Evagation

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

For now, everything stays the same.

We are not ready to even discuss me getting pregnant. Which is something we are both more than fine with; I'm not ready because I've only had a few years to wrap my mind around the idea that Devin wants a biological kid (at least the one) and less than a few weeks to wrap my mind around the idea that I'm HEALTHY; Devin's not ready because even though he was the one with the deadline, that was not REALLY a deadline, and more like a future point at which he might be ready to be a father. We are focusing on keeping me healthy. Thanks so much to everyone who helped remind me (and I reminded Devin for you all) that being healthy is the true reward right now, and the baby stuff was just noise in the air. I'm starting to cut back on the painkillers (trying to get myself off opiates for the first time in over a decade), which is hard, but good. I'm re-reading Elizabeth Wurtzel's More, Now, Again because that is truly one of the best drug recovery books I've ever encountered in my entire life. (Which is saying a lot for me because 1) I read a ton of drug/alcohol recovery books and 2) I despise everything else Elizabeth Wurtzel has written, and I'm fairly certain that the reason I like More, Now, Again is because she had a new editor, who was VERY vocal about trimming down parts of the book, as much as I love Betsy Lerner, she really could have done far more trimming of Wurtzel's Prozac Nation, and Bitch.) Although I don't think I could handle an NA meeting in such a small town. One thing about Narcotics Anonymous, and Alcoholics Anonymous, is that in the big cities, it is fairly easy to remain fairly anonymous. Not so much where I live. My detox is also not particularly clinical. My doc and I have worked it out, for the most part, and I know what to look for as I taper down (and then off) the opiates, that might mean I'm going into withdrawal shock, or whatever. This is what sucks about having a physical dependence on Vicodin (I stopped taking Percocet a few months ago, which was also a good thing). My body could get really sick just from getting clean. We opiate addicts are really nuts. At least, I know I am. I know that my physical tolerance for opiates is damn near unreal. Especially for someone who's never done heroin (for obvious reasons--I would like it way, way too much and all of my friends know about this, so it has not been offered to me in years, since I stopped hanging out with Josh and David). Out of habit, I called in my Vicodin refill even though I was supposed to be quitting (I've got another painkiller, Darvon, that had been working fantastically well). But. Well. I'm an addict. I didn't even think about trying to get a Vicodin refill, I've been doing it for so long that I just called it in and it went through. Except Doc halted the other painkiller, Darvon. Which means he really has been listening to me when I've been talking about my addiction to painkillers. Although I learned this from his office staff, who explained to me that the Darvon had been stopped because I just got the Vicodin, and to call them when I'm done with the Vicodin. The somewhat nice office staff lady then said that I should be calling in about a month, right? "Well. You want me to call when I'm almost done with the Vidodin, right?" I ask. "Yes, that's what the doctor said. He might even want you to come in for an appointment, I don't know. So, about a month?" She asked again. "Um. No. About two weeks." "Excuse me? Didn't you just fill that prescription a few days ago?" "Yup. Doc and I have talked about this. One of the reasons we're phasing me out of the Vicodin is because I can take up to three times my daily limit and not feel a damn thing. Conservatively speaking, I'm probably taking double my daily limit. Which means I'm calling you back in about two weeks." "Oh. And the doctor knows about this?" "Yup. We've talked about it." "Okay. Well. Give us a call and I'll get you an appointment." I didn't ask for clarification about how I went from maybe having to see the doctor, to definitely having to see the doctor: I'm an addict. Doc likes to check up on me and make sure that I'm not resorting to my old ways (foolishly trying to get the Vicodin refill) or about to die from withdrawals. What I've read about most opiate blockers is that, while they work, they also contain lactose, for some reason. My Crohn's is really touchy with lactose. So, I'm just going to have to detox the old school way. And hopefully not die. The painkillers are for my knees, just in case you all were wondering. These first few months of the year are the worst for my arthritis, to the point where my knees painfully swell and, when the swelling eventually goes down, they are surrounded by bruises because the swelling was that bad. Most people with arthritis can take anti-inflammatory drugs, which are better for arthritis than simple painkillers, but I've also got an inflammatory disease of the intestinal tract, so anti-inflammatories are a BIG NO for me. It can make the Crohn's go wacky and actually trigger a flare (in me, I'm not sure about the rest of the IBD world on this one but this has always been true of me--I can't even take over the counter Motrin). Doc will probably work with me on the painkiller stuff if I agree to go back to physical therapy. UGH. He's brought it up a few times this year and I've just said I didn't have the time. Well. I better make time for it now before summer starts, otherwise I really won't have the time. Although the last time I went to physical therapy, they had me doing so much work that I fainted right off the elliptical machine. Scared the hell out of the entire place. I was fine on the stationary bike, but something about having to stand up on a machine and move my legs around in strange circles, had me dizzy and passing out within ten minutes. I think it was because they programmed the machine a certain way and when I needed to stop to catch my breath, the machine wouldn't