I Will Not Suffer In Silence

My husband had woken me up about two hours after my last journal entry, to say he was going to take off to game night, unless I needed him to stay with me. I pleaded with him to stay. He said he would, but that he just didn’t know what to do if I was going to spend the rest of the day sleeping.
I told him that made me feel guilty - that he should just go to game, then.

It was clear he didn’t want to leave me alone, but he didn’t want to not be with his friends. It took me about 20 minutes or so to rouse myself out of my pain and pain medication stupor, but I told him “why don’t I just go with you to game, then?”

He liked that idea.

We collected my heating pads, my meds, the laptop in case I wanted to blog or attempt any homework, and two books; one for school and one for pleasure.

We got to our friend’s house and to my dismay, it smelled like smoke. I have a smoke allergy/chemical sensitivity. I was grouchy at my friend C - “WHY DID YOU SMOKE IN YOUR HOUSE.”
C replied, “Yeah but that was hours ago.”

I resigned to my fate - I was stuck here. My husband was already setting up the kitchen table for game night.

I was told where I could make myself comfortable, and I was told that a friend J, who lives in that house, was downstairs with a burst ovarian cyst. I didn’t want to disturb her unless I heard her crying out in pain, so I stayed upstairs in my own little world of pain.

I tried to heat up my heating pads, only to be reminded that they do not have a microwave in that house. I was directed to a big heating pad and was allowed to use that.

The offending smoker friend also helped set me up on his wireless network, but the moment I was set up, I was suddenly exhausted again and so I put the laptop away. I couldn’t even keep my eyes open long enough to hold conversation with anyone, watch TV, or read a book.

A third friend, also named J, who lives in that house, was also not feeling well. He sat in the living room on his laptop the entire night. He’s had spinal cord injury and had surgery after surgery to cauterise nerves. He thinks nerves are growing back or something, and is in a lot of pain again. I gave him one of my Tylenol 3 because he did not have any Norco on him.

At one point, around 8pm, the stabbing right side ovarian pain returned. I ended up on the floor, moaning in pain, rocking to and fro, with the heating pad. I was on all fours, then on my back, and then I settled into an arm chair w/ ottoman for the rest of the night. Their crazy cat October decided to be nice for once, and curled up on my tummy and purred all night. I was told she only likes women, and likes women best when they are in pain - that is the ONLY time that cat is nice.
Crazy cat.

So, the pain I had on Sunday lasted through until after 10pm, despite the fact that the bleeding had subsided again. My abs and ribs still felt bruised all that day.

I got home, showered, changed into my bedclothes, and went to bed.

Woke up Monday morning pain-free and got ready for my first day back to work. I was still spotting a little. I decided to try riding my bike to work, but as I went out the door to go to work, the pain set back in, and so I abandoned the bicycling idea and drove the measly one mile to work, instead. Glad I did. I needed my energy at work to move stuff around and help set up for the new school year.
I required a total of 800mg Advil to get through the day.

Got home and was very tired, but went on to my psychology appointment. I’m seeing a shrink again ever since I had a major depressive episode at the end of July. I’m still trying to figure out if it was JUST all the stress I have been under from school and finances, or if the Cannabidiol I tried for pain management set off an even worse episode of pre-existing stress and depression.
I evened out by August 18, but that was three weeks of pure hell from one menstrual cycle right up into this next menstrual cycle, which started on August 19. I am still on anti-anxiety meds (ativan).

I spent the rest of Monday evening hanging out with my husband, making and eating dinner, and watching TV. No homework got done on Monday.

Today is a new day - I start the clock so to speak - I have 21 days til next bedridden. Today I will go to work (not sure if driving or biking yet - it’s supposed to be in the 90s today so I guess biking would be better on the ozone), and when I get home, I will force myself to do some more homework.

In about 8 days, I will have Mittelschmerz - so the middle of next week - the first week the children are back to school. Hopefully it will go easy on me while I navigate my first week in the classroom.

