Part 2

The Continuance

I left his office feeling like this nightmare was never going to end. I went home and instantly got on the internet. I searched and read anything I could find on small fiber nerves, shoulder and neck nerves, etc. I tried the stretching exercises, along with another round of ice packs and heating pads that were suggested for relief. I stumbled across a few articles that mentioned doctors prescribing antidepressants for neuropathy pain. Once I see the word “antidepressant” in anything, I immediately stop reading. I have had a few past experiences with people and antidepressants, and in my opinion, they seemed to do more harm than good, and I wasn’t willing to even consider taking them. Many of the articles said that neuropathy patients were having very good results by taking low doses of these tricyclic antidepressants. All of my research said that they were developed in the 1950’s, but aren’t prescribed as much anymore because of their large list of side-effects. In low doses, they are used to treat migraines, insomnia, neuropathy and many other issues, and in higher doses, are still used to treat depression, anxiety, stage-fright, etc.

I read all I could find but still was unwilling to consider it.

So, I kept on keeping on. I continued with the CBD oil, took both turmeric pills, and put turmeric powder in my food, and I kept up my Excedrin habit. I now had a bottle by my bedside, two bottles in the kitchen, one in my car, one in hubby’s van.

Each day I tried to live the best I could, and each night I cried myself to sleep from the pain.

During this time, I finished my second round of 13 visits to physical therapy. With PT having not led to any real positive results, my doctor scheduled me for a nerve block in my lumbar region. X Rays showed I had 4 vertebrae out of alignment, but was told would only “cause some pain, but not the pain you say you are experiencing”.

Ugh, nothing makes you trust in medicine more than when they make you think your crazy and making shit up. They gave me the blocks.

No relief.

It’s interesting because my PT told me the same thing when she saw my X-rays. She gave me homework of watching videos on the internet so that I could understand how chronic pain works, and how nerves sent and received signals and how our bodies “perceive” pain. After I watched them, I kind of felt insulted. I felt as if they weren’t taking me seriously and that they thought that I wasn’t experiencing the pain that I said I was. They thought I was just “perceiving” pain?

I wasn’t PERCEIVING anything, I was FEELING it.

A few weeks later I am back in my doctors office. Before I could open my mouth to answer his question about how I was, I lost it. I started to sob. I sobbed hard. A really ugly type of mucus(y) and loud sobs. By the look on his face, I caught him off guard. He had never seen me like this before and he was surprised. I was always laughing and making jokes. Now, here I was completely opening up to him and spilling out all the crap inside of me at the same time. When I finally could stop crying I told him that I couldn’t take the pain for one more day. I told him that I had done some research and asked about the antidepressants. Now, this did very much surprise him because he knows how strongly I feel about the current state of over prescribing doctors.

(I’ll answer that in another rant for another day…Stay Tuned for that….)

He asked me was I sure. Am I serious. I said that I was and that I was willing to give them a shot. I was desperate. He left the room and came back about 5 minutes later and told me that he sent me in a script to my pharmacy. He then gave me directions on how to take the new meds and to call him in a few weeks and let me know what was going on. This was this past December that I started the Amitriptyline at 10mg. doses.

The evening I took the first dose was a doozy. After suffering from lack of sleep and insomnia for the past up-teen years, I fell asleep within 30 minutes of taking that little red pill. My hubby was flabbergasted that I fell asleep. He said he was happy to see me sleeping, but it didn’t help any to combat my terrible snoring, though. I found that I didn’t wake up every time I changed position, which was abnormal for me. I had a hard time waking up the next day, and spent a few hours very groggy. I was off of work that day, so I stumbled around the house. I did not notice any difference in the pain in my arm and shoulder that day. The second evening I took the meds, I fell asleep quickly and slept peacefully through the night, without waking. That second morning I could barely get the energy to move. I was so groggy, and I couldn’t stop yawning once I got up. I was so tired that I went back and slept another 2 hours. When I finally got up for good, I got all the way downstairs before I realized my arm didn’t hurt. You would have thought that I would have noticed something like that right away, but I was so “hung over” that I didn’t. I stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom and looked at my arm like it was someone else’s. I touched it where I knew it hurt the worst. Nothing. I ran my hand along the inside of my bicep to my shoulder and onto my neck where the pain was so bad that sometimes I thought I was being impaled with a hot poker. Nothing. I brushed my teeth, I combed my hair, and I applied deodorant. All of the things that caused me pain yesterday had absolutely no effect on me today.

