It’s Labor Day, for most it’s a time to a honor the workers of America, and send the summer off with a bang.  For me, Labor Day this year marks my 14th wedding anniversary.  I can honestly say, I’d marry this may again in a minute!  It sure doesn’t feel like our wedding was 14 years ago, yet, it feels like we’ve known each other forever.

We had planned to go on a day trip to just get away, but things haven’t quite turned out as we’d planned; maybe we’ll make it there soon.  Instead we went to the botanical gardens here in town, it was like walking into a secret garden, I really needed to get out and commune with nature.  I’m so glad we Stuart talked me into going.

(I’m actually starting to get sleepy, but I really wanted to post this now, so I haven’t read over this, please excuse any and all errors, if something doesn’t make sense, let me know.)

sleep: After reading the comments left of my post about my lack of sleep and extreme fatigue, I have tried a few things and I think I may have discovered a couple of things that may have been contributing to it.

• One – allergies.  It was suggested that this might be the case so I checked looked up what might be causing that, and found out that ragweed is causing MODERATE pollen counts.  I’m very allergic to ragweed, so I increased my antihistamines and have been doing a saline spray.  I wish I could use a Neti Pot but it causes vertigo.
• Two – mood swings.  Someone mentioned that when she is feeling the way I have been that she knows she is a bit manic.  Well that sent up bells and whistles.  I realized just how quick to anger I have been lately.  I’ve been cutting myself off from people.  I am trying to make an effort, but it has just been so hard.  I’m simply having a hard time putting forth the effort.  I’m sorry I’ve been neglecting my people.  I’m also having uncontrollable crying spells.  Today (I’m wring this on Sunday night) I just couldn’t stop my eyes from leaking.  It annoyed the hell out of me.  So, have I been a bit hypomanic, that would cause the anger and the lack of sleep, but it doesn’t explain the tears.  Could I been depressed?  Is it possible to be experiencing both at the same time?  After being diagnosed with bipolar I over 22 years ago, you’d think I could figure this out, but I must admit my moods have not been as stable this past year as they have been for many, many years.  I’m not having full blown mania or severe depression, but I’m having a very hard time coping.  I’m also having a very hard time holding my tongue, and unfortunately I have been hiding how I’ve been feeling from almost everyone (I do share these things with Stuart, we are in this together) including someone who is causing me some severe anxiety.  I’d really like to cut this person out of my life, but it’s just not possible, at least not right now.  I’m trying hard to just let it go, and be gentle with myself.  I understand that I’m really getting upset because this person is not behaving as I expect people to, it is these expectations that I have to let go of.  But the drama is affecting other people in my life and that is causing me more anxiety.  I’m sure most of that makes no sense, but it felt good to get it out, even if it is a little cryptic.
• Gabapentin – I’ve been taking 100 mg of gabapentin 3 times a day for a while now, and it hasn’t really bothered me.  I take 200 mg at bed time and 100 mg upon waking.  If I don’t take this my arm goes to sleep and aches, my back hurts more and my aches and pains are more intense.  Since moving here I’ve needed to refill my prescription a couple of time and I noticed that the manufacturer is differnt than the one who supplied my pharmacy in NC.  I can’t help but wonder if that changed things.  so for the past couple of days I haven’t been taking my morning dose and honestly I haven’t been nearly as sleepy during the day. That’s unfortunate because my pain has increased quite a bit.
• Stress and anxiety.  We’ve talked about this before, but I have spent a number of hours awake lately when I simply could not shut my brain off.

