echodrift

Trust Doctors

Recent comments have reminded me that hey! I haven’t written in a while. That’s largely due to the fact that no, I did not get an earlier appointment with the neurologist and yes, my headaches continued. Have continued. So, this is an entry about doctors. I think that in the next few weeks I am going to have way more than my fill of them. In the past 5 weeks I’ve seen 4 different ones. And since I have been taking very few photos this is pretty much another wall of text. I think this type of post is becoming my trademark.

First up: neurologist. My appointment was on the 22nd. He actually took more time to listen to me than I thought he might; most doctors seem to be in and out in under 10 minutes. After telling him a lot about my headache history and the four weeks immediately leading up to this appointment he advised me to not take any more over the counter medication such as Tylenol or Motrin or Aspirin. Even though I had told him that I was using those very rarely he wants me to not develop rebound headaches from taking too much medication. He gave me some different forms of triptans to take; triptans are a large group of abortive, meaning stopping the pain, migraine medications that are largely the same.

Since those only help with stopping the pain and not the actual onset of headache he gave me a prescription for amitriptyline to take daily. I have been on that for a week now and I don’t think it’s helping much. It definitely has yet to live up to his promise that it would make me “sleep like a baby” because I told him of the problems I’ve had with sleeping for the previous four weeks. If you think about that statement, babies and sleep are usually found in conjunction with the word NOT. So in that sense it has “helped” me. All of that to say that I have continued to wake multiple times in the night, every night, which I think is at least partly due to a headache. Some nights I actually do remember coming from a dream state, realizing that I am in the process of waking up, and HOLY COW my head is pounding and hurting. I have an MRI and MRA scheduled for October 7th and also need to have some blood work done before I see him again on October 19th. Basically, for now he is treating me for migraines but I think the jury is still out on whether or not I actually have migraines. I think it’s more likely to be a different headache disorder but that’s only from my Google-fu knowledge. I’m not a trained professional, right? With that, the next appointment.

Tuesday I had an appointment with an ophthalmologist. For one thing, nearly everything they did seemed to have an extra added cost to it. Specialist copay? Why that will be $30 instead of the regular $20 copay. Refraction test? Insurance might charge me $20 for it. Contact fitting (even though I have worn contacts for year and could put them in with my eyes closed if the process didn’t require my eyes to be open)? Another $40.

So all of that was rather annoying.

But then. Then came the part where this specialist tells me that the contact and glasses prescription that I have had for over 4 years is twice as strong as it needs to be. Let me state this again: for years I have needed contacts that were -6 or stronger. I think my last prescription was, let me try to read it, -6.5 for my right eye and -8 for my left. (Wait… that doesn’t sound right at all. I had SO much trouble getting the last person I saw to give me a prescription for something I could actually SEE with. I didn’t realize I ended up with the left eye being that much worse. Weird.) For those blessed with excellent vision, the more negative number the more nearsighted you are. Me? I honestly cannot see the large “E” on the eye charts without some sort of aid. It seriously looks like it could be an F or maybe some weird rectangle. I’ve also had issues with astigmatism that required me to wear special lenses to correct it. But then this guy tells me that I need a -5 for my right and -5.5 my left. At most; he thinks that my vision might be better than even that. And I have no need for astigmatism correction.

I have absolutely no idea what to think. I told him that for years the other people who examined my vision (mere optometrists instead of ophthalmologists) had determined that I needed that strong of a prescription. I asked him how it was possible for them to give me something that was so wrong. His answer? I believe he said that I was over correcting. Now that I think about it that really isn’t an explanation at all. Clearly, one or more trained medical professionals is at fault. Either this specialist is completely off his rocker or the multiple people I saw before him had it all wrong. Really wrong. I am not an optometrist or an ophthalmologist. I’m just the person in the chair who has to tell them if 1 or 2 looks better. This or this. Or when they all look the bloody same.

