I Do So Love Class

Today wasn't too bad of a day, despite it being rainy and a little cold. I got to wear my armwarmers that Bran got me for christmas <3, and I went to see my NP, who is always lovely. I hated having to tell him about going back on more pharmaceuticals, but he was understanding and we focused more on digestion. He is a kind person, so i'm always glad to see him.

On the other hand, I was late for class >.> but since I have a disability impact statement exactly for this reason (and I was walking around with my cane) my lecturer wasn't bothered (and took the time during break to catch me up :) ). I'm so thankful to go to a school with such kind lecturers. 

Pain wasn't too bad today, although for the past few days my ankles have been going out. So I used my cane to make sure I wouldn't trip. My R knee went out once and my feet keep falling asleep but otherwise I was alright. I need to make an appointment with the osteopath I was seeing before, but i'm hopeful things will start to even out soon. 

Oh, and no sign of the maggots. Thank The Gods!

Visit with the NP

I had a nice meeting with my Naturopath today. We've decided that it might be a good idea to up my romotiv (it's a mix of hops and st.john's wort mostly) and add in the magnesium powder to see if it will help with pain and muscle problems. Other than that keep steady with cutting out gluten, sugar, and dairy. Fun stuff.

I cooked a chicken. It didn't end up being raw this time ;).

Biochem and Panko

Here is to getting back into the swing of things. Today I went to go see my Naturopath. He's been a real trooper with helping me deal with all off the symptoms and emotional problems that go along with being chronically ill. We've found some things that work (in this care, very well for anxiety) and lots of things that haven't. But that's life I suppose. We are trying to raise my energy from a different path this time, utilising a specific amino acid that I forgot the name of and will tell you about tomorrow. He went on about how it assists with mitochondria producing more atp and allowing acytle-CoA something something science biochem......I actually did understand it at the time thanks to my biochemistry course.

On a completely different note, i've found a really good way to panfry chicken. It uses panko instead of flour or bread crumbs :D. Turned out nice and crunchy to go ontop of our salads. Yay sort-of healthy!

Tall Stack

It's been almost a month since I last updated. Oh, and what a month it has been!

I ended up getting food poisoning and being quite ill for two weeks, this ended with me deferring one of my exams. I also ended up going off my meds because obviously there is no point in taking them if they just go through you (or potentially make your immune system even less able to help).

Being off my meds has brought on some interesting symptoms though. I've found i'm much more cognitively impaired at times (brain fog) which would mean that is an autoimmune aspect and not a mystery fibro symptom. I've also started developing psoriasis plaques again. Which would mean I do indeed have psoriatic arthritis and no sero-negative rheumatoid (though it's possible that could develop at any time). I've kept off my pharmaceuticals so I can show this to my doctor on wednesday.

I have gone back on my naturopathic medicine, and while I definitely see the benefit in the anti-anxiety and anti-depression herbs (St. john's wart, hops, and valerian with passion flower extract as an emergency for panic attacks), I don't think i've had much help with the saligesic or the herbs that are meant to help with energy. But considering most of my pain is fibro, i'm not too surprised. I also tried taking some magnesium, but it caused stomach upset. My next course of action is to go back to Mark the acupuncturist and see if that will help.

In other news, I am a permanent resident. That actually doesn't mean so much...they can't kick me out as easily. In a year I can apply for citizenship. I can access centrelink if need be (although Bran is thankfully earning a good living, thus I cannot access anything). And I pay domestic prices for uni. But I am not able to get the HELP debt (which is a gov't loan for school which you start paying back once you earn a certain wage). Which I thought I could get... So i'll likely only be going to school part time this year and hopefully finding a job.

I got a new phone. It's shiny.

Finally, i've gone to a few more meet-ups. One of my usual pagan ones, one for a fibromyalgia group, and one for a different pagan group. The fibro one was nice, it was good to be able to talk about things with people who understand a bit more. The other pagan one was quite fun and i'd like to meet up with them again. Quite a lively bunch! We had a nice discussion about crystals, contacting the other side, and a bit about older magic systems. I also had the opportunity to try mead, which I quite enjoyed.

Thats about it for me. I'll try to get back in the habit of regular updates.

STRESS

Oh. My. Goodness. It's been a very stressful last few days. My anxiety has been increasing anyway as I have final exams coming up, my family hasn't contacted me, as well as dealing with the ever ongoing pain and problems that come along with PsA and fibro. Now i'm having problems with my neighbour. I wont go into too much detail, our dog scared her cat and that caused some upset. I can understand that, I just hate knowing that someone who shares a wall with us is mad. Plus I know Milo didn't mean any harm :( he just hasn't met a cat....but it also puts a stop on our plan to adopt a cat until we know Milo will calm down.

