Tag Archives: health issues

Please Wear A Mask And Stay Home If You Can (or This Shouldn’t Be Political)

Posted on October 7, 2020 | Comments Off on Please Wear A Mask And Stay Home If You Can (or This Shouldn’t Be Political)

When the pandemic started, I think most of us thought that maybe it would take a month or two but that it would be under control quickly. Yes, it was a lot of unknown stuff, but we were being told things to help us try to not get sick. I know that there was confusion at the beginning about if you should wear a mask or not and if this was airborne or on surfaces, but a lot of information hasn’t changed. Yet, here we are, almost 7 months later. And at least in some parts of the country, things have been shut down for that entire time.

I don’t know why this pandemic became a political point. Maybe the president thought it would blow over enough and he wouldn’t have to take a lot of action. Maybe that’s why he was telling people to not worry. I don’t know what he was thinking and I don’t need to know. All I know is that it has become so political and polarized if you believe things are bad or not. And I honestly don’t get it.

There’s no denying in my opinion that there is a pandemic that has killed more people than the standard flu or cold. Over 200,000 people have died. I have not known anyone personally who has died, but I have so many friends who have lost someone. They have lost parents, spouses, kids, family, and co-workers. I have known so many people who have gotten sick and recovered. Some of those people were getting very sick and I worried they wouldn’t make it. Many of them are still dealing with health issues. And we have no clue what the long-term effects will be if you had this at one point or not, even if you had no major symptoms.

What we are being asked to do is to wear a mask when you go out, stay at least 6 feet away from others, and stay home if you don’t have to go out. That’s not a lot. And yes, it is hard to stay home and the boredom and isolation are real. I’m experiencing that so much.

But boredom and isolation are so much better than being sick. My friends who have been sick have shared stories about how they felt. Some of them thought they were dying. Some of them felt like they couldn’t breathe and wondered if they were about to end up on a ventilator. The pain in their bodies that some of them described is worse than anything I have ever experienced, even on my worst pain days. I wouldn’t wish this disease on anyone as it sounds truly horrendous and scary.

And I know the president just said how this was not that bad and we shouldn’t let our lives be taken over by the pandemic. But we don’t know if he’s completely healthy yet. I don’t believe if they have said he has tested negative yet. But keep in mind that the treatment he got was very different from what anyone else can get. He has a full medical staff in his home that monitored him before he went to the hospital. He was taken to the hospital in a helicopter. He was in the hospital for observation and not because he was seriously ill. He was given medications that no other person has gotten for this disease. When he went home, he still has a full medical staff taking care of him. And for all this treatment, he will have no medical bills. That’s not anything that anyone else could have.

I’ve seen so many stories of people who were very ill and turned away from the hospital because they didn’t need to be on a ventilator. There was just no room in the hospital for them or the medical team wanted to only have the sickest people there. They had to go home and either be alone or be with people in their homes who didn’t have medical training and were also terrified of getting sick since they didn’t have the PPE needed to be safe. And even if they were in the hospital, the medications and treatments the president got are not available at all hospitals. Some have said they would have no way to give a patient those medications because they were not available to them. So even if everything the president is saying is true and that this was something very easy for him to recover from, unless you have the same privileges that he has you might have a harder time getting over this.

I wish the president would have said something about how he feels very lucky that he had an easy recovery but he understands that is not the case for everyone. I wish he acknowledged how many people have died because they were sicker than he was or didn’t have the same medical advantages as he did. He seemed to feel like this is nothing and nobody should worry. But from my friends who have had this or have lost someone because of this disease, I know that we should be careful and worried that we might get sick.

Wearing a mask is not a sign you vote for one political party or another. It is a sign that you understand that there is a pandemic and that a mask can protect you and others. You might be asymptomatic and not know you are getting others sick. Or someone else might not know they have it and the mask will protect you. Understanding why some businesses can’t open just yet isn’t saying anything more than that you know that they cannot open and keep their customers and staff healthy and protected. I’m just as frustrated as anyone that things are closed. But I also know that we have ways of slowing down this disease so they can reopen. And all it takes is to wear a mask and stay home when you can.

It’s frustrating to see that the people who are protesting for things to open are the ones who won’t do what it takes to make it happen. But I will still do what I need to do in order to stay healthy and try to slow the spread. And hopefully, others will stop acting like a mask is a political button and will do the same so we can get this under control.

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I Feel Like Every Monthly Challenge Is The Same (or Will This Be The Month I Get Back On Track?)

Posted on September 1, 2020 | Comments Off on I Feel Like Every Monthly Challenge Is The Same (or Will This Be The Month I Get Back On Track?)

