Category Archives: Health

Doing My Best To Stay Calm (or At Least I’ll Have A Longer Break Between Appointments This Time)

Posted on April 20, 2023 | Comments Off on Doing My Best To Stay Calm (or At Least I’ll Have A Longer Break Between Appointments This Time)

I honestly can’t remember a time when I wasn’t dealing with a lot of anxiety around going to the dentist. I’m sure as a kid I wasn’t as bad as I am now, but I don’t think I’ve ever really been ok going in. I know I do what I should do for my teeth, but genetics really haven’t been on my side and I’ve had so many issues with my teeth. And combining that with a few really bad dentist appointments that really went wrong, I think my anxiety is never going to fully go away. I’ll admit that it has gotten better over time, but I’m always so stressed as I’m going into an appointment.

My last appointment didn’t go as well as they normally do. It wasn’t horrible, but things just took longer and things weren’t as easy as I’ve gotten used to. There are a couple of reasons why this might have happened, but after that appointment, I really told myself I needed to be better about making sure I do everything I could for my teeth. I mainly use a water flosser because I do better with that than normal floss, but I knew I needed to try to use regular floss more often. And I’m not always good about brushing my teeth after eating lunch, but I made an effort to try to do that when I could. Sometimes when I don’t really eat lunch, but instead I eat a snack over a long period of time, that’s not as simple to do. But even a little extra effort can always make a difference.

I felt somewhat hopeful when going into my appointment earlier this week, but I was still shaking as I was walking into the building and waiting in the waiting room. And I wasn’t calming down when I got brought back for my appointment. I feel bad because I know I look mean and a bit rude at the beginning of my appointments, but it’s just me trying to stay calm. I know if I talk too much or think too much about it, my panic attacks will hit me. So I just try to stay quiet and get things started so I can get them over with.

Fortunately, I was right and this appointment went a lot better than the last one. It was easy for me to get through and I had to really focus on trying to not shake too much, but at least I didn’t get any bad news and things went quickly because there wasn’t a lot that had to be done. And because of the timing of when my appointments have been, I was almost due to get new x-rays. But I asked if that could wait until my next appointment because I knew I wanted to be a bit more mentally prepared for that since that can also bring up bad news like fillings that need to be done. Since I’m not experiencing any pain or weird symptoms, my dentist allowed me to wait until just after I’m due for x-rays to get the next set. I know that my next appointment will be a bit more panic-inducing because I know those will be coming up, but I’ll just have to deal with that when it happens.

And I’m a little extra nervous on top of that for my next appointment because I’m actually not going back for 6 months. For a long time, I went to the dentist every 3 or 4 months because of the issues I had. But things have been a lot better over the last few appointments, even with the worse appointment last time, and my dentist said we can switch to me coming in every 6 months. I’m a little hesitant about that since I know that waiting longer could mean that things won’t be as good, but hopefully all the effort I put in at home will continue to pay off and it won’t be as bad as I fear. And if that appointment doesn’t go that well, I can always go back to every 4 months to keep things easier on me.

So I’m excited that I don’t have to deal with being this scared again for 6 months, but I know it won’t be the easiest appointment since there will be x-rays and it’s going to be a bit of an unknown. But hopefully, this last appointment going well is a good omen and things won’t be as bad as I think they might be.

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Default ThumbnailSurprises At The Dentist (or Guess I Have A Few More Appointments) Default ThumbnailMore Prepared Than Necessary (or Splitting Up Dentist Appointments) Default ThumbnailStill Panicking More At The Dentist (or Working On Staying Calm When I Can) Default ThumbnailStaying Calm With Changes (or Testing My Fear Of The Dentist) Default ThumbnailMaking Small Investments In My Health (or Trying To Not Be Anxious Or Paranoid) Default ThumbnailAnother Panicky Dentist Appointment (or I Don’t Like Unexpected Moments)

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One Busy Week And One Unscheduled Week (or I Guess This Is Balance)

Posted on April 7, 2023 | Comments Off on One Busy Week And One Unscheduled Week (or I Guess This Is Balance)

Last week for me was a bit of a busy week. I had some really fun things that I got to do and I was around a lot of people. It felt like a week I would have had before the pandemic. And I was surprised that I wasn’t feeling burnout after being so social since that’s something I’ve experienced before. I was just living my life and loving having things to do and being around others. But I guess my new way of balancing is having one week on and one week off because this week has been the exact opposite.