Anyway, it's all caused too much stress and I was really starting to break down. My naturopath gave me another herbal tablet and a vial of passion flower extract to help deal with anxiety, i'm very thankful for that as i've been able to function much better for the past day and a half than I have for the previous week! Which is good, as I have a very busy week of meeting with my GP, rheumatologist, and osteopath. I met with my OT already today to deal with my wrist brace hurting my thumb, as well as class and getting blood drawn for my monthly tests.

Honestly, i'm tired and really in pain from my wrist, elbow, hips, feet, jaw and ankle. But my back is feeling mostly better! It's nice knowing I have some people on my health care team who are doing their best to help.

Osteopath and Ocular Migraines

Time for an update. I'm off the low carb thing, I started getting ocular migraines and losing weight is just not worth hallucinating.

My R wrist and elbow have been acting up the past few days. I can still use them, but since seeing the OT they have just been grumpy. My jaw is also back to being painful. I'm trying to figure out of maybe there was some trigger that caused it. Sugar maybe? Too much gluten? I'm too tired to try to cut anything else out of my diet right now. Though i'm likely to go visit a Naturopath that focusses for on allergies and diet soon, as suggested by my Osteopath. Speaking of osteopath, she's quite nice. A bit more hard edged than my lovely naturopath, but in a good way. Though she did give me the "sexual abuse is linked to obesity is linked to fibromyalgia" speech. I know that it is their job as a holistic practitioner, but how many times do I need to be told i'm fat? *sigh* But her manipulations have definitely been helping my hip/knee pain and tightness. Not as much the second time around but I can still notice a distinct difference.

She also brought up the anti-TNF meds, which was interesting. My rheumy doesn't want me going on them though as he feels the pain I experience is all fibro because my blood tests are fine. Except from my understanding fibro pain is more in the muscles, and while I do get pain in my muscles a lot of my pain is in the joints. I'm going to have to see my rheumy again soon as I got my MRI results, though i'm dragging my feet :P.

Aaanyway, other than that my energy levels haven't been bad. I went on a crazy 20 minute cleaning spree and got the kitchen and bathroom clean (mostly, the floor is Bran's job ;) ). Still getting good results from the naturopathic medicine as far as my back pain goes. We're going to take Milo to the dog park for the first time in a while, poor thing. He'll be happy that he gets to run around.

Low Carb and High Fees

Low carbing continues. It's pretty neat in a way, because it's forcing me to utilise some flours i've never used before in order to create low carb options for breading and baked goods. I'm using quinoa flour currently, we all know how good quinoa is and now I can make brownies out of it! ;) Haha, I did have a day off yesterday where I ate chips and a sugary drink (and a piece of banana bread <3) but i'm back on it today! It isn't going bad, though I do not see this as a long term option for me.

In other news i've been reminded again that I owe most of this semesters fees >.>. I do know I owe it, and we are working out a solution, but i'd rather not get the harassing calls. I have spoken with people in the office, I wonder if there is a lack of communication...hm.

I've been feeling a bit better recently as well. Still getting fatigued, but physically i've been not as sore. I'm saying it's from the new naturopathic meds. So i'm going to try and fit in more walking with Milo :) we had a nice half our walk today around a nearby park, and other than him getting some prickles in his paws (poor baby :( he needs little doggy boots!) it was quite good! Though my ankles are not very happy. We'll see what tomorrow brings.

Surprise MRI

I had my visit with the neurosurgeon about my back today. It was just so workcover can figure out whats going on really. He said basically i'll be fine, just that there isn't a particular time frame of when i'll start feeling better (the back injury, anyway). So i'm not really sure what workcover is going to do with this information...

Anyway, I also got to jump ahead in line for my right hand MRI! This will show whether the arthritis has damaged my joints yet. Despite the fact that I only put in the request today, they had a cancelation so i'm up tomorrow afternoon. I'm not really sure what I want it to show...of course I don't want there to be damage, since that is irreversible and bad, but part of me wants to have something to show to my rheumatologist to say "See! Told ya! Now I would like it if you gave a crap!". We'll just have to see. It'll be good to get a baseline anyway for in the future to judge if any/how much damage is done in a specific time period. If there is damage, it'll also help say whether it is PsA or RA. I'm not really digging either, but there are some different ways they are treated.