One last thing - about last week sometime, I developed a cough again. So this is the second virus / cough since July 18 that I have caught. And now I’m going to enter a new school year with preschoolers. I expect to be sick continually in one form or another until December. I am pounding Vitamin C and Zinc and all the rest of my supplements, and will be back in the gym by no later than Thursday this week, once the heat wave cools down. Today is Day 2 of the first heat wave of the Northern California Summer.

The drugs and the pain did take me down pretty hard Saturday morning. I went back to sleep on the couch, and didn’t get up til around 1:30pm. I went to the bedroom to change out of my pajamas, and ended up going back to bed!! I didn’t get up again until my landlady called me at 2:23pm.

I put on some street clothes and had to deal with the landlady - her husband finally replaced the hard-wired smoke detector/carbon monoxide detector, and they inspected the source of the banging pipes we’ve been complaining about. The sprinkler system hasn’t been going on in the morning, but the pipe system outside clicks, and the pipes in the walls bang from the vibration/pressure. They never did tell me if they FIXED the pipe issue. I’ll find out tomorrow morning if the pipes begin banging again.

After the landlords stopped by, I felt sufficiently awake to tackle some homework. I spent the rest of the day doing homework, until 11pm. I FINALLY finished binder #3 out of 5 for the Language Arts class I took in July. The remaining two binders are about 50 pages each, and hopefully I don’t have much to illustrate, as a lot of them are just word lists. Then it’s on to the Mathematics binder, which is only half finished. I still have 70-something illustrations to do for that binder, plus photographs and quotations.
There’s more - LOTS more - but I’ll just focus that far ahead for now so I don’t have a panic attack.

Getting back to how my body did for the rest of the day - the bleeding and the pain both subsided. I had stabbing right side ovarian pain intermittently throughout the day, and my lower back hurt pretty bad at times, but for the most part, I was feeling much better Saturday afternoon than I had felt in the morning.

Around 7pm, however, the pain started ramping up again, and the bleeding resumed, although it was not heavy. As a precaution, I took another 600mg Advil and a Tylenol 3, so, total medication for Saturday was 1,200mg Advil, and two Tylenol 3.

Once I finished with my homework, I pushed myself to work a little bit more by scrubbing down the shower and tub with Borax after my shower, so that I could soak in the tub. My reward was a nice long soak in hot epsom salt and lavender bubble water. Ahhhhhhhh.

My low and mid back is still too tight for comfort, but the rest of me is relaxed jello goodness. Wish my husband was home to give me a massage - he’s still out with friends, and it’s after 1am. *grumble* I texted him and he didn’t answer. NOT COOL. So I called him. *relief* he’s driving a friend home and will be on his way home soon.

Two last things before I go:

The nausea is still an issue - intermittently throughout the day Saturday, and it kicked up again after my soak in the tub tonight.

Last night before I went to bed for the night, I tried to remember some Chi Nei Tsang stuff I was taught a couple years ago. Basically, I just pushed and held gently along the connective tissue near my belly button. I was hoping this would help with the pain and maybe slow the bleeding, but it was a total fail. On the other hand, I had a very nice bowel movement when I woke Saturday morning - the Chi Nei Tsang if nothing else always gets the bowels moving smoothly…

I knew you wanted to get that bit of TMI as the end of my journal entry. It’s only appropriate to happen at the end!

Okay, okay, I’m going, now. Good night.

Yesterday’s running thought was, “I cannot for the life of me believe that this much blood can keep coming out of me.”

The flow is usually heavy for several hours, then it dies down.

It never died down yesterday.

I turned in for the night after midnight and was still bleeding heavily and whimpering in pain and had nausea. My abdomen and stomach muscles all feel like I’ve been doing situps.

