Earlier this morning I posted on the Chronically Sick Facebook Page about my rough night going into this morning. Let me give some back story before I explain:
In the end of August, I had an episode of fatigue, nausea, diarrhea and pain in the upper torso. After being a moron and Googling my symptoms, I was convinced that I was having a heart attack. The Huzz spent hours trying to calm me down (to no avail) before finally driving me to the ER where they did an EKG and determined I was merely having an anxiety attack and sent me home less than two hours later. I decided it was time to quit smoking and lay off the caffeine and bad foods before it WAS a heart attack. I had another mild episode at Walmart
A few weeks after that, I went to Urgent Care for a horrible sinus infection, which also triggered anxiety symptoms. They prescribed Amoxicillin, which made me so nauseous that I was not eating, and missed almost a full week of work. I decided to start seeing a new Primary Care Physician at this time, who told me to stick with the amoxicillin, and gave me Valium, Ativan and Zofran for my anxiety symptoms. He gave me orders to get blood work done at their lab, which I finally di on the 16th.
The Amoxicillin also landed me in the ER, due to the nausea being so severe. A script for Phenergan and I was sent home, and told that my sinuses looked fine and I could stop the Amoxicillin.
The following Monday, the infection came back with a vengeance, and I went to see my new PCP. I was given Keflex for the infection, which I completed with no problems. After completing that round of antibiotics, I was left with a HORRIFIC yeast infection (I am still dealing with this, and will be telling the doc about it) and nausea every morning. I have been alternating sleep medications by night. Most nights I take Benadryl, but every once in a while I will take a 2mg Valium, or 1mg Melatonin, or a Tylenol PM. I have yet to touch the Ativan, because I was reading online that it had caused a heart attack, and that is the one thing I am terrified of.
Cut to yesterday. My uncle who lives approximately 1,000 miles away from me was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer last year. We knew it was only a matter of time. Since we are all so far away, we keep updated through the magical Facebook. His daughter had posted that the doctor had told them that his body is no longer absorbing nutrition from food and anything he eats from this point on will purely be for his own pleasure. This hit me incredibly hard. I was not especially close to this uncle due to the miles between us, but it hit like a ton of bricks. I was crying for the first three hours of my work day, which left me feeling like crap on top of the assumed tendinitis that was flaring for a week.
So, by the end of the day yesterday, I was headed home with shoulder pain, headache, sore throat, and pressure under my jaw and a new symptom – heart palpitations. I have had some heart palpitations for as long as I can remember, but lately they are more noticeable. I felt like crap all through the day into my drive home, and tried taking something new that my friend’s mother swears by, Country Life Stress Shield. I felt better for an hour or two, but on our grocery shopping trip, it started to hit again. We finished shopping, went home and ate dinner.
The night progressed and my symptoms went up and down. I was on the verge of taking Benadryl again for sleep, but some little voice in my head convinced me that I was going to die if I did that. I spent the night in and out of bed, pacing the small area between my dining room hutch and the fish tank. When I finally did fall into bed, it was for a few fitful hours of sleep.
My mother helps with The Teenager and Little Miss on Thursdays and Fridays. When she came in our front door today, she took one look at me and made me sit down and talk to her. There is something about my mom that no matter how much we fight or pick at each other, she makes me feel better like nobody else. She explained to me that a lot of the heart conditions that I had always thought my family had were not as bad as it sounds. Her side of the family had NO heart conditions. She had a sister that had Rheumatic Heart, but that was from a fever when she was a baby. This same sister is married to the uncle discussed earlier and went on to prove the doctors wrong and have four beautiful children and live a very active life to this day. The heart conditions I had been under the impression that my Father and his mother had and still have were not as severe as they had made them sound. Those were the two that weighed heaviest in my mind.
I finally called my doctor’s office today (The Huzz told me to, and I hate to say it, but it did make me feel a little better) and asked if they had received the results of my test. I figured if I can get some sort of confirmation that I am not going to die today or tomorrow that I might do better with all of this. I was told that the nurse would call me back, which she did while I was writing this. My cholesterol looks fine, as do my red & white blood cell counts. I have a few things that I need to work on. My B12 was high, and there are a few other things that my doctor will discuss with me at my appointment on Monday. It felt good to hear that I shouldn’t drop dead before my next appointment.
But as most of us here know, there is always that evil little voice in the back of our head that screams “IT’S YOUR HEART!” and makes the anxiety climb again. As I type this, I can feel my jaw tightening and my stomach gurgle. Yes, it is lunch time, but still. I have to keep telling myself that I am going to beat this. We will find a solution for my little aches and pains. We will beat the nausea and I will live to be 100 years old and beat all of my grandparents’ records (They all lived well into their 70’s and 80’s, and Grandma is still kicking). I just have to talk to myself and learn how to deal.
Sorry for the long post. Here is a potato.
chronicallysickmanicmother 