I was stunned. I remember starting to cry…

Love,

Gwynny

Ok, so I’m watching TV today with my nephew, Redbull…Well, that’s not entirely true. Yes, Redbull was there in the living room with me, my mother and my brother, who is his daddy. My nose was stuck in my cell phone playing my bubble popping game. Redbull was simultaneously controlling a RC car, playing with a spiral doodle set and watching tv as normal for 9 year olds today. His grandma and his father were just there…The movie Speed was on with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. I had already seen it about a handful of times, so I was mostly just listening to it. They got the to the part where Keanu is going to disarm the bomb that’s underneath the bus. He’s talking by walkie-talkie to someone about which wire to cut. Redbull starts yelling,

“Cut the black one! Cut the black one!”

What? How does he know the black one needs to be cut? Has he seen this movie before? No, it turns out, he had never seen this movie before. Well, then how do you know it’s the black one that needs to be cut to save the day?

“Well, Duh, Aunty Pia, everybody knows you always cut the black one. Don’t you watch tv?”

Ha! I sit there, perplexed, for lack of a better word to use to describe the absolute stupidity of what I have just been told by my yet to be 9 year old bomb – de-detonating expert nephew. Wow, was I THAT stupid that I didn’t know that it was always that damn black wired bombs. As I sat there, speechless, continuing to hear him prattle on about cutting the black wire, I searched back in time through my memory. Searching for some evidence that what he was saying may have a bit of truth to it. The only thing that I could come up with for sure was the fact that all through my degree program for electronics engineering, we always used a black wire to signify “ground”, and a red wire to signify the “live” wire. But, with that said, I don’t EVER think I came across any type of written or unwritten rule, for that matter, that said, it must be as such. Did bomb building require a certain set of centralized standards that every bomb builder had to adhere to? Was there such thing as honor amongst bomb builders, but not thieves? Had I been misled all of these years? If there were such a rule book, then all bombs could be deactivated, and nothing would ever blow up. What happened if you got to the end of assembling your bomb and you find out at the very last minute that you are completely out of black wire? Chuck the whole damn thing in the garbage and not blow something up? Well, not me, I am not a quitter. I am also a leader, and not a follower. I would assemble my bomb my way. I would use a purple wire instead of black. I would use pink instead of green. My bomb would look like a Unicorn exploded. A beautiful rainbow of un-followed rules.

So, go ahead, dumb asses…

Cut the black one!

Love,

Gwynny

Part 1

The Beginning

So, I’ve been complaining about the pain in my right arm and shoulder since what feels like forever. In reality, I can honestly say, the pain first began in early 2013. That is when I found that it was becoming more and more difficult for me to drive. Since my last 3 cars have all been manual shifts, each and every drive only added to my discomfort. I can remember 4 office visits for the same issue.

Once they told me I had tennis elbow.

Twice was pulled muscles.

The fourth was a sprain.

I did all the recommended cures. I iced it for 20 minutes, 3 times a day, I applied heat other times. I even did 5 weeks of physical therapy, and wore an air brace for about 9 months. Nothing helped to lessen the pain.

I found that sometimes if I held my arm up straight up in the air, it alleviated some of the pain for a little bit, but it never went away for very long.

At night, I had to sleep on my stomach, put a pillow under my shoulder and hang me arm over the side of the bed.

I took ibuprofens by the handful until I convinced myself my stomach was going to explode from taking too many. No pain relief. Then I switched to naproxen, and took those the same way, 4 at a time, at least twice a day. No pain relief. I had heard about CBD oil, so I parted with $75 and bought a bottle. I calculated what I thought was a good dosage to start with. I chose a conservative one and figured if that provided no relief, I would up the dosage incrementally until I found satisfactory relief. I put it in my unsweet iced tea every morning. By the time I left the house, I smelled like a pothead. I kept up with this experimentation for a few months. At the end I was broke, and still had 100% of the pain.