Actually, that may be true…yesterday was the first day I forced bedrest for much of the day, rather than continue sitting in the hard chair in the kitchen. Although it was easier on the pelvic pain to sit in that hard chair, I wanted badly to be under warm blankets and SLEEPING. So I forced the bedrest. Once in bed, I was restless and could not sleep for very long - due to the pain - so I kept sitting up.
Going from prone to sitting up uses the abdominal muscles. Perhaps I strained myself.

Or perhaps I’m bleeding so much that it’s “normal” for my abs to feel all bruised like this. I don’t know which scenario is true, and whether I should be concerned/scared…but the emotional truth is that I am really scared.

I woke up a few times during the night to go to the toilet, and even in the wee hours, I was still filling the bowl with blood - and also big clots. I kept saying to myself, “It’s never this heavy for this long. What is wrong?”

Both my gynecologist office and my local doctor herself called me back yesterday to tell me that all this bleeding is NOT caused by the endometrioma on my left ovary - that the ovary itself does not produce blood - that the bleeding is caused by the shedding lining of the uterus - that it must have just been extra thick lining this month.

And yet, every woman I’ve talked to who has dealt with ovarian cysts and/or endometriomas has said that they have encountered super heavy bleeding. My online friend V said she went through FOUR pads in one hour a few days ago!!! She also has an endometrioma.

Also, Mayo Clinic, the U.S. governmental Women’s Health page, and wikipedia all tell me that abnormal bleeding can be the result of having an ovarian cyst and/or endometrioma. These sites even mention the ‘bruised ribs’ / ‘worked out abs’ feeling I am experiencing - as being ‘normal’ for one who has an ovarian cyst or endometrioma.

So my endo sisters and the Internet ease my panic and fears over all this heavy bleeding, while once again, my doctors dismiss my experience.

I woke in pain at 7am, after emotional dreams. My best friend from high school and my best friend from back in 2002 - both who left me - was morphed into one person in the dream, and she was re-establishing contact with me to introduce me to her wife and show me her toddler son. She had been uneasy about this little reunion, because she thought I’d be mad at her for coming out of the closet, since I’d had a crush on her and she’d spurned me. I just wanted everything to be okay between us again. It was very awkward and emotional.

Anyway, I got out of bed and went and stood in the kitchen eating some food so that I could take more medication without running the risk of a stomach ache. I took an entire Tylenol 3, 600mg Ibuprofen, and .5mg Ativan.

I cannot remember how much medication I consumed yesterday. I think it was a total of three Tylenol 3 pills in a 14 hour period, and 1,200mg Ibuprofen, and .5mg Ativan.

My pain yesterday never got below a 7 on the pain scale, and was often hovering near 8. I need to also note that I’ve had annoying ‘growing pain’ type pain in the left leg all throughout this cycle.

In graphic terms, it would look like this on the Allie Brosh pain scale:

But when I woke at 7am this morning, still bleeding heavily and passing big clots, I became even more scared. I kept saying to myself, “The bleeding is supposed to have tapered off by now.” This put me in the Allie Brosh pain scale graphic of:

The drugs have kicked in, so I’m going back to bed. I lose another productive morning to the pain. I hope I do not lose the entire day like I did yesterday. There’s so much homework still to be done. I return to work on Monday. I had completely hoped I would have all of my homework done by the time I returned to work. Because of my emotional meltdown at the end of July and into the first three weeks of August, and because of the endometriosis pain last cycle and this cycle, I have lost MANY DAYS of productive homework time.

I hate this illness. I hate it. HATE. IT.

I am spotting today. I woke up fine with no low back pain or any back pain. I had no cramps. I was in the kitchen eating breakfast when the cramps and the hypoglycemia hit. This is at least Day 4 or 5 of having hypoglycemia issues. The last time I had to deal with that on a regular basis was when I was eating gluten and yeast.

Okay and sugar.

So I have to cut the sugar addiction once again. Blah.

