I’m kind of excited.
I tried the CPAP machine again the other night and took it off after a few hours of it driving me bananas. I thought it was hopeless, but, I read up on people’s experiences a bit more and it seems everyone has a difficult time adapting and the best advice is to go in with a positive attiutude… So, I tried again. This time with a smile. It was still a nightmare. Mine is a body that needs to move in the night. I’m in a lot of pain when I stay in one position, so I toss and turn quite a bit. EVERY time I moved, the mask sprung a leak and I had to come awake to adjust it. It doesn’t fit the bridge of my nose, so I have a band aid and a wad of toilet paper holding in the air at the top of the mask. The band aid fell off three times and I kept getting up and getting progressively bigger, stronger ones. I felt like I woke up 100 times when my mouth dropped open and the air filled my cheeks and made them flutter like a skydiver. I woke up a few times with pains in my belly from trapped gas and air… HOWEVER, look at my Zeo graph from last night:
If you’ll recall, my graphs have a tendency to look like this one ~ the top line being “W” for “Wake”:
In the last few weeks, I finally got some abnormal tests, which shouldn’t make me happy, but it DOES. I have sleep apnea ~ I was waking up 49 times an hour! ~ I have low zinc and iron, I have no good bacteria in my gut (thank god no one put me on antibiotics; that could be pretty dangerous). There are some natural interventions that might actually make me feel much better.
This morning, my eyes are blood shot and my neck is killing me and my back is very stiff from trying not to move in the night, but I’m hopeful. I’ve also felt stronger in the last week since my big headache went away (I still have a daily headache, but it is my normal, manageable one). It’s interesting ~ I’m in the same physical pain, I’m being hit by the same ol’ exhaustion, but I’ve been able to keep up with my stretches without injury (I’m being very careful to take a hot shower or bath before stretching so my muscles are warm)… I’ve been able to eat rather than feeling too fluish to be bothered… I’ve been able to watch a movie and laugh… Each of the last 4 days I’ve taken over 2,000 steps. By comparison, when I had my headache it was more like 500 and, in the weeks before the headache, it was 1,000-1,500. I’ve been jiggling my legs again. I know that sounds weird, but I was always a jiggler while sitting or watching TV ~ my feet would be moving ceaselessly or my knee would be bobbing up and down. It always distracted my husband. I was the girl in the movie theatre that was making your seat shake from down the row. That movement totally went away with the exhaustion. I sit, bricked, like a lump of concrete, no interaction, barely able to turn my head or answer a question. Lately, I’ve noticed the jiggles return. I told my acupuncturist that I felt like a racehorse in the cage before they go down the track. Like I want to sprint but I’m caged and antsy. I know why the caged horse jiggles.
The Evil Calcium Headache
Ok, I’m back in the land of the living. I can’t describe the last week adequately. I considered going to the ER about once every ten minutes, but I knew they’d want to do a lumbar puncture and I knew I wouldn’t let them (because of aforementioned LP that didn’t heal properly), so I stayed put in bed. Head pain, I think, is the most debilitating pain there is. It takes away all your senses. You can’t open your eyes to light, you can’t move your eyes up and down because it hurts too much, you can’t stand noise, you can’t chew, you can’t stand people touching you or talking to you… you can’t even be upright. At least with most of my back pain I can watch TV. The other day, I was talking to my husband on the phone, telling him how bad the pain was on the right side of my head. As we spoke, I felt it zig zag over to the left. It was bizarre. It was like I could feel a little pain worm traveling through my brain to the other side. I had just said, Thank god half my head is out of pain~ it makes it more bearable. As I finished the sentence, the pain had completely switched sides. That night, the pain radiated down into the right side of my jaw for about an hour. Yesterday, it was pretty much gone except a residual cramping. Every time I tensed something ~ coughed or pushed my pee out too quickly ~ the right side of my head would light up. It was like somebody blowing on embers. It would erupt into fire briefly and then go back to smoldering again.
Now, here’s the kicker. I realise it makes sense to say it’s another unexplainable symptom of ME or it’s because I came off the pill or it was just a ridiculously bad migraine, but I’m pretty sure it was from my calcium supplement. That was the only thing that changed. I started taking powdered calcium citrate in OJ, thinking I was being so responsible. My husband was googling help for me and saw that too much calcium and too little magnesium can cause headaches. Then I found this site. If you don’t want to read all the comments like I did, I’ll sum it up: one person after another saying their calcium supplement caused terrible headaches. Many of them saying they got the worst headache of their lives and that it was all on one side. Mine was invading my entire head for many of the days, but it was certainly only the right side the last two days. YOU FOUND THE CAUSE! I whispered to my husband, but my eyes said block capitals like that: YOU SAVED ME! The pain started to ease up a day after I stopped the calcium and it was gone two days later. Be warned, everyone! Especially if you have one of these sensitive systems (a blessing and a curse).
Now my dilemma is how to keep my bones strong since I have osteopenia, don’t eat dairy, don’t do weight-bearing exercise, I’m petite and had hyperthyroidism for years (the latter two my doc said contributed to osteopenia in the first place. The dairy and exercise, obviously, are omitted because of ME). Honestly, though, I’m not touching a calcium supplement for a while. I’d rather live in the now without a headache.
