Hi everyone, wow the club has been busy lately! I'll try to briefly respond to everyone.
lsgs, cycling used to be nice on my hip joints too, even during the winter when my joint pain was pretty bad otherwise. But I think now that the bowels are acting up, the rules have changed. My fitness ability is going down the tubes lately! I did about 30 mins of yard work outside yesterday, and it wasn't particularly hot (we were in a nasty heat wave last week but it's cooled down so it's pleasant again). Even so, I was exhausted and sweaty after only a relatively small amount of yard work. I can still lift weights, but my cardio ability is diminishing and my stamina/energy levels are going down too. It's very odd.
Bluebird, how are you lately? How are the driving classes going? Have you gotten your air conditioner fixed yet? Your ex-friend and mine should become friends together... or maybe not, maybe people like that shouldn't encourage each other!
Wow, I can't believe your ex-friend faked having cancer, that's horrible! My ex-friend claimed she had a heart attack at age 25 (before I met her). She told me it was because she was so fat at the time. But I saw older pictures of her, she was a little chubby but was never obese so I think her heart attack story is fake too. My hubby and her hubby are still friends, so my hubby sees her every so often, and he tells me she's on her way to getting really fat now. She was skinny when we were friends, but now hubby says she's been gaining a lot of weight lately. Time for another fake heart attack from her soon I'm guessing?
Perfectly.Frank, I have sometimes wondered if my house is a contributing factor in my illness too. My house was built in the 1950s and has some mold issues too. We bought the house in Nov 2008, and in Oct 2009 I got sick - so we had only been there 11 months when I first became ill. I'm not sure if that's coincidence or not. My hubby came down with suspicious symptoms similar to mine about 2 years after we bought the house - at first we were afraid that his vomiting & abdo pains were IBD as well, and if so we both suspected the house must be making us sick. Fortunately his illness turned out to be kidney stones (apparently kidney pain can sometimes manifest as abdominal pain) and he's fine now, so I really don't know if our house is involved in my illnesses or not.
As for night sweats, I only seem to get them in a bad flare - and I haven't had them at all in this current flare (or whatever it is! My symptoms are all different this time around!). Even in a terrible flare, I'd only get night sweats for maybe a week tops and then they'd go away. But they were really awful while they were happening, I would be absolutely soaked head to toe. The first time it happened, I thought I must have peed the bed, but I was so soaked and all over my whole body, I realized I couldn't produce that much urine, let alone distribute it so evenly in my sleep!
I feel for you, it's not pleasant. The only trick I've found that helps is to sleep on a towel to soak up a lot of it without soaking the sheets too much. Oh, and if I anticipated night sweats, I would keep spare pajamas next to the bed so I could change in the middle of the night without turning on the lights and waking hubby. I never found a way to actually prevent or stop them though.
Bozzy, that's awful about your mom not visiting you and being basically horrible to you. Your husband sounds like a great guy though and I'm glad he stood up for you. And you sound like a great mom to your daughter, keeping her away from bad influences even if it is your own mother. I'm sorry you have to go through this, but I hope it's helping you stay less stressed through your recovery from the surgery. I must say, I giggled at Bluebird's idea to put all the bad mothers on an island and make a reality show of it. They'd probably like all the attention a reality show brings though so it wouldn't help make them better people!
Oh, Bluebird, you mentioned some lactose-free cheese. Can you do goat cheese? I am lactose intolerant and can't do cow's dairy, but I can do goat cheese without any problem. It's really yummy too! I've tried various "cheese substitutes" like soy cheese, rice cheese, etc. None of them taste very good and they don't melt properly on a pizza, etc. But goat cheese tastes and melts like real cheese does, and it never bothers my tummy. If you haven't tried it yet, look for goat cheese. I'm not sure what chain stores are near you, but I believe Whole Foods carries goat mozzarella & cheddar. Trader Joe's carries this amazing goat gouda which smells strong but tastes mild, it's delicious! Now I'm drooling thinking about cheese, ha ha!