But this “error” can’t be the sole source of my headaches. If it is indeed any problem at all. This guy could be wrong. While the ophthalmologist determined that there is no swelling on my optic nerves, he also didn’t mention any other problems and said that I needed to keep my appointment for my MRI. But then can I trust what he says? It seems like so much that we are told to trust doctors, trust specialists. They’ve been trained. They’ve had years of schooling. They’re the “experts.” And yes, I realize that they are all still human. But for several of them (or maybe this new one) to make what I consider to be such a grievous error? I mean, what if this has a permanent affect on my vision? What if some of this is the cause of the headaches I’ve been plagued with? It makes me feel very unconformable. How am I supposed to know that they are doing the right thing or at the least, something that isn’t so blatantly wrong?

All in all I am not feeling like I should be very trusting of doctors. I know that may be slightly irrational but if what the ophthalmologist said is true it definitely sounds like the other professionals I saw are guilty of some form of malpractice. I am definitely not comfortable or confident after this incident.

Since I didn’t start this entry until late Tuesday and am finishing up semi late on Wednesday I can say that I made it through the day wearing the new, much weaker contacts. I don’t feel like my vision is any worse or better. It is extremely difficult for me right now to judge how harsh my headache is right now or even remotely determine what the cause is. I didn’t get a SUPER MASSIVE headache immediately after putting the contacts in or at any other time of day. Right now it kinda feels like it did when I accidentally switched the lenses for my left and right eye. I have a bunch of tests before my followup appointment and I see the ophthalmologist again in 3 weeks. So we’ll see.

One bad week becomes more

I wish I had something positive to say. Unfortunately, that last bad week has simply stretched on for two more and counting. Maybe I’m being over dramatic. I don’t know. It’s hard to say. I ended up seeing another doctor the Thursday after I posted. (I really shouldn’t let such large spans of time pass; references to days lose their meaning.) She immediately referred me to a neurologist, partly because I’d seen her before for migraines. Here’s the thing: the earliest appointment they could get me was for September 22, which was then nearly two and a half weeks away.

At the time I wasn’t worried. Surely nothing would last much longer than it already had, right? I mean, a week is a crazy long time to have a headache.

Wrong. I’ve not really felt well since. There were a couple of days that seemed OK-ish but my head never feels right anymore. On Saturday (after a rather blinding episode) I began to realize something. The last bad headache before that was the previous Wednesday. Before that? Sunday. I felt like I was grasping but that seemed like a pattern… 9/11, 9/8, 9/5… what had happened 9/2? Since I started writing all of this stuff down I went to look. Result: bad headache. The days in between? Tolerable. What then, happened on 8/31? Bad headache, with two tolerable days between. The pattern kind of breaks a little since 8/27 wasn’t the start of a bad headache but it had started later in the day on 8/26 than these others. So maybe this pattern holds for the whole period.

Am I sounding crazy yet? I don’t even know. But thinking that tomorrow could be one of those days makes me want to go crawl under a rock and stay there until Wednesday. Also, I haven’t been able to get my appointment moved up. I have to keep calling the office to check to see if they’ve had any cancellations and try to get to it before someone else does. Encouraging, yes?

I think it’s going to be another long week and a half.

I am really tired of being such a fount of negativity. It’s hard, though, because I just feel so drained. I haven’t been sleeping well and most days I just can’t move around much. But um, good things. My computer is doing very well. I haven’t been able to use it very much but I am glad to have a working computer again. After a small problem with Amazon not properly packaging a 1,000 page book I got my copy of The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson on Saturday. I finished it today. This is the first book in a planned series of 10 (I am just now realizing why 10 books is important…) and I am eager to see more of them. The world he built for this seems so real and believable, unlike some fantasy I’ve read. This is more effortless in comparison.