Now, mind you, if this was my only issue with discomfort, I could have tried to find a way to live through it, but I have terrible lower back issues that I was in therapy for. Both my hips are rife with arthritis and occasionally I have weakness in one, and I miss steps and even fall. If that isn’t enough, I have hypothyroidism that has wreaked havok on all my joints, with my left knee being the worst, which now recently decided to try out being Bursitis(t). All of this leaves me walking like an 89 year old in a 48 year olds body. I’ve struggled with my weight my whole life, so being heavy doesn’t help me out any. I look like a weeble that wobbles and hobbles from side to side. I should hang freaking bells on my ass and at least rest easy that I’m worth at least an entertaining laugh. Pushing through the hypo and PCOS, I was able to lose over 85 lbs. I was hoping that the weight loss would help with the pain. NOPE! No relief.

It got to the point that I couldn’t do much of anything anymore. I hurt so bad. I was up all night long, crying and aching. I couldn’t roll over. I couldn’t sit up. Walking hurt. Sitting hurt. I was driving my hubby nuts. I started taking the Vicodins that my doc gave me for another issue, and one didn’t work. SO I took 2. Nope. 3? Nope. Ugh! The only thing they did was make me sick. Tylenol…Ah ha, the old standby. I was scared the naproxen was going to kill me, so I switched to Acetaminophen and started my Excedrin 4 at a time, twice a day, which I am still on. RELIGIOUSLY! They provide me with no relief, but I take them hoping to convince my brain to convince my body that they Do work. Crazy, right? Well, that’s all I got left.

Ok, another trip to doc. I told him that I did some research and I think my problem is a pinched nerve.

He ordered x-rays to rule out other possibilities and then ordered a test where they insert needles into your nerves and then electrify them. He said they can tell if a nerve is bad from it’s “reply” from the electricity. OK, let’s do this. Well, first it had to be approved, because it’s an expensive procedure.

I was scared to death the day I had to get it done, but it turned out to not be that bad. I have a tendency to over react to anything I may deem as painful…After poking me in the arm, what felt like 20 or 30 times, he stuck the needles in my neck. As he was wiping the tiny droplets of my blood seeping out of me through his needle holes, he told me that all of my Large Fiber Nerves were A OK…What? I was so upset. I laid there and cried. He must have thought I had lost my mind. He told me that I was alright.

I was NOT.

By the time I heard from my doc 2 days later, I told him of my newest research. I set up an appointment and went to see him 3 days later. I brought up the fact that maybe it was a Small Fiber Nerve issue, and we had just done the wrong test. He said there were more testing we could do, but with the fact that I was self pay, I wouldn’t be able to afford it. He also said that if it turns out it is a Small Fiber Nerve, that there are so many in there, that they’d never be able to pin-point it. I felt so defeated. From the beginning of this whole pain ordeal, I refused to take any type of narcotic. My experience with narcotic pain medication doesn’t stem from my having a drug problem or anything like that. My mindset is that your just covering up the pain and not solving the problem. While the meds numb the pain, your feeling 100% when in fact you could be hurting yourself even more.

I didn’t want a band-aid for my pain.

I wanted an answer.

I wanted a cure.

Love,

gwynny

Footnotes:

PCOS – Find Information Here

Hypothyroidism – Find Information Here

A few years ago, when I noticed that I had a shit-ton of stories about my upbringing and my parents and family, I thought,

“Hey, wouldn’t this be a great way to get back at my &$*^# for all the things they did to me?”

I was so gung-ho about getting this to fruition, that I was almost manic. I found through a writing society that I frequent, a class on memoir writing. I knew that I had the stories either still in me or on computer, so I was already ahead of myself, but I had a lot of reservations and anxiety about publicizing certain demons. I found that I wasn’t the only one. Everybody that first class was under the same umbrella as I was. They asked,

• “What if I publish this and my family is hurt by it?”
• “I want to tell how my father abused me, but it will make my mom look guilty, too”
• “If my grandmother ever found out about this, it would kill her!”
• “Can I use real names?”
• “Can I be sued for liable if I tell my story?”

There were about a billion questions about what to do and how to do it, but what all the questions boiled down for me, to just a few thoughts.

If your that worried about pissing somebody off, and that thought bothers you, you have 2 choices. Either get over it or do not write the story. How much do you love your grandmother and want her to live?