let me, and kept forcing my legs to go in those freaky oblongs. I remember coming to on the ground and the crazed machine was still going. Never again am I getting onto a pre-programmed exercise machine of any kind. People need to realize that if I can't breathe, then I can't remain conscious. It's a heart thing. (Huh. Speaking of. Wonder if I should call my cardiologist. The guy was a bit of a jerk, though. Probably do need to find a new cardiologist. I've also got appointments with my trio of eye doctors to make--retinologist, opthmalogist, optometrist. Although my range of vision has been great since the surgery--no apparent relapse, which makes me happy. I should still get it all checked out since it's been almost a year since I saw them all.) I guess more of the same right now means more doctor appointments for Katie. Now that we know the major stuff is under control, it's time to start checking out the rest of me. Make sure the apparatus holding my left eye together is still doing it's job. Probably time to update my prescription glasses. Find a decent cardiologist and make sure that my fainting thing is what the other cardiologist said (after I failed the tilt-table test), that my blood circulation is damn near stagnant when I stand for too long, or am standing and not able to catch my breath, then I just conk out. By the time I left Starbucks, I was fainting there about once a week. As most longtime readers know, it was the fainting at Starbucks that most likely lead to the detachment of my left retina. Hit my head on the floor one too many times and tore a hole in my eye. But now I'm at a job where I can sit down all day if I want to, so I haven't fainted in over a year. Yay me and my stagnant blood circulation. (I'm trying to think if I'm leaving any specialist out. This is when taking care of myself starts to get nutty. I could easily fill the rest of the year with doctor appointments. The eye docs I'm calling today. I've already called my Nurse Practitioner for the pap smear, and already have an OB/GYN ready to accept me as soon as I get pregnant, so that's out of the way. Might just go ahead and call my orthopaedic doc and make that appointment instead of going through my Internal Medicine doc first. Find new cardiologist. Or maybe see old, creepy cardiologist. Thankfully have never needed an ear/nose/throat guy. Have a dermatologist but I never go to him because my skin is great and I am decadent when it comes to my skin care regime. OH YEAH. Dentist. Chipped tooth. Hurts a bit. I think that's all of them.) I can only imagine how much worse my doctor load will get as I age. I'm already seeing more doctors than most old people that I know (and most of my doctors have waiting rooms full of really old people, never anyone close to my age). I've got the health insurance, and I want to make sure I'm super-duper healthy, so I might as well use it. Especially before summer starts and the pool business becomes so insane that my father-in-law will get cranky with me for not dealing with all of these docs BEFORE the busy season hit. Which makes sense. Time to make some calls. P.S. It's late and I can't sleep, so I thought I'd fill in all the fun doctor news. I know you all live for this stuff (or I live for this stuff). Apparently, after having such a major eye surgery, my retinologist wanted to see me every six months, so I'm quite a bit behind in my retina appointments. The receptionist must be new from the last time I went because she didn't remember me at all, and once I gave my name, she did the whole, "You had a detached retina at TWENTY-FOUR?." Of course, she didn't even wait for me to respond because there wasn't really much for me to say to that, so she plowed on with, "and how could you FORGET to keep up with your eye appointments, how many times have you had eye surgery?" Which sounds a lot meaner than it was, she was mostly shocked that once I was told my surgery had taken and that I was recovering beautifully, that I just stopped thinking about dealing with it at all. Didn't even try to explain the Crohn's to her and that the eye is just one more thing I have to deal with, and that I hadn't noticed any problems, so I honestly thought that I didn't need to bother with appointments. I just hope that the examination does not involve sticking things into my eye. I've had more than enough of that to last me for the rest of my life. (Or at least the next thirty years, which is when the apparatus holding my eye together might fall apart, or start peeking through the eye socket, which seems a bit freaky. The plastic buckle--scleral buckle, to be precise--might edge itself into visibility, so I'd have plastic bits sticking out from around my eye. FUN.) I was able to rush a dentist appointment for early next week (they love me at the dentist), which is good because I could use a nice, happy nitrous morning. I've got some minor filling work to do that I put off earlier this year, so they're going to do that and deal with the chipped tooth at the same time. Which is good. If I'd gone in for only the chip, I probably wouldn't get the nitrous because it would be an in-and-out appointment. So, I had to work it around to get my nitrous. Of course. It also happened to overlap with the pap stuff. Which I got rescheduled pretty easily. Dentist more important than having cells scraped off my cervix. Because they don't give you nitrous for a pap smear even though they REALLY SHOULD. Devin and I are cooking at home, and taking lunches to work. Part of our getting healthy thing. It's working out better than we could have imagined. We both work on cooking dinner, we both chip in on the clean-up, so we are actually spending more time together than we were before, when we would both scrape together our own (unhealthy) dinners, or just grab something while we were out, and retreat to our private spaces. At least now we cook together, eat together, clean up together, and THEN split into our separate spaces. Except for tonight. Tonight was "Casino Royale," which was