That’s all I have. Oh, I think my twitter plugin is broken. I should fix it sometime…

Last week? It was bad

Last week was a nightmare through and through. I’m having a hard time comprehending what all happened but that might be the migraine talking. Migraine? What migraine? That will be at the end. First, everything that happened BEFORE. Note: I’ve been pretty whiny lately and I’m pretty sure a lot of people would call these “first world problems.” It’s also a wall of text and I have no pictures (that’s also in here somewhere). Also? I didn’t really proofread.

Last weekend- actually, August 22, we picked up the remains of my husband’s computer. He had shipped it to a friend back in October of 2009 through a company that uses Big Brown Trucks. The package was damaged and we hadn’t actually seen it for ourselves yet. It was a little shocking. I don’t mean a dented case or a slightly damage USB port. The thing is basically not salvageable. We have been going back and forth for over nine months now to resolve the insurance claim on it but still have heard nothing. I wrote up a long entry with details and pictures but delayed in posting it. I contacted a customer service representative and was given a magic phone number that was supposed to fix things. We’re still waiting. Depending on the outcome of a phone call that husband is going to make tomorrow I might just push the Publish button and name names. Waiting over nine months on a legitimate claim is ridiculous. I’m talking call the BBB AND email The Consumerist ridiculous. I probably should have done something like this sooner but I am too much of a forgiving person.

So that took place on Sunday and Monday. On Tuesday I sat down to work on my pictures from the weekend and also from the beginning of August. My thoughts were to use some of them for a Wordless Wednesday post. Little did I know that more than two thirds of the photos had been corrupted. I’m using a temporary set up for my hard drive because my own computer is definitely out of commission. The hard drive containing my photos, though, is so far fine and I wanted to remain consistent with my storage methods. The hard drive is jury-rigged using a SATA to USB cable. All that I can guess is that somehow when I transferred my images from my camera card straight to that hard drive the files were corrupted. I did find a free program called PhotoRec that allowed me to bring back most of them. The others I think are lost because my genius self said last Friday (the 20th; this is what happens when you don’t update for so long- last, next, etc lose their relevance) “Self, you should format your card because that article you read said that regular formatting made it easier to retrieve accidentally deleted files.” Oops. But in the days between realizing the original copies were toast and being able to resurrect (some of) them I was a total mess.

Also, that whole week, The Place I Don’t Talk About Much was causing crazy amounts of stress. I don’t go into specifics about my job but some things happened that make me question what some people I work with really think of me. I’ll give you a hint: it’s definitely not like an equal. There is so much more I wish I could say but the Internet Police might get me. So in a word: stress.

Thursday night terrible things happened. Things were fine until around 8:00 when what turned out to be one of my worst headaches EVER started. And I do mean a literal headache. Sharp stabby hot poker-like pains behind my right eye. I thought no big, that usually goes away after a half hour or so. NOT THIS TIME. It progressed in to something bad so I took an Excedrin Migraine. I used to swear by the stuff; just a half a dose usually gets rid of whatever I have. It didn’t. So about a half hour later I took the second half of the dose. Instead of anything getting better it settled in to a mixture of a steady/sharp headache that after 2 hours was no better. Thinking that I could sleep it off I went to bed. WRONG. I woke up a few short hours later. I think it was from the headache itself. After sleeping just a little while longer I continued to wake up and eventually emailed in to work to say I couldn’t come it.

All day Friday I waited for it to go away. And waited. Once again I tried sleeping and got the same result: a nice, painful headache that woke me up. Since my go-to medicine had failed and you’re only supposed to take 2 every TWENTY-FOUR HOURS (read: eternity when you have a headache like that), I didn’t take anything else. Come Friday night I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep lying down so I tried to sleep in our papasan. That didn’t work. At 4AM I was literally counting down the hours until the weekend clinic would be open. That wouldn’t be until 10AM so I eventually gave in and slept on the couch.