The longer we are told to stay at home, the harder I’m finding it to figure out new monthly challenges. My life seems stagnant. I don’t feel like anything in my life is moving forward. I’m trapped in this moment of time and nothing is changing. I know I’m not alone in this feeling, but that doesn’t make it easier to deal with. I’ve said that this year is going to be the lost year. I have to understand that I might not accomplish much at all this year. But if not accomplishing much means I stay safe and healthy, it’s worth it.

Most of my monthly challenges lately have been about trying to stay positive in this difficult time. And that’s exactly what last month’s challenge was all about. I wanted to try to focus on the good and track good things that happen to me each day. I know I need to remember that even on my worst day, there is something that was good about it. It might be something as small as eating something I like or being able to watch a good show on tv. But no matter what, there is always some good every single day.

I wasn’t sure how I would track these things, but it ended up just being easiest to combine it with my gratitude list that I made each night. I made sure that at least one thing listed on the gratitude list was something that made the day good. And there were some days that I had really good things like being able to see a friend or having an amazing workout. And there were plenty of days where the only good thing was that I slept ok or that I didn’t do something destructive. August wasn’t a horrible month for me, but it was still a tough one and I needed to make sure that I didn’t make things worse for me by forgetting the good that I had.

I’m planning on continuing this idea because I know that with each month that passes with the pandemic still being a huge concern, I’m feeling more and more disconnected from my life and what I have liked to do in the past. And I need to be reminded that things are not all bad and that there are some things from my life that I am still enjoying or that are good.

My monthly challenges for the past 6 months have all been along the same line. My motivation to do a lot of things isn’t that high right now, so I am trying to find challenges that aren’t too difficult to accomplish. And I try to find things that I know I need to do, especially with the setbacks that I’ve been encountering while staying at home.

And this month’s challenge is no different. I know I’m not on track with so many aspects of my life. I have been letting things go, ignoring stuff I should focus on, and haven’t been caring enough about things that I used to care about. Some of this is about my health and weight. My workouts haven’t been what I know they should be. My food is much worse than it’s been in a while. My sleep is still tough at times and I’m sometimes having a week or two with under 4 hours a sleep a night. And some of these things about my physical health is taking a toll on my mental health so I’m not focusing on doing things that I know will make me happy.

So this month, I want to work on getting back on track. I need to figure out a schedule for myself, even if I don’t have much to do. I need to prioritize myself more and to make sure that I’m setting myself up for things that will be positive for me. I need to get my food under control (or at least more regular). And I need to push myself harder in my workouts when I can.

I have gained weight in the past 6 months. I’m not happy about it. I don’t feel like myself. I hate that my clothes don’t fit me correctly. I feel like I have ruined so much that I have worked so hard for. I know that weight is not everything, but I want to get back to a place where I feel like myself, and I know weight is something holding me back. And hopefully getting myself back on track with other things will result in at least a little weight loss. I’m not too concerned about getting back into weight loss more than getting myself back to where I was at the beginning of the year. If I lose more than that, then I do. But that’s not the goal I’m giving myself right now.

Hopefully, focusing on the things that have been getting out of control will result in a lot of good things for me. And maybe it will make things easier for whenever we start transitioning back to what life was life at the beginning of the year. I know that eventually, that will happen and I want to make that as easy as a switch as possible. And if I can get my life to feel close to what it used to feel like, then I think that will be an easy change for me when it happens.

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Learning A Lot About Healthcare (or More Union Education)

Posted on August 19, 2020 | Comments Off on Learning A Lot About Healthcare (or More Union Education)

I have always thought I have been somewhat educated about the healthcare system. I know there are a lot of problems in our current system and there are places where things can slip through the cracks or be a failure for patients. For example, for me to get breast MRIs covered, I had to work with a geneticist to declare myself high-risk for breast cancer. Mammograms are covered as a cancer screening, but if you are told you should get MRIs to check for cancer they might not be. I have a similar issue with TB testing. The skin test (where you get the little bubble under your skin) is free. I cannot do the skin test because when I was 18 I was exposed to TB (I never had it and took medication for a year to make sure I wouldn’t get it). I need chest x-rays. But my insurance wants to charge $500 a view for those. I’m still trying to get those covered so I don’t have to pay $1000 for something most people can do for free.

But even with all the problems with healthcare, I know I’m lucky. I have good doctors who I know are making sure I’m ok and healthy. I do have coverage for most things that I need and usually, it’s a pretty easy system to get care in. I don’t have cheap insurance because I pay for it as an individual, but it could be much worse and it was much worse before the ACA went into effect.