I knew this week might be a tough one for me because I was expecting to have my pain and nausea kick in. And it did do that right after I got home from Santa Barbara (I was so glad that I wasn’t feeling horrible while I was with my family). And this month, it has been extremely bad. I have been taking all the medications that I have available and it hasn’t been taking the edge off. I’ve been working a lot from my bed because it’s uncomfortable to sit up at my desk for too long. And I’ve been using my heat pad so much that I’ve been turning on my air conditioning even though it’s not hot out, I’m just getting overheated from having the heating pad on me for so many hours in the day.

I’m glad I didn’t have anything really scheduled for this week because I just wouldn’t have been up for doing it. And I’ve also been exhausted so I would probably be tired if I were doing something and not enjoying it the way I should. As much as I’ve been trying to get enough sleep each night, I’m not sleeping well and I can see that in the app I use to track my sleep. I’m tossing and turning all night and I feel like I’m dragging all day. It’s not that I’m going to bed too late, I’m just not sleeping when I should be.

I know that this week is not necessarily normal for me. I also know that every month I can have a week or two like this. It’s always just frustrating and annoying when they are as bad as this week has been so far. I don’t have a lot of motivation to do stuff, so I have to put my focus on doing things that I have to do like working. But anything outside of my required things each day seems like too much effort. I’m trying to not be upset with myself for acting like this because clearly, my body has needed this week to not be a social one. But when I was so happy last week with how being out in the world again made me feel, this can feel a bit depressing.

I don’t have any plans for this weekend yet, but I also don’t want to make any plans until I know how I feel. I might need this weekend to rest and relax or I might be craving being social again and will make plans at that point. It’s so hard to know what I’ll want to do when I don’t know how I’ll be feeling. And I also worry because I could be feeling ok one moment and then I start experiencing really bad nausea again. So it can be better to lay low instead of making plans and having to cancel them. And hopefully, it won’t be that much longer before I feel ok again and I can get back to trying to make some fun plans.

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Default ThumbnailMaking Busy Days Busier (or I Guess I Like To Maximize Only Certain Days) Default ThumbnailSeeing Friends In Random Places (or Unscheduled Hangouts) Default ThumbnailBusy Workout Week (or Maybe Overdoing It A Bit) Default ThumbnailIt’s Another Short Post Type Of Week (or Sorry About This) Default ThumbnailBeing Social And Out And About When In Pain (or Of Course This Would Happen When I Am A Bit Busier) Default ThumbnailNot Much To Write About This Week (or Busy But Not Doing Much)

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3 Years Of The Pandemic (or Still Figuring Out My Normal)

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Comments Off on 3 Years Of The Pandemic (or Still Figuring Out My Normal)

There are a few dates that people consider the beginning of the pandemic. I think of March 13th, 2020 as the last normal day. I know things didn’t necessarily change that day, but that was the last regular day before everything started to shut down. In some ways, that feels like a lifetime ago. In other ways, I can’t believe that 3 years have passed since those crazy first few days of the pandemic. One thing that I know for sure is that my life is significantly different from what it was like at the beginning of March 2020.

In the last 3 years, I’ve changed jobs and moved to a new home. I have a much clearer idea of what I would like to have in my life and in a relationship. I feel like I’ve become much more introverted, but that might be partially due to still being worried about getting sick. And I know that Covid is still a risk for people. I’ve had friends test positive in the past week or two and some have gotten pretty sick. Fortunately, they all have been vaccinated, so nobody was so sick they had to be hospitalized. So while I’m still worried about getting sick, I’m not as worried about being hospitalized or dying as I was 3 years ago.

I still wear a mask almost everywhere I go. I might be the only person at the grocery store who wears one, but it’s something that I do that makes me feel more comfortable. A friend asked me when I might stop doing that and I really don’t know. The few colds I’ve gotten recently have all been from times I was around other people and not wearing a mask, so wearing one just seems smart especially when it’s cold and flu season. I’m sure eventually I’ll stop wearing one, but I just don’t see that happening any time soon.