On a very good note, my Naturopath has me on some new tablets that I think are helping. One is a pain tablet which I do notice helping, since I can tell when it wears off (lol). Another is one thats meant to help me calm down and sleep better. I think it's helping, I did sleep well last night. The last is st. john's wart which has anti-depressant/anti-anxiety properties. That one has for sure helped me get off the stupid cymbalta! I've actually not has any brain zaps today, and even over the past two weeks they've been bearable and decreasing. I feel a bit bad that I wasn't able to tolerate the liquid mixes he made, i'm not sure if it was the alcohol base or what...but I just couldn't do it.

Now i'm off to bed to prepare for another full day tomorrow of class, MRI, and a doctors appointment all in different areas of town >.> Yay!

Tired

I've tried to think of something interesting to write, but honestly i'm just very tired. I'm not at my worst point pain wise, but I am sore. I'm just really tired both physically and mentally from dealing with diseases and my body falling appart on me. I'm only 23 but i'm already dealing with a seronegative arthritis,  degenerative disc disease, fibromyalgia, facet joint degeneration, nerve damage, some mental health difficulties (PTSD and depression related to it), and all the fun stuff that comes with the medicines for said diseases/conditions and of course my previous emergency microdiscectomy which kicked it all off (I think).

I'm not saying my life is awful or woe is me, I know i'm lucky to be in a country where healthcare is covered by taxes or is relatively inexpensive. I'm very lucky to have a loving husband and supportive in-laws. I'm lucky in that I can still walk, and that my pain isn't worse than it is.

I'm just tired.

Even over my "vacation" from school I was still running around dealing with health related meetings.

On a lighter note, I have some new herbal mixtures to try that focus a bit more on fibromyalgia and CFS. I do so love talking to my new naturopath, David :) he is such a funny guy. He also doesn't mind explaining what the different herbs do and whatnot.

Well, now i'm off to attempt to get some housework done before the end of the day.

Naturopath Appointment

I had an interesting meeting with a new naturopath today :). My other (lovely) naturopath had to take time away for family reasons, so he recommended this one (also lovely). He was so funny! And once he found out I am a naturopathy student he was happy to tell me all about the different herbs and supplements he was prescribing and took a picture of my iris and told me about it (iridology).

He said that the rings around the grey/blue/green parts my iris meant that I have had a lot of stress throughout my life that I haven't let go of (sounds like the psychic when she said that I have so much worry in me that if someone reached in and took it away I would crumble!). And that the wiggly fibers meant that I had a lot of worries on my mind. The ring around the middle represents my gut and that it is very out of whack, especially my stomach which apparently isn't digesting correctly (not enough stomach acid?).

My eyeball

He also let me peek in when he was making up the herbal extract mixture and let me smell the different extracts he put in ^__^ it was very exciting! *naturopathy-nerding out* It was great being able to talk to him and get a good idea of what he was prescribing and what autoimmune arthritis means in naturopathic terms.  The only down side is that he wants me to go back off gluten *grumble* but i'll do it if it'll help.

Nice People

Sometimes you just need a single person to be nice to you. For me, I deal with medical professionals quite a bit. They can be grumpy and a bit brisk. Thankfully I have a lovely gp, but it is very much a business relationship there. Then I met my lovely Naturopath :D. My goodness is he wonderful! He is the type of person you wish all doctors were like, he explains things without needing to be asked, he is not brisk, takes his time, chats but not too much, and actually cares what is going on. He actually said I could call/email/text him if I had any questions or concerns and to make sure I keep him up to date with how I feel! This may not sound like much, but i've never had a doctor even say I could call them with questions. :) He seems to really be interested in helping me get healthy and not just treating me. It's really refreshing.

And he didn't charge me for our appointment today, because he didn't actually help do anything. Despite being there for 45 minutes. That, to me, is the sign of a true medical professional. He isn't in it for the money, but to help people. That is the kind of naturopath I strive to be like :). I may be gushing a bit at this point....>.>

He also said I could go back on wheat, which makes me happy.

In other news I actually had coffee with a friend today, talk about stepping out of the box XD. It's nice to be getting anxiety under control a bit more.

Still feeling nauseous from the mtx, but the Naturopath told me to seep the ginger tea for 15 minutes and not 3 >.> hopefully that will help.

Pain: hands, WRISTS, ELBOWS, SHOULDERS, hips, R ankle, big toes, STERNUM