I’ve never been eligible for healthcare through my work. I have had day jobs where I was working full-time, but you had to be there for a very long time before you could sign up. I wasn’t at that job long enough (I think it was 1 year before insurance and I was there 10 months), but I knew that I wouldn’t take that insurance because I was in the middle of my hip issues and the work insurance was the wrong insurance company. I’ve had other day jobs that gave everyone who worked at least 35 hours a week insurance after 30 days. But they kept us all at 34 hours or under.

And I’ve never been eligible for healthcare from my union. The healthcare plan is a separate organization from my union, but that plan is only for members of the union. You have to earn a certain amount of money or work enough days to be eligible. It’s something that is a goal for me (although I don’t know if I’d sign up for the healthcare if I could get it because it is not the insurance all my doctors are with). But just because I’m not eligible doesn’t mean I don’t want to understand the plan and the options. I also feel like I need to be informed so I can do my work with my slate’s social media as successfully as possible.

Recently, the healthcare plan for the union announced some changes. They usually do changes each year, just like any other healthcare plan. But of course, this year things are different since work has been almost completed stopped for almost half a year (and we have no idea when it will be coming back). People are worried about a lot of things regarding healthcare, even if you don’t have to worry about being eligible.

And I know that some people are not happy about the changes to the union plan. I don’t think they are great, but I also know that they could be much worse. For example, the old healthcare plan had 2 levels with different income eligibility requirements. The new plan only has 1 level and the income requirements are between what the old 2 were. However, there is a new COBRA relief plan for anyone who has income at the old lower eligibity level. If you are at that old level but don’t make the new one, the plan pays for 80% of your COBRA premiums. That makes COBRA close to the cost of the regular premiums. That’s much better than having to pay full COBRA.

Of course, some people did not make enough to be eligible for that and their options now are to go on regular COBRA or find individual insurance. Fortunately, since the ACA made pre-existing conditions not an issue for insurance anymore, individual insurance is typically much more affordable than it used to be. I’m sure it’s horrible to know that you are not going to get the health insurance that you were planning on and it might not have been your fault. You might have been on track to make enough and then things shut down. But I’ve been talking to friends who are in that situation to make sure they know the options and to connect them to people who know how to help people who are buying individual insurance go through all the options to find the best plan.

The union has been doing some webinars about the healthcare plan and I was able to attend one last week. They explained the realities of the costs of healthcare. And yes, a huge problem happening with all insurance plans is the insane cost of care. A medication could be listed at $10,000 and the insurance plan has to cover that. But it doesn’t have to cost that much because it’s only $250 in other countries. But the insurance plans have to cover the cost for here. So that makes things expensive for anyone. Also, the way the union healthcare plan is funded is mainly from contributions from our employers (the producers for the projects we work on). With no work, there are no contributions. We did just have a big victory with our last contract by getting a huge increase in the contributions. But we need to work to see that in effect.

They also explained all the options that everyone has, whether or not they met the income requirements. Even though none of them apply to me, I’m glad I understand what the requirements are for different things and how people who might not hit that level can still have options. I want to be able to answer questions that people have and I understand things a lot more than I did before.

Healthcare in this country is complicated no matter how you get it. You might have eligibility requirements that are difficult or confusing to get. You might have to figure out individual insurance and what things you need or don’t need. Even when you have insurance, you might have to fight to get things covered because they aren’t exactly how everyone else gets treated or checked. I think universal healthcare has never been more important than now. Not just because of the issues some insurance companies are running into, but because everyone needs healthcare no matter what. It shouldn’t be tied to your job. So many people lost their job this year and also lost their insurance. You should never had to worry about how you will get healthcare if things change in your life.

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Doing A Health Check-In On Myself (or Seeing Where I’m Slipping)

Posted on July 30, 2020 | Comments Off on Doing A Health Check-In On Myself (or Seeing Where I’m Slipping)

I think it’s a pretty common thing right not to be struggling. We are going through a pandemic and life is so uncertain. People are scared of getting sick or being a carrier and getting someone they love sick. They are lonely at home or if they live with others unable to take time for themselves. Our routines are completely different and it’s hard to figure out a sense of normalcy. Almost everyone I know (at least in the US where the pandemic is still hitting us hard) is struggling with food or weight. I don’t know anyone who says they are doing just as great as they were before.

Struggling sucks. Even when you know that you aren’t alone in the struggle, it doesn’t necessarily make you feel better. And I know that I’m struggling right now. There’s no question about it. I’ve written about different struggles I’ve been having and I think that having an outlet to write about it has helped. But it hasn’t made it go away.

