everything else right. (True fact: In a study of whether or not blood pressure meds cause weight gain, what he put me on was called out by name to cause rapid and massive weight gain.  Yet he was 150% positive that those meds don’t cause weight gain and in fact tried to pin it on the fact I just had a baby.  This was about 6 months AFTER giving birth.)  So needless to say I’m a little skeptical about the medical profession and not looking forward to having to find yet another new doctor.  However, the husband is insisting and it would be nice to have someone to see should I have a general illness, and should he actually know how to treat my fibro, and not be scared by the BPD monster… well, I’m not holding my breath.

Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes

Bleh

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