Tell YOUR TRUTH. Do not accuse other people of things just to inflate your cause. Do not write it just to get back at someone; revenge. This isn’t healing.

Other people’s issues ARE THEIR problems, not yours! Write how a certain topic affected you, but don’t drag someone through the mud to satisfy your own issues, or to make you feel like your better than they are. Is this MY story or am I just hanging out my mother’s dirty laundry? This is shaming.

Tell your SIDE of the story. Tell what you remember, IF you can remember CLEARLY.

Don’t make things up, because then you just became a fiction writer, not a memoirist.

Sure, you can use real names, but if the step-mother you wrote about loses her job as a defense attorney because you alluded to the fact that she’s a nudie dancer working the graveyard shift at the Swing-N- Shack on Saturday nights, YES, she may sue you.

There are plenty of memoirs out there to read. My favorites are the very dark, seedy, fucked-up disasters like Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs, or Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt. Another good one is The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls.

There a quite a few stories in each one of these about their family members that I never would have been able to publicize personally, but all these authors chose to. I can only imagine how my father would have felt had I told the world that although he was a Doctor of Psychology that when he was at home, he would fish his poops out of the toilet and take to the picnic table in the yard so that he and the kids could decifer the exact twist of the poops end to see in which direction it pointed.

I could also imagine the horror of letting it be known that my mother was so mentally fucked-up that she gave up custody of me to be raised by such a man.

So, when your telling the story of your life, think of the life your living RIGHT NOW, because YOU are going to be the blame, the cause, the root of all the evil that is going to fall upon your children that they will be posting and writing about 20-30 years from now. Think about the character your going to play in their memories. Are you gonna be the mom that didn’t teach them to eat right? The dad that drank the paychecks away? The aunt that gambled the rent? It’s up yo you…

So, what’s your story?

So I’m pulling out of the parking garage at Crocker Park in Westlake, Ohio and a mini van comes flying out of nowhere and almost takes the whole passenger side of my Jeep out. This mother fucker never even looked my way while he barrelled right through his stop sign, going well above the posted 15 mph sign. Mind you, up until this point, I had followed the proper rules of indoor parking etiquette. I had my headlights on, was obeying the posted speed limits , and was looking both ways at the stop sign before pulling out. So, here comes, what I always assume to be a man….sorry, guys. Mr. Asshole driver, but all I see is a flash of white fluff. Now yelling at this guy at the top of my lungs as both fists fly into the air and into separate gestures, I floor it and get right behind this ass wipe. As he turns left at Trader Joe’s, I catch another glimpse of something white in the driver side window. I follow him until we both are able to make a right onto Crocker Rd. It takes me no more than a split second to bring my car parallel to his. We get stopped by the light at American Greetings. I wave to him, and motion to him to lower his passenger window. As the window lowers, I see the white object that I had caught a peek at before. It’s a fucking mop dog on his lap. Without thinking, because that is how I mostly react, I decided I was going to give this guy an American Greeting of my own.

I yelled/asked him if he knew what a fucking stop sign was?

He looked shocked by my question. Well, in all honesty, maybe it wasn’t the question, but my demeanor, or my language, or hell, it was probably a mix of all three. The window started going up, but I can guarantee he heard me when I told him he could shove that fucking dog of his square up his ass! This is for sure.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am an animal lover. A big animal lover. I don’t believe I have ever existed without at least 1 pet in all of my 47 years. At one time, I had 9 cats. I’ve picked them up off the roads, found them in my yard, been offered and unable to say no. Not just cats. I love all animals, snakes, gerbils, possums, raccoons. I have a rule at home. If it comes into the yard, I will feed it, and if I can my hands on it, I will also probably try to kiss it on the lips, very much to my hubby’s dismay. (Sorry, honey, but I kiss you and you put that snuff shit in your face!)

Anyways, this is probably the TOP pet peeve (pardon the pun), that I have with drivers. For the life of me, I don’t see the need to drive around with a damn animal in your lap? Would you drive with your kid in your lap? (OK, so bad question…I remember as a kid riding on grandpas lap because I liked to steer.)

Without thinking, because that is how I mostly react, I decided I was going to give this guy an American Greeting of my own.

