Knocked Out for Forty-five Hours, and a Whole Bunch of Other Stuff

Well today seems to be going good so far. I can say that I am not tired that's for sure. I caught some 48hr bug and seriously slept 45 of those hours. 


So if you've been following my blog or my Facebook page, you will know that I've been having some medical issues lately. One of them being me trying to get put on the name brand drug for my seizures. Since I moved to Wisconsin six years ago I have been prescribed Phenytoin rather than the Dilantin I had been on. 


We  moved back to Minnesota and I tried to get to see my old Neurologist but it seems he's quite the busy guy with teaching and hospital work and the wait was gonna be a long one, and I needed my meds. so I saw one of his whatcha callem's co-worker thingies. Colleague, that's the word. I saw one of his colleagues. Hmm, not such a good pair we were not. Here's the low down on that one 


So anyhow, back to the story. I finally get to see my original Neurologist and the first thing he asks me is, "how is the depression?" Whoa Frickin Nelly! Hold the boat for a moment. So I explain that the "depression" thing is a load of crap, and something else is going on. I tell him my thoughts on what might be happening. Ya know the whole generic drug thing. I ask him what is it going to hurt if for a couple of months we switch over to the Dilantin, and see if this could be part of my health problems? He's like, "what the hell let's give it a go." Yes my doctor totally said, what the hell. I love him.


So it's been a couple of months later and I had an appointment with him today. First thing he says is, " well you don't look depressed." WTH? I'm gonna hurt that other doctor for putting that in my file. He must have wrote it in bold red colors or something. Now I do in fact suffer from depression, but it's not something that I have to battle every day. I am aware of the times when I am unable to control it and I can't get myself outta a funk, and I need happy pills to help me. Right now though? I'm Good to go. Actually there is a valid reason he keeps asking me this. Apparently Dilantin can cause depression. It also can, get this, cause seizures. Not even going there. Nope. Not at all.


Oh yeah, back to the story. So I tell him about the dizziness and vertigo stuff that's been going on and I tell him it's been going on for awhile, but in the last month has gotten super duper bad. He tells me to get my levels checked, and he wants an MRI since neither of us can remember when I last had one. Ya know, just to make sure things are still normal in the noggin, or at least as normal as I seem to get.


I felt pretty good about the appointment. Holy crap, I just got all medical lingual on myself...totally deleted it all as I'm sure you all could care less unless of course you have a seizure disorder. Here's the dealio ...Everyone says that Phenytoin and Dilantin are the same thing. They are not! 


I was on 300mg twice a day of phenytoin that barely kept me in the lower normal levels. When I switched over to Dilantin my doctor kept me at the same dosage. This is after all an experiment...sort of. The doctor called me back about 30 minutes after I got home. Ok, did you catch that? The doctor called. Not his assistant, or his nurse, it was him.  He called to inform me that my levels were through the roof. Remember I'm on the same dosage as I was of the generic version. Ten to sixteen is the normal range. When I was on Phenytoin I was at a consistent 10.2 my Dilantin labs from today showed I was a toxic 44, and that was after throwing up a dose this weekend. He told me to cut 200mg out and told me to not take my dosage tonight, and to get back in on Monday to have my levels re-checked. 


Hmm why do they keep insisting that these two drugs are the same and interchangeable? I'm sitting here barely functioning because first off, someone refuses to put me on the right drug, and then the right drug just about puts me in the hospital. Holy Hell's Bells! Why does this stuff always happen to me? On a more positive note. I stupidly made the MRI appointment for tomorrow morning, which is ok, except my nose is newly pierced and I don't want to take it out. It will hurt like the dickens! I guess it wouldn't be so bad except the other day while trying to get buggers out very carefully with a Kleenex.(yes I do have buggers, and yes I have to get them out somehow, and no it apparently wasn't carefully enough)I popped the fricken post out of my nose. Picture this...me in bathroom, me going, "oh shit", me yelling, "Princess come here!" Princess showing up asking, "what", me and her looking at each other like a couple dorks, Princess giving me a pat on the back and telling me good luck and walking away. Me grinding my teeth as I try to put the stupid thing back in. You can after all only really fit one set of hands on a nose you know. It now hurts like hell...again. 