A lot of things I used to enjoy just aren’t as big of a part of my life anymore. I don’t go out to eat that often, but when I do I don’t sit inside so I’m much pickier about places to go. I also haven’t been back to Disneyland since they reopened because I don’t want to be around crowds and the cost is very different now than it was for me before with my annual pass. But I also used to do a lot of things like those with specific friends who no longer live in LA. I have tried to find friends to do certain things with and it’s helped me to revitalize past friendships that I hadn’t focused on before, but there are still some things that I haven’t been doing just because I don’t have people to do them with.

I think I’m much more hesitant to do things outside of my comfort zone these days. There are so many reasons for this, but I know that most of them stem back to the first few days and weeks of the pandemic. I have gotten very comfortable in my new routine, which is much more isolated than what my life used to be like. I don’t know if this is a good or bad thing, it just is. I do try to push myself a bit more, especially if it’s not something too crazy. But I also have less guilt about turning down plans if I just don’t feel up to them.

When the pandemic started, I remember wondering how long it would take for things to become normal again. As time went on, I wondered if we were living in the new normal and thought maybe things would never be the way they used to be again. And now, it’s still a mixed back of the old normal and new normal. And many of the new normal things that are still a part of my life are by my choice. I don’t know if this will ever change for me, but I do feel a bit more in control over the situation that is going on around me. I still make choices based on my comfort and safety and I’m not worried about making those choices. And when I’m willing to do a bit more, I do feel a little safer than I did before even though I still worry about getting sick. I still have thoughts in the back of my head about if I’m making smart choices or taking too many risks, but it’s easier to feel better about what I chose to do or what I chose to skip.

I don’t think any of us expected this to still be a part of our lives 3 years later. For many people, it stopped being a part of their life after a few months. I know I’m in the minority who still worries about things and still takes a lot of precautions. But after 3 years of this, what I’m doing now feels somewhat normal to me and helps me feel better about trying to do as many things as I can that make me happy. I guess in a year, I’ll have to see what is still normal to me and what may be more like the old normal again.

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Default Thumbnail2 Years Into The Pandemic (or Still Seeing What Is The New Normal And What Has Returned To Normal) Default ThumbnailStill Not Feeling Like We Are Post-Pandemic (or Continuing To Struggle Being Social) Default Thumbnail2 Years Of Movie Club (or Another Pandemic-Related Anniversary) Default ThumbnailSome Things Are Starting To Return To Normal (or I Still Have To Make Smart Choices For Myself) Default ThumbnailKeeping Up With One Beauty Routine (or A Mix Of Old Normal and New Normal) Default ThumbnailBeing Social Feels A Bit Cold (or Another Realization About The Pandemic)

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Being Social And Out And About When In Pain (or Of Course This Would Happen When I Am A Bit Busier)

Posted on March 10, 2023 | Comments Off on Being Social And Out And About When In Pain (or Of Course This Would Happen When I Am A Bit Busier)

I haven’t been busy in quite some time, at least as far as my social life goes. I’ve been busy with work and things like that, but I haven’t been doing a lot after work and usually just lay low most days. I am trying to work on fixing that, but it’s not as easy as just saying I want to be busier. And of course, whenever I want to start planning things, I just lose motivation when I’m done with work for the day because I’m usually pretty exhausted since I get up so early. But I’m trying and sometimes it works for me.

But even though I say I want to be busier, there are plenty of times I’m so grateful that I don’t have much to do outside of work. Whenever I’m dealing with pain and nausea, I really want to just stay in bed and rest when I can. I do still go to my workouts and I still work, but I don’t do much else. I work from my bed or from the floor when I need to. Being able to move and work where I’m most comfortable when I’m not feeling well is just one of the reasons I’m so grateful that I work from home.

And of course, getting busier just happened to line up with when I’m dealing with a significant amount of pain and nausea.

I’ll share in my posts next week about what I’m doing, but in normal times I wouldn’t consider myself that busy. But I have a few things happening that cannot be postponed so if I want to be a part of them I have to do them now. And when I knew that this week was likely going to be a bad week, I was hoping that maybe it wouldn’t be that bad. Sometimes I expect a lot of pain and nausea and it really doesn’t kick in that much. I will always have some that I have to deal with, but when it’s tolerable or manageable with medications, it’s not that bad. I’m uncomfortable and maybe a bit awkward if I’m breathing through a wave of symptoms, but it’s nothing like when it’s really bad.