I dragged the husband out of bed at 9:30 (ON A SATURDAY) and asked him to drive me which he did without fuss. The doctor there told me pretty much what I expected to hear. Need to visit my family doctor… oops, I really don’t have one of those yet. Should probably get a referral to a neurologist to schedule a CT scan “just in case” this is something abnormal. Was not pleased at all to hear that I had been on Accutane this year. (Oh hmm. I never mentioned that here, did I. Maybe another day.) Said I should also visit an ophthalmologist because it’s been way past time I do that anyway. My last pair of contacts? They’ve already gone past the time I should still be wearing them but I don’t know that I can get an appointment before SEPTEMBER 28th.

In the end I walked out with a prescription for Fioricet, which the pharmacy took over an hour to fill. Thought that was a bit crazy. Anyway, got the medication, took it, and waited. Nothing much happened. Four hours later took another. Still nothing. Yet another 4 hours later I took another and decided it was time to sleep. AND I GOT TO SLEEP. I can’t tell you what really getting to sleep for several hours straight and not waking up with a raging headache was like. Some of you might know but it felt AWESOME. I continued to feel good for most of Sunday. I did end up taking more medicine once but that was it. Decided I could go to work on Monday (meaning this morning) so I did. Most of the day I felt pretty fuzzy headed and was told at least once that I didn’t look so good. –Doesn’t that always make a person feel GREAT? For other people to go “You look terrible” or “Your eyes make you look exhausted”? I always just have to kind of smile and nod and try to go on.– I ended up leaving a bit early because I felt extremely tired and thought a nap would help. I also have a meeting in the morning that I need to go to and I didn’t want to make myself sick by staying.

So I came home and tried to rest. And woke up with my head hurting again. It’s like I can’t shake this at all. From all of my 4AM Googling and research I keep wondering what if something is truly wrong. What if there is no cure? What if I’m stuck with chronic headaches for life? WHAT IF I NEVER GET TO SLEEP AGAIN?? I know it’s crazy but I’ve talked about my irrational fears that I continue to have even when I know they’re irrational. I’ll find some way to deal. I’ve made one of the appointments I need: ophthalmologist (I have said that so much in the past few days that I don’t need spell checker for it anymore). I didn’t get an appointment until September 28 (as mentioned) so we’ll see.

I have started keeping a headache journal to see if there is anything I can identify that triggers these things. There hasn’t been a single thing that I can remember but I don’t think my memory is sharp enough to keep up with every headache I’ve had.

Oh, and Sunday? (I had written “Monday” but realized that today is Monday, so yesterday was Sunday. GAH.) My host had the motherboard go out on the server I’m on. Had I sat down to write when I intended I would have found out then but I didn’t until later.

I almost forgot this part: on Thursday night I had tried to order my computer. I found what I thought was a decent priced pre-built computer that should suit my needs. It should definitely be faster than what I had. But the company’s website wouldn’t let my order through. Friday the husband tried to order it for me but the free shipping coupon wouldn’t work (my order was totally eligible) AND the site still wouldn’t let my order through. He started a chat support session with the company. I don’t know what all they said but they were like “If it’s eligible the shipping coupon should work. You have to create a profile to order the computer. That computer isn’t eligible for the 25% discount coupon. The site still won’t let your order through? Just give me your credit card number in this chat and I’ll order it for you.” That last bit is where I put my foot down. Putting a card number in a secure cart system is one thing; giving it to an agent in a chat session? Totally out of my comfort zone. They ended up calling us and getting the computer ordered on their side. I still feel like they should have given us something extra for the trouble but OH WELL. My computer should be here September 8 or earlier. I will finally have something to really work on photos with.

So that is all of last week’s tweets in the expanded form. I think. I have a few other projects that I’ve been trying to work on and here I go being cryptic but I may also have some hopefully good news to share. I’M NOT PREGNANT; my family always seems to jump to PREGNANT when they hear things like “good news.” If by some chance I actually am (I SHOULDN’T BE) I would probably pass out and you wouldn’t hear from me a for a while because I don’t think I could handle the shock.

I’ve got to do something about writing these massive walls of text.