Health Journey

This last week was one of the roughest that I have had in a while, and not because I had a flare, but rather because I reacted poorly to a treatment for it. This post will contain triggering topics related to depression and suicide, so you might want to skip this one if those topics bother you. Your browser does not support the audio element. Med Changes To talk about the week, let’s roll back to the week before. If you skipped my last post, the highlight was that my psychiatrist made a couple of adjustments to my meds, which included adding a new one. At first, the new change didn’t seem to do much. At the start of this week, I was feeling even more down than I was the week before, but I kept pushing on. It was strange to me because I wasn’t feeling my normal nerve pain that I get in a flare, but I was feeling my mood plummet. By Tuesday, I was back to not being able to sleep much at all. I was having constant nightmares during the night and kept waking up with my heart pounding. This caused me to go into a bit of a downward spiral as my lack of sleep built up. ...

This week was a rough week, but not because of the nerve pain. In fact, my nerve pain was actually not too bad this week, but I had really troubling issues with my mood. Being depressed is very frustrating because it makes it hard to take care of myself like I should, so it causes everything to compound and can really ruin my week. Your browser does not support the audio element. Starting off the week with low sleep Over the weekend, my wife and I both caught a little cold and I ended up having to take time off from work on Monday. It luckily didn’t cause a flare, but it did make it hard for me to sleep. Sleep is pretty important with whatever is going on for me and I can’t go long without a good night’s sleep without it making all of my issues worse. The strange part is that this time, it didn’t cause much in the way of nerve pain, but what I was instead hit with was almost as bad. ...

This week was full of surprises, but not all of them were the fun kind. I started the week by waking up in a flare on Monday, but I ended the week with an appointment with a rheumatologist (finally!). As I am typing this, I am feeling pretty overwhelmed. I had thought that the flares wouldn’t be so bad since I moved to the new meds that seemed to make the pain almost non-existent. Turns out, even if the pain isn’t what it used to be, there are other symptoms that I should care about. ...

Time to talk about another possible diagnosis for me! This one came about in a rather unexpected way, and I am not sure if I really have it yet, but it seems like a good time to talk about it. I am thinking that it might be interesting for others to see how my views on ADHD change over time, especially if the diagnosis is correct. Your browser does not support the audio element. What is ADHD? First, let’s talk about what I know about ADHD so far. Most of my knowledge is really second-hand because my wife has it and I have seen her struggle with it. To me, it basically comes down to being able to focus. The trouble that I see as an outsider is that she either has too much focus or not enough focus. That is an oversimplification, but it is a good start. At its core, the too much focus is a problem when she wants to ignore people or noises, but she can’t stop herself from seeing, hearing, and feeling all of the external stimuli. She says it can be very overwhelming, and from my viewpoint, she will get so wrapped up in what is happening outside that she doesn’t pay attention to her own mind/body. On the opposite side, if not much is going on around her, she can’t force herself to do something. It is pretty common around our house to find projects and tasks that were started and not finished because they didn’t provide her with enough stimulus to keep focusing on them. ...

I thought it might be a good idea to write a little bit about what my “flares” are since I tend to mention them a lot. Honestly, I was also putting this off a bit because it’s hard to write about them when I am in the middle of one. Since I am past the last one I just had, I figured now is as good a time as I am going to get to talk about it. ...

Time for the obligatory first post! I am excited to be starting another blog, even though this will probably end up being the hardest one for me to write. My goal is to post weekly at first and see how that goes from there. For now, let me give you an overview of what is going on in my life so we are all caught up. Trigger Warning: This post discusses experiences with chronic pain, mental health struggles, and thoughts of self-harm. Please take care while reading and prioritize your well-being. If you need support, consider reaching out to a mental health professional or a trusted person in your life. ...