Anyway, the low back pain is starting to set in. I did not take any ibuprofen yesterday like I said I would. Today - right now - I’m popping 400mg Ibuprofen. I’ve been wearing a panty-liner for the past two days, but now I definitely need it cuz as I said, I’ve begun spotting this morning. Super light pink.

This is of course just PERFECT, because I’m supposed to make up a missed class for Language Arts tomorrow and possibly Friday.

Great. Perhaps I’ll just go in today at lunchtime and see what all I can talk to the teacher about, and photograph, and illustrate. Yes. That sounds like a plan. Do that now before the horrific pain sets in.

Planning my entire life around the pain - that’s me.

When I woke this morning, it was before my alarm went off, and it was because my lower back hurt so bad that I wanted to cry. This is the same pain I get every month right before george arrives.
I got up and moved around, and the pain eased up, but then the hypoglycemia set in.

So far this morning, I have eaten two bowls of cereal, a homemade 16oz goat-milk yoghurt smoothie with bananas and strawberries, and two gluten free waffles with cinnamon and gluten-free, dairy-free buttery spread. That was two hours ago, and I’m already hungry again.

So far this morning, I have had brain fog due to the hypoglycemia, I am still wrestling with low-grade pelvic pain and the constant need to check to see whether george is here, and I’ve nearly cried three different times.

I have not pre-medicated this week. I should start taking the ibuprofen today. I always have doubts that it does any good, but whatever.

Last night before bed, I tried to do some Tibetan Relaxation, which turned into leg lifts because I have had restless legs and scattered energy and no focus going on…for weeks now (it’s part of the depression and mania I’ve been going through, lately).

About half an hour ago, I spent ten solid minutes jogging in circles around inside the house to let off some energy and clear the brain fog a bit. I think it worked, though my legs are still bouncy.

I have homework to do. I am so woefully behind on endo blogging on the main website and on the youtube and twitter pages related to endo. I need to clone myself, or learn how to better manage my time.

The spotting is very faint, now. There is no cramping today, though I did need a heating pad on my entire back and shoulders last night.

I slept for 11 hours overnight. This is the second time in a week that I’ve done this. I think I’m still catching up on my sleep deficit, acquired over the past six weeks when I was in summer school every weekday from 8am - 5pm. My last class was last Friday.
When commuting, I had to be up at 5am. When staying in a hotel, I did not sleep well and had to be up at 6am. So I think I’m just catching up on my sleep.

Tonight, my husband goes off to yet another game convention. He’s sharing a hotel room with several of his buddies, and says the total cost comes to $50 (minus, of course, food and sundries)…

I plan to stay locked in and working on homework all weekend, and eating whatever is left in the fridge, freezer and cupboards. Ugh. I am so spoiled and not looking forward to grazing or making do with what we have. I did not grow up so spoiled - in my childhood through my teen years, we had to make do, and we ate a lot of canned food and government rations. I am still haunted by the cheese bricks and the giant plastic containers of honey that hardened immediately.
Once I left home, I spent years doing what I wanted, food-wise and expense-wise, because I couldn’t in childhood.

Now I’m forced to look at mac ‘n cheese meals again.

Meh.

Today the pain and bleeding have subsided. I have only had minor pain with the occasional stabbing in both ovaries and the uterus. I’m still constipated. I have not had any pain meds yet today.

I’m still sick with a cough and chest congestion. I have not taken any cough syrup for it yet today, because it has codeine in it, which is constipating. I’m just coughing the junk up. Maybe tonight I’ll take more cough syrup.

Today I had an appointment with the pain management shrink, so I checked our financial status to see where I should pull money for the co-pay and parking fees. This is when I got a huge shock; apparently the school decided to deposit two checks at the same time after having held onto them for a couple of weeks. Apparently I had budgeted the money, assumed the checks were cashed, and continued spending money from the account without looking. This is something I always do. I have created lists and lists. I have printed my account balances out. I have tried spreadsheets and checkbook registers….and STILL I do not keep a tight enough mental handle on my money. STILL it flies out the door unchecked.
This time around, I even went so far as to print out the bank statements nearly every week and set it on my husband’s desk so he could provide the ‘checks and balances’ - the oversight - in case I had failed.