Fortunately, even though my pain and nausea are pretty bad right now, it’s not the worst I’ve dealt with. I am able to get out of bed and the symptoms are lessened by my medications instead of feeling like they are the same whether or not I take something. But I’m uncomfortable and sometimes the best way to feel better is to be in really weird positions in a chair or on the ground. That’s not going to be possible at the things I’m going to. But I’m going to do everything I can to feel ok when I go out and am around other people. At one thing, I’ll be around just my friends so if I’m really not able to feel ok I can let people know and they will understand. But I still want to feel ok so it’s not a big deal or something that I have to work around.

At least I’m not so busy that it will be overwhelming and it’s only a few events I need to worry about. And they aren’t back-to-back days so I’ll be able to rest in between them and maybe those rest days will help me feel better for the next time I have to be around others. And of course, when all my symptoms should be ending, my calendar is pretty empty outside of my usual obligations. But maybe I’ll be able to add a few more things so I can continue working on doing more outside of my house and I’ll be more up for it when I know I’ll be feeling ok.

I know that I’ve been saying I want to do more things and get out of the house more and I also know that pain and nausea can be 2 weeks a month of my life. So it shouldn’t be so surprising that they happen to overlap. I do wish it wasn’t like this, but I’m going to do my best to make the most of the fun that I have coming up!

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Default ThumbnailSleeping Away The Day (or Sometimes The Pain and Nausea Are Just Too Bad) Default ThumbnailEnding Some Pain and Starting Other Pain (or At Least I’m Stocked Up) Default ThumbnailDealing With The Pain (or Not All Pain Is The Same) Default ThumbnailStill Feeling Sick (or This Will Be Another Short Post) Default ThumbnailNeeding To Take Care Of Myself (or Not Ignoring All Pain) Default ThumbnailDoubling Up On Pain (or Physical and Mental Pain Together)

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Getting Out Of A Doctor Appointment (or I’m Lucky I Was Listened To)

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Comments Off on Getting Out Of A Doctor Appointment (or I’m Lucky I Was Listened To)

Considering all the medical things I deal with and how many recurring doctor appointments I have, I’ve been pretty lucky with having good doctors who listen to me and don’t make assumptions. This isn’t always the case and I’ve had some doctors who aren’t as helpful or won’t believe either my symptoms or my lab results, but I usually can avoid those doctors after they act that way.

In the past, I wasted time trying to get doctors to believe me when things aren’t what they expect. For example, I have low cholesterol, low blood sugar, and normal blood pressure. But because there are assumptions about people who are a certain weight or size, I have had doctors wonder if the results were correct. Or if I’m seeing a new doctor, they look at my past test results and think that they must not be accurate anymore so they make me do all the same things again to prove to them that I am healthy. Things have gotten better over the years, but there are still some doctors who believe that weight is the reason behind any ailment and won’t budge or look into what the cause could potentially be.

I’m always nervous when I’m meeting a new doctor or seeing someone I haven’t seen before. For example, when I went to urgent care recently, everyone there was new to me and they don’t know my history. I know that I will always have to do some of the basic vitals when I go to urgent care, but sometimes because of the situation, they aren’t normal results for me.

When I was in urgent care last month, part of the intake was to do my blood pressure and heart rate. I know that my blood pressure reading can be weird sometimes. It has come back impossibly high, not just high like what a living person could have but high where I should be dead. Those results are obviously not accurate, and I’ve learned things I need to be mindful of when I get my blood pressure taken. One of the biggest things I need to do is make sure my feet are on the ground. I usually can’t touch the ground with my feet when I’m sitting back the way they want me to be, so I need something for my feet otherwise I know the results won’t be right. And when I was in urgent care, I tried to tell the nurse that so I could get my blood pressure taken correctly. They didn’t have anything I could use, but my results weren’t high so I figured that was the end of that.

Then a week later, I got something in the mail saying I had a doctor’s appointment I didn’t schedule. I called my insurance and found out that it was for me to go to the blood pressure clinic again because of dangerously high blood pressure in urgent care. That didn’t make sense to me since it was in the normal range, so I looked at my online records and realized that there was a typo in my vitals so it looked a lot higher than it was. I asked if I could get that appointment removed because of that error, but they couldn’t do it unless I spoke to a doctor.