Pre-Publish Update: I called radiology and they said titanium was ok to leave in during an MRI. Thank you good Lord Jesus, and thank you super metal sensitive body for making me buy the expensive nose post!

Shoveling Snow...Not a Good Idea

Today is supposed to be a pretty mellow day. Hopefully it stays that way, although looking out my window at the snow that is coming down...it might make things a bit more interesting later while I'm out driving. 

Yesterday wasn't such a good day for me. I was in a lot of pain. My arthritis was kicking my butt. So far today it seems to be doing ok, but then again I haven't gone out to shovel yet or actually done much of anything so far. 

It's sort of funny. I went to the Rheumatologist originally for the pain in my hips, but he seemed more focused on my hands. So I asked him why he was looking at my hands, because to me it seemed there wasn't a problem there, it was my hips that were killing me. 

He says to me, "your dad has psoriasis doesn't he?" "Um, well yes he does, but how did you know that, and further more what does that have to do with my hands?" It seems that people who have or are carriers of Psoriasis tend to get arthritis more. I so, did not know that, but I do now, and since I'm so nice I decided you all need to know that too. See, you can learn something from me. Then again if you already knew this, well I guess your just S.O.L today. Catch you some other time.

So back to the doc...I says to him I says, "you know my hands don't really hurt, It's my hips that hurt." So he reluctantly stops examining my hands, pushes on one of my hips, which sends me clinging to the ceiling in pain. Once I manage to uncling myself from the ceiling and am sitting back on the table trying to look like I didn't just fly onto the ceiling, he says, "yep you have Bursitis in your hips." Now I have heard of Bursitis before but didn't really know what is was, and isn't that something much older people get? Apparently not, because that is exactly what is wrong with my hips. Yeah me! I even Goggled it and the internet says my doctor isn't blowing smoke up my ass. We all know the internet is all knowing right?

Well the doc puts me on some medicine for the arthritis and Prednisone for the hips, get a shot of cordisone in the hips . Took the Prednisone for about four months and guess what? Holy crap! The hands that didn't hurt, stopped hurting, along with my hips to of course. It seems the arthritis came on slowly in my hands and I didn't really notice the change and I just thought the fatness of my fingers was just due to weight gain. (I have some short fat fingers people, I shall never be a piano player with these stubs.) Suddenly I could almost get my rings back on, and actually fold my hands (not that I do that very often, but if I wanted to, I could now).


It's time to go back to the doc, because my hips are hurting big time, and in the last week or so I haven't been able to even open a bag of chips. My fingers just don't want to work, and they hurt so bad and are swollen again. It makes it very hard to get things done around here. It's funny how something that I didn't even know "hurt" before, is making life so hard now. Live and learn I guess.

By the way...shoveling wasn't such a good idea. Hands and fingers are now on fire. 

You Know Your Life is Crazy When...

So I have some health problems. These wonderful problems seem to perplex the medical field, which in turns frustrates the hell out of me. Allow me to elaborate here without details, or rather many details. You do need to know some in order to follow the story here. Argh.


First things first...I have a seizure disorder. I do not have normal seizures, why go normal when you can be abnormal right? They call them atypical. Ooh! I get a special word for my lovely seizures. Atypical means the following:

a·typ·i·cal

adjective

not typical;  not conforming to the type; irregular; abnormal: atypical behavior; a flower atypical of the species.

Yep that about sums me up right there, and I'm not talking just about the seizures. I'm thinking it's not such a good thing when your doctor gives you this label. Maybe this is the reason the jackass doesn't listen to me. 