Well, he didn’t look at the balances too closely, or didn’t care. Worse, he didn’t keep the printouts with my side margin maths. He thinks he just glanced at the stuff and threw it away. There goes the oversight!

So we are in the hole - the joint account is completely drained, with bouncing checks and overdraft fees. My personal bank account has less than $300 in it (I need at least $300 in order to not be fined each month for falling below balance).

And there’s my credit cards - both are maxed out; one is at $2K and the other is at $6K. Most of that damage happened in May, 2009 for the honeymoon, and the cards were finished off in May, 2010 when we went to Michigan. Payments on those cards are due in the next week.

So now I owe my own husband over $1,000, and I still owe my employer at least $100 for a hotel stay during summer school, and I still owe the training school $325 for the last class I took.

Then there’s the medical bills - I owe hundreds of dollars in co-pays for the MRI, the ultrasound and the Emergency Room visit I had because of a co-worker wearing Chanel perfume to work - who knew I’d go nearly anaphylactic?

The school costs and the credit cards are due ASAP. The medical bills can wait.

I have ongoing appointments with all kinds of medical professionals - acupuncture, the head of pain management, the pain management shrink, and massage. I can no longer afford any of this unless my husband hands me the cash on the spot.

I’m going to make yet another list for him tonight, because he said he will crunch numbers and see what he can offer me.
He’s already paying all of the rent, most of the groceries, and all of the bills. *sigh*

I am not scheduled to return to work til the end of August. I have so much homework that I NEED that time off, anyway.

The financial mess I’ve gotten us into has wrecked me emotionally. I thought I’d planned well enough to avoid this, and yet here we are. I cried at the pain management shrink today, but not about the finances. I cried about my illness necessitating all of these appointments. I skirted around the financial issue and focused on the quality of life issue. I said I just want to go back to ‘blissful ignorance’ and just stop trying to MANAGE this illness, when it just seems that there’s no managing it.
The truth is that I NEED to learn how to manage my stress and my pain, so I NEED these pain management clinics. I just think however that I can get what I NEED for FREE through the dispensaries, thanks to my Prop. 215 certification. So I’ll make out the list of services I need and see if I can get everything I need from the dispensaries, and sadly I will have to fire UCSF because it’s a huge financial drain.

In other news:
Today I am starting the kidney and liver detox diet. It lasts one month. I am not going to do the gallstone flush at the end of the month, because I do not believe it works. I do however still believe in the detox itself. Here are the details:

DETOX WEEK 1

Night before first day - Make kidney tea.
1 Tbs. Tea mix into 1 cup cold water in non-metal pot (enamel or glass)
Heat to boiling point (do not boil) and then turn down to simmer for 20 minutes. Leave out overnight. Can be made a few days at a time, extra to be refrigerated.
Warm (do not boil) before drinking.

Breakfast: (or at any time of day) Kidney Tea: Strain tea. Warm and drink one cup.

Supplements before meal: 2 clove capsules

Supplements with meal:
1 ginger
1 Uva Ursi

Lunch: Supplements before meal: 2 clove capsules

Supplements with meal: 1 ginger

Dinner: Supplements before meal: 2 clove capsules
7 wormwood capsules

Seven Vegetable Soup OR Parsley Tea 1 cup boiling water, steep a few tbs. chopped parsley for 3 minutes, strain & drink (or at any time of day)

Supplements with meal: 1 ginger
2 Uva Ursi

Before Bed: 3 tsp. Black walnut tincture in 1 cup of water

Make tea for following day if needed

Do not consume caffeine in any form (coffee, sodas, teas, chocolate) as it is counterproductive.

