Okay so there are times when we can go months and months withough seeing anyone in the medical profession......and then there are times where I feel like I'm in a revolving door and pop in frequently to see the doc, pharmacist and recently therapists/resource coordinators (not medical I know but still a "professional" so it will count in this instance) The past few weeks have been one revolving door visit after another.
I've seen our family doctor twice more since I lost my mind in his office 4 weeks ago and bawled and damn near had a panic attack and begged for help. Once to get a refill of my 'blithering idiot pills' since I'd taken the remaining 6 pills that were left over from January's back spasm incident when last Tuesday I had another spasm. I spent 24hours looped out of my mind (for 20of them I was asleep) and then the next couple days in just slight pain - only taking the pills at night. Since that left me with no more pills I decided I'd go ask for a refill of them to have on hand for when - not if - but when this happens again and thankfully the doc and the student doc both agreed to my request. 15more magic beans on hand for next time. woohoo!
Yesterday I was back in his office. This time with a sick little girl, who'd been home from school for the past 2 days. "She doesn't look very sick and her throat is only slightly red and her glands are only slightly swollen but I'll take a swab and give you a prescription just in case" (since he was leaving early and wouldn't be around later). Why does he insist on playing this just-to-humor-me game everytime I drag a sick child in for a throat swab. 9 times out of 10 I'm right and it's almost always the ones that 'don't look sick' that end up with the positive swab and the resulting bottle of yellow stuff to battle the germs. I predict at least one more member of this family to test positive over the next week.....we are a sharing family that way. I appologize to anyone else we may subsequently share this with. Think of it as our way of saying we love you!
I wonder how many more visits to see him I can squeeze in before the 15th of July....which is apparently when he is no longer our doctor. To this I say "Pardon?" While reading the local newspaper last Friday.....just an hour or two after leaving his office re the blithering idiot pills, I read a notice announcing that he is leaving his practice and some new doctor will be taking over all his patients. Huh? What? Come again? I'm stunned. So now I have a new doctor that I don't even know - I'm so not comfortable with this situation....especially since things are about to get more interesting in the family medical area around here in the next little while.
Which brings me to the HOPE part of this update.
We've seen the psychologist - a result of my loosing my mind in the dr's office 4wks ago, 3 times in the last 3 weeks plus I've talked to him a couple times on the phone. Finally I feel like I have someone solidly on my side who sees the big picture and understands what's going on and can help. Help me with my state of mind and also help with dealing with some of the chaos and confussion around here. While not all strategies we brainstorm durring these sessions end up working the way we expect - every little idea helps in some way. Well almost every idea - we WILL NOT being doing any more relaxation exercises ...thankyouverymuchbutnothanks (since 4hours later I was flat on my back in pain from a spasm...relaxing - NOT!) and the girl takes things so literally and to the extreme that some suggestions just ended up snowballing - but it was a good effort and the psychologist got a good idea of how information is or is not being processed in that little ol' mind of hers.
I'm even slowly adjusting to the fact that since the funny psychologist guy rattled ThatWoman from CSS's chain, she's been more involved. She's called a couple times and is coming out to 'visit' next week (have i mentioned I don't like people in my space who may 'judge me') to do a home safety assessment as part of some Union agreement regarding respite - so even though we dont' actually have respite workers coming INTO our home we have to have this assessment done. Oh Boy.
Anyway (i got sidetracked there for a minute) back to the HOPE. Hope in the form of a prescription. The phychologist has suggested a couple times that we consider trying medication again to help with some of the issues at hand - inattention, mood swings/irritability etc. and he's mentioned trying Ritalin again. We did it once and I've often thought of trying again so I was willing to go for it. That is until yesterdays meeting. A totally different medication was brought up and to me it seems he's really put alot of thought into this because after reading about the medication and its uses it's reinforcing some ideas I've had lately --- and I think my ideas are his ideas too.
Someone mentioned to me a month or so ago that the symptoms/issues we have been experiencing seems alot along the lines of Asperger's Syndrome and the more I read the more I'm convinced that this is at least in part what we are dealing with......and although I have not mentioned this to the phychologist - the medication he is recommending is becoming known for dealing some aspects of AS - particulary irritability and aggression and impulsivity. So this really leads me to think him and I are on the same page and I'm gonna ask him straight out about it next time I talk to him.
In the mean time - he's sent a letter to our doctor....you know...the one who's leaving soon.....requesting he provide the prescription for a very low dose of Rispiradol and the subsequent monitoring of it. I'm worried about the reply. It could go either way. The doctor could agree OR he could say no. So I'm waiting and waiting to hear and trying not to get my hopes up that this will happen sooner rather than later (if he says no then we have to find another doctor willing to take this on) and I'm trying not to hope too much that this medication will actually work and more importantly work with minimal ,if any, side effects. This won't FIX things but it could potentially improve the quality of alot of lives in this house....and that is so worth HOPING for!!!
~K
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