Why can’t the dog sit in the passenger seat? Oh, I see, because your wife is sitting there? Well, then why can’t she hold the fucking dog? Why do you feel the need to pay more attention to your dog than you do the lives of the people around you on the road? What the fuck do you think is going to happen when you stop sudden and that dog either goes flying into the windshield, or falls onto the floor and gets stuck under the accelerator or even worse, the brake, and you cause a fiery crash and kill someone? What about the back seat? Can’t the dog be put into the back seat, given 2 open windows to run back and forth like normal people driving with their dogs? Or better yet, why not just put your fat ass in the back seat and let the dog drive? Too much to ask for, hu? Poor dog. Maybe has some type of separation anxiety? Oh, I see, maybe it’s a Therapy Dog, and you can’t stand to be separated from it? Obviously, it’s you that has the problem, cuz a dog is only going to be as smart as his owner. I’m thinking whatever your reasoning, maybe you shouldn’t be driving. Obviously your wife is about as brain dead as you are, because she puts her life into your hands because you can’t stop touching your dog long enough to go shopping. Now, I know this has got to be illegal and a danger akin to cell phone usage, texting while driving, etc., so why does it continue?

I contemplated following you but decided at the last second that I didn’t trust myself enough not to cause a death, so I released my anger, turned the radio up and drove along my merry way. Today, you were lucky, sir. But, if I ever come upon you again, I can’t promise that I’ll be able to walk away again. I’ll get you, and your little dog, too…

Love,

Gwynny

Ok, so another rant…The last few weeks have been hell for me, as I’m sure all of you are dying to hear about, so I shall just park all this bullshit right here….So, for anyone who knows me, they know I usually don’t run to the doctor every time I stub my toe, like most people around me…It takes a real true reason for me to go, and no, not because I’m cheap…lol. So, as of April 30th, I lost my health insurance and have been searching for some new stuff. Well, the marketplace is a load of crap, I don’t live biblically enough for the Christian-based health sharing programs, which by the way, ONLY 1 is approved through the ACA to negate you from paying the IRS penalty, the others will get you butt raped next year. (That one that is exempt as far as I can tell is right here in Ohio, BTW)

Anywho, on top of all the stress of my regular daily life, I’ve been having a lot of Thyroid-related issues. I can always tell when it tanks, cuz it’s almost agonizing. My joints hurt even worse than normal, I get more headaches, I can’t concentrate, or sleep. My irritability level is 100 out of 50, my energy level is -150, and I’m strung so tight I could kill at any moment. 2 weeks ago, to the surprise of the WW weigh-in lady, I gained 5.6 lbs., who was sure I was going to give her an excuse of, “But, I swear, I am sticking to the plan!” The sad fact, was, that I WAS sticking to the plan. But, nobody ever gives you the benefit of the doubt, they just always assume your fat because you love to stuff food in your face…Well, to be honest, that is true, BUT, it’s only a part of the problem.

So, I made an appt. with my PCP. While I waited for the day of my appt,. I started having new symptoms of some new malady that had yet to be identified. While out shopping with mom, I got dizzy, and very light-headed. I passed the first one off, but she caught the 2^nd one about 30 minutes later. It was hard to hide because I thought I was going down, so I went to her and told her what was happening. She said that I had turned red and looked weird. (Wow, Great, now I can add looking “weird” to my list of sufferings. Or, who knows, maybe I have already always looked “weird”.) So, I found a spot and sat down for about 5 minutes, and when I was kinda sure that the sensation had passed, we finished up our shopping trip. That same night, as I was watching tv, I began to see things crawling around, and after a while I figured out it was eye floaties that I was seeing. I was also seeing quite the spectacular light show in my peripheral vision. It threw me for a bit of a loop, because I was seeing these things in both eyes. I felt a lot of pressure behind my eyes, and that’s when the “other” headaches started. I say other” because my normal is headaches, but more towards the back and sides of my head, while these were smack dab right behind my eyes. I told mom again what was going on, and she told me that she experiences the same thing once in a while and what it was called, which completely escapes my memory right now…(yet another Thyroid side affect.)