Jazi, did the doctor say why they wanted you to take stool softeners? I know that in some cases, a person can have diarrhea and constipation at the same time, so maybe that's what they're thinking? My understanding is, a hard mass of poo will form, and then diarrhea will like flow around it. If you can clear the hard mass with laxatives, you'll feel better and should have firmer stools because it can harden instead of having to be liquid to get around the mass. (I hope that made sense!) That's the only situation I'm aware of where it's logical to take stool softeners while having diarrhea though, so I would make sure that's what your doctor is thinking.
As for the job stuff, have you applied for Family Medical Leave (FMLA)? You don't need a diagnosis to be approved for it. It is basically a job protection act, it says that you can't be fired for taking off more days than the average person due to having an ongoing medical condition. I think you are allowed up to 90 days off per year with FMLA and your job is protected. I know I couldn't do without FMLA! If there's an HR department at your work, check with them and they should be able to give you the paperwork to fill out.
Oh, and Perfectly.Frank, yes, when an American says "pissed", it means angry, not drunk.
We don't really use that term to mean drunk here in the US.
Ronai, are you able to get a second opinion from another doctor? It sounds like your mother is not very understanding either (me, Bozzy and Bluebird can all empathize with you on that!). I would explain to her that bloodwork is not definitive and is not always the most accurate. Also, what one doctor says is "normal" may be on the very low end of normal or another doctor may say it's abnormal - I would ask for the results on paper so that you can see and do some investigating on what exactly your levels were.
Have you seen a rheumatologist about the joint pain? It could just be pain from the flare - or it could be the start of arthritis. In my personal experience, the earlier you catch arthritis, the easier it is to treat. I went to my GP right away when I started having recurrent hip pains, and he diagnosed mild arthritis and sent me to physical therapy. Because of PT, I had a nice period of a couple of years with pretty much zero joint pain!
You mentioned migraines too - did you get migraines at all before the digestive issues started? I never got migraines - then I got sick with this bowel illness just before I turned 30, and suddenly I was getting migraines all the time. My doctor prescribed 25 mg of Amitriptyline and that prevents most of my migraines - now I seem to only get them once or twice per year, which is wonderful compared to what it was like before. Amitriptyline is an antidepressant in higher doses (100 to 200 mg), but in low doses (10 to 25 mg) it works as a migraine preventative, and it also can "calm" the bowels in some people (not me unfortunately) and can help some people with chronic pain as well. You may want to ask your doctor about trying it.
Did I miss anyone? How's everyone doing today? I had my MRI on my hips this morning. I don't have a follow-up scheduled with the rheumy but I'm hoping he can give me the results over the phone or through email soon. I think the MRI went well - the nurse was an hour late so I had to wait quite awhile to actually have the test, and I did have one moment of claustrophobic panic when they first put me into the machine, but other than that everything went well. I had an MRI of my liver a few years ago, and I had an adverse reaction to the injected contrast at that MRI. This time, I had no bad reaction to the contrast fortunately.
So all in all it went well, now I just get to wait for the results. I'm hoping to have them back before my next GI appointment, which is Aug 7th.
I wonder if anyone has studied the connection between music and MRI/claustrophobia. When they first put me into the machine, it felt like I just kept going in forever - it felt like the way out was too far away and the space was too small and I just wanted to get OUT! But I told myself, I have done this before, I can do it again. I had no issues whatsoever with claustrophobia during my first MRI, so it seems strange to me that I did have an issue with it this time around. But as soon as my music came on, I started to feel much better. I fortunately had the good sense to make a mix CD with mostly calm music on it. The first song was "Take 5" by Utada and it made a world of difference - it's a Japanese song, so I don't understand it but I've read a translation of the lyrics, and it's got a lot of calm imagery, like lying on your back and looking up at the clouds. And that song just made me feel so much better! Calm down Cat, breathe, take 5. You're lying on your back and looking up at the clouds. Take 5. I shudder to think what my mental state would have been if I had put something peppier as the first song on the CD. Would I have panicked more? I really don't know, but the music helped me a lot. I wonder if that's why they let people listen to music - at my previous MRI, I figured it was just to drown out the noises that the machine makes, but this MRI experience has given me more to think about.