So I had another phone appointment this week to discuss what happened. I’m so glad that even though this was a doctor I didn’t know, he listened to what I said and found other things that seemed off about my vitals from that appointment. He said that my blood pressure should have been taken at another time since I was in pain and my heart rate was very high. There were signs that I wouldn’t have normal blood pressure, even if my feet were on the ground, so I shouldn’t have been referred to the blood pressure clinic. I don’t think he really cared that there was a typo in my records because the other information showed him that I was ok. And there is a history of recent blood pressure reads where it is normal so having just one high one with all the other information shouldn’t have triggered the referral.

I was totally prepared to explain a lot about why this seemed wrong, and I was lucky that this doctor already found things that didn’t seem right and I didn’t have to make that much of an effort to get the appointment removed. He did say that I should get my blood pressure done at my next in-person appointment, which I always have to do so it will be done soon enough. And of course, if it comes back high then, I might have to go back to the blood pressure clinic.

It’s nice when I really don’t have to put in as much work as expected to have a doctor hear me. This should be how it always is and I’m fortunate that it’s like this most of the time. It’s only the rare time now that I have to stand up for myself more and I’m glad that it’s become less and less frequent.

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Default ThumbnailAnd Yet Another Doctor Appointment (or At Least This One Showed Me What I Already Knew) Default ThumbnailMy First Doctor Appointment In A While (or Not Everything Can Be Done Over The Phone) Default ThumbnailBack To Back Doctor Days (or At Least This Was A Virtual Appointment) Default ThumbnailI Guess Not All Doctor Appointments Can Be Good Ones (or I Don’t Think I’ll See This Doctor Again) Default ThumbnailGoing In For A Doctor Appointment (or Making A Plan With My Dermatologist) Default ThumbnailFinally My Last Doctor Appointment Of This Month (or Getting Better With Dealing With Needles)

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Working On Feeling Better Mentally and Physically (or Picking A Workout Challenge For March)

Posted on March 1, 2023 | Comments Off on Working On Feeling Better Mentally and Physically (or Picking A Workout Challenge For March)

When I set my monthly challenge for February, I had no idea I’d basically be forced into sleeping better in order to get over the cold I caught. I was going to bed earlier and could sleep in because I wasn’t going to my workouts. I think the last time I got that much sleep was when I was out of work and was not getting up too early to work out in the morning.

And getting that much sleep that week proved how much I really needed to work on my sleep schedule. I’m back to getting up as early as I normally do since I’m back to my workouts, so my focus has to be on what time I get to bed. There are some nights when I’m getting to bed a lot earlier than I used to and there are other nights when I’m noticing I’m staying up too late. But even those later nights are still not as bad as they used to be. I’m averaging about an hour more sleep a night, which is a start. I want to get it up a bit higher, but that will take some time. But at least I’ve made a start that I can build off of. This is a work in progress, but it’s the most progress I’ve made on this goal that I’ve had for myself for a long time.

And for this month, I’m doing another health-related challenge and it’s inspired a bit by the time when I was sick. After I took a week off from my workouts, I did notice that I had gotten a bit weaker. This was expected since I had to take time off, but it was frustrating. And since I’ve been back, I’ve been really wanting to build my strength back up. But as I’ve been doing that, I also have wondered if I’ve been stagnant with what I have been doing. So this month, I want to challenge myself to find where I can be stronger and work harder in my workouts.

I know that there are some parts of my workouts that might be easier to build upon than others. I think it will be hardest to have improvements with my rowing, but I know I can still try. But because of some physical restrictions, there is only so much I can do. I’ll see what can happen when I try, but I’m not setting any crazy expectations. But I think I can make some good improvements on the bike and with the floor work. I want to see if I can increase the resistance level on the bike a bit more for some of the workouts and also see if I can pedal faster when I’m using the levels I’ve been using for a while. And on the floor, I know it’s not just as easy as using heavier weights, but I should be more comfortable with testing out the heavier weights to see if it’s possible or if I could do some of the reps with the heavy weights before using my normal ones. This isn’t the most straightforward progress, but they are steps toward improvement and that’s what I need to be ok with doing.

As much as I’d love to see super fast progress and immediately have improvements in my workouts, I think seeing how my sleep improvement went made me remember that any steps of progress are good. So even if I end March with marginal improvements, that will still put me ahead of where I am now. And if I can make small improvements every month or every other month, that will add up over time. All I can do is try and see what happens over the course of this month and hopefully, there will be some changes that I can continue over time so I see some big improvements and changes at the end of the year.