I want to say that I am ok and nobody should worry about me. I’m safe, I’m healthy, and I’m going to be ok. I am not worried about myself or if I’ll be ok because I know I will be. I just sometimes struggle randomly or my brain doesn’t want to remember that this time is temporary and eventually it will be done.

But even though I’m ok, that doesn’t mean I’m ok every day. I don’t believe that I have depression, but I know I have symptoms of being depressed. I am not enjoying some of the things that I know make me happy. There have been days that I wished I could just sleep away the day and thought maybe somehow the next day would be more interesting (even though my days don’t have much variety). I deal with loneliness a lot. The lack of physical contact or touch with others is a big struggle. I crave some of my normal life back and that’s just not possible.

I am working on being more social with friends and family in ways that I can be safely social. But even when I’ve had weeks where I was talking to someone on the phone or had a Zoom hang out almost every day, I still feel lonely. Being alone in my house isn’t easy. If I lived somewhere bigger, I might have asked a friend if they wanted to stay with me during this time so we didn’t have to be alone. But that’s not exactly an option for me right now. And I don’t know if seeing a friend from a distance is going to be enough for me. I know it helps because it has given me a boost when I have done it. But I also wonder if I won’t get the same boost now as I did before because I’m struggling more.

And I know my physical health is struggling too. This time is exceptionally hard for anyone with an eating disorder. I know I’ve gained weight in the past few months. Some of it is possibly stress-related, but I also know that I haven’t been eating the way that I should and my workouts aren’t as hard as they normally are. So it would make sense that I would gain weight. But I hate it. I feel really uncomfortable in my body right now. I want to get my weight back to where it was. I would prefer to work on losing weight again, but just to get back to where I was in March would be so nice. I’m trying to do the right things to get myself back on track, but then I slip up. This feels so much harder than any other time with my eating disorder and I wish I could figure out what I need to do to start getting back to the old me.

I remember seeing something on social media about how we shouldn’t be comparing ourselves now to ourselves before the pandemic started. We aren’t the same people that we were before. We are dealing with things that we never have had to go through. We are trying to live our lives through a pandemic and it’s a mix of normal life and everything being crazy. Struggling right now is normal. And it’s also normal to reach out for help. I have reached out to my therapist to make sure that I shouldn’t be worried about how I’m struggling. And I’ve been told that I’m doing ok, but if I feel like I need some help then we can discuss medication. I don’t want to go that route yet (just because of how often I deal with side effects), but I’m glad it is an option I can explore if I feel like I need it.

Hopefully writing this all down is going to help me feel a bit better about things. I can tell that it does feel like a bit of the weight holding me down has been lifted. I don’t know if this post will help me find a way back to the old me or a way to get back on track, but right now all I want to get to is to feel like I’m not struggling as much. It’s a small goal, but it would make me feel so much better.

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Sleeping Away The Day (or Sometimes The Pain and Nausea Are Just Too Bad)

Posted on July 22, 2020 | Comments Off on Sleeping Away The Day (or Sometimes The Pain and Nausea Are Just Too Bad)

Every month, it’s not a surprise for me when I have to deal with pain and nausea. It’s not fun and I wish I could change this about my life, but there aren’t really any options for me that are reasonable at this moment. I could try birth control pills again, but those will likely make my tumors grow again. There’s a small chance that it won’t do that, but it’s not worth the risk for me right now. The other option is to have a hysterectomy. I’ve actually thought more seriously about this lately, but I’m not ready to take that step just yet. So until then, I just have to deal with the pain and nausea every month.

I’ve said to many people that I feel like there is a set amount of pain and nausea I have to have each cycle. Just to explain it, let’s say I have to get 100 points of pain and nausea. Sometimes, it’s 10 points for 10 days. Sometimes it’s 20 points for 5 days. But that’s a general idea. But sometimes, I feel like I get almost all the pain and nausea in just one or two days and it’s close to unbearable.

That’s exactly what happened on Monday. I had mild nausea for the few days leading up to Monday, but Monday was just the worst. The pain was making my vision go white from time to time (like what my hip pain can do at times). The nausea made me want to live on my bathroom floor all day. I honestly don’t remember having a day that bad ever, but I’m also sure that if I have my mind blocked it because it was so bad. I tried to work out and that kind of failed (more about that in my workout recap next week). I had to get some work stuff done and I did it, but it took me significantly longer than it should have because I had to keep stepping away.