So, by the time I got to see Dr. Peter, I had a whole litany of maladies to discuss with him. He sent me for my thyroid blood work, which proved that my feeling was correct, IT TANKED! (Just for reference, this appt. would be the very last appt. I would have while being covered with insurance.) He told me that because of my recent concerns, along with the fact that my blood pressure was high this visit, my continuing and daily heart palpitations, that he didn’t want to raise my medication back up to where I was 2 months prior until I saw a Cardiologist. (Great! Wow, I can’t wait to SEE what THAT’S gonna cost!) Dr. Peter had lowered my thyroid med. levels because after taking the same dose of a different manufacturer, I actually went HYPER! (The pharmacist told me that they were unable to get my regular Levothyroxine due to all of the happenings in Puerto Rico, so I had no choice but to take a substitute. Well, I’ll NEVER do that again. Same meds, my ass!) On top of that, he gave me a prescription for blood pressure pills.

WTF???

His other recommendation was to see an Ophthamologist. (Wow, looks like Gwynny is not only going to be busy, but broke!)

So, the saga begins…

No insurance now, so here we go.

I go to see my eye doctor, and am referred to another Doctor. He said no sense paying 2 office visits, and if he saw something, he would have referred me there anyways. At this point, I was feeling like I was getting a head of the game. That maybe things would start working out some. Boy, was I fucking wrong! I get to my car, and call up the new doc and see about getting an appt. and a cost rundown. Yes, they have menus, but never want to tell you about them. The receptionist said that she would make me an appt., and then give me the number to their billing dept. and they would be able to give me prices. So, I make the appt. for tomorrow at 11 am. My next call is to the billing dept. She tells me that it is $402 for the office visit. (“Just to walk in the door”, was her exact words.) Then, if the doctor did any testing, they would be added on. She gave me the names of the tests and their corresponding costs. I rounded the prices and added them up. $1100.00. Oh my fucking WTF! I then asked her if there was a discount for cash payers, and she told me that I could ask the doctor for a discount at the time of the visit. She couldn’t offer discounts. She said the doctors TRY to work with uninsured patients, but there was no guarantes. Great! So, here I sit. What the hell do I do?

Ok, so I arrive at the Ophthamologists office the next day a bit early. It wasn’t long before I was called back. The doctor was wonderful. She explained to me everything that she was going to do, asked me questions and spent some time with me before the exam. It’s nice when they do that. Makes you fell kinda like a real person, instead of their next payment. She gave me a basic exam said that she would continue to test after dilating my eyes. I waited once again in the patient rooms until my eyes were properly dilated. When she was done, she said that the “floaties” that I was seeing had nothing to do with any changes or damage to my eyes. It was more likely that I was having migraines. I told her that I had really bad headaches, but couldn’t say for sure if they were migraines.

Now in my experience when people ask if I had ever had migraines. I responded with, “I don’t know. I have real bad headaches, but I don’t know if they are truly migraines.” The reaction to this is always the same, “Well, if your having a migraine, you’ll know it!” WELL, That’s NOT true!

Now if I could regulate them and say ok, hit me with a regular headache….ok, now give me a migraine…I’d have something to COMPARE, BUT since headaches don’t happen this way, how could I say what I was experiencing?

So, the only thing that made sense to me was that all along I’d been having migraines and never knew. I though they were just regular headaches. Christ, I’m not a psychic. Different people have different pain tolerances, so…WTF?

She told me to make a follow up with my PCP and call her to let her know what he thought.

So, with her diagnosis and feeling thankful that I wasn’t going to die of a brain tumor or go blind from detaching retinas, I approached the check out desk. The receptionist said that the total for the days services totaled $315, but if I paid that day, she could give me a 30% discount, bringing my bill down to around $220. Although I was prepared to use credit if I had to, I had almost enough to cover it in cash, with a little help from mom, who went to the appt. with me. (She was in charge of driving because of the eye dilation drops.) I paid the bill in full, and left. I was happy. Broke, but happy!

The next day, I called my doc, and he called me in a prescription for migrain/blood pressure pill all in one.

After I started the new meds, It took about two weeks for the floaties to go away completely, having diminished a little every day, until their were no more.

Ironically, this was the exact same amount of time, two weeks, it took St. John’s Hospital to bill me for that 30% discount they offered me.

I swear, sometimes I just can’t catch a break!

(I called the billing dept. and got it straightened out, and didn’t have to pay that 30%, not that I would have paid it anyways…)

Love,

Gwynny