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Default ThumbnailGetting Back On Track (or Another Continuation Of A Monthly Challenge) Default ThumbnailA Double Hard Workout Week (or I Did Want A Challenge) Default ThumbnailMy Monthly Challenge To Finish Out The First Half Of The Year (or Sleeping And More Organizing) Default ThumbnailWorking On My Strength (or Feeling More Normal Again) Default ThumbnailAlmost Through A Year Of Monthly Challenges (or Picking A Good Challenge For November) Default ThumbnailHitting A Workout Milestone In Isolation (or Still Working Toward A Goal)

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health

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Another Virtual Therapy Appointment (or Preparing For Potential Changes)

Posted on February 16, 2023 | Comments Off on Another Virtual Therapy Appointment (or Preparing For Potential Changes)

My therapy appointments have been every 6 months for a long time and ever since the pandemic, they have also been virtual appointments. I did some virtual appointments before the pandemic, but they weren’t every appointment because there was a rule that you had to be seen in person every so often. I’ve been grateful they have been video appointments that I can do from home because that makes them very easy to fit into my work day. I just take my lunch break when my appointment happens so I don’t have to worry about much. If I had to drive in and wait for my appointment time, I might still be able to fit it into a lunch break, but it would be harder to do. So keeping them virtual has worked out perfectly for me.

Because of the timing of when these appointments switched to being every 6 months, my appointments are now around my birthday and half-birthday. And the one this month just happened to fall on Valentine’s Day. I found that kind of funny, but I also didn’t mind having my appointment then since I knew it would be a pretty routine check-in.

And for the most part, it was very routine. My therapist made sure that I was still doing ok in general and I did let her know I was getting over a cold so if I sounded down it was because of that and not my mood. She confirmed I was doing ok on my current dosage of the medication I have been taking for years, which I am. And we discussed the new medication I’ve been taking and how it’s been working for me. She’s happy that I’m seeing success with it but was frustrated for me about the medication shortage. But she agreed that there’s not really anything I can do other than to be patient and pick up my refill as soon as it is available.

After my check-in, my therapist gave me a heads up that the medication she prescribes me might have a shortage soon. For some reason, of all the medications that do similar things, all the doctors at the hospital are switching their patients to the one that I am taking. So there will be a higher demand for it than there was before. We discussed what this shortage could mean for me, but hopefully it won’t affect too much if it happens. And if I have to go a week or so without my medication, I would be able to start back at the same dosage I’m already on and I wouldn’t have to worry about starting at a low dosage and working back up. I won’t need to order my refill for another month or so, so there is a chance there won’t be a shortage when I have my refill in. But she wanted to make sure I knew so I could be prepared.

And she also gave me a heads up that I may have to go to occasional in-person appointments again. My next appointment in August will be virtual, but the one in about a year might have to be in the office. She’s not sure if that will be necessary because the policy is about making sure patients see a doctor in person at least once a year, and I do see other doctors in person on a regular basis. So I might not have to go in for therapy. And a year is a long time from now, so a lot of policies could change in that time. But just like with the medication shortage, she wanted me to be prepared for this potential change and not have it seem sudden or surprise me. I really appreciated that.

That was about it for my therapy appointment. It was simple and easy, just like it’s been for a while now. And I guess I’ll just have to see if I’m affected by this other medication shortage in the next few months and if in the future I’m back to going to in-person appointments again. But maybe nothing will change and my appointment in 6 months will be another boring and routine check-in, which sounds perfect to me!

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Default ThumbnailA Super Easy Therapy Appointment (or Just Doing A Check-In) Default ThumbnailSome More Virtual Therapy (or Trying Another Medication) Default ThumbnailAn Easy Therapist Check-In (or Virtual Appointments Make Things Easier) Default ThumbnailAnother Quick Therapy Appointment (or Video Appointments Make Things Easy) Default ThumbnailA Super Fast Therapy Appointment (or Having Therapy On An Insanely Stressful Day) Default ThumbnailAnother Virtual Doctor Appointment (or Planning Some Next Steps)

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Another Medication Shortage (or I’m Feeling More Calm This Time)

Posted on February 15, 2023 | 1 comment

I’ve recently dealt with a few different medication shortages. I understand if I’m taking something that a lot of other people are taking, this can happen. I don’t understand why the manufacturer didn’t plan for something like this because they should have realized when a medication is approved for something that affects so many people that they would have increased interest. But there are a lot of things about the medical community that I don’t understand and that I believe are done more about profit than healthcare.

