Tag: polycystic ovary syndrome


You are the Silence in Between What I Thought and What I Said

25
November

Well, the computer came back today.  Yay.  It appears to be working fine.  Unfortunately, my external hard drive has to be reformatted again, so that makes me quite unhappy.  I guess I should just get used to this kind of geek-related disappointment.  So, I’m waiting on the formatting to finish.  I’m also trying to get my iPod to sync.  It keeps saying that it’s done syncing, but it hasn’t added ANY of the (1000+) songs that I spent the last couple of weeks listening to.  This is also disappointing.

In less disappointing news, I had a pretty good Thanksgiving.  Aside from my mom’s blood sugar dropping throughout the day, my getting a migraine from (of all the foods that could cause it) pinto beans, and finding out that my aunt is apparently going to get to pick what day she has Christmas with my grandmother before my parents and I get to (thus ensuring that she doesn’t have to see us), then it was actually quite good and bordering on superb.  Of course, when you factor all of that in, it knocks it down a few pegs.

I have to have blood work done sometime in the next week or so.  One of the doctors from the UAB Clinic wants to do his own hormone-research stuff to figure out why it is that I don’t get my period regularly.  Even though I’ve been diagnosed with PCOS, apparently, he feels the need to figure out what is going on.  So, good luck to him with that.  He thinks it is my thyroid, which is a theory I bet he will abandon when the blood work comes back with a low-end-of-normal reading on my thyroid function hormones.  Then he will probably give up.  If I sound convinced of this, it is because I am.  This is what always happens when doctors decide to check my thyroid.  I even told this doctor that, but he seems to think this time will be different.  (Maybe he is a bigger nut than I am.)

Oddly, right after he made the first call to find out if I had ever had the thyroid tests done, I got my period.  I was quite surprised by its appearance, since it had been many months since it had last come around.  Of course, it was very heavy, painful, and nausea-fever-and-dizziness-inducing.  It was not fun.  Of course, I don’t think it has ever been fun.  I think that it is over for now, which is odd, because I only got it for about a week and a day, but it could come back.  (Sometimes it just appears randomly a few days after it has supposedly quit.  It’s very rude like that.)

Tomorrow is the wonderful day which will test my dad’s anger management skills, aka the Iron Bowl.  I’m hoping that his ability to keep his temper in check this season will continue through the game tomorrow.  If he does, then it will be an Iron Bowl miracle.  There might even be holiday specials made in his honor if he manages it.

Comment » | Family, Geekery, Holidays, My Family's Weirder Than Yours Is, Sickness and Health

I Know The Answer, Or Think I Do

22
October

I finally got a response from the doctor about the urine culture and the ultrasound that had been done to figure out what was causing all the discomfort. The urine culture apparently was “contaminated” and contained mixed flora. So the doctor said that it was probably fine. She said that the ultrasound revealed a small uterine fibroid and an ovarian cyst.

She started explaining cysts by saying that every woman gets them during their cycle and that they usually go away. She was acting like it was no big deal. Maybe she is right. Of course, there was one problem with her “every woman gets them so it isn’t a big deal” theory: in the theory, every woman with a regular cycle gets them right before she gets her period; in reality: I had that ultrasound almost exactly 1 month ago and I still haven’t had a period. So, forgive me, if I’m not completely sold on that being a normal thing. If she had said it was small or didn’t look like it was causing any problems, then I might be more sold on the theory. She didn’t say that, though.

Actually, she didn’t say it was huge or anything of the sort. She did say, though, that she thought it was causing a lot of my abdominal discomfort. So, even though normal-routine-every-woman-gets-them-every-single-month cysts can cause some pain, I don’t think they cause pain that goes up into the upper quadrants of the abdomen. That is what makes me think that this isn’t just your run of the mill cysts.

I am wondering if any of it has anything to do with PCOS, which I was diagnosed with back in November of 2008. (I actually remember the week it got diagnosed because I remember starting on Metformin right after I got back from seeing the Twilight premiere.) I guess I should probably make sure to call my gynecologist to see what he has to say. Also, it’s been almost a year since I’ve seen him, so it might be a good idea for me to go get a check-up.

Comment » | 10 Years of Madness, Confessions, General, Sickness and Health

Minority Girl

27
November

Since Jenn had gastric bypass recently, it has made me wonder about my own surgery that took place in August of 2003. I have decided that I probably am no better off than I was the day I had the surgery.

According to the doctors, the following is possible:

Benefits of WLS

Benefits of WLS

    The image is nice, but the following are different for me.