And when I was done with all the stuff I had to do, I went to lay down to try to feel better. And I ended up sleeping away almost the entire day. At least when I was asleep, I wasn’t feeling the pain or nausea. I’m sure I needed some sleep because I haven’t been sleeping well lately, but this was mainly sleeping to make the day go by faster and easier. And it did do that, so I’m grateful for it.

I’m writing this post on Tuesday and I’m still pretty miserable. It’s not as bad as Monday was, but it’s still pretty bad. I’m planning on resting in bed for most of the day while medicating myself and having heat pads. I might end up sleeping the day away but I also know doing that can mess up my sleep schedule a bit. But sometimes, that’s all I can do for the day, and the best self-care that I can do is to not have to deal with the day.

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LA Is Shut Down Again (or Somehow This Makes Me Feel Better)

Posted on July 15, 2020 | Comments Off on LA Is Shut Down Again (or Somehow This Makes Me Feel Better)

On Monday, it was announced that California was going to be shutting down some public spaces again. And several counties, including Los Angeles, were going to shut down even more things than what was being done throughout the state. A lot of things on the shutdown list were things that I didn’t know if they had opened at all in LA (like movie theaters or indoor restaurant seating). But there were some things that I know had reopened that were closing again. Mainly gyms and personal care places (nails, waxing, hair salons).

I haven’t been going to any of the places that are being shut down. For the most part, the only places I have gone in the past 4 months have been grocery or drug stores to get things I need or to doctor and dentist appointments. I haven’t gone anywhere for fun or entertainment. I haven’t been out and enjoying the city even as things reopened. And I’ve been having very mixed feelings about pretty much being a shut-in inside my house.

I know that the virus is serious and needs to be taken seriously. This is not something that isn’t a big deal or as simple as the flu. Even if you have a mild case or no symptoms, there is nothing known about the long-term effects. And from what the research has shown so far, it does appear that there are long-term effects and people might have health issues in the future. But we won’t know until it happens. So I am staying home to stay healthy and make sure that I don’t get sick. For me, it is more about keeping myself safe than protecting others since I don’t really interact with anyone else. But to keep me healthy is a good reason to be home. And I do take every precaution when I go out in public. I wear a mask. I stay away from others. I keep a distance. I don’t do anything that isn’t necessary.

But as things were reopening, I was starting to worry that I was using the virus as a reason to isolate myself from others for another reason. I don’t know why I would be isolating myself, but it was starting to feel like I was doing that. I saw people posting about going out still keeping a distance from others while being out of their homes. People have been going to parks, doing more than just the essential errands, and starting to live their lives again. I was worried that I was too scared to do all of that and what it meant for me. I don’t want to pick up new habits that make me not want to go out and be around others when it seems safe to do so.

And I still don’t know if that was the right choice or not then, but now I feel a bit better about my decisions since things were shut down. Nobody is really going out and doing much anymore. I know we need to do this because the numbers are rising again and we cannot just sit around and hope we don’t get sick. We need to take steps to make sure we aren’t getting sick and a big part of that is having a safer at home order. Things aren’t as strict as they were in the beginning, but they are stricter than what they were a week or two again. To me, it doesn’t really make much of a difference unless they decide that dental offices have to fully close because I still need to go back to finish my appointment.

With things shut down, I no longer have to think about if I want to try to leave my house and do something. I am just going to stay home and keep myself safe. And hopefully either this closing will bring the numbers back down or something else will happen that will help keep us safe and healthy. I am ready for things to be open again and to be able to feel safe to be out and around others. But we are not there yet and I’m not willing to rush things and take a chance. Waiting until things are safe isn’t easy or fun, but it does seem to be the right decision for me.

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Another Hip Surgery Anniversary Down (or I Wonder What The Pandemic Means For My Hip Issues)

Posted on July 7, 2020 | Comments Off on Another Hip Surgery Anniversary Down (or I Wonder What The Pandemic Means For My Hip Issues)

Today marks another anniversary of my hip surgery. It’s been 14 years since my surgery, and I still am amazed that it has been my only hip surgery so far. I was sure that by this point I would have had at least one more. The goal is still to not need a hip replacement for either side for a few more years (the original goal was to be at least 40 when I get them), and I am glad that I have been able to meet that goal so far.

My hip issues have been a roller coaster since they started. I’ve had lots of good days, lots of meh days, and some really bad days. Sometimes it’s the side that was operated on that hurts and sometimes it the side that hasn’t had surgery yet that is causing the issues. When it’s the side that was operated on that is hurting, I’m terrified that I have caused enough damage that I can’t put off a hip replacement. When it’s the other side, I’m scared that I finally tore the cartilage and will need the first surgery. I have seen a doctor that told me that I was doing fine, so I know that when I have those fears that it’s unlikely to be the real issue. But I can’t help but be scared since the original issue seemed to come on so quickly.