I forgot to make the tea so I’ll do that this afternoon. I forgot to take the 7 Vegetable Soup out of the freezer, so I just did that now and it should be ready for me by tomorrow night.

Just a quick update to say I’ve not had time to check comments for this blog - I’ll get to it this weekend, I promise. :)

I am in my last week of the summer intensive teacher training, but the homework will still follow me for another couple of weeks.

George is due this weekend, so downtime is definitely coming, and I’m not going to be able to focus on my homework too much as a result. In fact, I fear that george will be early, because I’ve been trapped in a room full of women all summer. Last week, my new friend from school, who also has endometriosis, had her painful cycle and I drove her home a couple of times. This week, another classmate who is sitting next to me has gotten her period, and it is unusually painful for her. She’s been sitting in class doubled over her heating pad, trying to get through the lessons. She says she’d normally take time off for her body when the pain is this bad, but she did not want to have to make up the classwork.

I fear the pheremones or hormones or whatnot might be acting on me, along with the horrid diet I have kept, and the high stress I have had - all from being in summer school and living in motels on and off. This week, I have spent the entire week so far in a motel because it got to be too stressful to commute the hour and a half back and forth to school each day. I had no time to get homework done.
In any case, I have been experiencing pelvic pain since Monday morning. I have been on lots of ibuprofen all week. The worst pain day was Tuesday, when I began checking for blood, because I was sure george would arrive any second. I’d say the pain reached 5.5 on the pain scale. It was intermittent shooting death all day, too.

The pelvic pain was on top of the leg, thigh, calf and foot pain I was already experiencing, as I had walked over 8 miles on Sunday for the AIDS Walk. The walk itself is 6 miles, but we walked much further all told, getting to and from our table on the meadow, and all the running around I had to do after the walk to prepare for school the next day.
So it’s been a pretty painful week with these two factors combined. I *still* hurt from the walk.

On top of all of this, I have caught a cold, because several friends are sick and decided to show up to two social events I was at last weekend. I really wish people wouldn’t be so selfish. Yes, I know our friend is turning 40. Yes, I know you signed up for the AIDS Walk. But you are sick. STAY THE HELL HOME. I’m miffed at these people. I don’t know which one of the five it was who got me sick by breathing on me, or if it was all combined, but I’m miffed.

I’m excited to have been able to go on a date with my husband last night - he drove down to see me and intimate fun was had, and no pain afterwards, thank the gods. I’m excited that I might make it through my last day of class today, but fearful that george may show up during my practicum orientation meeting tomorrow.

We’ll see how it goes.

Yesterday I observed something interesting - I had an aggrivated bladder after drinking less than half a 20oz of Mountain Dew Code Red® (which contains corn syrup).

Usually I get uterine pain after consuming anything with corn syrup, but this time it was simulated UTI/overstimulation of the bladder. I had painful urgency for the rest of the day.

This morning, I woke with actual uterine cramping. I’m about a 2.5 to a 3 on the pain scale.
I checked the calendar and confirmed that this is also about the time I would normally experience Mittelschmerz. I usually get this mid-cycle pain on Day 8 of the new cycle, and Day 8 was on July 13. So I am at Day 9 and 10 when the bladder and uterine pain hit, and of course it was totally instigated by ingesting corn syrup. I might have not had mittelschmerz otherwise. Ah well.

I also don’t normally cave in to corn syrup anymore. I’ve been in summer school for teacher training, and my diet has gone completely to shit. I’ve been eating Wendy’s fast food burgers for chrissakes. Ugh.

I’m also not getting enough sleep - about 4-5 hours a night, and the homework load is a large part of it. Being in a room with 25 women (including the teacher) is also part of the stress load, because this group is the worst classroom dynamic I’ve seen in a long time. I actively only talk to one person in this group. It would have been 2 people but the other person I met last week was only there for last week it seemed. I’ve already had to have a stern talk with one of the women in the class, due to the fact that she’s behaving like a grade schooler. She was actively talking shit about other classmates (including for a large part me and my co-worker) and had the gall to believe no one could overhear her constant string of negativity. She was beside herself with shame when I confronted her quietly after class the other day.

Anyway, the stress level. UGH. The diet is out of control with red meat, sugar, alcohol, caffeine, and chocolate.

I’ve gotten drunk twice this month (manageably drunk - nowhere near staggering or blackout drunk).

I’ve been having IBS-like symptoms all month, because of how much stress I’m under.

I have had several near-panic attacks (the throat feeling like the fluttering/closing up, and the chest pains/tightness, and the nausea and dizziness), which have hit while driving to and from school as well as at home, and I have had one full on panic attack which woke me from sleep. I thought I was having a heart attack until I googled the symptoms and realised this is what I used to regularly experience back in 2000-2002 and was on Xanax for.
Thankfully, my husband has some Xanax leftover from when he had to fly to Michigan (he hates flying). I took one full milligram of it under the tongue that night of the big panic attack, and it calmed me down within 10 minutes.

The next bedridden time is next Saturday, July 24. It’s probably going to be a bad one.

The good news I guess is that after next week, I’ll be done with the summer intensive school program.

Oh - one last thing - on the chemical sensitivity front, I have only been using Dr. Bronner’s soap, and so my fingers have NOT been splitting open! They’ve healed quite nicely, including my thumb! I carry a wee container in my pocket and use it when I’m at school or anywhere that I have to use a public restroom. My husband filled the soap containers at home with the Dr. Bronners, too. So we have no more of that Softsoap in the house. I’m convinced the Triclosan in it has been aggravating my dermatitis.
I also took care of the chemical attacks at school - I bought Trader Joe’s cleaning liquid, which contains clary sage oil, instead of harsh fragrances and chemicals. I filled up the dispensers with it and the women have been using it without complaint, and I don’t have to run from the classroom at quarter to five in the afternoon anymore.

In the stress department, I have sacrificed eating breakfast and getting dressed just to make time for this blog entry on the state of my health, for my own posterity. I have to leave for school in 18 minutes. :(

Today, my own hormones are doing a number on me. I am full on with surging rage.

I was awakened by the recycling truck using its backup sirens for too long, and then idling with its rumbling engine in front of my home. Then the cramps set in - about a 4 on the scale. Then I was journaling and had another flashback to doctors who have pissed me off over the years and that just threw me into a spiral. My heart began racing and I wanted to kill the nearest thing, which happened to be my cat, who was licking plastic bags again. Don’t worry, I didn’t kill her, I just took her bag away. That cat can find any plastic bag or cover in the house. She simply walks away from one confiscated item and finds new plastic to lick. I swear, if she gets tumours, I’ll be sure it’s from all the xenoestrogens she’s licked up off of all the damned plastic bags over the years.

I ate some cereal and took 600mg Ibuprofen, but I’m still restless. Thankfully the pelvic pain has not ramped up, but the pain in general is radiating from my pelvis all the way down my legs to my ankles.
It is rare, but it has done this before. Usually the pain only goes to my knees. It is a dull ache - it feels like I have bicycled for 10+ miles. My hips, thighs, upper legs, knees, calves and ankles feel strained and swollen. My legs are restless, twitchy and painful. I’m drinking water and tea as though I’m trying to ease the dehydration - but I know that it’s not dehydration. It’s just part of what endometriosis puts me through.

I am REALLY tired. I went to bed around 11:30pm last night, but I did not sleep well all night. I kept having more strange dreams and nightmares, and I had to keep getting up to pee (welcome to having a period). The only nightmare I remember was tornado like conditions happening outside. The wind was blowing fiercely and banging things around. The sky outside was dark grey and brown, and the air was brown because of all the dust and dirt flying around. This is California, near the San Francisco Bay, so these conditions are not reality.