  • I still have migraines. Actually, they occur more often and seem worse.
  • Only recently has my depression leveled off. That probably has more to do with my being too concerned with my physical crap.
  • I still have asthma, and it seems to be growing worse again. This may be due to autoimmune crap.
  • I still have GERD, and it is also getting worse.
  • PCOS was diagnosed post-surgery, though symptoms had been present for years.
  • Metabolic Syndrome was diagnosed post-surgery.
  • I’m assuming that osteoarthritis is considered Degenerative Joint Disease. If so, the official word is that that is getting worse.
  • Quality of life? Well, I guess it’s okay. I’m just used to going to the doctor every week (sometimes every day) these days.

Things they don’t tell you:

  1. Depression may start to get better, but if you suffer from bipolar disorder or a schizophrenia spectrum problem, then you are still going to have problems. You will still have to take meds. If you take any psychiatric medicine, chances are you will gain weight right back. Think I’m joking? Check the side effects on psychoactives.
  2. Weight can be regained without stretching or distorting the pouch. I have regained all but a few pounds, and I have the same size pouch that I am supposed to have.
  3. Vitamins are wretched after a while, and it becomes more of struggle to swallow them down. I am supposed to have chewable ones. I used to do Flintstones…they were bad after a while. Then there were Disney Princess gummies, which barely had any vitamins. Then there were Flintstone Gummies, which were horrible. Now I take like Nature Valley or something. They taste like Jello, which is great…now.
  4. Even if you take the vitamins and iron like you’re supposed to, you can still suffer from anemia, and I mean suffer.

Gastric bypass is something that should never be taken lightly, and I didn’t take mine lightly. I did my homework. For two years, I lost. I lost quickly. I went from 341.3 pounds on the day of my surgery to 250 pounds in those two years. Then I dropped down to 190 after going on a 900 calorie a day diet and being placed on Cytomel for depression. The Cytomel triggered my underactive thyroid to go hyperactive and my body started screwing up. So I was taken off that. My metabolism dropped quickly. Around that time I was started on Depakote at 500mg. It was just a short time later that I was on 3500mg. People have been known to gain weight (for some: 50 pounds) on just the starting dose of 500. Within a year, I had gained 100 pounds. I went off the Depakote, and I quit gaining. Then I had to get treatment for migraines and I was put on Depakote. I gained the rest of the weight back on just the 500 mg dose. Fun, huh?

5 comments » | General

Busy Week

18
November

This is supposed to be a busy week for me. Yesterday was my only off day. Today I had an appointment with the gynecologist. Tomorrow is pdoc. Thursday is the therapist. On Friday, I have two tickets to see Twilight.

My gynecologist was busy today, so I only got to see the nurse and the nurse practitioner. The nurse was lucky that I went in in a relatively good mood because she was extremely rude. She announced twice that I had gained 15 pounds…loudly. She then chastised me for gaining said weight and then pestered me on the cause of my visit. I kept telling her that my hormones were screwed up and THAT was the reason my periods have been gone since the summer. She kept insisting that I must be pregnant. Now, I’m no health care professional, but I do believe I have had enough of a biology lesson to know that if you don’t have sex, you don’t get pregnant. Now, I do believe in the whole exception to that rule thing, but I was not visited by angels, nor do I think that I have been inseminated in my sleep by the Spirit. So basically, I knew I wasn’t pregnant, but she would not let it go. Finally, she said, “Well, maybe he won’t make you take a pregnancy test, but I doubt it.” Grr! Oh, and she gave me a hard time about my blood pressure being so high, after she had thoroughly made me mad. The nurse practitioner spent a good deal of time with me. We talked about how I’ve had reactions to birth control pills in the past when trying to get all regulated. We also talked about how impossible it was for me to get pregnant without sex. She told me that she was fairly certain I had PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome), but she was going to run some tests to confirm. So I had to have blood drawn, and the person who did that was actually able to do it in one-stick. That was a God-send.

Tomorrow, I have my five month checkup with the psychiatrist. He’ll tell me how relatively sane I might be, or insane as the case may be. I will have to remember to take my form from UAH to get them to say that I’m a crazy girl and need assistance on tests because of my nuttiness. Fun stuff.

Thursday is my monthly visit with the therapist, though I missed the October one. When I go too long without psychiatric or psychological treatment, I get antsy. Thursday will also be my day to call my family doctor AGAIN to get them to schedule me for a visit with the neurologist to see why I have been having what my mom refers to as “seizures” since I was a little kid.

Friday, of course, is Twilight. All I have to say is that it better not suck.

1 comment » | Plans for Life, Sickness and Health, UAH

     

↑ Back to top