With the pandemic, I’ve noticed some good and bad things for my hips. The good is that I’m not doing as much so I don’t have some of the pain I get from being active. I’m not getting tired, which can cause my posture to suffer and I stand funny. And when that happens, my hip that was operated on can almost slip around in my hip socket. I describe it as dislocating my hip, but it isn’t really that. It just can pop out of place and I have to pop it back in. I know it sounds gross, but I’ve been doing this for so long so I’m used to it. And in the past few months, I’ve rarely had to do it since I’m not moving around as much (which I know has its own problems).

But there has been an unexpected issue that is making things harder for me. I rarely leave my house, but when I do it’s usually to go to the grocery store. I try to do grocery delivery when I can, but there are some stores that don’t have delivery options or I need something and can’t get a delivery time. And when I go to the grocery store, there are lines both outside and inside. Standing still in line is really hard on my hips. It can make walking and moving extremely painful. When I’m lined up inside to pay, it’s not as bad because I can usually lean on the shopping cart. But when it’s outside, I just have to tolerate it. I try to keep shifting my body weight to make it better, but there have been times that I got home from the grocery store and needed to take my strongest painkillers to continue on with my day.

I do have a cane, but I don’t like to use it. I probably need to get over that and bring it with me to the store. Or I need to look at the lines at stores and maybe only go when there isn’t a line. I know there are solutions for this issue, I just haven’t really worked on it yet. And even with the bad days I’ve had recently, it’s still better than the mix of good, meh, and bad days that I normally have. I have had significantly more good days than normal. Overall, I think I’m doing better than normal even if it doesn’t feel like that when I’m having a bad day.

I’m probably overdue to see an orthopedic surgeon again to get some x-rays and an exam. Maybe when things are safer and more normal again I will look into making a new appointment. I’m not too worried about it now because I know that even if the worst-case scenario is happening, nothing is urgent and needs to be dealt with immediately. I can wait a bit to make sure I do things when they are best for me.

Hopefully, in a year things will be normal again and I can celebrate the 15th anniversary of my hip surgery feeling a bit more confident about how my hips are doing. Hopefully, I will have a better idea of what my pain issues are really like and not just what they are like during a pandemic and isolation. It’s not easy to celebrate much these days, but I am celebrating making it 14 years since my hip surgery without needing another one. That’s not something I expected to happen and it’s amazing that it did.

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Default ThumbnailMy Hip Surgery Anniversary (or Lucky 13) Default ThumbnailHip Surgery Anniversary (or This Feels Like A Milestone) Default ThumbnailMore Hip Problems (or Thinking Out Of Order) Default ThumbnailSurgery Anniversary (or I Guess It’s Good I Almost Forgot) Default ThumbnailA Non-Surgery Anniversary (or Another Year Of Being A Medical Miracle) Default ThumbnailMore Hip Issues (or Wish It Was Me)

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I Guess This Makes Me Feel A Bit Better (or A Physical Explanation For My Emotional Symptoms)

Posted on June 24, 2020 | Comments Off on I Guess This Makes Me Feel A Bit Better (or A Physical Explanation For My Emotional Symptoms)

The past week, I’ve been struggling more than normal. I haven’t been sleeping well. I have been feeling off. I had some body aches and pains that I couldn’t explain. And I just had a general feeling of uneasiness. I assumed that this was due to isolation and my mental health. I know a lot of people are dealing with a bit of depression right now and it made sense to me that I might be dealing with the same. I would almost be worried if I didn’t have a bit of depression right now. I don’t want the current state of the world to be normal to me.

So I had been trying to do things to make me feel better. I’ve been especially focusing on my sleep because I know when I’m tired it makes everything harder for me. I just couldn’t seem to sleep well even if I was going to bed early. I was tossing and turning a lot, and some of that was due to hip pain. I also couldn’t reach deep sleep and when I did I had some really weird dreams that made me wake up feeling very unsettled. Again, I assumed this was all due to the circumstances with the world and didn’t think too much about it.

And then, I ended up getting my period almost 2 weeks early. Sorry if this is TMI, but I write about this plenty. I write about how much pain and nausea I deal with and how much it affects my life. And usually, I deal with a lot of symptoms for 5-7 days before my period starts and I am pretty miserable. For some reason, because I wasn’t dealing with nausea, I didn’t even consider that everything I was dealing with could be this. Also, since I’m usually pretty regular I never would think that I would get my period 2 weeks early.