According to DreamMoods,

“Tornado

To see a tornado in your dream, suggests that you are experiencing some extreme emotional outbursts and temper tantrums. Is there a situation or relationship in your life that may be potentially destructive?

To dream that you are in a tornado, signifies that you are feeling overwhelmed and out of control. You will be met with a series of disappointments for the next week or so. Your plans will be filled with complications.

To see several tornadoes in your dream, represent people around you who are prone to violent outbursts and shifting mood swings. It may also symbolize a volatile situation or relationship.”

Well, I did get into it with my husband for the past two days over chemicals in the house. His hairspray (Rave) woke me from a dead sleep and rendered me disabled for half the day on Monday. And on Tuesday, he berated me after I began choking when he used the Trader Joe’s lemon scented kitchen hand soap. I thought we agreed to stop using it - I should have thrown it away. I washed my hands with the orange scented dish soap and he said, “And yet you’re okay to use that stuff.”

I read off the short list of natural ingredients to him, had him TRY to read the long list of chemicals in the lemon soap, and then put it in no uncertain terms that he can either accept that I have chemical sensitivity or we can re-evaluate our relationship, because if I have to move out, I will.
That shut him the hell up.

I then informed him that I want this household to be scent free in the next 12 months, which means his hair products especially have to go. I told him I ordered him some unscented hairspray from NationalAllergy.com, and that we’ll have to work on finding scent free hair gel and other stuff. I reordered scent free shampoo and conditioner, and I’ll have him try it out. I already have scent free liquid soap (Dr. Bronner’s) in the bathroom shower, I’m going to make sure that’s available in the kitchen dispenser as well.

*big sigh* Yeah I’m just a pretty picture, aren’t I?

Oh, and the bleeding that started off bright red yesterday? It turned into dark, sticky brown discharge, and continued on like that all day. And it went away overnight! It returned this morning, but as a shadow of itself from yesterday. I expect by the end of today, there will be actual flow happening.

In the meantime, I’m distressingly tired (also welcome to having a period), but I cannot go back to sleep because the brain weasels are in full force today. I’ve got unwanted thoughts and memories returning to my head - stuff dating back 9 or more years. It’s totally unnecessary.

I’m going to take a No-flush Niacin, get some housework done, and try to start on my homework.

If the brain noise does not abate, I’m going to take one of my husband’s xanax pills (they’re leftover from the last time we had to get on an airplane).

1pm update: The brain noise abated and I was able to take care of the clothing issue in the bedroom. That occupied me for about 4 hours. There’s just not enough room because two drawers are taken up with framed pictures that I had to put away because the wall space has to keep going away to make way for upward storage in this small place. So my clothes - clean and dirty - have been just being thrown into piles on the floor for weeks, which really irritates me.
I did get creative though, and I did purge some clothes, so it worked out…mostly. Around noon, the menstrual flow became more pronounced, and with that, the cramps began ramping up. I’m at about a 5.5 on the pain scale at the moment. I just ate some leftover pesto chicken and sweet corn so that I can take half a Tylenol 3 with some more ibuprofen.

To make a visual of it, I’m going to use the Allie Brosh Pain Scale - here’s where I’m at on her scale:

I feel like I’m being bum-rushed outta my house by Hades, and I keep pulling back, saying, “Hang on, just one more minute! I’ll be done in a minute! Wait!”

*sigh*

The sooner I acquiesce and go to the underworld, the sooner I can do my time and be done for the month.

Meh. I’m just so tired of this.

1:35pm edit: Hades took me. I’m fully in the underworld, now. OMG it hurts. :(
Six and a half on the Allie Brosh scale, Seven and a half and moving steadily towards 8 on the Mankoski scale. Inner thighs and tops of legs on fire with nerve pain that’s radiating down from the pelvis. I took a full Tylenol 3 and 400mg Ibuprofen. I’m taking another half a Tylenol 3 NOW dammit. OMG.