Anyyyhoo, so some of the problems I have been having could be symptoms of  a seizure when I do have them. So me being me, decided to try to narrow down the possibility's. Oh silly me, whatever was I thinking? I make an appointment with my incompetent wonderful neurologist to see if changing my medicine from generic to the brand name will help. I get the old run around and he tells me, "it's not the medicine, it works just fine and your levels are within range." Humph. I tell him, "my original doctor specifically put it in my records that I was NOT to get generic, since the one time the pharmacy decided to replace them with generic I started having seizures". He says, "there are more breakthrough seizures with the brand name than the generic. Have a nice day see you in a year". Yeah, fuck you.

Well things do not improve and in fact are getting much worse. So I made another appointment with him to address the same thing.  Same spiel except this time he actually listens to me describe the symptoms.  His answer..."your depressed go see a psychologist." I...hate...this...man. Now I could really tell you what I feel and think about him, but I'm sure I would offend, oh, I don't know, like half the world. Guess I'm not going there. 

I go home utterly flattened, and decide to look up physical symptoms of depression. Strange, they kinda sound like what I have only there's one simple thing missing......I AM NOT DEPRESSED! What I am is PISSED OFF! To appease the neurology doctor who thinks he's God I make an appointment with a psychologist, but only so I can go back to him and throw it in his pompous face. Weehaa I'm starting to feel better now.  

So I go to my appointment with the shrink, and I tell her why I'm there. I then proceed to tell her a bit about myself, cuz that's what your supposed to do right? I tell her the meds I'm on, one of which is Bupropion. For those of you who don't know what this medicine is, it is well... an anti-depressant. Here's the catch, I'm not on it for depression. It also is supposed to help a person quit smoking. Guess what? It's not working, cuz I'm still smoking like a chimney stack, however I am not depressed...haha we covered that somewhere up there now didn't we. Fricken neurologist take that. If you actually looked at my record, and I know you didn't, you would see that I'm already on an anti-depressant. 

Well we talk for my hour, and at the end she says, "your not depressed, your overwhelmed and need a vacation, and obviously have some medical issues that need to be address, and you really should try to get into see your original neurologist since this one seems to be an ass. Ok she didn't really call him an ass, but you get the drift". THANK YOU!! She is now my best friend. Ok well maybe not my best friend since seeing her is $200 a pop, but since my insurance covers it...she is my new best friend once a week. Hmm, now that I put that on "paper" so to speak, that's kinda saddening. I think I have crossed over to depressed...Na. 

So why keep going to her when I'm not depressed? Well why the hell not? I felt much better after unloading on her, she gives me some things to think on. Like I need any more things to think on. And one can never have too many different perspectives when looking at a problem. Then again in my case if there are too many I just might get confused.  I'm talking perspectives here, then again problems would also qualify for causing confusion.


Now I'm getting to the part that resulted in the title of this blog. You see, I don't feel that I'm a particularly funny person. I have a strange sense of humor. Kinda on the sarcastic side with an odd little twist. I never get jokes. Yeah it sucks to be the last one laughing, but it is who I am. I see myself as a rather somber type of person. So when the following thing happens, it tickles me to the bone.

I have seen her a grand ole total of three times, and apparently my life, yes the CRAZY LIFE that this blog is based on, is hilarious. Either that or I'm two sheets shy of the looney bin and she's keeping it a secret from me. The reason I say this is that on all three occasions of  seeing her, I cracked her up. I wasn't even trying people! I give her credit though she really tries to hold it in. I mean come on how unprofessional is it to laugh at your clients life?  Tonight it resulted in her snorking. What is snorking you ask? Well it's similar to snorting, but it's snorking. Plus the sound that came from her didn't really qualify as a snort. I couldn't use snort since I am an Atypical sort of person. So I have come up with my own term cuz if your going to be different you might as well go with a bang. Ha ha snork, damn I even crack myself up. Good thing I see a psychologist now isn't it?