I’m grateful I don’t have a headache!!!!!!
Worst headache of my life… and I don’t say that lightly.
I had a lumbar puncture years ago that didn’t heal properly. That was the worst headache of my life until this week. I can’t explain the pain of the last 5 days. If I had a job, I couldn’t go to it. If I had a child, I couldn’t tend to him/her. Hours upon hours upon hours lying down with a cold cloth over my eyes. Hours of weighing the odds of taking painkillers and the potential for bounce-back headaches and lower pain threshold or just powering through. I haven’t been able to power through at night. The pain has woken me up every night this week. I’ll be drenched in sweat and panting, my head being crushed on one side, my eye coming out of its socket. I’m scared, not gonna lie. It feels like the MRI should have shown a vice around my brain and an icepick through my temple and some dead soft space at the base of my skull and a huge pool of concrete where my forehead should be and one eye twice as big as the other. It still hurts now, so this is just an update and then I’m going back to bed.
To those of you that have called, texted, sent letters, sent presents (yes! Can you believe how lucky I’ve got it?), thank you!!! Your thoughtfulness and words of encouragement mean so much more than anyone can fathom. I truly don’t think I’d be strong enough to do this if not for you all. When this headache goes away, I’ll try to get back in contact with the world.
Buffers can help, but sometimes not enough…
My brain MRI was fine. No evidence of MS, no sign of something causing my headaches. My c-spine MRI showed that I have mild intervertebral disk space narrowing and mild central disc osteophyte complex, centered at C4. I won’t go into the history of my neck problems, but if this is “mild” I feel very, very sorry for anyone with moderate or severe problems. When my neck has “gone out”, the pain is 10 out of 10. It is like nothing I’ve felt before. Can’t lie down, sit down, move arms, head, back… I’ve showed up at the doctor’s office twice at 7:30am, without an appointment, crying and begging for help. Both times they gave me injections in my butt that knocked me out for almost two days. I guess, if the bone problem is mild, the muscle problem can still be severe. My physical therapist said I had the worst case of hypermobility in my neck that she had ever encountered. It must have been from all my head banging, rock ‘n’ roll days and all the extreme sports I played. That’s sarcasm. I didn’t do anything!
My neck first went out a week after a particularly bone-rattling roller coaster called The Iron Wolf. It was a stand-up roller coaster and they had head buffers on both sides to minimize injury as you were being tossed around. I was too short for them to buff properly, though, and my head and neck took a battering. My brain felt blended. One week later, I tried to get out of bed and couldn’t. The neck pain was excruciating, radiating down my limbs. I was so unfamiliar with bone/muscle pain, that I thought I was going to be paralyzed. I thought my spine was fractured or something. I lay there for hours with tears running into my ears, waiting for my husband to get home. That one healed on its own since I had no health insurance at the time, but I’ve had problems ever since. I guess I did go into the history of my neck problems, after all!
Anyway, back to the present: I added back in rice to my diet with no adverse effects. Unless this exhaustion and pain are caused by the rice?? Haha. Just kidding. I’ve added flax to my smoothies and started taking the zinc and ferrous gluconate supplements. The latter is meant to be taken 1 hour after food and 2 hours before food and, let me tell you, it is VERY HARD for me not to eat for 3 hours, so I’m cheating a bit on that one.
I stopped taking the birth control pill yesterday. My headache is all day, every day and is crippling me. I’ve spent a lot of time lying down in dark rooms in the last 3 weeks, my face is permanently pinched, I can’t deal with too much light or noise. I am constantly alternating epsom salt baths, ice packs, arnica, IcyHot spray, TENS unit, meditation, breathing exercises, anything I can think of to ease up my neck and back muscles and hopefully help the headache. After much research on my headache support group forum, I’ve convinced myself that it is caused by the pill, so I am going go stop taking it for a month and see what happens. I also want to quit the pill because I’m extremely sedentary and that contributes to the risk of blood clots (and being over 35 years of age). I actually think I would prefer any other pain to this headache (except for maybe the aforementioned 10-out-of-10 neck pain… and, when my period hits, I’m sure I’ll amend that statement).
I woke up full of gratitude this morning. There are people out there dealing with this and other illnesses with little to no support, starting their journey with so much less than I have. My heart breaks for them. Without my income, I am terrified of losing our house, our savings, our health insurance, but I could have started this illness with no house, no savings and no health insurance. What do people do? I am blessed and grateful to have a slight buffer. Like The Iron Wolf’s buffers, it may not be enough to save me down the road, but, for now, I can ride the roller coaster.
Diet… Day 51. Wash-Out… Day 12.
Last night I drempt that I had been out socialising with friends and I started to crash. I couldn’t get back home, so I was trying to get my husband to find me a hotel room… I had to lie down… I was going to collapse… please help me, it’s dark and wet and where is everyone?… I just need a bed for a few hours… I don’t want to die… And then rats attacked me. They were fat and wet and squeaking and hanging off of me everywhere… I woke up panting while I was being eaten by the rats. I was scared shitless and didn’t know where I was and my sheets were wet from sweat.