What I discovered was not an issue.  My use of medical marijuana.  For the most part I’ve been using mostly CBD during the day. You can read recent studies on sleep and CBD on NCBI  To make sure the CBD was not causing my insomnia and/or my daytime fatigue I decided to stop taking it for a while.  After 2 weeks I saw no difference with my sleep, but did notice an increase in my headaches and anxiety.  I haven’t been using any cannabis with THC duing the daytime.  I have still been taking it right before I go to bed, it does help me sleep for about 4 hours at least.  (note I’ve been using marijuana to help me sleep for a couple of years now)

Increase in physical symptoms: I’ve been much better for a while now…my vertigo has been almost non-existent at least 9 months now.  This past week, it has been worse again.  I haven’t been having full rotational spins for the most part, but I have been seeing things move and I feel like I’m moving.  I’ve had a few spells this week that caused Stuart to come home early to help me.  I haven’t thrown up from vertigo in quite some time.  Even before I stopped having vertigo on a regular basis, I had stopped vomiting.  I normally use a little cannabis to stop the nausea and vomiting, but I was trying hard this week to not do that, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t causing me to lose sleep.  Well, it wasn’t and I will be using it to help with the vomiting the next time I have vertigo.  My migraines have also increased, and I don’t feel like the gammaCore is doing much.  That makes me sad.  To be completely honest, I’m having a very hard time staying in the present and not freaking out over the thought that I might get back like I was.  I’m already afraid to drive again.  Shoot.

House search: We still haven’t come close to finding a house that is suitable, there just aren’t very many houses that have the features we want/need.  Now we’ve found a little snafu on our credit report that we need to clear up.  It’s sad when someone has a credit score of over 800 and the ability to put down a down payment of over 20%, and we are having trouble getting pre-approved.  There’s something wrong with that picture.  We are hoping we can get it straight soon.  If not we’ll just rent for a while. I’m trying hard not to stress over it.

Eating:  I still feel like food is controlling my life.  I recently had a week where I wasn’t starving all the time and I was able to stay in my calorie range.  I’m terrified of gaining all that weight back, yet I can’t seem to stop eating, and that is simply tearing me up inside.  I did find a cool app called Mealime and it has been a great help in planning meals that are pretty easy and healthy too.  Now if I could just control the snaking, especially in the middle of the night.  How did I go from having to force myself to eat, to overeating?

Doctors: It has been a challenge finding doctors here.  Most of the doctors I found on the BCBS site who said they were accepting new patients actually weren’t.  I do like the PCP that I found, except for a couple of things, I’m hoping those things will resolve themselves after we get to know each other better.  (like she isn’t comfortable prescribing my Valium for the vertigo.  I don’t take if often, but if I’m having vertigo that is the only thing that helps calm it down.  I do not take it as an anxiety medication, nor do I over use it.  My last prescription of 90 pills lasted me almost a year!  She doesn’t seem to understand that it is the best vestibular suppressant out there.  I will have to find an ENT.  I want to see a neurotolgist here in town, but he only sees patients that have been refereed by an ENT.  So I have to find one of them first.  Argh, what a pain!  I am hoping he can treat both my Meniere’s an my migraines though, so I really hope I can get in there to at least talk to him and see if he can offer any help at all.  I do like my neurologist now, well what I learned in my first visit to see him anyway, but I do not like how hard he is to get in touch with, nor do I feel like his staff is very helpful.  Recently I had a seizure, my first in a very long time, the next day he called my neuro and left a message about it.  No one ever called back.  I had a seizure and NO ONE CALLED BACK?!?   The doctor who operated on my wrist was not as thorough as I felt he should have been.  Every time he was in the exam room with me I felt he was always on his way out the door.  I didn’t feel like he answered all my questions and I didn’t feel like I had clear enough discharge instructions.  He also didn’t even talk with Stuart after my surgery.  Talking to me right after I wake up is not a good time to expect me to retain information.  They did send me a survey to fill out and I spoke up about my feelings, I’m proud of myself for that. I was told by the resident who took my stitches out that I could have pain from the healing for a year. wow!  Didn’t expect that one.

That’s all for now….I guess that was a bit longer than a “mini update”  perhaps I should have called it a “maxi update”  🙂

*photo taken by W. Holcombe at Tucson Botanical Gardens, Tucson, AZ – all rights reserved.  Please do not copy without permission.