There are so many reasons why this happened. I am guessing a lot of it is stress and nothing more than that. I know there can be medical reasons for this, but that’s usually when you have irregularity happening more consistently and this was just random for me. Or at least I hope it’s random. I track things so I will know if it’s happening a lot before my next doctor’s appointment.

And now, I’m dealing with the pain and nausea that I usually have. That’s really annoying because I just got over nausea about a week and a half ago. I thought I would have more freedom from it. I’m used to having more time without it. But I can’t do much now except try to take care of myself with my usual remedies and medications. It’s not as bad as it has been before, so that is a good sign. Of course, it could get worse as this week goes on. But I’m going to be grateful that it’s not bad now and I didn’t have the week of nausea before this that I was expecting.

As frustrating as it is to have my period be 2 weeks early, in some ways, it’s also a relief. I never thought all these issues I was dealing with could be related to my period since I wasn’t expecting it. But now that I know my cycle was thrown off, almost everything makes sense. The weird pains I was experiencing can almost all be explained by this (except my hip pain, but that might be a weather thing). Moodiness and fatigue make sense. The issues sleeping make more sense, even though that’s not something I normally have it’s something I occasionally have. The general feeling of uneasiness makes perfect sense now. And while I can’t feel certain that everything I’ve been experiencing will end when my period does, I do have a bit of hope that it will. I don’t have to worry as much that this is just how I’m mentally doing because these issues did come on suddenly. I hope they will go away just as suddenly.

I know that if I googled irregular cycles that there can be a lot of reasons to worry (especially when you consider my age). But since this is a one-off thing for now, I’m not going to think too much about it. Hopefully, things regulate in my body for the next cycle. And if they don’t, then I can discuss it with my doctor when I go in for my next appointment. But for now, I’m just grateful that I have a better idea about why I have been feeling so off for the past few days.

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Hope And Health (or I Don’t Have The Motivation To Do A Bigger Challenge)

Posted on June 3, 2020 | Comments Off on Hope And Health (or I Don’t Have The Motivation To Do A Bigger Challenge)

When I was struggling to figure out monthly challenges in the past few years, I had no idea how tough it would be to plan them when I’m isolated at home. Even though many of my challenges don’t involve me leaving my house to do them, my motivation while isolated is nowhere near it normally is. I don’t feel the push to do a ton every day. Some of this is due to physical exhaustion and some of this is mental exhaustion. This isn’t an easy time for any of us, but I’m trying my best. I am working on being gentler and kinder with myself because it’s so easy to compare myself now to myself before. But we are living in a different time and that’s not a fair comparison.

Because of those factors, my monthly challenges lately haven’t been very intense. They have mainly been about taking care of myself. Last month, I challenged myself to stay hopeful. And for the most part, I think I did an ok job with that. I paid attention to the news to see how things were progressing with testing and cases in LA. The news was sounding better. Things were starting to be able to reopen. Even if I wasn’t going to go to places, I was hopeful that them being reopened was a good sign. And I was staying hopeful that we were through the worst of this wave (I still fear another wave in the fall, but that’s another issue).

But then at the end of the month, it became harder to be hopeful. Not because of the pandemic but because of police brutality. I was saddened to see those stories happen, but I tried to stay hopeful in amplifying the voices that needed to be heard and working on being a better ally. I wasn’t quite as hopeful as I was before, but I also became more aware of the racism and discrimination out there that I might have been blind to before. I found hope in seeing people taking action and learning how to take action myself. I am hopeful that one day, we will find a way to have systematic change with law enforcement and how people are treated. I am not hopeful that it will happen soon. It will take a lot of work and we cannot let up.

This month, my challenge is related a bit to wanting to be hopeful. I want to work on my health. This is about both my mental and physical health. For my physical health, I need to find ways to work out harder and I need to eat better. Those aren’t easy, but they can be done. And they are things that I have been working on for a long time.

But more importantly, I want to work on my mental health.

I am overwhelmed with everything going on in the world and it would be so easy to retreat and hide. But the more I learn about racism the more I know that I cannot use my mental health as an excuse to avoid hearing these stories. I need to find a purpose and actionable things to do whenever I hear stories of police brutality or racism. I need to find a way to not let these affect my mental health because I need to be a source of amplification of voices who may not have the same privilege that I do. I need to find a way to turn this activism into a positive thing for me and not an upsetting thing. This is a huge shift in my mindset, but I know it will be for the better. If these situations don’t make me run and hide but instead make me feel like I can help and seek ways to do so, I will be a better ally for so many people. I will likely be able to handle other stress in my life as well, but that is not my focus. My main focus is to turn the feeling of being overwhelmed or sad into the push to get to action.