I have, however, been feeling a little stronger the last few days. Not strong, but stronger. My headache has eased up enough to be manageable with epsom salt baths, the tens unit and icy hot spray on my neck. The pain and stiffness in my back doesn’t have me in tears and the exhaustion seems to be controlled. Just a normal ME/CFS exhaustion, not a crippling, slurring, crawling-up-the-stairs exhaustion. I have a new symptom driving me batty: constant pins and needles in my right foot for the last 3 days. It moved into my calf last night, but doesn’t seem to be there today. I have had this before in my hands and I have the Raynaud’s issues in my feet, but I can’t remember this maddening constant tingling before.
My days have become very predictable. I am up at around 8:30am, after about 7 to 7.5 hours sleep. I have GREEN tea now and, for breakfast, homemade granola with almond milk and a smoothie (today was pear, pineapple, strawberry smoothie with flax seed, coconut milk and walnuts) while I do some “work” on the computer (pay bills and curse Comcast and Verizon, see how our budget is going, answer emails, apply for disability but get overwhelmed and stop, try to make an Amazon Fresh shopping list because I can’t go grocery shopping and decide it’s too much energy and too expensive, research ME treatments and start to bang my head off the wall, research MRI stories and wish I had the option of Valium, write in my blog etc.). Then I warm up my muscles with a bath or the hot tub, do some stretches and then a meditation, which I always try to turn into a nap. Then lunch (usually a salad or soup or tuna and I’m currently addicted to Terra Chips) and maybe some house chores if I’m able. Maybe some reading or some more computer time. Another meditation (rest before and after activity, always. Resting is considered only lying down with eyes closed, awake, meditating or sleeping, says Dr. Bested). Walk around the house, if I’m able and then the evening with my husband, having dinner (whatever is leftover or whatever he makes because I’m virtually never able to stand for long in the evening without hitting that pain and exhaustion wall), watching a movie ~ whatever I can manage. Another meditation if I’m not going to bed early. Most of the time I’m in bed at 7 or 8pm, reading/researching. Some of the time I can stay upright until 9 or 10pm. I usually don’t turn off the lights until after 11pm.
My sister-in-law sent me a Stretching for Beginners DVD and usually anything anyone buys for me is too advanced because I’m more decrepit than they realised, but this DVD is good! I have done the sitting, standing and lying stretches ~ one on each day that I’m up for it. So far, it has felt good and I’m so proud of me. And I’m ecstatic that I haven’t pulled a muscle doing it. Maybe I’m finally learning. I walked five laps around my house yesterday. I’ve been wearing a pedometer this week and have taken between 1,700 and 2,200 steps each day. I realise this is not a lot — my dog park visits alone were over 2,000 steps — but, those numbers are including 400 to 500 steps walking laps around my house. There are many, many days when I’m not able to do that and my pedometer would say more like 1,000 steps at the end of the day, so I’m happy. I want so desperately to double, triple those steps. I want to go outside and run as hard as I can for as long as I can. On top of everything else I have had to endure, the patience needed to deal with this disease is mind-blowing. Every time I have to go upstairs or downstairs, I think, “What can I take with me?” so I don’t waste any trip. Every movement is about conservation, every day is planned, every physical feeling analysed to ascertain whether it was caused by too much of some activity or emotion. Damn, I shouldn’t have done laundry… I knew I shouldn’t have chopped those vegetables… If only I hadn’t lost my temper… From now on, I must sit down when I dry my hair…
My mood is much better, which is probably why I’m feeling stronger and my symptoms seem a bit more manageable. I think my Mother and brother being here helped give me strength. Plus, I got to Skype with both of my best friends in the last week and that is like a pain killer. Literally ~ people can be pain killers. It’s amazing.
Something else helped nudge me from defeat into fight-mode: I read that there are multiple studies putting the average age of death of ME/CFS patients in the late 50s. That’s about 30 years too early. On the one hand, I’m very grateful that I might have 20 more years to live and, on the other hand, I’m devastated that I might only have 20 more years to live. I’m not emotional over it. It just caused me to think, Alright, time to get over this now because I’m not going to die in my 50s, dammit. Obviously, I’m not just going to “get over it”, but it made the fight come out a little. I can’t just accept that this is permanent because I don’t want to be one of those statistics. So, time to heal. Seriously.
My back is killing me, I have to stop typing now. So, a moment of gratitude: I am grateful every single day that I am not worse off. I am grateful for walking and talking and typing. I am grateful for eating and drinking and showering myself. I am grateful I was never in a motor vehicle accident, never got fungal meningitis from a steroid injection, never got shot or stabbed or beaten up. Some people are much more… oh, ever so much more… oh, muchly much-much more unlucky than you!
It’s a troublesome world. All the people who’re in it
are troubled with troubles almost every minute.
You ought to be thankful, a whole heaping lot,
for the places and people you’re lucky you’re not!
Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart 