I Will Not Suffer In Silence

I enjoyed a mere four pain-free days before pelvic pain returned. I don’t know if this was early mittelschmerz or what, but on September 9 and 10, I endured intermittent stinging and stabbing in the uterus all day long.

Then, on September 11, I had to contend with dyspareunia all day. I had intense low back pain with stabbing uterine and cervical pain all day after intimacy.

For two days after being intimate with my husband, I had right side stabbing ovarian pain all day. It made me cry out “OW!” or yelp in pain each time. Around 4pm on September 12, there was continuous pulsing pain for several minutes, and on September 13 I had intermittent stabbing ovarian pain all day again. Despite this, I bicycled to and from work on September 12 and 14.

I was able to enjoy three more pain-free days from September 14 to September 16.

On September 17 (my birthday), dyspareunia ruined all the fun again, and lasted for two days.

I then had three pain-free days before the pre-menstrual pain cycle set in on September 22. To make things worse, I contracted an intestinal virus, which caused mean stomach pain on September 23, leading to diarrhea, which lasted for two days. I felt like I could die. My entire body ached and my mood was more foul than my worst PMS.

Speaking of PMS…stomach flu aside, I have to say that this month’s PMS was the most aggressive and depressing since I was on synthetic hormones. The level of rage I had in the past two weeks equals that which I experienced when I was on Yasmin back in 2007. I phoned my mother to ask when she started menopause, and she thinks it was right around the time we moved houses back in 1983, which would put her at 39 years of age. She gave several instances of being a raging psycho hose beast from hell (which my diaries corroborate).

Well here I am at age 40…so I wonder if I’m starting down the path to menopause. Half of me shouts HOORAY! because the hope is that with menopause, the endometriosis will burn out.
The other half of me is freaking the eff out for two reasons: #1 I still look, act and feel like I’m in my late 20s, and #2 all the other crap that goes with menopause is terrifying to ponder.

Going back to the whole pelvic pain thing…
On September 25, I attended the annual Alameda Home Tour, despite getting over the stomach flu and enduring more pre-menstrual cramps. I was on Tylenol 3 and Ibuprofen all day, but not to the point of stupor – I took half pills of Tylenol 3.

To cap off the day on September 25, I developed a migraine.

I have started tracking the migraines. I also had a migraine back on September 7, and I complained on facebook that I felt like I was having an increase in migraines each month ever since my surgery last December. My friend Wanda is the one who told me it could be tied to my cycle, and to start tracking it, so I went back as far as I could online and in my iCal to see if there was a connection.

Well wouldn’t you know it, there IS, and it goes back YEARS:

September 7, 2011 – Migraine lasting several hours (two days after period ended. Also, it was 86F outside and I was at work in the heat for a couple of hours, then bicycled home).

April 27, 2011 – mild to moderate cramps, migraine from hell, lasting 5 hrs (on first day of period)

January 19, 2011 – light to moderate pelvic pain two days after my period started, “with migraine that lasted five hours, then major pelvic pain and bleeding with cramps at 11pm.”

October 12, 2010 – Migraine noted in facebook (1 day after period ended)

January 29, 2010 – Migraine lasting for several hours on same day spotting started.

January 8, 2010 – Migraine noted in facebook (During period)

December 26, 2009 – Migraine noted in facebook (during Mittelschmerz)

July 9, 2009 – pounding headache two days before period.

April 6, 2009 – moderate headache on 4th day of period.

January 26, 2009 – Migraine noted in facebook (3 days after george ended)

In all, during my supposed uptime, I enjoyed TEN total pain-free days, which were non consecutive. This is dismal compared to the last few months.

Despite having cramps this morning, I did not want to chance taking my car to work, and I had forgotten again to see if there was a quick bus to my workplace…so I bicycled to work. This is the first time in 134 days that I have bicycled! It felt so good. Granted, I live only a mile from my job, but still, any exercise is good exercise. The weather has finally turned from constant winter rain to unseasonably warm and sunny; yesterday it got up to 83°F and today it got up to at least 86°F, so there was no excuse not to bike to work.

Speaking of exercise, I’ve been weight lifting again. Don’t get excited – they’re only 3lb weights. But as I said, any exercise is good exercise. I typically do the weights before bedtime, but I’m trying to get better at lifting when I wake up in the morning, too.

This month has been stressful for three reasons:

• I’ve been sick all month
• My father-in-law’s been in the hospital and just underwent a Transmetatarsal Amputation on Monday of this week
• A classmate who wanted to work with me on the thesis project for graduation has not done anything useful, and I have to fire her.
• Mercury turned Retrograde yesterday.

I detailed my getting sick in this post. I felt like I was getting worse, not better, on that day, but instead of starting in on a new pack of antibiotics, I decided to give it a few more days, since my doctor said the z-pack was supposed to have benefit for 5 days after the last pill. I just didn’t want to have to get a yeast infection. I have enough going on down there as it is with the endo.
I’m still coughing up junk, but not as much. I’m still needing what’s left of my inhaler once a day, usually in the morning. My ears are still clogged and the left ear is still painful, but not all day long anymore. So I guess I’m getting better…

Around about March 25, my arse started bleeding again. Same as it ever was, always a week before my period. It lasts a few days and happens during bowel movements, and then stops.

This week my symptoms were near-debilitating low back pain on Tuesday, and intermittent uterine cramping throughout the day on Wednesday and Thursday. Then last night I went to bed with the heating pad, woke with worsening cramps at 3:30am, took a half Tylenol 3, and went back to bed with the heating pad. This morning when I got up for work, I had moderate low back pain and the pelvic pain was about a 4 on the pain scale.
I kept forgetting to take ibuprofen all damned day, but after biking to work, I felt like I was more limber throughout the day. So that’s excellent.

Regarding my stress level…my father-in-law spent February in the hospital and then in physical therapy rehab after having his left toe amputated. Five years ago, he had his right toe amputated. He has mismanaged his diabetes for 20+ years, and is now shocked that he’s losing digits. When, two weeks after being discharged from rehab he was back in the hospital with another gangrene toe on the left foot, all hell broke loose (again) with his wife.
She told him he can’t come home until he can properly care for himself. Then she went on a previously planned vacation with her son and wasn’t back in time for her husband’s surgery. The surgery was a much agonised-over foot amputation.

His wife got back the day he had surgery, showed up at the hospital once he was out of the recovery room, and then fled in a hissy fit a couple of hours later. I’m the one to thank for that, because I got tired of her talking about him as though he wasn’t in the room with us, bitching about how he doesn’t take care of himself and it’s all his fault he’s back here again (not entirely true – he has a calcified artery in his leg, so no amount of dietary management or exercise was going to stop the toes from dying. She even told me earlier in the day that she was throwing out all of the “liquor”, even though he only has wine in the house. I tried to explain that his occasional glass of wine isn’t what set all this off but she wouldn’t have it.

Sure, yeah, it’s still his fault over time due to gross mismanagement of his illness, but he didn’t do it in the past two weeks as she keeps claiming). Anyway, I told her she and he need to work this out, it’s not for me and my husband to figure out for them. And apparently that’s talking down to her and I was told, “You can’t talk to me like that!” and she fled. Left her husband there, eyes welling with tears. Refused to answer her phone for roughly 15 hours. Wasn’t at the house when we drove by after hanging out in the hospital awhile longer.

I found out later that she’d had a previous marriage and that the guy was an alcoholic who literally drank himself to death. So it seems she’s having a giant triggering flashback that she can’t escape, and she’s projecting her previous marriage partner onto her current partner. Wow, serious mental issues, there. I’m told she refuses to do therapy. The way she freaked out when I said they need to work on their stuff kinda indicates her refusal towards therapy. I dunno. I don’t actually want to talk to her again for awhile.

The other stress I’ve had revolves around continuing homework and internship responsibilities, and the classmate who wanted to work with me on the thesis but who has barely done anything at all towards it. I’m going to see what she produces for the seminar next weekend and then fire her if she doesn’t have enough to show for. Ugh. Hate it. But she can’t take the credit for all my work. I won’t let her.

In the food and drink department, preceding this menstrual cycle, I have imbibed on wine, port and nigori to the point of drunkenness, but not anywhere near the point of making an ass out of myself. I have gorged on chocolate and cheetos – staging a rebellion I guess – I have no excuse. I know these things hurt me and I did it, anyway. I wanted comfort food to deal with everything.

Regarding the astrology thing with Mercury going retrograde – I’ve been feeling the effects of that for the past two weeks. Ugh. It becomes harder for me to control my mouth. It becomes impossible for me not to drink or spend money or in general do unwise things to my body and mind. Most people find astrology to be hogwash. That’s fine, we’re all entitled to our quirks. If you don’t like my quirk, I don’t need to hear about it. Plus, I’m PMSing. Telling me how illogical astrology is will just get you thrown into a pit of rabid weasels.
I’m probably PMSing so badly because of all the junk I’ve been putting into my body. But it’s too late, now. I just have to go through this month and hope all the damage I did isn’t long-lasting in my body tissue.

The PMS is pretty harsh. I’m extremely moody and my body temp is all over the place, but mostly I’m freezing. I just spent a day in hot weather, came home, stripped down to my underwear, and within an hour I was freezing and now I’m still freezing, even though the house is 70°F inside (it’s down to 73°F outside). I’m literally wrapped in a velour blanket. Oh and the cramps are back again, now that I’m cold. Awesome. Good thing I just ordered some leafy green saag from the local Indian restaurant. Oh yeah, spending money again. *sigh*
George will be here officially in a minute – the mucosa changed colour this afternoon.

Lastly, I don’t think I’ve experienced mittelschmerz this month. I know I said the same thing in January and went back on it, and then in February it was difficult to tell for sure because it could have either been dyspareunia or mittelschmerz, or both. This month, I was just too stressed out to remember to record whether I was having mid-cycle pain.

The last day of george was February 13. There had been nearly no bleeding overnight from the 12th to the 13th, and then the cramps and bleeding ramped up by 9:30am.
I still went out of the house despite the pain, and an acquaintance helped me return the rental car I’d gotten for the weekend seminar. I came home and took a whole Tylenol 3. The pain radiated down the inner side of my thighs almost to my knees. I was nauseous. The pain reached 7.5 on the pain scale.

This of course proved to be the “last gasp” as we call it – the bleeding and pain abated by late afternoon and then I spotted on the 14th and 15th.

The good news of the February menstrual cycle is that I was not bedridden at all!
The bad news of the February menstrual cycle is that had the pain struck me on a week day as opposed to the weekend, I still would have missed two days of work, because the pain was above a 6 on the pain scale and required narcotic medication to treat.

Eight days later, like clockwork, mittelschmerz (mid-cycle pain, a.k.a. ovulation) occurred and lasted for two days. The symptoms consisted of sharp, intermittent stabbing pain in the uterus and left ovary (that damned left ovary!!!), which lasted for hours. On February 22, I took half a Tylenol 3 before bed. On February 23, I took 600mg of Ibuprofen before bed. The pain lessened but was still present (less stabby) on February 24 (today). It’s difficult for me to know if the pain would have been less sharp, because on February 21 and 22, I was intimate with my husband (funny how ovulation and an increase in libido happen at the same time, huh? ;). It could be the dyspareunia OR the mittelschmerz OR both. I’m special that way.

So the bad news is:

• The pain still got to 7.5 on the pain scale, which is unacceptable.
• I continue to have mittelschmerz.
• I continue to have dyspareunia.

Still, I am excited about what promise the March menstrual cycle holds. Each month my body recovers from surgery means hope that the really bad pain has been ameliorated by surgery. Hope is strong. Only at six months post-op am I allowed to throw in the towel with the hope that surgery worked. I am fully aware of the statistics of actual pain relief amongst endometriosis sufferers with surgery, and by that I mean I know full well that our numbers are low. But I am not one to give up so easily.

I am hoping with this next paycheck on February 26th that I can start up the acupuncture and massage treatments again. My masseuse also has endometriosis. She got a hysterectomy and had no relief even after that! She went to massage school and also had massage therapy on herself. What ultimately helped to relieve her pain was PUSH therapy. My masseuse is certified in Swedish massage, acupressure, Shiatsu, sports massage, deep tissue massage, reflexology, Dynamic Reposturing, and PUSH Therapy.

I also need to get back on the bicycle again. I’ve been a weather wuss, which is hilarious because when I lived in Michigan, I bicycled in 48°F weather all the time. The rain is another issue, I have never liked to bicycle in the rain.

Challenges to continue working on: omit alcohol, sugar and chocolate intake entirely.

So what I’ve been doing is keeping a running log of tidbits from my day, thinking that later each day, I would expound further and make a good narrative journal entry for you. And then it wouldn’t happen. So the next day, I’d type up some tidbits from that day, hoping to put it in more readable narrative…etc. And what you get instead is me being way behind and playing catch up.

Day 45
Monday, January 31, 2011
Day 5 of my return to work. I don’t recall the order of the day. The big news that day happened when we got home and got a call from my husband’s step-mother, saying his dad was in the hospital again due to complications from Type II Diabetes. His left foot had swelled up, and he had to have his left big toe amputated. Now he has no more big toes. His right toe was amputated back in July, 2005.

My husband endured a long rant from his step-mother, and looked depressed when the call ended. He said, “I seriously wonder if he’ll be able to ever walk again after this.”

That’s not all – father’s wife is screaming divorce because she’s tired of him not taking care of himself. It’s been going on for over 20 years.

Day 46
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Day 6 of my return to work. I wore slacks again, and no, the belly button wasn’t any happier – 46 days after surgery!!!

I was stressed out at work, and had little water intake because I forgot to take my water bottle to work with me, and it was my first day of recording the childrens’ work. Recording entails walking around the classroom with a clipboard and noting what the children are working on, checking their work with a Three Period Lesson, and noting on the clipboard next the activity whether the child has mastered it, needs to redo it, or is just having a sensorial experience with it.
The class usually has 20 children, and at any time, three or four of them are tapping me on the shoulder or arm while I sit with another child, or they’re calling out across the room when they’re not supposed to. Then there’s four to six children playing instead of working at any given time, whom I have to continually resettle. It was a very busy day.

That night, we visited my husband’s father in the hospital.
I experienced sharp ovarian pain on the right side as we walked down the corridor to my father-in-law’s hospital room – this was after climbing stairs – and I had just told my husband that I was fine to climb stairs, since I had been active at work.
It’s a workout to do Head, Shoulders Knees And Toes every day, along with squatting down and getting back up again several times a day to check children’s work…in Montessori, many children work with materials on the floor.

We visited probably for an hour, and my husband’s father seemed not to be too put out that he’d just lost his other big toe. He talked about the trip to Alaska he wants to take this year, and refused to discuss serious matters of his health – you know – reality.

When we got back home from visiting my father-in-law in the hospital, I mentioned online about my crazy mood swings I’ve been having since surgery, and an endo sister suggested I try taking Zomig. I don’t have any Zomig, but it does have the ingredient 5-HT in it. I took a 5-HTP supplement, instead.

Within an hour, my tummy was burning and nauseous, and I had moderate indigestion all the way up the esophagus.

Note to self: 5HTP contains sulfites and B vitamins. You know you can’t take B vitamins because it upsets your tummy.

I took a shower, and discovered that the first scab had fallen out. It looks burnt to a crisp, just like last time. My scabs didn’t fall out til around Day 61 last time.

Right before bed, I experienced sharp pain towards the left side – it was more uterine in nature this time.

So, now I have to go back on what I said in my last post – I had said I did not experience Mittelschmerz, but actually, I think it was just a bit late – Day 10 of the new cycle instead of Day 8.

Yeah. I still get Mittelschmerz. :(

Day 47
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Day 7 of my return to work. It was my second day of recording the students as they worked, and I was still running around all frazzled, trying to keep up. No pain that I can remember – no notes about pain so I must have had a pain-free day!

Day 48
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Day 8 of my return back to work. We had Chinese New Year celebrations and only half an hour of work period, but I recorded what I could for the head teacher. I came home from a good day at work but the moment I got home, I was full of angst the likes I haven’t seen since I was in my early 20s.

I realised that it is because I am sick to death of LOOKING and DRESSING like a preschool teacher five days a week, and coming home every day with songs from The Wiggles or Dora or some such stuck in my head. I also realised I was PMSing.

Day 49
Friday, February 4, 2011
Day 9 of my return back to work. It was my last day shadowing the person who is leaving that room to work in the classroom I was moved from.

That night, I went dancing! I wore a corset! Sadly, no pix. My husband is really bad about that, and well he’s been depressed about his dad being in the hospital. That night, I blew out my right knee while dancing, and had to ice it right there in the club. The staff were FANTASTIC about coming to my aid – they didn’t have to do that but they did. To my fellow endo sisters, I know you understand when I say the blown out knee pain was HILARIOUS compared to what we normally go through. I iced it for a bit and went back dancing!

I must note for posterity that I did drink alcohol that night. Alcohol is known to be a bad actor for endometriosis, so it’s something I need to stop consuming. I struggle with this.

Day 50
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Sharp right knee pain. I got up after only 6 hours or so of sleep and went to have my blood drawn again (still dealing with follow-up to Dec. 28 high eosinophil crap). From there, I went over to a sports shop and bought another knee brace. ACE bandages don’t take care of the pain anymore – I have congenitally misaligned knees, so over the years, the pain has just gotten more annoying. Stretchy knee braces don’t take care of the pain anymore, either. So I bought a cool knee brace with hinges. It worked superb! I wore it all day and my knee felt SO MUCH BETTER by the end of the day!

And then the depressing news – I also experienced sharp pain on my left side – ovarian area – after eating breakfast (frozen mango, frozen banana, goat milk yoghurt, gluten-free vanilla extract, cardamom, cinnamon for a nice smoothie, and two gluten-free waffles with cream cheese).

Meh.

Day 51
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Intimacy with husband the night before resulted in pelvic pain that morning. We’re not doing anything fancy or kinky, mind you, and I’m still getting pain pretty much every time. I was told by my last surgeon that surgery won’t change that – I have dyspareunia and that’s just how it is. I had asked my current surgeon to please fix my retroverted uterus during the December surgery, as I’m convinced that it accounts for the dyspareunia and for some of the pelvic pain during menstruation, but she said there’s no easy fix to a life-long retroverted uterus. She said that the tendons or whatever it is that connects the uterus to the bladder and other organs would become to strained or weakened if she lifted the uterus up and clamped it into proper positioning. She said it would result in even more pain for me. I have to trust her on that, since she’s performed hundreds of surgeries for endometriosis and pelvic conditions. She’s probably seen the gamut.

The day started off great – I woke before the alarm, ate breakfast, showered, and went to my Alexander Technique class. The panic attack wanted to happen the moment I drove off towards the appointment.
WHY.
My hands were shaking. I couldn’t breathe. I felt the flutter in my throat. I took .5mg lorazepam on the way to class, and when I got out of my car, I thought for sure I was going to faint, so I took another .5mg lorazepam.
I got to my class and was the only one for a bit. I was honest with my instructor that I was not emotionally well grounded that day for some reason. Class began, and two more filtered in and joined the conversation – all of us regulars – all people I’m comfortable with. Then halfway through the class, a staff member opens the door and asks if a new patient could be admitted to class. This is where the session went downhill. This woman made the conversation all about her, and was verbally defiant and combative the entire time with the instructor. The other three of us may as well have ceased to exist. I began doing my breathing exerises. I dissociated and put myself into a fixed state, staring down my nose at the floor, just focusing on breathing so I would not have a panic attack and lash out at this horrible beastly woman who kept saying, “I can’t do this. I can’t do that. I want you to teach me how to properly sit so I can play flute and not be in pain. I can’t do what you are asking me to do. I want you to help me.”

Back and forth. UGH.

When the class ended, I bolted.

I got home and locked my keys in my car, I was so frazzled after that class. I mailed two bills by walking to the mailbox on the corner, came home, and my husband gave me a spare key to go get my keys out of my car.

I got back home and started sorting laundry. I left the room to go through my closet to double-check whether more clothes need to be pared down, came back to the living room, and saw my cat actively sniffing around on the laundry piles on the floor. This cat has a bad history of peeing on my stuff since November 2009 so my heart sank. I knelt down and began to go methodically through my clothes. I found four pair of underwear and a work shirt, all damp from my cat having just peed on them. WHY. WHY.

My husband guessed that perhaps we’re not keeping the litter box clean enough again. This was all I could take for the day, and I feel immediately into a black depression. My posture slumped. My face fell. My eyes glazed over. It was 72F outside for an unseasonably warm February weekend, and emotionally, I was not up to it.

After I threw away the underwear and shirt, I bagged up the remaining laundry and took it out back to the laundry room. Then I took some crocheted blankets (two are from a thrift store, and one is from a friend) to the laundrymat because I like the front loader machines better for such delicate washing. I tossed in some scarves and my Dickens Fair skirt I had made in 2009 and had worn again in 2010.

When I returned to the laundrymat to retrieve my items, I found that everything reeked of mothball.

WHY!   WHAT THE HELL!   HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?   Was it one of the thrift blankets? Was it the washer I chose?
I hung up all my items when I got home. Airing out was good enough for most of the items, but a scarf and a thrift store blanket still reeked horribly, so I washed them twice by hand with baking soda, vinegar and oxobrite cleaner.

I had already been deeply depressed over my cat peeing on my stuff again, and then the mothball chemical assault happened. I’ve refused to eat or do homework all day. I did another load of laundry here at the house, but that was it. Even as I sat here typing this out, I was hunched over. My stomach was hurting. I wanted to sleep. I wanted to just go away.

8:19pm update:
I think I got the mothball smell out of everything except for our tartan scarf. :( I’ll keep trying at that before giving up, though.
There are two culprits now – the green crocheted blanket I got from the thrift store, and the purple microfiber blanket I just bought from the neighbor last night. Two different smells at that! The green one is the mothball and the purple one smells like a dog or cat had urinated on it at some point and it was incorrectly washed and dried. This makes a good argument for me never getting thrift store or yard sale blankets ever again.
I’m wondering how sick I’ll become now that I’ve exposed myself to nasty mothball fumes all day. One day I’ll learn to just flee the situation or throw the offending items away instead of trying to save things. ugh.

Day 52
Monday, February 7, 2011
Continued pelvic pain from late Saturday night’s intimacy.
Lots of intestinal gas noises, and pressure on the low back extending to rectum. This is “normal” pre-menstrual activity. Alas.
I awoke around 4am and finally got up to use the bathroom around 4:30am. I took .5mg lorazepam. I was never able to get back to true sleep after that. I hit snooze on the alarm four times, being stubborn about getting out of bed. I was exhausted and I still had a whole day ahead of me.

I got through the day but had to take 600mg Ibuprofen gel-caps by 9am to get through the day, because of low uterine pain. I seriously had to go check to see if I’d started bleeding, the cramps were strong enough. I’d wager about a 4 on the pain scale.

Postscript:
My first surgery was February 1, 2007 and I never did get any pain relief from that surgery. That’s why I had the second surgery on December 17, 2010. Both surgeries were electrocoagulation type Laparoscopy. I wanted excision surgery this time around, but my surgeon told me that the latest research out there shows that both excision and electrocoagulation have benefit. She prefers electrocoagulation but will not hesitate to do excision where necessary. The bulk of what I ended up “needing” was electrocoagulation, according to my 2010 surgery report.

I am hoping that with each month post-op, the pain relief will increase. That’s where I’m at…

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

I woke up at 6:45am and got ready for a psychiatric appointment. Since I had been out with my husband last night, this meant that I got 6 hours of sleep when I’d been so used to 8 solid hours, so I was really tired.

Outside it was so cold that there was frost on my car windows. I’m glad I’ve kept my snow scraper with me all these years after having moved from Michigan! It came in real handy that day.

After scraping ice off half the windshield

It doesn’t snow at ground level in the Bay Area, but every winter does bring some frost on the ground and on the cars. After scraping and warming up my car, I successfully drove to my appointment, but was late because parking was stupid. The meters in two out of the three places I tried to park were not working correctly. Finally I parked and went inside the building. They have an elevator, so I used that rather than brave the stairs first thing in the morning. My mid back was already stiff and sore from getting into my little Neon, driving, and getting out of the car again. Any time I have to twist side to side for anything, the pain ramps back up again.

My psychiatrist still wants me to try Abilify. She’s been pushing this on me since September, 2010 and I’ve been too afraid to try it because of all the side effects. She offered to get me an even smaller prescription dose than she gave me in September (which is still sitting in the cabinet), and she said while I’m off work already, this should be the best time to try the Abilify to see if I will have side effects.

My rationale states that I want to be alert to any possible surgical side effects FIRST. I don’t want to try to figure out if my mood or whatnot is caused by EITHER surgery OR the Abilify. Too much on my plate, y’know?

After I got out of the psychiatry appointment, I decided to take the stairs down instead of using the elevator. There were three flights of stairs. I took it slowly, but by the time I reached the bottom, sure enough I had pelvic cramping going on.

When I got home, despite being in pain, I wanted to get some housework done, so I tackled laundry. I slowly loaded up my laundry basket with two loads’ worth of dirty clothes, and then scooted the basket over to a waiting luggage cart. I finagled the basket up onto the luggage cart and secured it, then towed the laundry basket out to the back of the house where the laundry room is.

After the first load washed and I had put it into the dryer and the second load into the wash, I took a nap, because all of that had worn me out. I set out 600mg Advil and a half Tylenol 3 for the pain, but then refused to take the meds all day because I’m stubborn like that.
I slept for nearly an hour.

After my nap, I was still really tired, but I brought in my laundry and just let it sit (folded) in the basket. I threw myself together to go join a friend for her birthday dinner. We were late, which made me feel bad, but it all worked out. She was at a Mediterranean restaurant, and since I still have not reintroduced solid meat to my diet, there was very little I could eat. The waiter cobbled together a vegetable plate for me, consisting of sliced asparagus and bell peppers, and I used those to dip into the Hummus. I also drank red wine for the first time since before surgery. I was happy to have the wine because my social anxiety was spiking again. There were only five of us for dinner, but still, I felt very awkward socially.

To my glee, I did not have any major digestive problems with the vegetables or the wine! Yay! The bell peppers usually give me heartburn, but even that was minor on that night. Awesome.

Our friend left to go off to a dancing class, and we paid her bill, being that she was the birthday girl. We then got back to our car and my husband drove us over to Forbidden Island Tiki Bar, where we met up with two more friends who had secured an area for our birthday girl. We hung out and had drinks – I drank an Exotica (Coffee liquor and other flavours in a martini glass), a Chamborlada (Chambord and Pina Colada), and part of my friend’s birthday Fugu drink that she could not finish. That was enough to get me pretty tipsy, nay, drunk. Thankfully, not a sloppy or embarrassing drunk. Chatty, yes. Having fun, yes. It was a good night.

At Forbidden Island Tiki Bar for a friend's birthday

We got home around midnight and I went immediately to bed after consuming a pint of water. I had to be up the next day for my post-op appointment in San Francisco.

Firsts for Day 18:

• Drove alone on my own to Oakland and back – stiffness and soreness returned.
• Did my own laundry, using a luggage cart to haul the basket.
• Worked on some homework.

Limitations:

• Still having pain with climbing stairs and driving.
• Lifting anything over 5lbs is still painful.

Complications:

• Still having thick mucous vaginal discharge – doesn’t smell foul anymore. Is likely ovulation.

I slept until 10am – another eight hour night before my body was too sore to stay in bed. Actually I should say my body is sore by the 6 hour mark, but I am stubborn and keep going back to bed until it’s been 8 hours. Oh how I love 8 hours of sleep.

The first thing I did when I got out of bed was spend about 20 minutes walking around the house and doing gentle stretches.

Today I cleaned up some papers and such on the kitchen table, but I didn’t get my ass out of the house until after 4pm. The weather was cold, overcast and windy – I think it only got up to 50°F today, and it sprinkled throughout the day.

My husband and I got some pet supplies for the cats, and then we went for a short walk behind the shopping center, which has a sidewalk overlooking the estuary (which flows into the San Leandro Bay). There are observation decks one can climb up to in order to get a better look at a view of the estuary and the Oakland hills. I climbed a bit faster than I had done yesterday, and coming back down the stairs, I was able to go at my normal pace. I did so giggling with delight.

However, less than a hundred feet later, I began to get stabbing uterine pains and had to slow my walking pace. I adjusted and picked up my pace again, but I still struggled with the pelvic pain. My husband stopped into a game store to ask a game console question, and while I stood there waiting, the pain reached a 5 on the pain scale.

When we got back to the car, I took 600mg of Ibuprofen. I’ve been fatigued ever since. I spent the rest of the night on the couch taking it easy, which sucks, because I had wanted to try going to a nightclub for the first time since before surgery.

Food I ate today:
Leftover Indian (Saag Paneer)
Gluten-free freezer pancakes
Boost drinks
Rice Chex cereal
Homemade macaroon a friend had made
20oz of water
Coconut juice

Note:
The foul smell abated some and the bloody discharge went away overnight, but late this afternoon I had some thick mucous discharge again. I’m wondering now if this is ovulation already. Today is about Day 6 of the new cycle, and I always get mittelschmerz on Day 8 of the new cycle. Could it be a couple of days early?

Complications:
I am still having the round of diarrhea or loose stool every morning. I’m guessing this is still a holdover from when the surgeon bumped the mesentery on the way in with the camera.

I nearly threw up tonight after eating the same kinds of food I’ve been eating; gluten-free pancakes and Boost. I also developed a headache so I took my temperature and the temporal digital read 100°F. The glass therm read 99°F. Bah, whatever.

Firsts for today:
I wore loose-fitting slacks! I looked like a dweeb, but at least I have a pair of slacks I can wear to work in the first week back, which is coming up fast.

The mid-cycle pain (mittelschmerz) started on November 16 and lasted through November 17.

On November 18, I was highly fatigued, and missed a friend’s concert. I was however able to get some teaching internship homework done that night, with my remaining spoons.

I got through work on November 19, and had to return to work on November 20 for the annual Fall Harvest Festival. Parents of the children who attend the school were put into groups and had a continent assigned to them. They all had to cook or bring foods found or popular to a particular continent. Each class did songs and dances relating to the continent/country they are studying. My class has been studying the Philippines in Asia, and so they counted from one to ten in Tagalog, sang Sampung mga daliri (see another cute rendition here), attempted a traditional dance, and sang I Am But A Small Voice (which went so well that they got wild applause).

After the Fall Harvest Festival, I needed downtime. I’d used up all my spoons, but I still wanted to go out dancing that night. I was pretty upset with my body for being so tired and achey. I was mad at my mind for being so moody and premenstrual.
I ended up staying home and joining a party of friends 2,500 miles away in my home state. They were having a party and so I joined them on Skype. They were all super drunk and having a fun time, so my husband and I decided to have elderflower fizz – it is elderflower liquor with champagne.

Well, the champagne hated me worse than I expected. I know I’m not supposed to have anything with yeast or sulfites, but this particular champagne must have been loaded with them. My stomach hadn’t hurt that bad or been that upset in a long time. What a shitty day overall it had turned out to be, health-wise and emotionally for me.

On Sunday, November 21, I went to a matinee with my husband and two of our friends – we saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. When I got home, I spent the rest of the evening once again catching up on teaching internship homework, and practicing my presentation for Monday.

Despite the weekend’s ups and downs, my husband and I were able to enjoy each other intimately. I note this because with endometriosis, it is often difficult to be intimate without grave pain. Twice a month is the norm – anything more than that and we’re jumping for joy. Such as it was this month – a veritable jumping for joy.

On Monday, November 22, I began to experience gnawing uterine cramps, and I knew this was the result of having been intimate with my husband over the weekend, because I am diagnosed with dyspareunia. Same thing happened which set off the mittelschmerz last week.
So on Monday, I had sharp stabbing pain on the right, then on the left, then radiating through the rectum as day/night progressed. That day, I took half a Tylenol 3 + 400mg Ibuprofen at lunchtime at work. Later, I ingested half a Tylenol 3 + 400mg Ibuprofen at dinner time, and then another half Tylenol 3 after dinner while at a friend’s house catching up on The Walking Dead.

When I got home, I experienced a painful bowel movement, which set off some nausea and shakes, and reminded me what I’ve known for years – that I have rectal involvement with endometriosis. I went to bed with a heating pad on my abdomen and lower back all night.

This morning, I woke nearly two hours before my alarm clock went off, and could not get back to sleep. I had only had five hours of sleep. Despite that, the pain level was very low, so I went to work. I did not bicycle to work because the pain has been too unpredictable, and it has also been raining.
While walking from my car to the workplace, I was so shaky that I thought I might collapse. I couldn’t tell if the shakiness was from nerves or from my body becoming so weak from fatigue and recent pain, but I forced myself to keep walking.
I got through the morning in a moderately agitated state, with frequent bouts of ‘warm flashes’ because my hormones are doing acrobatics inside of me.

The gnawing uterine cramps started up again at lunch hour. I experienced intermittent sharp stabbing pain on the right ovary. I took 600mg Ibuprofen at lunchtime at work, but the pain radiated to my rectum, which left me debilitated, shaky and nauseous. Right before I was to end my lunch break, my bowels went into a painful tizzy, and I spent many minutes on end at the toilet, trying not to vomit from the recto-vaginal pain as a painful bowel movement tried to happen. When I finally did defecate, there was blood in the stool. My anus did not hurt, so I wondered if it was from hemorrhoids or from endometriosis perforating my bowels. Either way, I was feeling really ill.

I can handle a certain amount of uterine pain more than I can handle the ovarian pain, but I cannot handle the recto-vaginal pain at all. May as well beat me senseless, it’s all the same.

When I got home from work today, I applied a heating pad to my bottom, half a muscle relaxer (Soma), .5mg Ativan, and a nap. I slept from around 3pm til nearly 8pm. I woke to urinate, then had cereal for dinner, which caused a new round of painful defecation – loose this time, with some more blood, and nausea. I took my temperature – it’s 99.4°F. But then it’s been 99 point something more often than not for months, if not over a year, now.

I began to wonder if I have an intestinal virus. I’d spent the better part of last week fighting off an upper respiratory tract infection. Preschoolers – they’ll kill ya.

Now I’m back in bed, journaling all of this before returning to sleep for the night.

Good night.

The last time I blogged was on November 9. The pain abated by November 11, and so I decided again to try bicycing to work. I seemed to be okay, so I pedaled to work again on November 12, despite the trapped nerve resurfacing overnight once again from all the stress I’m under. Speaking of stress, I began taking Ativan again – on November 11. :(

On November 13, I participated in my friend’s wedding. It was beautiful. :)

The grooms

The cake cutting!

My husband

Me

The only thing though, we all drank for about 12 hours that day. I had a total of 3 glasses of wine and two and a third hard alcoholic drinks in the course of those 12 hours. Not bad, but then again I shouldn’t be drinking at all with autoimmune disease. Hell, I got more drunk the night before, at the rehearsal dinner, heh. I think I drank 2/3 a bottle of wine that night…

During the wee hours of Sunday morning, a virus within me had activated and let loose on my maxillary sinuses. It felt like my runny nose coated my pillow. Ugh. I’ve been sneezing and blowing my nose ever since.

I tried resuming bicycling to work Monday and Tuesday this week, but with the virus making me excruciatingly tired (like, wanting to be in bed by 8pm), I decided to not bicycle to work today.

Because of the virus, I have renewed heightened sensitivity to dust, mold, perfumes and chemicals in general. This of course did not stop me from getting super PMS-tastic last night and using Tilex diluted in hot water to scrub moldy window sills – without a mask. WTF!!

Also, the biggest WTF right now is Mittelschmerz. It hit like clockwork on Day 8 of the new cycle – yesterday the 16th. And ever since yesterday, I’ve been trying to eat all the chocolate on the planet. Tonight, I wanted alcohol, and I’ve been imbibing on liquor in the house. The boozing is in part to the stress I’m under at work, and in part due to nightmares I’ve had for two nights straight.

This upper respiratory tract infection is not helping with my stress level. I know I shouldn’t be drinking, especially with a virus going on, and yet I have no control over my cravings and wants right now.

I’m experiencing mid-cycle pain, PMSing, and my period is already due by next Saturday, even though just last week, I was just coming off my period. This so-called 25 day cycle is for the birds.

So I just wanted to let you know where it’s at – I’m PMSing, chocolate-gorging, stressed out, drug-addled on Ativan and Benadryl, and totally having a pity party over the Blue Moon Menstrual Cycle this month.

Yeah, pity me. Wah. Boo hoo.

 
Click image for bigger size.

I should start noting my mental state here. I’ve been seeing a psychologist, and I saw a psychiatrist on September 14. Both think I may be bi-polar, but they do not agree on which type of bi-polar I am.

The psychiatrist gave me a prescription for abilify, but I refused to take it. I asked for and got Lamictal, instead. I still haven’t taken it, though. I am afraid of more side effects. I’m done with more and more mental stuff going wrong with me.

I’ll restate what I said in my previous entry –
Because I’ve not really enjoyed a pain-free or sick-free or allergy-reaction-free day in about seven weeks, I have hit my breaking point emotionally.

I’ve already been wrestling with what I call ‘dangerous depression’ since the end of July.

Well, it’s getting louder in the head, and more externally vocalised.

I went with my husband to a Victorian-era home showing that happens every year in our city. There were eight homes on the bill to walk through. I did not enjoy it this year. It was painful to move. My low back pain crept back in to flare with the trapped nerve in the shoulder, every time I had to climb stairs, or really move at all. And I was still in pain from one visit to the gym last Thursday.

I was super depressed.

I guess it doesn’t help that I’ve been on Soma (muscle relaxer) for two weeks, and I know from experience that it adds to my depression. I have not had a dose of it today and will refrain from taking any more of it.

After the home showing, there was the annual parking lot sale over at the famous tiki bar in town, so we went on over.
I immediately went for the booze. First time in 51 days that I got absolutely full on drunk. My husband had gone off to his sacred game night, leaving me in the company of friends still at the tiki bar. I was still going when his game session got out around 10pm. He picked me up and took my sorry ass home. Thankfully, no tears or puke or hangover this time. I drank lots and lots of water, thanks to a very attentive bartender, and was a good girl and drank lots of water when I got home, and took vitamins and advil.

I remain dangerously depressed.

Today at work, while rocking a child at naptime, I got stabbing right side ovarian pain that lasted for about five minutes. It went away until now. I’m just sitting on the couch, typing, and the ovary is pulsing a low stabbing pain. Today is Day 10 of the new cycle, so I guess it’s mittelschmerz, which usually happens at Day 8 of the cycle, but has been off by a day or three for a few months, sometimes not happening at all. I blame it on the endometriomas on both ovaries.

I bicycled home from work in 95°F heat – thankfully the ovary did not stab me on the ride home.
But I am wiped out after spending some time in the outdoors at work today. Ugh.

So this mental health thing. The meds. I’m so tired of meds. Today I started a detox diet – the one I tried to start back in July or August and didn’t keep up with. So I started it over today. Lots of supplemental pills to take with every meal.
And then either tonight or sometime this week, I might begin taking the Lamictal. I’m terrified of it. Read all the horrific side effects here. If you think that looks bad, read the side effects for Abilify, which is what the psychologist originally wanted me on and I said no way.

Now, let me tell you again what I’ve said before. I have been going through what I call dangerous depression since the end of July, 2010, because of all my pain conditions and reactions to medications.

This is also known as, yes I will spell it out and face up to it: suicidal ideation.

I have wrestled with suicidal ideation for much of my life, so this is nothing new. The frequency is what is worrying me.

But look here, if I take Lamictal or Abilify, the warning is basically the same:

Patients, their caregivers, and families should be counseled that AEDs, including LAMICTAL, may increase the risk of suicidal thoughts and behavior and should be advised of the need to be alert for the emergence or worsening of symptoms of depression, any unusual changes in mood or behavior, or the emergence of suicidal thoughts, behavior, or thoughts about self-harm. Behaviors of concern should be reported immediately to healthcare providers.

Why would I want to take a drug that will make me MORE suicidal than I already am?

I already went down that road once, with SSRIs (Paxil), back in 2000.

Honestly, I probably won’t take the medication. I’ll get my diagnosis officially recorded as bi-polar something and then I’ll manage it myself. I’ve lived this long…