I have already been working on this idea. Yesterday was Blackout Tuesday where we were not supposed to post on social media. Originally, I thought that meant we were supposed to stay off of social media and I was planning on doing that. It would be an easy way to avoid and hide from things. But my friends corrected me and said it was not about being silent but about sharing and amplifying the voices that should be heard right now. And that’s what I did. I found posts from leaders in the Black Lives Matter community and shared them. I took time to educate myself, find reading and watching lists, and followed new accounts that I know would continue to share information. I didn’t hide and avoid things because that would have been easier. I took in the information, which wasn’t always easy, and made sure to share it. And I feel like I felt better doing that than I would have if I didn’t.

Hopefully, I will be able to continue to strengthen and repair my body and mind this month. My mind is the priority to me because I know that being able to be focused and taking action is more time-sensitive. I know that it is needed now. And I am hoping that doing that will lead to other positive changes with my mindset and how I react to things that might be negative or upsetting. I want to be a voice of change and not a silent supporter.

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Feeling Sick Just Isn’t Fun (or I Was Already Doing Nothing)

Posted on May 21, 2020 | Comments Off on Feeling Sick Just Isn’t Fun (or I Was Already Doing Nothing)

When I was put on antibiotics after my visit to urgent care, I was very grateful because I did want my leg to feel better. And I’m glad to say that now, I’m almost totally better. I knew it wouldn’t be completely fixed by the antibiotics because I do still have an autoimmune disease and the flare is brought on by that. But now, it’s what a normal flare is like for me and not something that is causing me intense pain or issues trying to walk.

This was only the second time I went on antibiotics for my autoimmune disease. I know that it can almost seem like a miracle cure because it does help a lot. The other time I was on antibiotics, I wasn’t having a bad flare. But my old dermatologist wanted to see what would happen. I went along with it, but I knew that it probably wasn’t going to do much. I knew it would temporarily fix it, but that it doesn’t cure the disease. It’s a temporary fix until another flare happened. But I did it and it was great to be without any flares for a few weeks.

But when I was on antibiotics that time, I also got very sick. Because it’s a very powerful broad-spectrum antibiotic, it doesn’t just kill one type of bacteria. It can kill lots of bacteria in your body. When I was on the antibiotics back then, I didn’t really think about that happening so I was surprised when I got so sick. And there are a lot of things you can’t take when on antibiotics because of how it interacts in your body. The good thing was that I did feel better pretty soon after stopping the antibiotics. But the time that I was sick was just not fun. All I wanted to do while I was sick was sit at home on the couch or in bed and do nothing.

And sitting at home doing nothing is already pretty much what I have been doing. So when I was put on antibiotics last week, I knew that not much would necessarily change in my life except I might feel pretty cruddy. I was lucky this time and I didn’t start feeling sick until day 3 or 4 of the antibiotics. It mainly felt like a stomach bug. Unfortunately, most things you take when you have a stomach bug aren’t things you can take on antibiotics (basically, you can’t do anything that might change how your body absorbs medication through your stomach). I was a bit more proactive this time and asked the doctor at urgent care what I could be prescribed ahead of time since I was anticipating feeling sick. And I did get some stuff that helped me and I was so glad I didn’t have to go back to the hospital to pick up anything. I was able to stay home and not leave my house. Which again, isn’t much different from what I’ve been doing already.

Normally, being home and doing nothing is a break from regular life. This time, it was just more of the same. I think because it was what I was already doing, it did take a bit more of a toll on my mental health. I wasn’t depressed, but I was very moody and easily upset because I was feeling so sick. Doing nothing and resting has lost its novelty because I’ve been doing that for so long already. But I didn’t have an option to do anything different so I just had to suck it up and get through it.

I’ve been off the antibiotics for a few days now, and I’m finally feeling better from them. I still have a bit of an uneasy stomach, so I’m trying to eat things that I know have good bacteria in them to rebalance my body. And I know I will be fine soon. The difference between the last day of taking the antibiotics and now is huge. I’m probably 80% back to feeling normal. And the last bit will just take some time and before I know it, this will all just be a memory.

As upset and annoyed as I was by being sick this last time, I guess I can be a bit grateful that there was nothing on my schedule that I had to miss. I didn’t have to skip a party or an event I was looking forward to. I only had plans to do nothing. So that was one thing I didn’t have to worry about or feel distressed about. But I still don’t want to be sick again during quarantine (outside of routine nausea I have to deal with). I’m already feeling a bit bored with not having anything to do. Being bored with nothing to do and feeling sick is even worse. At least it’s done now.

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