Every time I’ve had a medication shortage, it does get resolved in one way or another. Sometimes it means I have to miss a week or so of medication and sometimes the medication is back in stock before I run out so I just have to pick it up at the last minute but I’m not missing a dosage. There’s nothing I can do to change the situation. I order a refill as soon as I can (which is usually a week before I run out) and I pick up my medication when it’s available. Sometimes it’s on time and sometimes it’s not. But I don’t stockpile or do anything else that could make a shortage worse. I just take things as planned.

With my injectable medication, the first time I had experienced a shortage things stressed me out. In the end, my dosage was increased early so I could get a refill sooner, and that brought some other issues for me but in the end, I’m glad that’s how it worked out. But not knowing what was going to happen made me worry and I didn’t know how my body might react when I missed a dose, especially since it was a new medication for me. I don’t know exactly how I reacted since when I started it up again, my dosage was higher and those side effects were intense.

The next shortage I had with that medication ended up not affecting anything because I was able to pick it up right before my next dose was supposed to be so I never missed anything. I was a bit worried about what would happen if I had to take another week off, but I’m glad I didn’t have to experience that. I had no idea how long the shortage would take since all I could find out was that it was out of stock, so it was a big relief when I got the text alert that it was ready for me to pick up and I could go that same day.

I ordered my next refill this past weekend because I knew my last injection with my current pen would be on Monday this week. Originally, the system said it would be available to pick up mid-week, but then I got an alert that they are experiencing another shortage. I have no idea if this shortage will be resolved before I am supposed to take my next dose on Monday or if I’ll end up missing a week again. But for whatever reason, I’m feeling much more relaxed about the situation this time.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been noticing the medication working more and more. I’m not experiencing as many side effects which is nice too. Even though it is working, I’m not worried about maybe missing a dose. I know that I will pick things back up as soon as I can if I can’t take it this coming Monday and I don’t have any reason to believe that it won’t continue to work. Maybe the stress in the past was because I wasn’t experiencing all of the positive outcomes yet and the stress was also about worrying if this was the right thing for me to take or not. But now, I know I’m doing the right thing and that I will just continue doing it as soon as I’m able to.

I hope that this shortage isn’t something I have to deal with every time I get a refill, but I know it might be like this for a while. The company that makes it hasn’t really increased how much they can make and more and more people are being prescribed this. Fortunately, it’s not a medication that anyone needs to stay alive, but it is something that helps so much and it’s unfortunate when you don’t have that help, even if it’s temporary. But all I can do is continue to try my best with the other things I have been doing and know that as soon as I can get my refill I’ll be back on track with things again.

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A Non-Workout Week Recap (or I Hated Taking Time Off)

Posted on February 13, 2023 | 1 comment

After my last workout recap, I was really hoping I would have a good workout week this past week. What I didn’t expect was having to take the entire week off from working out due to being sick. I knew over the weekend that I had a bit of a cold, but I didn’t think it would it would affect my entire week. And maybe if it had been a normal cold, I only would have needed to take one or two days off.

I knew pretty early on Sunday that I would need to take Monday off. I was dealing with a lot of issues with my cold and I knew that showing up when I was coughing that much wouldn’t be a polite thing to do to everyone else. I also knew that I could use extra sleep so sleeping in would be nice.

By Monday night, I was feeling better except for my throat. And because of the swelling in my throat, the pain was really intense and I didn’t feel like I could fully catch my breath. Exercising when you can’t catch your breath isn’t a smart thing to do so I figured I would take another day off. Unfortunately, that continued to be the pattern through the rest of the week.

My throat was starting to get a little better by Thursday, but it was still not great and I knew that I just had to keep taking the week off. I debated going in on days I normally take off, but I decided against that since even by the weekend I wasn’t fully recovered. I don’t want to make any of my symptoms last longer than they have to, so resting was the smartest plan. I could have worked out at home or even at the little gym my condo building has, but I decided to focus on rest and recovery. I did do some stretching workouts, but that’s as intense as I got this past week.