much better in the theater, but still a good Bond movie. Love Daniel Craig. Eva Green, not so much. It had the "Spiderman 3" preview, though, which makes me giddy every time I see it. If the movie can live up to that preview, then it is going to KICK ASS. Summer is going to be nuts. The Simpsons MOVIE. "Spiderman 3." The last Pirates movie (which I'm a BIT excited about, compared to the rest of what's happening during the summer). THE LAST HARRY POTTER BOOK. There will be insanity. There will be mourning. There will be MADNESS. I am trying to not think too much about it, even though I need to get on with re-reading the entire series. Which I simply HAVE to do before the last one comes out. While in Cayucos, the other Katie and I bonded again over our complete devotion to the Harry Potter books, and she told me about the hotline that's being set up for distressed fans after they read the final book. She said I was the only person who responded to this news with a hearty, "THANK GOD." And I actually meant it. Devin had to calm me down after I finished reading Half-Blood Prince because I was alarmingly distraught. Also the next Ocean's... movie. Eh. I like these mostly for the cast, and not the complete lack of plot (which is pretty much true for all of us who see these movies, I think, we all just LIKE those guys, so we're fine with watching a movie that is really not much more than them hanging out together). Good lord. Forgot that the movie version of Order of the Phoenix is ALSO coming out this summer. Damn. I need to start saving my money now because the must-see-movie list is getting rather long. Have to see the new Harry Potter film, of course, even though Order really kicks off the dark, angsty teenage years for Harry and the others, making it not as much fun as the others. Even though Goblet ends on a very sad, depressing note, it still ENDS that way. Order can be surprisingly depressing from the get-go. That's how the books are going, now. J.K. Rowling is being very true to her word and properly aging the books with the kids, consistently tackling more adult problems, and showing the kids growing into teenagers, and by the end of the last one, probably young adults (the one who SURVIVE, that is). It's had a lot of parents very angry because now the cute, fun series about wizards is now more scary, and depressing. Anyway. Good lord. Order of the Phoenix this summer as well. Although, thankfully, I do not care at all about the "Fantastic Four" sequel. I thought the first movie was crap and, after having seen it a few more times, still stand by that first impression. Jessica Alba might be hot but her face is less expressive than a mannequin's and, for some reason, her little girl voice bothers the hell out of me. The only one I liked in that movie was Michael Chiklis as The Thing. Unlike Alba, who has no excuse, this guy actually managed to emote even when he was wearing the heavy Thing makeup. Same goes for "Live Free or Die Hard." Devin's all crazy excited about a new "Die Hard" movie but I'll have a good giggle at the name, and that's it. No desire to see that one. Same for the sequel to "Bruce Almighty." Never saw even saw the first one. Ditto for the "Rush Hour" movies. But a new "Bourne" movie? Will probably have to see that one. Devin and I are HUGE fans of the Bourne movies, Devin to the point where he is actually reading Robert Ludlum, but I just appreciate their glossiness, intense action, and cool mind games. A "Bourne" movie is always a good movie experience. Damn. That's a lot of movies to see this summer. Luckily it's easy to consider going to the theater a necessity during an oppressively hot Central California summer--you make up the ticket money in free air conditioning for a couple of hours. But in order to make all of this happen, I have to get the doctors out of the way NOW, otherwise all of my spare time in the summer will be spent with doctors. Plus, you know, there's fixing up the house and finally having that garage sale before summer hits. (Summer is dead time for two reasons: 1) the pool business will be insane, Devin will be working crazy hours, I will probably end up doing some over-time myself just to keep up, and we are both going to be cranky as hell because of it, and 2) remember last year? ten straight days of triple-digit temps out here in California? yeah. that happens a LOT for us during the summer. the lethargy it produces is legendary, we would all rather lie around and moan about it than try to get up and do anything.) Oh YEAH. I have to get my application for counselor for sick-kid camp in by the end of the month. Sick-kid camp is sometime in July. Which. I just realized. If it coincides with Harry Potter then there are going to be major problems. Some summer camps are taking field trip to bookstores if they are in session when the book is being released. This had better be true for sick-kid camp. We are sick people. At the Paul Newman camp, fer cryin' out loud, WE WILL NEED OUR HARRY POTTER. Oh, thank goddess. They have managed to time the two sessions of sick-kid camp so that they BOTH miss Harry Potter Day. The first session ends the day before, which might be a bit rough if I wanted to go through with the camping-out-in-bookstore thing for the last book, but I could probably managed it. The next session starts two days after the release. But it doesn't end until AFTER "The Simpsons MOVIE" comes out. Well. Now I have a lot to think about. I wouldn't NOT go to camp for either of these reasons (I hope), so I think I'm going to have to deal with not being able to completely camp out in a bookstore for the book's release. Since "Simpsons" opening weekend is not something I'm willing to miss (we've already got a whole group of us ready to buy tickets as soon as they go on sale, and we're making a huge party out of the weekend). Okay. If I can really pull all of this off, this is going to be the best summer EVER.

Labels: doctors, health

Posted by Katie. at 9:05 AM | Permalink | 4 comments | links to this post   

<< Home