I really hate taking time off from working out. I still am shocked that I say that, but it’s true. It’s become such a part of my routine and I can feel it when I need to work out now. It’s not just about getting to my workout goals each month or year, I really crave working out now. And having to take time off when I could convince myself maybe I should go is tough. When I took the week off because of my foot, that was different. This time, I had to be smart and mature and know that this was the best choice for me.

As I’m writing this, I fully plan on going back this week. I’m still not 100%, but I’m doing significantly better. And I know I’ll need to ease back into things no matter what so going easy this week will be good for a few reasons. There are studies that show that working out can help you get over a cold, but I knew that I needed to wait until it was a bit safer for me to work out. I did get to miss what should be the worse of my pain and nausea by having this past week off, but I know that could continue into this week as well. So I might be dealing with that besides everything else I have. But I know I can handle it because I’ve done that before.

Hopefully, I won’t need to take more time off from working out anytime soon. I know I did the best thing for myself, but it doesn’t make it any easier. I want to get back to my normal and somewhat crazy routine and I hope that happens this week!

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An Evening At Urgent Care (or I’m Ready To Not Be Sick)

Posted on February 10, 2023 | 1 comment

Usually when I am sick with a cold, I have a somewhat predictable pattern of how things go. It starts with a weird scratchy throat that feels more like I can’t quench a thirst than a sore throat. Then I have the typical symptoms of a cold for a few days. And finally, I start to get better. And when I’m getting better, I usually don’t have a regression of symptoms other than congestion. It can take longer for me to get over some colds than others, but I normally can tell when I’m starting to get better and am over the hump.

But this cold that I’ve been dealing with for over a week hasn’t been following the pattern that I’m used to. My sore throat was different before I had cold symptoms, so I didn’t think at first that I was getting sick. Most of my cold symptoms were gone on Tuesday, but my sore throat was getting worse every day. I was struggling to swallow anything and even drinking water was extremely painful. And I was starting to not be able to breathe as deeply as normal because my throat was really swollen. I also started to lose my voice, which was really odd. I knew this wasn’t what a normal cold is like for me, so I told myself that if I wasn’t better a week after the symptoms started, I would go to the doctor.

That one-week mark was on Wednesday and I kept calling to try to get in to see a doctor. But there were no appointments until next week, so if I wanted to try to see what was going on sooner, I had to go to urgent care. I know that going to urgent care is for stuff like what I was dealing with, but I would have preferred an appointment. But I didn’t really have an option so I went in after work on Wednesday and prepared to be there for a while.

It was pretty crowded when I got there, but I was seen about 2 hours after I arrived (a sore throat isn’t the most urgent thing in urgent care so I knew there would be a wait). I explained the timeline of my symptoms and how I thought I had a cold over the weekend but that what I was experiencing at that point didn’t feel like a cold. I knew it was very unlikely it could be strep since I don’t have tonsils, but I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing something that needed to be treated.

The doctor I saw was very nice and he understood my concerns. And he agreed that it was the right move for me to come in just to confirm that I was doing all the right stuff to get better. I didn’t get another Covid test since I had taken a few at home and my symptoms weren’t really what you would expect with Covid. He checked my ears to make sure I didn’t have an ear infection and then ran a rapid strep test even though he knew it probably couldn’t be that. But I appreciated he wanted to confirm since some people can still get strep after having their tonsils out. But as expected, it wasn’t strep and it wasn’t anything else that I was checked for.

My diagnosis: I likely had a cold over the weekend (as I assumed) and my sore throat and laryngitis were due to inflammation in my throat and vocal cords. The inflammation could be just from the cold or I could have had another random issue at the same time such as allergies. But all my remaining issues were due to inflammation so I needed to make sure I resolved that. I was prescribed two different anti-inflammatory medications (basically Advil and Tylenol) and was told that it might take 3-5 days before I’m better.

When I went to the pharmacy, I also picked up a few over-the-counter items. I have used the throat numbing spray before when I had a sore throat, and I really should have thought about getting it when things were bad earlier in the week. But at least I got it while I was there so I had something that I knew would take some of the pain away.

I’m still dealing with a pretty sore throat and I still don’t have a voice, but I do feel a lot better than I did when I went to the hospital. I can tell some of the inflammation has gone down but I also know I have a few more days to go before I probably will be better. But to have any relief from the pain I’ve been experiencing over the past week is nice. And hopefully, by the start of next week, I’ll be feeling better and can finally get back to my normal routine again.

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